30 reasons why Ubuntu is here to stay
“The first release of Ubuntu Linux (version 4.10) occurred on 2004/10/20, and life hasn’t been the same since. Unless you’ve been living under a rock in Antarctica, then surely you’ve heard of Ubuntu…”
- DistroWatch.com
I’ve been using Ubuntu since version 5.04, in 2006. Since then it has only gotten better. Here is why I think Ubuntu excels in many points.
Edit: Due to popular demand: Yes you can translate, re-post and even edit this article. Credits are welcome.
1 – Free (and pretty good)
2 – It’s HUGE
Its clearly the most used linux distro. According to Wikipedia, Ubuntu passed 100 million users in April 2009 and many vendors started selling computers with Ubuntu pre-installed:
A number of vendors offer computers with Ubuntu pre-installed, including Dell, Tesco, OP3, Gliese IT, System76, and the South African company Bravium Computers.
- Wikipedia
3 – Many resources
It is very easy to find help for Ubuntu. A quick search in Amazon listed 800+ books about Ubuntu. There’s an official wiki with loads of FAQs, guides and manuals all organized in a practical and reachable way. If that still haven’t solved your issues there is the “unofficial” forum with over 7.5 million posts.
4 – Stable
Blue screen of death? Memory dump ? Frozen screen? Unacceptable memory leaks? Need to reboot it once in a while? Ubuntu has nothing to do with that son. I’ve seen reports of up-times as far as 2 years and the system kept smooth.
5 – Secure
Open source is more secure than closed source applications for many reasons. More people can detect and fix bugs on open-source software than in closed-source. Even the Whitehouse and the US Departament of Defense have realized that. Also Linux protects system critical resources without annoying the user.
6 – Commercial support
Ubuntu was born with enterprise mentality and thus is has very good commercial support around the world. Be it for desktop or servers, you can get it at Caonical’s paid support and from its partners.
7 – Faster
Doesn’t need to be reinstalled every now and then to keep running smooth since there is no registry. There’s no DLL hell and no viruses. It also uses less hardware resources.
Ironically like I said bellow on the Wine topic, some Windows games ran faster on Ubuntu for me. You can see a very good benchmark between Ubuntu and Windows on tuxradar.com’s article.
8 – Disk space
Ubuntu vs Windows comparing disk space usage. Altough Ubuntu uses way less disk space, it has more hardware support and comes with Office installed. Image source: tuxradar.com.
9 – No registry
With Ubuntu you don’t get that geek registry which is a big exposure of the system, a mess of system and user software configurations mixed forming a SPOF.
10 – Office for $679.95 Free!
It comes with the free OpenOffice suite which can also open and save in Microsoft Office format.
Edit: As noted by Shady, OpenOffice is not yet a full alternative to Microsoft Office. Although OpenOffice has 80% of the most important functionalities that any office suite, it can be very frustrating if you need anything from those 20% of advanced functionalities. I hope it catches up with but only time will tell.
11 – Battery efficient
Ubuntu can be very energy efficient if properly configured.
12 – Philosophy
Ubuntu makers follow a very humanistic philosophy which serves as a guideline for them to don’t be evil:
1. Every computer user should have the freedom to download, run, copy, distribute, study, share, change and improve their software for any purpose, without paying licensing fees.
2. Every computer user should be able to use their software in the language of their choice.
3. Every computer user should be given every opportunity to use software, even if they work under a disability.
13 – Great repository
As a child of Debian, Ubuntu inherited a very special power: it’s package system. APT works seamlessly with the whole system to keep it updated and offer a vast list of software to be installed.
With the addition of Synaptic things got even easier. And now the final blow: Ubuntu app store which is a hub for commercial and free software on Ubuntu. Enabling users to install apps with the click of a mouse, be it paid or free.
14 – Just works
Ubuntu offer better hardware support than Windows and MacOS and uses less resources to run. Add the fact that it can boot without installing and comes with a free Office suite and you’ll see that in most of the cases it Just Works.
15 – Easy and fast installation
Ubuntu installs faster with less clicks. It recognizes and respects other operating systems and try to keep them working side by side. Ubuntu 9.10 even prompts users to import user data and settings from other operating systems that where detected during install.
16 – Enterprise
Canonical takes Enterprise very seriously if you think at what it has been doing with Ubuntu. First hey created various editions of Ubuntu to attend to various endpoints of an Enterprise project such as Desktop, Server, Cloud and EC2.
17 – Cloud
Canonical offers Ubuntu for cloud computing that works both in-house and on Amazon EC2. Add that to the Desktop and Server versions of Ubuntu can you can build a complex but still homogeneous infrastructure that fit variable needs, all composed of the same type of brick – Ubuntu – which reduces TCO and simplifies IT allot.
18 – Virtualization
Ubuntu Server Edition offers a great variety of virtualization technologies, whether it is used as a host or a guest operating system. From free to non-free solutions, Ubuntu offers choices to match every need. We acknowledge that not any single tool offers all the options to fit all needs and while we are strongly committed with KVM as our maintained open source option, VMware and Parallels’ OpenVz offer choices for use cases that KVM does not account for in the server space.
19 – Ext4 – Modern file system
Ext4 adds some features on top of Ext3 while keeping backwards compatibility and speeding things up a little. According to kernelnewbies.orgExt4 increased filesystem size from 16TB to incredible 1 EB maximum. Ext4 also support larger files, now limited to 16 TB instead of 2 TB from Ext3.
While there is still some skepticism around Ext4 it now seems stable and reliable. It was available to the average joe since Ubuntu 9.04 but wasn’t the default option a that time.
20 – Wine: run windows applications with
Wine can run Windows programs and games without the impact on performance that virtualization has. In fact CounterStrike 1.6 and Warcraft 3 runs faster on Ubuntu with Wine than on WIndowsXP on my computer. It’s amazing to get 100fps on those games with a crappy PC. It runs smooth!
I remember the other day when I was playing Warcraft 3 against some friends online when all their games crashed but mine. What they had in common? They where all running windows, I wasn’t (no I was not the server).
21 – Learn once for all
Ubuntu 4.10 at 2005
Ubuntu 9.10: nothing much has changed since Ubuntu 4.10. It just got polished.
Ubuntu doesn’t change its interface very often. It just refines them. So that users can get nice design without having to relearn where things are.
You can see by the pictures above that Ubuntu haven’t changed much in the last 5 years, it has only been polished. Those two and other pictures can be seen in this nice softpedia’s article about the evolution of Ubuntu desktop interface.
22 – New releases add features, not bloat
Windows is well known for its bloatware, tons of useless stuff added update after update, release after release.
23 – Try without installing
Since its beginnings Ubuntu can run from a CD or other sources like USB pendrive without installing it and without any change to the PC. Today Linux distros that doesn’t offer this feature feels outdated.
This is a very valuable feature. Despite being able to use Ubuntu without installing, it enables one to use public computers with security or to execute recovery procedures to computers without altering their hard disk.
24 – Open source
Open source is often associated to free software. Well, although that’s often the case, it’s not a rule. There are paid open-source software. But is really the price the main advantage of open-source? Most experts say there’s much more into than just licensing costs.
25 – Predictable releases
26 – Hardware compatibility
One of the main strengths of Ubuntu is that it is considered one of the most hardware compatible Linux distribution. It is well known that Linux today has more hardware compatibility than Windows or Mac.
Some might argue that Windows 7 will recover its 1st place on the rank but recent events say the opposite. The first driver for USB3.0 was released by Intel to the Linux kernel.
27 – Server
There is the Server edition of Ubuntu. Which is great because you can setup an IT infrastructure consisting of servers and desktops of the same base: Ubuntu.
28 – Canonical factor
Canonical is not just another Linux fanboy. Its rich founder, Mark Shuttleworth, decided to take Linux to the next level of usability and made it accessible for all. From Desktop to the Cloud, Canonical filled the gaps and is investing heavy on making software cheap and accessible for normal users while not forgetting stability and TCO for the Enterprise.
29 – Fancy
Ubuntu desktop can get really cool if you enable Compiz Fusion graphics effects. They also enhance usability. Look at this demo (which is outdated, new effects had been added since then):
30 – Ubuntu One: 2GB of online space for free
Since Ubuntu 9.04 users can sign for a free 2GB space to store their files, notes, and contacts online. All integrated into the operational system. Note that to use it in 9.04 you need to install it, but from 9.10 on it comes pre-installed.
That’s it!
That is my toughs about Ubuntu and why it is here to stay.
Can you think of other good things about Ubuntu?
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[...] It comes with the free OpenOffice suite which can also open and save in Microsoft Office format. Full Story [...]
I’m an Ubuntu user for a year now. I love it, recommend it to family and friends, and totally embrace its philosophy in my IT work as well. I have a problem though which I came across in your nice article here: OpenOffice.
First of all, OpenOffice is not a MS Office alternative. It is far from that. It causes a lot of frustration and disappointment when you promise an alternative to a powerful office suite only for new users to find out the bitter truth. OpenOffice is trying but it’s not there yet. I still use my MS Office under CrossOver for the lack of a decent alternative.
Second, I do not think OpenOffice should be promoted as an Ubuntu “feature”. It’s simply a pre-installed software that’s not maintained by Canonical. The same way that Firefox is not a “feature” of Ubuntu.
Nice, I love ubuntu too, it was my daughter’s first OS. I recommend it to anyone new to computers and it’s a must for expert users. I have my copy on VMWare Fusion and it works awesome even in virtualization. Great to re-purpose old PC’s.
[...] Originally posted here: 30 reasons why Ubuntu is here to stay « ZenBuntu.com [...]
Just Works -> latetly thats not true at all, it has been just a run to get the latest version out, skipping important bugs.
Ubuntu is flexible:
I can make it feel and look like anyting I want: xp, os ox. It’s dead felxible
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Ubuntu Rocks. I am using Ubuntu since last two years and it took only 2 weeks to switch over to Linux Completely..
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Superb article……..nice graphs and nice pictures…..You done a fabulous job…Keep it up
100% agree!! Nice work! The reasons might be informative and/or crucial for new-comers.
However there’re some debatable/arguable point, so you should be prepared to have some *tricky* comments
but not this one!
Waiting for new post!!
Good luck!!
100% agree!! Nice article!! The reasons are informative and might be crucial for the new-comers!!
However there’re some debatable/arguabale points, so you should be prepared for some *tricky* comments, but not this one
Waiting for new posts!!
Good luck!
so much for the nice things to say, ive been having this grey background for my pidgin tray icon for some time now, and it really looks stupid up there on my transparent panel.no fix yet, 3 weeks already. wrong comment on the wrong post? whatever!
Very Nice , Thanks
“Second, I do not think OpenOffice should be promoted as an Ubuntu “feature”. It’s simply a pre-installed software that’s not maintained by Canonical.”
Shady, that is true of all of Ubuntu as well as most Linux distros.
As to your gripes about OOo, it is not necessary for an alternative to replicate all of MS Office’s abilities. Some of those abilities come with bloat or security issues.
Otherwise, some of the reasons listed here are about Linux generally.
Proprietary closed source drivers that Ubuntu uses is against the whole philosophy of FLOSS (Free-libre open source software). If you remove pressure from vendors to open their drivers, you promote closed source software, and allow Microsoft to influence vendors to ensure that the linux version doesn’t work as well or have as many features.
This is against the whole idea of free (as in beer) and free (as in speech, ie ‘libre’) software.
Ubuntu built heavily on the backs of debian, and a large number of its packages come right from the debian repositories.
Anything you can run in Ubuntu you can run in Debian, and there’s no corporation behind Debian, it’s a community effort. Debian’s installer was lacking, but is way better now and sometimes installs on things Ubuntu has trouble with.
Great post.
That’s really freakly amazing!(Y)
Really nice post. I have to add one more reason: Ubuntu is the first distro that *really* put the usability as a priority.
@shady and Fr33d0m: I agree that OpenOffice it’s not a perfect alternative to MS Office, and this happens with many other programs. I wrote about it some time ago: http://www.nongeekperspective.com/2007/06/5-tips-for-linux-promotion.html
mmmmmmmmm
some reasons are good, others less….
hardware support not is complete
wine not work, is ever a sperimental software with different problems
ext4 have different problems up-todate: data loss or very slowly………
First of all, thank you all for the support and critics.
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@Shady: “…OpenOffice is not a MS Office alternative…”
Shady, I totally agree with you! Ubuntu is great but OpenOffice is just not one of its merits. I think OpenOffice should be considered an evolving tool that currently solves the most common needs. I edited that part of the post. Thank you.
———————
@tomitzel: “…it has been just a run to get the latest version out, skipping important bugs…”
Well, tomitzel, While I agree with you that it surely has bugs you must bear with me that it is well known that software is never finished at all. You just have to release it when you think it is stable enough for the majority of the users or you risk never releasing it.
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@Francis Alp: “Ubuntu is flexible…”
Yea I forgot that! I’ll edit the post to add that 31th reason ASAP! Thanks!
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@ibubesi, LOOOL ;p
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@math: “…If you remove pressure from vendors to open their drivers, you promote closed source software, and allow Microsoft to influence vendors to ensure that the linux version doesn’t work as well or have as many features…”
While I agree with you this, we will never be able to presure the industry sufficiently if Linux isn’t installed on a large number of computers. And for that to happen linux needs to work well and that incurs on it having to “temporarily” tolerate closed source drivers and software. This is a very hot debate that I’m not educated enough to discuss about, sorry. Thanks for your important notice.
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@math: “…Ubuntu built heavily on the backs of debian…”
Yes, I like to think that Ubuntu is Debian for human beings. Debian is a great distro and Canonical made it accessible to the masses by applying a different philosophy to it.
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@nongeek: “…Ubuntu is the first distro that *really* put the usability as a priority…”
Although this is as clear as water, I’ll research about that and probably it will be the 32th reason on this post. Thanks! I’ll read your post.
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@carcass: “hardware support not is complete”
Hardware support isn’t complete on Ubuntu and will never be in any other OS. For what I’ve been reading Windows 7 lags well behind Ubuntu 9.10 when it comes for hardware compatibility. I’m sure this will change soon because of Microsoft’s larger user base and because the industry concern. But, some old truths are changing and while I write this post Ubuntu 9.10 has more hardware support than Windows 7.
———————
@carcass: “ext4 have different problems up-todate: data loss or very slowly”
That was true but isn’t anymore. Ext4 had serious bugs but they where promptly fixed.
While some people still refuse to use Ext4 because of misinformation spread on the web, do you think Ubuntu 9.10 would be delivered with Ext4 ON by default to millions of users if they weren’t sure it is stable enough? That would be suicide for Canonical.
Be careful with the publication date of the content you read. ;p
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[...] 30 reasons why Ubuntu is here to stay « ZenBuntu.com Good "yes it does" guide for naysayers and skeptics of Ubuntu. (tags: ubuntu linux) [...]
Why for number 24 did you choose the purposely vague term “Open Source” when you really did mean Free Software, and then confuse the issue further by not realizing that Free Software about more than price, it’s about Freedom. The Ubuntu devs, motu’s, and most of the community know this. There is even a “Free Software Only” install. As a registered Ubuntu user and member of the FREE SOFTWARE community I am disappointed in the lackadaisical manner in which this article was written. For those who don’t know the difference between Open Source and Free Software please see http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html and for those who want to keep Free Software alive and well please donate to the Free Software Foundation at FSF.org
@threethirty: “…Why for number 24 did you choose the purposely vague term “Open Source” when you really did mean Free Software…”
First of all, thank you very much for taking your time to comment on this humble blog. I, just as you, am very concerned on not spreading confusion and misinformation on the net.
About meaning Free Software when I wrote Open-Source. I don’t think I meant Free. I wanted to note the advantages that open-source software bring us without touching the hot debate of software freedom. In fact I even wrote there’s much more into open-source than just TCO and Freedom.
I’m conscious enough to know that I’m in no way competent to write on that matter. But as a software developer that I am, I know other good points about open-source software and that is what I, and the linked articles, refer to, such as reliability, auditability, ample support, vendor lock-in, etc, etc… That’s what I meant when I said there’s more into open-source than just the price.
About the post seeming a bit “lackadaisical” which the dictionary explained to me could mean “without interest, vigor, or determination; listless;”. I apologize if the information seems a bit vague but this isn’t meant to be a technical and profound text. This way I can reach more people just like Ubuntu does with software.
Again, my sincere thanks for your attention. I didn’t meant to damage the Ubuntu community in any way.
Man, currently, i stay having problem with the “death screen”, the memory usage in windows (after XP) works well, but, is far from Linux.
The popularity of Wi-Fi networks reopens the door to people interested in security, simple and clean usage of social networks, without warry with virus, trojans and all.
Nice post, i will keep looking for more tips and how-to.
“wine not work, is ever a sperimental software with different problems”
Hi is not easy, but do what is necessary in Linux (Office e some another programs)
See ya
Yeah… Ubuntu is great
I love Ubuntu…
One of the reasons I felt is… ” I can learn a lot using Ubuntu ”
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I just updated all my Ubuntu machines (2) and servers (4 2 are virtual) all went well.
Way quicker than windoz. I use dual boot so you can really compare the speed.
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“Blue screen of death? Memory dump ? Frozen screen? Unacceptable memory leaks? Need to reboot it once in a while? Ubuntu has nothing to do with that son.”
Come on! I’ve switched from Debian to Ubuntu as Badger (5.10) has been released and used it until the Jaunty disaster with KDE 4.stillUnusable.2 was released. Indeed Linux has no bluescreen of death because it dies quietly and you have the “irresponsive Desktop of WTF?!” and blinking keyboard LEDs signaling the common nerd “kernel panic”. Especially Jaunty and Intrepid were very unstable releases and crashed with the Linux version of BSOD: The classic blank black screen or blinking keyboard LEDs.
“I’ve seen reports of up-times as far as 2 years and the system kept smooth.” Also Win2k has no problems to run a print server for two years without any reboot.
This is just another Linux fanboi article.
Alexander I’ve been using Ubuntu for 2 years now and since then it crashed only once. Speak for yourself.
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What’s with the fanboi articles? This is just another in a long series of steaming piles of lies about Ubuntu being gods gift to n00bs.
Unfortunately I had quite bad experience when installing Ubuntu 9.10 on my older Dell desktop. Install went great, but for some reason Ubuntu didn’t talk to NetBios and did not recognized any other machines on network by name, only by ip (that is a problem when using DHCP). BTW smb did recognized the machines by name.
Also there is not menu item/setting for such a simple task like adding a network printer.
These might be some of the reasons why Ubuntu will not make it with general population.
After a day of research and mostly failures I decided to ditch Ubuntu and install Windows XP, sad.
I still do run Ubuntu 9.10 as VMWare appliance (where networking seems to run OK).
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Karmic is the Vista of Ubuntu.
Four ubiquity upgrades, four failures, two recovered with apt-get dist-upgrade and fiddling, two total reinstalls.
Bluetooth broken. Polkit-1 broken (mount auth), things like automount options moving to gconf to change them (No registry, just using a gconf editor and vim on raw XML? This is better than regedit how?). Grub’s helpers (e.g. find screen rez, find bootable partitions) are broken.
I have a long list of problems and I ACTUALLY USE UBUNTU AS MY MAIN COMPUTER EVERY DAY and have been for a long time (Dapper Drake or earlier). Each new release except for Jaunty has been worse though with Jaunty I had hope Karmic would fix even more but instead broke even more than Jaunty fixed. I’ve been with linux since 0.99! (Yggdrasil).
Instead of a new desktop they should get grub2 to recognize bootable DOS partitions – something I actually use. And fix the polkit-1 problems. And bluetooth. And make it so I can check or uncheck a box so everything isn’t autorun/automount.
But for Lucid, I expect more breakage, annoyances, crashes, difficult upgrades, ignored bug reports. But they will have a beautiful new splash screen. Maybe they will listen and fix things instead of overloading it with new and changed things.
I wish I could say something good, but I’ve gone from a few tweaks to several hours hacking a new install to fix things which should be easily changed or should not change at all between versions.
Interestingly bluetooth works for me.
The grub2 thing might be true but, does windows recognize anything but its own formats?
[...] A good set of reasons to move to Ubuntu December 16, 2009 proteus555 Leave a comment Go to comments 30 reasons why Ubuntu is here to stay [...]
@tz “Karmic is the Vista of Ubuntu.”
I agree with that. Only we didn’t have to wait 5 years for it, and we’re not stuck with it for 3 years.
@ shady “Second, I do not think OpenOffice should be promoted as an Ubuntu “feature”.”
I agree with that too, but it ís a feature that you can install a complete and fully usable operating system, including office-suit in less than 20 minutes. Having it pre-installed really adds to the “everything works out of the box” experience that I like so much about Ubuntu.
Open Mind and Use The Open Source .. I love u Full Ubuntu …
Nice work
Translated to arabic.
Thanks.
[...] [...]
I don’t see my #1 reason: The freedom to collaborate, share and improve within a very friendly community of ethical programmers and users.
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Nice post!
But one thing. Throwing in google analytics into the mix is like throwing Hitler into a political debate. As far as I know from what you’ve shown there is that Ubuntu is higher on the search then the other distributions. This could mean a couple different things. For example, more people searching more often could mean more issues for users. Ubuntu users might be trouble shooting more than the others. Not a fact, but possible.
I’m a big Slackware and BSD fan. You’ll find that these score low as well in analytics. Why? Because there is a HUGE silent majority of folks like myself who are too busy getting things done. We don’t have anything to search for or talk about. We know what works and we use it. Just a thought.
Keep up the good work!
thanks for this article.
i’ve translated it to my native language, Romanian.
great reasons for using Ubuntu.
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Very nice. Thank you for sharing.
[...] Why ubuntu? | How to install-softwares in ubuntu? [...]
Good article. My wife and I have been using Ubuntu for about three years now and I must say its the best operating system out there. When I am out shopping and the subject of computing comes up I always recommend Ubuntu as a great system which teaches you as you use it.
I tried Windows on my computer. After a while the system slowed down. I’d install software, remove it and install more. Eventually it was so slow, I’d have to wipe it away and try once more.
I needed Anti-Virus software (that I had to pay for??) and anti-spyware/malware software too. Seems what ONE found as malicious, the other DIDN’T. This slowed down the whole responsiveness of Windows.
Unwanted pop-up windows still happened. And when the system was infiltrated repairs left things hobbling in many places. Browser home page hijacked… it was a mess.
Sometimes the sound worked right. Other times I had to fiddle with setting, throw my hands up in the air and restart the system. That *might* fix it, and it might *not* fix it.
Adding new hardware isn’t always as easy as touted. If the hardware is plugged in too soon the driver install software can get confused and my new toy won’t work.
To modify a quote from Lubos Pochman above: “These might be some of the reasons why Windows will not make it with general population.”
I’m not worried about the general population when it comes to adopting Linux. Would it be a good thing if Linux were adopted everywhere? Linux users would populate both sides of the argument, some saying “yes”, others, disagreeing, would point to Windows as proof that widespread adoption of an O/S isn’t always good for it.
Ubuntu does what I need a computer to do. I want more from it, but I’m patient. Windows wasn’t an all-purpose tool when it first showed up, and it had huge corporate backing. I can patiently wait for Linux to grow.
Teşekkürler gayet şık ve güzel birpaylaşım olmuş.
thenks.
About meaning Free Software when I wrote Open-Source. I don’t think I meant Free. I wanted to note the advantages that open-source software bring us without touching the hot debate of software freedom. In fact I even wrote there’s much more into open-source than just TCO and Freedom…
Kahpeleri her zaman sikeceksin.
Tşker güzel paylaşım.