Revisiting Linux Part 1: A Look at Ubuntu 8.04
by Ryan Smith on August 26, 2009 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Linux
What’s the Value of Technical Support, Anyhow?
Besides patching bugs and security vulnerabilities, the other aspect of “support” is technical support; help for when things go wrong. As I mentioned earlier, Ubuntu is free, and one of the conditions of this is that there is no official technical support for Ubuntu for the user. To be fair, there are some purchasable support options for larger organizations that can afford a support contract, but for the average desktop user this isn’t accessible. So as far as we’re concerned, Ubuntu doesn’t have any official technical support.
I spent quite some time gnawing over the idea of just how valuable technical support is. I have never made a technical support call for desktop software, often because I’m capable of finding and fixing the issue myself through the magic of Google, and because calling for technical support seems to be a futile exercise in being fed canned support scripts. So many possible things can go wrong with software that the person on the other end of the line may not be able to help you, which makes me question the value of technical support for software.
Trying to come up with a resolution for this matter, I posted a poll last year in our forums to get some user feedback. The skills of the people who inhabit our forums versus those who read our site means that this poll is not a scientifically valid poll, nor is it even a fair poll; it’s greatly biased towards the techie crowd like myself. Nevertheless, I wanted to know who uses technical support when they have it.
I had theorized that the results of the poll would end up reflecting my own views, and this is exactly what happened. When our forum participants were asked if they had ever called Microsoft for technical support with Windows (excluding activation issues), out of 52 votes only 9 of those votes were a “yes” for 17.3%. Clearly out of our techie crowd, the majority of users do not use their technical support options.
Based on this, I do not believe that technical support for a software product is valuable for the people most likely to be installing Ubuntu on their own. Or in other words: So what if Ubuntu doesn’t come with technical support? It’s not like most of us would use it anyhow.
I would take the time to separate the idea that software technical support is the same as total technical support however. It becomes another matter entirely when you can get support for a complete computer from an OEM. They can support both the hardware and the software, and that means they can (probably) help you solve issues when what looks like an issue with one element is really an issue with the other.
The benchmark here is Apple since they make both their hardware and their software, which puts them a step above Dell and other PC OEMs that are a bit more separated from the software. What I’m getting at is that is that even if Ubuntu came with technical support, it would be of limited value since they cannot help you with your hardware. If you need real support, you’re better off buying a computer from an OEM who can support all that you need (although we should note that even for computers sold with Ubuntu, the OEM does not usually handle the software support…).
Finally, just to throw out an example of how useless technical support can be even when you have it, let’s take a look at Windows (we’d take a look at the Mac, but OS support is bundled with the hardware). Even for a retail copy of Windows, which Microsoft offers direct support for, you only get free technical support for 90 days after activation. After that you’re out $59 per incident. It’s effectively installation and post-installation support, not support for continuing use.
In the end, not only would technical support likely be unbeneficial for most people once they’re past the installation process, but there’s no real precedent for offering technical support on just the OS. As such while there’s no technical support for Ubuntu, it ultimately doesn’t matter because no one else provides cheap extended technical support for just their OS either.
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Eeqmcsq - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
for your time spent on writing this article. I've made the jump to from Windows to Ubuntu (and Xubuntu for my older computers) back around 7.10 and 8.04 and I went through some of the headaches in adjusting to Ubuntu, but I eventually solved all of them and I'm quite settled in now.One comment about finding help in the form of command line instructions, rather than GUI instructions. GUI instructions for Ubuntu would not be useful for Kubuntu or Xubuntu, since they use different window managers. The command line solutions usually work for all three.
Also, boot times were noticeably improved in 9.04. Perhaps you can run a quick retest on it.
And you CAN install stuff when using the live CD. I've installed a couple of temperature monitoring utilities when I was stress testing my motherboard.
Finally, thanks again for writing such a thorough look into your Ubuntu experiences. It was a great read in seeing how far Ubuntu has come and what it still lacks.
fepple - Thursday, August 27, 2009 - link
Yeah, you can set the APT sources to use a CD. There is an option for it 'system' > 'administor' > 'software source', or you can edit the /etc/apt/sources.list fileclarkn0va - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
[quote]since SMB is the predominant protocol for consumer file server gear, it’s a fair test of such use.[/quote]While this comment is not false, it presents a lazy approach to comparison; it's a one-sided contest, and Linux, pitted against Windows on home turf, doesn't stand much of a chance.
You as much as acknowledge this in the article, so why not provide some counterpoint? For example, consumer file server gear, even if it supports SMB almost ubiquitously, is usually *nix-based. So instead of just showing Windows and Linux clients interacting with Windows servers, show them interacting with *nix servers as well. Do some NFS transfers as well; NFS is well supported in consumer NAS these days.
You also really missed the boat on the video drivers. 8.04 was not the first Ubuntu release to include the Restricted Drivers Manager (known simply as "Hardware Drivers" in later releases). This handy app will identify hardware, such as AMD and NVIDIA GPUs, that can take advantage of proprietary drivers, and will offer to to install the same via synaptic (APT) with just a click of the mouse. No CLI, no headaches.
Still, a thorough review, and generally well-researched. I'm looking forward to the 9.04 follow-up.
Since you mentioned hardware HD decoding, I recommend taking a look at smplayer from the testing ppa (https://launchpad.net/~rvm/+archive/testing)">https://launchpad.net/~rvm/+archive/testing). Unfortunately vdpau doesn't work with the nvidia blobs in the default Ubuntu repos, but I believe there's a PPA providing vdpau-compatible blobs for anybody not wanting to do CLI installs.
db
VaultDweller - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
[quote]While this comment is not false, it presents a lazy approach to comparison; it's a one-sided contest, and Linux, pitted against Windows on home turf, doesn't stand much of a chance. [/quote]This isn't Linux pitted against Windows on home turf, it's Linux pitted against Windows in the real world.
clarkn0va - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
Well, no doubt SMB is the dominant method of sharing files for consumers in general. Obviously comparing Linux to Windows makes sense in a world where Windows is the incumbent, but it's not the whole story.I hope Part 2 will address some of the objective benefits of Ubuntu, and not fall into the trap of "worse because it's not the same as Windows".
VaultDweller - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
I agree in principle, but there has to be a distinction between "Worse because it's not compatible with Windows," "Worse because it's not as easy as Windows," and "Worse because it's not the same as Windows." Die-hard *nix advocates tend to dismiss the first two as if they were the latter, and this tends to undermine their argument.Also, in some cases "Worse because it's not the same as Windows" can be a valid point, because the public has been trained to the point that the Windows way is the "intuitive" way. Of course, this isn't truly intuitive, as people who learned Linux first would find Linux methodologies more intuitive - but that's largely a moot point, as that's not the reality we live in today. You could say the same thing about the color red - in the western world, when we see red we can intuitively guess that it means Stop, or Warning, or Error, etc. The fact that this is not an understanding we're born with but rather a socially acquired intuition does not mean it would be any easier to suddenly change the color of traffic lights and expect people to adjust without problems.
Ryan Smith - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
All of the NAS gear I can get my hands on is either SMB only, or is a Time Capsule which is SMB + AFP. I don't have anything that does NFS, which isn't so much a comment on testing (I could always set up another box) as it is usefulness. NFS just isn't common on consumer gear; SMB is a more important metric if you're looking at file transfer performance, because that's what most people are going to be working with. This doesn't preclude doing NFS at a later time though.And the Restricted Drivers Manager is limited to the drivers in the Hardy repository, which means they're a year+ out of date.
amrs - Wednesday, September 30, 2009 - link
Interestingly, if one checks the SmallNetBuilder NAS charts, it looks like out of 87 NAS devices, 49 have NFS. 56% in other words. And you say NFS isn't common? Really now? Seems a little biased to me.ekul - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
While a lot of your issues have complicated solutions or lengthy technical backstories I can solve your complaint of smb shares mounted in nautilus not being useful in non-gtk applications in one simple command (or as you seem to hate commands the gui can do it too).theory: make a symlink to the directory nautilus mounts to so it can be easily accessed. Symlinks to directories or files are transparently (to users and applications) identical to the location they refer to. Windows doesn't have symlinks (only useless shortcuts) so it isn't surprising you were not aware to do it.
howto: gvfs uses the directory /home/$USER/.gvfs as a mount point so link to it:
ln -s ~/.gvfs ~/linkname
howto gui: in nautilus go to your home folder then choose view -> show hidden files. Right click on .gvfs and choose make link. Then you can rename the link to whatever you want and hide hidden files again.
hint: symlinks are your best friend. My home dir is littered with links to places on the filesystem I visit a lot to avoid a lot of clicking/typing
Ryan Smith - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
I suddenly feel very humiliated...The symlink is a very elegant solution, I'm embarrassed I didn't think of that myself. It's a bit of a lousy solution in that there even needs to be a solution, but as far as things go that's a very insightful suggestion.