Revisiting Linux Part 1: A Look at Ubuntu 8.04
by Ryan Smith on August 26, 2009 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Linux
Things That Went Terribly, Terribly Wrong
One concern I’ve had for some time when writing this article is that it runs the risk of coming off as too negative. I don’t want to knock Ubuntu just for being different, but at the same time I’m not going to temper my expectations much as far as usability, stability, and security are concerned. If something went wrong, then I intend to mention it, as these are things that can hopefully be resolved in a future version of Ubuntu.
This section is reserved for those things that went terribly, terribly wrong. Things so wrong that it made me give up on using Ubuntu for the rest of the day and go back to Windows. This isn’t intended to be a list of all the problems (or even just the big problems) I encountered using Ubuntu, but rather the most severe.
We’ll start with mounting file servers. I have a Windows Home Server box that I use to store my common files, along with hosting backups of my Macs and PCs. I needed to be able to access the SMB shares on that server, which immediately puts Linux at a bit of a disadvantage since it’s yet another non-native Microsoft protocol that Linux has to deal with, with protocol details that were largely reverse engineered. My Macs have no issue with this, so I was not expecting any real problems here, other than that the network throughput would likely be lower than from Windows.
For whatever reason, Ubuntu cannot see the shares on my WHS box, which is not a big deal since neither do my Macs. What went wrong however is that manually mounting these shares is far harder than it needs to be. Again using the Mac as a comparison, mounting shares is as easy as telling Finder to connect to a SMB server, and supplying credentials, at which point it gives you a list of shares to mount.
Ubuntu, as it turns out, is not capable of mounting a share based on just the server name and credentials. It requires the share name along with the above information , at which point it will mount that share. Browsing shares based on just a user name and password is right out. Worse yet, if you don’t know this and attempt to do it Mac-style, you’ll get one of the most cryptic error messages I have ever seen: “Can't display location "smb://<removed>/", No application is registered as handling this file.” This tells you nothing about what the problem actually is. It’s poor design from a usability standpoint, and even worse error handling.
Unfortunately the story doesn’t end here. Ideally all applications would work as well with files on a network share as they would a local drive, but that’s not always the case – often the problem is that it’s harder to browse for a network shared file than a local file from inside an application. For this reason I have all of my common shares mapped as drives on Windows (this also saves effort on logging in) and Mac OS X takes this even further and immediately maps all mounted shares as drives. So I wanted to do the same for Ubuntu, and have my common shares automount as drives.
Nautilus, which transparently accesses SMB shares, is of no help here, because by transparently accessing SMB shares it doesn’t mount them in a standard way. The mount point it uses is inside of a hidden directory (.gvfs) that some applications will ignore. The ramifications of this being that most applications that are not a GTK application cannot see shares mounted by Nautilus, because they can’t see the mounted share that GTK tells its applications about, nor can they see the hidden mount point. The chief concern in my case was anything running under Wine, along with VLC.
The solution is not for the faint of heart. Highlights include additional software installations, manually backing up files, and a boatload of archaic terminal commands – and that’s just if everything goes right the first time. I love the terminal but this is ridiculous. Once it’s finished and set up correctly it gets the job done, but it’s an unjust amount of effort for something that can be accomplished in a matter of seconds on Windows or Mac OS X. This was easily the lowest point I reached while using Ubuntu.
The other thing I am going to throw in this category is mounting ISO images. I keep ISOs of all of my software for easy access. Interestingly enough, Ubuntu has the file system driver necessary to mount ISOs, but not a GUI application to do this. While it would be nice to have all of that built-in (ala Mac OS X) that’s not the flaw here – I’m perfectly content downloading a utility like I do for Windows (Daemon Tools). The flaw here was the Ubuntu GUI application for this, Gmount-ISO, can’t mount ISOs off of a SMB share. Worse yet, it doesn’t tell you this either.
The first time around, the only solution I was able to find was an another archaic CLI command that involved running the mount command by hand, in the style of “mount file.iso /cdrom -t iso9660 -o loop”. This was a terrible solution.
It wasn’t until some time later that I finally found a better solution. An application that wasn’t in the Ubuntu repository, AcetoneISO, can properly mount files off of SMB shares. Better yet it’s a bit closer to Daemon Tools functionality, since it can mount BIN/CUE, NRG (Nero Image), and MDF images.
I throw this in “terribly, terribly wrong” column because the solution was completely non-obvious. If you search for “Ubuntu Hardy mount iso” or something similar, AcetoneISO is nowhere near the top of the results, and the Ubuntu package repository is of no help. What’s in the repository is the aforementioned useless Gmount-ISO, and what’s at the top of Google’s results are Gmount-ISO and instructions to mount the image via CLI. It’s a success story in the end, but it was uncomfortably painful getting there.
If there’s any consolation in these matters, it’s that these were the only two issues that made me outright stop using Ubuntu, and go back to Windows for the day. Any other problems I had were significantly less severe than this.
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justniz - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
Maybe I'm missung something but this appears to be a new article.Why are you reviewing a year-old version of Ubuntu? there's been nearly 3 releases since that (Ubuntu is on 9.04 now with 9.10 coming very soon).
Its important to review the most recent version as Ubuntu is totally unlike the Microsoft world in tnat new releases are frequent (Every 6 months) and have real practical improvements.
ioannis - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
I couldn't help myself, but...RTFA!!
:-D
PS: if you read the article, you will also get the joke ;)
nafhan - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
Great article. I look forward to reading the follow up.One comment on security that I would like to make. The commercial Linux vendors (IBM, Novell, Redhat, etc.) are all VERY dedicated to ensuring Linux security, as many/all of their server products use Linux, and changes they make will filter back down to the Linux desktop community. This is something that OSX does not have to nearly the same degree.
My experience with running Linux on the desktop sounds pretty much the same as yours.
-Games killed it in general. I don't usually have a top of the line system. So, I'm usually pushing my computer its limits to run newer games under Windows. Also, I hate dual booting, and most of the FOSS I use is available as a compiled binary for Windows.
-Drivers killed it in one specific instance with an older laptop, as I never got NdisWrapper (required for my wifi cards Windows drivers) to run better than intermittently. I spent way to much time messing with it.
crimson117 - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
[quote]and for the price you’re only giving up official support.[/quote]Ubuntu doesn't have free official support, but neither does Microsoft. Apple does give 90 days free phone support, to their credit, but after that you have to pay.
You can always hire an expert (from ms, or apple, or a third party) to help you, but that's also true with ubuntu, though I expect there are fewer such experts to be found.
MS, Apple, and Ubuntu all offer free web-based help, both community maintained and "officially" maintained.
So I think it's misleading to imply that going from Windows or Mac to Ubuntu means you're downgrading your support options. People overestimate just how "supported" their operating systems are. Also, Linux / Ubuntu releases fixes and updates much more quickly than Apple or MS, so your chances of hitting a bug is lower in the first place. (MS maintains a huge knowledgebase of bugs they haven't bothered to fix yet and might have a workaround for - but I hardly see that as a positive).
crimson117 - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
I'm probably being too hard on Apple here. The genius bar offers free 15 minute appointments to diagnose problems and offer software tips / advice.I'd say apple has the best "official" support, followed by a fuzzy tie between ubuntu and microsoft.
gordonsmall - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
While I have used computers for 20 years or more, I am not a techie. I am much more interested an experience that "just works".When Vista came out I decided to explore the Linux desktop world. I have been using it as my primary system (still keep the dual boot option for XP) for just under 2 years.
I agree that "free" and security are big considerations for moving to a Linux desktop environment. However, there are some other items (and you might class them under security) that I like - because of the file structure, you don't have to periodically defrag your system. Both systems have a lot of updates, but so far I have not gotten the feeling that my Ubuntu system is gradually slowing down and clogging up with a lot of useless files (you don't see a lot of adds for such utilities as Registry Cleaners:). I no longer experience the MS ripple effect - when MS sneezes, other Windows apps may get a cold.
That is not to say that there cannot be issues. My pet peeve has been that my sound has disappeared on a couple of occassions after downloading updates. Using Google, and the Ubuntu documentation, I have been able to get it back up - but wish that wouldn't happen. But Windows updates can on occassion cause some issues.
I think you made a very valid point about the issue of tech support. Google has made a big difference in problem solving.
Enjoyed your review.
Gordon Small
yuchai - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
I've tried using Linux (usually Ubuntu) as a full replacement desktop on and off for the last few years. I've gone back to Windows every time after a while. Some key points:1. For my desktop usage, there honestly isn't anything that Linux does better, in terms of functionality, than Windows
2. Windows is cheap enough that I do not mind spending the money on it. For the $100 that I spent for Vista 64 Home Premium OEM, it is quite worthwhile even if I only use it for 3 years. Yes, there are more apps out of the box for Linux, but it's usually easy to find freeware for Windows with the same functionality. Even Office is now pretty affordable with the Home & Office version.
3. Games - Wine just doesn't cut it. When I want to play a new game, I want buy it and play it immediately! I do not want to have to do research to see whether some game would work on Wine even before I buy it. I do not want to spend hours troubleshooting on the internet if something doesn't work right.
4. There's always something that you want to change in Linux that you can't figure out. Yes, usually the solution is on the internet. And I used to even enjoy spending time and looking for the solution. But, it eventually grew old. Now I just want things to work and keep working.
Note that I do love Linux and actually have a server that doubles as a mythtv HTPC setup. It's a beautiful thing. I am comfortable with shell commands and frequently use SSH to perform multiple functions remotely. My opinions above is purely based on desktop usage.
cciemd - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
Great article, Ryan! Putting out some well written Linux articles really adds depth to your site. I have been reading this site daily for years and this article is prompting my first post.For future articles it would be great to see some Linux benchmarks in most of the hardware reviews. There are some excellent tools out there (check out http://www.phoronix-test-suite.com/)">http://www.phoronix-test-suite.com/). This would also give some closer apples-to-apples comparisons for Mac vs. Linux performance. I for one would LOVE to see SSD articles report some Linux (and Opensolaris/ZFS) benchmarks along with all the Windows tests.
Users often don't realize how much they benefit daily from open source software. I don't think most Mac users realize all the OSX pieces that are used in the background for which Apple leverages open source code (Samba for SMB access and sharing, Webkit for Safari, etc.). Home NAS and enterprise storage which serve files in Windows environments are often *nix based.
It is also a myth that open source means that developers aren't paid. Most enterprises recognize that implementing even commercial apps can require considerable internal development manpower. If enterprise developers can utilize open source code internally and contribute back to the code base, the companies save considerable money and benefit from a healthy software development ecosystem. There are thousands if not millions of developers employed to work on open source code.
Please keep up the good work. I am looking for your next article.
Ryan Smith - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
Unfortunately the Phoronix Test Suite doesn't work under Windows, so it's of limited utility. It's something we may be able to work in to hardware reviews, but it's not really applicable to OS reviews.chrone - Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - link
what i'd like to see on the next ubuntu version is more softer and smoother graphic and font rendering. i hate the way gnome renders the graphic and font. they look old operating system. using the ms core font some how helps but not much.i know there's compiz and friends, but i just wish it comes by default, so no need to hassle with compiz and its setting. i wish it could be rendered softer and smoother such as in windows and mac osx.
the look and feel should be tweaked more often! :D