BaffledExperts by Adam Norman

Ubuntu, it’s over

I tried to like you, Ubuntu. I just can't. It's not me. It's you. I'm going back to my other boyfriend, XP. Yes, XP. He's older, but he's much better. I've made a list for you, so maybe you can get along better with the next sucker who falls for your free love pitch:

20 Things that are wrong with Ubuntu: A letter to Ubuntu developers.

1. I do not want choice. I want my OS to work. Choices are only necessary when something is preventing me from working. I may need to choose a printer. I do not want to have to choose my graphics performance options. Choices are bad. OSes are not something I want to think about. I certainly don't want to think about repositories. Nobody does.
2. Brown is ugly. Yes, I know I can choose another colour. See point 1.
3. MP3s, DVDs, and Flash should work right away, right out of the box. Stop making excuses. Meet people's needs.
4. The default Ubuntu font is ugly.
5. All the fonts are ugly, actually.
6. The fonts that come with Ubuntu are not the fonts that people use.
7. Desktop search should work, and it should work out of the box.
8. Wireless should work out of the box.
9. The terminal is not good. It is bad. Sane people hate using the terminal. Stop making them use it.
10. Folders should be named for what they contain, and should contain what they are named. Sbin should be named “Applications” if it contains applications. If it is named “Applications”, it should be the only place that contains them, and it should contain only them.
11. Icons should be attached to applications. I should not have to search for icons.
12. The panel is hard to configure and hard to use. It should be a dock.
13. Drag and drop should work correctly, and it should work every time.
14. The trash should be on the desktop.
15. The finder should be called “Finder”, or "Filing Cabinet", or "Work Space", or something. It should not be called “Nautilus”. That doesn't make sense.
16. There is no reason at all to have Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Xubuntu, and Edubuntu. Everything apart from Ubuntu is terribly broken. The people working on the others should devote themselves to fixing the one OS that stands a chance. X, K, and Edu have lost.
17. All applications should be named for what they do. Beagle is (was?) a stupid name for a search utility. Bloodhound is much better. Duplicate or similar names must be avoided. What, for instance, is the difference between “Indicator Applet” and “Indicator Applet Session”? And what the fuck is an applet? And what the fuck is a session? I use computers every day of my life, and I do not know, nor do I care to know.
18. Applications should be described by people who get paid to describe things, not people who get paid to program. “An indicator of something that needs your attention on the desktop”? That describes everything from recent emails to battery status, from the weather update to the daily news. Does the Indicator Applet (and WTF is an “applet”?) really do all that?
19. I should never, ever, need to edit a file to make my computer work. If I can't fix my computer with the GUI, my computer is completely broken.
20. If you want geeks to use your OS, continue doing what you've been doing, but shut up about the putative superiority of Ubuntu. Ubuntu is inferior, and will remain so. If you want citizens to use Ubuntu, stop slagging their needs and their knowledge. Fix what they want and brag.