Issue42

Contents

  1. In This Issue
  2. General Community News
    1. Dell computers with Ubuntu available
    2. New Wine and Wine-doors Team
    3. New Planet for US LoCos
    4. Ubuntu places #16 on list of best products from PC World 2007 Awards
    5. Ubuntu Live upcoming, Ubuntu members to get discount
    6. An Open Letter to the Open Source Community
  3. Interview of the Week
  4. In The Press
  5. In The Blogosphere
  6. Developer News
  7. Meetings and Events
    1. Sunday, May 27, 2007
      1. LoCo Team Meeting
      2. Georgia US LoCo meeting
      3. Catalan LoCo meeting
    2. Tuesday, May 29, 2007
      1. Kernel Team Meeting
      2. Community Council Meeting
    3. Wednesday, May 30, 2007
      1. Edubuntu Meeting
      2. Xubuntu Developers Meeting Meeting
    4. Thursday, May 31, 2007
      1. Ubuntu Development Team Meeting
  8. Community Spotlight
  9. Team of the week: Catalan Team
  10. Updates and security for 6.06, 6.10, and 7.04
    1. Security Updates
    2. Ubuntu 6.06 LTS Updates
    3. Ubuntu 6.10 Updates
    4. Ubuntu 7.04 Updates
  11. Bug Stats
  12. Did you know...
  13. UWN needs YOU
  14. Archives and RSS Feed
  15. Additional Ubuntu News
  16. Conclusion
  17. Credits
  18. RSS
  19. Feedback

Welcome to the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter, Issue #42 for the week May 21st - May 27th, 2007. In this issue we cover Dell's long awaited release of computers with Ubuntu preinstalled, the newly created Wine team, a new planet has been added to our blog solar system for US LoCos, an interview with Corey Burger, the newly approved Community Council member, a quick summary on the new procedure to become an Ubuntu Core Developer, and the spotlight is on the Catalan Team this week which was recently officially approved.

UWN Translations

In This Issue

  • Dell computers with Ubuntu available
  • New Wine and Wine-doors Team

  • New Planet for US LoCos

  • Ubuntu featured on PC World 2007 Awards
  • Special discount for Ubuntu Live
  • Interview of the Week with Corey Burger
  • Team of the week: Catalan Team
  • New section: Did you know...?
  • UWN needs you

General Community News

Dell computers with Ubuntu available

The long awaited release of Dell computers preinstalled with Ubuntu was this week, with Dell announcing three different models, two desktops and one laptop. All three laptops contain mostly Intel parts, with the two desktops using Core 2 Duos. All models are priced about $50 USD cheaper than the equivalent Vista models. Currently they only available in the US, although Dell representatives in at least Canada and Australia have confirmed that they will be available in those countries. You can see more at http://www.ubuntu.com/dell and you can purchase the models at http://www.dell.com/open.

New Wine and Wine-doors Team

Stephan Hermann has created an ubuntu-wine team that will be responsible for maintaining Wine on Ubuntu. Stephen also created a team to maintain the wine-doors tool. Wine-doors is package management tool designed to make installing Windows applications on Linux, Solaris, and other Unix systems, easier. While wine-doors levarages code from Wine, it plans to support Cedega and Crossover Office in the future. Read more: http://linux.blogweb.de/archives/328-Announcing-the-ubuntu-wine-team.html

For the ubuntu-wine Launchpad team, see https://launchpad.net/~ubuntu-wine.

For wine-tools, see https://launchpad.net/wine-doors/

New Planet for US LoCos

A planet has been created for aggregating blogs of all approved US LoCo teams. If your LoCo has a team blog, that blogs about what your team is doing for Ubuntu and in the Ubuntu community, then it would be a perfect fit for the planet. This is only meant for team blogs, not individuals, and teams approved by the Ubuntu Community Council. To read the planet, see http://planet.ubuntu-us.org

Ubuntu places #16 on list of best products from PC World 2007 Awards

Up from 27th place last year, Ubuntu 7.04 placed 16th in the 2007 PC World Awards. Calling Ubuntu "fast and friendly" and "a Linux distribution both newbies and geeks can use", PC World also noted the Dell deal. You can see the award page at http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,131925-page,16-c,electronics/article.html and PC World's review of 7.04 at http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,130110/article.html.

Ubuntu Live upcoming, Ubuntu members to get discount

The Ubuntu Live conference is coming up soon, on July 22 through 24 in Portland, Oregon. The conference is designed for community members, developers and users of Ubuntu to network and learn more about Ubuntu, how it works and how to contribute. Run by O'Reilly Media, Ubuntu members have been offered a %35 discount off the admission price, they merely need to cite the code "ubu07ucm" while registering at http://www.ubuntulive.com/pub/w/60/pricing.html.

An Open Letter to the Open Source Community

Melissa Draper sent an open letter to the community this week expressing her concern about behaviour that discourage women from participating in the Open Source community in general. Read the full letter at: https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/sounder/2007-May/010269.html

Interview of the Week

This week we interview Corey Burger, one of the recently appointed Community Council members, and head of the Marketing Team.

UWN Reporter: Since when have you been member of the Ubuntu community?

Corey Burger: In October 2004, while running Red Hat 8, I was looking for a new distribution and heard of this new Ubuntu, just having heard of the recently released the RC for Warty Warthog. I downloaded it right away, wiped out my Red Hat install and fell in love. About a month later, I heard of the first development conference, the one in Mataro, Spain and decided to use some of my hard earned money to ship myself to it. While there I met the incredible team that had been collected and was made to feel very welcome, despite having no coding experience.

UWN: What do you think the next year will look like for Ubuntu?

C.B.: I suspect we will see the first million desktop deal publicly announced (There may already be a million desktop deal out there, just not announced). I suspect that Ubuntu on the server will truly come into it's own. I suspect we are going to bigger and noisier and cooler. I wouldn't be shocked to see a few surprising announcements about partnerships this year, good ones the community is not expecting, not semi-evil ones like the Novell-MS one. All in all, I expect to see lots more the same as last year, only bigger and better.

UWN: What do you think can be improved in the Ubuntu community?

C.B.:We just need more people and we need more communication between the various teams that are already rocking on so many cool projects all over the world. We need to hear about how the people in Venezula are talking to their government and how the people in Eastern Europe are pushing into schools. Nothing breeds success like hearing about other people doing amazing things. We also need to help struggling projects get off the ground, provide them with cool resources and mentoring to get them going.

UWN: What are you most active in the community?

C.B.: Aside from my Community Council membership, which I suspect will eat a fair amount of my time, I am very active in the Marketing Team, helping keep various projects working, connecting people to existing projects and generally cheerleading. I am also the nominal head of Ubuntu Canada, where I attempt to bridge the massive geography Canada has.

In The Press

  • PC World lists their top 20 products of the year. Ubuntu 7.04 comes in at #16. with PC World saying "Ubuntu has solidified itself as the one Linux distribution that Linux geeks love and newbies can comfortably use. Even Dell turned to the 7.04 version of Ubuntu when it announced its intention to preload some systems with Linux." See more at http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,131925-page,16-c,electronics/article.html

  • John K. Waters, at Law.com, wonders if Ubuntu is the Linux OS for law firms. John says the "distro really shines is on the desktop." Pointing out that security and package updates do not require a subscription support service, Ubuntu also comes with an office productivity suite, integerated email and calendaring applications, note-taking program, browser, photo editor and a media player. John notes that Canonical has many key relationships with vendors that provide valuable business applications like IBM's DB2 database, VMware's VMI and Para-Ops, SugarCRM, and a variety of Sun's Java tools. Along with well known companies using Ubuntu, like Google and Siemens, Dell's decision to sell Ubuntu pre-installed is "the sexiest endorsement of this distro." Read the full article: http://www.law.com/jsp/legaltechnology/pubArticleLT.jsp?id=1179751704065

  • Matthew Newton, at PC World, describes how the user can try out KDE and Xfce if they installed Ubuntu with a Gnome desktop. Matthew provides instructions on how to install kubuntu-desktop and xubuntu-desktop on an existing Ubuntu installation. Links are provided to Psychocat's Ubuntu Installation Guide as well as Ubuntuguide.org. The Psychocat guide provides an illustrated step-by-stop guide, while ubuntuguide.org is useful for finding troubleshooting advice. Read the full article: http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,132030-c,linux/article.html

  • Wired asks if Ubuntu is for the non-geek computer user. It describes how Linux "costs nothing, and it's also free of corporate control and restrictions on how you can use your media." The security company Panda Software is mentioned sayng there are "300 pieces of malware targeting Linux systems, versus more than 100,000 for Windows machines." Wired provides a list of common applications that the user would be likely use: OpenOffice, Firefox, and Evolution. The Ubuntu Forums is listed as a resource to determine if digital cameras will work and Rhythmbox and gtkpod are provided as alternatives to iTunes. Read the full article: http://www.wired.com/software/coolapps/news/2007/05/ubuntu_faq

In The Blogosphere

  • The Ubustu Feed has created an install guide for Ubuntu Studio. It provides instructions on how to partition disks and three methods of installation: (1) how to install with the official DVD; (2) how to install without a DVD burner; and (3) how to add Studio to an existing Ubuntu install. The guide uses screenshots and videos to guide the user through the process. Read more at http://www.ubustu.com/globe/ubuntu-studio-install-guide/

  • Grant Robertson, at Download Squad, thinks the attention received by the Dell/Ubuntu relationship has been incredibly positive. The reviews from PC World and Wired are encouraging while lower prices on the same models with Windows Vista should make a difference. The current success of Ubuntu and "just a few more breakaways could catapult Canonical's Feisty Fawn into the annals of history, and the living rooms of many a consumer." Read more at http://www.downloadsquad.com/2007/05/25/what-does-the-future-hold-for-ubuntu/

Developer News

There is a new way for users to become core developers, those that work on the main and restricted repositories, involving the new MOTU council, to remove the backlog with the Technical Board. With the new procedure, which can be viewed at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/NewDeveloperProcess, the MOTU Council first collects all the information about the prospective core developer and then passes that information on the Technical Board.

Another change this week in the form of a proposed new mentoring structure for prospective MOTU. The new procedure will help work on documentation for new users and most importantly, team up prospective new MOTUs with existing developers, to help them get over the learning curve. The new procedure can be seen at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MOTU/NewMentoring and as this is the final call for comments, mail those to the MOTU list at ubuntu-motu@lists.ubuntu.com.

Meetings and Events

Sunday, May 27, 2007

LoCo Team Meeting

Georgia US LoCo meeting

Catalan LoCo meeting

Tuesday, May 29, 2007

Kernel Team Meeting

Community Council Meeting

Wednesday, May 30, 2007

Edubuntu Meeting

Xubuntu Developers Meeting Meeting

Thursday, May 31, 2007

Ubuntu Development Team Meeting

  • Start: 16:00
  • End: 18:00
  • Location: IRC channel #ubuntu-meeting

Community Spotlight

Team of the week: Catalan Team

On May 15th, Catalan LoCo Team obtained officiality. We worked hard to achieve this, and we are very proud to have been the first Lingual- and Cultural-based Ubuntu LoCo. Moreover, this has also had some impact in Catalan technical media.

But the beginings were not that good. In May 2005, I put the team on the LoCo Team List, my first mistake was not to spread this decision, hoping for everyone entering Ubuntu website to find it easily. So, few people knew about it and the Team was not able to get along. One and a half years later, Ubuntu was really at the top of GNU/Linux distros and passing by the wiki page, I put an "abandoned project" note. Curiously, at that moment six people interested in the project contacted me and, on the other hand, people from my LUG made commentaries on the same direction, so thanks to our contacts we put a mailing list online, on a university server, and this time I spread the word in a few free software lists. In a week, we were more than 100 people on the list.

The needs for a Catalan LoCo Team were obvious: we are in a technologically advanced region of Europe and, although not well positioned in free software matters at administration and political level, we have had for many years ago people very involved with the free software movement, who have done great work spreading, raising awareness, translating and even developing.

Ubuntu Catalan User community gathers Catalan-speaking users of Ubuntu in all its varieties. The scope of the Catalan LoCo Team are regions where Catalan is traditionally spoken, where members and volunteers are spread practically all over their geography.

To join the Catalan Team, head over to their team on Launchpad: https://launchpad.net/~ubuntu.cat/

Updates and security for 6.06, 6.10, and 7.04

Security Updates

Ubuntu 6.06 LTS Updates

Ubuntu 6.10 Updates

Ubuntu 7.04 Updates

Bug Stats

  • Open (30450) -189 # over last week
  • Critical (33) +10 # over last week
  • Unconfirmed (15289) +53 # over last week
  • Unassigned (22955) -56 # over last week
  • All bugs ever reported (102847) +1219 # over last week

As always, the Bug Squad needs more help. If you want to get started, please see https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HelpingWithBugs

Check out the bug statistics: http://people.ubuntu-in.org/~carthik/bugstats/

Did you know...

Did you know that the current Community Council is composed of: Benjamin Mako Hill, Corey Burger, Daniel Holbach, James Troup, Jerome S. Gotangco, Mark Shuttleworth, Matthew East and Mike Basinger?

UWN needs YOU

The Marketing Team is looking for people curious and involved in the community to cover the "Specification Spotlight", "Feature of the week" and "Team of the week" sections. It would mainly involve in digging for something interesting each week and writing a nice paragraph or two each week. If you think you're up to the task, please send a quick email to our mailing list (ubuntu-marketing@lists.ubuntu.com) and let us know.

Archives and RSS Feed

You can always find older Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter issues at: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuWeeklyNewsletter

You can subscribe to the Ubuntu Weekly News via RSS at: http://fridge.ubuntu.com/uwn/feed

Additional Ubuntu News

As always you can find more news and announcements at:

and

Conclusion

Thank you for reading the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter.

See you next week!

Credits

The Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter is brought to you by:

  • Martin Albisetti
  • Nick Ali
  • Corey Burger
  • And many others

RSS

You can subscribe to the UWN feed at: http://fridge.ubuntu.com/uwn/feed

Feedback

If you would like to submit an idea or story you think is worth appearing on the UWN, please send them to ubuntu-marketing-submissions@lists.ubuntu.com. This document is maintained by the Ubuntu Marketing Team. Please feel free to contact us regarding any concerns or suggestions by either sending an email to ubuntu-marketing@lists.ubuntu.com or by using any of the other methods on the Ubuntu Marketing Team Contact Information Page (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MarketingTeam). If you'd like to contribute to a future issue of the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter, please feel free to edit the appropriate wiki page. If you have any technical support questions, please send then ubuntu-users@lists.ubuntu.com.

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