Its because its nice and easy to use. Ubuntu are really helping the Linux IMO as they are managing to bring a whole new audience to Linux. Which is good right?

I'm not sure what you mean by inefficient and split into thousands of little peaces?

he he he.

i followed the link and watched the presentation of the looking glass desktop project, and i gotta say.. man it's cool. If some distro were to adopt something like that it would be a huge boost i think because it would convert a lot of Windows users over. I am not that familliar with enlightenment. I have tried it a few times in the past, but found it kinda.... difficult.

After doing careful research into which distribution would best suit me, (as a first-time Linux user) I decided on Ubuntu. I'm nothing but pleased. However, I sometimes see people on the forums talking about jumping on bandwagons and such. I would like to say: well, of course; why not? I've never considered myself a trend follower, but I'm willing to put good money on it that No One who uses Any Linux distribution is a trend follower, in the traditional sense. As to why I think it's okay to jump on the Ubuntu bandwagon, my first reason would be that it's Because it has such a following...I know there will be others around, not only online, but for example: I went to Barnes&Noble last week, and they had six different books on Ubuntu. What other distribution can say that? (except Fedora but I heard some negative things about them....nothing to get into here). Anyway, I thiknk I've gone past my two cents here, especially for a pink, bald, newbie.

This does create a root account which works great while in the shell but when you need to use root privileges with programs such as adept it still requires the the password of the normal user account and not the root account password that you set

This is not really fine if you using ubuntu as a multi user desktop because the root password (which I read somewhere in the ubuntu docs) is the password of the first user account setup on the system.

The 'sudo passwd root' does not seem to make a different in the x environment...

I prefer Kubuntu, as I like KDE. I had Mandrake/Mandriva 2006 for a while and liked it, but not all my hardware worked right. My wireless card especially. I had to run a big ethernet cord across the house to my router. Kubuntu ran my wireless card right off, as well as both of my optical drives. I put in a new DVD-ROM drive and it just plain worked. Well, not really new, but you know, new to my machine. I like that I got it to run perfectly, making all my hardware work, and all the audio/video codecs running correctly. That was something I had real trouble with on everything else.

I find this strange. I'm suppose to need root priviledges in order to use Administrative Apps, but can get in just by typing my user password. doesn't make sense!

I find this strange as well, but this is what happens with the Ubuntu family of distros. When I setup Ubuntu, I completely disable the sudo thing after setting up a root password. I also get rid of the admin group because I don't really need it.

So what does this do for you relating to our statements?

When I've setup Ubuntu over the years, I noticed that if you do "sudo passwd root" and give root a password, you still get some apps asking you for your password and not roots password in order to gain administrative privileges. By "switching off" the sudo thing, I get a classical Unix environment where "all" apps ask for roots password and not the normal users.

I've never used it, but I think that's the whole idea behind sudo, and you can set up any system that way. People in the "sudo" group can get root priviledges for one operation only by using sudo. They don't maintain those priviledges beyond that one operation. The system does much more extensive logging of sudo actions than it does of normal root actions. I suppose that Ubuntu assigns the 1st user added to the system to the "sudo" group ... then encourages (guides) him to use sudo instead of logging in as root with it's attendant ongoing priviledges.

Its probably a good plan for newbies, who are known for logging in as root and trashing the system. Sort of Linux administration training wheels, and rather insulting to people who have already learned the lessons Ubuntu wants to protect us from.

So, since I just spent 2 weeks setting up SuSE and still haven't gotten my wireless to work, will Ubuntu support my Broadcom BCM4309 Wireless card? Does Ubuntu have XGL and Compiz? One last thing, how different is the installation procedure from the suse rpm's to the ubuntu installer? I would say I am new to linux, but not a complete beginer. I don't mind typing in things as long as I know what to type into the console (howto manual). I can figure out simple errors and why what I typed doesn't work, so I think I should be fine with Ubuntu right? There are ways to update to the latest firefox and other apps that come installed in Ubuntu without losing the icon from the Applications menu in Gnome right? I have been looking for a plug and play distro for a while. For my desktop, SuSE worked like a charm. For my laptop, HP Compaq nx6125, not so good so I think Ubuntu might work? Thanks for any advice.

I like Ubuntu (6.06.1) because it ran my whole system right out of the box. BUT, I am going to install Debian and try to use it before I commit to Ubuntu....why use 'junior' when 'papa' is available? I have heard that Debian is the most stable of all the distros.

Not saying be a follower because uniqueness is Linux but as the old saying goes.... majority rules. I have heard alot about the Ubuntu distro and decided to give it a try... and about 1/2 an hour later I had just about made up my mind to get rid of windows. Now a couple of months later I'm glad I did as all the important things I did in windows are available to me here in Kubuntu. And the customization can simply not be beat. I enjoy my *new system and hope to continue to learn more.