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Ubuntu 9.10, the user-friendly, free, Linux-based operating system, is to be released tomorrow (the 29th of October 2009). Canonical, Ubuntu’s corporate sponsor, states that Ubuntu 9.10, codenamed Karmic Koala, ‘puts the user at the heart of its new design’, and being an Ubuntu user myself for about three years and a Linux user for significantly longer, I can certainly agree.

Having been a tester of Ubuntu 9.10 during its development, I can tell you that Ubuntu 9.10 will feature the following upon its release.

• E-mail and Chat Features – Ubuntu 9.10 will feature a built-in instant messenging client, Empathy, which can connect to many of the most popular instant messaging services, including Yahoo, Gmail (Google Talk), MSN (Windows Live), Jabber, AOL, QQ and many more. In addition to instant messaging, the latest version of the e-mail and personal information management program, Evolution, is included. Evolution can manage your contacts, e-mail, schedule, tasks and memos – all for free.

• Internet – Ubuntu 9.10 ships will the very latest version of Mozilla Firefox, which is much faster and excellent for browsing modern websites and web applications which are heavy on dynamic client-side content, such as Javascript. Complex web pages such as Facebook, Google Maps and others will load and work lightning fast.

• Music and videos – Music and videos are managed with ease in Ubuntu 9.10. Simply plug in your iPod, PSP, MP3 or MP4 player and use the built-in media player, Rhytmbox, to download, store, buy and play your music collection. Ubuntu 9.10 can play many video formats with no problems and anything it can not play it will offer to download and install the required codecs automatically, and for free.

• Office and productivity – Word processing, spreadsheets or presentations can all be handled by the latest version of OpenOffice.org which is including in the latest version of Ubuntu. OpenOffice is compatible with all other office applications including, but not limited to, Microsoft Office.

• Store, share and synchronise – Ubuntu 9.10 features integrated ‘Ubuntu One’ service, which allows you to easily and seamlessly synchronise your contacts, notes, files and folders between all your Ubuntu computers. Even if you are on a computer running Mac or Windows you can still access all your files online, meaning you’ll never be at computer without your files.

• Software centre – The brand new software centre for this version of Ubuntu allows you to download and install thousands of free and open-source applications automatically with only 2 or 3 clicks.

• Gaming – Linux-based systems are generally not well known for their gaming prowess. However, Ubuntu 9.10 ships with the ability to download over 400 fun games directly from the built-in software centre. All these games are still completely free and installable with only a few clicks.

This latest version of Ubuntu provides advantages for both business workstations and home user desktops. Although not mentioned in this article so far, for enterprises and small home/offices, the server edition of Ubuntu 9.10 is also released tomorrow alongside the desktop edition.

For more information about Ubuntu, visit the official Ubuntu website.

So Google announced in July that they’re going to have a crack at making an OS (operating system). Interesting, we all mused here at Rapidweb. Will it be just a fancy GUI (graphical user interface) for Linux? Will it just be a proverbial middle finger to Microsoft? I guess most importantly will it be any good? Most of these I can’t answer but let’s look at what we know already.

I’m going to start with a list of technology companies that say they will design, build and I quote “devices that deliver an extraordinary end user experience” – exciting prospect. These companies are: Acer, Adobe, ASUS, Freescale, Hewlett-Packard, Lenovo, Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, and Toshiba – some REAL big hitters! But are they just talking about pre-installing Google OS on existing netbooks and smartphones? After all it is Linux based and Linux as we all know could run on an 8o’s calculator watch. As you can see from the quote though it does suggest specific hardware to run on, this could just be Google branded products though with sponsorship advertising from the above mentioned manufacturers.

I really like how Google have re-vamped the web browser, I like how quick it is, it keeps the last bunch of webpages on a kind of active favourites homepage – in theory you could always have your favourite webpages on a single page! I also like the fact that the search bar is also the URL bar, something that Firefox also boasts but will all these innovations be enough to push an OS? One of the biggest features they’re talking about is a near instant boot up, this is interesting, and a lot of netbooks do carry a small SSD drive but it’s still not near instant, perhaps they are talking to manufacturers of chips to make their OS embedded? This in itself creates a number of potential problems, firmware flashes instead of updates? Sure it’ll be quicker initially but if it is going to be embedded wouldn’t that be a step backwards? I mean, for instance, how many people actually update their BIOS (basic input/output system) regularly on their motherboard? Ok techies do, sure but it does make it a niche market and not a widespread user friendly piece of software.

According to reports Google are currently working on a video player and a jukebox style program to roll on their new OS. Again I think it’s good that they are deciding to develop their own, after all if they use Linux based applications Google Chrome OS would just be a re-branded version of Ubuntu. This also keeps other companies on their toes, iTunes may face fierce competition if Google’s jukebox style program can sync with an iPod and I doubt Google would accept money from media goliaths like NBC to enforce DRM (digital restrictions management) so that users are prevented from recording television shows that they have the legal right to record (allegedly).

There are some supposed leaked screenshots of Google OS which you can take a look at here draw your own conclusions though, some claim them to be real some not so convinced, one thing is for sure though – it free so it’s got to be worth a look.

Ok, so we’ve all heard that Microsoft are producing another operating system called Windows 7 but will it be any good? After their last lack lustre release of Windows Vista will people still put their hard earned cash into another Microsoft flight of fancy? Well after having used the release candidate version, that has been available for several months now free of charge, I can say YES! It’s everything Vista should have been! Over the next few weeks our techie supremos will break down the main features for you, perform comparisons to the current Windows XP favourite that the majority of us are still using and give some hints and tips to lesser known features from an end users point of view. Below is a little taster of things to come.

Let’s start with how it installs, after all this will be the first step for anyone, if you’re upgrading from Vista the install process can take a while as Windows 7 will change the settings and keep all the user information as is on your system but as with any new OS (operating System) it’s always advised to do a fresh install. I’ve been a techie for quite a number of years now and as with all techies anything that happens REALLY quickly gets us excited, I have quite a mid range PC just now (AMD X2 6000 processor, 4 gig RAM, 4800 series ATI graphics card) nothing particularly punchy, sure it’s not the slowest of PC’s but for the hardware that’s out there at the minute its mid range for sure. From putting the disc into the drive, allowing the CD drive as the first boot device and selecting the type of install I would like to perform it took 20 minutes, that’s right 20 MINUTES! I was astonished, sure it was missing a couple of drivers but only a couple, bearing in mind I installed this months ago when there was little to no drivers available an all round great result so already I’m impressed.

If anyone has used the help system in Windows XP or Vista you’ll know it’s pretty dilute however not so in Windows 7, it advised me that it had problems installing my Creative X-Fi sound card and would I like to use the online support, here we go I thought, a breadcrumb trail that leads nowhere… it proved me wrong! It advised me that I needed to download an additional driver from the creative site and put the web address on-screen for me, I thought ok, it’s better than the last help and support but I know where the homepage is, I clicked on the link anyway just to see where it would lead me. As I clicked the link a download dialog page appeared asking me where I would like to download the driver too, GENIUS! Although I’m not sure I should have got so excited about an enormous company like Microsoft finally getting their help and support system finally working after 2 OS’s and over 10 years of development.

What this does show us though is that Microsoft is finally listening to customers’ feedback about how users would like the software to work with the key responses being “…just make the features included work correctly and quickly…” – sadly something that Vista fell short on, very short.  So next time on the blog we’re going to go through some of the new features of Windows 7 and how they compare to Windows XP and the equivalent Vista features, stay tuned.

Here is our follow on article on the Look and Feel of Windows 7.