With all the positive press about ubuntu I thought I would add some constructive negative press about the installer.
I downloaded the CD from the web and installed on laptop. First problem is that it appears that you cannot keep windows and resize partitions like some. I got partition magic from work and partitioned with ntfs, fat32 (cross over), ext3, swap, ext3. I boot up. I am confused by the partition options (does it really just consume all 40 gig as a big partition if I select wipe everything?). Fiddle selecting custom setup. Ok after trying to figure it out, if you define your partitions before ubunto install it will not let you overwrite them by default (good idea but...) it was really confusing the 'not used' confused me and there was no warning saying that it located ext3 partitions and it would not use them. Eventually figure out that I have to change partitions from do not use to ext3 and it then works OK. Onwards with the install. Get to user setup. I type in Ken Foskey, user ken, password, and it clocks back to the beginning with something flicking up on screen. I am not sure whether it is prompting me because of an error or whether it actually is asking me to create another user. Either way not very friendly. OK I give up trying to figure out how to create a user, I figure I must have done that already. Continue install, install goes nicely installing everything after asking me to SELECT packages. Funny it never actually asked me to select anything just installed a base system. -1 for misleading instructions. It boots up fine. and now I find out I cannot log on, obviously it was an error message from the user creation screen. No password for root, no userid, no good. The installer needs some work before i would call it really easy to use. Seems to be streamlined for a simple clean all setup. Error messages appear to be a bit weak when things go wrong. I will bring it along tonight and hopefully someone can crack the userid problem. -- Ken Foskey -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
