Ubuntu

I have been using Redhat and Fedora Core for as long as I can remember. A long long time ago, I did have an installation of slackware but since then it has been Redhat and now Fedora, all the way.

So just for the sake of trying something different I downloading the DVD image for Ubuntu. It's interesting that the same DVD can be used as a live DVD and to install the OS. In fact it was quite a suprise to find that the installer actually boots off the live DVD to start the installation process. This is a huge huge improvement over the Fedora installer which always forces you to reboot for the slightest thing.

But the Ubuntu installer isn't all plain sailing. It repeatedly failed to recognize my partition system. Finally I figured out the reason, it expects the swap partition to appear before the root. That is, the swap partition should have a lower number than the root. This is ridiculous. perhaps there is something elese that bugging it, but what matters is the the installer kept failing until I tried swapping the swap and the root.

One good thing about the installer is that it didn't mess up grub, which Fedora has always done for me.

The first boot of Ubuntu of the hard disk is disappointing. It doesn't seem to have as many pre installad packages as Fedora.