Ch-ch-ch-ch-Changes
It has been an eventful week in the world of Ubuntu. It started with a move to an online format for UDS, progressed through a discussion about the possibility of rolling releases and the announcement of Mir as a replacement for X windowing. That is a lot of change. I have waited until now to write about these changes because I wanted to take my time to reflect on each of them and Ubuntu as a project.
Today the Ubuntu Community Council had a discussion about these events with Mark Shuttleworth. There was one consistent theme; we all want Ubuntu to be successful. One thing Mark expressed is that for Ubuntu to be successful it must succeed with lots of people across all the platforms they use. I agree with him; I would not consider Ubuntu a success if it ends up being no more than the most popular linux distribution for desktops and laptops.
It is my opinion that the emergence of phones and tablets as personal computing devices presents an amazing opportunity for Ubuntu. The two major players, Android and iOS, are tablet and phone operating systems only. Apple has OS X and Google has chrome, and there is no doubt in my mind that they are working towards a convergence as well. The time for Ubuntu to take the lead is now. This would be a dramatic change for Linux in general and Ubuntu specifically. I have no doubt that the incredibly talented people at Canonical and in the Ubuntu Community have a real shot at taking the lead and getting their first. I imagine this process will involve periods of chaos and moments of pain that will require decisive and difficult decisions.
Technology moves rapidly so this opportunity needs to be seized quickly and will require the community and Canonical to be agile. With this in mind one can begin to understand the recent changes and announcements.
UDS Goes Online:
The first thing that has to be acknowledged is that this decision was poorly timed for members of the community. Many people, including myself, are not going to be able to attend sessions due to being at work. With less than a weeks notice there was simply not enough time to take time off from work. While my initial thoughts were focused on the lack of in-person time and the informal conversations that happen outside the sessions I realized today, after attending one session, that there were many things that would be better. Todays remote experience was a far better than my previous remote sessions. I was able to clearly understand what was being said by the people in the hangout compared to poor audio from the fish bowls of the past. I saw more people contributing to the pad and more attention paid to the IRC channel. When I attended sessions remotely in the past I felt like a person that got bad …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Planet Ubuntu