Yet another Ubuntu release is upon us. This time around it’s Oneiric Ocelot (
Ubuntu 11.10).
The last release of Ubuntu was quite controversial in some respects
because of the Unity desktop. This time around Canonical has made some
tweaks to Unity that might provide a potentially better experience.
We’ll find out in this review if that’s true or not.
What’s New In This Release:
Here’s a sample of the new features in this release:
New releases of compiz and UnityNew Alt+Tab switcherPlaces are now called LensesDash has a music lens that uses Banshee to search your musicLaunchers and Panel promise better performanceUbuntu Mono and Ubuntu Condensed have been added to the Ubuntu Font FamilyUnity 2D shares more code with Unity and contains nearly completed accessibility support featuresUbuntu Software Center 5.0 OneConf lets you keep installed applications in sync across multiple computersDVD size has been shrunk to 1.5 GBThunderbird is the default email clientDeja Dup is the default backup toolGwibber has been updatedLightDM is the login manager Synaptic and Pitivi are not installed by default (but they are available in Software Center)Linux kernel 3.0.0-12.20Ubuntu One music collections can now stream to iOS and Android devices
Multiarch support for installing 32-bit application and library packages on 64-bit systems
Firefox 7 included as default browser
LibreOffice 3.4
Let’s jump into some of these new features in no particular order.
The multiarch support means that those running 64-bit systems will
have access to a wider range of 32-bit applications and libraries. Not
every application has to be 64-bit to be useful and so this release of
Ubuntu should be particularly pleasing to those running 64-bit systems.
I’ll talk about the Ubuntu Software Center 5.0 in the software
section of the review. Suffice to say that it’s had a significant
overhaul that should make it a much better experience than it has been
in the past.
The new improvements to Unity are welcome and appreciated. Unity 2D
is nearly on par with the 3D accelerated version. The entire Unity
experience has gotten significantly better in this release. And please
note that I have not exactly been a fan of Unity in the past. I found it
to be significantly more usable than in the past though I still am not
sure I’d want to use it on a day-to-day basis. This time around though
Unity feels much more…livable. I suspect that if I used it long enough I
*might* actually come to like it.
Current users of Unity will note that it feels faster than the last
release and it seems much more consistent than it did previously. I
suspect that some of those who have been hesitating about Unity might
now be swayed by the quality improvements in this release. I make no
promises but if you’ve been skeptical of Unity you might want to give it
another look.
The performance of the Panel and Launchers has been improved and is
definitely noticeable. I never complain when the performance of
something increases so I’m certainly not going to do that now. Kudos to
Canonical for speeding them up.

LightDM is a very attractive login manager (see the screenshot in the
Login/Desktop section of the review). While a new login manager isn’t
earth-shattering news, it goes along with the rest of the improvements
of this release in terms of polish. Little things like this help provide
an overall better user experience when you add them all up.
The change to Thunderbird being the default email client matters very
little to me. I stopped using local email clients and have mostly gone
with web-based mail for a long time now. So I won’t be using Thunderbird
or any other local email client any time soon. But your mileage may
vary and some users might enjoy Thunderbird.
Deja Dup adds some real value by letting you back up locally or
online via Ubuntu One. You get 5GB free with Ubuntu One and that’s a
good start for most people to use for backups. True, it will cost you
some money if you want more space but sometimes additional storage is
worth paying for if you want to use online backups.
Oneconf is an excellent addition that should make it quite
comfortable for anyone who wants to keep their apps in sync across
multiple computers. I like anything that saves me the time and headache
of having to manage things like that manually.
The absence of Pitivi and Synaptic are not particularly bothersome.
You can easily install them later if you find yourself missing them.
Firefox 7 is now the default browser for Ubuntu 11.10. Don’t like
Firefox 7? Well wait a few days and I’m sure Mozilla will release
Firefox 8, 9, 10, etc. Ha, ha. Just kidding.
LibreOffice 3.4 should easily meet the needs of most desktop office suite users.
Gwibber has a new interface based on the latest GNOME technologies.
