My initial observation is a good one. This browser let’s me switch between open tabs by using the scroll wheel, much like Epiphany and others. This is something that hugely increases productivity and makes my browsing experience smoother. Simply place the mouse over any of the tab names, and scroll, and you’ll be going through your open tabs. Simply an awesome feature.

It has other features that I’m anxious to try out. People have been raving about Chrome since it’s release, and it has taken a sizable chunk of the browser market relative to it’s age. We’ll see if it can compete with my current browser of choice, Opera.

Stability and the length of support. I’ve chosen to stick with the Long Term Support releases. Every 2 years, an LTS version is released with 3 years of support. The current LTS version is 8.04, Hardy Heron. The standard releases, every 6 months, are supported for 18 months. I want the stability of sticking with my established version. Such reliable service from my machine is more important to me than using the latest release. The older, LTS version has had patches and/or fixes applied already, and it’ll give me few problems. However, if I were to upgrade to the newest version every 6 months, I’m bound to run into issues somewhere. I’d be sacrificing some stability. That’s the price you pay for living on the bleeding edge.

I will of course use 8.10, Intrepid Ibex. In fact, I’ve installed it on a VirtualBox virtual machine, so I can try it out while not affecting my 8.04.1 installation. I trust the fine folks who maintain Ubuntu to take care of me with patches & fixes, even when my 8.04 LTS gets to be long in the tooth, so I won’t be upgrading until version 10.04 LTS. Ubuntu’s site explains all of this here.

Another interesting bit of info that might affect your decision is found here.  Is Ubuntu getting slower with each new release??

So, what are your plans for upgrading?? Why are you?? Why aren’t you??

Open Evolution from the  Applications > Office menu.

Click on Calenders in the bottom left corner.

Double-click on a date and/or time where you want to place an appointment. A dialog box will open up, fill in the details and click Save to make an appointment.

Click on the time & date on your upper toolbar, in the upper right hand corner of the screen. You’ll see a calender drop down. You’ll notice that whatever day you have put a calender event will be in bold text.

Click on that day, and you’ll get a little display of your appointments for that day.

That’s it, all very quick, and without having to open you calender application.

Here’s what it will look like when you click on a day that you have an appointment scheduled.

sudo apt-get install aptoncd

Now that you have it installed you can find it in System > Administration > APTonCD.

Upon opening it up you’re greeted with 2 options. To make a backup of your programs, click Create.

Now you simply check everything you want to make a backup of (everything is checked by default). A right-click gives check all, and uncheck all options. Click Burn to begin the backup process.

APTonCD has created an *.iso image of your packages ready to be burnt onto a CD or DVD. You can then choose your burning application. I just use the default nautilus cd burner.

Now choose whether you want a CD, or DVD, and the name of your image. The box marked Create a meta-package is a useful tool. It will create a little package on the disc that you can then use upon installation to install every package at once without having to select each and every one of them.

Choose your drive, and write speed. A lower speed will allow a greater chance for disc integrity, I always use 4x. That’s it, your backup disc will be done shortly. Later, we’ll cover how to install or restore from this disc.

Here’s how to install it, open up a terminal and enter this command:

sudo apt-get install glabels

This will installl the 2 packages necessary for gLabels to function, glabels, and glabels-data. Now you can find gLabels Label Designer in the Office menu. This method works great if you have an internet connection. It’s a small download, so even over a dial up connection (like me) it won’t take too long. But what if you don’t have an internet connection at all? If you’re reading this you must have access to the internet at work, or a friend’s house. In that case, you can download gLabels here. Make sure to download both packages, glabels & glabels-data. Put them on a USB flash drive, and then from that onto your internet-less Ubuntu desktop at home. Copy them to your desktop, and then double-click on them to install them. Here’s what that looks like…

Save the file

Save both files to your USB flash drive, then copy them onto your desktop at home.

Double-click on each file and you’ll see this box. Click on Install Package to complete the installation. That’s it!

Here’s what you can expect…

Opening Screen

Choosing a label template

Designing your new label

To download & install the KDE desktop environment that comes with Kubuntu…

code

sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop

To get the XFCE desktop environment that comes with Xubuntu…

code

sudo apt-get install xubuntu-desktop

The next time you login, find the choose session option on the login screen, and choose which one you want to use. In this way you can play with different environments without having to install different operating systems.