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I asked this question over at the Ubuntu Forums, but I wanted to elaborate more on the subject here. In case you don’t know what Ubuntu is, it is one of the many distributions of Linux. Ubuntu, just like Linux, also has many flavors. There is Linux Mint (a distro aimed at noobs), Ubuntu Studio (a distro aimed at the arts), Mythbuntu, and more.

I have been thinking, and apparently, so have other people in the Ubuntu Idea Pool. There isn’t much of anything for developers and programmers in terms of out-of-the-box usage in Ubuntu, which has lead to the idea of Devbuntu. Devbuntu would be a new flavor of Ubuntu aimed at developers and programmers. The reason for creating a seperate distro is simple, including many programming applications would only bog down Ubuntu for the regular desktop users. Here’s a list of the features I hope would be included in such a distro:

• Specialized packages that are streamlined and optimized for specific use with Devbuntu.
• Supports all modern development languages, and include the option to add on old, outdated languages for the hobbyists out there.
• Includes all the best development libraries, and has the option of installing others.
• Includes testing frameworks such as junit and phpunit.
• Includes the best IDEs for each language, plus the ability to install others.
• Include the best GUIs for FTP, SFTP, SSH, etc.
• Ability to install virtual machines, they would bog down the machine if they come pre-installed.
• GUIs for SVN and CVS.
• Team collaborating tool, which would sync all the code together, including the revision number, who made it, live chat, and maybe more.
• Include the option for various syntax highlighting code writing apps, such as jedit.
• Create one repository that would allow Ubuntu users to easily upgrade to Devbuntu by adding the Devbuntu repository, similar to Ubuntu Studio.
• Cuts out all the fluff included in Ubuntu and creates a basic programming environment with no eye-candy or distractions, but allows the user to install the features if desired.
• Includes the best GTD and mind-mapping software.

That’s all I can think of for now. I might add some features to this later. Tell me what you think of it, and also tell me if you would like to help out with this project, because if there is enough demand for this distro, I will certainly go ahead with creating it.   Also, which windows manager should be installed by default, KDE, Gnome, etc…?

Foreword

This guide has been written with Ubuntu Gutsy(7.10) in mind, but should work for any other OS as well.

Intro

I’ve read several complaints stating that Ubuntu Gutsy’s partitioner was unbearably slow when resizing a Windows Vista NTFS partition. There were also some people asking why it wasn’t slow with Windows XP’s partition. The reason Gutsy isn’t slow when resizing the XP partition is because Windows XP and Windows vista have different versions of the NTFS file system. So basically, something in the code is written wrong, which makes the resizing of a Vista partition painfully slow. But there is another way of doing this without taking a 5 hour coffee break to install Gutsy. You can partition your drives right inside Vista itself. Using this process, I was able to partition, install, and tweak Gutsy in under an hour. Here’s the process I used to partition my hard drive:

Steps

Click Start
Go To Computer and Right-Click
Select Manage

Select Disk Management under Storage in the left hand hierarchy.

Right Click (C:)
Select Shrink Volume

Choose how much you want to partition off, and go.

That was easy wasn’t it? It’s also a heck of a lot quicker than waiting for Gutsy to do it.

Here’s my partition table after partitioning:

NOTE: Having certain features, such as thumbnails, enabled in Vista only allows you to partition a certain amount off your drive, so beware.

Before, I had a long way around to install the beautiful Ubuntu Studio theme on regular Ubuntu. This way worked, but it required typing in the terminal and messing with the sources list. List could get a little complicated for beginner Ubuntuers. I’ve since found out that you can download all the artwork straight from the Ubuntu Studio website. This makes it much easier to install the theme. Here are the new, refined steps for installing the Ubuntu Studio theme on Ubuntu:

1. Go to the downloads page of the Ubuntu Studio website.

2. Download the Feisty Artwork.deb file.

3. Drag and drop the file into the Appearance window. (You can access the Appearance window from System -> Appearance.

First off, some of you may be asking “What is this IRC that you speak of?” Well, IRC, or Internet Relay Chatroom, a way of communicating in real time with people from all over the world. It is made up of different networks of servers, which allow people to connectto discuss just about anything by joining channels. Channels are basically chatrooms with a specific topic. The channel names either begin with a # or an &. Each person on IRC is known by their “Nick” or nickname which is essentially a screen name this name is the name that appears as the person talks. Channels are presided over by operators, which are more commonly known as “ops”. Ops essentially moderate the channel and enforce its rules. There are a large set of commands that IRC allows you to use, but I will not discuss them here because the list is too extensive. Plus, I don’t even know all of them. If you would like to learn more about IRC you should visit the IRChelp website.

In order to join an IRC server and a channel and talk on them, you will need an IRC client. One of the most popular ones for Windows is mIRC, but it is pretty old school looking, and it costs $20 to register after the 30 day trial period. It also reminds me of Windows 98 to be honest. My favorite IRC client is IceChat. It is more modern looking and is very easy to use. For Linux, I like X-Chat, which also has a windows version. And on Macs, I love using Colloquy, which has a couple of great looking skins and integrates with the Mac OS X look and feel very well.

I frequent the #rmxp channel on the irc.slacked.org server. For you other IRC users, what channels do you frequently visit?