Many enthusiast PC sites create buying guides for people looking to build their own PC’s from components. For instance, The Tech Report released their latest system guide. For the first time they made a recommendation for a “mini-econobox” built around Intel’s Atom processor, and intended to be as small and quiet as possible. Their recommended OS for this machine? Ubuntu, of course.

Earlier this week, Zimbra quietly released version 5.0.9 of the Open Source Edition of the Zimbra Collaboration Suite. This release is the first to offer official support for Ubuntu 8.04, the latest LTS release of Ubuntu. As evidenced by the traffic on this bug in Zimbra’s bug tracker, users of Zimbra on Ubuntu have been clamoring for this support since long before The Hardy Heron was released in April. Users of the ZCS on Ubuntu now have a clear upgrade path that will allow them to keep current on both components for the foreseeable future. Hopefully this release and the presence of Zimbra at the Canonical booth at OSCon are both indicators of an increasing synergy between these two groups. When you have the de facto leader in OSS groupware working with the de facto leader in OSS desktops, it can only mean good things!

One of the classic problems that newcomers to Linux face is locating and installing software to do the work they want to accomplish. With Synaptic in Ubuntu, installing the software has been made simple, but choosing which software to install can still be a challenge. The more than 20,000 packages that Ubuntu offers up can be daunting indeed. This is where sites like Gnomefiles.com can come in. Gnomefiles is a clearing house of software built on GTK, the application toolkit that underpins the Gnome desktop that Ubuntu uses.

About a year ago, I installed Ubuntu on the laptop owned by a friend of mine who lives back east. Here’s her Ubuntu story … back in 2007, and today.

Previously, I introduced my theory of the Difficulty Divide. It’s a concept that I’ve used for several years when talking about why I use Linux, and why some people may give up on it. I also promised that I would present on how I’ve modified it in recent years to reflect the current state of things. Before I do that though, I think some clarification is in order.

Over the years, I’ve developed a generalized theory about the relative cost of getting things done in Windows versus that of Linux, and as something of a corollary, the reason a lot of people say Linux is too hard, or “not ready for the desktop.”

One of the great services that Canonical offers with Ubuntu is shipping free installation disks to anyone who requests them. With 8.04 “Hardy Heron” going into final release, they have started accepting pre-orders for CD’s at Shipit. If it’s difficult for you to do large downloads, or you’re just someone who would appreciate a shiny pressed CD of Ubuntu, head over and put in your request!

The Everex Cloudbook is one of the more recent entries into the realm low-power portable computers that come pre-loaded with Linux. In the case of the Cloudbook, it comes with gOS “Rocket,” which is based on Ubuntu. It is the perfect companion to the Sager laptop I recently purchased and reviewed, in that it virtually everything that the Sager isn’t. Small, light, and virtually pocketable. All while being powerful enough for most of the day-to-day tasks that come up while I’m out and about.

As a nearly full-time Linux user, it can be frustrating when exciting new hardware comes out. My enthusiasm is often squelched when I find out that the new device offers no support for my beloved OS of choice, Ubuntu.

I recently described how I came to purchase a Sager NP2092, after searching high and low for a laptop that would meet my requirements. Now, I’d like to share some first impressions about the laptop, upon which I’ve installed Ubuntu.