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- daveisfera, on 02/25/2008, -1/+48I used to play around with Linux a lot more when I had time, but I just haven't had time to partition my drive and such, so Wubi sounds like a GREAT idea and it will definitely get me back on the Linux horse.
- argylesocks, on 02/25/2008, -0/+41Wubi is so easy. I have used it with 6.10 on several machines with great results and I didn't see any performance lag. And uninstalling is just as easy. What a brilliant idea, cant wait to see it fully integrated into Ubuntu.
- icechen1, on 02/25/2008, -0/+21It probably means Windows UBuntu Installer?
- Planets, on 02/25/2008, -0/+21It's not the issue of using GRUB. The problem most new Linux users have is installing Ubuntu the "traditional way". Setting up new partitions, etc.
- Planets, on 02/25/2008, -0/+20Right, they want to give that taste of Ubuntu with the least hassle possible on the user's part. Also, there aren't really any significant cons to permanently staying with Wubi.
- paintpro, on 02/25/2008, -0/+16Wubi was my first introduction to linux when a friend installed 6.10 on my computer. I love Ubuntu and use for most activities on my computer. Wubi makes testing the linux waters so easy that everyone should give it a try!
- dinostabOMG, on 02/25/2008, -1/+14So if I understand correctly, the point of this is just to provide new users with a transitional install, with the intention that they will eventually switch to a partition install?
- mazza558, on 02/25/2008, -0/+13Fair enough, but let's not forget that this is a great new opportunity for new users - it's half way between the "no-risk liveCD" (which offers no customization) and a full-blown install. With this, users can install Ubuntu just like another Windows program (like they're used to) and keep using Ubuntu until they're comfortable enough to try dual booting (at which point they can back up their files and go true dual-boot). I already know several people who would love this - people who are on the fence about Ubuntu, and I know they'll be much more likely to try it out with this method.
- ozid, on 02/25/2008, -0/+12It's what I've been recommending to my friends who like my linux computer but don't know enough to install it themselves. Plus it gives them the option to revert back extremely easily if they decide they don't like it for whatever reason.
It's a godsend for people like me who hate explaining what a partition is and how you get from having one to two of them. Although now its pretty elementary to me now that I've done it 30 times. - kingofpenguins, on 02/25/2008, -0/+12Honest question here... Is it possible to use Wubi with another Linux distro (or *BSD) by just installing over top of the Ubuntu "partition"?
- dinostabOMG, on 02/25/2008, -0/+11I just heard about it - at first glance I am not sure why you would want to do this... do you really want your whole Ubuntu install in a Windows folder? With all the implications for file access and security? Maybe it is more convenient for those who just want to try it out, but I use it as my main OS... What is so difficult about using grub?
- mrsteveman1, on 02/25/2008, -0/+9Its actually a disk image sitting in the windows partition, the intention is to make installing ubuntu as easy as installing any other windows application.
- AirRaven, on 02/25/2008, -1/+10The gripe I have with Wubi is its impact on drive access times- it's leaps and bounds ahead of a standard LiveCD, but the "Partition-in-a-file" approach leads to noticably slow HD access times. The OS feels quite a bit more sluggish than it should normally do- not really all that bad on a standard desktop with a fast Hard Drive, but it gets rather noticable to the point of annoyance on a Laptop with a slow HD. In addition, if Ubuntu goes FUBAR at any point during its use and leaves you with no choice but to hard reboot, you stand a much higher chance of wreaking havok on the partition in which Wubi's installed.
I speak from experience there. I know there are ways of recovering from just about *anything* in Linux, but the average user just won't know these. Wubi's comparitively sluggish, and can have serious implications if anything goes wrong. Despite it being a wonderful piece of software, it's just not worth the fuss on systems with slower hard drives- any HD-intensive task runs with all the grace flair of Windows ME dipped in treacle. If there's any optimisation of the drive-access system, I'd quite happily take the chance of any problems occurring and use it in lieu of a "proper" install on systems I wouldn't want to risk partitioning. - AutomatorXV, on 02/25/2008, -1/+9Wubi's the whole reason I got into Linux. I accidentally installed it on my Family PC after trying to run Xubuntu ISO as a live CD and freaked until finding out that it didn't mess up any of the Windows files and how easy it was to remove, then I got to enjoying its superior speed and installing it on my old PII.
- wiresjr, on 02/25/2008, -0/+8You still have to reboot with wubi. It's just an easier way to install a dual-boot system as you can do it from inside Windows and easily remove everything again using add/remove programs. After installing to a specified folder, it sets up a special grub system that loopmounts the folder as a filesystem on reboot. From that point, it's almost exactly the same as having a dual-boot system, except one partition is just a folder on the windows drive. Oh, it also comes with a proggy to transfer the installation to a dedicated partition. Marvellous.
- stoanhart, on 02/25/2008, -0/+8I think you are trivializing the process a little there aldenhq. It is quick if:
a) You've done it before, know what you are doing, and are confident
b) You have already decided how to lay out your drive
If you need to decide what partitions you want, what size, what order, then it takes time. You have to decide what FS you want your bulk data storage to use, where you will keep "my documents" so you can access them with all operating systems. These decisions depend on the OS you are running (try putting your linux home directory on a Fat32 partition... not fun), and what other OS's you want to access them with.
Then, you need to back up all your data because even though nothing has ever gone wrong, there is no way in hell I am going to trust my data to operations as inherently risky as resizing and moving partitions. What if the power goes out?
And what if something goes wrong. Sometimes GParted can't complete an operation for some reason. If you're unlucky, some of the operations have completed so your hard drive is in a funky state where half of the changes you want have been done. Maybe your old OS won't boot anymore. If you don't have time to undertake the (usually lengthy) repair operations, you probably shouldn't start the whole process in the first place.
Wubi is definitely a plus for new users who want to try Ubuntu. - aaabatteries, on 02/25/2008, -0/+7will wubi work for installing over operating systems other than Windows?
e.g., Mac OS X, FreeBSD, etc... - arcticblue, on 02/25/2008, -0/+6You must be new. It's 2008, hence the 8, and it's going to be released in April so that makes it 8.04.
- icechen1, on 02/25/2008, -0/+6I heard there's Lubi to install inside linux but never heard of a Mac version.
- Innocentious, on 02/25/2008, -0/+6RTFM!!!!!!!!
- icechen1, on 02/25/2008, -0/+5Ask it in ubuntuforums not here
- DarkTrancer, on 02/25/2008, -0/+5Why would it run slower? It is linux that just uses a different filesystem
- sirhomer, on 02/25/2008, -0/+5Actually the Ubuntu LiveCD comes with Gparted, just go to System -> Administration -> GNOME Partition Manager. This is only on the LiveCD, and is not installed when you install the system. Also, Ubiquity (the normal Ubuntu installer) that comes on the LiveCD has an integrated partition manager, abet not as powerful as gparted it can still accomplish most partitioning tasks.
- aldenhg, on 02/25/2008, -5/+10You haven't had time to partition your drive? It takes about 8 minutes to download a Gparted ISO and about 3 minutes to boot it up and then a few minutes telling it how you want your drive to look and then you let it do it's thing. In most cases the whol process shouldn't take more than half an hour.
- inactive, on 02/25/2008, -1/+6Why the hell do you dual boot XP Pro and Vista? That's just wasting hard drive space. Pick one.
- Frou, on 02/25/2008, -0/+5Wubi sounds pretty cool. I think I'm going to try it right now.
- mattmcm, on 02/25/2008, -0/+5That's true, but me personally, I like backing up my data before doing any partitioning. I know it's not necessary because Gparted works great (never screwed up for me yet) but I still like the peace of mind.
- h0ly, on 02/25/2008, -0/+5From the article: "a new sound server called PulseAudio, the new GIO and GVFS I/O abstraction layer and virtual filesystem mechanisms, the PolicyKit secure privilege escalation framework, improved support for virtualization, and a new VNC client"
Personally, I think GVFS is a great step in fixing some annoying bugs on a more fundamental level, and I'm happy to see that PulseAudio has matured enough to replace the clunky ESD server. Those two changes will probably make the GNOME experience so much smoother. - wiresjr, on 02/25/2008, -0/+4They _are_ dual-booting, and there's an included program (in ubuntu) to move the wubi install to a different partition. It's even better than you think it is.
- Stonekeeper, on 02/25/2008, -0/+4"The difficulty of installing Linux is often cited as a major impediment by prospective users."
Huh? It's easier than installing XP. Or do people forget that you need to partition disks to install XP too? At least when you install ubuntu you can say "yeah, use my entire drive and set it up as you like". - stoanhart, on 02/25/2008, -1/+5As far as I can tell, I did.
Oh, look, there I go again! - xivulon, on 02/25/2008, -0/+4The wubi frontend is GPL and rather simple to rebrand and reuse by other distros (ask in the Wubi forum if you need help rebranding).
But there are also some back-end changes that need to be incorporated inside of a distribution to support installing/booting/rebooting from a loop device. Again ask in the Wubi forum for any further info.
Because of the latter point it is not generally possible to install another Linux distro by simply swapping the Wubi files (as a guest). It is well possible to install Ubuntu via Wubi inside hosts different from Windows though. Linux host is already supported by Lubi as for the mac version it will happen too sooner or later. - mmmiiikkkeee, on 02/25/2008, -0/+4you should e-mail the maker of your wifi card. tell them you want then to open the spec to the card so an open soucre driver can be made.
- nickb827, on 02/25/2008, -0/+4No, it uses a virtual HDD, stored on your regular HDD. Its not a "real" partition.
- unrealmp3, on 02/25/2008, -0/+3you sound wubbish
- Isidore, on 02/25/2008, -2/+5Good progress - hope the bugs are ironed out enough. I couldn't get it to work last year.
How did Firefox become popular - even with the non-tech types?
One of the main reasons was 'try before you buy' with your REAL DATA including
- easy import of Favorites/Bookmarks, home page etc
- did not require you to dump IE
- only an extra program
- can ignore or uninstall it easily if you want.
Live CDs tend not to let you work on existing documents and media, so this type of trial seems artificial and too little. But taking the plunge with a Linux seems too much of a commitment too soon.
Ubuntu inside Windows lets the user learn the look and feel of Ubuntu, and learn many of the Linux ways of doing things on their real-world documents/data etc..
After that some might take the step towards dual-booting, Windows and Ubuntu. Assuming they can safely read and write the data on their NTFS partition from Ubuntu. They they will see and have a choice of which OS is superior for their different purposes.
It would be nice if a major PC vendor gave a dual-boot option, pre-partitioned with Windows using a separate partition for Documents and Settings, which Ubuntu also used. Having anti-malware cleanup software run from Ubuntu would make a stunning point. - tech42er, on 02/25/2008, -0/+3Yeah. I've guess I've always just used Ubiquity. Hasn't always worked, though.
- dosware, on 02/25/2008, -0/+3I'll second the potential risk of FUBARing your partition if a hard reset is required. I installed Wubi 7.10 on a second hard drive (not the windows boot drive), and had to perform a hard reset after a freeze. Couldn't see that drive's contents after rebooting. Running Window's disk check did fix that- but scary.
I later learned that under Linux the Alt-Sysrq R E I S U B key combo (all keys held down) can usually reboot a frozen system without corrupting the drive contents. Has workd for me. - mmmiiikkkeee, on 02/25/2008, -0/+3i did not like the "F#@% Microsoft" remark either. But at least it simi "on topic"( Microsoft make windows, and this article is about getting windows user to move to Linux...(ok it not very 'on topic' but some what)). this post is clearly "off topic".. I can't see how to relate his post to the article at all.??? can you?
- joycevdb, on 02/25/2008, -0/+3I love this - looking at the case studies -- it has been extremely successful for businesses and schools around the world.
http://www.ubuntu.com/products/casestudies
Keep improving! - Ellipsys, on 02/25/2008, -0/+3Wubi looks interesting, though I don't plan on using it. What I really hope is integrated into 8.04 is complete support for the Asus Eee. Eeeuser forums individuals have nice scriptpacks to hack it into (mostly complete) functionality, but I've heard that 8.04 will have most of those integrated. Anyone try out 8.04 Alpha 5 on your Eee? In any case, both Wubi and the increased functionality of 8.04 will certainly be a nice step forward for linux adoption. Coupled with the recent WINE improvements, I think we're seeing the OS' user experience really mature.
- stoanhart, on 02/25/2008, -0/+2Just hold Alt+Sysreq and then one at a time, enter these letters
R (Raising) - Forgot what this does.
S (Skinny) - Sync the disks
E (Elephants) - Kill all processes
I (Is) - Kill all processes that are still running, stubborn bastards!
U (Utterly) - Unmount all drives
B (Boring) - Reboot
It's essentially an emergency clean shutdown. Also, like daradib said, wait a second between each command to give the system time to do it. - Aitese, on 02/25/2008, -0/+2If you're only a fan of Ubuntu for themes you've totally missed the point.
- xivulon, on 02/25/2008, -0/+2...also known as xivulon...
- kazamx, on 02/25/2008, -0/+2This is the LTS. No big changes in an LTS. The version after the LTS is where they can go crazy, and they will.
- mrsteveman1, on 02/25/2008, -0/+2bst coment evar!
- daradib, on 02/25/2008, -0/+2Take a look at Lubi and UNetbootin
http://sourceforge.net/projects/lubi - inactive, on 02/26/2008, -0/+2no one does
- mrm3x1can, on 02/25/2008, -0/+2"Although Wubi is very impressive, there are still some bugs that have to be resolved. For instance, suspend and hibernation did not work in Wubi during my tests and some users report that Wubi doesn't work at all with the 64-bit version of Ubuntu."
this is a actually a problem with the alpha of heron and not wubi - xivulon, on 02/25/2008, -0/+2It's very unlikely that suspend and hibernation will be fixed for 8.04 anyway. Hopefully they will be addressed in 8.10.
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