Thinking about Ubuntu

BarryG

BarryG

I'll stick to my 2 inches
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I am considering making a full switch to Ubuntu, but there are a couple of things that I'm not sure about.

1) RAW support
I assume RAW is supported in GIMP? I had my first play with GIMP today, hence the consideration of a full swicth

2) iPad support
I have 2 iPads and an iPhone, I know updates can come wirelessly to the devices now, but it would be good to know I can plug it in and run a backup etc. What solutions are out there? Would I need to run iTunes in WINE? Is there another option? I don't know why iTunes don't have a Linux verison.

Ubuntu 12.04 looks very good, if I can get these 2 things sorted I can finally say goodbye to Windows :)
 
Failing an Ubuntu option, does anyone know of a very tiny windows 7 version?

If push comes to shove I will dual boot solely for iTunes.
 
gimp can import raw files through ufraw, or dcraw. Ufraw is nicer, imho. I grabbed the latest ufraw source for d7000 support which built/installed fine on Lucid, which is rather old now.

There's also rawstudio, rawtherapee, digikam and others you can play with.
 
Thanks Beth, sounds like that is the photo editing side of things sorted!

Just need to iTunes support now! Don't really want to dual boot if at all possible.
 
I use Ubuntu daily (in fact this is being posted from Ubuntu), and like you was considering a switch to get away from propriety non open source software. However while there are tools such as gimp, Rawtherapee, and various photo library managers, I found that they came up well short in terms of functionality and performance in comparison to the commercial alternatives which are not available on Linux.

Another problem I encountered was that of screen calibration. Basically while it can be done, you can only do it by eye and the tools that I found to do this were basic in the extreme.

Print drivers are also a very poor relation to their Windows/Mac counterparts, and lacking features that can be quite important.

All in all I found Ubuntu a less than ideal system for photo work. I'm not saying you can't use Ubuntu for photography, it's just that you'll probably get far better and far faster results from the tools that the mainstream systems have to offer.

As with everything YMMV. In the end I decided to stick with Mac for my photo work.
 
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What do mean by itunes? there's quite a few 'manage your ipod/mp3 player' type things in the ubuntu repo: gtkpod, gpixpod, mythexport...
Synaptic is your friend for finding them all, or search the repo at http://packages.ubuntu.com/
 
Thanks Slaphead, if I do end up dual booting I'll keep Photoshop for now. I don't really use the machine for much more than photos and storage so maybe this exercise won't be fruitful.

Beth, it doesn't have to be iTunes at all and I only use the iPads and iPhone for apps - so music/video transfer isn't necessary. Do these other applications manage apps too? I'll have a look at your link too, thanks for that.
 
I run a mixed network here. I have 1 BSD Unix machine (main fileserver), 3 Linux machines (running various versins of Ubuntu and used as HTPCs) and 5 Windows (XP and 7) machines. I'm perfectly competent with Linux - I was building some device drivers last night for remote controls - but every time I try using a Linux machine "properly", I end up getting very frustrated as I keep finding bugs. Yes, there are often how-tos but they are often out of date and you can be very much on your own.

IMHO, stick with Windows or OSX unless you have an overriding problem with whatever OS you are using.
 
After 2 annoying years using Ubuntu, i've finally gave in and went back to Windows. Everything else was ok, except photography/video work, trying to find a program that supported the RAW files from my camera was just frustrating. Only RawTherapee worked and by worked I mean could change the colour temp, not much else. Couldn't add noise reduction at all, changing the exposure would change the colour temp, etc.

The only positive from my time on Ubuntu will be getting the best out of GIMP (no other choice really), and when I go back to Windows I'll be using GIMP again.

As Arad says, if you hit a problem (and you will) you really do feel alone. I was having a mounting problem with a hard drive, I Googled the problem to find only 20 results, all on Ubuntu forums and none answered/solved.
 
Barry, I don't know off hand.

I haven't used windows for about 15years now, been able to find free software to do what I want. Probably helps that I used to hack linux for a living firstly doing tiny embedded systems for set-top-boxes and then toolchain and kernel support for a processor manufacturer. Not that I'm against windows as such, I've just bought photomatix for windows but run it under wine!

For proper 'work', or getting a job done I tend to advise people to use what you are used to, not bash your head against a paradigm that's not familiar. If you want to play it's a different matter. Ubuntu has p'ssed off many people with it's unity interface so folks have been recommending Mint as a better new user distro.
As for problems. Nah, I've never felt alone.
 
BethAtTheHug said:
Probably helps that I used to hack linux for a living firstly doing tiny embedded systems for set-top-boxes and then toolchain and kernel support for a processor manufacturer.
Click to expand...
Cambridge... processor manufacturer... ARM by any chance? ;)

BTW, I do set-tob box software for one of the larger set-top chip manufacturers...
 
Nope. MIPS... before they made stooopid decisions on the eve of the banking crisis and ended up having to ditch our office to keep afloat.
 
Ahh.. that fits better.... You were working for our competition then ;)
 
Yup, I think everyone was our competition. ARM were the enemy, we were better obviously. Didn't stop a number of my colleagues taking up residence with them. Must have been fun for the lawyers!

BTW, STB's were with Amino Communications - linux based IPTV, not MIPS. At the latter we didn't make anything just licensed core IP for others to make SoC's/etc.
 
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As mentioned "Mint" is a great build suited more to media. if you really need itunes then use wine to run it if not theres plenty of other programs out there to back up your iphone/pad etc which is alot faster.
 
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BethAtTheHug said:
Ubuntu has p'ssed off many people with it's unity interface
Click to expand...
This is why I switched to xubuntu :)
Wish I'd done it sooner, tbh.
Of course, one of the advantages of Linux is they're (mostly) burned to CD as Live versions, too, so easy to try before committing to an install.
 
Oh... another example of Linux being not too clever. I have an i7 laptop with external Nvidia GFX. Under Windows, this is supported with their Optimus technology which decides which is best - internal or external gfx - depending on the program being run. Optimus isn't supported in Linux. Now whether this is the cause or not I don't know, but I loaded Ubuntu Live the other day to do some network testing. Result: the CPU fan was on 100% even if the machine was idling. On windows, it barely rises above whisper... Linux just isn't there for todays latest technology.

BTW, Unity is easy to remove. Just install a different windowing system and select it from the tools dropdown before you log in....
 
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