Unity is the new desktop environment for Ubuntu, having first premiered in
version 11.04, significantly enhanced with version 11.10, and very much the
cornerstone of the upcoming 12.04 release.
A striking departure from Gnome 2, Unity has been seen as a source of
controversy in the Linux world.
This talk will outline some of the design goals that Unity addresses, noting
strengths, weaknesses, and improvements across the three versions of Ubuntu in
which it's been included.
While Unity offers many usability affordances, some Ubuntu users prefer to
customize it for their specific workflows. Linux is famous for its
customizability, and Unity is no exception if you know which tools to look
for.
This presentation will outline some of the tools available through the Ubuntu
Software Center to show you how to customize the Unity interface.
Speaker Bio: Richard Gaskin is President of Fourth World, a software design
and development consultancy in Los Angeles. Since founding the company in
1994, he's developed dozens of commercial and open source applications used by
a wide range of organizations, including FedEx, AOL, the US Library of
Congress, and hundreds of universities around the world.
Although he started his career with Mac OS, Richard has since delivered
applications for Irix, every version of Windows, and has been developing for
Linux for the last two years.
Richard has spoken at more than a dozen tech conferences, including UbuCon,
LiveCode Developer Conference, and MacTech where he had the distinction of
being the only presenter using Linux.
Date: Thursday March 8, 2012 7:00 PM - 9:00 PM
Location: Downs 107