LXer Weekly Roundup for 06-Nov-2011

LXer Feature: 06-Nov-2011 Welcome to this week's collection of big stories from the LXer Newswire. Enjoy!

Apple and Microsoft file patents for touchless controls: Recently released patent filings reveal new ways to control devices that do not involve physical contact. Microsoft describes waving one's hands to "draw" three-dimensional objects on a computer, while Apple's designs involve allowing users to "throw" content from one device to another.

Shuttleworth: Linux Power Users Aren't too Cool for Unity: Ubuntu now has 20 million users as founder takes aim at Unity interface criticism and lays out a plan for the cloud, desktop and everything in between.

Xubuntu 11.10 and my Netbook: October saw the release of the latest version of the Ubuntu family and that includes Xubuntu, the Xfce edition. I’ve just installed Xubuntu 11.10 on my netbook and the experience was rather good.

The right to dual-boot: Linux groups plead case prior to Windows 8 launch: Red Hat, Canonical and the Linux Foundation have laid out a set of recommendations for hardware vendors in hopes of preserving the ability to install Linux on Windows 8 machines. Windows 8 machines should ship in a setup mode giving users more control right off the bat, the groups argue.

Mea culpa: coming clean about my n00b Linux mistakes: But, to be honest, what bothers me most, what saddens me the most, is that I’ve always held onto the myth that Linux was the last, best hope for those of us who like to do it ourselves and like to run software we’ve built ourselves. And here’s where my mea culpa comes in. It was, ultimately, my fault that I believed in Linux as much as I did. Those of you working with Linux on a daily basis aren’t at fault for doing what you do or loving your environment.

For one user, the end is near for Ubuntu: I was a huge ubuntu fan. They got it *right* for a few years there, from 9.10 through 10.10 which I currently run on my netbook and desktops. My son's machine is still on 10.04, and now I have a problem. It seems they just decided that 10.04 is reaching end of life and now I can't perform updates on his machine. Further, the option to easily upgrade to 10.10 is no longer available in the update manager, they want us all to move to 11.10.

Fedora Wants To Simplify the Linux Filesystem: Harald Hoyer and Kay Sievers, two Red Hat developers, made an announced their attempt to simplify the Linux filesystem, to clean up the "mess" created when the /bin and /sbin directories were separated.

Registration for SCALE 10X opens: The SCALE 10X team announces that registration has opened for the first-of-the-year Linux expo in North America. Admission for SCALE 10X ranges from $10 for an Expo Only Ticket to $60 for a Full Access Pass. The Linux Beginner’s Training Class, a separate admission, is $25.

The 'Year of the Linux desktop' isn't coming: Linux is 20 years old this year, and for most of those years I’ve been hearing about how the ‘Year of the Linux desktop’ is coming. It’s not coming. Linux it’s stuck permanently at a 1% market share. And that’s where it’ll be ten years from now. But that doesn’t mean that there’s no hope for the OS.