The real meaning is lost in translation.

It's one of three things for me.

1) The author feels Ubuntu is becoming the Microsoft of Linux and he will not continue to support it based on ethical reasons.

2) The cost of supporting and maintaining quality free software takes considerable effort and time. You have to be altruistic in every sense of the word to be an open source developer. People expect and sometimes demand you keep pace with every release of Ubuntu and be technical support/troubleshooter for them. All of that for free.

3) He hates Unity and is moving on (like I did). Just kidding, Ubuntu, err I mean Lubuntu is great.

It's number 2. He's hoping to take a break for a bit and then maybe come back at a bit slower pace. http://blog.ubuntu-tweak.com/2012/10/22/thank-you-ubuntu-twe...

"Ubuntu, err I mean Lubuntu is great."

Don't forget Xubuntu ;)

I've never really understood this, what's so hard about "apt-get install xfce" and choosing that from the gdm menu instead of Unity? Why is there an entire secondary project for something that used to be a checkbox choice on Debian and Redhat?

if you've got an old computer that you're trying to make useful, it's a lot easier (for most users, who can't config the alt-installer) to just download and burn xubuntu.

What is (was) the importance of Ubuntu Tweak?

I am asking as someone who does not use Ubuntu and with knowledge of http://ubuntu-tweak.com/. On the Mac, there are many tools which appear similar. What is different on computers running Ubuntu?

It was the equivalent of PowerTools(/Tweak/XP Toy? possibly had another name) for Windows XP in that it made many Gnome & Compiz tweaks one-click options, which given Ubuntu's easy-to-use focus went down well.

Things like displaying certain icons on the desktop (which I know in Windows used to require a registry setting without a tweak tool), or the contents of your home folder on your desktop.

One of things us Linux heads liked the Ubuntu of old was how customizable it was. Ubuntu Tweak allows you to tweak the OS without having a PhD in Ubuntu or the command line.

It allowed people who didn't know how to use google to tweak some aspects of their computer. Going by what I've read while attempting to help people in the Ubuntu forums, Ubuntu-tweak was roughly as reliable as pasting lines from google searches into a root prompt.

Disaster! Ubuntu Tweak is the first thing I install whenever I set up Ubuntu.

I don't like some aspects of Unity, and this is great tool for tweaking it. Does anyone know of a good alternative?

Not using Unity?

I quite like Unity once I've tweaked it. The only thing I still don't like is the global menus (a UX abomination), and I can live with that.

  sudo apt-get autoremove appmenu-gtk appmenu-gtk3 appmenu-qt

That works on 12.04; you might need to remove a slightly different set of packages on 12.10 but it's certainly possible to change.

What was the reason behind this? "not free anymore"==??

It's likely in response to Ubuntu's controversial new "feature" of including Amazon search results in unity search (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/09/24/ubuntu_amazon_sugges...)

I'm guessing it may have had more to do with Ubuntu's decision to "develop out of the public eye": http://techcrunch.com/2012/10/18/canonical-ceo-mark-shuttlew...

dead response from rlpb:

In a subsequent blog post, Mark Shuttleworth says: """ What I offered to do, yesterday, spontaneously, is to invite members of the community in to the things we are working on as personal projects, before we are ready to share them. This would mean that there was even less of Ubuntu that was NOT shaped and polished by folk other than Canonical – a move that one would think would be well received. This would make Canonical even more transparent. So please disregard the commentary by folk who assumed that the public discussion of Ubuntu development would somehow change. """ http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/1207

I love this (from the article):

"You trust us not to screw up on your machine with every update." -- Mark Shuttleworth

That's not the same as "I trust you with my personal information." No matter how trivial, it's still personal information.

Seems like this could be a potential security risk, as well, although I'm having trouble articulating it.

The simple truth is that you cannot use an OS without trusting its developers. To a lesser degree, the same is true for any software. I do not like this dependence either but it seems to be a reality we (at least I) have to accept.

I don't think that is true of software at all. I wouldn't trust Fyodor (well, I suppose these days I would. Not in the past though), but I do and always have trusted Nmap.

The fact that we're okay with running their code need not necessarily mean that we should be okay with sending them personal information. The two are mutually exclusive.

The word you're looking for is "orthogonal".

Mutually exclusive means that either one, xor the other can be true, but not both. That is not the case here. You can be OK with running someone's code and with sending them your personal information.

It's strange because he wrote "making free software is not free" not "using free software is not free". This gives the impression that somehow working on ubuntu tweak is costing him too much money.

From his tweets, the latest version of ubuntu tweak is built on a web view, which means some parts of the soft is running on the server, and so far this server nearly runs out of the bandwidth.

Maybe he should have approached Ubuntu then? I bet it wouldn't be a significant expense for them to host such a useful utility.

I am curious why it would need to be a web view that he hosts, rather than something running locally on the user's machine.

If so, a nice feature would have been to add the removal of this to Ubuntu Tweak

He explained this in a later article: http://blog.ubuntu-tweak.com/2012/10/22/thank-you-ubuntu-twe... He feels like Ubuntu tweak is getting too high maintenance and that he just needs to step away from it for a little while, to work out a balance with his job and life and such.

xxaio, I tried to respond directly to you but you are hellbanned.

My guess is that this app might take a lot of time, and unless the developer is paid well elsewhere then a realization may be had--time costs money :/.

That's my only complaint about free software--UX can be rough at times for the uninitiated.

I wonder the same thing.

Development of free software never stops. It only pauses until someone picks up a fork.

Unless no one does, which is very frequently the case.

This app made my migration a lot easier back in the day. While it's certainly bad it's not a complete disaster.There are other apps that can replace it's functionality.

Janitor alternative: Bleachbit

Software Sources: Yppa Manager (not exactly one click goodness compared to Ubuntu Tweak but maybe that's better considering I always end up in a dependency hell on Ubuntu one way or another)

Visual Stuff and miscellaneous settings: MyUnity and Unsettings.

These are just some suggestions,my suggestions, and I haven't used any of these since the 12.04 release.If you know better alternatives please reply so everybody can see.

Strange. I've been using Ubuntu for over four years as my only OS for work and home but I've never heard of this.

its on github! https://github.com/tualatrix/ubuntu-tweak

I moved my laptop to Mint a while ago, and my Ubuntu desktop uses Cinnamon instead of Unity (and I might move that to Mint once 14 is released)

Elementary is also becoming an option, but I'm really looking forward to Steam and while it should be able to run on Mint I'm not sure it will on Elementary.

I don't really like these tools. Developers should be forced to make these options available in default settings.