Well. I’ve been thinking and suddenly I came up with an idea of writing a few sentences about new (1.1) version of Jolicloud. I must admit that it is really improved comparing to version 1.0. The upgrade brought us many interesting and pretty useful changes, that made this system working better.

I was attending in the two upgrade approaches. One on my computer and the second on the Asus Eee PC netbook of my friend. On none of them upgrade went well. In my case (Windows installation version) it crashed, when I went, following the advice displayed on the screen, to the kitchen for my coffee. When I got back there was black screen with shell and some error like: “Something went wrong. Dropping to shell”. Well, no chance of repair. After the reboot the system crushed. After the reinstall on my Windows, everything is fine.

On the netbook it was even funnier. It was clean install made from the ISO image, so it was like normal GNU/Linux distribution. Upgrade failed of course. My friend tried making an upgrade from the shell, which took us about 6 hours for all the packages download, install and configure. After then the system shown the message about error of the package manager, which could not install jolicloud-common package. After another hours of running some repairs the system started, but there was no program bar on the top. I still don’t know how it ended. So, if you can, just make clean install of Jolicloud, instead of counting on the upgrade system.

Now let’s see some improvements made in this new version.

Local apps directory

For a long time I’ve been missing my local apps, installed on the system but available to me in a handy way. Everyone, who’s been using Jolicloud before, knows the problem. I have had Rhythmbox installed, but running it was a horror. Every time, I was forced to go to the This Device tab, then open Local Apps page and open All Applications directory, then search for my program. Of course the more apps you have had to run, the less work was needed to be done in order to do it. However, now we have Local Applications directory on the Dashboard, which is really cool! I mean it. You can add your very own application to this directory. You can’t put any of your apps on the main screen of dashboard though. Still it is easy and fast enough to be appreciated.

The wallpaper

Another, not so useful, but making your Jolicloud more yours is the option of choosing and uploading your own wallpaper. The file is uploaded to their server, so wherever you use Jolicloud, you get your favorite wallpaper. The library of wallpapers available to all Jolicloud users is reach and nice, so you may not even upload yours. Especially if you have no idea on wallpaper (I doubt that).

What is still needed?

I see there are still some problems, that hasn’t been fixed yet. The first one is the service of the multiple screens. Especially when I’m at home and I would like to use my 24″ screen. It is really hard to make it work on Jolicloud. First thing is detection of the screen on the fly. I have to start Jolicloud with the monitor connected to the computer, since on other cases it will not even detect it. But as far as I know it is issue known to all GNU/Linux distributions. Second problem is working with the resolutions. Resolution higher than 1280px in width is not for Jolicloud. It shows the smaller (its maximum?) version of Jolicloud in one corer, and the rest of the screen is useless. The third thing is changing the screens. Getting to the settings responsible for the screen is another horror. I hope this (or even part of it) will be fixed soon.

The second thing I would like to see in Jolicloud is some sort of settings of my Dashboard. I have 15,4″ screen in notebook and Jolicloud is loosing too much space for me on showing only two rows of apps on one screen. I would like to be able to chose how many rows and columns of apps I have on my dashboard.

Anyway, new Jolicloud, except some troubles with upgrade and still problems with bigger screens, does great. It starts even faster then before, what is big advantage. It goes down pretty fast as well. I have noticed though that when I turn it to sleep it starts without asking me about the password, when on the other hand, after turning off the screensaver it asks. I think the solution should be somewhere in the settings of the system, so that’s not a big deal. I think Jolicloud is still best alternative for all Netbook/Windows users. It is fast, easy and web oriented. And they are still working on it. I thing the final version 2.0 will be really better than now. I am waiting for any news on it.