Fedora is currently discussing whether to ‘de-emphasise’ officially-supported optical media for future releases of their OS — and the discussion got me thinking about Ubuntu, and the way Ubuntu users install the OS.

So, for this week’s poll, we want to know exactly that: which method you use to install Ubuntu.

Fedora’s Debate

Fedora is not discussing dropping CD or DVD images, as the distro’s QA Kamil Paral stresses. Instead the debate is around how prominent and tested disc images should be if, as is assumed, a lot of people no longer use them.

“I wonder whether some changes in decreasing the importance of optical media could be appropriate. All of that is, of course, motivated by trying to spend QA time more effectively,” he notes.

Furthermore his questions are only related to physical optical media support, not to whether the .iso image in general (i.e. sometimes the .iso may work in a VM but fail when booted from physical media, etc).

It’s an interesting discussion, albeit a potential controversial one. Should failures or issues in a disc image block an alpha or beta release, even when the .iso boots fine? Could the community take over some of the quality and testing roles?

All interesting points to consider.

Poll: How Do You Install Ubuntu?

Think back to the last time you installed Ubuntu: how did you actually install it? Did you use a USB drive? Or did you install Ubuntu using a DVD (or minimal net-install CD)?

If you didn’t install Ubuntu because it came pre-installed then the poll isn’t for you, hence why you don’t see a ‘none of the above’ option. We’re also not counting virtual machine installs which don’t require anything ‘bootable’.

Lodge your choice in the poll below, and scoot down to the comments to add your thoughts on the general point.

P.S. if anyone has any ideas on how to theme PollDaddy polls to look less, well, a*se, i’d appreciate it!