Ubuntu: Critical GUI Failure After X Window Update Reversion

Many users of the increasingly popular Ubuntu Linux distribution found themselves on Tuesday thrown back to mid-1990s, when a botched update to the graphical X Window subsystem brought them face-to-face with the command-line terminal.

The update, pushed out to Ubuntu users Monday night, aimed to fix some hardware issues to the X Window software used by almost all Linux systems, but instead caused the graphical user interface (GUI) to fail to initialize, leaving users to deal with issuing text commands through the terminal. By Thursday, more than 700 comments had been posted to the Ubuntu forums by affected users looking for answers, and the Linux project--managed by software and service firm Canonical--issued an apology.

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