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Sometime during the Ubuntu 9.04 release, Canonical added a 60-second delay when Reboot or Shutdown was selected. At that time it was at least possible to go to the "User Switcher Preferences" and disable the delay. Now, with the 9.10 release, that disable option seems to have disappeared.
Webmin provides a web based interface to manage an Ubuntu server. One of the management options is to configure daemons to start at boot time. This task can be performed using Webmin.
So my folks Windows XP box started having difficulty booting. Most of the time it would go to boot and suddenly you'd be back at the BIOS, then the "Windows didn't shutdown properly last time" menu and then once you selected "boot normally" the cycle would begin again. Usually eventually you'd get lucky and Windows would boot (but sometimes they gave up first). Not good...
Another thing which is a trifle annoying is the amount of time taken to boot up and shut down. I have no idea why this is so. The first time I shut down the PC, I left the room and then came back and had a second look to see if I had actually initiated the shutdown.
When Mark Shuttleworth first announced plans for Ubuntu 9.04 his primary objective was to make the operating system boot faster. With a battle with Microsoft’s Windows 7 looming, the speed of startup - and shutdown - of a laptop PC has become a critical battleground.
If you have been using Ubuntu for a while, you probably know that after 30 boots Ubuntu runs a check on the hard disk. This “Fsck” check slows down booting a lot. AutoFsck runs the check on shutdown instead, and asks you if it is a good time first. If the occasional slow boot is a problem for you, AutoFsck is perfect.
It is reported that Microsoft recently obtained patent for "Operating System Shutdown". In simpler words, Microsoft now holds the intellectual property rights for 'shutting down an operating system'.
