Ubuntu is now the most used Linux operating system out there, both for desktops and in the cloud, and there are some good reasons why that is true. We'll go through a few of those reasons.
It's impossible to know whether Mark Shuttleworth, the founder of Canonical, imagined this right from the very beginning, but he did put a lot of money and effort into this project. He was already a rich man after starting a few other projects, but Ubuntu is proving a difficult nut to crack. The desktop side of things hasn't been made profitable just yet, although other branches are.
Canonical makes Ubuntu, the desktop that everyone knows about, but it's a big company and they are also working on a variety of other important projects, like Ubuntu for Phones, Ubuntu for servers, Ubuntu for IoT devices, and we're not even counting stuff like Mir or Snappy. It's safe to say that they have their hands full for many years to come.
1. Ubuntu is everywhere
One of the reasons why Microsoft has had great success with Windows is because it's shipping by default with a lot of PCs. Not a lot of users are installing Windows clean on their computers. Most of them just got their PC with Windows by default.
Like it or not, Canonical is doing the same thing with Ubuntu. This Linux operating system is shipping with some big names like Dell, IBM, and a few others. Also, smaller companies like System76 are shipping computers exclusively with Ubuntu. It's one of the main reasons why you can see Ubuntu everywhere.
2. Ubuntu is supported
With the exception of Ubuntu, there are maybe a couple of other distros that feature the same kind of long-term support. Everyone is providing short term support, for one or two years, but Ubuntu has five years. This is much more difficult to do than you can imagine. It takes money and people to make this happen, resources that are not usually available to other open source projects.
It takes more than just simply upgrading the packages every once in a while. Many of the applications in Ubuntu are developed by Canonical and even the ones from other projects, like Nautilus, for example, are heavily modified. Now imagine that they have to keep this up for five years.
3. Ubuntu is stable
There are a few users out there that will argue Ubuntu is causing them problems, but there aren't too many. In fact, for most users Ubuntu just works and this because the operating systems is being tweaked and fixed all the time. The fact that all the latest packages are not integrated during the development cycle also helps a lot.
It's difficult to make Ubuntu crash, but it does happen. The fact that the OS is so widely used also means that there is a big community out there and you will likely find a solution quickly for your particular problem.
4. Ubuntu is easy to use
Unity might not seem like a popular choice, but it does wonders for the workflow. It's easy to pick up and use, even if you come from a Windows OS. Users don't need to do anything extra when booting Ubuntu with Unity for the first time, and it simply works.
Even if Unity might seem like something hard to tweak, that's not actually the case. With the exception of moving the launcher, you can do pretty much anything you want with Unity and there are a ton of applications that can help users do that.
5. Ubuntu is punctual
One of the things that make Ubuntu the force that it is today is the cadence of its releases. Users get a new Ubuntu version every six months, and a new LTS (long term support) version every two years. They are never late, and they deliver the new version on a day that's been chosen many months before. This kind of punctuality goes a long way when you want to show just how serious the team is.
Some of you will disagree with these points and will say that Debian, Fedora, or some other OS are better. And that just might be true for you. This is the beauty of open source, the ability to choose what suits you and what you like.
Ubuntu 8.04, in the old days
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