I work for a small non-profit radio station where we've got a couple of Ubuntu boxes (running 10.10, or whatever the latest version with standard GNOME 2 is). I've only done it because we recently expanded our volunteer base and didn't have XP licences to cover computers for every desk!<p>I've actually been really surprised at how well the volunteers have taken to using the machines, and how some even seem to prefer them to the tried-and-tested XP installation we've got on other computers in the building.<p>It helped that we were already using Chrome, Thunderbird and OpenOffice as our standard applications throughout the station - so when I installed the machines, I just stuck big, bold icons for each one on the desktop to make it obvious what to do. Audacity was a new one (we're using Adobe Audition on other machines) but people took to it reasonably well.<p>Comments I've received have been along the lines of <i>"There's a lot less shit on the desktop than on those other [XP] computers," "It's easier to find what you're doing, and it seems a bit faster too,"</i> and so on. For some reason, our XP machines accumulate junk on the desktop, whereas the Ubuntu boxes stay relatively clean!<p>It works for a lot of our older, less experienced members who find it difficult to find, say, the Thunderbird icon among a pile of old documents and folders on the Windows desktop, or get confused when Start -> Email opens up an empty install of Outlook Express for some reason. It often feels like I spend more time helping people out when something's disappeared, they can't print, they can't find something on a Windows box than actually doing my job, so the Ubuntu machines have been a boost - they seem to just keep trooping on.<p>Of course, our users are simply booting the machine and opening up some standard applications that also run on Windows, and not going in and changing settings, or anything - I suspect that's where it would fall down in usability.<p>However, I've tried out recent pre-releases of Unity and GNOME 3 and found them pretty confusing, and I expect a lot of the users who've made positive comments to me about Ubuntu at work would too. It seems like a step backwards to me, with too many unclear mysterious icons, and bits of the UI whizzing on and off the screen while I try to work - and I'm sticking with the LTS at home, and not updating the work machines, either.