Riyad Kalla over at the Break It Down Blog has pointed out that there is an xorg.conf GUI control panel coming in Ubuntu 7.10.

For the most part, I feel this is a major step in the right direction. Editing the xorg.conf file by hand is a dangerous task for anyone who doesn’t truly know what they are doing. The behavior of X in the face of a malformed or just generally borked configuration file isn’t always stellar.

Time will tell, however, if it is enough. I can easily see the increasingly high number of less-educated Linux users accidentally banishing themselves to the command-line simply by tinkering in this easily accessible GUI. To this day, if I boot a fresh Feisty install on my laptop and turn on ‘Desktop Effects’ (which for most people is as simple as going in to preferences, and turning it on), my laptop becomes a terminal with a bad-ass video card. If, however, I am meticulous and manually edit the altered xorg.conf file, I can fix the issue, and boot back into Compiz glory.

So, what’s the lesson? Check how much rope you’re holding before you hang yourself.