I am an Ubuntu user. So far all my cameras worked perfectly out-of-the-box (Shotwell). I am thinking about buying the X-E1. I was wondering if anybody has already tried it with Ubuntu (Precise Pangolin 12.04.2)?
I do not want to work with RAW, JPEG is fine with me. So I just want to copy the files from the camera to the computer. For me it is not important if I do this via drag&drop (Nautilus) or import (Shotwell). So the question is: Can I copy pictures from the camera to my computer?
It looks like currently you can't just plug it in and have Shotwell work out-of-the-box, but if you don't mind a little work, you can mount the camera via "PTP" mode and then import the images from the filesystem. See this blog entry from someone who did this on FreeBSD; the Linux situation will be similar.
Probably eventually the software will gain direct support, but honestly I wouldn't bother. I find using a card reader and swapping cards to be a easier workflow — I always make sure I have a fresh card in the camera, and I swap out the battery at the same time. Any card reader should just work in Linux, so you should be all set.
That's if you just want to copy JPEG files. If you want RAW, the situation is worse. The Fujifilm X-E1, like the X-Pro, uses a unique sensor layout and while dcraw, the basic RAW file decoder for Linux can read these files, I'm not aware of any RAW converter on Linux which will process them.
So, under Linux, you're stuck with JPEG only; you can convert RAW files to JPEG after the shot in-camera (although Fujifilm's implementation of that is clunky and limited), but out of the camera you're really out of luck. On the plus side, at least, the JPEG engine is amazing and you should be able to get great out-of-camera results. You just won't be able to count on the complete post-processing flexiblity of RAW.
The Fuji X-E1 works with Ubuntu Precise Pangolin (12.04 LTS) out of the box. The camera just needs to be connected via the provided USB-cable. Ubuntu will recognize the camera as PTP-camera, and open either Nautilus (file manager) or Shotwell (photo manager) at the user's choice. Both applications are pre-installed by default.
I noticed however, that Nautilus struggles if there are thousand of pictures stored on the camera. Shotwell, however, performs always great, and allows for easy transfer of the pictures from the camera to the computer.
An alternative approach would be to take the SD-card out of the camera, and plug it into the computers card reader.
Separately, for those who are interested in working with RAW format, RawTherapee and Darktable look promising.
Many Linux applications use gphoto to connect to and download photos from cameras that support something other than a simple mass-storage access method.
Looking at http://gphoto.sourceforge.net/proj/libgphoto2/support.php I can't see your camera model, so if the camera doesn't connect as mass-storage, you'll likely have to use a card reader.
By far the best way I have found to transfer any file from a camera is to remove the SD card from the camera and plug it into SD card reader on the target computer. Linux should mount the SD card and then you can then use the cp (copy) command to copy the files.
I would not recommend connecting your camera to the computer using a USB cable because far too many cameras have been damaged when people move their laptops whilst forgetting that the cameras are in tow.
By the way, you can still copy raw images of any type, they are just files and use linux as a file server and process them on another machine.
