[BigRedS]

I'm not sure where a GUI comes in handy here - it's not like there's any good GUI (in the traditional sense) tools for fiddling with webserver config.

Even were I to want one on a webserver on the localhost I'd probably just install webmin or something, which you can do equally well on a VM somewhere else.

[thedufer]

If you're not already comfortable with the command line, Ubuntu's package manager GUI is a hell of a lot more intuitive than apt-get. After that, a simple text editor is easier to work with than nano, emacs, vim, etc. for changing config files.

That said, I wouldn't use a GUI for such things, but I would still prefer my own box. The big power button is a lot easier than EC2s endless menus and options. I say this from the perspective of someone who's used EC2 for a couple of project - imagine someone who's never seen it before.