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1 • Reasons for popularity (by Benjamin Vander Jagt at 2003-12-01 16:45:00 GMT)
I know I'll get eggs thrown at my house for this one. :-þ
What do you think is the reason that Mandrake has held such a high position? As in, does there seem to be something that Mandrake has that the other desktop distributions need to steal?
I was happy enough with Mandrake 9.1 that I installed it on a customer's laptop, but it took a lot of welding and duct tape to do it. Mandrake 9.2, I must say, is the worst distribution I've used to date. Sure, the desktop is great and quite fun to use, but can that really be the whole appeal? SuSE has a great desktop, too. Of course, SuSE suffers from not being nearly as easy to install from a free download.Red Hat isn't a good desktop out of the box, though I used Red Hat 8.0 quite happily for about a year, and it was not hard to add MPlayer or MP3 support.
Mandrake's easy to download and install, and the desktop has a good range of toys, but can that really be all that matters? Do so many people use a distribution without ever changing software or installing drivers?
If that's the case, then Mandrake holding the lead does in fact glean some important information. Linux, estimated at usage by 18 million people, is used extremely widely as a desktop by the non-technical crowd, and now we have proof we can point to!
My uncle says that five years ago, he left a message on a message board stating that Linux would overthrow Microsoft. Nobody knew what Linux was, and when they searched on the internet, they returned and laughed at him and mocked him. Likewise, five years ago, I left messages stating that FreeBSD would overthrow Microsoft. Funny thing there is that nobody mocked me!
A little over a year ago, when I'd first discovered Linux and still had no idea what it could do, I told another uncle that Linux would take over the world. He didn't believe me, and he said (and still says) that "Microsoft is here to stay." I estimate that by the release of Longhorn, Microsoft will be on visibly shakey ground in operating system sales and that Longhorn will be their final significant release. I had made a bet with the doubting uncle that in a year computer illiterates would be installing Linux themselves. Little did I know that they were already doing that. Now, I insist that computer illiterates learn on Linux, 'cause it's so much simpler and easier!
Ah, but that doubting uncle probably won't believe me until MS finally leaves the market...then again, he doesn't even believe me despite Steve Ballmer's and Bill Gates' excessive free advertisement of Linux with big, bold, public statements like, "AOL and Linux were the biggest threats to Microsoft. Now Linux is certainly the biggest threat to Microsoft."
As Bill O'reilly said of the Fox News Channel, "Ted Turner said, 'I will squash them like a bug.' As we all know, that bug turned into Godzilla."
By the way, I just tried SuSE 9.0. My history with SuSE is this. I tried 8.1 and declared, "I'm in love! I absolutely adore SuSE 8.1! I want to use it on my system for the rest of my life! ...if only it worked." I tried SuSE 8.2 and shouted, "SuSE 8.2 is even better! It's awesome! ...I wish it worked." Now, with SuSE 9.0, "Oh cool, it works! It even compiles problematic software effortlessly and uses the nVidia driver just fine. It detected WAY more hardware than anything else, and it even works with my wheel mouse (which SuSE previously didn't.) .....I'm used to Slackware speed, though. Meh."
2 • Slackware nº1 in Portugal? (by Henrique Maia at 2003-12-01 17:09:08 GMT)
So Slackware is nº1 in Portugal. Does that means we're tougher than other countries?
It does not mean anything, but it is a pleasure to see that portuguese distrowatchers are specially interested in the alternatives to the alternative.
Nice work, keep up!
Henrique
3 • Slackware in Portugal (by Benjamin Vander Jagt at 2003-12-01 22:05:12 GMT)
Likewise, it's a pleasure to see Slackware receive such a title. (= I've tried many distributions, and Slackware reigns as my favorite, and it's in fact the one I prefer for systems I build.
As for toughest country? I wonder where FreeBSD ranks highest. ;-)
4 • Mandrake (by tyga on 2003-12-01 22:38:14 GMT)
Why is Mandrake No.1? Simple, its easy to install, easy to upgrade, easy to configure ( most of the time ). It is also FREE, as in, free beer.
The more difficult distros will never be as popular as the user friendly distos as the vast majority of consumers are computer illiterate, a M$ legacy. There will only ever be a minority of experienced or expert computer enthusiasts, so point and click distros will always be vastly more popular.
5 • Slackware nº1 in Portugal? (by Henrique Maia at 2003-12-02 01:25:34 GMT)
So Slackware is nº1 in Portugal. Does that means we're tougher than other countries?
It does not mean anything, but it is a pleasure to see that portuguese distrowatchers are specially interested in the alternatives to the alternative.
Nice work, keep up!
Henrique
6 • SuSE and Mandrake (by Honaby at 2003-12-03 02:57:56 GMT)
SuSE would have been at the top if only they have decided to distribute their disto as an ISO instead of just the FTP install.
Mandrake's popularity is just based on availability and support. And definitely not because its a great desktop or distro. Its has plenty of bugs and is very slow. But still since almost everyone can get a hold of a copy of Mandrake Linux easily, it just got popular!
7 • Mozilla 1.5.1 (by None at 2003-12-03 05:49:41 GMT)
This is a little off topic. But the current version of mozilla (stable) is 1.5. The only version at 1.5.1 is for OS X. Just curious on why this would be listed.
8 • RE SUSE and Mandrake (by jerry at 2003-12-03 07:14:18 GMT)
SUSE is a GREAT distro, don't get me wrong, but as Honaby said, the lack of ISO's does limit them. We'll see what happens when Novell takes over. I've tried tons of distros and what holds me to Mandrake is support. Their newbie and expert mailing lists and the newsgroup are among the most friendly I've ever seen for a linux distro. As far as "very slow" goes, well I've never experienced that though I do agree that Mandrake definitely has its share of bugs (but hey.. it's pretty bleeding edge on software).
When I was using RedHat it had to get to panic level before I'd ask a question on their list because they were so fast to flame people. Haughty "RTFM"-type gurus keep so many people from switching to gnu/linux. There's a big oxymoron here. Most gnu/linux advocates spend all kinds of time telling people why they should switch to gnu/linux but when someone actually does, they won't help out, which drives people away. I think the biggest boost to conversion would be better community support. GNU/Linux and/or free/libre/open source software _is_ about community, right? To keep from sounding too bitter I must say that when help is given, it's given thoroughly. Once you start getting answers to questions you can hardly keep up with all the information you get; it's just a matter of getting someone to actually answer.
On a side note... will MandrakeMove be on the main Mandrake page or is it going to split off? Seems it should stay on the Mandrake page to me since it's put out by Mandrakesoft even if it is kind of in a different category (cd-based).
9 • Mandrake's popularity (by fdavid on 2003-12-03 09:18:15 GMT)
I think Mandrake's popularity isn't really due to the free ISOs. There are a plenty of distros with freely available ISOs, then why Mandrake? The reason is simple. This distro has(had) - likely - the best hardware support, and the most easy-to-use installer. (I speak of the 8.x series, because with the 9.x series I wasn't really satisfied.)
I started with SuSE 7.1 three years ago, which was disappointing because of the lacking support for some of my hardware. Another drawback was certainly Yast. So I got fed up with yast and struggling with the poor hardware support and I tried Mandrake 8.0. This was the distro for me that time. Smooth installation process, all of my hardware supported. Great. After using Mandrake for two years, I could totally switch to Linux amd clean Windows from my harddrive, and even choose a more advanced distro of my own taste.(*) So many thanks to Mandrake. Needless to say, that during that two years I tried a couple of distros out (Red Hat, Debian, Slackware), but I sticked with Mandrake. Red Hat was a disappointment, Debian and Slackware were too difficult for me at that time. IMHO that's the reason and not the free ISOs.
(*)A year ago I switched from Mandrake to Gentoo, after some trial with Debian and Slackware, which are really great distros, but I fell in love with Gentoo. You can guess, where could I find all the neccessary information about distros on my way of looking for a distro of my own taste. ;-) So thank you, Ladislav for this great site.
10 • RE: Mozilla 1.5.1 (by ladislav at 2003-12-03 23:57:00 GMT)
It has been this site's policy to list package versions based on available source code, not binary codes. While it's true that Mozilla has released binary files of version 1.5.1 for MacOS only, Mozilla has also released modified source code, version 1.5.1 (check the Mozilla FTP server).
In short, the latest available stable Mozilla source code is version 1.5.1.
11 • RE: SUSE and Mandrake (by ladislav at 2003-12-04 03:08:12 GMT)
Another factor contributing to SUSE's relatively low ranking is the lack of an open development tree, such as "cooker" or "rawhide". All other major distributions have one and those distribution's pages are updated daily. But the SUSE page is only updated when a new release comes out, which gives few incentives for people to visit the page more often. Yes, SUSE's popularity is harmed nor only by the lack of ISO images, but also by a lack of an open development model where everybody can participate. This can be a lot of fun. Personally, I would not be interested in a distro that develops behind closed doors - where is the fun in that?
12 • SUSE (by pr0c at 2003-12-04 15:04:55 GMT)
I've been using suse 8.2 @ work. Why? Well Ximian Desktop 2 is why! I use the latest and greatest from Ximian Desktop 2 snapshot/devel by means of Redcarpet and my packages are more up to date than suse 9! Also Suse/ximian/novell MIGHT be the distro of the future for cooperate users especially gov offices. Think about it... money is getting tight, Microsoft's business model and software is frequently under attack, many gov offices already have contracts with novell for netware and groupwise. If novell offers a distro with SUSE, novell pieces and polishes it off with ximian's products I think it will be a killer distro!
13 • Gentoo Protage and Mandrake 9.2 (by Andrew Online at 2003-12-05 12:50:14 GMT)
Has anyone seen the new Gentoo portage site. It's great!!! I can't get over how good it looks.
And Manrape////// I mean Mandrake 9.2, it looks really great too. Baby, I'm right in heaven. I'll never look at console again. Wait, I can't say that!!!! I use gentoo.
14 • LinuxQuestions,org's Interview With Red Hat's Jeremy Hogan (by John Lowell on 2003-12-06 05:07:38 GMT)
I really don't know which is the bigger jackass, Red Hat CEO, Matthew Szulik or his syncophant, Jeremy Hogan. Reading his interview with LinuxQuestions.org via this site tonight
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/showthread.php?threadid=122959
one gets the distinct impression that Hogan first must have inhaled laughing gas. But, from all appearances, it's the gas that comes out of him that more particularly concerns a not inconsiderable and growing number of GNU/Linux users these days. This time we're "plugging" OSX, last time it was Windows. Will these people ever cease with their callousness, their egregious insensitivities?
I suppose that those of us that continue to hope for Linux preminence on the desktop can be grateful that the Szuliks and Hogans of our world have consigned themselves to the obscurity of the - must I - "enterprise". It's a place perhaps more consonant with the sheep-like sensibilities of the business school types there that so regularly soil our community with insider jargon and hackneyed expressions like "culture". I mean we really must stop allowing people with purposes as inimical to ours as theirs are the open forum and advantages of interviews. Cut them loose for goodness sake. Please!
John Lowell
Number of Comments: 14
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| Archives |
| • Issue 1107 (2025-02-03): siduction 2024.1.0, timing tasks, Lomiri ported to postmarketOS, Alpine joins Open Collective, a new desktop for Linux called Orbitiny |
| • Issue 1106 (2025-01-27): Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta 6, Pop!_OS 24.04 Alpha 5, detecting whether a process is inside a virtual machine, drawing graphics to NetBSD terminal, Nix ported to FreeBSD, GhostBSD hosting desktop conference |
| • Issue 1105 (2025-01-20): CentOS 10 Stream, old Flatpak bundles in software centres, Haiku ports Iceweasel, Oracle shows off debugging tools, rsync vulnerability patched |
| • Issue 1104 (2025-01-13): DAT Linux 2.0, Silly things to do with a minimal computer, Budgie prepares Wayland only releases, SteamOS coming to third-party devices, Murena upgrades its base |
| • Issue 1103 (2025-01-06): elementary OS 8.0, filtering ads with Pi-hole, Debian testing its installer, Pop!_OS faces delays, Ubuntu Studio upgrades not working, Absolute discontinued |
| • Issue 1102 (2024-12-23): Best distros of 2024, changing a process name, Fedora to expand Btrfs support and releases Asahi Remix 41, openSUSE patches out security sandbox and donations from Bottles while ending support for Leap 15.5 |
| • Issue 1101 (2024-12-16): GhostBSD 24.10.1, sending attachments from the command line, openSUSE shows off GPU assignment tool, UBports publishes security update, Murena launches its first tablet, Xfce 4.20 released |
| • Issue 1100 (2024-12-09): Oreon 9.3, differences in speed, IPFire's new appliance, Fedora Asahi Remix gets new video drivers, openSUSE Leap Micro updated, Redox OS running Redox OS |
| • Issue 1099 (2024-12-02): AnduinOS 1.0.1, measuring RAM usage, SUSE continues rebranding efforts, UBports prepares for next major version, Murena offering non-NFC phone |
| • Issue 1098 (2024-11-25): Linux Lite 7.2, backing up specific folders, Murena and Fairphone partner in fair trade deal, Arch installer gets new text interface, Ubuntu security tool patched |
| • Issue 1097 (2024-11-18): Chimera Linux vs Chimera OS, choosing between AlmaLinux and Debian, Fedora elevates KDE spin to an edition, Fedora previews new installer, KDE testing its own distro, Qubes-style isolation coming to FreeBSD |
| • Issue 1096 (2024-11-11): Bazzite 40, Playtron OS Alpha 1, Tucana Linux 3.1, detecting Screen sessions, Redox imports COSMIC software centre, FreeBSD booting on the PinePhone Pro, LXQt supports Wayland window managers |
| • Issue 1095 (2024-11-04): Fedora 41 Kinoite, transferring applications between computers, openSUSE Tumbleweed receives multiple upgrades, Ubuntu testing compiler optimizations, Mint partners with Framework |
| • Issue 1094 (2024-10-28): DebLight OS 1, backing up crontab, AlmaLinux introduces Litten branch, openSUSE unveils refreshed look, Ubuntu turns 20
| | • Issue 1093 (2024-10-21): Kubuntu 24.10, atomic vs immutable distributions, Debian upgrading Perl packages, UBports adding VoLTE support, Android to gain native GNU/Linux application support |
| • Issue 1092 (2024-10-14): FunOS 24.04.1, a home directory inside a file, work starts of openSUSE Leap 16.0, improvements in Haiku, KDE neon upgrades its base |
| • Issue 1091 (2024-10-07): Redox OS 0.9.0, Unified package management vs universal package formats, Redox begins RISC-V port, Mint polishes interface, Qubes certifies new laptop |
| • Issue 1090 (2024-09-30): Rhino Linux 2024.2, commercial distros with alternative desktops, Valve seeks to improve Wayland performance, HardenedBSD parterns with Protectli, Tails merges with Tor Project, Quantum Leap partners with the FreeBSD Foundation |
| • Issue 1089 (2024-09-23): Expirion 6.0, openKylin 2.0, managing configuration files, the future of Linux development, fixing bugs in Haiku, Slackware packages dracut |
| • Issue 1088 (2024-09-16): PorteuX 1.6, migrating from Windows 10 to which Linux distro, making NetBSD immutable, AlmaLinux offers hardware certification, Mint updates old APT tools |
| • Issue 1087 (2024-09-09): COSMIC desktop, running cron jobs at variable times, UBports highlights new apps, HardenedBSD offers work around for FreeBSD change, Debian considers how to cull old packages, systemd ported to musl |
| • Issue 1086 (2024-09-02): Vanilla OS 2, command line tips for simple tasks, FreeBSD receives investment from STF, openSUSE Tumbleweed update can break network connections, Debian refreshes media |
| • Issue 1085 (2024-08-26): Nobara 40, OpenMandriva 24.07 "ROME", distros which include source code, FreeBSD publishes quarterly report, Microsoft updates breaks Linux in dual-boot environments |
| • Issue 1084 (2024-08-19): Liya 2.0, dual boot with encryption, Haiku introduces performance improvements, Gentoo dropping IA-64, Redcore merges major upgrade |
| • Issue 1083 (2024-08-12): TrueNAS 24.04.2 "SCALE", Linux distros for smartphones, Redox OS introduces web server, PipeWire exposes battery drain on Linux, Canonical updates kernel version policy |
| • Issue 1082 (2024-08-05): Linux Mint 22, taking snapshots of UFS on FreeBSD, openSUSE updates Tumbleweed and Aeon, Debian creates Tiny QA Tasks, Manjaro testing immutable images |
| • Issue 1081 (2024-07-29): SysLinuxOS 12.4, OpenBSD gain hardware acceleration, Slackware changes kernel naming, Mint publishes upgrade instructions |
| • Issue 1080 (2024-07-22): Running GNU/Linux on Android with Andronix, protecting network services, Solus dropping AppArmor and Snap, openSUSE Aeon Desktop gaining full disk encryption, SUSE asks openSUSE to change its branding |
| • Issue 1079 (2024-07-15): Ubuntu Core 24, hiding files on Linux, Fedora dropping X11 packages on Workstation, Red Hat phasing out GRUB, new OpenSSH vulnerability, FreeBSD speeds up release cycle, UBports testing new first-run wizard |
| • Issue 1078 (2024-07-08): Changing init software, server machines running desktop environments, OpenSSH vulnerability patched, Peppermint launches new edition, HardenedBSD updates ports |
| • Issue 1077 (2024-07-01): The Unity and Lomiri interfaces, different distros for different tasks, Ubuntu plans to run Wayland on NVIDIA cards, openSUSE updates Leap Micro, Debian releases refreshed media, UBports gaining contact synchronisation, FreeDOS celebrates its 30th anniversary |
| • Issue 1076 (2024-06-24): openSUSE 15.6, what makes Linux unique, SUSE Liberty Linux to support CentOS Linux 7, SLE receives 19 years of support, openSUSE testing Leap Micro edition |
| • Issue 1075 (2024-06-17): Redox OS, X11 and Wayland on the BSDs, AlmaLinux releases Pi build, Canonical announces RISC-V laptop with Ubuntu, key changes in systemd |
| • Issue 1074 (2024-06-10): Endless OS 6.0.0, distros with init diversity, Mint to filter unverified Flatpaks, Debian adds systemd-boot options, Redox adopts COSMIC desktop, OpenSSH gains new security features |
| • Issue 1073 (2024-06-03): LXQt 2.0.0, an overview of Linux desktop environments, Canonical partners with Milk-V, openSUSE introduces new features in Aeon Desktop, Fedora mirrors see rise in traffic, Wayland adds OpenBSD support |
| • Issue 1072 (2024-05-27): Manjaro 24.0, comparing init software, OpenBSD ports Plasma 6, Arch community debates mirror requirements, ThinOS to upgrade its FreeBSD core |
| • Issue 1071 (2024-05-20): Archcraft 2024.04.06, common command line mistakes, ReactOS imports WINE improvements, Haiku makes adjusting themes easier, NetBSD takes a stand against code generated by chatbots |
| • Issue 1070 (2024-05-13): Damn Small Linux 2024, hiding kernel messages during boot, Red Hat offers AI edition, new web browser for UBports, Fedora Asahi Remix 40 released, Qubes extends support for version 4.1 |
| • Issue 1069 (2024-05-06): Ubuntu 24.04, installing packages in alternative locations, systemd creates sudo alternative, Mint encourages XApps collaboration, FreeBSD publishes quarterly update |
| • Issue 1068 (2024-04-29): Fedora 40, transforming one distro into another, Debian elects new Project Leader, Red Hat extends support cycle, Emmabuntus adds accessibility features, Canonical's new security features |
| • Issue 1067 (2024-04-22): LocalSend for transferring files, detecting supported CPU architecure levels, new visual design for APT, Fedora and openSUSE working on reproducible builds, LXQt released, AlmaLinux re-adds hardware support |
| • Issue 1066 (2024-04-15): Fun projects to do with the Raspberry Pi and PinePhone, installing new software on fixed-release distributions, improving GNOME Terminal performance, Mint testing new repository mirrors, Gentoo becomes a Software In the Public Interest project |
| • Issue 1065 (2024-04-08): Dr.Parted Live 24.03, answering questions about the xz exploit, Linux Mint to ship HWE kernel, AlmaLinux patches flaw ahead of upstream Red Hat, Calculate changes release model |
| • Issue 1064 (2024-04-01): NixOS 23.11, the status of Hurd, liblzma compromised upstream, FreeBSD Foundation focuses on improving wireless networking, Ubuntu Pro offers 12 years of support |
| • Issue 1063 (2024-03-25): Redcore Linux 2401, how slowly can a rolling release update, Debian starts new Project Leader election, Red Hat creating new NVIDIA driver, Snap store hit with more malware |
| • Issue 1062 (2024-03-18): KDE neon 20240304, changing file permissions, Canonical turns 20, Pop!_OS creates new software centre, openSUSE packages Plasma 6 |
| • Issue 1061 (2024-03-11): Using a PinePhone as a workstation, restarting background services on a schedule, NixBSD ports Nix to FreeBSD, Fedora packaging COSMIC, postmarketOS to adopt systemd, Linux Mint replacing HexChat |
| • Issue 1060 (2024-03-04): AV Linux MX-23.1, bootstrapping a network connection, key OpenBSD features, Qubes certifies new hardware, LXQt and Plasma migrate to Qt 6 |
| • Issue 1059 (2024-02-26): Warp Terminal, navigating manual pages, malware found in the Snap store, Red Hat considering CPU requirement update, UBports organizes ongoing work |
| • Issue 1058 (2024-02-19): Drauger OS 7.6, how much disk space to allocate, System76 prepares to launch COSMIC desktop, UBports changes its version scheme, TrueNAS to offer faster deduplication |
| • Issue 1057 (2024-02-12): Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta, rolling release vs fixed for a smoother experience, Debian working on 2038 bug, elementary OS to split applications from base system updates, Fedora announces Atomic Desktops |
| • Issue 1056 (2024-02-05): wattOS R13, the various write speeds of ISO writing tools, DSL returns, Mint faces Wayland challenges, HardenedBSD blocks foreign USB devices, Gentoo publishes new repository, Linux distros patch glibc flaw |
| • Issue 1055 (2024-01-29): CNIX OS 231204, distributions patching packages the most, Gentoo team presents ongoing work, UBports introduces connectivity and battery improvements, interview with Haiku developer |
| • Full list of all issues |
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