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1 • Rest in peace Mandriva (by Sandrina on 2006-03-20 12:38:41 GMT from Kfar Saba, Israel)
Sorry that lively Conectiva goes down as well
2 • Ubuntu Linux - Where has the trust gone? (by Brian on 2006-03-20 12:52:41 GMT from Winnipeg, Canada)
"Ubuntu Linux was about the most trustworthy Linux distribution on the market, with the reliable 6-month release cycle as one of its stated goals. Suddenly, a big part of this trust is gone and users have every reason to question the validity of Ubuntu's other promises."
As a Ubuntu Linux user, I can't say that any trust is shaken in the disto. It just means I have to wait for the newest release. It is a pity they couldn't keep the timeline, but I have been of the opinion, it is done when it is done. That's just my two cents. Others are certainly welcome to their opinions.
3 • Ubuntu and delay (by Eric on 2006-03-20 12:55:16 GMT from Voorhout, Netherlands)
I am running the Dapper flight with great pleasure. If the final release is going to be better than what I have now, it will be really a fantastic distro. For that, I can 'wait' six weeks.
4 • Bye-bye Mandrake-Mandriva/Connectiva/Lycoris-Redmond (by Soloact on 2006-03-20 12:59:29 GMT from Redding, United States)
Goodbye you three. Gael would most likely be welcome in many Linux developer camps. I wonder who is going to make the pitch for him. Somehow I see Linspire throwing out the first offer. Don't ask me for specifics, it is just a feeling, so I could be way off on this one.
Perhaps he could join in the *ubuntu development. Well, maybe he just wants to sit back and weigh his options.
Too many founders of too many establishments seem to be ousted by greedy, power-hungry, profit-grabbers. Take over, run the company into the ground, milk it for all it's worth, then sell it off. A lot of that happening in the business world. Sad.
5 • Promoting Debian (by Roy Stefanussen on 2006-03-20 13:00:11 GMT from Houston, United States)
Linux: I tell people that's how I avoid viruses and spyware.
6 • Linux promotion (by Tom on 2006-03-20 13:02:29 GMT from Rochdale, United Kingdom)
>Any similar experiences among the readers of DistroWatch? How would you
>explain Linux to casual acquaintance? Please comment below.
I just showed my KDE laptop, and let a friend play around a bit.
He went: "This is pretty cool. It's almost like Windows. I thought Linux is kinda crappy. I got to give it a try."
First impressions count a lot. And I don't want to be flamed or anything, but I think KDE is the one to use for good first impressions...
7 • Mandriva is Dead (by Shiyu Tang on 2006-03-20 13:10:03 GMT from Wuhan, China)
Mandriva can't release a really attractive product for a long, and it still asks money from its supporters. Now it fires Gaël Duval, I really don't what will be in the future. It's time to find a substitution.
8 • Mandriva (by James Mansion on 2006-03-20 13:27:22 GMT from New York, United States)
> it shouldn't take too long before it would generate solid and
> sustainable revenue from private and government contracts
Isn't it easy to put your mouth where somebody else's money is? ;-)
Perhaps if you could justify this in a business case, an investor will help out. If you can't justify it, why state it?
9 • Ubuntu Wait (by Web250 on 2006-03-20 13:29:06 GMT from Newark, United States)
I've been anxiously awaiting Dapper, as Hoary had a few minor problems for me (stability, hardware recognition) that seem to be fixed so far (thank you udev). However, if it takes 6 more weeks for Ubuntu dev's to make Dapper a truly fantastic release, then I'll be more than happy to wait
10 • RE: 8 • Mandriva (by ladislav on 2006-03-20 13:37:08 GMT from Taipei, Taiwan)
Hey, it's just an opinion. I believe I am right, but it is also possible that I am not. I doubt that I'd put my neck on the line to prove the former ;-)
11 • Mandriva and PCLinuxOS (by Patrick on 2006-03-20 13:37:39 GMT from Braslia, Brazil)
I still like mandriva, but as my hardware is becoming older, I had to switch to PCLinuxOS, which is faster (and, in fact, the best Mandriva system you can find).
12 • Mad-riva, sorry Mandriva. (by Andy on 2006-03-20 13:38:17 GMT from Stevenage, United Kingdom)
Truth be known It was dead long ago. Only the hardline club members would disagree. Gaël Duval must be sad seeing his baby grow into a spiteful, disliked monster. Still, I expect later in life he'll look back on the last few weeks and count his blessing that he escaped when he did. Mandriva is doomed and only the an idot would stay at the wheel of a sinking ship. It's onwards and upwards for someone so talented as Gaël.
PS - Maybe he'll help out at PClinuxOS. At least they've stayed true to Gaël orginal Mandrake concept.
13 • Linux Promotion - LIVE CDs get attention! (by mike eberhart on 2006-03-20 13:50:02 GMT from Strongsville, United States)
I have found the best way to quickly get a person to see the potential and power of Linux is to demo a Live CD distro like Kanotix/Knoppix/Kubuntu. When the newbie watches me place the OS in the CD/DVD player and turn on the computer, boot into a working OS within a minute or two with all these awesome working *applications* installed (like, FireFox, OpenOffice, etc) they are floored. And, they can instantly see the appeal of doing things like web-browsing from a LiveCD to avoid viruses and such.
Then, I provide each person I demo a LiveCD to, with a copy of that CD to get them started at home. Soon, I have people asking about doing hard-drive installs and/or running business applications from Linux and so on. Next, they are telling their friends about Linux!
14 • Mandriva distribution (by Troy Banther on 2006-03-20 13:50:57 GMT from Denver, United States)
I use Mandriva personally and really like the distro 2006. People should remember the community does not represent the company-stockholders or the reverse. I also use Slackware and RedHat professionally so I'm not just limited to a single product.
I suspect there is more to the Gaël Duval story than just a layoff or firing. How do you fund a new project without startup money? Maybe, due to the way French law works, this is the only way to recoup your investments in a company you helped create.
15 • 6 weeks is not long to wait (by Ken Yap on 2006-03-20 14:03:45 GMT from Fern Tree Gully, Australia)
I don't think the Ubuntu delay will lose any trust. If anything it shows that the developers are willing to put quality ahead of an artificial deadline. Sure, it's good to be able to stick to schedules, but the truth is, nobody's going to die waiting 6 weeks for Dapper. Open Source is ready when it is ready, and should not be pushed out prematurely for the benefit of marketeers. In that lies shoddy outcomes. They should make up lost time in the next cycle anyway.
RIP Mandriva. It was really cool in its day but the suits tried a me too approach to selling their products and ended up mediocre. I'm sad that it pulled down Connectiva with it.
16 • RE: 13 Linux Promotion (by tom on 2006-03-20 14:03:53 GMT from Helena, United States)
Distribute Live CD's is the way to go. Ubuntu sends me several at no cost, but they are harder to use then most. I have seen the "light" go off with several useres. Once they see the GUI and software offerings most are like a kid in a candy store.
Second, get the hardware manufactures to offer Linux installed on new computers. Make users download, buy, and install an alternate OS.
17 • Suddenly, a big part of this trust is gone ... ? (by Ralph Patterson on 2006-03-20 14:08:57 GMT from Spartanburg, United States)
"Ubuntu Linux was about the most trustworthy Linux distribution on the market, with the reliable 6-month release cycle as one of its stated goals. Suddenly, a big part of this trust is gone and users have every reason to question the validity of Ubuntu's other promises."
I think most loyal Ubuntu endusers agree with Brian and Erics' comments...
There's too much ka-do about this delay. I can appreciate and understand the desire to have the latest and greatest release (and Ubuntu has had this ability to provide releases with significance). However this interruption in the accustomed release cycle could only be expected after awhile. Besides, when you’re close to finalizing improvements it is best to deliver the quality your endusers are use to. No trust is gone with the Ubuntu or its' development team, and Ubuntu is still one of the most trustworthy distributions available.
The statement "[if] the extra six weeks turn Dapper Drake into the most amazing Linux distribution ever built, then be it!" rings loud with our LUG. Patiently we wait for our favorite mirrors to sync.
18 • RE: Ubuntu Wait (by mobo on 2006-03-20 14:14:02 GMT from Kajaani, Finland)
I've heard that the release delay is mainly due to Mark Shuttleworth wanting to improve the support for Asian languages in Ubuntu. Of course, they COULD have added the extra language support AFTER the Dapper release to make sure that this slip in the release schedule doesn't also affect the future releases, but they decided that the improved language support is the kind of polish that Dapper Drake needs. Well, we just have to wait and see if this decision will have any repercussions.
19 • Beware the jabberwocky (by Lobster on 2006-03-20 14:16:04 GMT from Rochdale, United Kingdom)
Beware the jabberwocky - and the suits.
Linux is being used and noticed more and more. Why? Well it works. So of course it has potential to earn or bypass the money required in OS development. So the suits are coming.
I have a plan . . . shave the beard, cut the hair, wear a suit but think penguinated . . . well I never said it was a good plan. Personally I am willing to do all that as long as I can keep the propellor on my hat . . .
20 • Mandrake worse than medicore (by lordstorm on 2006-03-20 14:19:57 GMT from Hillcrest, Australia)
I use to love mandrake but I have watched it slide since 9.0/1 into the worst distro around. Netfinity 5000 graphics support is far from good. Debian is more reliable than mandrake during install.
Sorry to say but smoothwall is far from great. And usualy has been a main source of problems over the years. Where is all that mandrake club money going?
Oh I know what happened they changed their name to something gay and to go with it turn my old fav distro into a gay one that is more broken today than it ever was
21 • Ubuntu (by Rick on 2006-03-20 14:31:30 GMT from Wilmington, United States)
After playing around with Dapper Flight 5, I can honestly say that if the end result is better, then so be it. I think most people would rather have a stable feature-rich release than one that rushed to meet an artificial deadline.
22 • Crisis? What Crisis? (by dthacker on 2006-03-20 14:35:26 GMT from East Lansing, United States)
Six weeks does not a crisis make. I appreciate the fact that Shuttleworth and Co. are willing to take the needed steps to make the distribution solid. We need solid products to compete with Microsoft, Sun, and Apple. I urge the Ubuntu user community to support the developers in their desire to make the Ubuntu distro family solid and supportable.
23 • Suits aren't Bad-if they make good decisions! (by |TG|Mateo on 2006-03-20 14:41:28 GMT from Quincy, United States)
Mandriva, alas, we knew you well.
There is a built in reaction to the "suits": that's just silly. Frankly, without the suits, you would not have OpenSuse, Fedora, or Ubuntu, three of the top 10 distros on this site.
Now, not all suits are good: people should have seen the writing on the wall when mandriva's income flipped from desktop/home user based to corporate based. Since Mandriva is publicly traded, they have to shift their focus to that. Mandriva One is just the latest nail in the Mandriva desktop coffin.
Does that mean that the Founder and Spiritual leader should have been axed? No. That was pure stupidity.
I don't use Mandriva, and now, I doubt I ever will. I've already subscribed to Gael's latest project, and hope to help in whatever way a suit like myself can.
BTW: "Gay": according to the thesaurus:
alert, animate, animated, blithe, blithesome, bouncy, brash, carefree, cheerful, cheery, chipper, chirpy, confident, convivial, devil-may-care, festive, forward, frivolous, frolicsome, fun-loving, gamesome, glad, gleeful, hilarious, insouciant, jocund, jolly, jovial, joyful, joyous, keen, light-hearted, lively, merry, mirthful, playful, pleasure-seeking, presuming, pushy, rollicking, self-assertive, sparkling, spirited, sportive, sprightly, sunny, vivacious, wild, zippy
So I take it that Mandriva is a light-hearted, jolly, jovial, and altogether FUN distribution?
24 • Mandriva and Duval (by tomcat on 2006-03-20 14:43:13 GMT from Stillhorn, Germany)
I followed the whole story with lots of interest (Although I am a Fedora user). Most of your points are very true, Ladislav. Mandrivas Management has appaprently no idea what they did to their already crippled reputation. Who will use Mandriva? I almost hope that no one will. The product was/is okay, but the policy behind it stinks.
Going for corporate market when your strength is the Home user is suicide, especially if you don't have a plan. Mandriva actually has a plan, although a weird one: "Our plan is that we don't have a plan." (Let's go for the home user market. Yeah, PC. No PPC is better... ah, ditch PPC, get back to PC... or inlcude PPC, too? Dunno. How about servers? Yeah... and a live-CD? Why not. But not one that you can install... or what? Errrm... dunno. Club... yeah, club... silver, gold, bronze... Bronze??? How about Mud-Members? We could throw our foul eggs at them...)
Since some years, their product got less innovative, less stable, less community friendly (club-shit). They lost lots of their users and they will loose even more, as they don't listen to their usersbase. But they think that some CEO (...what's his name again?... errm... irrelevant... he will be forgotten in two years) knows more about Linux than Duval. Duval did a hell of a job.
For years, if someone asked "which distro should I use, I am new to Linux", the usual answer was: Mandrake/Mandriva. Now, I and others only recommend it with very, very, very mixed feelings, if we recommend it at all. With Duval gone, lots of things might/will change at Mandriva, not for the benefit of the distro imho.
Mandriva was once a great project. Now it is digging its own grave. I only hope that Duvals new project, Ulteo, will prove Mandriva wrong for firing him.
25 • #11 (by Anonymous on 2006-03-20 14:45:18 GMT from Braslia, Brazil)
"I still like mandriva, but as my hardware is becoming older, I had to switch to PCLinuxOS, which is faster (and, in fact, the best Mandriva system you can find)."
Eu nunca gostei do mandrake, mas usava o conectiva -- desde o 7 até
o 10 de forma exclusiva (sem windows e sem virus!).
Com a morte do CL, eu instalei o GenieOS 0.5 e complementei com
o 3.1 Sarge...
É o que estou usando agora.
Embora eu nunca tenha testado, mas tenho lido aqui mesmo na DW que o Vector é legal para HW antigo...
Baxei e olhei o PCLinuxOS - é bonitinho... Mas, linux é linux...
Vc pode pegar um Debian ou um Slackware e deixá-lo do jeito que vc quiser, não é mesmo?
26 • Mandriva++ (by emre on 2006-03-20 15:21:13 GMT from Trk, Turkey)
I don't think Mandriva is doing bad. This is a financial decision. This definitely means that the Company will no more be friendly to geek world. But they may be right because I don't think their revenue from the Club was satisfactory.
So they decided to take Red Hat's path. But this could not take place with Gael, because once he said "we won't follow Red Hat's business practices, we will always be a community-friendly distro". This was a good tactic to attract us but obviously it didn't work.
So symbolically they dropped the community symbol of Mandriva. And they are now focusing on their core business. Their main and primary purpose is to be backed by European and Latin American governments. This is already the case for the French government.
Whatever you say, I think with more revenue Mandriva will become a much better distro. And they will give back more to open source world (just look at the Red Hat and the GFS example)
27 • Dapper Drake Delay Decidedly Diligent Decision (by Bob on 2006-03-20 15:43:15 GMT from Trenton, United States)
If you were planning to support something for 5 years, I think that an extra few weeks would be important to insure stability.
28 • Mandriva goodness - Thanks to Gaël Duval and his co-workers (by Paul Blackburn on 2006-03-20 15:46:31 GMT from Havant, United Kingdom)
Mandriva has a lot of good things.
I would like to thank Gaël Duval and his co-workers for their work
on Mandrake and Mandriva.
After rpm-dependency-hell with a certain coloured hat distro,
urpmi was sweet magic.
The Mandrake Control Centre...very nicely done.
A choice of KDE or Gnome at login...mmmm.
Did I mention the clever X-Windows configuration tool?
How about diskdrake?
How about rock solid kernel performance?
How about a really neat way to update your software (urpmi again).
Make a network install server in about three easy steps.
Great work.
Thank you.
29 • Sad -Mandriva (by towsonu2003 on 2006-03-20 15:52:40 GMT from Baltimore, United States)
I never had the chance to experiment with Mandrake (yes, I know) bc it's fee-based basically. It's sad that I came to know Linux too late to meet Mandrake...
As for describing Debian, why not "Debian is a free operating system" + "unlike Windows"?
Finally, why would the trust in ubuntu be shaken? Wouldn't a 6 week delay to fix bugs instead of rushing out further stabilize the trust in this distro? If release schedule is a basis for judgement, Debian is the most unstable distro of all, followed by Slackware...
30 • my ramblings (by ray carter at 2006-03-20 15:54:16 GMT from Meridian, United States)
I had pretty much given up on Mandrivel when I tried the last install. It was one of the 'minimal CDs' with full install from the internet - like I've done before with SuSE. Main difference: the SuSE install worked. The Mandrivel one didn't. It left me an unfinished system which I had to finish configuring by hand. It was about this time I switched to (K)Ubuntu, and also found the joys of simple ditribution upgrades - the advice with MDK and most other RPM based distros has always been - "it's much better to do a clean install than an upgrade". I think they probably erred with the purchases of Connectiva and Lycoris - I've certainly seen no particular improvement from the Lycoris purchase -and BTW I really liked Lycoris the last time I looked at it. I think the latest dismissal is probably the beginning of the end.
I'm not totally sold on the Ubuntu delay. I think it might have been in their best interests to release on time with the caveat that there would be an update issued in a few weeks - unless there really was a major show stopper.
I reviewed the kororaa CD, and found it interesting. I expect that in a few years we may wonder how we ever got along without 3D desktops, but right now I don't see it as a huge issue. It was cool wrapping a window over two adjacent desktops. One problem, of course, is the number of unsupported graphics sets: Intel and VIA leap to mind.
I have Linux mugs, caps, T-shirts etc. which I use regularly. When someone asks, I tell them it's a free, open source operating system I use which is virtually immune to malware, includes all the software I normally need, and is so stable and robust that I leave my computers on all the time - with no ill effects. I also tell them they can see it in action and try it for themselves at the Portneuf District Library where we use it on the public access internet computers.
I've really been quite impressed with Elive. When folks ask about using Linux, I suggest they boot a Live CD - like Knoppix or Elive. The difference being, of course, that Knoppix and most Live CDs use KDE or Gnome which is quite similar to the MS desktop - Elive is another approach, and runs splendidly on 'older' hardware - it runs quite nicely on a P166 with 64MB RAM.
31 • Something great came out of Mandrake (by william johnson on 2006-03-20 15:54:35 GMT from Wilmington, United States)
Thank god Texstar left mandrake to create the fabulous
PCLinuxOS ,and its now only version .92. The mind gets
giddy thinking how great this will be at say version 2.0.
At that point the game may be over, checkmate !!
32 • Dapper Delay is good news (by Tom Hatch on 2006-03-20 16:09:12 GMT from Denver, United States)
The Dapper Delay is exacly what I have been hoping for, the previous versions of Ubuntu were just plain buggy, I am glad that Ubuntu is making the responsible decision, Dapper now shows far more promise!
33 • Gael (by ray carter at 2006-03-20 16:15:33 GMT from Meridian, United States)
Just found on a MDK newsgroup that Gael is now working on a new project to be called 'ulteo' - see www.ulteo.com - hope this is not a prank. Anyway, thought you'd be interested.
34 • Ubuntu (by AC on 2006-03-20 16:22:08 GMT from , United States)
I can definitely see the point about trust, but as a loyal Debian user, I'd be a hypocrite to fault them for delaying for the sake of quality. Here's to releasing when ready and putting out the best distro possible.
35 • Mandriva (by bobby ballantine on 2006-03-20 16:35:49 GMT from Saint Clair Shores, United States)
It's sad when such a fine distribution such as Mandriva (formerly Mandrake) has a failing market. I hate to sound like a know it all but I predicted three years ago that Mandrake would go down the tubes. My first indication was drawn on the fact that they were always pushing their Mandrake club memberships down the Linux worlds throats. Dont get me wrong, it's nice to make a lucrative business out of selling and profiting from your work, but for goodness sakes don't force the issue! Let me make this prediction, and you heard it here first (flame suit on) Like it or not Ubuntu,Kubuntu, and whatever other buntu, will eventually suffer the same fate as Mandriva. Distributions such as Redhat, Debian, Slackware, and Suse have already established themselves as the strongest contenders in the Gnu/Linux world, and will continue their strongholds in the upper echelons of the Free Software World. In the meantime I wish Mandriva all the best and I hope it recovers from it's downward spiral.
36 • Oh, naturally! (by just john on 2006-03-20 16:39:50 GMT from Fremont, United States)
Of COURSE Mandriva should start to fade! It's the one I chose for my full install, and I'm still happy with it.
So naturally, it will go away. It's all my fault.
Anybody have any sports teams you want to undermine by having me start to root for them?
37 • Slackware 11.0 (by Mauro on 2006-03-20 17:16:17 GMT from Agrate Brianza, Italy)
Coming soon.
Wonderful!
38 • No subject (by woka on 2006-03-20 17:41:33 GMT from Herndon, United States)
It's a little early to completely write Mandriva off. If they haven't lost all ties to reality they are certainly watching our concerns with interest. Perhaps they can even learn some useful lessons from this.
As for the Dapper Drake postponement: Ubuntu hasn't let me down in the past and if they do come out with a less than splendid return on the additional time bought by the delay I will certainly forgive and forget. (Just don't let it become habit!) Every path worth taking will be bumpy from time to time.
39 • Describing Debian (by woka on 2006-03-20 18:04:35 GMT from Herndon, United States)
How do you describe Debian to the uninitiated? It is linux. It is stable. It is powerful. You have been been benefiting from it via the web for years and will be seeing more and more of it ahead. To sum it up: It is fantastic stuff!
40 • Trust? (by Nnyan on 2006-03-20 18:06:20 GMT from Long Beach, United States)
A few missed deadlines for the sake of improvement doesn't sound to be a basis of loosing trust and starting to question everything about a company.
How many people bash M$ b/c they release products with buggy code and imcomplete features? So now you get someone with the guts to say "hey we need a little more time" and suddenly thats horrible?
Man you just can't win for trying eh?
41 • Olive name clash!! (by EEDOK on 2006-03-20 18:11:11 GMT from Edmonton, Canada)
Isn't Olive the name of an already active OpenBSD livecd?
42 • Mandriva, and other memories (by Dimitri on 2006-03-20 18:11:49 GMT from Portland, United States)
Folks,
It's natural to feel a loss for something that's going or is gone. But, it's the way of the world that things come and go. It's the ability to take the best, and learn from the worst, of those things that have passed into history to make the present and the future that much better. If, indeed, Mandriva goes, there's still Gael Duval, the many contributors to Mandriva, and its many users to pass on a wealth of knowledge to make GNU/Linux that much better going forward.
Now, excuse me while I crank the Victrola, crack my buggy whip, dance the Charleston, and sip a cold Schlitz beer.
Dimitri
43 • Mandriva (by gino on 2006-03-20 18:14:11 GMT from Kista, Sweden)
I've been using Mandriva since the late '90 when it forked from RedHat. I tried many other distros in the last years, but none was so perfect to force me to switch (you know, I'm lazy and I really don't want to spend my time tweaking the OS).
Now that they've decided to turn towards the RedHat corporate-oriented business model they are going to loose (almost) all the desktop private users. Clubs look like a perfect move in this direction.
I really don't know if they're right or wrong, if they will achieve financial sustainability or not.
What I know is that I should begin to look for a replacement.
44 • Nail in the coffin? (by AdamW on 2006-03-20 18:56:19 GMT from Vancouver, Canada)
How is a distribution designed to give you a powerful desktop system which can be run from a live CD or easily installed to the hard disk, and which will be distributed publicly for free (just like Mandriva Free), "the latest nail in the Mandriva desktop coffin"? I don't quite get that logic.
45 • Mandriva (by bushman on 2006-03-20 18:57:30 GMT from Atglen, United States)
S*** happens and then things change. Lick your chops then geton with life. Stop whining. Do something!!
46 • #43 (by Anonymous on 2006-03-20 18:57:43 GMT from Braslia, Brazil)
"What I know is that I should begin to look for a replacement."
http://genieos.toluenterprises.com/Home.html
47 • Ubuntu (by Douglas on 2006-03-20 19:13:57 GMT from Bothell, United States)
People talk about the big break with the schedule to fix something. I keep thinking about the space shuttle and how it kept to the schedule. Ka-boom. Do you think Shuttleworth thinks about the space shuttle too?
Taking time to get it right will make more trust that hurting the reputation of a product with failure or even no change. Make it right and make it better is the way to success. I also wonder why does it matter to have a tight schedule, why do users like that? Why do they need it?
"Let me make this prediction, and you heard it here first (flame suit on) Like it or not Ubuntu,Kubuntu, and whatever other buntu, will eventually suffer the same fate as Mandriva."
I started Linux by trying Debian and then Slackware. I could not get ether one of them to work! So next I heard about Mandrake. I put it in and it work great! Then they started that club and after a bit, I could not get what I needed (help, software) without joining. I was frustrated to say the least.
Then I heard about Ubuntu but it had Gnome. Next, I found Kubuntu. It is what I have used ever since. I love it because I can get the help I need, the software I need, the updates I like and it works. The gun that put down a sick Mandrake was Ubuntu. Without Ubuntu where would I have turned?
48 • You're joking, aren't you? (by Stuart Moore on 2006-03-20 19:19:03 GMT from London, United Kingdom)
>Perhaps he could join in the *ubuntu development. Well, maybe he just wants to sit back and weigh his options.
Considering his opinion about Ubuntu's intentions, that's unlikely.
49 • How I describe Linux (by PastorEd at 2006-03-20 19:20:53 GMT from Olympia, United States)
"Linux? Oh, it's the system of programs I put on my computer when I got sick of spyware and viruses. Now I don't worry about them at all."
50 • six weeks... silly. (by Rory on 2006-03-20 19:21:11 GMT from Willowdale, Canada)
We're talking about a six week delay. Compare that to Windows Vista delays of years.
This is going to be an enterprise edition that will be supported for five years. If Ubuntu wants to take an extra six months to release it, people should recognize that this is actually a very short amount of time and there is added value is delaying a release at many points.
51 • Gael / Mandriva (by JAG on 2006-03-20 19:22:44 GMT from Brooklyn, United States)
Man,...If Gael would hook up with Barry...(developer & founder)...of Puppy; they would be able to get out Puppy 2.0 in no time...and it would probably ROCK!
I like how it's been climbing the chart lately (top 20)...pretty cool!
52 • Madriva and Linux Promotion (by Robzilla on 2006-03-20 19:33:17 GMT from Los Angeles, United States)
When it comes to Mandriva I have to disagree with a lot of people. I have used many Linux distros and I have found advantages and weaknesses in every single distro. In fact in every operating system I have ever used. If you wanted the latest Linux apps and the latest kernel then Mandriva has been lagging way behind and it is frustrating I agree. However I have not found it to be unstable. I found it to be very reliable and for everything to work. I liked the Mandriva control center and I found that all of my hardware worked well including my wireless. I really enjoyed using Mandriva. I did use JFS and I found that it was the best filesystem and there was a big difference in stability in regards to what filesystem was implemented. So if I was just considering the OS and how it worked and not how up to date it was and not considering the business model I liked it.
I do agree the Mandriva business model was doomed. The Mandriva club is a joke and a big rip off and anyone who bought into it I have some real estate for you to buy!! I do agree that there distribution was completely outdated.
The future for Mandriva is grim. They could have a great product if they worked on their product!! As it has been said change your business model, get rid of Mandriva club and maybe you will have a chance. I sure hope PCLinux is not affected!!
As for spreading the word about Linux it depends on who I am talking to. If I am talking to anyone with a Windows PC then as others have said a Live Cd is worth a thousand words!! In three words it is Stability, Security, Free Apps!! No OS can compete with Linux free apps!! Now if they have an Apple I don't push the OS but the open source software like NeoOffice or The Gimp or Firefox and Camino and clamxav.
Lets face it most people are not going to try Linux unless they have curiosity in it or have heard of it before. I think as someone else said when Linux is pre-installed on a pc and is mass marketed(aka Big Suits) it will stay a small community. I still can't believe how many people use Windows and are not fed up by it. They think that all of the security flaws and stability issues are what you have to deal with. They are so conditioned to the Windows environment that anything else is like speaking another language. It is sad.
R
53 • Dapper delay (by jyp on 2006-03-20 19:45:58 GMT from Montral, Canada)
Having used Kubuntu since Hoary and needing Chinese language support, I am very glad that the Ubuntu (Kubuntu) team plans to polish the Asian language support in Dapper. So it does not matter for me to wait a few more weeks since I intend to use Dapper intensively. As far as trust is concerned, having met Mark Shuttleworth and the developpers in Montreal last Autumn, let me say that they have my full support and that I am grateful to them; in their opinion, the delay was required and they had the courage to propose it and to live with the decision; it is an intelligent move. Besides, they can now sync the releases with the Summer and Winter Solstices!
54 • Ubuntu delay (by mike rosenlof on 2006-03-20 20:36:33 GMT from Boulder, United States)
I think trust is broken much faster by releasing poor products than releasing good products late. I'm still very happy with Ubuntu.
55 • 48 (by Anonymous on 2006-03-20 21:02:04 GMT from , United States)
Bancilhon doesn't speak for Gael. Or did he also say something about Ubuntu?
56 • Mandriva & Xandros (by Anonymous on 2006-03-20 21:29:45 GMT from Greensboro, United States)
I began my Linux experience with Mandrake back in 1999. I just happened to see a retail boxed version of it on the shelf at a store one day and picked it up because I wasn't familiar with software called "Linux". It interested me and so I bought it and successfully installed it. I really liked it alot and since then I have been hooked on Linux. I have tried and use other distros, but I will always have fond memories of my first distro, so I hope that Mandriva gets things worked out for the best. -- Just my thought on things.
BTW, does anyone know when the next version of Xandros will be released and what it will be like? Thanks
57 • Mandrake (by istoyanov on 2006-03-20 21:35:59 GMT from Sofia, Bulgaria)
Mandrake 8.2 was the _first_ Linux distro that I tried some years ago (being an _absolute_ newbie) and you may imagine my fascination when upon install it was simply working! Later, my positive experience with Madr{ake|iva} disappeared and I naturally found my way to other distributions. However, here I would like to thank Gael for his great work in promoting/developing Linux to the desktop. Good luck with your future work, Gael! And cheers!!!
58 • fired (by mika hack on 2006-03-20 21:36:59 GMT from Rome, Italy)
Gael......same story as Steve Jobs??
;-)
59 • Mandriva (by Chuck D on 2006-03-20 22:00:56 GMT from Saint Paul, United States)
Thanks for the accurate analysis of Mandriva current woes. I'm currently using the 2006 PowerPack 86x64, which is an amazing release, technically.
Mandriva has always suffered from a reputation as THE desktop Linux for beginers. Perhaps this is one of the reasons they have failed to penetrate the lucrative enterprise market.
Over the years, they've made more than their share of bad decisions but have somehow managed to find a way out of the mess just in time. Hope the current crisis finds a positive solution... However, letting someone like Gaël Duval go is beyond explanation. If there was a Hall of Fame for Linux developers, Gaël would be one of the founding members.
60 • Promoting linux (by Robert K on 2006-03-20 22:28:17 GMT from Austin, United States)
If I have my laptop/am at a computer, and someone asks about linux, I whip out my SLAX CD. The fact that it's on a minicd is cool, and a lot of people are in awe by the time I tell them that it has games AND a full office suite on there.
61 • Which is it? (by AdamW on 2006-03-20 22:32:02 GMT from Vancouver, Canada)
Let's see...(from two different posts):
"Then they started that club and after a bit, I could not get what I needed (help, software) without joining. I was frustrated to say the least."
"The Mandriva club is a joke and a big rip off and anyone who bought into it I have some real estate for you to buy!!"
So, let's see, is the Club so essential to the distro that it's not worth using Mandriva without it, or is it a joke and a big rip off that's worth nothing at all?
You understand how it's sometimes hard to believe all the criticism...
62 • Ubuntu and the futility of schedules (by Lucho on 2006-03-20 22:37:59 GMT from Rio De Janeiro, Brazil)
from comment 40
>> A few missed deadlines for the sake of improvement doesn't sound to be a basis of loosing trust and starting to question everything about a company.
How many people bash M$ b/c they release products with buggy code and imcomplete features? So now you get someone with the guts to say "hey we need a little more time" and suddenly thats horrible?
Man you just can't win for trying eh? <<
and from comments 50 & 53
I couldn't agree more.
Also, it's ironic that a debian offshoot that specifically changed the
debian way making software ("it'll be ready when it's ready") is be-
coming more debian-ish about releases.
As a loyal debian user, good for them
63 • re. mandrake cutting off their DNA (by Joh on 2006-03-21 00:37:05 GMT from Milton Keynes, United Kingdom)
My friend sent me a link to this site with reference to the Mandrake snooze. It's shocking. You don't throw the baby out with the bathwater! What planet are these folks on? Microsoft ala OpenFarce?
I tried linux a few years ago (with Suse) and gave up on it because lingos have never been my forte and it was too technical. Mandriva (I use PcLinuxOS btw) is such an improvement from my experiences then. I only wish I'd bothered to get it sooner - would have spared me the cost of a new pc 6 months ago!
I view RedHat with cynical suspicion. I worry when they charge for their os . I fear microsoft like world domination. So therefore as far as I was aware from my research (at least five if not more) years ago there were about five distros I'd heard of (and therefore trusted) and Mandrake was one.
I have also tried Ubuntu - but their definition of 'help pages' is a non stop rollercoaster disguised as a mesage board. Nice idea - shame about lack of substance to it.
What more can I say.....asides from pass me the coffee (despite it being gone midnight!).
Joh
PS. Only thing I really use and that I'm having probs with on mandriva is GAIM. Believe there is a bug or something but if you guys could possibly get the brainy geeks to fix this with a new beta or whatever it would be really appreciated as tar balls are like the opposite sex - so easy to get wrong - so I rely on RPMS, and I don't do AIM or Micro whatsit. I use Yahoo (yazoo? Nah that's a kid's milk drink - but a good one) and GAIM is about the only chat client I can get via rpm that semi works - but it's very temperamental - tx
64 • Ubuntu's broken promises (by AC on 2006-03-21 02:20:13 GMT from , United States)
I find far. far more worrying the breaking of this promise:
"Ubuntu is entirely committed to the principles of free software development; we encourage people to use free and open source software, improve it and pass it on." http://www.ubuntu.com/
contrasted with this:
Is Launchpad open source? Will it be?
"Our goal is to release all of Launchpad as free software, though it will take some time (potentially, years) before that happens."
This blog spells out some of the very serious concerns here:
http://www.joachim-breitner.de/blog/archives/60-Launchpad,-Google-and-why-Microsoft-is-not-the-problem.html
But the concern about the validity of their promises arises even without the things spelled out there coming to pass. "Entirely committed" is not compatible with "is committed to Free Software only insofar as it is compatible with the business plans of Canonical."
65 • Ubuntu Dapper delay (by Henrique Maia on 2006-03-21 02:23:39 GMT from Carnaxide, Portugal)
I'm also with the ones who weren't a bit disappointed with the delay. In fact, I prefer a rock solid distro than to have with some faults but on schedule.
66 • Not about DW (by Manuel Ms on 2006-03-21 03:09:05 GMT from San Juan, Costa Rica)
Greetings, this is a random question, can someone tell me if there is a app that can transforme the resolution of more that one image once, i know that it may not be open source, or there is a open source alternative?
67 • 66 (by Anonymous on 2006-03-21 03:38:38 GMT from , United States)
http://www.imagemagick.org/script/index.php
68 • 66 (by Anonymous on 2006-03-21 03:41:10 GMT from , United States)
A short bash script and some wild cards may be necessary
69 • 66 (by Anonymous on 2006-03-21 03:48:52 GMT from , United States)
http://www.linux.com/article.pl?sid=05/10/27/166215
70 • 66 one last link (by Anonymous on 2006-03-21 04:03:24 GMT from , United States)
http://www.bbips.org/
haven't tried it
71 • UBUNTU (by Rigodor on 2006-03-21 04:59:59 GMT from Mandaluyong, Philippines)
good! i have to wait longer for the next stable release of ubuntu. well, if it is for better then so be it!
the reason why i chose ubuntu over others is its FREE AS IN FREE! (not beer). why would i use experimental distros or pay their non-experimental versions (i dont want to name them, but they're red hat and suse.. LOLz) when i can use one that is non-experimental and absolutely free.
what about the community support? it's easy to get supports for ubuntu because of it's popularity and community.
in mandriva, they don't have a community (club members) but "dumb" costumers who are paying for nothing when they can have everything for free (ubuntu again). this is the reason why mandriva is dying (or it is already dead). duval is already working on ulteo, let's see if will make mandriva cry!
have you people tried Automatix? it solved problems in my breezy, especially installing proprietry softwares/drivers that are not included in breezy (they can not include them legally). search Automatix at ubuntuforums.org
72 • #43 (by Tim on 2006-03-21 05:13:04 GMT from Denver, United States)
www.pclinuxos.com
73 • Dapper Delay (by benplaut on 2006-03-21 05:20:05 GMT from Burlingame, United States)
Like most of the replies on the issue, i'm happy that Ubuntu is delaying. Face it - April 20th was the origional release date. If you updated to Dapper dev on that day, it would most likely be almost identical to what the release would have been, had they stuck to that date.
While i, personally, run a heavily customized Ubuntu, the default settings and programs could use a bit of interface love, too. Also, given the number of Asian language questions through the forums, i'm glad they're giving that more time.
Another recent development (i'm suprised ladislav didn't cover it) is Dapper's completely new theme, and theme engine. While there were lots of bitter words exchanged because Clearlooks Cairo was not included, the new theme engine uses cairo, and is considerably more stable.
I love the new theme, but you can count on different color assortments coming out soon after dapper's release. Orange is nice, but, in my opinion, you can't fail with a nice lime-green.
74 • Ubuntu Linux - Where has the trust gone? (by Ron on 2006-03-21 06:49:29 GMT from Phoenix, United States)
Really? This is the kind of troll-ish nonsense one usually finds on Usenet. This delay only reinforces my trust in the rationality of the people running Ubuntu. This is not a hardcore distro for hackers, but truly aims to be "Linux for human beings". The Ubuntu group has said for some time that they want this version to be "enterprise ready." That's an extremely ambitious goal. If they need 6 more weeks to pull it off, than the users will only benefit from the effort.
75 • To BSD or not to BSD (by Mike on 2006-03-21 07:37:11 GMT from , Kenya)
Thanks for the comments in last week’s discussion on whether to BSD or not to BSD. I agree, Ubuntu can make money by selling support contracts. After all, that’s how Red Hat/Mandriva/Novell-Suse pay the bills. I guess what Mark Shuttleworth’s trying to do now is build mindshare for Ubuntu.
Why do I seem so concerned about whether Ubuntu (or any other Linux distro, for that matter) can become financially self-sustaining? Too often, consumers of free software (myself included) tend to take the free, as in beer, for granted, and forget that even free software is subject to the Law of Economic Entropy: if you think of a free software project as a closed system with no cash/donations/volunteers coming in, then you can expect that the project will eventually grind to a halt.
Perhaps the BSD license does not offer any significant advantages over the GPL, and it may even have a serious downside. As AC noted, the BSDL may result in less cooperation among distributors and forking of the code, as happened with Unix in the 1980s. The GPL on the other hand, by compelling people to release everything back to the community, can lead to sustained improvements in the code which benefit all. The danger of customer lock-in to a single vendor is also minimized (no single vendor has you by the gonads as is the case with proprietary software). BSD supporters might argue, however, that even though the BSDL does allow proprietary code forking, this is likely to be temporary or limited because “forkers” would cease to benefit from the exchange in code and information from the larger BSD community. FreeBSD, NetBSD, and OpenBSD are all forks of the original 386BSD, but they all collaborate closely to minimize incompatibility.
Debates on BSDL and GPL aside, one study has estimated that based on the number of lines of code in Debian Sarge, it would cost US$ 8 billion to build a system the size of Debian totally from scratch. There is a tendency to confuse money with wealth. Wealth is anything that satisfies a need or a want. Money is just a convenient, if imperfect, way to measure and exchange wealth. Without being properly acknowledged in the economic statistics, Free Software has become one of the major wealth creation efforts of the last two decades. Hopefully, this process is going to continue without being hampered by such things as software patents.
Perhaps what the Free Software movement needs now is a Nobel Prize. And I have just the man: the bearded one himself, Richard Stallman. And what could make better Nobel Peace Prize material than Stallman’s Four Software Freedoms?
P.S. As for Microsoft’s claim that “Free Software is Communism”, well, there’s a big difference between Communism and Communitarianism. Incidentally, the term for the communitarian ethic in the Zulu language is, you guessed it, UBUNTU!
76 • Ubuntu Delay (by Smart Move on 2006-03-21 10:09:26 GMT from Eilenburg, Germany)
Well guys I think this is a free (as free) marketing campain. Everyone is talking about it. Just keep on watching.
Cheers.
77 • Wrong date (by Andrew on 2006-03-21 14:15:49 GMT from Charlottetown, Canada)
The link for ubuntu release date in the article you talk about has Ubuntu being released on July 1st, when it is being released in June 1st.
http://www.ubuntux.org/ubuntu-dapper-drake-now-officially-postponed
is the article with wrong date.
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DapperReleaseSchedule
has correct date.
78 • Dapper Delay (by welkiner on 2006-03-21 15:07:59 GMT from Los Angeles, United States)
Last week I wrote a comment about how impressed I was with the new Dapper Drake installable live-cd "Flight 5", but I was dissappointed that I could not boot up into graphic desktop on laptop. Well this week I tried to install Flight 5 to hard drive on at least 5 different desktop computers (using different iso downloads) with a 100% failure rate. I am still very impressed with what Ubuntu is trying to do, but it looks to me like they definitely need some more time to get the bugs out.
79 • Mandrake (by vipernicus on 2006-03-21 15:12:33 GMT from Plano, United States)
I remember Mandrake Linux 6.0, I had used Redhat and a few others before it, but never felt comfortable in linux as a desktop until versions 6.0-8.1. I've moved on since then to Gentoo, (I still try to mimic alot of the beautifications from Mandrake), but I still believe that Mandrake was the perfect distribution for beginners and workstations.
R.I.P. Mandrake
80 • Ubuntu (by Jimmy on 2006-03-21 16:14:23 GMT from Newton, United States)
Although I like Ubuntu overall, I still prefer Debian. And now that they're delaying their release cycles, they're becoming more like Debian. It's inevitable. Projects on a large scale always have inefficiencies and large armies are always disorderly. It's just the way it goes. In addition, if Ubuntu is taken seriously in the desktop world, it won't be long before they start charging for it, or some corporate entity buys it and charges for it. Even if Shuttleworth is opposed to this, it won't be up to him. I'm sure there will be plenty of developers who will ask the question, why shouldn't I get paid? If Ubuntu remains a small market share OS, this will not happen since the smell of money wouldn't be in the air. I personally use OsX because I figure by the time Linux becomes a major desktop OS, it'll cost money to get it so why should I wait when I can pay anyways and have the features I want now? Don't get me wrong, I love Linux and I use it, but it'll either bow down to the way the world turns or it'll wither away and die or remain a great OS with a small following.
81 • Mandriva (by Johannes Eva on 2006-03-21 16:24:30 GMT from Dreieich, Germany)
Great Article about Mandriva! Think they've passed the non-return point. Very sad indeed!
(Great we have SuSe :)
82 • SUSE? (by AdamW on 2006-03-21 19:42:43 GMT from Vancouver, Canada)
Yes, SUSE, that wonderful small distribution that's still run by its founders and has no tie-wearing, downsizing management at all.
Oh, wait. Oops. Aren't they owned by some big company called Novell or something?
83 • Can't afford keeping the brightest mind? (by Ariszló on 2006-03-21 21:55:53 GMT from Budapest, Hungary)
Not the best PR for a profit-oriented company.
84 • RE: #82 (by Anonymous Penguin on 2006-03-21 21:58:44 GMT from Roma, Italy)
"Oh, wait. Oops. Aren't they owned by some big company called Novell or something?"
So what? It is open, free in both meanings of the word, a lot of innovation going on... *Much* more than it can be said of Mandriva these days, which "betrays" even its paying customers (the ones who buy boxes, as the (few) privileges are reserved to club members only).
In case you didn't notice, Novell didn't cannibalize SUSE, on the contrary: they improved it from almost every point of view.
The same cannot be said of what Mandriva did to Conectiva and Lycoris.
85 • Bobby Ballantine's prediction (by Ariszló on 2006-03-21 22:05:48 GMT from Budapest, Hungary)
Let me make this prediction [...] Ubuntu, Kubuntu, and whatever other buntu, will eventually suffer the same fate as Mandriva.
If you are only vaguely saying that nothing lasts forever then it is not a prediction. Otherwise, I disagree with you. Ubuntu has a completely different business model.
86 • 80 (by AC on 2006-03-21 23:05:28 GMT from , United States)
I don't think a six -week delay is anywhere close to Debian's releases. That's absurd. (And I don't use Ubuntu. I'm a taunch debianista.) Second, it is up to Shuttleworth whether Ubuntu is sold. He holds the purse strings and Canonical is privately owned. And the developers do get paid. A lot of Debian, GNOME, and Python developers do get paid now because of Ubuntu. Third, Debian and Gentoo will always be free. They have social contracts and democratically elected leadership and non-profit organizations funding them. It's conceivable they could simply collapse, but they won't be bought out. Fourth, even companies that do charge, such as Red Hat, have to comply with the GPL, making their source code available, thus making projects like CentOS possible. The idea that someday you won't be able to get GNU/Linux for free is nonsense. Fifth, so you don't keep making the previous mistakes and so you get a reality check about the "way the world turns", you ought to do some reading on Free Software and on the GPL. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/ Sixth, maybe then you'll also see that not charging isn't the main reason that OS X isn't the best choice for personal freedom, whether they charge or not and whether or not GNU/Linux is avialble for free.
87 • Re: 80 & Lycoris (by Misty on 2006-03-21 23:08:53 GMT from Elizabethtown, United States)
"In addition, if Ubuntu is taken seriously in the desktop world, it won't be long before they start charging for it, or some corporate entity buys it and charges for it."
So when will Debian start charging too? They made the same promise to remain free as Ubuntu's founders. By the same token, if Debian should become so popular (and I predict that it will get more popular as more people catch onto the fact that the installer is fairly easy now) they could start charging too. Why is their promise to remain free taken seriously but Ubuntu's isn't?
Don't get me wrong, I'm a Debian user myself, but I'm sick to death of this "Ubuntu is going to start charging!!!!!!!!" nonsense I see everywhere. It says on the very first page of the website that they're free and will remain so. Since that's pretty much the same promise we've been getting from the Debian developers for years, why is it taken for granted that Debian will always be free and Ubuntu won't? I think you folks need a brush-up course on advertising law too - that is, if Ubuntu should start charging they can actually be sued for false advertising.
Regardless of that, if Ubuntu did become a commercial distro it would be Ubuntu in name only. Many of their own developers would resign and re-build Ubuntu under a different name - after all, the Ubuntu project is GPL, just like most other distros, so what would stop them? Obvioulsy you people aren't thinking of that, believing that they're all in cahoots together in some evil plot to take over the Linux world. You really think all the people involved with one distro are all Gates-wannabes, gleefully rubbing their hands together in anticipation of getting the chance to bleed Linux-users dry? That's the picture you guys paint. It's past the point of ridiculous now.
On to Mandriva buying out Lycoris. Why haven't they done anything with it? Because they never intended to. They were just eliminating competition. It's an all-too-common practice in the world of commercial software: buy out the company of a competing product then discontinue said product. That's why Adobe bought out Macromedia not too long ago. Lycoris was very easy to use, fairly well-polished anfd growing in popularity, so of course Mandriva, a distro that has been king of the easy-to-use distros for a long time, would want them out of the way - among others, but most of those others are prosperous enough that Mandriva won't be buying them our anytime soon (e.g., SuSE). Hasn't anyone else noticed that Mandriva's president is always firing off at other distros that are supposed to be easy-to-use? Ease of use was Mandriva's main stock in trade and they'd love nothing better than to be the only easy-to-use distro again.
88 • 87 Misty (by AC on 2006-03-21 23:18:55 GMT from , United States)
It seems you and I were both responding to 80 and the same time. And I agree with most of what you wrote. I will say this though. Advertising law when applied to the internet to a company that is based overseas is tricky at best. Whose advertising law are we speaking of? England's? South Africa's?
I do take promises made by Debian and Gentoo more seriously because of the way that the projects are organized and funded. Ubuntu has already broken promises. (The relase isn't what I mean either. See my post 64)
Still, I agree it's highly unlikely Ubuntu would start charging. I don't think Shuttleworth's plans have anything to do with that. And as we both said, because of the GPL, if they started charging someone else could take the source to produce a free version, a la CentOS.
89 • Mepis leaves DCC, switches to Ubuntu (by AC on 2006-03-21 23:40:35 GMT from , United States)
http://www.desktoplinux.com/news/NS6045116609.html
90 • Please. (by AdamW on 2006-03-22 00:12:31 GMT from Vancouver, Canada)
"It is open, free in both meanings of the word"
http://wwwnew.mandriva.com/en/downloads/mirrors/2006iso
http://wwwnew.mandriva.com/en/company - "The company also provides and maintains a completely free version, Free Mandriva, as part of its commitment to the open source principles."
http://qa.mandriva.com/twiki/bin/view/Main/MailingListHowTo (all the development related mailing lists, which are, you will note, open to public subscription)
Please. Genuine criticism is fine, but only someone whose brain has been permanently disconnected could try and argue that Mandriva is not "open and free in both meanings of the word".
91 • mandriva idiots (by henry on 2006-03-22 00:14:10 GMT from Liverpool, United Kingdom)
You don't fire the creator of the distro lightly. You certainly don't fire him on bad terms. Mandriva is going to feel the sting of community backlash for this one.
92 • Dapper delay (by Uncle Peng on 2006-03-22 00:14:20 GMT from Dresden, Germany)
I think very few have really thought about what are the concequences of the Dapper delay -- if there are any.
I've browsed several available opinions for documentation and it seems to me that the Ubuntu Dapper will be an exceptional release -- the Ubuntu dev team wants the Dapper Drake release to be something similar to "Debian stable". The Ubuntu team wants Dapper to be an "enterprise quality" release -- something quite exceptional in the Ubuntu line of releases. They want that the Dapper release will be very much like "Debian stable". "Debian stable" has a reputation that no other distro will never reach, but it WOULD be a great achievement for Ubuntu if it could establish that Ubuntu's based on Debian and it's always binded to the latest GNOME. (I'm personally much more inclined towards XFCE than KDE or GNOME).
For what I've gathered, it seems that there will be a number of special releases for Ubuntu. Dapper Drake will be one of these special releases. And the release after Dapper will be something that the Ubuntu team will refer to as "fun, fun, fun". The Dapper+1 release will be the one where the developers don't have to worry about any of this satuff about the "enterprise quality". They can break stuff as they will and introduce new stuff that isn't in ANY way compatible with the Dapper stufff. It will be pure fun for the Ubuntu devs (and an agony for users following the latest development branch).
As usual, this is just one opinion. I'd like nothing better than hearing other opinions.
93 • RE: #90 (by Anonymous Penguin on 2006-03-22 00:55:21 GMT from Roma, Italy)
>>Please. Genuine criticism is fine, but only someone whose brain has been permanently disconnected could try and argue that Mandriva is not "open and free in both meanings of the word".<<
One might wonder whose brain has been permanently disconnected.
(This reminds me of the prime minister of my country who, being desperate, has started insulting everybody)
So you want to compare the 3 CDs "free" Mandriva version, released 6 weeks later than for club members, with no Nvidia drivers or commercial plugins, to the 5 CDs or equivalent DVDs for 3 architectures, available for SUSE, on the same day for everybody?
The downloadabe SUSE CDs are *absolutely identical* to the ones you buy.
The *free* Mandriva CDs are very much akin to a demo, especially for a newbie who doesn't know how to install Nvidia/Ati drivers and commercial plugins.
And while you are at it, tell me where I can download the Christmas edition of this oh so free and open distribution called Mandriva.
In case you have any doubts left, see if you can convince the linux community and your very own club members of the validity of your arguments.
94 • RE: Opinion: Mandriva on the rocks (by Anonymous Penguin on 2006-03-22 01:59:37 GMT from Roma, Italy)
"Right now, the only thing that can save Mandriva from certain death is return to its roots - by building a distribution for home users, not suits. Although following Red Hat's business model might sound like a perfect way to ensure future financial prosperity, the sad reality is that Mandriva will have hard time competing with the likes of Red Hat and Novell. Instead, the company should close its rapidly diminishing Club infrastructure, return to a 6-month release cycle, and give away the base distribution with no delays and no strings attached."
I agree with every single word.
95 • I'm not buying. (by AdamW on 2006-03-22 02:05:10 GMT from Vancouver, Canada)
I'm not buying the argument that the fact we provide a commercial edition and the fact that we build special editions as a thank you to our Club members make the free edition useless. I also find it ironic that you say you like SUSE because it's free and open in both senses of the word, then praise it over Mandriva because it includes proprietary software; gun, meet foot. If free and open software is the bees knees, you should LOVE Mandriva Free, because that's all it contains. If you love proprietary software, you shouldn't be criticising Mandriva for not being "free and open in both senses of the word", yes? It appears to me that what you're principally concerned about is free as in beer, you don't appear to be that fussed about free as in speech, despite all your protestations.
All the free / open source software on the commercial editions of MDV 2006 is available entirely free of charge from the public FTP mirrors. It's very easy to add these as urpmi media using rpmdrake or websites like easy urpmi - http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/ . You can also do a network installation directly from an FTP site and access the complete range of FOSS packages right at install time. We put the Free edition on three CDs because we find people don't like the idea of downloading more, not in order to be stingy. Doesn't everyone claim to love Ubuntu so much because it's just one CD? What happened to 'less is more'?
96 • And BTW... (by Anonymous Penguin on 2006-03-22 02:05:57 GMT from Roma, Italy)
I'd like Mandriva to look and feel more "professional"
If you have no clue what I am talking about, have a look at SUSE.
Then I might even consider buying a boxed edition again (but not becoming a club member)
97 • RE: #96 (by Anonymous Penguin on 2006-03-22 02:16:23 GMT from Roma, Italy)
"All the free / open source software on the commercial editions of MDV 2006 is available entirely free of charge from the public FTP mirrors. It's very easy to add these as urpmi media using rpmdrake or websites like easy urpmi - http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/ . You can also do a network installation directly from an FTP site and access the complete range of FOSS packages right at install time."
I didn't deny that.
As to my so called contradictions about free as in beer and free as in speech, the answer is quite simple:
http://en.opensuse.org/Download
Quote:
>>The Evaluation edition of SUSE Linux contains some proprietary components such as Adobe Acrobat Reader, RealNetworks RealPlayer, Sun Java Runtime Environment and Macromedia Flash Player. The Evaluation edition does not time out in any way.
* Download the Evaluation edition of SUSE Linux
If you prefer you can download and use the Open Source Software (OSS) edition of SUSE Linux 10.0 that includes only open source components:
* Download the Open Source Software edition of SUSE Linux <<
That is true freedom in my books.
98 • Talking about Linux (by Scott Ruecker on 2006-03-22 05:52:37 GMT from Scottsdale, United States)
I Wrote an article for LXer.com called, "How to give Linux away"
http://lxer.com/module/newswire/view/56092/index.html
Also, I started a thread there as well called, "Talking about Linux"
http://lxer.com/module/forums/t/22054/
Let me know if you think, tell me of any of my ideas helped.
Scott Ruecker
Staff Editor, LXer.com
99 • Re: 89 • Mepis leaves DCC, switches to Ubuntu (by Lanx on 2006-03-22 08:25:32 GMT from Stuttgart, Germany)
Here is the official anouncement:
http://www.mepis.org/node/9454
100 • 89 & 99 (by AC on 2006-03-22 09:15:45 GMT from , United States)
I suspect that many people who have avoided Ubuntu because of the incompatibility with Debian, folks who chose Mepis for that very reason, will be switching to Kanotix. The ones who hadn't already, I mean.
101 • RE: #99 (by Anonymous Penguin on 2006-03-22 12:41:49 GMT from Roma, Italy)
I never liked Mepis too much. Now I'll like it even less.
Kanotix all the way :)
102 • And BTW... (by Anonymous Penguin on 2006-03-22 12:52:36 GMT from Roma, Italy)
Over one month, the H.P.D of Mepis have sunk from 5th to 9th.
It also looks as if there is a comeback of Gentoo. Even if personally I don't like compiling, I am glad for them.
103 • # 101 & 102 (by tom on 2006-03-22 13:29:30 GMT from Helena, United States)
I currently use Kanotix and have been very pleased with the distro. I have found it "just works" as well. Prior I was with Mepis, but hte distro was not a easy as advertised.
Nice to see press/recognition for Kanotix.
# 102- I am still waiting for Gentoo to work for me. I do not have the time/energy to deal with the arrogent attitude of Gentoo and hassle with configuration. I work with computers and need them to work for me. My attempts to install Gentoo have univerlsy been failures and the web pages (for information) frankly are incomplete and incomprehensible. Not to metion outright wrong in several areas. Gentoo needs to "get a clue" and become much more user friendly.
Free BSD is much easier and straight forward then Gentoo, installing form source is straight forward (make .. install.. clean). and works. many of the Gentoo "packages" are broken (Like X, KDE, GNOME ...) and do not install properly (at least I have never been able to install on a Gentoo system, but have been able to get "up and running" with BSD). It is not as if I have not put in my time, I have spent many hours trying Gentoo and am familiar with their (lack of ) support for "end users".
104 • 102 (by AC on 2006-03-22 14:04:33 GMT from , United States)
I know what you mean about compiling. I find Gentoo to be great fun - just not on a machine I use for real work. But I would recommend to anyone giving it a try. Not to be 1337, but because they might just enjoy themselves. And along with Debian, Gentoo is one of the distros that takes freedom seriously.
105 • RE: #104 (by Anonymous Penguin on 2006-03-22 14:16:18 GMT from Roma, Italy)
"And along with Debian, Gentoo is one of the distros that takes freedom seriously."
Exactly. That is why I said that I am glad for them.
106 • Mandriva Club (by RF on 2006-03-22 14:27:54 GMT from Great Malvern, United Kingdom)
The Mandriva Club defies me, it has potentially the worst business model, yet it still survives! A commercial contract cloaked by the "supporting the distro" spin. As a former club member, I have witnessed lack attitude from managament with regard to communication, the club releases are worthless to the ordinary user as they are not supported by Mandriva, you don't get all of the benefits you signed up for (well that is unless you shout about it.....). The only official forum supplied by Mandriva is the club forum, and to be fair, it's not the best place to get help from, it is essentially a stomping ground for die-hard fans whose technical competency is (by majority) limited to the GUI. this paid community does not compare to say ubuntu's official community forums, which in my experience are about 10 times more helpful that Mandriva's. I find it difficult to look at Mandriva and their poor efforts and not come to the same conclusion, that it's run by wannabe buisinessmen who clearly do not understand the market, or even to protect their product (they couldn't care less abot people redistributing powerpack cd's for next to nothing).
Mandriva was good as a beginners distro, but it looks like PCLinuxOS is out to steal that crown, and why not, textar clearly understands the market better than the Mandriva board, good luck to him!
I'm sure i've made Gael cringe with some of my posts on the club forums (i'm sure at least a handful have passed his eyes, shame on me), but I would like to offer him the best of luck in his new venture,
Cheers
107 • Gentoo (by RF on 2006-03-22 14:34:00 GMT from Great Malvern, United Kingdom)
I agree with AC!
I have learned a lot from Gentoo, and it's not a difficult to install as it is made out to be (I did my first after using Mandriva for 6 months). i hve never come accross a build that is broken yet, maybe i'm just lucky, who knows!
108 • No subject (by Anonymous on 2006-03-22 14:54:17 GMT from Chestnut Hill, United States)
"I don't think a six -week delay is anywhere close to Debian's releases. That's absurd."
True. But today it's 6 weeks and tomorrow they're as slow as US mail. I admit it's possible people myself included are overreacting to this, but never hurts to be cautious and keep organizations on their toes.
"Second, it is up to Shuttleworth whether Ubuntu is sold. He holds the purse strings and Canonical is privately owned."
I wasn't being literal. Whether Shuttleworth wants to sell or not, there will be pressure to do so if Ubuntu gained traction. Secondley, you can be thrown out of your own company eventually. It happened to Steve Jobs and plenty of others.
"Third, Debian and Gentoo will always be free. They have social contracts and democratically elected leadership and non-profit organizations funding them. It's conceivable they could simply collapse, but they won't be bought out."
When it comes to money, anyone can be bought out. Granted, with Debian it'd be tough because it'd be tough to figure out who to buy out, but if a corporate entity saw real opportunity with Debian and Debian gained real traction in the world, perhaps an $100K donation to about 100 of the Debian developers would be enough. Still cheaper than buying a whole company.
"Fourth, even companies that do charge, such as Red Hat, have to comply with the GPL, making their source code available, thus making projects like CentOS possible. The idea that someday you won't be able to get GNU/Linux for free is nonsense."
How many ideas have been crushed in human industry and how many idealistic ideas and idealistic people were put to the flame. Granted it won't be soon, but idealist people and organizations never last. A shame, but that's the way it goes.
Fifth, so you don't keep making the previous mistakes and so you get a reality check about the "way the world turns", you ought to do some reading on Free Software and on the GPL. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/.
Philosophy was fun while I was in College and I have made use of it in my dealings in the real world, but it can't save a ship that will evenutally sink.
"So when will Debian start charging too? They made the same promise to remain free as Ubuntu's founders. By the same token, if Debian should become so popular (and I predict that it will get more popular as more people catch onto the fact that the installer is fairly easy now) they could start charging too. Why is their promise to remain free taken seriously but Ubuntu's isn't?"
As a business person, I don't take anyone's promise seriously. Promises are meant to be broken and it's always a question of what button to push. If any of the linux distros gained real traction, they'd start charging. Simply because partners expect to get paid. You can't encourage people to develop drivers and software without offering something and you can't offer something unless you yourself are receiving. It's not a question of people's ideals, it's a question of how shark-invested the water of business is.
I think you folks need a brush-up course on advertising law too - that is, if Ubuntu should start charging they can actually be sued for false advertising.
As someone already pointed out, which country due you sue under? Who is doing the suing? False advertising, I see it everyday. Pills that make people lose weight overnight; the new Intel-based Apple computers are 4 times faster than their predecessors; and so on, you get the point. The advertisers are obviously not fearful of lawsuits. And even if they were sued, the price of the lawsuit pales in comparison to the revenue they take in because of the campaign. It's not a quest of right or wrong, it's a question of whether the gain outweighs the loss.
People, don't get me wrong, I love Linux and what it stands for, but it's a dream like all others that won't last forever. I wish the world were an idealistic place, but it's far from it.
109 • 108 (by AC on 2006-03-22 15:30:29 GMT from , United States)
I find your lack of faith disturbing.
110 • No subject (by AC on 2006-03-22 15:56:31 GMT from , United States)
In all seriousness, let me first point out that it was I who raised the difficulties of "false advertising" claims. So I am hardly the wooly headed idealist you may suspect me of being.
Responding to your replies:
There is a difference between trying to "keep organizations on their toes" - an active and constructive stance - and speaking of the "inevitable" as you did earlier. The latter is fatalistic acquiescence, more suited to a monastic mentality than the dealing with the "real world" that you advocate.
One can be thrown out of the company one founds - if one makes it public. It remains to be seen whether Shuttleworth will do so - many businesses do not go public for the very reason that they do not wish to give up the reins of what they built.
A businessman would be foolish to attempt to buy out Debian as you suggest for this reason: it is not merely a few dozen or even a few hundred developers that make Debian, but rather a whole community that tests, submits bug reports, offers fixes, etc. And that community would abandon Debian in the situation you describe. So what remained would not be worth the price to the new owner of Debian. A pyrrhic victory.
Rather than addressing my point about CentOS and the possibility of forking code which the GPL preserves, you've gone into some maudlin and to my mind foolish claims about the way of the world. The history books I've read record a lot of progress and many idealists achieving a good deal of their aims. Not perfection, no; but progress nevertheless. Look at literacy, infant mortality, life expectancy, the spread of democratic freedoms and civil liberties that were considered pipe dreams 300 years ago, freedoms extending to women, to people of different races. No, I certainly do not think it is all sweetness and light, but neither does history support your fatalistic ruminations about "the way it goes."
I won't reply to the responses that were not to me except to say this: you may wish to return not only to philosophy but to economics. Oh, you have the mastered the venal assumptions about human nature that caricatures of Adam Smith would have us accept. (Adam Smith himself was far more thoughtful and multi-faceted than those who invoke his name or regurgitate his ideas third hand tend to be) but people are far more complex in their motivations and economics is intertwined with (constantly changing) technology in such a way that such simplistic views are hardly the self-evident views their advocates would have one believe.
I am not saying that Free Software will sweep the globe. I am offerring no such predictions. I am merely pointing out that your assumptions are not the only ones open to a rational realistic person.
111 • Party Switch (by Kevin Durst on 2006-03-22 16:47:39 GMT from Old Chelsea, Canada)
"Well, you know theres Windows right? Well theres this other one, and its crap load better, AND its free? I meen, 300 bucks, or free? C'monnnn, fffreeeee."
112 • Feture of Ubuntu (by Douglas on 2006-03-23 01:46:02 GMT from Bothell, United States)
When speaking of the future of of Ubuntu don't you need to look at the dreams and motives of the owner. What I see is a person who has made more money that most of us will ever see in 10 life times. If someone where to try and buy him out, they would have to offer a lot of cash. Also if they went after the Debian team he has the money to counter it if he had to and wanted to.
It seems to me from his history that he is a person what wants the best for mankind. Look at how he treated his former employees! Look at the edubuntu.
The rich people I have meet get board and look for things to do. Often that is power, or helping others or drugs. It looks to me like he has picked helping others after having tried playing and women. LOL.
"Shuttleworth gained worldwide fame on 25 April 2002 as a civilian cosmonaut aboard the Russian Soyuz TM-34 mission, paying approximately US$ 20 million", (wikipedia). Can this person be bought? If he doing this for more money? He made about 553.87500 million U.S. dollars selling his last company and he has others!
Also from Wikipedia, "South African entrepreneur Mark Shuttleworth established the Shuttleworth Foundation [1] in 2001, with the aim of driving social innovation in the field of education. The Foundation is built with the belief that education is the key to unlocking the creative and intellectual potential of the youth, inspiring them to believe that “anything is possible”. So again what does he want in the Linux world? He looks like a good person to me and buying him is not an option unless maybe you are Bill Gates or something.
I sound like his PR person but I am not. I just don't see him as the take over and kill or take over and suck the blood out of things kind of person. I think he may truly want to help mankind and has the power and money to do so. Maybe he thinks it is fun. I am sure that many of you know more about him than I do. As they say walk the talk. If you want to know the man look at where he has been.
113 • my "Elevator Pitch" for Linux (by Pete Trbovich on 2006-03-23 08:10:50 GMT from Clarion, United States)
When I have to explain what Linux is in 30 seconds flat to a non-geek, I just say, "Linux is a free operating system for personal computers. It's written by the people, for the people. It works better because the people who use it, write it."
114 • mandriva and pclinux OS (by Darrin on 2006-03-23 10:21:31 GMT from Sydney, Australia)
Well the man that made Mandrake really cool was Texstar and when they introduced the mandrake club I suspect that they really annoyed him and he went to make his own cool distro, So Gaël Duval your legacy rock on in PCLinux OS, the lesson of the day don't tick off tallent like Texstar
115 • Beatrix (by George Appleton on 2006-03-23 11:12:33 GMT from , Australia)
Whatever happened to little Beatrix?
It was looking quite promising about a year ago.
116 • Beatrix seems to be dead... too bad... (by Caraibes on 2006-03-23 14:28:04 GMT from Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic)
well, yes, I enjoyed the whole concept behind Beatrix... And it worked mighty well...
I read somewhere that Steve, the founder, had some problems, and that the team split...
It was a great project, kind of in the same area as Puppy and Slax...
I wish it could go on... If I was a developper, I´d look into it...
117 • Ubuntu for the "fast and slow" people (by Aliby on 2006-03-23 15:05:30 GMT from Johannesburg, South Africa)
The danger of the delay is that what is one fo the most reliable as well as progressive linux systems becomes a tail gazer like so many others.
Fast progressive distro's (systems or anything in fact) attract developers who want to make a difference and push the limits - which makes the distro even more Fast and Progressive ... etc
Sure a winning distro, that filters through every aspect of PC useage, must have a solid base so that I can run Ubuntu at home (and for my 3 yr old) and also know it won't fall over at work.
The release cycle must ensure we don't loose the edge over the complacent "flowery cap" type linux distros which although have stability lack the spark.
Some thing like a 4month, 8 month release cycle could work or to provide business stability: perhaps a six month release cycle, with a enteprise release every third or fourth year given a little more testing/development time folllowed by a flash release to get back up to speed with the latest releases and on the cuttiing edge. I mean if you are not on the edge where are you?
6 month - 6 month | 6 month - 6 month | 8 month - 4 month
eg. v4-04 - v4-10 | v5-04 - v5-10 | v6-06 - v6-10
118 • Mandriva bashing getting boring (by Sitor on 2006-03-23 16:05:48 GMT from Bruxelles, Belgium)
This article tellls some truths, that is beyond denial. However it is very one sided and does focuses only on the negatives. Mandriva 2006 had a few flaws when it came out that should have been avoided. And a number of decisions of the company (of which the lay-off of Gael was very visible) do not look good.
However Mandriva still does a lot of great work. And I still prefer Mandriva 2006 over any other distro I have tried so far (including Kubuntu and SUSE, although SUSE is coming very close).
Lately there have been a number of articles, including this one that focus on the bad and forget about the good. Adam Williamson who wrote some reactions here is now very active on the club (paid by Mandriva), and that has brought a huge improvement. Also Mandriva is working on innovations like www.hcl.mandriva.com, taking into account community ideas and feedback. There is a lot of good, but you need to want to see it.
In any case, prediciting the downfall of the Mandriva distro is really pre-mature. And the bashing by ex-users who have left Mandriva a long time ago and don't really follow Mandriva evolution except for these kind of articles is really getting sad. Please stop the black and white depicturing: Mandriva does sometimes take wrong decisions, but why never speak about the good ones (Linux pre-installed PC's and stuff)? In any case Mandriva still is a damn good OS (for my needs I believe still the best).
By the way some of the innovations that Mandriva is working on is not enterprise related at all. So for the moment, their actions still proove that they keep working for the home users as well, and not only for the enterprise users. Despite of what a lot of people are spreading in articles like these from their living room at the other side of the globe as if they do know all.
In any case Mandriva can keep counting on my support. For the moment the 2006 release gives great satisfaction, and I don't see why the 2007 release would not be even better.
Kind Regards,
Sitor
119 • RE: #118 (by Anonymous Penguin on 2006-03-23 22:38:00 GMT from Roma, Italy)
"And the bashing by ex-users who have left Mandriva a long time ago and don't really follow Mandriva evolution except for these kind of articles is really getting sad."
I disagree. Even if it is true that I stopped using Mandriva as my main OS a long time ago, I have tried every single release, and sometimes it has stayed on my HD for a while.
The only critcism I have of the distro is that it should be more stable when it is released (but that is true of every distro, except maybe for Debian and Slackware) and that it should have a more professional look and feel.
My main criticism is against the management, and it has always been since I was a member and since I used to buy the most expensive boxed editions.
I have always believed that a club membership is a silly business model.
And then there is a long series of wrong, unpopular and undemocratic decisions that everybody knows, but I can list some of them if you want.
120 • Ubuntu Delay (by Ian B Gibson on 2006-03-23 23:05:57 GMT from HUNTSVILLE, United States)
Ubuntu is wonderful, but still has its faults (as every piece of non-trivial software ever written does). I think we should admit that missing the release deadline is bad, but not as bad as keeping to the deadline but releasing a shoddy product. So the delay is the lesser of two evils.
Still, compare this with MS, who just announced another two-month delay on Vista and nobody bats an eyelid - what's another two months on top of the two years we've already waited?
121 • 120 (by AC on 2006-03-23 23:28:27 GMT from , United States)
"Still, compare this with MS, who just announced another two-month delay on Vista and nobody bats an eyelid..."
Tell that to Dell and HP, faced with the prospect of flat Christmas sales when people realize their new PC will have a four year old operating system without much support time left that will be considered outdated in a few months. Ouch.
122 • mindless mandriva bashing (by agendelman on 2006-03-24 01:27:32 GMT from Little Neck, United States)
I've also grown very weary of the hostility and name calling. It seems that distrowatch is morphing into a site whose main purpose is to gush with endless uncritical praise of ubuntu and flame endlessly at mandriva.
Legitimate criticism and discussion is part of the open source process, but the thoughtless anger and almost religious fanaticism can't be ignored. Let's get a grip.
123 • RE: mindless mandriva bashing (by ladislav on 2006-03-24 02:03:00 GMT from Taipei, Taiwan)
...and your contribution is mindless DistroWatch bashing. Instead, why don't you write an article explaining your view or sharing your experiences about your favourite distribution?
If all you are capable of is writing a two-minute moan, then you have no right to complain about somebody else's opinion.
124 • Fedora (by tom on 2006-03-24 13:31:16 GMT from Helena, United States)
I know it is late in the week, but...
I downloaded Fedora and am attempting to install on a system with several Linux patitions, some of which are data. I am having troubble assigning the root partition for Fedora and the installer will not allow me to assign mount points for non-root (data) partitions.
Help, is there a web page or man page ??
If no respone I will try re-posting early next week
125 • RE: RE: mindless mandriva bashing (by Sitor on 2006-03-24 14:21:05 GMT from Bruxelles, Belgium)
>...and your contribution is mindless DistroWatch bashing. Instead, why don't you write an article explaining your view or sharing your experiences about your favourite distribution?
>If all you are capable of is writing a two-minute moan, then you have no right to complain about somebody else's opinion.
His reaction was a support too mine, so I feel this applies to mine as well.
See www.computertaal.info for a 30 page article on Mandriva in their free digital magazine (DCM) that I wrote. It is in dutch though and written to convince the non-linux user instead of users already using linux, so not in place at distrowatch.
Sorry, but I have a full time job and a family, so such articles already take all the free time I have. Writing articles for distrowatch just is not high enough on my priority list I guess. I prefer to convince non-linux users to use linux, rather then convince users of other distros to use Mandriva.
But does that mean that I have no right to raise MY opinion when someone is (according to me) misinforming others (I'm sorry, but giving a very one sided view just is misinformation). If you don't want to allow others to complain about that, then why do you offer the possibility to comment your articles? For praise on your great articles only?
126 • Mandriva bashing (by Douglas on 2006-03-24 15:46:22 GMT from Bothell, United States)
My former statements could be seen as bashing so I wanted to state that while I used it it worked well. It was the only Linux system that I knew of (pre-distrowatch for me) that I could get to boot. My problem with it was that I wanted a no pay system. To get the drivers that I needed and get them to work I had to join the club; I was a total newbie. This was not true the first few months that I used it but as soon as the club started the access to good info about the system started to dry up for non payers. I am sure that if you have the money to pay for it Mandriva is still a great system or if you don't need graphics drivers.
Has any one used the new Gentoo? I got the last one to boot all the way to KDE but then tried to update the system and broke everything. I was sad because it was the fastest system my computer ever ran! Very snappy and it had just what I needed and wanted. Problem was that after I broke it I spent my whole weekend trying to fix it. I gave up and put Kubuntu back in my machine.
Complaints about compile time to me are silly. My computer runs all the time with nothing to do but watch for emails. I am sure if you needed your computer for work or something Gentoo would not be for you unless you had the time to take off or had a second computer. I think most home users could take the time if they really wanted too. It is also a great way to jump from advanced newbie to expert in no time. I learned more in my two weeks of Gentoo than all my last year of Kubuntu.
So is this new 2006 Gentoo less of a house of cards? Or is it just easier to install? The other problem I had is that the help I found on the net was often wrong. I think it was wrong because it was dated but you could not tell that by reading it. One mistake and you are in computer hell. I would only use Gentoo it it were easier to find and fix mistakes. Gentoo with an undo button would be perfect! It seems to need better docs for post install users. I found the install docs to be great. The other problem I had is that it could only detect my dsl line one time in 10! Even the install disk had this problem. Ubuntu does not have this problem, nor does DSL or Knoppix. I never could figure out what was causing the problem.
127 • Apple-Windows (by Robzilla on 2006-03-24 18:07:28 GMT from Los Angeles, United States)
I have to say that the news of Windows Vista being released late does not surprise me. When it is released it will be full of bugs and still have many of the problems of XP. I have been a Windows user since 95 and when I got to ME I gave up. I bought a laptop with Xp and soon put Linux on it.
Linux is great and I love it. I think it is becoming more and more excellent as time goes on. I like all of the distros. Some more than others. I have used Ubuntu and it was o.k. and I have used Mandriva and liked it a lot. I think the majority of Linux users who have issues with Mandriva will complain about the same things. Basically the OS is outdated and buggy before patched. No one likes to buy a release and then have to fork $12 a month forever just to have the best that Mandriva has to offer. I like to support open source and I like to have proprietary drivers and just have a Linux that works!! I mean no one complains so much about Linspire who also charges way to much. As much as I hate the club at least all of the software is free? No click and charge like Linspire. And I will say that Mandriva is a much better OS in my opinion than Linspire. I think Mandriva need to go the way of the Suse business model and they will be successful again.
I sold my Windows Laptop and bought an Apple iBook. Say what you will about apple and their hardware. I have found their hardware to be well designed and of high quality. Do they charge a high price, yes. It is worth it and I love my Apple. I can run Neo-Office which is open source and free. I can also run aany number of Linux programs in X. So now that I have been using it a while I have to say I will never go back. Tiger is awesome. My only complaint is their move to Intel. I would have liked to see AMD chips on apple. I think AMD makes a better product but maybe they will figure that out. For now my power pc kicks *ss!
If Linux is to grow and succeed beyond just a hobby OS or server then companies like novell are on the right track. I think Mandriva and Linspire have got some good ideas on working with manufacturers. I would love to see SUse pre-installed on a nice Sharp laptop with an AMD 64bit chip then I may look at buying something other than an apple. Until then the pc world has lost another customer. Leopard is gonna shred Vista a new *ss anyway!!
R
128 • 122 (by AC on 2006-03-25 00:27:00 GMT from , United States)
agendelman wrote:
"...distrowatch is morphing into a site whose main purpose is to gush with endless uncritical praise of ubuntu..."
in a week that Ladislav wrote:
"Suddenly, a big part of this trust is gone and users have every reason to question the validity of Ubuntu's other promises."
and I posted (64) a link to a blog entry suggesting that Canonical, Ubuntu's sponsoring company, could be more dangerous than Microsoft, and pointing out other broken promises. Others have also been critical or at least suspicious of Ubuntu in various ways.
I wonder if it was "thoughtless anger and almost religious fanaticism" that made the poster of comment 122 fail to see the contradiction here.
Yes, there's been some strong criticism of Mandr* here recently. I've never used it myself and don't follow it closely, but the criticism doesn't really seem unwarranted. But I'd welcome having my ignorance corrected and urge the poster to write an article setting us all straight on the facts that ladislav is allegedly overlooking or misrepresenting.
Personally, I think Ladislav is remarkably fair and even-handed. And I say this as someone who has had posts deleted for gratuitously bashing Slackware! Hey, I was in the wrong. (In how I said it anyway. What I said wasn't inaccurate.)
129 • Gentoo (by tom at 2006-03-25 17:31:35 GMT from Helena, United States)
Yes, Gentoo is very, very broken. I have had the same problems with less success. The portage system is broken and the web page is useless. I could find no help or support from the "Gentoo community".
130 • Sacré bon dieu de sort ... comment peut on trouver ce progrramme en français ... (by joel gazel on 2006-03-25 17:37:00 GMT from Stains, France)
Cannot find the french version
joel.gazel@wanadoo.fr
131 • 129 (by AC on 2006-03-25 21:56:27 GMT from , United States)
Did you describe your problems on the forums? Look there for similar problems? Check the mailing lists?
132 • 124 for Tom in Helena Fredora install docs (by AC on 2006-03-26 00:32:18 GMT from , United States)
have you looked here?
http://fedora.redhat.com/docs/fedora-install-guide-en/
133 • RE: #127 (by Anonymous Penguin on 2006-03-26 04:12:22 GMT from Sestri Levante, Italy)
Robzilla,
Having had the chance to play with Mac OS X for a while, I fail to see why it is better than linux.
It is kind of "cute" and easy to use, but personally I find Kanotix better from almost every point of view: more powerful, flexible and even easier when it comes to installing applications (nothing beats apt and synaptic, IMHO)
On top of that you can install linux on almost every hardware, while here in Europe you have to pay almost double for Mac hardware.
134 • 133 (by AC on 2006-03-26 04:38:11 GMT from , United States)
Most of Rob's comments seemed to be on hardware but I could be mistaken. I concur in preferring GNU/Linux to OS X. but I also think Apple makes better hardware. Of course, when it comes to hardware. Sun is pretty much the best in my experience. Everything is so incredibly well designed, e.g. cables are exactly the right length so there's no excess (and of course, no coming short). Even fairly old Sun hardware holds up remarkably well. And the same applies to Apple.
Kanotix is nice. I often use it on Qemu for secure browsing, on top of Debian amd64 testing. I don't see any great advantage of Debian proper (except the live CD aspect) but it is a nice system.
135 • RE: #134 (by Anonymous Penguin on 2006-03-26 05:57:43 GMT from Cava De' Tirreni, Italy)
"Kanotix is nice. I often use it on Qemu for secure browsing, on top of Debian amd64 testing. I don't see any great advantage of Debian proper (except the live CD aspect) but it is a nice system."
Basically I do not disagree. Kanotix is a fast way of installing a fully working Debian, a nice set of scripts and a LiveCD. Other than that it is Debian.
As to Mac hardware it might be of good quality but, as I said, too expensive in Europe to justify the price. I can choose every single component and build something equivalent to any given Mac for much less.
136 • I am very mobile again :) (by Anonymous Penguin on 2006-03-26 06:41:46 GMT from Cava De' Tirreni, Italy)
These days I am very mobile again, lol.
At least I am living in beautiful places: Sestri Levante, Cava De' Tirreni...
I guess it makes all of you a bit jealous :)
137 • 135 (by AC on 2006-03-26 06:48:52 GMT from , United States)
I think Kanotix is great if you either haven't formed many preferences or happen to prefer just the apps Kanotix includes (as you seem to). For me, it takes more time removing all the things I don't want and adding all the things I do than I save with the quick install. (And I prefer the flexibility of d-i.) Besides, I have my own scripts for setting up a good GNOME, XFCE4, WindowMaker, or FVWM2 desktop (depending on the hardware and how I'll use it) automatically from a minimal install. With my runlevels the way I want, grub the way I want, my sources the way I want, fstab the way I want, etc. Don't get me wrong: I think Kano does great work and it's a handy live CD. I use it. But I like my choices better than his.
As for Apple hardware, you're probably right. Most of my boxen are custom built AMD based machines and it's a better deal, especially if prices in Europe are high for Macs. I'd stand by my view that nothing beats good Sun hardware though, but that's in a different class entirely. I misspoke in saying "the same applies to Apple". There is a similar coherence to the design, but beyond that, both PC and Mac hardware pale beside the stuff Sun makes.
138 • Novatech Unwire WiFi card (by Carl Smuck on 2006-03-26 07:31:31 GMT from Haymarket, United States)
The Novatech Unwire Wireless 802.11G WiFi card for notebook PC's is really good for anyone wanting a WiFi card that works with SUSE Linux 10.0 right out of the box. Particularly if you own one of those AMD Athlon 64 or Turion 64 laptops that likes 64 bit operating systems. In addition the Novatech Unwire card is availble at surpluscomputers.com for only $25.99. This is very good news for anyone with say an HP Pavilion zv5410us notebook PC. Windows XP Professional x64 edtion is nice for AMD Athlon 64 Desktops with a VIA chipset on the motherboard but it is not good for much else. Fedora Core 5 is nice but it does not seem to be much good for wireless networking.
139 • Apple/Linux (by Robzilla on 2006-03-26 08:27:46 GMT from Walnut, United States)
Well let me say this. Linux an incredible operating system especially for the flexibility and level of configuration it offers. The security and amount of free software programs and the quality of those programs is amazing. My hats off to the GNu movement. I do particularly enjoy Linux.
The problem that I have had with Linux is stability and issues with hardware. I have had an issue with one of these two things in every Linux OS I have used. I am not saying that the hardware issues are the fault of Linux in no way! I am amazed at how well Linux can work with hardware with copyright laws and the amount of hardware out there. That being said I still had issues. Stability has been an issue in a good number of distros. Now as many as I have had stability issues I have as much or more that were very stable. So if you keep looking you will find a stable Linux. Again the problem for me would be that the type of Linux that would work with all of my hardware would not always be the most stable choice. Furthermore my skill level was such that I could not fix these problems on my own or even with the help of people on forums. However Linux was as stable as Xp and was a much more secure and configurable OS than windows will ever be. Then add the free software!
Now to apple. I did not say Apple was better than Linux. I do not think it is. The hardware from apple is better designed and lasts longer than the pc makers I have used. OSX is an awesome OS there is no doubt about it. Why I think a part of it is the fact there is FreeBSd and OpenDarwin under the hood. It is one of the most stable OS's I have ever used. As for security again FreeBSd!! Then using it is pretty nice too. Spotlight the file finder feature is really handy. The GUI eyecandy and attention to detail is again awesome. Configurability could be better. Linux is better here. Buut then one of the best features of OSX is that I can run X and use all of the great Gnu software like the Gimp! I already have native neooffice, thunderbird and firefox. So despite the initial shock of cost I am happy. I really enjoy the mac. The more I use it the more I like it. Kind of how it was when I started learning Linux. Contrast that with Windows where I just hated ever minute and really did not enjoy it at all.
If you own a mac you will understand.
R
140 • Just an observation (by AC on 2006-03-26 09:49:33 GMT from , United States)
Linus uses a Mac. Running GNU/Linux of course.
But then Linus prefers KDE...
141 • RE: #139 & 140 (by Anonymous Penguin on 2006-03-26 17:09:16 GMT from Roma, Italy)
Well, once Linux distributions make EFI compliant versions, I guess Macs could be ideal for dual booting: the range of Mac hardware is pretty limited after all, thus supporting it should be easy.
But for me the main issue remains cost, once again.
And BTW, AC, I believed that Sun only made extremely expensive hardware, but I have realized that it is simply not true: in fact they make affordable workstations.
142 • UNIX trivia (by AC on 2006-03-26 20:04:34 GMT from , United States)
Ever wonder why IBM and HP went in big for GNU/Linux while Sun has always been ambivalent? It's in large part because IBM and HP were strong in the "big iron", where their UNIX offerrings were secure for the foreseeable future. But workstations and mid-range servers were always Sun's bread and butter and GNU/Linux on commodity hardware was a direct threat to that.
BTW, you can get a good Sun workstation on eBay for
143 • UNIX trivia oops (by AC on 2006-03-26 20:05:42 GMT from , United States)
less than US $100. Don't let the low specs fools you. A RISC chip performs far better at the same clock rate than an x86, partly because of the huge cache, but mainly because the Restricted Instruction Set runs code a lot more efficiently. And they agre very well.
Number of Comments: 143
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