 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 299, 20 April 2009 |
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Welcome to this year's 16th issue of DistroWatch Weekly! It's the Ubuntu release week (or Ubuntu "circus", as some prefer to call it), a major event in the calendar of many open source software enthusiasts. What will the distribution's 10th official release be like? And will the download servers cope with the expected heavy demand? We'll have to wait until Thursday to find out; in the meantime, read below for a quick tip on reverting to an older kernel under Ubuntu and visit Canonical's ShipIt service to order your free CDs. In the news section, Mandriva gains support for hardware database known as Smolt, Easy Peasy ponders a few ideas concerning the distro's default user interface, and Fedora's Ricky Zhou points out the importance of innovation in Red Hat's community distribution. Finally, don't miss our feature article which calls for an implementation of a centralised bug-tracking database for all open source software projects. Happy reading!
Content:
 Listen to the Podcast edition of this week's DistroWatch Weekly in OGG (32MB) and MP3 (33MB) formats
 Join us at irc.freenode.net #distrowatch
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| Feature Story |
FOSS needs a central bug tracker (by Jesse Smith)
It happened again today. I was using one of my favorite applications when a familiar bug popped up its head and brought my work to a screeching halt. Determined to rid all of humankind of this pest, I went to the Help menu and selected "Report A Bug". Seconds later, I was on the project's bug tracking web page. Seconds after that, I determined that the only way for me to report this bug (to the upstream project) was to create yet another bug tracking account.
Usually I consider myself among the lucky; I generally use Linux and generally use one distro. Reporting bugs is relatively easy in that I just need the one bug-tracking account with one vendor. However, there are days, dark days, when I'm required to use other operating systems with no central bug-tracking system. This becomes a problem after a while. Sure, it takes very little time to set up one bug-tracking account with one open source project. But when a person uses dozens of open source applications across multiple operating systems, the amount of time and the number of username/password combinations grow at an alarming rate. As I mentioned, I usually live a sheltered, one-distro life, but what agony distro hoppers must go through, setting up a bug-tracking account for each and every Linux distribution they test drive! And for those people on other operating systems, imagine opening bug tracking accounts for GIMP, OpenOffice.org, Firefox, FileZilla, etc, etc, in an effort to get one's voice heard!
OpenOffice.org bug tracker
(full image size: 146kB, screen resolution: 1140x943 pixels)
Bug-tracking software is a wonderful tool and I applaud any software project that uses one, but therein lies the problem: so many software projects have this software and they all operate separately. Fedora has one tracker, Debian another, Ubuntu another; and there are thousands of upstream projects, many with their own trackers.
Now, let us think for a moment about these thousands of bug tracking systems and consider the amount of duplicated effort. Not just in the repeated bug reports when someone reports a problem to Slackware and another person reports it to Fedora and another to Ubuntu, but also in the effort of setting up these thousands of databases. We're talking a lot of man/woman/admin hours, here!
GNOME bug tracker
(full image size: 96kB, screen resolution: 847x568 pixels)
I think it would be a good idea to see a grouping of this talent and data into one place. Consider this: a project such as Debian is already a hub for reporting bugs and making feature requests for over 20,000 open source projects. In fact, as an open source developer, I often check the Debian bug tracker to see if anything has been reported against my projects. Wouldn't it be reasonable if we took this a step further and brought all of the various distributions' bug trackers under one system? Imagine if you found a problem in any open source project on any operating system and could report it in one place. Just one bug tracking account for each user and developer! When application XYZ crashes, I could go to, for example, opensourceoops.org and report the issue, regardless of whether I'm running a flavor of Linux, OS X or BSD. While the initial setup would be a large effort, the reduction in duplicated work over the long term would be fantastic. Also, it would lower the barrier to getting those pesky bugs reported by users who don't wish to register yet another username.
An all-in-one solution would also benefit the developers of open source software. As I mentioned previously, I maintain a few small, open source applications, which are packaged for various Linux distributions and BSDs. Though I certainly don't fault the busy package maintainers, problems and patches are very rarely forwarded from the distributions to our upstream developers. To try to fix everything in the upstream source, we (myself and other developers) have had to go to each distro we know of which maintains a package of our software and search their issue tracker for our package name. This is tedious work. Imagine how much easier it would be to find and integrate patches if a developer had to simply search one large issue tracker.
I would very much like to see an open source supporter, such as Red Hat, Canonical or Mozilla, for example, implement a large, inclusive issue tracker. While a large investment up front, the benefits to open source users, developers and package maintainers would be a great boon to the community. There is some precedent for this. As mentioned before, distributions, such as Debian, track issues for thousands of packages. On a similar vein, web sites such as SourceForge and Google Code already provide open source projects with a central location to save, present and contribute. A central bug tracker could work much the same way, providing open source developers and users with one location to report and work on problems.
Ubuntu's bug tracker, Launchpad
(full image size: 88kB, screen resolution: 860x630 pixels)
The greatest hurdle I see to adopting a central system is that people tend to stick with what they have. For a mega issue tracker to really be effective, most of the smaller, single-project and distribution-specific trackers would probably have to be phased out. People would have to be encouraged to adopt the single location method. As an alternative, perhaps the central tracker could be set up in such a way that it would pull issues from other sources. Distributions and upstream projects might see the benefit of having their trouble tickets uploaded to a central location where everyone could see them. This would also centralize issue tracking, without the problems of forcing people to use The One method. Change is often difficult, especially when we're looking at so many people spread out over the world. However, I think something needs to be done; we have hundreds of distributions and thousands of open source projects. Encouraging users to maintain separate accounts for each one is cumbersome and inefficient for everyone.
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| Tips and Tricks |
Reverting to older kernel under Ubuntu (by Ladislav Bodnar)
  As many regular DistroWatch Weekly readers will know, over the past year I've been experimenting with various Linux distributions on my ASUS Eee PC 900. This is one of the most popular netbooks on the market and many distributions have made efforts to provide out-of-the-box support for the little laptop and its hardware. Mandriva Linux was probably the first distribution offering full support for the Eee PC, but others soon followed. The recent release of Ubuntu Netbook Remix 9.04 RC as an *.img file, a format easily transferable to any USB storage media, has quickly become my preferred operating system on the Eee PC and it has now replaced the original Xandros-built distribution on its internal solid state drives (SSD).
The primary reason for my preference for Ubuntu Netbook Remix over other options is its extremely efficient use of the available screen real estate. While most other distributions provide more of the same interface as designed for desktops and laptops with large monitors, Ubuntu Netbook Remix goes out of its way to reduce the unnecessary clutter to a minimum. Gone are the taskbars and other such "luxuries"; instead, the distribution sacrifices parts of the applications' title bars to display icons of open applications (on the left) and important system information, such as date or network and battery status (on the right). This is a very clever way of fitting a working environment to a small, 9-inch screen, thus making Ubuntu Netbook Remix and excellent operating system for any small-screen device.
The efficient use of the screen real estate is the primary advantage of Ubuntu Netbook Remix.
Now for the bad news. The release candidate for Ubuntu Netbook Remix 9.04 doesn't work well on most Eee PC models. This is the result of a kernel bug that makes the distribution's home desktop barely usable due to the presence of "mouse-over" effects that temporarily freeze the cursor for a few seconds before jumping to a new position. While this erratic mouse movement can't be classified as a show-stopper bug, it is highly annoying, making the first impression of the distribution extremely negative. Additionally, there is no obvious way to disable the mouse-over effects and restore normal mouse operation. It also seems that this bug, reported on Launchpad as number 349314, won't be fixed before the final release of Ubuntu 9.04.
Fortunately, there is a workaround. Those of you who followed the development of Ubuntu 9.04 on an Eee PC since the beta release have probably noticed that, at one point, the "jerky mouse" problem disappeared, only to re-appear once again after the next kernel update. The patch which fixed the issue in kernel 2.6.28-11.40 was reverted in kernel 2.6.28-11.41 because it caused other problems. The short-lived happiness lasted only a couple of days and it resulted in some users asking how to restore a known working kernel under Ubuntu. If you don't mind opening the terminal and passing a few commands, the fix is actually fairly simple. Here you go:
- First, download the working kernel files:
wget http://launchpadlibrarian.net/24767281/linux-image-2.6.28-11-generic_2.6.28-11.40_i386.deb
wget http://launchpadlibrarian.net/24767282/linux-headers-2.6.28-11-generic_2.6.28-11.40_i386.deb
wget http://launchpadlibrarian.net/24767280/linux-headers-2.6.28-11_2.6.28-11.40_all.deb
- Next, install the three downloaded DEB files with dpkg:
sudo dpkg -i linux-*
- Now, reboot your computer. Once booted up, you should see your mouse-over effects on the desktop working correctly, with smooth movements of the spinning icons when launching an application and nice notifications.
- The final step is to put your current kernel on hold (otherwise it would be upgraded once again during your next "aptitude update && aptitude safe-upgrade" routine):
sudo aptitude hold linux-image-2.6.28-11-generic linux-headers-2.6.28-11-generic linux-headers-2.6.28-11
Finally, a quick reminder for those who are about to install Ubuntu Netbook Remix (or any other Linux distribution) on a netbook with solid state drives. Since these drives have a limited life span that depends on the frequency of write access to the drives, you can greatly prolong their life span if you follow these two rules while installing your preferred distribution (here is the source of this information, although there are those who dispute this):
- choose a non-journalling file system (e.g. ext2)
- don't create a swap partition
The release candidate for Ubuntu Netbook Remix 9.04 can be downloaded from here: ubuntu-9.04-rc-netbook-remix-i386.img (846MB, MD5). Installation instructions can be found here.
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| Miscellaneous News |
Ubuntu takes pre-orders for Jaunty, Mandriva supports Smolt, Easy Peasy focuses on interface improvements, interview with Fedora developer
  The latest version of Ubuntu is almost upon us. Version 9.04 is dubbed Jaunty Jackalope and scheduled for release on 23rd April. The Ubuntu web site provides information on what this new version will bring over the previous release. The list includes GNOME 2.26, a new notification system, improved multi-display support, an upgrade to X.Org server 1.6, Linux kernel 2.6.28 and support for the ext4 file system and cloud computing. If you are happy to wait and don't have a fast Internet connection, the good news is that you can now pre-order CDs from Canonical's ShipIt service: Ubuntu is available free of charge and we can send you a CD of the latest version (9.04 Jaunty Jackalope) with no extra cost, but the delivery may take up to ten weeks, so you should consider downloading the CD image if you have a fast Internet connection. Ubuntu is, of course, free to distribute.
* * * * *
 Mandriva Linux is another one of those distributions which has greatly improved over the last couple of years. Since getting back to its roots, it has provided a mature and stable operating system. One area in which Linux is constantly improving is hardware support and recently, contributor Frederick Himpe has built packages for Smolt and uploaded them to Cooker, Mandriva's testing branch. He writes: "Smolt is a tool developed for Fedora which collects information about all your hardware and submits it to a central database. On the smolts.org web site, people can view all hardware entries and indicate which one is working OK for them. The database is also coupled with a Wiki, where extra instructions can be written to get the hardware working. Smolt is used by default already for some time in Fedora and also in openSUSE." Hopefully the inclusion of Smolt will help Mandriva solve issues within the distribution and increase the overall quality and stability.
* * * * *
 The upcoming release of Ubuntu will officially support netbooks for the first time, but that hasn't deterred derivatives of the operating system from maintaining their own approach. Easy Peasy (formerly Ubuntu Eee) is one such distribution. Lead developer Jon Ramci wrote on his blog about working on improvements to the default interface: "Just as we've made the Linux kernel and Easy Peasy as a whole, a thoroughly optimized operating system for netbooks, we want to take the netbook interface one step further. We want to move web down to the desktop, as you're using Easy Peasy on a netbook you shouldn't have to start Firefox to start surfing. We add an Easy Peasy profile on the top right. The desktop will be open and module-based, so anyone will be able to write the next great module. Default modules should include Facebook, Twitter, email, chat and RSS feeds."
* * * * *
 The Fedora project has been gaining a lot of steam and positive reviews of their recent releases. The upcoming version 11, dubbed Leonidas, is set to continue the strong tradition of bleeding-edge technology on a solid foundation. This week we are including an interview with infrastructure team member Ricky Zhou, conducted by How Software is Built. In the interview they discuss: "identity of the Fedora community and its relationship with Red Hat, relationship between Fedora and other distributions, upstream projects as they relate to Fedora, public opinion about the Fedora project, open source involvement in the software industry and university sphere." When asked whether he feels that Fedora gets credit for pushing new technology, Zhou replies: "I think that Fedora definitely gets credit for that. If you look at some news sites, you'll see that a lot of people are fairly aware of how and where things have come from." He continues: "Overall, Fedora does have a good reputation for being an early adopter of many useful features. I've seen people mention in a few places that a lot of software has improved and stabilized a lot after being included in Fedora."
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| Released Last Week |
Sabayon Linux 4.1 "GNOME"
Fabio Erculiani has announced the release of Sabayon Linux 4.1 "GNOME" edition: "Dedicated to those who like order over chaos, to those who like simplicity over complexity, to those who think that less is more, to those that just want more for less. Sabayon 4.1, based on Sabayon 4 LiteMCE, represents the best of the out-of-the-box, GNOME, multimedia applications, and what you need for your daily tasks. Features: based on Sabayon Linux 4 LiteMCE; custom Linux kernel 2.6.29.1; ext4 is the default file system; complete GNOME 2.24 (2.26 available through Entropy); OpenOffice.org 3.0.1; Compiz and Compiz Fusion 0.8.2; X.Org 7.4 supporting the latest AMD and NVIDIA video cards; multimedia applications (audio, video, DVD ripping, file sharing); media center mode, transforming Sabayon into a complete multimedia platform thanks to XBMC...." Read the full release announcement for more details.
gNewSense 2.2
Karl Goetz has announced the release of gNewSense 2.2, an Ubuntu-based, 100% free GNU/Linux distribution as defined by the Free Software Foundation (FSF): "The gNewSense project is pleased to announce version 2.2 of its 100% FSF Free GNU/Linux distribution. This is the second point update to the release code-named 'deltah'. This release introduces GLX back into the default install. This enables hardware acceleration by default, meaning Compiz and 3D games will work once again. Short list of changes: installer now supports two more file systems; GLX re-introduced; changed description of -updates and -backports in Software Sources; lsb_release output corrected; GNU Icecat repository available via Software Sources; Builder - substantial code restructuring...." See the rest of the release announcement for more information.
gNewSense 2.2 - the "freeest" of all distributions
(full image size: 305kB, screen resolution 1280x1024 pixels)
SliTaz GNU/Linux 2.0
Christophe Lincoln has released SliTaz GNU/Linux 2.0, a fast, independent mini-distribution and live CD: "SliTaz GNU/Linux 2.0 is released after a year of hard work. Based on version 1.0, SliTaz comprises of 1400 software packages easily installable via the 'tazpkg' package manager. The live CD can be fully configured to taste to easily create a custom distribution specifically for tasks such as multimedia, graphics or development. Some of the new features in this release include: better hardware support for WiFi, Windows drivers, NTFS and low memory systems; easier customization to roll your own distro; web boot support; Openbox replaces JWM as the window manager; more tiny graphical utilities for administration, setting preferences, system upgrade, etc. The distribution is available in English, German, French and Portuguese." Read the detailed release notes for further information.
SliTaz GNU/Linux 2.0 - a 30 MB mini-distribution featuring the Openbox window manager
(full image size: 91kB, screen resolution 1280x1024 pixels)
FreeNAS 0.69.1
Volker Theile has announced the release of FreeNAS 0.69.1, an updated version of the FreeBSD-based operating system providing free Network-Attached Storage (NAS) services: "FreeNAS 0.69.1 (Omnius). Changes: upgrade Samba to 3.0.34, ProFTPD to 1.3.2, mDNSResponder to 1.08.6, lighttpd to 1.4.22, cdialog to 1.1.20080819, e2fsprogs to 1.41.4, nut to 2.4.1, Transmission to 1.51, Upgrade NTFS-3G to 2009.2.1, Bash to 4.0.10; upgrade 3Ware serial ATA RAID controller driver to 9.5.1; add 'SSL/TLS only' on 'Services, FTP' page to allow TLS/SSL connections only; add 'Reverse DNS lookup' on 'Services, FTP' page; add 'Authentication' checkbox on 'Services, BitTorrent' page to enable and disable authentication for TransmissionBT WebGUI...." Read the remainder of the release announcement for further details.
* * * * *
Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases
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| Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
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Summary of expected upcoming releases
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| DistroWatch.com News |
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New distributions added to database
* * * * *
New distributions added to waiting list
- Desktop Paraná. Desktop Paraná is a Debian-based desktop distribution created for the regional government of Paraná in Brazil.
- Lihuen. Lihuen is a Debian-based GNU/Linux distribution developed by the Faculty of Information at the Universidad Nacional de La Plata in Argentina.
* * * * *
DistroWatch database summary
* * * * *
And this concludes the latest issue of DistroWatch Weekly. The next instalment will be published on Monday, 27 April 2009.
Chris Smart
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| Reader Comments • Jump to last comment |
1 • Central bug tracker (by Didier Trosset on 2009-04-20 07:53:04 GMT from Germany)
I was at ACCU conference in April 2007, and there was a keynote from Mark Shuttleworth: "Collaboration with a capital C". He identified the missing thing with bug tracking as a _distributed_ bug-tracking software, not a centralized one.
2 • OpenID (by Duhnonymous on 2009-04-20 08:04:52 GMT from United States)
You wouldn't need multiple accounts if people just supported OpenID.
http://openid.net/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenID
3 • Downgrading kernel until... (by viktor on 2009-04-20 08:19:30 GMT from France)
Spot on! Just as I was wondering about the sluggishness of Jaunty RC on my 900...
Usually I use synaptic to force a specific version but I never experimented it with kernels.
Although I put the kernel on hold as scripted, update-manager suggests 2.6.28-11.42
I'll post back to say if it's ok or if you should stay with 2.6.28-11.40
4 • No subject (by Anonymous on 2009-04-20 08:26:27 GMT from United States)
"As an alternative, perhaps the central tracker could be set up in such a way that it would pull issues from other sources"
Launchpad can track issues that are tracked in other bugtrackers, and the project's aim is to synchronize bugs and comments with other bugtrackers.
5 • Launchpad (by Azrael on 2009-04-20 08:37:49 GMT from United States)
See https://help.launchpad.net/Bugs
6 • Central bug tracker (by Greg at 2009-04-20 08:40:45 GMT from Greece)
Maybe the first step for a Central bug tracker would be to first start distributing the software as the upstream developers wrote it, not patched or branded downstream.
Which would be a huge step forward.
7 • Downgrading kernel until... (by viktor on 2009-04-20 08:42:03 GMT from France)
As you feared kernel 2.6.28-11.42 doesn't fix the issue on Eee 900.
Downgrade to 2.6.28-11.40 and stay there untill further notice (or until EasyPeasy/eeeBuntu fills in the blanks).
Putting the kernel on hold/forcing previous version doesn't prevent update-manager to prompt us with an upgrade to uncheck every time...
8 • OpenID +1 (by M. J. Zölde-Fejér (mjjzf) on 2009-04-20 09:52:00 GMT from Denmark)
I echo comment #2 that an implementation of OpenID on bugtrackers would eliminate much of the problem.
9 • No subject (by Anonymous on 2009-04-20 09:54:25 GMT from United States)
"Since these drives have a limited life span that depends on the frequency of write access to the drives, you can greatly prolong their life span"
Is that the case?
SSD do have a limited lifespan compared to traditional harddrives?
I would like to buy the eee pc 901 linux edition, but if this is the case, I'm reconsidering.
10 • Bugs buggy (by Tom on 2009-04-20 10:09:51 GMT from United Kingdom)
I thought this was already done with projects like BugZilla and LaunchPad. LaunchPad is used by distros and projects other than Ubuntu. It offers a range of different services and projects can choose to use just one service or several. Translations could also do with some centralisation and it's another service offered by Launchpad. Sometimes it is unclear whether a problem is a bug or a simple Question or perhaps even a feature! lol. I thought Launchpad did a good job of filtering the bugs and sending the proper bugs 'upstream' to Bugzilla.
There is a danger of going too far the other way! Too large and corporate and microsoftie might be intimidating for users but i think that a few large projects like LaunchPad would be good, perhaps one for each family of linux? If each could filter out the non-bugs and send the remaining bugs upstream and perhaps smaller projects could feed directly into upstream or choose to filter into one of the larger projects. Or is that what already happens?
I even know a Slackware distro that started using LaunchPad for bug reports a couple of weeks ago but the culture of a distro takes a while to change. So Launchpad isn't just for Ubuntu and it's not even restricted to Debian, if you've got a project then consider using it, or one of the others.
I really thought this is what was happening anyway.
Regards from
Tom :)
11 • FOSS needs a central bug tracker (by Not bob at 2009-04-20 10:12:27 GMT from United States)
You should remove Canonical and launchpad from that article.
Launchpad is not Opensource, nor does MS ever plan on releasing the code.
http://blog.launchpad.net/general/how-we-are-open-sourcing-launchpad
https://dev.launchpad.net/OpenSourcing#what
>Almost. There are two components, Soyuz and Codehosting, that we're keeping internal. They're part of Canonical's "secret sauce" in business areas that we care a lot about, and for now the costs to us of opening them up outweigh the benefits.
Couldn't agree with #6 more!!!
Stop hacking the code to death, and perhaps there wouldn't be so many bugs. If you're running an Ubuntu application and report a bug upstream, the first thing they ask you to do, is compile and install the original source - if the bug report is accepted at all.
12 • greenLegs (by Anonymous on 2009-04-20 10:44:51 GMT from France)
It will be hard to get a large number of parties to agree on a specific centralized or distributed bug tracker solution (though it sure looks desirable).
We can be certain that the distribution by the distros of vanilla packages will never be part of that solution, as it goes against the ingrained "culture of choice" and the diversity of needs met in Linux.
Why would, say, openSUSE, and, say, Arch make the same choice? (or Debian, to stay in the big league).
OpenID: it adresses only one of the inconveniences of the current state of affairs (and mostly from the end user's point of view, not from the developpers' point of view).
13 • @ Ladislav (by Anonymous on 2009-04-20 10:48:14 GMT from United States)
You can also find the "good" kernel in /var/cache/apt/archives on your hard-drive and save the bandwidth (assuming apt's default behavior hasn't changed and you previously installed the working kernel through apt).
14 • @ 11 (by Tom on 2009-04-20 11:14:07 GMT from United Kingdom)
Errr, there seems to be contradiction between what you're saying and the article you linked us to. In the second one the line "... will continue after Launchpad is open-sourced too..." and in the first one the headline "How we’re open sourcing Launchpad."
A discussion about centralising linux projects, such as bug-tracking, would be pointless without mentioning names of heavy investors in this area. Not mentioning Canonical, RedHat and perhaps others would make the discussion pointless and could be seen as quite opaque to the point of cloudiness, rather than open and honest.
Also i thought that a key feature of OpenSource was that people could tinker around with it and perhaps take it in new directions, possibly feeding ideas back into the main package. But this does lend weight to the argument that smaller bug-trackers are necessary to deal with quirks that may not be in the original upstream package. I think there do need to be larger bug-tracker's, such as we already have, but perhaps being used more - and bug-reports apparently need to flow upstream faster more smoothly. Perhaps people working at triaging bug-reports faster, just sorting into 3 categories "going upstream", "our quirk", "really a question" could mean a lot of bug-reports get to the right people faster.
I'm sure the total anarchy described in the article isn't really the whole story. Certainly what i have seen is a lot more organised but perhaps could do with a little streamlining
Good luck and regards from
Tom :)
15 • @14 Read the article (by Not Bob on 2009-04-20 11:31:23 GMT from United States)
Take about 2 minutes and actually read the articles and comments I posted ;)
Or - just give a link to the source code :)
16 • @14 Some help (by Not Bob on 2009-04-20 11:38:23 GMT from United States)
The Storm license -
Storm is licensed under the LGPL 2.1. Contributions must have copyright assigned to Canonical.
Let me repeat -
Contributions must have copyright assigned to Canonical.
Contributions must have copyright assigned to Canonical.
Jul 21, 2009 (Tue)
Open-source Launchpad itself; release 3.0.
So, as I posted it is not Open Source.
Nor will MS completely open source ALL of the code. The code that will be released
must have copyright assigned to Canonical.
17 • Staying with the current kernel for Jaunty on netbooks (by Mark on 2009-04-20 11:56:31 GMT from Australia)
Just use Kubuntu. Works fine on an ASUS EEEPC (at least it does on my model 1000H) ... it is even fast enough to support the "3D cube" and other desktop bling effects.
KDE 4.2 applications and dialogs have been specifically designed to be OK on a smaller netbook screen.
There are they odd flaky moments when first running, but they are soon past. One such moment is setting up wireless ... Kubuntu wants to use the Kwallet to store passwords, and while that is being done the first attempt to connect to an encrypted WPA wireless network fails. It works OK on the second attempt, however.
Other hints:
Set Nepomuk and strigi off. These technologies are not ready.
Set the "Force DPI" to 96 DPI in the System Settings -> Appearance -> Fonts setup. Also enable anti-aliasing.
Select "Adjust All Fonts" in the System Settings -> Appearance -> Fonts setup, and change the System Font to "Bitstream Vera Sans".
Install gtk-chtheme, run it, and select ANYTHING other than Raleigh. Choose "Bitstream Vera Sans here also as the system font for GTK applications. Install some other GNOME/GTK themes if you want some choice.
Adjust the height of the panel at the bottom to about half of the default. Gives lots of room for small netbook screens.
Right-click on the desktop, select Appearance Settings -> Type -> Folder view. This sets a more traditional KDE3-style desktop icons behaviour.
Add the Lancelot Launcher to the panel. Move it from the right-hand edge to the left. Right-click on the Lancelot launcher icon, and select Lancelot Launcher Settings. On the Applet tab, select "Show categories inside the applet". On the Menu tab, select "Classical menu" and "No column number limit".
This will give you a tri-menu, rather like GNOME. Remove the Kickoff menu launcher icon.
Don't forget to lock the widgets once you are done setting them up.
Enjoy.
18 • Central Bug Tracking?? (by Udo on 2009-04-20 12:31:32 GMT from Germany)
That opinion is just "I want a pony covered in fairy dust" dreaming.
Central Bug Tracking will never be a solution. Launchpad today gets more bug reports than any other FOSS project. If you just put a central place for everybody the amount of sloppy reported bugs will be its "denial of service" attack.
What FOSS needs is distributed bug tracking that is integrated with git, bzr and hg, where closing a bug is an atomic operation with the applying the patch.
That is where things should be heading.
BTW: Launchpad will be FOSS soon (AGPL).
19 • Ubuntu here Ubuntu there.. (by Ykpaiha on 2009-04-20 12:52:26 GMT from France)
I know it is easy, but regarding Linux development, more and more distro looks and works the same...
I used to come here to get informations about "novelties an innovaton"
Since most of distros are ubuntu's rpms with a different wallpaer, it looks a bit sad.
Quid of the madness ? and intelligence in Linux world?
Is it a fee to pay for more and more users from outer world ?
Why by exemple not a single word on XPUd ?
It become rare to see some truly interesting ideas in Linux distributions.
I'd rather like to see fresh and interesting idea again here.
Reading you is still a pleasure but for how long..
20 • RE: 19 Ubuntu here Ubuntu there. (by ladislav on 2009-04-20 12:55:55 GMT from Taiwan)
Well, you are more than welcome to contribute some "fresh and interesting ideas". Or you can just complain. The choice is yours.
21 • reply #17 Mark - Other hints: (by bandyt on 2009-04-20 12:56:58 GMT from United States)
Thank You, Thank You, Thank You :) God I hate how KDE 4.x looks.
22 • RE: 18 Central Bug Tracking?? (by incubusss on 2009-04-20 13:04:35 GMT from France)
> Launchpad will be FOSS soon
As it has been said before, Launchpad isn't and will never be 100% FOSS. It would be quite ironical to base the development of a FOSS software on a proprietary platform.
23 • @19 (by PingPong on 2009-04-20 13:57:40 GMT from Taiwan)
Did you miss last weeks feature on TinyCore?
24 • Ladislav (by Ykpaiha on 2009-04-20 14:03:43 GMT from France)
In a way complaining (and in my post it was not) can as well be a contribution no ?
My meaning was more to say ok we are in a line where rpm's ubuntu (vice-versa) distros are majority.
On my view Distrowatch is "The" place where I could see some kind of innovative improvements, not only those provided by such or such "elephant".
Sorry if my words was irrevelant, your contribution to democratize Linux was not suspected in my meanings...
25 • Efficient use of screen real estate (by 1369ic on 2009-04-20 14:04:46 GMT from United States)
I would like to see that Ubuntu netbook screen real estate idea become an option in more places. One reason I keep using Fluxbox is that I can put the toolbar over the title bar of the windows and save a nice row of pixels. I do this on both my 12.1 inch laptop and my desktop with a 21.5" screen. I hate losing the space enough that it's worth it to not have the menu and other goodies that come with a more full-featured panel.
Title bars have to be the stupidest thing that no one is questioning. Maybe it's because I was a Mac user for a long time, but it just seems like no one cares about the fact you lose a chunk of real estate right where you should have important stuff. Instead, what's there is useless most of the time and serves nobody but the software project. I mean, I'm all for them taking credit, but do they need to take a row of pixels all the way across my screen to do it? An icon on the tool bar is enough to remind me, really. The title bar is a constant that provides nothing of value, and therefore disappears after about 10 minutes of use (that's first-time use, not 10 minutes each time) and just steals space from me from then on.
Not an Ubuntu fanboy, but cheers to them for thinking about this.
26 • No subject (by lalala on 2009-04-20 14:38:52 GMT from United States)
Wow, distrowatch actually managed to squeeze in some non-ubuntu stuff this week.
27 • OpenID +1 (by Robert on 2009-04-20 14:49:42 GMT from United States)
The problem directly referenced here was the need to create new accounts for each bugtracker. This would be solved if OpenID was used.
Actually integrating all bugtrackers is a separate issue - perhaps a better idea would be a bugtracker "feed" of sorts?
28 • bug tracking (by Anonymous on 2009-04-20 14:57:26 GMT from United States)
An interesting article about bug tracking.
To me, centralized bug tracking seems reasonable at first. Then it occurs to me that bug-tracking methods would be best decided by the consensus of major developers. However, there is little evidence that these people will ever get together, so the idea is doomed.
The article was a good one though.
29 • Centralized Bug Tracking (by Sitwon on 2009-04-20 15:03:20 GMT from United States)
There are plenty of project hosting sites like SourceForge.net who offer bug tracking. I realize that most established project already have their own hosting (including bug tracking) but creating an empty project page on Source Forge would both increase their project visibility and allow anyone with an existing account to report bugs.
At some point, people could even go one step further and create bindings for whatever bug tracker SF uses to hook into whatever existing bug tracker these established projects are using.
30 • It's more complicated than what we think (by dooooo on 2009-04-20 15:12:52 GMT from Jordan)
The number of accounts we have to register is not the biggest problem .
If the philosophy of distro X is to heavily patch old sources then one should report to the distro bug tracker .
If the philosophy of distro Y is to provide updated vanilla packages then one should report upstream .
Unfortunately , the situation is not that simple . I chose distro Y so I once reported a bug upstream . The upstream developer couldn't reproduce the bug because he uses distro X for development (that means heavily patched kernel , tools and libraries) .
If upstream developers practise what they preach and use a vanilla toolchain for development , life would be easier .
31 • this week (by dave on 2009-04-20 15:19:41 GMT from United States)
Okay so not quite as interesting this week (for me)as DWW usually is.Certainly cant expect it always to be, as DWW is aimed at more users than just me.Bug reports?Im sorry to say i dont do that sort of thing kind of like i dont vote either.I suppose this is an area i should look into?I personally come here to find out about new releases and see whats new in the linux world.And by the way that interview link led to a VERY interesting site(imo).theres a lot of very interesting interviews there.I even went as far as to bookmark that page for further reading.I find interviews with linux developers very interesting and thanks DWW for that one!It seems to me that every week non unbuntu stuff is included .I dont know where that last comment came from butit was kinda foolish imo.I really dont run into many bugs except the occasional firefox/iceweasel hang up,but that dont bother me.I certainly dont expect things to work perfectly all the time as they never will regardless of what os you use.I really dont use a lot of applications excpt burning discs viewing pics or surfing and they all work really well.certainly not enough problems for me to bother and report them.I currently have 4 computers up and running on 6 different linux operating systems,and they all work completely to my satisfaction.I guess I personally would like to see an installation/review of one of the new distros from the previous week,as that is by far what i enjoy the most.I would have loved to see chris do an article on a slitaz installation as that distro seems to grab my attention with its size and configurability.
32 • SSDs & Journaling (by dooooo on 2009-04-20 15:24:19 GMT from Jordan)
@Ladislav
This is a blog post written by Theodore Ts'o :
http://thunk.org/tytso/blog/2009/03/01/ssds-journaling-and-noatimerelatime/
He concludes at the end :
"for normal workloads that include data writes, the overhead from journaling is actually relatively small (between 4 and 12%, depending on the workload). Further, than much of this overhead can be reduced by enabling the noatime option"
About preserving screen state in netbooks . It would be great If DWW features an article about Tiling WMs . The opensource community are miles ahead Windows in the area of tiling as a method to preserve screen state and use it effectively .
33 • Centralized FOSS Bug Tracker (by Ed Borasky on 2009-04-20 15:28:56 GMT from United States)
A great idea! Here's this bell ... there's that cat ... which one of you mice is going to
a. Scope out the project ... figure out which open source projects need to be there.
b. Choose the bug tracking software, RDBMS, etc.
c. Buy the hardware
d. Implement it?
In other words, who's gonna *pay* for the effort?
34 • SSDs & Journaling (by dooooo on 2009-04-20 15:49:32 GMT from Jordan)
Comment deleted (duplicate post).
35 • @34 (by john frey on 2009-04-20 15:54:20 GMT from Canada)
You're missing the point. I believe the reason for disabling journaling was to save on writes to the SSD and thus extend it's lifespan, nothing at all to do with lowering overhead on the CPU and memory subsystems.
36 • @35 (by dooooo on 2009-04-20 16:02:27 GMT from Jordan)
Sorry for the double-post earlier .
@john frey :
Did you read the article ?
The writer actually compares the size of data written to the disk .
37 • Oracle buys Sun (by HoPops on 2009-04-20 16:15:06 GMT from United States)
http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=16598&tag=nl.e589
I can''t imagine that Oracle will continue to support Sun's pet projects (MySQL, OpenOffice, OpenSolaris). Can anyone find a silver lining in this dark cloud?
38 • @35 (by dooooo on 2009-04-20 16:15:18 GMT from Jordan)
Comment deleted (duplicate post).
39 • Centralized bug tracking, UNR bug, SSDs, tiling WMs (#9, #34), #31 bug reporting (by Caitlyn Martin on 2009-04-20 17:08:37 GMT from United States)
Nice "I wish" article, Chris. While I certainly agree with you in principle I'm afraid getting open source developers to agree on anything is like herding cats. Good luck with that. Sadly I don't see it happening soon.
Ladislav, thank you for highlighting the issue in UNR. I followed the link and read through the bug reports on Launchpad. This isn't limited to just the EeePC. It seems anything with an Intel Express Graphics 915 or 945 chipset is affected. That includes my Sylvania g Netbook Meso (945 chipset) and that also means that MSI and Dell netbooks are also impacted. There are probably others. Now I have to decide whether or not I'm going to upgrade UNR on my netbook from 8.04 to 9.04 as planned and downgrade the kernel or else stick with what I know works for now. Anyway, it's an excellent article that covers both thye problem and the solution.
#9: There were concerns about the lifespan of SSDs early on. It is now believed they may actually last longer than conventional hard drives. The main issue for me is the SSDs in many netbooks are very slow. There are faster models but they tend to be expensive and, as a result, they don't make it into netbooks. I do recommend using to noatime option when mounting an SSD including USB sticks. Many distros now do this by default.
Regarding tiling window managers I did an article about PekWM for O'Reilly Broadcast not long ago. See: http://broadcast.oreilly.com/2009/03/improved-linux-screen-space-ma.html It's also still on the front page of http://linux.oreilly.com if the long link is problematic for anyone. I use PekWM + fbpanel + VL-Hot on my netbook to use my screen space efficiently. I actually like this better than the UNR interface but that's a personal preference.
#31: If you don't report a bug it may just stay forever. It's rare that you find multiple systems with identical hardware and software configurations. Reporting bugs is the best way to make sure issues get addressed. Of course if everything works perfectly for you then you have nothing to report.
Sorry this DWW wasn't to your taste. I actually found both articles to be really good and really interesting.
40 • @39 (by dooooo on 2009-04-20 18:44:55 GMT from Jordan)
Again , sorry for the other double-post earlier (Seems to be a bug in Midori or Privoxy or the combination of them when I refresh the page) .
I never used PekWM but as far as I know It's not a real tiling WM . yes , It imitates the tiling way (filling the empty space instead of maximizing) .
Feel free to correct me If I'm wrong .
41 • #40 - Not correct (by Caitlyn Martin on 2009-04-20 19:09:30 GMT from United States)
I think we have two different definitions of tiling going here. Did you read the article? What I mean by a tiling window manager is that it allows multiple apps to share the same window using tabs to change between apps.
42 • @40 (by dooooo on 2009-04-20 19:38:17 GMT from Jordan)
Tiling is the opposite of Floating . I think the technical term of what you describe is simply Tabbing (I think Fluxbox can do that too) .
Wikipedia is helpful :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiling_window_manager .
43 • Tracker/ Chris: Last Week's Article (by Landor on 2009-04-20 19:55:31 GMT from Canada)
I think one of the largest problems any "one" bug tracker would face (and what I believe would make it a non-viable solution) is the fact that the bug could be distro-centric. I believe this is where the community does thrive indeed. The devs around each distro weed out various possibilities like it being their own configuration, some error between the keyboard and chair, etc. Then they can forward the info upstream if they truly surmise it is in fact upstream. In that scenario I believe that distros, competent ones, should have a central bug tracker for devs only which then would be a boon to all. Throwing users into the mix, especially new users is completely insane in my personal opinion.
Chris :
I had to smile when you said in the article, " You had a little bit of experience with Arch and Gentoo".
That's quite a bit of an understatement :) If I remember correctly I read an article some time ago that you had been using Gentoo since 2000..lol :)
Speaking of the article I read, I remember you stating something along the lines of you believing that your own build/distro lost it's popularity due to you excluding the XGL aspect of it. Do you still feel that way? Also, do you think the majority of distros that provide proprietary for either video drivers, codec, or some other support out of the box would lose their popularity or never had gained it without such support. What are your feelings still on distros including proprietary software alongside the GPL'd kernel?
Before I forget, what's your main distro now, do you still us Gentoo as well (if it's not your main)?
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
44 • small screens, window manager (by yelamdenu on 2009-04-20 20:46:42 GMT from Netherlands)
Talking of mini-laptops, OpenBox is a great window manager if you're looking for something lighter than XFCE (i.e., no "desktop environment, just a WM), that uses screen space well and isn't as lo-fi (or doesn't look like that) as some other light-weight window managers. It uses similar window management controls to Metacity, KWin (is that how they call it?) and the like, and since (unlike Fluxbox) it has no panels at all, there isn't any space wasted on the screen. Just use Ctrl Alt (left, right) to move to a fresh virtual desktop.
Middle clicks on the desktop show all desktops and their running applications, right clicks show a menu (comparable to Fluxbox, but cleaner IMHO). There is no "Run" option, or perhaps I'm too stupid to find a way to include one, but the easiest thing seems to be to start any app in a fresh xterminal. Makes most apps easier to kill too. :-)
45 • Not my articles (by Chris on 2009-04-20 22:14:04 GMT from Australia)
For anyone who missed it, I didn't write any of the feature articles this week.
-c
46 • @43 - Landor (by Chris on 2009-04-20 22:29:08 GMT from Australia)
43 • Tracker/ Chris: Last Week's Article by Landor
Hi Landor,
At the time, no-one had made an XGL Live CD and that made Kororaa pretty popular. I even went to tech shows where people had the Live CD on display :-)
What I had done was include the NVIDIA and ATI's FGLRX driver with the CD, already compiled against the kernel as modules and ready to load. This most likely violates the GPL (has not been proven in court), but I personally believe that it does (hence why no major distribution will do this). So I took them out. After a while every distro started including XGL / Compiz, so I didn't see much point to continue working on my little distro.
That wasn't the only reason however, others included the rise of Sabayon which had set out to achieve many of the goals I had (although it tends to include everything, whereas I have a minimal focus). And other things like it being just too much for me to do on my own.
There's nothing wrong with including proprietary software if it's mere aggregation, that is, they just happen share the same CD image and are not derived works. It's only a problem if you take closed source software, build it against something that is GPL licensed and distribute it without any source code (which you can't do with these 3D drivers because they are closed source).
Yes, I think distros would lose popularity if they didn't include codecs or make it easy to do so. Think of how popular Ubuntu has become after making these things easy. Mind you, I have a great amount of respect for the Fedora Project, which makes a stance against these things and hasn't bowed to pressure to include them. It has an almost opposite view and purpose to Ubuntu (which incidentally comes out in that interview we linked).
-c
47 • FOSS needs a central bug tracker (by Fred Rutten on 2009-04-20 22:29:09 GMT from United States)
OO is history. Oracle will shout down the OpenOffice project. There is no need for a free OpenOffice in the eyes from Oracle. Open Office will become Oracle Office Site for around HK $20 on the free market at pirate bay.
48 • #47: What is your statement based on? (by Caitlyn Martin on 2009-04-20 22:50:12 GMT from United States)
@Fred Rutten: What is your statement based on? Do you have any solid information on which to base it? Do you have a source at Oracle? Or is this just a supposition on your part because Oracle has never been an Open Source company?
49 • even if (by Nobody Important on 2009-04-20 23:25:31 GMT from United States)
Even if OpenOffice.org was shut down, it doesn't matter. While Sun was an awesome sponsor, OO.o can keep on going. Oracle cannot pull the source code from us. GPL YAY!
Tiling window managers are awesome. Awesome, actually, happens to be my favorite (I love 2.3 series; haven't tried 3 yet). I played with it in Ubuntu 8.10, but 9.04's one didn't launch terminals when I right clicked on the desktop like usual.
50 • @37 (by Darkman on 2009-04-20 23:47:58 GMT from United States)
I agree with HoPops. Oracle's purchase of Sun is ominous.
51 • Easy peasy, lemon squeasy ! (by mikkh on 2009-04-21 00:37:07 GMT from United Kingdom)
Well I saw plenty of Ubuntu logos and my first, way past my bedtime reaction is... I pretty much hate it!. It's sluggish and unresponsive when run live and the layout, while interesting, leaves me no desire to install it for a better look
... just a warning to anyone else curious enough to want to try it on a normal desktop
52 • OO vs Office (by Anonymous on 2009-04-21 01:05:46 GMT from United States)
Oracle hates Microsoft. Ellis has always had a unfriendly view of them. I would think that Oracle would do everything in their power to beat up on MS. What better way than to supersede with OO.
Kicking the lifeblood out of MS's cash cow!
53 • OO I say (by DeniZen on 2009-04-21 10:56:31 GMT from United Kingdom)
OO's days may be relatively numbered - in any case?
Well, I mean as we currently know it as a 'thick' application mostly.
'Da Future' is gonna be all Cloud-like. We hear.
Apparently.
The Ulteo Distribution already offers OO set up this way.
http://www.ulteo.com
So if the code is not on the end-users Workstation, maybe its all a bit of a moot point?
Or have I missed the point.
All ifs & buts & maybe's , maybe.
54 • Cooperation in the Linux World (by Anon on 2009-04-21 10:58:35 GMT from Norway)
Kudos to Jesse Smith, and Chris and DW, for suggesting an area which may or may not be suitable for a closer cooperation between the various distro developers and communities!!
It's high time, given that this (cooperation) is something I've been bitching about for years ;)
Here's another project proposal: Easy upgrading of firmware. I happen to have a floppy drive still, or I might have to consider this route:
http://aquariusoft.org/page/linux/upgradefirmwareinlinux/
I don't have the courage to test the procedure... How difficult can it be to develop a 'flashing app' that could be used by any and all Linux distros? With a built in emulator and whatever?
55 • @ 32 & other posts - SSD's and Journaling (by DeniZen on 2009-04-21 11:04:21 GMT from United Kingdom)
I recall reading that enabling the ' noatime ' attribute in /etc/fstab can help reduce this concern with SSD's
I enable it anyway (on my home/general-use workstations only!) because I'm convinced it speeds up disk operations generally, and makes system more responsive.
I've never measured it TBH, but it feels like it does speed things up a little.
I'm aware there may be potential downsides to enabling noatime, but I've never suffered from any on a *domestic* workstation.
May be worth investigating as a benefit with SSD's due to reduction in write counts?- just a thought.
D
56 • No subject (by Sertse on 2009-04-21 11:39:38 GMT from Australia)
The other factor is that most people are actually running nOO without realising it. Even if Oracle were to do something (I highly doubt so), Novell surely has an vested interest in the porject.
Btw: Someone confirm, I thought the new Slitaz now run openbox? Jwm being an alternate option.
57 • OpenID (by Jesse Smith on 2009-04-21 12:07:46 GMT from Canada)
Some people have raised really good points about the opinion article I wrote concerning bug tracking. I agree fully that OpenID would solve the problem of making bug tracking easier. If more projects would support OpenID, that would be great.
The other half of the issue, the duplicated effort between bug rackers would still exist, but probably to a lesser degree, since more people would report upstream.
Thanks to everyone who posted or e-mailed feedback. It was muchly appreciated.
58 • more on ' noatime' (by DeniZen on 2009-04-21 12:13:00 GMT from United Kingdom)
I meant to add that noatime can be further enhanced (for speed, and reduced writes) by adding ‘ noatime,data=writeback ’ to your fstab.
Then watch it fly ;)
Disclaimer (Disk-claimer?!) :
Perhaps best to read up on noatime to check it is a setting you are safe and happy with before trying.
Like I say, I've seen no issues in years of using it on Conventional HD's, but I wouldnt feel quite so comfortable enabling it by default on an enterprise , or work or critical system.
But testing out a distro on an SDD (or a conventional drive) - cant see the harm in seeing if it helps.
D.
59 • No subject (by Anonymous on 2009-04-21 15:11:52 GMT from United Kingdom)
Ref the topic of SSds...and possible wear issues.
Were you to take a look at this site ...
http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/news.phtml/22495/23519/pocket-lint-quick-guide-to-ssd.phtml
...there is the implication that SSDs, albeit dearer that HDDs in any respect, will last longer....but specifically excluded, to my mind, is their usage...eg, lots of little files being written/read constantly or larger files being written/read only occasionally.
I would suggest it would be prudent to wait a year or so to see how the SSD only netbooks pan out. If "we" find, in the various forums, tales of woe then one might take a certain view.
I would posit that feedback from thousands of users is likely to to be far more accurate than manufacturer's tests that could be designed to find/prove almost anything...LOL
In any event it would be prudent also to wait for the supply of "early adopters" to tail off so that once the manufacturers have milked the market, made improvements etc etc the price drops (?) to a more "sensible" level...
60 • No subject (by forest on 2009-04-21 15:51:56 GMT from United Kingdom)
Ref SSDs again:
http://www.cdfreaks.com/news/15206-Windows-7-will-treat-SSDs-different-to-HDDs.html
Ignore reference to inferior OS, ahem...and gen is about 4 months OOD...but it's enough to suggest caution.
61 • #56 sliTaz (by anticapitalista on 2009-04-21 16:17:36 GMT from Greece)
"Btw: Someone confirm, I thought the new Slitaz now run openbox? Jwm being an alternate option."
Correct
62 • #53 Cloud Computing is a Trap (by Notorik on 2009-04-21 17:51:27 GMT from United States)
Before we all go piling on the "cloud computing" bandwagon we should consider the wise words of GNU founder, Richard Stallman:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/sep/29/cloud.computing.richard.stallman
63 • I got worried ! (by DeniZen again .. on 2009-04-21 18:00:44 GMT from United Kingdom)
Driving home from work, I began to worry a bit (as you do!) that someone might read my posts above and just edit their /etc/fstab and stick ' data=writeback ' in and reboot.
I did suggest reading up first, so I hope no-one dived in and did that, but to make safe, heres a guide.
Its written 'for' Ubuntu, but the concept is pretty much universal.
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=107856
Note - you would probably need to change your disk device name to whatever your installation is on, and probably use the later descriptor of '/dev/sda* ' instead of ' /dev/hda* '
When you have noatime and writeback enabled, you should get the response below from query 'mount' :
Heres the first line output of 'mount 'on my Ubuntu 9.04 laptop:
/dev/sda3 on / type ext3 (rw,noatime,data=writeback,errors=remount-ro)
I understand that this is not a 'technical forum' as such, so forgive this rather odd post, but I didnt want anyone to misunderstand my previous comments above and go bork anything ;)
D.
64 • @ Notorik 62 (by DeniZen on 2009-04-21 18:12:48 GMT from United Kingdom)
Well, I'm not 'piling on' any bandwagon personally!
I'm unconvinced regards the notion of cloud computing - I dont think that Planet Earth is quite ready to consider it yet.
But if it does not take off (yet/ever) it wont be just because Stallman thinks it is pants.
Kudos to the Guy, but he is not King Canute, nor Nostradamus, nor the Net Police, nor the advisor to a Generation.
In *this* respect, he is just a guy with an opinion.
Yes, Markets create demand and interest.
But if Cloud-Computing does not 'work', it will flop.
If it does 'work' .. well .. 'oooh look .. ponies'
So listen to R. Stallman on this - if you want, or better still , listen to your own mind ;)
65 • Eeebuntu is superior to plain vanilla Ubuntu Netbook Remix (by Ubu Walker on 2009-04-21 18:24:57 GMT from United States)
Sadly, there is no mention of Eeebuntu on Distrowatch. It works almost flawlessly on my Asus Eee 701. More people prefer Eeebuntu than Easy Peasy or Ubuntu's netbook remix. Make sure to check it out before settling for something that you'll have to tweak endlessly!
66 • #64 (by Notorik on 2009-04-21 18:44:20 GMT from United States)
"So listen to R. Stallman on this - if you want, or better still , listen to your own mind ;)"
Yes. I'm just tossing it out there into the market place of ideas.
67 • Bug tracker (by Romane on 2009-04-21 21:02:57 GMT from Australia)
This should be followed up on further. I know it is, in a way, irresponsible of me, but I no longer bother to report bugs, for the very reasons outlined in this article. And I doubt that I am alone. If I jst have one place top go, then I will happily create an account and report those bugs that I find. I have enough trouble remembering my existing accounts, let alone trying to remember one that I may use only rarely. But even easier, the way that that other operating system reports bugs - "oops, I've fallen over; do you want to report me? Hang on a sec, and I'll send the info for you. There. Done. Would you like to see if a solution has been found?"
68 • figures (by Nobody Important on 2009-04-21 21:18:25 GMT from United States)
It figures that two days before Ubuntu 9.04's release I discover the fruits of Debian + Xfce. Strongly recommended.
But having used Ubuntu 9.04 for two or three months without (too many lasting) issues, I may just have to dual boot. They're both wonderful systems. Ubuntu may be a bit slower, but ease of use can't be ignored. And the new themes look very nice.
Am I the only one who feels a vibe of goodwill to Ubuntu this round? It seems more and more users are seeing Ubuntu as a real, realistic competitor to the big names.
69 • Ubuntu Release 9.04 (by Verndog on 2009-04-21 21:45:29 GMT from United States)
If you have installed or will install Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty) and will have video problems. I found a solution for my video card:
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation 82865G Integrated Graphics Controller [8086:2572] (rev 02)
The fix can be found here:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ReinhardTartler/X/RevertingIntelDriverTo2.4
It amounts to rolling the Intrel driver back to version 2.4. Simple as that.
I must have read hundreds of posts and links and tried all the procedures.
I knew it wasn't codecs because if I changed xorg.conf to reflect "vesa", the movies works, just very choppy AND only 640X480 screen size.
Someone even came up with a hair-brain idea of installing a new kernel along with a slew of other files just to get the video fixed. It was very time consuming and in the end, it failed!
Even if you have an Intel integrated chip that fix may not work for you, but if you do and it works please edit that wiki link so others can benefit.
I'm reporting the fix here because there may be some innocent soul that tried Jaunty and has the same issues I did. That link may be your answer.
My problem was ID'ing the problem. I wasn't sure if it was the Intel driver, Xorg or a combination of both. In the beginning I too thought it must be some missing codec.
70 • Ram question, old hardware (by Tom on 2009-04-22 10:17:35 GMT from United Kingdom)
Does anyone know how to make a dual-boot into Windows put the "pagefile.sys" onto the linux-swap partition? A link would be great but my email address is there :)
Thanks and regards from
Tom :)
71 • put the "pagefile.sys" onto the linux-swap partition (by Alexio on 2009-04-22 12:04:00 GMT from Romania)
@70 : You can have Linux use a swap file instead of a partition. You can also have Windows (via something like SwapFS - see http://www.acc.umu.se/~bosse/ or the mirror at http://branten.se/nt/) use a swap partition and move your pagefile.sys to it.
SwapFs is a driver for Windows that let you use a Linux swap partition for temporary storage, like a RAM-disk. It is possible to put Windows page file on it. It is implemented as a disk filter driver.
New in release 2.1 Works with swap partitions bigger than 4GB, works on 64-bit systems.
New in release 2: Works with standby and hibernation on Windows 2000/XP.
You should also know that there are two files for the Windows operating system: the paging file (pagefile.sys) for swap and the hibernation file (hiberfil.sys), which stores the system state when the Windows operating system goes into "hibernate" mode.
72 • GParted, new release (by Jan on 2009-04-22 13:26:43 GMT from Netherlands)
GParted has 2 versions on Sourceforge, a stable and a testing.
The stable has version number 0.4.4.1 (mentioned here at Distowatch).
The testing has version number 0.4.3....
This seems unlogical to me.
Is there possibly a mistake?
For fiddling with partitions I prefer the safest (stable) version.
Has anyone a comment or explanation?
Jan
73 • Ubuntu 9.04 (by capricornus on 2009-04-22 14:54:06 GMT from Belgium)
at 69
thank you so much for comforting me. I threw the CD away this morning, it lies between an empty butter cup and meat wrapping...
I just bought a nice 17" laptop without any OS (xxodd for the locals) and tried to install Ubuntu 9.04 since I was sure it would be the right choice.
The right choice turned out to be: AntiX8, the only Debian/*buntu that recognized 1440x900 on a SIS mirage correctly...
74 • #73 (by Notorik (Wolvix Extremist) on 2009-04-22 15:21:24 GMT from United States)
AntiX worked very well for me too. I ended up installing Mepis 8.0 on a friend's laptop because of the larger selection of applications. In retrospect, I should have gone with AntiX. Oh well, next time around. Actually Wolvix final will probably be out by then and since I'm a Wolvix fanatic I'll probably use that instead. As for big, bloated Ubuntu, it wouldn't even finish installing. I like Ubuntu too, if you have a new machine with a good processor and loads of RAM.
75 • RE 46 & 72 (by Landor on 2009-04-22 17:43:33 GMT from Canada)
RE: Chris - 46
I've always been a huge fan of Red Hat from way back in the day, Fedora is no exception. I'm not found of KDE4, but truly enjoy their Gnome project (shocking for me..lol) I admire their stance as well. Along with Slackware's too. For me, directions are simple to follow and getting a system "up to snuff" for what I want isn't such a daunting prospect at all. That of course is me, and ease of use really is perception based of course. I personally believe with all our hardware detected, then configured (usually) out of the box, Linux users actually have it easy compared to windows user (and they expect far too much in my opinion due to that) and what's so hard about addin' a few codecs, flash player and a module or two to get things configured.
Anyway, rant mode off..lol I also enjoyed the interview and the link to the page with so many more interviews as I see another person here felt the same. Great DWW yet again this week. I wonder how many people actually realise how much "freely available" information there is out there for our community. One could never grow bored if that was to their liking. When I read a tutorial say, I like to read a few more (if I can find them) on the same topic. Hopefully I'll find that the information holds true in the first through the others, and it's a great way to possibly pick up a few more tips and tricks. Sadly though, many times it's made me lose my original intent since I end up strayin' from the topic I was reading and pulling in tons more info..lol :)
RE: 72
By the numbering for the version I "personally" "feel" (lol disclaimers eh) that it was a previous testing version to their most recent release. I may be wrong, but I'd put money on it being just that.
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
76 • No subject (by forest on 2009-04-22 17:54:21 GMT from United Kingdom)
re #74
Well Notorik (Wolvix Extremist)...dunno about loads of ram...I have managed to get the Uxx s running ok on a scrapper Toshi lappy with only 256MB ram and Celeron clocking 1500MHz...which is no big deal at all. Certainly that setup is enough to play films/movies...granted it's not overjoyed at running other apps whilst you are doing that.
What is a bit embarrassing tho' is said lappy was running a cooking XP on only half the ram...
77 • #76 (by Notorik (Wolvix Radical) on 2009-04-22 18:35:35 GMT from United States)
Well, as you know I usually end up taking back at least half of what I say here because I refuse to give in to the idea that I should be quiet and have everyone think I'm a fool, how dare they!!! So, having said that, I'll just revert to the old cop out, "in my experience" on several machines it was an ungainly beast. But if I could use it I probably would, why not?
78 • #77 (by Notorik (Wolvix Revolutionary) on 2009-04-22 20:03:22 GMT from United States)
I take half of that back.
79 • RE: 78 (by IMQ on 2009-04-22 21:33:13 GMT from United States)
Which half?
:)
80 • Intel 9.04 stuff (by Nobody Important on 2009-04-22 21:52:34 GMT from United States)
Honestly, I wish Ubuntu would have the guts to fall back on the old version when the new one doesn't work properly. Come on, you guys!
I didn't mind AntiX, but it didn't work on my hardware (no Wi-Fi, borked xorg.conf). Bit of a shame; I liked it conceptually.
And I agree with an above poster. Tons of RAM and a new processor for Ubuntu? What the heck are you smoking?
81 • @79 (by Tom on 2009-04-22 22:06:44 GMT from United Kingdom)
Err, the right half? ;)
82 • #80 (by Notorik (Wolvix Satori-Man) on 2009-04-22 22:15:04 GMT from United States)
1. I did take half of that back.
2. You're nobody important so be quiet.
3. I bet you'd like to know "what I'm smoking" but I won't tell you.
4. What are you smoking, AntiX works on everything.
5. Oh sorry, did you say, "on my hardware"? Kinda of like I said, "in my experience"? But then again, back to #1, I did take half of that back but which half?
83 • Действительно интересно (by Алексей Александров on 2009-04-22 22:40:18 GMT from United States)
Comment deleted (off-topic).
84 • @ 71 Alexio (by Tom on 2009-04-22 22:51:33 GMT from United Kingdom)
Thanks for those links! :) I've been wondering about that for ages but didn't know where to post. It's great to know :))
@ Notorik
Is that a "Free" "Radical"? Is it revolutionary because a LiveCd just keeps on spinning?
@79 IMQ
I know imo and imho and even recently seen ime and worked that one out...
23-04-09 is a big day for the number 1 distro. Anyone having a party? I'm trying to stay awake until midnight :)
Thanks again Alexio :)
Good luck and regards all,
Tom :)))
85 • Wolvix extremist? Not running antiX. What works for you... (by Caitlyn Martin on 2009-04-22 23:21:52 GMT from United States)
@Notorik: I refuse to be a radical or an extremist for anything. Those words often have very negative connotations when used in conjunction with ideology, often referring to people willing to resort to violence. I assume you aren't contemplating any violent actions.
I like Wolvix. It just works for me. I have a serious problem with the code name of the last antiX release and the political connotations involved. I don't want to go into that here. This isn't the proper forum. I also don't think politics and releasing a distro should mix regardless of your position on a given issue. So I've chosen not to run Mepis or antiX regardless of how good the code is. That's my choice.
I am a great believer in people running what works best for them. As you say it depends a lot on what hardware you have and if you are willing to do some extra work to get a difficult install completed. Many people aren't and very often there is no real reason for them to do so.
86 • No subject (by forest on 2009-04-22 23:23:14 GMT from United Kingdom)
Ref the above...I think I got lost...LOL...
anyway..."easy peasy"...amazin' to look at...got it onto my old Compaq Evo but as live DVDroms go it was a bit slow, (not really the right platform of course). Clocking at 2GHz I thought it might have been a tad more responsive. Tried it on another IBM desktop type machine clocking at 2.6 and not surprisingly it worked much better. Got it onto a usb (allegedly), via its own app, but would not boot on the machine it was "made" on....I don't know either...
I have not used this sort of desktop before but I have to say I rather liked it for getting around. Wifi worked in less that 5 secs after typing P/W which is not bad at all, if you are into speed of this that and the other.
My only gripe, nothing to do with easy peasy, is I don't have a DVDrom drive on my lappy so can't try it straight away...looks like another experiment in the offing trying to load via ext DVDrom drive...you cannot complain about being bored on this forum, LOL, ALWAYS something to try.
Cheers, Ladislav, for my ongoing education, LOL.
87 • Since we're talking about AntiX.. (by Sertse on 2009-04-22 23:31:32 GMT from Australia)
Any chance they'll make a version with Icewm, and what needed to have AntiXCC but still "base" so it doesn't have a ton of apps installed?
I always felt that using the base iso, you kind of removed the big thing that AntiX had which others don't
88 • No subject (by Bill Gates on 2009-04-22 23:32:07 GMT from United States)
"23-04-09 is a big day for the number 1 distro. Anyone having a party? I'm trying to stay awake until midnight :)"
No, I'll wait until the price comes down or until the Christmas rush is over.
I'm Waiting With Bated Breath !
Right now Ubuntu is some 800+ points ahead of #2. Wait until after the Jaunty release. That number should double! GO Ubuntu!
89 • #85 Politcal Correctness Police (by Notorik (Wolvix Bad Boy) on 2009-04-23 00:10:23 GMT from United States)
Hello. Are you trying to bait me? Nobody advocated anything. I would like to go on record now though as advocating my belief that everyone should get rid of Windows and use Linux (preferably Wolvix). Radical, yes. Extreme, yes. Revolutionary, yes. Satori, well maybe. By the way, nice writing on Blogger. I enjoy reading your perspective (please don't assume that I don't get it). I like Mepis and AntiX (Intifada). I also like Puppy.
90 • flags (by Tom on 2009-04-23 00:16:37 GMT from United Kingdom)
Waiting for that SP1 BG? I gave a big wave after midnight, or at least my eyelids did ;)
I thought AntiX was written by "Women against the War", hence references to Lysistrata http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysistrata but i'm increasingly getting the feeling i'm wrong about all that.
Goodnight folks. Regards from
Tom :)
91 • Oh, you guys! (by Nbdy Imp (Ubuntu Uninterested) on 2009-04-23 01:00:22 GMT from United States)
Notorik, you sassy brute.
It depends on your definition of "a lot of RAM," of course. For me, that's anything over 256 MB. And I know AntiX's odd behavior was out of the ordinary. I'm sorry. But I'll try Wolvix soon to make up for my bad behavior.
I've always been extremely interested when a community gets politics thrown into the midst. Like when Slax creator Tomas threw some "there are no God" YouTube links on the bottom of the Slax website. I mean, it's funny and thought provoking in some cases, but why? Certainly the effects are often damaging.
But I'm wondering why Caitlyn won't run MEPIS just because a fan-made creation uses names such as the Islamic word for "Revolution." I had no issues, personally; I'm not one to be so judgmental of a distro or its creator that politics matter (it just didn't work, sorry). Certainly you wouldn't knock Debian if the next release of Ubuntu was "Socialist Salamander," or "Nazi Nymph," no? (I find those names extremely funny, by the way. Shuttleworth, are you there? We've got some trademarks to discuss.)
I'm also curious why the word "radical" sparked a "violence" comment. In what way? Sure, radical groups in certain parts of the world will resort to such things, but radical can also mean that Old Man Whithers went all the way down the hall today. It simply means that it's something or someone well outside of the usual. You could say Gandhi is radical.
I can't say I am a "Radical" for anything. I like Ubuntu and Debian, but I am no fanboy. And remember, Linux geeks far and wide, riots are NOT the answer, no matter how fun they are. If we start throwing chairs around (which break Windows rather easily, har har) we're no better than them!
Rule number one of message boards: if you don't want to start a discussion about something, don't say anything it all. Dangerous, dangerous work.
Final word: One more day until the internet tubes fill with brown FOSS goodness, everyone! HIP HIP HOORAY!
92 • Other stuff (by Nobody Important on 2009-04-23 01:15:40 GMT from United States)
@Public: Sorry for double posting.
@87: I believe 8.0 defaulted to IceWM, with Fluxbox served on the side. Both were pretty and worked well.
@90: The names for AntiX I find are about revolt.
Intifada = Arabic for "rebellion"
Lysistrata = Greek play about a feminine uprising against a war
Spartacus = the famous slave who started a revolt
VETËVENDOSJE! = Albanian for 'Self-Determination'
Toussaint Louverture = the slave that defeated Napoleon in a revolt and brought freedom to his people for a short period of time
That's a few, anyway. I know the lead dev also had a few far-left websites bookmarked in earlier releases, but I saw none of that in 8.0. Maybe Anticapitalista will wander along and explain his own names.
93 • #91 (by Notorik (Wolvix Sassy Brute) on 2009-04-23 01:19:12 GMT from United States)
LMAO! Finally, someone with a sense of humor! That is probably the funniest, most logical thing I have ever read on Distrowatch. By the way, I like "Imp" better than "Nobody Important".
94 • Ref#85 by Caitlyn Mart (by Verndog on 2009-04-23 02:48:32 GMT from United States)
Actually I agree with you on this one. Especially this quote
"I also don't think politics and releasing a distro should mix regardless of your position on a given issue. So I've chosen not to run Mepis or antiX regardless of how good the code is. That's my choice."
I had similar feeling when I question the author of antiX. Since then I just decided to say no thanks.
95 • #89, #91, $94 Brief response (by Caitlyn Martin on 2009-04-23 03:25:55 GMT from United States)
Intifada, in current usage, refers to a specific uprising. I'm Israeli-American. Let's leave it there, OK?
I also do think Tomas made a mistake by putting those links on the Slax website. Whether you agree with him or not I think we can all agree that it will drive people away from his distro, which, IMHO, is a pretty darned good one. That sort of thing is generally a bad idea. That was my ENTIRE point. I certainly do not want to get into a political or religious discussion on this forum. In terms of distros it's just plain unhelpful to go out of your way to offend some people if you want them to try your distro. Since Tomas also solicits donations on his website to support development I'd be willing to bet those links cost him money as well.
No, I am not trying to bait anyone. I will say this: any time someone complains about "political correctness" it usually is an excuse to justify bad behavior and defend the right to be offensive. Notorik, You haven't offended me and I have no desire to offend you. I just found some of your posts this week, well... odd and off-putting, OK?
96 • Re:92 AntiX Base (by Sertse on 2009-04-23 03:52:55 GMT from Australia)
AntiX uses a highly customised icewm yes (and fluxbox has alternative). However AntiX-base (the version without all the extra software/games/etc) only uses fluxbox.
I was hoping there will be a "base" icewm version, with AntiX Control Centre, but no extra apps.
97 • #91 - To answer your question (by Caitlyn Martin on 2009-04-23 04:05:31 GMT from United States)
If Ubuntu or any distro was stupid enough to put Nazi in their name I would not only boycott it, I would be writing scathing editorials calling for a community wide boycott. Does that answer your question? I'm the daughter of two Holocaust survivors and you asked this question on Holocaust Rememberance Day. This is a VERY sensitive issue. I think too many younger members of the Linux community don't realize just how sensitive which is truly a pity.
I don't believe any distro, let alone Ubuntu, would use such a name.
Socialist can mean many things and is offensive in the same way.
98 • IMPORTANT CORRECTION to #97 (by Caitlyn Martin on 2009-04-23 04:06:53 GMT from United States)
The last line should read that socialist is NOT offensive in the same way. Talk about a blunder and hitting enter too quickly! My apologies.
99 • #95 (by Notorik (Bad Behaving) on 2009-04-23 04:18:16 GMT from United States)
Like I said, I read your blog. I disagree with your premise. If you know the history of Slackware you would know that Tomas's views are consistent with the philosophy of the founder. I admire your knowledge of Linux and your liberal views on the environment and whatnot. I find it off-putting that you refuse to acknowledge Puppy and still tout the dead or dying DSL as the preferential choice when it is clearly sub-par. Now you won't use Mepis or AntiX. What's next? Does the name Jackalope offend you? This undermines your credibility as an objective voice. Yes, I behave badly, (quite a lot actually I just can't help it) but bad behavior isn't a crime (unless it's a crime). You can have the last word because this is my last post for the week. Have a nice weekend everyone and remember Distrowatch is about putting "the fun back into computing".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slackware
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_the_SubGenius
100 • Ubuntu....well, err (by Beaf Wellington on 2009-04-23 04:22:38 GMT from United States)
Both good or bad talk about Ubuntu is win-win for Ubuntu and here's why. It gets people talking no matter if you love or hate Ubuntu. I see no other distro that generates so much talk prior to and post release chatter other than Ubuntu. Ubuntu may not be the best, but it sure is the king of most Linux discussion forums with people who passionately love Ubuntu and just as many who hate it all the way to its founder. I predict another windfall of chatter for Ubuntu which typically drive some to download and test drive it at the very least.
101 • No subject (by forest on 2009-04-23 07:56:54 GMT from United Kingdom)
So, nobody tried Easy Peasy, then?
102 • Responses #99 & #101 (by Caitlyn Martin on 2009-04-23 12:46:44 GMT from United States)
#99: I acknowledge Puppy Linux, just not in the way you want. I've repeatedly stated that a distro is more than code. The community matters and I find the Puppy community toxic. I also NEVER compared Puppy and DSL. To me they have very different purposes and target very different audiences. It's an apples and oranges comparison.
Regarding Mepis/antiX, yes I have principles that are more important to me than any given Linux distro. If you feel that damages my credibility then I'm afraid that is your problem, not mine. You are free not to read what I write. I'm not forcing you or anything. I don't see how that effects my credibility one way or another.
Damn Small Linux is dead or dying? Did you decide that? John Andrews has said there will be a new version which will be quite a bit different than the old. Why not give him a chance and see if he can deliver? I'm not one to rush to judgment. That's part of trying to be objective, methinks.
You can't please everyone.
I can't speak for anyone else but, no, I haven't tried Easy Peasy. The preinstalled official UNR works well on my netbook so I really didn't see the point of Easy Peasy on my machine.
103 • @97 (by Nobody Important on 2009-04-23 13:13:08 GMT from United States)
I'm not asking you whether or not the name was offensive (of course it was). I'm asking whether or not you would blame Debian for Ubuntu's dumb name in my example.
"I'm Israeli-American." This makes it somewhat understandable, if you want to go with _that_ definition of the word. You just mentioned that you boycott a distro because of a fan-made creation's release names: MEPIS, versus AntiX. Two different people involved. That was my question. In all other circumstances, mostly agreed with your opinion. Of course you have the right to ignore anything that you disagree with, no matter what anyone else says or thinks. I still haven't tried OpenSUSE because I don't like the color green (of course that's nothing compared to the Isreali/Pakistani War but it's a trivial and true example).
Puppy Linux is good-ish, but I'd like it more if there was a better slew of packages. After installation, I didn't know what to do with myself. And eventually DSL become...less than useful once I needed Wi-Fi. Cute little tool, however. I'm interested to see what that project does.
Keep your South African concepts on the ice!
Edit: Just as I was about to click enter, the Ubuntu website pushed the button and all heck broke loose.
Friends, 9.04 has arrived.
104 • Ubuntu 9.04 download... (by VernDog on 2009-04-23 14:16:06 GMT from United States)
It's here....
...but were? I can't find a download. That is other than torrent.
I will just wait a day or two then try again. I'm not in that much of a rush.
After fixing my Intel integrated video chip I'm anxiously waiting to try the release and see any minor improvements to my RC version.
To the commenter regarding good/bad comments for Ubuntu. You hit the nail on the head. If you hate - which I can't understand ,Ubuntu, it might be best to "...take two aspirins and call Distrowatch in the morning...", than to make hateful snide comments. Some have no real reason for their dislike of Ubuntu other than it's popularity.
105 • No subject (by forest on 2009-04-23 14:38:09 GMT from United Kingdom)
Re #103
Israeli/Pakistani war?! Crikey, when did that happen?
Re #102
You could say there's no point in trying distros designed for netbooks on a PC anyway...but it's just something folk do Caitlyn. If we all decided not to try stuff because we were all fixed up ok thanks very much there would be no point in visiting DW...we would all have stayed on the first distro we looked at (and got working of course...) and that would be it.
If Ladislav hosts the ads for certain distros I feel I should at least have a look at them...I have a suspicion other folk might do this too.
Perhaps what folk should NOT do is engage in discussions about geo-politics...unless there's a distro involved...or why a certain perceived ethos prevents them looking at certain distros...never forget history is only a matter of opinion...and generally the winning side gets to write the history book...
So perhaps if we all avoided off-topic stuff we could natter on inconsequentially about distros...
...so, Easy Peasy didn't do it for you then Caitlyn?
106 • fast download! (by Tom on 2009-04-23 14:53:52 GMT from United Kingdom)
Blimey, Cannonical Uk are serving it out at 1Mb/sec, about 10mins to complete download! Thanks for the heads-up, i'll be finished way before people get back from work :)
107 • Ubuntu 9.04 (by Anonymous on 2009-04-23 15:41:15 GMT from Germany)
Nice, i just installed Ubuntu 9.04 and it's booting faster then the last version. Haven't expected that. And until now I haven't run into any major problems :)
108 • Careful with that update Eugene .. (by DeniZen on 2009-04-23 15:47:08 GMT from United Kingdom)
For those (me included) who are likely to be updating/upgrading from an original install from 9.04 Alpha, or Beta, best to check out the known isues first
http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/releasenotes/904
Maybe .. especially this one:
"Upgrades from beta may use LABEL= in /etc/fstab"
An fstab gone bad can be a real pig.
I guess most people will have their disk / mount entries set by UUID in /etc/fstab, but best check that one first and consider the remedial fix offered by Ubuntu - before upgade.
That one could end up being right fiddle to fix after the event.
109 • Re: #109 Boycott the Boycott (by Pearson on 2009-04-23 16:37:37 GMT from United States)
Comment deleted (off-topic).
110 • Launchpad (by Tom on 2009-04-23 16:39:25 GMT from United Kingdom)
LOL, the Launchpad site has crashed but ubuntu.com is fine?!?!?! Yup, even the Wolvix part of Launchpad appears to have crashed out. I don't understand because launchpad doesn't host the download and surely there hasn't been that much heavy traffic or is it just down for "scheduled maintenance (honest guv)"
111 • RE: 106 (by Alan UK at 2009-04-23 16:47:24 GMT from United Kingdom)
Blimey is about right. I just clicked on the torrent link and got the direct download instead. Oh well. But yeah, it's downloading really fast.
Not that I'm an Ubuntu fan. I use Pardus. But I like to see what all the fuss is about.
Alan.
112 • No subject (by forest on 2009-04-23 17:26:42 GMT from United Kingdom)
Re #108
Cheers for the Top Tip ref upgrade...
Sounds like a cue to sort another h/d and install onto that...just in case
Re #111
Oh it's not me then...I thought I had broken the torrent thingy, thanks for that., LOL.
113 • 108 DeniZen (by Tom on 2009-04-23 19:02:15 GMT from United Kingdom)
Lol, thanks for the tip there. I'm looking almost like i know what i'm doing in the Answers forum now :))) Thanks DW :)))
114 • No subject (by capricornus on 2009-04-23 19:04:54 GMT from Belgium)
At Notorik the Great Wolvix Warrior
I do not make the choice between Wolvix and AntiX. I am a silent Wolvix fan, installing it on the most ancient machines, but I appreciate AntiX just as much. On that brandnew xxodd, I tried AntiX and it did more than the *buntu's I have in stock: recognizing the right 1440x900. That's all. I don't handle or/or, but and/and. In whatever direction.
capricornik, little warrior. If ever.
115 • Bravo! (by Eyes-Only on 2009-04-23 19:32:41 GMT from United States)
Simply put: Bravo Caitlyn, Bravo! As always, you've handled yourself with finesse. A stellar example to us all.
Amicalement/Cheers,
Eyes-Only
"L'Peau-Rouge"
116 • antiX and principles (by anticapitalista on 2009-04-23 19:55:43 GMT from Greece)
As has been pointed out, antiX release names are politically chosen. This is the 'price' users pay for trying it out (or not) and that isn't going to change as I am keeping to my principles in not only providing a fast, light and flexible linux distro to whoever wishes to use it, but also to 'publicize' an alternative world view.
If that upsets some people, well so be it. As has been said, there are plenty of alternative distros out there.
About the MEPIS/antiX relationship. MEPIS has no say over what I call the distro. antiX is an independant project that is supported by MEPIS and uses the MEPIS tools and kernel (until recently, the MEPIS tools were closed, but antiX got permission to use the tools and the MEPIS name). If one wished to 'boycott' antiX, then there is no need to do the same to MEPIS. I think Caitlyn has other reasons why she doesn't want to use MEPIS though. MEPIS has been around since 2003 and antiX 'Intifada' was released in February 2009.
BTW I'm not really too pleased that the distrowatch announcement for antiX-M8 release omits the release name 'Intifada', mainly because some people may download antiX-M8 and then complain about not knowing the release name.
117 • A great day for Ubuntu (by Duke Wellington on 2009-04-23 21:39:33 GMT from United States)
I finally completed the download of Ubuntu 9.04 Jaunty Jackalope. It took 5 and 1/2 hours to complete! Needless to say there were a lot of folks doing the same thing. Go Ubuntu!
Now for the rest of you. After this week you won't have to put up with us "Bunters" until late October. Then comes Karmic!
118 • @105 (by Nbdy Imp (Ubuntu Bored) on 2009-04-23 22:10:03 GMT from United States)
Please excuse my error. I mean "Palestinians."
After using Ubuntu 9.04 Final for a few minutes, I see a few tiny little bugs I have no doubt will be fixed within the week. Nothing major. 9.04 was able to light up an old Sony Viao, which is more than Windows XP can say.
I got lucky and noticed the Ubuntu release literally minutes after it happened, and I hopped aboard a server as I left for the day. I came back and found it finished. What luck!
Now, onward to get bored with Ubuntu and try Wolvix in its haste!
119 • 118 Nbdy Imp LOL (by Tom on 2009-04-24 00:09:49 GMT from United Kingdom)
Err was that you in Answers forum asking for Xp drivers, taxi driver? LOL
120 • Ubuntu Release Day (by Chris H on 2009-04-24 00:19:08 GMT from United States)
Happy Ubuntu release day.
I got pretty good download speed
from this mirror in Poland:
http://ftp.vectranet.pl/ubuntu-releases/
I have rc versions installed
and I think I'll keep them.
Chris H
121 • Ubuntu & EXT4 (by John L Way on 2009-04-24 01:33:48 GMT from United States)
I was using 9.04 RC release. Someone mentioned that the final release would have fix stuff that RC updates wouldn't catch. That's why I took the time to downloaded the final version.
Also, I tried for the first time, the file system Ext4. I'm not sure that that is the reason, but my boot up speed and shut down speed have improved a great deal.
122 • No subject (by forest on 2009-04-24 08:25:06 GMT from United Kingdom)
Re #121
Ref speed, I can echo that speed comment. I gather FF3 got fitted with turbos too...
I have to say boot and surf appear much faster.
That said there were quite a few (litotes) folk d/l the new Us yesterday...took hours to get U9 and Myth'. It is idle speculation really but one wonders how many new-to-Linux decided to take the plunge this time round?
123 • c Q (by Tom on 2009-04-24 08:33:13 GMT from United Kingdom)
Ok, i really wouldn't do this normally but this person is blatantly just joking
https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+question/68370
I'm finding it tough to give straight answers lol
124 • re 121 & 122 - Ubuntu 'speed' (by Anonymous on 2009-04-24 11:09:39 GMT from United Kingdom)
Indeed, 9.04 has definitely had some tweaking somewhere..
Ubuntu release notes only seem to suggest that it is the boot sequence that has been worked on, and its clear that it has - but - I have absolutely no doubt whatsoever that 9,04 is altogether very much snappier than 8.10 - for me, on the hardware that I have used to compare both.
I'm talking about Ubuntu only - not Kubuntu, which did not work out for me, and was anything but snappy.
(Easy to point at KDE 4.2.x there I guess, and there may be some truth in that, - but then, KDE 4.2.x runs v. well on Arch tested on the same Machine).
So, i has been err.. about a whole month now, and I'm _still_ a happy Ubuntu user, even through Beta and RC - flawless so far.
Now that 9.04 has reached Final, I am considering the remote possibility that some dreadful dissapointment may actually not even occur at all .. ;)
Theres a thing eh?!
Only Debian Stable has been comfortably un-eventful for me previously, but dispite the shared lineage, thats definitely an Apples and Oranges comparison, and long-term remains to be seen.
D.
125 • ubuntu 9.04 (by carlo on 2009-04-24 11:28:31 GMT from Italy)
I found that release disappointing.
Why they don't switch to rolling distro?
126 • 9.04 (by Tom on 2009-04-24 11:34:06 GMT from United Kingdom)
It's worth avoiding Kubuntu at the moment apparently and also if you've got intel graphics then it's probably worth avoiding - according to official release note DeniZen kindly gave in post 108.
I guess we've all noticed the remarkable lack of changes to eye-candy so i guess a lot of work was focussed 'under the bonnet' :) I'm looking forwards to trying it out on my dad's machine on his boat :)
Only 3 weeks to go before Kosmic Kola goes alpha! lol, Ubuntu are good at staying in the news and keeping people talking about them. If only we could get that more out into the wider world then maybe we could get more people using these entry-level distros. I'm sooo glad i got my download done so soon after they released it. My 10minutes seems so much better than the 5hours of 117, Duke Wellington. I usually try starting a few different downloads from different mirrors and then just pause or cancel the slowest ones after a couple of minutes. Now i'm just facing the frustration of not being able to install it yet!! lol
Good luck and a good weekend to all
Regards from
Tom :)
127 • Ubuntu 9.0.4 (by DistroMaan on 2009-04-24 12:06:22 GMT from United States)
"I found that release disappointing."
Me too. And it's very buggy.
128 • No subject (by forest on 2009-04-24 12:06:54 GMT from United Kingdom)
Re #126
Tom, I found myself doing exactly that with the d/l thing, torrent and direct so to speak. Didn't make a lot of difference cos quite a few d/ls going on anyway. left machine to run all night and took Mythbuntu down as well...there's minimal for you, LOL
Ref Myth' internet section there's a choice of FF3...or FF3, job done, simples .
I had been using the Xubuntu and took the latest updates going and noticed an increase in "snappiness" as was mentioned above...good term that...it onto the screen before tho'.
And, I'm going via wifi, which is very easy to sort on the new Us, even easier than before. Myth' has done the biz for you and as the desktop pops into being a little blue flag appears top RHS and tells you "we're" ready to r&r if you would care to type in the p/w.
Myth media player was configured to work just so too...none of this "you-need-a-codec-I'll-just-be-moment" stuff.
Why oh why can't all distros do this? No long tekkie explanations please, if wifi, say, works on the Us just-like-that...then that becomes my yardstick. I can't be arsed to fiddle around with going through all the rigmarole of dchp selection etc etc. "You" might, but personally I want to use the machine, not "play" with it trying to achieve the same result that is done for you.
I don't mean to imply there's anything "wrong" in "playing (in non perjorative sense)" with a distro...I don't always have the time to do so.
129 • No subject (by forest on 2009-04-24 12:09:00 GMT from United Kingdom)
oops some words missed out...probably praised the wifi too soon...
130 • BTW 124 was me, FWIW, oh .. and Zenwalk Gnome (by DeniZen (doh) on 2009-04-24 12:41:59 GMT from United Kingdom)
124 was me
.. Its Friday ;)
I meant to add, I'm sticking with ext3 for now, not ext4 - I'm not _that_ adventurous maybe.
I am using the 'noatime' fstab option ,and I've tuned the filesystem to use ' data=writeback '
But 9.04 was nippy before I did either- it's just nippier again since.
Aside, the same fstab & filesystem tweak gains could be applied to most Distros, and when testing, I usually do enable 'noatime' at least .
Interesting how many posters have mentioned that 9.04 just does not work, or presents problems.
Just goes to show how specifically 'hardware-related' a perception can rest upon.
OK, currently being tested on the 'spare partition awaiting Wolvix Final' (as I now fondly call that space ;) ) is Zenwalk 6.0 Gnome edition.
Heres a little firecraker that had crept under my radar.
I didnt try Zenwalk Gnome in my 'find a good distro for this modest Laptop' mini-project.
TBH, I thoght I had expereinced problems booting ZenWalk on my Lappy, but 6.0 Gnome went on fine.
I just had to ignore the option to install Lilo bootloader (which would overwrite my 'ubuntu' Grub), and then I manually added an entry for Zenwalk to Grub.
I have only spent a few moments with Zenwalk Gnome so far, but initial impressions are excellent.
Slick and zippy, seems very solid.
Laptops ALPS touchpad wasn't handled that well but it was an easy trip to the forums to find a cure.
During install there was a glitch while installing OpenOffice, but, there was an option to skip , and all that seemed to result was that I had to install it manually after install.
May have been my Burn.
netpkg is no 'apt' but its is more than servicable.
The repo's are not brimming with goodies, but most things that most of us want most of the time are present. Most of them 'straight out of the tin' anyway.
I susect that getting Zenwalk to talk to my Nokia in 'tethered' data mode will be a challenge, but hey its something to do, but that will be a bit of a deal-breaker if I cant get that wo work
(Mobile / 3G Broadband works 'automatically' in Ubuntu, and I've become spoiled already).
Nice Zen Control Panel, broadly similar-ish to the Wolvix CP in concept.
Great set of standard apps - one, and one only 'best choice' of each type of application. So its clean, and uncluttered, and fully-functional.
All Multimedia and flash that i tried so far seems to work. Nat an exhaustimve test.
Standard 'theme', FWIW is bright,friendly, and slick.
As usual, my speed-obsession urges me to comment on ZenWalk Gnome's err ..speed.
It is , as the young 'un's might say - wicked fast.
Veeery much so.
Boots v.fast, runs v. fast.
Zenwalk Gnome - how come it took me so long to spot you hiding there ? ;)
D
131 • Ubuntu 9.04 (by Taigong on 2009-04-24 13:30:37 GMT from Canada)
One improvement for Ubuntu 9.04 over 8.10 is that the boot time for live USB. The 9.04 takes only 48" from push the power button to ready to use. This is a significant improvement to the 1'15" for Ubuntu 8.10, with the same USB key on the same PC. Way to go, Ubuntu.
132 • Ladislav, don't be a FUDder! (by Tom on 2009-04-24 13:34:17 GMT from Germany)
Many tests have shown that under normal curiumstances SSDs can be randomly overwritten for years. So running them without a journal for "lifespan" reasons is just stupid.
For other reasons sure, but don't repeat the lifespan meme. It just scares people and the meme will go away.
If you want I can provide you with links, but so can Google.
133 • Ubuntu 9.04 Upstart (by Anonymous on 2009-04-24 14:02:18 GMT from United States)
If you read the review of DW list reviews on the left side, nanely this one: http://www.h-online.com/open/Ubuntu-9-04-on-the-test-bench--/features/113143
you will get a better explanation of why the faster boot up and shut down speed. Although he wrongly give Xorg a 7.04 version instead of 1.6.1
134 • antiX (or distros in general) release names (by arno911 on 2009-04-24 14:14:39 GMT from Germany)
anticapitalista will always stay true to himself, thats ok, I dont have to be an anarchist or socialist or anything on the left side to like his work, but it helps :-) fascist, corporatist and rascist folks can use any other of the estimated 300+ active distros, or make their own, or use windows as they should as a punishment...
all the linux/GNU/free and open software "movement" is in this way political biased towards Freedom, Opportunities, Chances and Choices- and didnt you guys watch the movie Revolution OS? I bet anti has, and he may have understood it.
I just find it hillarious to use a distro, or not, because it has a name of some sort . what a Kindergarten behaviour. grow up.
reminds me of the big laugh i had, when someone came up and asked, if sidux is a Nazi distribution, I said why? "Well, si duce me is yes, my leader in italian, and its based in Germany,(note: wrong, only the foundation behind it is) and it uses a root account and not a democratic sudo.
my following outburst, in laughing, did cost me half an hour to clean my TFT.
rotflmao!!
135 • Tom's (by Tom on 2009-04-24 15:11:50 GMT from United Kingdom)
I don't meet many Tom's although on my street there are 3 and another across the garden and 3 more in the next street. I think all the Tom's in my town have come to live in the same couple of streets. We often worry in linux about having minimal impact on systems and trying to ensure maximum longevity of equipment.
I think perhaps i agree slightly with the other Tom, that our fussiness may make linux appear more difficult to use but i think articles like that are clearly aimed more at advanced users than at noobs? The default seems to 'just work' and the article suggests this tactic as an added finesse :)
136 • doh, doubles sorry (by Tom on 2009-04-24 15:15:52 GMT from United Kingdom)
Sorry about double posting again :( but i just stumbled on this
http://flyspray.org/about
Is this something to do with the main article this week?
Have a good weekend all
Good luck and regards from
Tom :)
137 • Ref#135 What Tom? (by Anonymous on 2009-04-24 16:22:35 GMT from United States)
"I think perhaps i agree slightly with the other Tom," Since you didn't ref to any comment number I didn't see another Tom aboard.
What fussiness are you referring to and what article?
138 • kubuntu 9.04.kde4 (by Anonymous on 2009-04-24 18:15:05 GMT from Canada)
peculiar menu list
I cannot find adept or synaptic (have used kde for a couple of years)
Perhaps it is too simple .
139 • bbc news videos on kubuntu 9.04 (by jack on 2009-04-24 18:37:58 GMT from Canada)
I have been watching these on kubuntu 6.06.
NOW i am told that i have the wrong version
wtf
140 • Ref#138 Synaptic (by Verndog on 2009-04-24 20:17:31 GMT from United States)
If nothing else, from terminal type 'sudo synaptic'. In Ubuntu it's under "System > Administration > Synaptic Packager Manager".
141 • RE: 138 (by IMQ on 2009-04-24 21:46:57 GMT from United States)
I installed Kubuntu 9.04 last night. Neither synaptic nor adept are is installed by default. Kubuntu uses KPackageKit Software Management, something new to me. I gave it a quick look but not impressed.
So I installed the long tested synaptic. Just for easy browsing of packages in the repos. I prefer to use apt in the konsole for actual package installing and removing.
As a side note, I also installed wicd to replace network-manager to handle network configuration and connection.
142 • Ubuntu Studio (by Coffee on 2009-04-25 19:30:16 GMT from France)
On Ubuntu's cdimage page ...
http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/ubuntustudio/releases/9.04/release/
... I can only find 'alternate' i-386 ISOs for Ubuntu Studio 9.04.
Are there on 'standard' ISO images for this release?
143 • kubuntu 9.04. konqueror browser (by Anonymous on 2009-04-25 19:47:23 GMT from Canada)
cannot access hotmail account
page freezes; both with live cd and with installed os.
Did 2 downloads on different comps.
as always..your hardware may differ.
Screen resolution: I changed from1920x1200 to 1440x900. All ok until I restarted the comp. resolution came up as 1920x1200. but just clicking on the display monitor in "settings" changed it to 1440.
Every time i restart samething.
144 • #143 (by Anonymous on 2009-04-25 19:50:28 GMT from Canada)
screen resolution
comment applies to the installed os.
sorry.
145 • No subject (by DistroMaan on 2009-04-25 21:37:23 GMT from United States)
"I can only find 'alternate' i-386 ISOs for Ubuntu Studio 9.04.
Are there on 'standard' ISO images for this release?"
No. Only alternate
146 • No subject (by forest on 2009-04-25 22:11:20 GMT from United Kingdom)
Tried to install U Studio 9.04...gets so far then ask for the "next" CDrom...Hmmm
Have to assume that particular hardware is destined never to run Studio.
147 • RE: 143 (by Landor on 2009-04-25 22:11:27 GMT from Canada)
That's due to how Xorg configures itself internally now which blows in my personal and (atleast to me) extremely valid opinion.
What you'd need to do is to create an entry in xorg.conf for your monitor with the resolution of your preference, frequency, etc.
We're using a manually configured xorg.conf on my son's one old/spare box. He has an old board with an old 7600 GT OC, but the older crt monitor isn't high end and xorg continually blows it out of range now through its (cough) "superior autoconfiguration" without manual intervention on almost all "up to date" distros.
For everyone else:
There is also an entry (can't think of it offhand) to add the ability to use CTRL-ALT-BACKSPACE again. Google should bring up the fingertip incantation needed for those interested.
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
148 • @145 Ubuntu Studio (by Coffee on 2009-04-25 22:50:05 GMT from France)
... ahh, thanks!
149 • Ref# 147-CTRL-ALT-BACKSPACE (by VernDog on 2009-04-26 00:23:38 GMT from United States)
Here it is:
/etc/X11/xorg.conf:
Section “ServerFlags”
Option “DontZap” “false”
EndSection
By the way, you can use the Magic SysRq key set to do the same thing. It's found here::
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_SysRq_key
150 • Next mandriva... (by glyj on 2009-04-26 09:08:28 GMT from France)
If you want to try the next Mandriva before it's out.... It's possible !
Install Cooker ! The development version of the mandriva system.
For now, Cooker is frozen, and we can say that Cooker IS Mandriva 2009.1 spring (Official) ! (only some bugs will be corrected )
release codename : Pauillac.
regards,
glyj
151 • RE: 147 (by Anonymous on 2009-04-26 14:23:51 GMT from Canada)
Thanks Landor
I also downloaded ubuntu 9.04
The screen resolution works ok when changed . The next start is still 1440x900.
Can also access hotmail.
Don't like Brasero so will have to find out how much of KDE i have to download in order to get K3b to work on Ubuntu.
The KDE menu ...why not use the WHOLE screen and expand the entries horizontally. It is much quicker to scan visually rather than click, and reclick, on each category.
Perhaps kde is a power users desktop; designed by developers for developers. Nothing wrong with that; they certainly have a right to have a specialized desktop.
Just don't say or imply that it is for the "great unwashed".
Thanks
152 • KDE superfluous-click menu (by Conscript on 2009-04-27 00:57:59 GMT from United States)
The KDE4 multi-click menu abomination offers no rest for tired hands. It reminds me of an equally awful mug I saw at store today- it had a bottom which twisted off. Some ideas don't hold water! Early test CDs didn't have "classic" (competent) mode, and were very off-putting.
153 • re: 151 & 152 (by glyj on 2009-04-27 09:26:08 GMT from France)
I think you should try Mandriva 2009.1
The Default KDE menu In Mandriva 2009.1 is a classical one (not kickoff)
K3b has been ported to KDE4 (thanks - among others - to two coders Mandriva added to the project).
I you use Gnome, under Ubuntu or Mandriva, installing K3b package should install the minimal Qt's dependencies.
regards,
glyj
Number of Comments: 153
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