 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 355, 24 May 2010 |
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Welcome to this year's 21st issue of DistroWatch Weekly! As the network of Fedora download mirrors synchronises with the main server to provide us with a speedy delivery of "Goddard" later this week, it's time to take a look at the new version of one the most prominent Linux distributions available today. A full review of Fedora 13 is scheduled for next week; in the meantime take a look at the news section where a linked article discusses some of the best features of this release. Also in the news, a new version of OpenSolaris is rumoured to arrive before the end of the month, PCLinuxOS community releases a "FullMonty" edition with thematic virtual desktops, Debian announces further delays in freezing "Squeeze", and Ubuntu hints at some of the innovations in the upcoming "Maverick Meerkat". This week's feature story is a first look at NimbleX, a live CD that allows you to customise the system before downloading it, accompanied by an interview with the project's founder, Bogdan Radulescu. Other topics covered in today's issue include an explanation about SELinux, the usual recap of the distribution releases of the past week, and an introduction to FuguIta, an OpenBSD-based live CD developed in Japan. Happy reading!
Content:
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| Feature Story (by Jesse Smith) |
First look at NimbleX 2010 (Beta)
 NimbleX, based on Slackware Linux, is a project which attempts to provide a small, yet fully functional, desktop operating system for people on the go. Specifically, NimbleX provides a modern KDE desktop on a live CD or Flash drive. The project also provides a tool called Custom NimbleX, which allows the user to customize their ISO image prior to downloading it. Before taking NimbleX for a test drive, I had a chance to talk with Bogdan Radulescu, creator of the distribution.
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DW: Could you please start off by telling our readers a little about yourself? Where are you from and how did you get interested in Linux development?
BR: Hmm, a little bit about myself. This is a hard one. I will assume you want to know what I like and what I do so I'll go ahead with that. I am from Bucharest and my interest with Linux started a while ago but at some point in 2005 I decided that most distros out there didn't exactly fit my needs so I started to work on my own. I put it on the Internet and some people started to use it, so I didn't stop working on it and eventually it became a distro project. Along the way I found out I really like doing customized Linux solutions for various purposes and/or devices and if I can keep on doing this for a living, things would be pretty good. I like to travel both for work and pleasure when I have the chance. I like all the normal stuff other people like such as hanging out with friends, beer, movies, music, documentaries and some stranger things such as modifying my TV firmware, building my own appliance which does whatever comes to mind, reading documentation and working on the distro.
DW: Please tell us why you created NimbleX. What does it bring to the open source community?
BR: I think I've already answered how NimbleX started. I'm not sure what it brings to the open source community. I only do it because there are people that like to use it and I can tell you what are some of the things I've heard they like. They say it's faster than most of the other distros with KDE. Some say it just works for them and their hardware. My goal is to make it fairly quick, easy to use, with good hardware support and a software mix that should satisfy people. Also in the past I've added some interesting features which were not easily available out there such as network boot, Custom NimbleX and others. I'm not trying to make NimbleX for everybody because I believe everyone should use whatever they like but I'm always trying to make it better so feedback is always appreciated.
DW: The download image for NimbleX is fairly small, yet it comes with KDE and an office suite. How do you decide what makes it into the image and what is excluded?
BR: It's hard to say how exactly I decide because there are many factors. I guess most of the time I take into consideration the ratio between size and usefulness of something before adding it to the distro. Also, there is a lot of removing of any unneeded things from packages and components to keep the size down.
DW: Could you tell us a little about Custom NimbleX? It appears to be based on an older version of NimbleX, will it be updated with the 2010 release?
BR: The plan is to have it based on NimbleX 2010 at some point. Actually there is an ongoing effort into that direction. I am working with a friend, Florin Bera, who is good at Java and Flex development so the end result will be a Custom NimbleX that should be easier to extend and more browser friendly. The main problem is that we have too little time to wrap it up because we also have to work for money.
DW: How many people are working on NimbleX?
BR: I am working on NimbleX and on Custom NimbleX it's Florin and me. I would really like this project to have more people involved because there's a lot to be handled.
DW: The manual says NimbleX will only install on a hard drive where Windows or GRUB is present. Has that changed for the 2010 version?
BR: The installer so far was good enough to put it on a Flash drive which was actually the main purpose of the distro. The reality is that many people wanted to use it on the hard drive but there wasn't a good solution for that so I know it's something that should be fixed. Currently NimbleX 2010 was just released as a beta and the installer was not included in it. It's too early to tell how things will be in the final version. I can only hope I will find the resources to make the installer a little better.
DW: Your operating system is based on Slackware. What sort of features does NimbleX offer over plain Slackware?
BR: I like that Slackware doesn't make strange things with packages as I've seen in some of the other distros and I like that Slackware is meant to be a pure Linux that doesn't bring very specific tools. Thus far it has been a very good starting base for NimbleX which works as live Linux under the hood. The way NimbleX works means that you can't really break it. Even if you decide to save the changes in a file or in some other way, if you delete the whole /usr directory, at next reboot you'll still have everything there. If someone chooses to save changes and overwrites important files with something not OK, just deleting the changes will bring back a system that worked exactly as it did when it was installed.
DW: Is there anything else you'd like to share? Comments about the project or open source in general?
BR: I know NimbleX is far from perfect but there are many aspects to a Linux distro. Besides the ISO image there are many more things which have to be handled such as testing, preparing packages, adding features, supporting the community, writing good documentation, web site, graphics and so on. If someone is interested to contribute don't be shy. Also, I'd like to thank everybody who is doing their part on an open source project and all the people that enjoy using it.
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The project's web site has a nice presentation and is easy to navigate. Aside from the usual download area and blurbs about the project, there is also a short manual (listed as a work in progress) and a forum. The forum actually picks up where the manual leaves off, providing a good supply of tutorials and trouble-shooting advice. There are a few different flavours of NimbleX available for download:
- 2008 edition - the latest stable version weighing in at 200 MB
- sub100 edition - a KDE desktop with some extras removed, bringing the download to 99 MB
- NimbleX 69 MB edition - a KDE desktop stripped down to 69 MB
- 2010 edition - the latest beta, offering a complete KDE desktop in a 420 MB download
Aside from these, there is also a service built into the web site called Custom NimbleX, which allows the user to pick and choose which packages should be included in the ISO image. Put together, the project offers quite a bit of flexibility before we even get to burning the disc. For my experiment, I grabbed the 2010 beta.
NimbleX 2010 Beta - office and network software
(full image size: 136kB, screen resolution 1366x768 pixels)
The CD begins with a boot screen which allows the user to boot normally into a live KDE desktop, boot to a text console or try to run from whatever is currently on the machine's hard drive. Selecting the default (KDE) option causes the CD to boot into a KDE 4.3 environment. The theme is a combination of white and grey and the desktop is icon-free. The application menu, on the other hand, is packed with a wide range of desktop software.
Packages tucked into the 420 MB image include the GIMP, OpenOffice.org 3.2, Firefox 3.6, an image viewer, BitTorrent client, a port scanner, instant messaging client, e-mail client, an audio player, a video player and a suite of KDE games. There's a CD ripper, disc burner, GParted for managing disk partitions, VirtualBox, an archive manager, encryption tools (including KGpg), text editors, calculator and WINE. There are also some KDE development tools, though the GNU Compiler Collection isn't included on the CD. NimbleX also comes with popular codecs for playing videos and listening to music and a Flash browser plugin. For people who want access to additional software, NimbleX has a repository of extensions, or modules, which can be downloaded from the project's web site. The repository has a good collection of software, organized into categories, such as "office", "games", "security", "development" and "drivers". The user also has the option of searching for software by name if they're uncertain of the category. During my test run with NimbleX, I downloaded a handful of modules, unpacked them and found they all ran without any problems.
NimbleX 2010 Beta - getting system information and editing video
(full image size: 394kB, screen resolution 1366x768 pixels)
There is a trade-off with packing all of these packages into 420 MB and it seems NimbleX removes more traditional pieces of the Linux system in order to add modern tools. For instance, the default install has no man pages, compiler or vi editor. The 2010 beta doesn't include the system installed either, which appears in the latest stable release.
Security was a mixed bag. On the one hand, NimbleX doesn't run any network services by default. However, the live CD logs the user in automatically as root and mounts all local drives. While convenient, this strikes me as an accident waiting to happen. There doesn't appear to be any graphical package updater, software needs to be installed and updated from the command line. NimbleX uses the slapt-get program for software management. On my first attempt to run slapt-get, I found a problem with the program's configuration file. With that fixed, slapt-get was able to connect to repositories containing Slackware 13 packages.
I ran NimbleX on two machines, a generic desktop PC (2.5 GHz CPU, 2 GB of RAM, NVIDIA video card) and my HP laptop (dual-core 2 GHz CPU, 3 GB of RAM, Intel video card) and I found the distribution's hardware detection to be about average. There were no problems with the desktop machine, sound worked out of the box, my screen was set to the correct resolution and my network was detected. On the laptop, my video card was handled well, sound worked without any configuration and my touchpad worked as expected. However, my Intel wireless card and Novatel mobile modem were not picked up. Performance on both machines was excellent for a live CD and I found the KDE desktop to be very responsive. I experimented with NimbleX in a virtual machine and found the experience to be good with as little as 512 MB of RAM. Below that point the CD became increasingly sluggish.
NimbleX 2010 Beta - setting up a virtual machine
(full image size: 178kB, screen resolution 1366x768 pixels)
Using this distribution provides an unusual combination of experiences. For instance, I find it interesting to have a modern KDE environment with shiny desktop widgets running at the same time as I'm manually downloading modules and installing them from the command line. I'm a bit concerned by the way everything is mounted and I can browse file systems and there's no non-root account. There are other little things. For instance, the KDE menu doesn't have a shut-down option. The user can either hit the physical power button or log out of the desktop, which drops the user to a console login screen. Perhaps it's a matter of perception, but I often felt like I was moving back and forth between a very polished, modern distribution and a more primitive creation, making it hard to tell who this distro is targeting. The combination of pre-installed copies of VirtualBox and WINE make me think NimbleX is for people who do cross-platform work, but then there's no compiler nor man pages. The office suite and codecs appear to be for the benefit of an average end-user, but then there's no hard drive installer. So while NimbleX is interesting and fun, even, to use, I'm not sure what niche it fills.
NimbleX 2010 Beta - changing settings and manipulating images
(full image size: 240kB, screen resolution 1366x768 pixels)
What I find it really boils down to is that NimbleX is fast, it's modern and has a great supply of desktop software pre-installed. It's a good tool to have on a Flash drive either for the ease of taking your operating system with you on the road or for trouble-shooting. I really like the Custom NimbleX feature, it's a concept which is steadily becoming more popular and I hope more distributions follow it. The ability to build an ISO file prior to downloading it is a great time saver, especially for people on slower connections. Though there aren't a lot of extensions on the project's web site, the selection covers a wide range, which will fulfil the needs of most users. On the other hand, I really missed having an installer during my trial and I would have preferred to have been logged in as a regular user. If the developers manage to get a hard drive installer put together for the final release, I think NimbleX 2010 will be well worth running as it demonstrates how well a KDE distro can perform.
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| Miscellaneous News (by Ladislav Bodnar) |
Best features of Fedora 13, OpenSolaris release rumour, PCLinuxOS "FullMonty" edition, Debian "Squeeze" freeze delay, Ubuntu 10.10 feature proposals, Novell and Mandriva
 A new release of Fedora is always a highly anticipated event on the Linux distro calendar and this week's arrival of version 13 will be no different. What innovations can we expect to find in "Goddard"? For those readers who have missed all the excitement of testing the preview releases, here are the five best things coming in Fedora 13, according to Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols: "When Fedora 13, Goddard, is released on May 25, it's not going to be your usual Fedora release. In the past, Fedora has been seen as a great Linux distribution for Linux experts. Paul W. Frields, the Fedora Project leader, told me though that this release is more new-user-friendly and that is no longer just for experienced Linux users. Based on my early look at this Red Hat community Linux distribution, I agree. You will be able to see it for yourself soon. After several delays, Frields has no doubt that this time, the Fedora final will be available for download soon." The five best features? Professional-level colour management, better printer driver support, improved open-source graphic drivers, improved KVM virtualisation support, and faster boot.
Fedora 13 brings a new Software Manager and other incremental improvements
(full image size: 564kB, screen resolution 1280x1024 pixels)
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 Another release that could be coming to a download server near you at any moment now is the long-delayed new version of OpenSolaris. Although Oracle, the new owner of the open-source operating system, continues to keep absolute silence on the matter, there are some indications that maybe the new release is not too far away. A lengthy document entitled "What's New in OpenSolaris 2010.05" (note the version number change from the earlier 2010.03) briefly appeared on the OpenSolaris web site (it is still available in Google's cache) before it was moved back to its original location - What's New in OpenSolaris 2010.03: "OpenSolaris 2010.03 is the latest release of the OpenSolaris Operating System, a powerful and complete operating environment for users, developers and deployers. OpenSolaris prides itself on being a secure, stable, and highly scalable system. The OpenSolaris OS is open source software and freely re-distributable, and provides all the tools users expect from a modern computing environment. Additional software can easily be installed from online network package repositories." The document talks about some of the user-oriented features, such as the GNOME 2.28 desktop, X.Org Server 1.7.4, improvements in the Image packaging system and the OpenSolaris package manager, and the usual array of enhancements related to hardware detection and support.
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 The developers of PCLinuxOS recently surprised their users by releasing not one, but six different editions based on the included desktops or window managers. Or make that seven. Last week, a post on the project's forum revealed one more - a "KDE4 FullMonty" edition, a 3.6 GB DVD designed for those who expect to find in their distribution four different web browsers and five distinct media players: "The idea of the FullMonty concept is to provide the best out-of-the-box experience in an intuitive, thematically organized desktop setup. FullMonty is designed for Linux beginners and newcomers from other operating system, while Linux geeks may find this edition bloated. The typical user is provided with a cream of the crop selection of activity-related applications available in PCLinuxOS. The most popular ones are easily accessible from the respective virtual desktop and many more applications can be accessed from the PCLinuxOS menu." There has been no official announcement, so it looks like FullMonty is an unofficial "community" edition, but it's built from PCLinuxOS packages available in the official repositories. For those with fast Internet connection here is a quick download link: pclinuxos-kde-fullmonty-2010.iso (3,602MB).
PCLinuxOS 2010 "FullMonty" edition with a thematically organised setup on six virtual desktops
(full image size: 564kB, screen resolution 1280x1024 pixels)
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 The Debian GNU/Linux project is well-known for its released-when-ready release policy, a concept that has earned the distribution a reputation for being one of the most stable and well-tested operating systems on the market. It has also earned the project occasional criticism for lengthy release cycles. Unfortunately, it is likely that these reproaches will once again resurface as Debian's upcoming stable release, version 6.0 "Squeeze", is still a long way before becoming stable: "Adam Barratt and the release team sent out an update on the status of transitions, release critical bugs and a timeline of the Squeeze freeze. In short, we have a way to go before Squeeze is frozen and it is difficult for the release team to estimate when Squeeze will get frozen. Adam writes: 'In order to help us keep a clearer picture of which changes still need to occur before we can freeze, we will be introducing a 'transition freeze' before the end of this month." The release team is already working on some transitions now, like Qt 4 and gnome-desktop, which are finished. The KDE team is working on KDE 4.4 with the goal of having as up-to-date and stable version of the KDE suite as is possible." In other Debian-related news, Petter Reinholdtsen tells us that parallel booting is now enabled by default in the unstable branch (will move to testing soon), while Raphael Hertzog announces important recent changes in dpkg, the distribution's package manager.
* * * * *
 Speaking about future releases, some early information about Ubuntu 10.10 "Maverick Meerkat" emerged from the recently concluded Ubuntu Developer Summit in Brussels. Among them is the possibility of switching to Btrfs as the default file system and the introduction of GNOME 3.0: "It seems possible Btrfs could replace ext4 as the default file system in Ubuntu version 10.10. Developers attending last week's Ubuntu Collaboration Summit in Brussels discussed testing Btrfs as the default file system in an alpha version of Ubuntu 10.10. Ubuntu Developer Manager Scott James Remnant assessed the likelihood of switching to Btrfs as 'a one in five chance'. If Btrfs were to become the default in Ubuntu 10.10, this would be the second time the default file system had changed in less than a year. Ext4 was elevated to the default in Ubuntu version 9.10 - six months later than planned. The desktop is also set to change, with Ubuntu 10.10 slated to include GNOME 3.0, although the new GNOME Shell is not expected to be included. According to Mark Shuttleworth, GNOME Shell will initially be included in daily builds for testing, before discussion of its possible inclusion in Ubuntu 11.04. However, GNOME Shell will be installable from the Universe repository in Ubuntu 10.10."
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 Rumours and speculations about the possible sale of Mandriva were given a new twist last week when Gaël Duval, the distribution's founder and current CTO of Ulteo, noted (blog post in French) that Novell could be another party with interest in the troubled French Linux company. He links to this article by L'informaticien (also in French) which has talked to John Dragoon, Novell's senior vice president and chief marketing officer. This is the (translated) reply: "Some aspects of the Mandriva company are interesting, for sure. We have great respect for their technology, although that's not really what interests us. What would be more worthwhile for us is its installed customer base." However, the article concludes that Novell is unlikely to bid for Mandriva as it is currently distracted by trying to resist an (inadequate) takeover bid from one of its main shareholder, while offering itself for sale to as many as twenty other potential buyers.
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| Questions and Answers (by Jesse Smith) |
SELinux
Locking-it-down asks: Can you explain it in simple terms? How do I use it?
DistroWatch answers: If you've ever gone looking for a simple explanation of Security Enhanced Linux, it has probably been one of the few times Wikipedia has failed you. The on-line encyclopedia has this to say: "Security-Enhanced Linux (SELinux) is a Linux feature that provides a mechanism for supporting access control security policies, including U.S. Department of Defense style mandatory access controls, through the use of Linux Security Modules (LSM) in the Linux kernel." Which isn't all that helpful of an introduction. Perhaps the easiest way to try to understand SELinux is to think of a Linux system as having three parts:
- The kernel - which quietly keeps everything running smoothly in the background
- Programs - the applications you use, like Firefox or OpenOffice.org
- Users - people who can log in to the computer, like you or me
Traditionally on a UNIX (or Linux) system, a user has access to all of their own files and can run most programs, but can't change things on the system at large. That is, a normal user can't install new programs or change configuration files which will affect other users on the system. Now, a (security) problem with the traditional system is that any program a user runs has the same permissions and access as that user. So if you run Firefox, your web browser has access to all of your files and can, in theory, run the same programs you can run. Which is all well and good if Firefox behaves, but what if you visit a malicious website and Firefox gets hijacked? Then you probably don't want your web browser to have full access to your Tax_Return folder or the ability to change the script that runs when you log in.
The question then becomes, how do you limit what a program can do once it has been run by a user? SELinux is one of the answers to that question. This is where the kernel comes into our three-part model. SELinux works in the kernel to make sure programs, and users, only have access to the things they need. Following our example, you might use SELinux to ensure Firefox can only access its own configuration files, your bookmarks and your Downloads folder. Things like your Tax_Return folder, login script and your e-mails can be marked as off limits.
So how does it work? Well, each resource on your system is given a label. The label is then used to write a rule, called a policy, saying what programs can access which files and how. This means that even if one of your programs is compromised your system may still be locked down because the kernel knows what the program is, and is not, allowed to do.
As to how you can use SELinux, that will vary a little from one distribution to the next. The configuration tools and package names will be different and so it's hard to cover here. If you'd like to experiment with SELinux, then I recommend trying it via the Fedora project. Fedora has supported SELinux (and enabled it by default) in their distro for several years now and they've got a good collection of GUI tools to help build SELinux policies. They also have some of the most complete documentation on the subject here. Though some of the documentation is Fedora-specific, much of it will work on other distributions.
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| Released Last Week |
Arch Linux 2010.05
Dieter Plaetinck has announced the availability of an updated set of Arch Linux installation CD images, version 2010.05: "New installation media are available. There are fewer of them and they are smaller. But they can do more. Notable changes: all ISO files can now be burned onto CDs as well as written to media like USB sticks; more than half of the packages in core are now xz compressed; next to the single architecture images we provide dual images which can be used as 32-bit or 64-bit medium; use isolinux bootloader exclusively for booting the live media; snapshot of current core, including Linux kernel 2.6.33.4, Pacman 3.3.3 and glibc 2.11.1; updated Memtest86+; support for PXE booting; provide wpa_supplicant; support virtio...." Read the rest of the release announcement for more details.
Magic Linux 2.5
Magic Linux, one of the oldest surviving community distributions in China, has released its version 2.5 after at least 7 development builds. Major components of this release include Linux kernel 2.6.30.10, X.Org Server 1.6.5, GCC 4.4.0, and KDE 4.4.3 (with KDE 3.5.10 also available). The "magic_win" installer now allows Windows users to easily install Magic Linux from a hard disk without much manual configuration. Particular features that may interest the Chinese users include: lightweight but convenient input method "fcitx", WINE emulator optimized for the Chinese locale, powerful video player SMPlayer with good supports for subtitles and sound channels, StarDict dictionary program, various downloading utilities (aMule, KTorrent, MultiGet), instant messaging software (Konversation, Pidgin) supporting various online communications, and special network configuration tools. For more information please check the very detailed release announcement (in Chinese).
Magic Linux 2.5 includes the latest version of KDE 4.
(full image size: 533kB, screen resolution 1280x1024 pixels)
Linux Mint 9
Linux Mint 9, code name "Isadora", has been released: "The team is proud to announce the release of Linux Mint 9 'Isadora'. New features at a glance: new Software Manager - 30,000 packages, review applications straight from Software Manager, APT daemon, visual improvements; new backup tool - incremental backups, compression, integrity checks, backup and restoration of the software selection; Menu improvements - editable items, transparent menu, always start with favorites, 'Add to' shortcuts; desktop settings - changes apply immediately, additional options; better look and feel - backgrounds, welcome screen, update manager; system improvements - Windows installer, Husse quotes, USB Creator, default software selection, local repository and Gnome-PPP, APT hold/unhold/held commands...." Read the release announcement release announcement and visit the what's new page to learn more about the new version.
Linux Mint 9 brings a new Software Manager and other incremental improvements.
(full image size: 564kB, screen resolution 1280x1024 pixels)
OpenBSD 4.7
Bob Beck has announced the release of OpenBSD 4.7: "We are pleased to announce the official release of OpenBSD 4.7. This is our 27th release on CD-ROM (and 28th via FTP). We remain proud of OpenBSD's record of more than ten years with only two remote holes in the default install. As in our previous releases, 4.7 provides significant improvements, including new features, in nearly all areas of the system. Install and upgrade process changes: take more care to ensure all file systems are umounted when restarting an install or upgrade; if no possible root disk is found, keep checking until one appears; the default FTP directory for -stable is now the release directory instead of the snapshot directory. Some highlights: GNOME 2.28.2, KDE 3.5.10, Xfce 4.6.1, MySQL 5.1.42, PostgreSQL 8.4.2, Postfix 2.6.5...." Read the detailed release announcement for a complete list of all changes and improvements.
Scientific Linux 5.5
Troy Dawson has announced the availability of Scientific Linux 5.5, a recompiled variant of Red Hat Enterprise Linux with extra software packages, hardware drivers and other specialist features: "Scientific Linux 5.5 has been released for both i386 and x86_64 architectures. We have added gnuplot 4.2 as well as the iwlwifi 6000 ucode (firmware). The upstream vendor has also added FreeRADIUS 2 and PostgreSQL 8.4, as well as updated OpenOffice.org to 3.1.1. Scientific Linux release 5.5 is based on the rebuilding of RPMs out of SRPMs from Enterprise 5 Server and Client, including Update 5. It also has all errata and bug fixes up until the morning of May 18, 2010." Read the release announcement and release notes for a more detailed list of changes.
SystemRescueCd 1.5.4
SystemRescueCd, a Gentoo-based live CD containing utilities for hard disk management and data rescue tasks, has been updated to version 1.5.4. From the changelog: "Updated alternative kernels to 2.6.33.4 (altker32 + altker64); updated standard kernels to 2.6.32.13 (rescuecd + rescue64); updated FSArchiver to 0.6.10 (fixes several bugs); updated GNU parted to 2.2 with patches from Ubuntu 10.04; updated Memtest86+ to 4.10; updated firmware package to 20100430; disable NetworkManager when PXE / network boot options are used; fixed problem with firmware files in initramfs; fixed the pxe-boot-server service (empty directory was missing); added NetworkManager to make network configuration easier (especially wireless); print name of kernel modules before they are loaded at start-up...."
Ultimate Edition 2.6 "Gaming"
Glenn Cady has released a special "Gamers" variant of Ultimate Edition 2.6, an Ubuntu-based live DVD with a large number of ready-to-play games: "Ultimate Edition Gamers has been around for some time; however, this is the first time a page has been written for it. Our latest release 2.6 was built by Benjamin Breeg; he intends to make a PS/3 Ultimate Edition. Ultimate Edition Gamers is built off Ultimate Edition 2.6 with all updates pre-installed and a few games also pre-installed for your convenience: Urban Terror and extra maps, Aisleriot Solitaire, Atomic Tanks, Battle for Wesnoth, Boswars, Chromium B.S.U., Gbrainy, Glest, Gridwars, Mahjongg, Mines, Neverball, Play on Linux, Quadrapassel, Scorched 3D, Suduko, Warzone 2100." Read the rest of the release announcement for further information, screenshots and a video showing the live DVD in action.
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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
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DistroWatch database summary
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This concludes this week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly. The next instalment will be published on Monday, 31 May 2010.
Jesse Smith and Ladislav Bodnar
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| Reader Comments • Jump to last comment |
1 • Fedora 13 (by Stuart on 2010-05-24 14:20:19 GMT from United Kingdom)
I'm looking forward to the release of Fedora 13, sounds like they have contributed lots of useful features upstream for everyone to benefit from. And well done for not succumbing to western superstition about the number 13 ;)
2 • PCLinux all-but-the-kitchen-sink (by camil on 2010-05-24 14:50:33 GMT from Romania)
well, I fail to see the point of this spin, but probably there are people who might enjoy it
3 • Potential Mint9 Fresh "Upgrade" problems. (by zygmunt on 2010-05-24 15:05:03 GMT from United Kingdom)
Beware the Mint backup tool. Used as described in the Mint9 "Fresh" Upgrade is apt to lead to problems!!! Firstly I had error 6 problems in backing up hidden (.*) file and directories. Secondly there was error 13 which is possibly a "permission" problem. Thirdly on thinking about it one cannot expect old config files to be always suitable for an upgraded system. Looks like there is no sure fire upgrade path available as described in Linux Mint8/9 upgrade. Looks like the best procedure is a fresh install at the present time and to ignore any HIDDEN files in the old /home directory. This is the first disadvantage that I have encountered with Mint. The reason for my intended upgrade was to attack further software provided under Mint9. It should be noted that Google Chrome and Google Earth have some large files under the home directory which take some time to backup. I found it speedier to delete the cache on Google Chrome and to reduce the Google earth Cache from the 2000MB.
4 • The Linux Community (by Basilio on 2010-05-24 15:10:35 GMT from Puerto Rico)
Is it me, or the Linux community sometimes seems inactive? From time to time, it seems like there is not something new in the Linux Ecosystem. I know, it is a subjective matter, but we have become so used to the lightning speed, that one week seems like a Century. (Even waiting for the DistroWatch Weekly seems forever).
But here is the Summer again (have it ever go?) and we can expect an acceleration in new and great projects on the board. Have fun Linuxers, play and code wisely.
5 • having a look at paldo linux (by tuxxit on 2010-05-24 15:15:45 GMT from Italy)
after jumping one distro after another ,i have decide to give a try to paldo linux 1.22 today,suprisingly found it stable,fast and fortunately with little bug compare to other great distro over there.
i couldn't believe that a small distro with very limited community,and sound to have numbered (seems to be 3?)developpers,the capacity of offering us a so nice distro.
let's give a try to PALDO.
6 • RE: PCLinux all-but-the-kitchen-sin (by mikem on 2010-05-24 15:21:01 GMT from United States)
In response to comment#2:
This quote seems like the best reason for the spin to me: "FullMonty is designed for Linux beginners and newcomers from other operating system"
When I first installed linux, it was mandrake. I installed all 3 cds worth of software. It was nice to be able to try out all sorts of different web browsers, media players and window managers so I could find out what I like.
7 • About Debian (by LuisG on 2010-05-24 15:23:21 GMT from Colombia)
Making a "stable" debian is like taking a photograph of one thousand ants and pretending them to stand still for the picture in a militar formation.
Squeeze's app versions will already be on the edge of obsolecence when released. While it's not the most attractive proposition for, say, my new laptop, a long period, well planned release is invaluable on the server, where new features are not as important as rock solid stability. In my opinion, Debian "stable" should not try to be perfect to the last bit, but focus on the server basic modules.
OTOH, while a lot of criticism goes to distros like Ubuntu for not releasing "when ready", I believe a dictatorial-deadline based project it is the right approach for a desktop-oriented O.S. (maybe just plan for a longer beta phase).
8 • PCLinuxOS Full Monty (by Jose on 2010-05-24 15:34:44 GMT from Puerto Rico)
If you have the bandwidth to download it, why not? The beauty of Linux is precisely it's freedom of choice. Whether we're talking about browsers, window managers, etcetera. I think the more options the user has to try, the more informed choices that user will make about what s/he wants for his/her box.
PCLinuxOS, Mandrake and Linux Mint are the easiest ways to introduce Linux to the general public out of the box and without any major tweeks. More power to them.
9 • Mint 9 and Upcoming releases. (by Sly on 2010-05-24 15:35:12 GMT from United States)
I installed the Mint 9 release and works like a charm. It seemed that last week everybody was caught up in the discussion about mass Linux adoption, including myself, and there was not many comments on new releases.
I'm looking forward to giving Fedora 13 a spin, and also OpenSolaris, when it is finally released.. The prior version of OpenSolaris almost converted me. However now I am a bit more wary of it this time because I am unsure about whether security patches will be updated timely.
10 • Fullmonty (FM) edition (by XPDC on 2010-05-24 15:52:03 GMT from Malaysia)
Any torrents for PCLinuxOS KDE Fullmonty (FM) edition ?
11 • SELinux, FullMonty and @7 Debian squeeze (by Patrick on 2010-05-24 15:55:48 GMT from United States)
Jesse, thanks so much for finally providing an understandable, high level explanation of what SELinux is and why it is useful! I was among those finding the Wikipedia entry not the slightest bit helpful. ;-) Your explanation was understandable, explained what it does without going into implementation details too much and easily convinced me it is something I should give a try.
As for PCLinuxOS FullMonty, I can definitely see the point of such a distro for new users. When you just arrive into the Linux world, none of the names of programs are familiar as you are trying to figure out what programs you should use instead of what you're used to on Windows. So having them all laid out and being able to give them a try is a great way of seeing what's available.
@7 *LOL* Your photo-of-a-thousand-ants comparison of a distro freeze is hilarious and incredibly accurate at the same time. Thanks for the great mental picture of the difficulty distro makers have to deal with to bring order to the dynamic chaos that is the open source world.
12 • The Number 13 (by Jordan Clarke on 2010-05-24 15:59:36 GMT from Australia)
@Stuart (Comment #1) - Just another way GNU/Linux is wiser than Micro$oft, which skipped the codename Office 13 (i.e. 2010) to Office 14, because of that superstition (or fun, apparently) alone (http://www.winsupersite.com/office/office2010_faq.asp). It's little wonder that it's the same company that produces the ultimate line-up of top quality bloatware for sale! :D
13 • Scientific Linux (by LAZA on 2010-05-24 16:00:34 GMT from Germany)
I made a torrent for the 32 and 64 bit version.
14 • @5 - Paldo (by meanpt on 2010-05-24 16:16:04 GMT from Portugal)
I already commented last week on Paldo, which works fine, meaning really fast, even in a 256 MB virtual environment, but I don't understand the lack of any reference about it. Anyway, like you did, I'm also leaving here my appreciation for Paldo.
15 • PCLinux & kitchen sinks (by Anonymous on 2010-05-24 16:17:25 GMT from United States)
An intuitive and simple organization of different categories of software into different desktops and an every thing but the kitchen sink install? Brilliant! I don't think I've ever seen that sort of desktop by desktop software organization before, and it seems like such a smart but simple idea to include by default.
16 • ... still waiting ... (by meanpt on 2010-05-24 16:22:01 GMT from Portugal)
... still waiting for someone who tried and installed Fugulta with that nicely drawn desktop ... after the interview of last week, I can't barely believe there is another "self-enjoying" team of developers :)
17 • New distros and Grub2 (by Barista Uno on 2010-05-24 18:32:08 GMT from Philippines)
I prefer distros that still use the old Grub because I find Grub2 a bit complicated to configure and less stable.
Am I missing something by not using distros with Grub2?
18 • to #13 (by rc on 2010-05-24 18:49:05 GMT from Romania)
for linux torrents I would recommend http://linuxtracker.org/index.php, as they have torrents for about any distro you could want
19 • @17 (by Stuart on 2010-05-24 18:55:50 GMT from United Kingdom)
I think Grub 2 works on more architectures and supports unicode. I haven't found it unstable myself. If you don't need the features of Grub 2 there's no reason to change - it's only meant to boot your system after all, if that works fine for you, the rest is moot.
20 • @ 7 (by Ivan on 2010-05-24 19:10:36 GMT from United States)
I believe a dictatorial-deadline based project it is the right approach for a desktop-oriented O.S.
If they'd bother to fix regressions and focus on QA, sure, that would be great. But they don't. They focus on the dead line and leave a large percentage of users wondering what to do at a lovely black screen.
21 • Fedora 13 (by trotter1985 on 2010-05-24 21:23:52 GMT from United States)
Does anybody know for sure whether the
RC 3 version of Fedora 13 became the final
release?
22 • @15 (by Crow on 2010-05-24 21:41:15 GMT from Mexico)
We'll see. I'm downloading and will be installing PCLinuxOS Full Monty in computers from people who never used Linux.
The idea looks good from here :-)
23 • Kubuntu Netbook Edition (by Anonymous on 2010-05-24 22:30:53 GMT from Canada)
(celeron 2gig;512 ram, Ubuntu 10.04.desktop)
Idownloaded and burnt a dvd. The live dvd would not load on the same comp. A screen said "booting from cdrom", then a short pause and then my Ubuntu log in screen.
I switched hard drives (should not make a difference?) and it loaded. very slowly.
When I went to install it got to the "partition screen" then just a blank screen with "devices", type" etc across the top of the screen.
Pity as there is a nice screen on the live dvd.
24 • @21 (by Rahul Sundaram on 2010-05-24 23:26:16 GMT from United States)
That's right. RC3 == FINAL
25 • PCLOS, all in a DVD, but... (by f. lon on 2010-05-24 23:38:57 GMT from Brazil)
...still NO 64'thing ?!?
26 • Linux Mint 9 - laptop suspend is go!!! (by gnomic on 2010-05-24 23:50:28 GMT from New Zealand)
I am delighted to be able to report that Linux Mint 9 Gnome CD edition proved able to suspend a ThinkPad Z60m while running live from the CD. Even better, it was able to recommence the session from the suspended state. Now that's what I call progress!
27 • Mandriva needs work not up to the job (by john biles on 2010-05-25 03:43:20 GMT from Australia)
I brought 2010 Power Pack for $59.95 and it failed badly in providing an exceptable user experience for the money asked. I used it long term as I had spent my money so saw its faults unfold as time went on. I've aways disliked Ubuntu and couldn't see what was so great about it until I tried 10.04. I hope Mandriva staff read this as Ubuntu 10.04 is light years ahead in user experience. it's not perfect but very close. I wish my $59.95 had gone to Ubuntu not Mandriva. As Novell put it Mandriva the company is worthless, it is its paying user base that worth the money. Ubuntu has moved the goal posts forward to what a Linux user will expect from their OS so Mandriva and Novell come to think of it all need to run Ubuntu and install codecs, apps and use it every day as only then will they realize how far behind their products products really are. I'm running Ubuntu for Netbooks and installing or removing apps hasn't once broken the system. Ubuntu is the company that will bring the Linux Desktop to the masses. SuSe, Mandriva and even Redhat should be very scared as their company value will drop as each month passes if they don't improve their products to compete will Ubuntu.
28 • RE: 8-11-27 (by Landor on 2010-05-25 04:40:40 GMT from Canada)
#8
You're serious? This is going to give new users all they dreamed of? New users don't care about choice, they care about getting the job done, that's it.
I've read scores and scores of comments across umpteen forums for Linux and one of the major things I read is people coming to Linux are stupid and don't know crap. I've also read comments here that people need one program per intended use, anything else will confuse them. But now we have the great and vaunted "PCLOL" community building a dvd of all things with multiple WMs and DEs and tons of duplicated applications that are "sure to help the masses make the switch easier". What a joke!
This is just some wild-eyed community view of what's good for someone else, nothing more. This type of build is far from new-convert-friendly, unless you only figure someone who wants to tinker as a new convert. This surely wouldn't please the mom and pops of the computing world, which I might add are the majority of desktop users. All of them playing Farmville or tagging one another in photos on Facebook and such.
I know when I returned to Linux and decided to use it for the desktop a number of years ago, I installed KDE and looked at all the CRAP that dominated menus, all the duplication too, and though, wtf? Who built this. Just casting your eyes over such a menu is tedious at best. I don't know what broswer is there and I don't care, but as an example, they actually think a user coming from Windows is going to enjoy Midori (if it's there) the minute they try to use it for anything it can't handle? lol
#11
That's not accurate Patrick. There's a number of distributions, Ubuntu being one, that have the name of exactly what each program is intended for. Empathy IM Client, Firefox Web Browser, etc... To give someone, say your mother, an install and say, here, you use all these then when you're all done and you've decided which ones you like you'll install another Linux to get just those. That's ludicrous.
#27
I can understand you're upset due to the problems, John. Let me ask you this, did you contact Mandriva? I ask because you hope someone from the team/company reads your comment here. That tells me that you didn't attempt to contact them to sort out your problems. If I buy an item from a company and it fails partially I either attempt return it or contact them with the hope of resolving the issue with the item. If people don't do this then the company thinks their product is problem free. I've been using computers for over 25 years and be it a program or hardware, I've never to date not had a problem resolved by speaking to the proper person in the proper position. Instead of going off half-cocked, in inappropriate forums no less, making disparaging remarks.
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
29 • Nice review (by Anonymous on 2010-05-25 05:27:52 GMT from United States)
Excellent review. DWW editors and journalists set a high standard.
--
A significant thing about Fedora 13 is that it uses a fully tested 2.6.34 as the default kernel. This is a distro built for PCs with new CPUs and SSDs.
30 • Mint 9 Gnome - cancel good news on laptop suspend (by gnomic on 2010-05-25 06:42:01 GMT from New Zealand)
Alas, hadn't tested long enough & hard enough. After several hours on the web via wireless and with roughly 10 tabs loaded in Firefox, Linux Mint 9 Gnome failed to recover from suspend on my ThinkPad. It was frustrating in that unlike previous episodes where the system just went away to a dark place, this time X Window still seemed to be live and I was able to get to a console via CTRL+ALT+Fx. Firefox was apparently still running, but all I could get on screen was brief glimpses of a blank desktop when moving the mouse. After CTRL+ALT+Backspace X Window respawned on tty8 rather than the original 7, but of course all open X apps had left the building. So it's dang and tish. It was that kind of day :-(
31 • ... what name do you give to a distro that ... (by meanpt on 2010-05-25 07:44:10 GMT from Portugal)
... hum ... that provides you an i386 architecture iso, requesting processor extended characteristics of the PAE/NX type, and because you don't provide that it offers to boot with a one processor architecture but, in the end it doesn't boot at all? ... "blown" something? :) ... maby I'm getting too confused and too old to "self enjoy" my self ... :)
32 • Re #27 (by mandriveiro on 2010-05-25 08:22:40 GMT from Spain)
My experience: more than 10 computers with a successful installation of Mandriva, and a good user experience. My money for PP is worthwhile.
As #28 says, have you ever tried to contact Mandriva? Or your local Mandriva comunity? Did you read the errata page? Moreover, are you able to write down a single specific problem with Mandriva? Probably not, so why do you complain?
If you are happy with Ubuntu, that's ok. But don't write FUDs about Mandriva. How would you feel if I say that "Ubuntu user experience is far worse than Mandriva", but I don't write any real problem? BTW, I recall you tha Mandriva also offers a Gnome version.
I wish I am wrong, but I'm afraid that some fan boy gave you a bad advice...
33 • #27 (by SunnyD on 2010-05-25 09:37:01 GMT from United States)
I agree with you and my experience parallels yours. I was an Ubuntu non-fan for a long time but 10.04 changed my mind. I now use Puppy (Lucid, based on Ubuntu) and Ubuntu 10.04 almost exclusively. Don't get me wrong, I want Mandriva, SuSe, and the rest to be great so I wait and hope.
Here is what I like about Ubuntu, I have not had to go to the forums to ask about anything. That's the difference. Now that excludes specialized work like setting up Sonos etc. My experience across many different machines with widely varying specs and architectures is that Ubuntu (Mint is nice too) performs the best. Just an unbiased observation. I have seen Ubuntu referred to here as "garbage salad" lol! Well if that's the case it is a garbage salad that works(I don't know what we are doing here with the metaphors). :)
34 • Paldo (by mjjzf on 2010-05-25 12:30:38 GMT from United States)
I echo the recommendation from @7 on Paldo. It is an interesting distribution - and remarkably unknown!
35 • @28 (by Patrick on 2010-05-25 14:06:34 GMT from United States)
You are right Landor that I would never give this distro to my mother (who is happily using Ubuntu BTW). It would be more like something for the power user that is giving Linux a try. I remember that when I first tried Linux (Knoppix), it was an overwhelming experience because it had so much stuff in the menu. On the other hand, it also convinced me of the richness of the Linux ecosystem and made me stick around. I learned some of the programs I liked and some I didn't care for. Nowadays, I like the simplicity of a one-app-per-task setup, but I have to admit that in my case, an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink introduction to Linux proved to be useful. I agree it is not for the moms and pops of computing though.
36 • Best OS (by Thomas on 2010-05-25 14:22:05 GMT from United States)
I my opinion the best OS is Ubuntu. I just wish it would run on older PCs too. What I like about Ubuntu is that everything just runs, not the case with other distros. Fedora and OpenSUSE I have not been able to get mp3 support or MySQL to run. Solaris is another great OS awsome look and feel with Java Desktop but, very difficult to install software and resize a ZFS partition. One of the best things about Ubuntu is that the update manager updates both the OS and all installed software as do most Unix systems however I don't think Windows 7 or Mac OS X will do that. Windows 7 requires virus software (main reason I refuse to use it). Mandriva and PCLinuxOS are also great OSes but not as deep of repos as Ubuntu. I do feel Ubuntu still has a long way to go to compete with the look and feel of Mac OS X, Windows 7, and Solaris but, Ubuntu 10.04 is a big step in the right direction. Still need a graphical bootloader something like Chameleon and a better window border maybe something with a look more like Mac OS X but in bronze instead of silver (metal texture). Ubuntu should hire some graphic artists and photographers. I am awaiting the release of Fedora today (I've been using Fedora since it first came out) but, I don't expact LAME (mp3) to work or MySQL to setup correctly like Ubuntu. I also like the fact that you can upgrade Ubuntu instead of wiping out your system like Mint requires. I do wish Ubuntu would go back to having Sun java as defult java instead of OpenJava but aleast there is a work arround in the extened repos. So no OS perfect yet Ubuntu is the best. Mac OS X is good too.
37 • Slackware, Fedora (by Lumpy Gravy on 2010-05-25 14:53:58 GMT from United States)
In his release announcement for Slackware 13.1 Patrick Volkerding says ...
> We continue to make use of HAL and udev, which allow the
> system administrator to grant use of various hardware
> devices according to users' group membership.
... does this mean that more recent versions of udev, which don't use HAL but have been merged with DeviceKit instead, don't allow hardware devices to be managed on a per-group- or a per-user basis?
Regarding Fedora ... I've noticed that the distro's DWW ranking has taken a steep nosedive over the past two weeks. I seem to remember that it was well into the mid 1700s not too long ago. Shouldn't the accumulated 6-months average behave a little less jittery?
38 • ... there must something better than the hit list ... (by meanpt on 2010-05-25 15:12:28 GMT from Portugal)
... anyone could tell the friends "hey, just keep hitting on distro X all the afternoon cause I whish to see it in the first 30's" ... if counted for the downloads, it would be more difficult to fake ... well, anyway, DW hit list is a curiosity list, where people go to get old dated info (like puppy still listing itself as based on no one else distro), and not a preferences list, meaning no one knows if fedora fans are deserting for ubuntu or to anything else.
39 • bah... (by Leroy on 2010-05-25 15:21:26 GMT from Serbia)
"Fedora and OpenSUSE I have not been able to get mp3 support"
Well, like they say, FUD me! :) this sounds like Microsoft boys talking about Ubuntu. I hope you don't get me wrong. It just isn't true that you can't get mp3 support in Fedora.
Anyway, all hail Fedora :) I'm actually going to try one of the spins first, LXDE.
40 • Lucid Pepper Puppy (by nicolaszoon on 2010-05-25 16:20:07 GMT from Belgium)
I tried out Lupu and Peppermint, which run fine and swift (except on AMDx2). Please give me a Lucid Pepper Puppy, with a combination of the better. Make it work on both architectures. Make it lean. Give us a broad choice of software. Make it run, baby!
41 • @ 40 Pepper Puppy? :) ... try PALDO (by meanpt on 2010-05-25 17:11:32 GMT from Portugal)
... That's right, try it and make a wish ...
42 • @21 (by Adam Williamson on 2010-05-25 18:03:30 GMT from Canada)
Yes, it did. The relevant meetings are all held in public and logged, you can look this up in the public Fedora IRC logs if you like.
43 • @29 (by Adam Williamson on 2010-05-25 18:03:51 GMT from Canada)
No, it doesn't. The shipping kernel for Fedora 13 is a 2.6.33 kernel, not 2.6.34.
44 • Re: #39 Unable to get mp3 support (by sly on 2010-05-25 18:42:29 GMT from United States)
Have you tried going to the Opensuse 'community' webpage and installing the mp3 codecs via 1-click? If not, you may want to try it. I can't help you w/ Fedora as I have never tried to play mp3s using the distro.
45 • PALDO (by nicolaszoon on 2010-05-25 18:47:56 GMT from Belgium)
Well, I just did download it and did burn it at 4x. It starts up and ends with >grub. That's it, folks. This unknown so-called pearl on the LinuxHorizon ends before it really starts.
Give me Lucid: everything works. Puppy: it works fast. Pepper: it is presented in a delightful way. So Lucid Puppy Pepper would do as a name too...
46 • Have you paid fot Ubuntu tech support? (by bw on 2010-05-25 19:06:21 GMT from United States)
Has anybody (or their company) actually paid for one of Ubuntu's technical support programs?
Which program did you buy?
Has it been worth the money?
Thanks!
47 • Hopful Signs (by LLR on 2010-05-25 19:23:49 GMT from Hungary)
In the past years, ikons have been gradually disappearing from the desktop. Some of the distros nowadays show only a single dog hose. I believe that the effort of PCLinuxOS Fullmounty should be appreciated instead of criticized. In many distros, if you are looking for something specific, you need an Aladin's lamp to find it in the menus. Here you got a 6-activity focused virtual desktop layout with many ikons. The desktops are as follows:
1) for Internet activities
2) for Office work
3) for Games
4) for Music
5) for Image/Photo
6) for System Info, Administration, and Configuration.
Using distinct categories has a great advantage compared to many ad hoc built menu systems where parts of one item can be in different places, or many items can be hidden under the wrong headline. Properly selected categories can go a long way to ease the pain. At the top, I would separate Hardware and Software. Hardware would contain all the hardware components, their configuration and related settings. Software could be comfortably separated into System-related and Applications. But, I cannot see a single straightforward menu system like that. Perhaps categories and classifications should get more exposure in formal logic in the computer education curriculum.
Another important item in this weekly issue is Fedora's effort for better printer drive support. Finally, someone pays attention to this long agonizing problem. I hope other distros will follow suit, and maybe one day even live syste
ms will support printing out of the box. The sooner, the better.
48 • @26 (by Sam on 2010-05-25 19:35:54 GMT from United States)
Good for you. On my Thinkpad R61i, Mint 9 (like Ubuntu 10.04), when installed, consistently fails to suspend/resume.
49 • @23 More Kubuntu Netbook (by Chris H on 2010-05-25 21:01:06 GMT from United States)
I like the fresh new look of Kubuntu Netbook.
There's a brief review at
http://gadgetmix.com/index/kubuntu-netbook-review
50 • @ #7 (by bornagainpenguin on 2010-05-25 21:47:53 GMT from United States)
As has been pointed out already your post would make sense if the Canonical developers gave a flying Shuttleworth about their users and FIXED the issues cropping up in their various betas. Instead they expect "upstream" to fix everything and so people with issues (ones that pop up EVERY SINGLE RELEASE!!!) file reports that get ignored or have some wise guy respond with a "wontfix". Instead of fixing real bugs (WiFi issues on various netbooks and laptops, notification tray icons not conforming to themes, kernel load balancing killing battery life by preventing idle, etc etc...) they'd rather join the "windicators" circle jerk and break things that work instead of fixing things that are broken.
It's also why I am about to do a distro-hop soon, despite having been on board with Ubuntu since Warty and joining the Ubuntu Forums since they opened. I can't count on Canonical to fix bugs or support even still recent hardware any more. I can't rely on my applications working.
--bornagainpenguin
51 • @45 • PALDO - get better CD's (by meanpt on 2010-05-25 21:52:37 GMT from Portugal)
... come on, get serious, all of us who talked about it here were able to boot normally but you were the exceptional poor old unlucky martyr ... unless you think the distro devels have now to burn CD's for you ...
52 • Paldo (by Jesse on 2010-05-25 22:17:35 GMT from Canada)
@45 and 51:
Actually, I had the same issue with Paldo, the burned CD would only get about as far at the grub screen. A quick look at the forum shows this is a semi-common bug and is generally due to the download being corrupted. In my case, downloading and burning again (after confirming the checksum) fixed the problem. Maybe one of their mirrors has a problem, because I've seen a handful of people make the same report.
53 • @ 52 Paldo (by meanpt on 2010-05-25 22:43:01 GMT from Portugal)
:) ... I got it right too at the second attempt ... but did get it ...
54 • Fedora - support for new hardware (by Anonymous on 2010-05-26 00:41:36 GMT from United States)
#43 about #29.
Oops. Sorry for spreading misinfo.
Still, 2.6.33 includes support for Intel I-series CPU (e.g. Turbo) and for SSDs (TRIM) that isn't in 2.6.32 (or at least isn't in the versions of 2.6.32 that several distros have used).
55 • RE: 37 Fedora PHR numbers (by ladislav on 2010-05-26 01:04:13 GMT from Taiwan)
Shouldn't the accumulated 6-months average behave a little less jittery?
The page hit figures are not distributed evenly - at every major release there will be spikes on the page hit charts. As an example, yesterday's Fedora hit count was 5,549 (as opposed to just 1,678 a week ago) and the number will stay above average for the next few days. When these spikes slide off the chart, the overall average will drop noticeably, but when a new spike arrives, the daily average will increase again.
At this very moment there are no big spikes on the 6-month Fedora page hit chart because Fedora 12 was released on 17 November (which is more than six months ago). But this situation won't last long - once the numbers get updated later today, we'll have a new major spike so the daily average will increase dramatically. Fedora could even ovetake Mint again.
56 • RE: 35 - 55 (by Landor on 2010-05-26 02:15:49 GMT from Canada)
#35
It's funny, when I was typing that whole thing out and I spoke of KDE it was KNOPPIX that came to mind..lol Nothing against Klaus either, he puts together an amazing distribution with tons of applications for a live environment. It's just so full. Even the KDE 4 distributions are just so full of bloat. It's overkill for the most part.
#55
I remember when Ubuntu announced dropping The GIMP from their release you joined in on the discussion. Fedora has now dropped it too. You think we're going to see a trend here? I personally hope not. Not only is it the first major drawing card but it was the foundation/creation of GTK which is so widely used. It seems that GTK has become far more important than what it was created for.
One thing I do like is the fact that Mono's now history for Fedora. I have to see how shotwell and such do as a replacement.
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
57 • re post 48 on laptop suspend (by gnomic on 2010-05-26 06:49:23 GMT from New Zealand)
Maybe you saw my 30 in which I discovered that suspend on LM 9 had gone bad on me, after working when I first checked. This area does strike me as a weakness for Linux. The SLED version of SUSE does suspend reliably on a Z60m under Gnome (exact version number of SLED not to hand). Recently I also found that MCNlive Kris edition with KDE would suspend live on the Z60m, but just to be frustrating, not every time. Agh!
Just taking a quick look on the net, I see various people saying distro X works fine with my laptop Y, and even people saying suspend/hibernate doesn't always work with Windows. Maybe TuxOnIce is the answer but it seems some assembly may be required.
http://www.suspend2.net/
Success with suspend depends I believe on such variables as how much RAM a machine has and the size of the swap file. One annoying aspect is that various live CDs don't seem to have any sanity checks, and are just set to suspend willy nilly with no guarantee of a good outcome.
58 • GIMP and Fedora (by Rahul Sundaram on 2010-05-26 07:25:47 GMT from United States)
@56,
As a correction to what you said, GIMP has not been in the Fedora Live CD since Fedora 10 release and it was Ubuntu that followed the same thing. GIMP is available in the repository and there are no plans whatsoever to drop it.
59 • meanpt (by capricornus on 2010-05-26 08:00:44 GMT from Belgium)
I just make short reports and comments. I'll give paldo another try, and no harm done, and BTW, I don't expect anyone to burn my CD's. Better hold your mean tongue.
60 • Paldo and Peppermint (by capricornus on 2010-05-26 09:19:03 GMT from Belgium)
While it is raining hard, I tried both Paldo and Peppermint on a more recent Pentiumx2 with dual 1440x900 screen. The same Paldo CD did well, and Paldo tried to install. 1st time, the install stalled. 2nd time I had more luck. Dual screen was well managed. The NAS on the network was not recognized. GRUB1 only recognized Paldo and Windows, not the others.
Peppermint installed without any problems, the NAS was recognized, GRUB2 recognized all 4 OS'es on the system. I don't like GRUB2 but that's another problem.
Both are SWIFT. But only one runs swiftly also on an older laptop with an Athlon2000: the winner on that level is Peppermint.
61 • RE: 58 & Shotwell (by Landor on 2010-05-26 09:38:11 GMT from Canada)
#58
Thank you for the correction. I don't use The GIMP a lot and honestly couldn't remember if it was in 12 or not, just assumed so. Also, I've only in the last year or so have been considering a full switch to Fedora. Though I know you didn't say I did, I want to make it clear, I never stated Fedora was dropping it from their repositories.
-----
I'm not too impressed with Shotwell. I didn't look at it much during the development cycle and thought I'd give it a closer look with summer coming up and lots of pictures to be take. That said, even though I'm happy to see Mono gone, I'm unhappy to see something as feature rich as F-spot replaced by Shotwell. It's just really lacking in comparison. The interface looks old, I can't think of what the look reminds me, but something. Hopefully it'll improve over time. I may have to rethink some of my views regarding Mono.
62 • Re: 29, 43, Fedora 13 kernel (by silent on 2010-05-26 13:37:27 GMT from Belgium)
At the moment Fedora 13 uses the 2.6.33 kernel, but the update to 2.6.34 is already "being prepared": http://www.h-online.com/open/features/Rock-it-What-s-new-in-Fedora-13-1006388.html?page=3
63 • Mint's Page Hit Rankings (by Sly on 2010-05-26 17:35:00 GMT from United States)
According to the 7 day page hit rankings, Mint is #1. It is #2 behind it's parent distro, Ubuntu on the 30 day page hit rankings. I'll be checking to see if the trend holds, but even if it doesn't, congrat's to the Mint team.
64 • Distro Version Upgrade from Fedora 12, to Fedora 13 : success (rare) (by Jeffersonian on 2010-05-27 05:39:15 GMT from United States)
Fedora kept its promises.
I just did a distro upgrade as root : preupgrade)
I never before (I used Linux for 12 years +) could do this successfully!
Every time I had to do a full reinstall from scratch (slow, painfull).
But this time it just worked!
Just when it says "this may take a little while" read "one hour may be ?"
It took over 10 hours, but every package was successfully reinstalled... and miracle: after a reboot, everything worked, including Nvidia drivers, Wi-fi (Broadcom), skype, google-earth and all my apps. (so far).
WOW this is good !
Bug: I did hit a bug with "deluge" (great bittorent clien), posted it of fedora forum .org and some good soul posted a fix which works!
The promise of Fedora was to be able to do this, and the promise was fully kept!
I am not aware of any other distro able to really do that.
That'all folks: happy people have no story!
65 • @ 59 & 60 • Paldo and Peppermint (by meanpt on 2010-05-27 09:13:35 GMT from Portugal)
:) "... Better hold your mean tongue." - I will :):):)
I like your comments in post "60". It's a fair one. You're right about NFS - it's a failed process start during booting. But I don't need it, as I don't need samba shares either. Meaning I can't tell you if these services are available on the startup or intentionally disabled on booting. On the other hand, I never made a secret for the fact I test the distros in virtual environments with 256 MB of RAM. So, I never mess with dual ou tri-booting at all. And in this environment, Paldo runs faster than the PCLOS Openbox which in turn runs faster than Peppermint. The first test I do is to the speed of rendering pages in firefox. Than I go to youtube and stsart opening tabs with videos. Just to tell you I did test Peppermint as soon as it was made available and didn't understand why people were classifying it as "fast". In the referred trio, I would say Paldo boots faster, followed by Pepermint and than comes PCLOS ... . So, I wonder why is Peppermint better in your low resources machine. But I recognize sometimes it may be related to the architecture the distro was primarily designed for. For instance, in my referred virtual environment, CrunchBang i486 is slower than CruchBang i686. Go figure. Have a sunshiny day as I'm having too :)
66 • MeeGo ... come on, not an "img" again ... meeNogo ... meeNogo ... (by meanpt on 2010-05-27 09:29:38 GMT from Portugal)
... is it so difficult to make an ISO image file available? ... it happens that I don't want and don't needed to burn a CD ... Am I the only and lonely soul with this existential problem? Is there a way to turn a "img" file into a ISO image file without passing by a blacksmith of CDs?
67 • RE:64, I'm not sure what you mean. (by Eddie Wilson on 2010-05-27 12:48:29 GMT from United States)
"I never before (I used Linux for 12 years +) could do this successfully!"
Are you talking about a distribution upgrade? I've had several successful distro upgrades. But I've never done that with Fedora.
"Every time I had to do a full reinstall from scratch (slow, painfull)."
It can be a slow and painful process getting your system back to the way you want it.
"It took over 10 hours,"
That's a long time for an upgrade and a long time for even a fresh install. Do you have a slow connection?
Don't get me wrong. I like Fedora and I am glad that it works great for you. I'm just surprised that you've never had a successful upgrade and that when you did, it took so long. I've had several successful ones, (not with Fedora) but on the other hand I've had several that didn't work out either. Anyway if you are happy with the outcome then that's all that matters.
68 • Random Quote (by Dr. Smith on 2010-05-27 16:42:35 GMT from United States)
"Fedora has long had a reputation as the Linux you use when you grow up, when you get more sophisticated, and Fedora 13 is no different."
-The Register
69 • Fedora Upgrade (by pfb on 2010-05-27 18:06:35 GMT from United States)
I just went from F12 to F13 in less than 3 hours. I would have been less than 2 except I had to manually clear some old nVidia stuff, and I am using Grub2 from Ubuntu for start up. Grub2 required a brief excursion into Ubuntu to discover Fedora 13. I am impressed!
70 • Re:66 Burning MeeGo img.file (by nymark1 on 2010-05-27 20:12:10 GMT from Denmark)
Have you tried burning the .img file to a dvd using Brasero?
It works for me. You just have to choose "all files" instead of "image files", or Brasero won't find it.
71 • Re: 55, PHR numbers / Zenwalk (by Lumpy Gravy on 2010-05-27 21:04:41 GMT from United States)
Thanks for the reply, Ladislav. I wasn't doubting the correctness of the 6-months average for Fedora. I just found the steep decline of almost 200 points over such a short period a bit strange. But your explanation makes sense and I can already see Fedora rising again ... from the ashes :-)
I'm glad to see the latest release of Zenwalk is already using the brand-new Xfce 4.6.2. I hope SalixOS will follow suit soon. Shame, Xfce 4.6.2 came too late for the Xfce spin of Fedora 13. But I guess there will be an update to 4.6.2 in the repository.
72 • Linux Firewall/Router or Gateway/Server distro's (by Bryan Channell on 2010-05-27 21:58:25 GMT from United States)
I have a request for DistroWatch...
I would like to see a series of reviews on some of the many dedicated Linux Firewall/Router or Gateway/Server distro's out there... Every week there is some sort of a review on one of the Many Linux Flavors for the Desktop, but you don't see many reviews on any of the various distro's for a dedicated purpose such as I mentioned above... All across the web you can find review after review of most every Desktop version of Linux, but not to many reviews can be found of the many Firewall/Router or Gateway/Server distro's...
Would anyone else like to see this...?
73 • Firewall/router (by Jesse on 2010-05-28 00:14:56 GMT from Canada)
There are two minor problems with doing a review of a firewall/rounter distro. Well, maybe three.
1. To properly test them, you generally need to set up a small network, or re-arrange an existing one.
2. It's a bit of a niche market, so there's limited interest. Which means I'd be happy to do one, but a series would probably be out of the question.
3. Any distro can be used as a firewall/rounter. It would be a bit like doing a series on Linux server distributions.
That being said, if there's a demand, I'm willing to do it. Drop me an e-mail if you want to see a firewall-focused distro review. jessefrgsmith@yahoo.ca
74 • @73 Firewall/Router Review (by Bryan Channell on 2010-05-28 00:38:54 GMT from United States)
I guess your right... I didn't think about the complexities of reviewing such a distro... Compared to reviewing a Desktop distro... I guess that is why you don't see many of these reviews out there...
I have played around with a few different Linux Firewall/Router distro's but I have not found one that quite suited me yet... I love the third party Tomato Firmware I am using on my Linksys WRT54GS Router, but I would like to run something more like a UTM appliance with the same kind of simplicity as the Tomato Firmware...
75 • Zenwalk (by Slowhand on 2010-05-28 04:02:19 GMT from United States)
First report on Zenwalk: Excellent so far. Easy install (I didn't set up the partitions, just went for the automatic). Comes with Icecat(flash is installed), Icedove, Brasero, OpenOffice, and Gimp to name a few. Real smooth.
76 • RE: 68 (by Landor on 2010-05-28 05:13:46 GMT from Canada)
"Fedora has long had a reputation as the Linux you use when you grow up, when you get more sophisticated, and Fedora 13 is no different.
-The Register"
I've commented on this before, about what people are switching to. I've found pretty well the opposite when it comes to what people use once they've been on Linux for a long time. I'm talking power-users here too. People that ran Slackware, Debian, RH/Fedora/Centos, Gentoo, etc. Tried pretty well every distribution under the sun, and they all say the same thing, "Buddy, I switched to Ubuntu, it just works and I'm sicking of tweaking".
I also just had a two hour phone call with an ex-coworker about this very topic. This guy is what I consider one of the biggest gurus I've ever known personally. He's just out there. He's switched to Ubuntu with the 10.04 release. He was previously jumping between CentOS and Fedora due to the enterprise. His contention is that it truly is the most integrated/streamlined desktop user experience and out of all the people that have tried to make me use it as my full-time Distribution, he succeeded. He explained as well that a lot of people are hurting the Linux eco-system without knowing it. What we should be doing is focusing on at least one of four distributions (for the desktop). Those being Fedora, Mandriva, openSUSE and Ubuntu. He said this because he feels these four are the movers and shakers. If you're looking to support the enterprise solution then you should really consider supporting Fedora and/or openSUSE, and Mandriva to a lesser degree, in his opinion. If you're pushing the Desktop, then you should support Ubuntu.
By supporting another distribution you're taking away from these big four that actually really push the "market" for Linux. I had to agree with him on that point. We're not talking niche markets or the smaller server/enterprise markets either, where someone might thrive in business with any specific distribution other than the four. We're talking about the true global presence these distributions are constantly working towards, specifically.
I have Ubuntu on a number of my systems and I always post here with it, well, usually. I figure from the type of people I've heard from, that are the heavily tech kind of audience/usership, it's the distribution of choice for those that finally just sit back and say, "Hey, I just want to use my computer for well, things I need to use my computer for". I'm pretty sure I'm going to be included in that number, and I never thought I'd say that. Believe me, I am no Ubuntu fanboi, by any margin..lol
You just can't beat the integration that Ubuntu has put together over the years and continues to. I don't agree with some things with it, but they're going to be getting my support from now on. Well, after I tweak a few things out of it, of course. :)
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
77 • Fedora 13 is impressive (by anony moss on 2010-05-28 07:00:32 GMT from India)
Fedora 11 didn't do much for me, so I skipped release 12. Fedora 13 (Goddard) seems to be excellent so far after installing on my dedicated linux partition. The installation process is simpler, better and quicker than before. The startup and shutdown are quite snappy. I wasn't expecting to find any GUI tools so I was surprised to see some nice, really utilitarian ones.
Best of all, Goddard seems to be a release with attention to details. There are much fewer niggles and rough edges, and overall it seems to be much better put together than many other distros. Personally, for me, F13 has set new standards in linux usability. Of course, its not just Fedora, but also X, KDE (using the KDE spin), and of course, the kernel. The linux ecosystem is really thriving. We need future Fedora releases to be just as good and uncompromising in quality.
And please, no distractions online app stores, social networking, myriad themes for linux distros. We need the Desktop OS basics done well first, the rest is fluff. Fedora shows the way.
78 • @ 70 • Re:66 Burning MeeGo img.file (by nymark1...) (by meanpt on 2010-05-28 08:42:27 GMT from Portugal)
nymark, thanks for he suggestion but can you confirm that brasero will produce an ISO image file instead of burning a real CD or DVD?
79 • Second @ 70 • Re:66 Burning MeeGo img.file (by nymark1...) (by meanpt on 2010-05-28 08:44:47 GMT from Portugal)
:( ... forget my silly question ... seems it will . Many thanks again
80 • Tired of tweaking (by Jesse on 2010-05-28 11:48:29 GMT from Canada)
I tend to agree with Landor's comment in post 76. I used to enjoy using Fedora and various niche systems, but after a while I got tired of all the tweaking and adjusting, installing from third-party repos and bug hunting and just wanted something that worked immediately out of the box and would be stable. I reached a point a while ago where I wanted the computer to work for me, rather than work for it. Granted, I had fun with the tweaking and the learning and fixing problems, but now I want a smooth, boring experience so I can get stuff done.
Not sure if I agree that we should focus our energy on four big names, one of the nice things about Linux is it's ability to be tailored to specific tasks/flavours. I think we might end up with a few really good distros, but lose the flexibility and leaps in development some niche projects give us.
81 • Ubuntu & Landor comments(Jesse's too) (by Verndog on 2010-05-28 13:50:30 GMT from United States)
Landor's comment on post#76 says it all for me too. I've used Ubuntu for a few years now. It just works. On my hardware at least. I've tried PCLOS, Fedora, etc. Ubuntu works. So I can work.
Also I like to innovative approach some old style ways. Getting rid of or changing udev, upstart, plymouth. Problems as first, but now everything works. And does so very fast.
82 • RE 58:Differents skills are needed to download and to use. (by Croc de Boucher on 2010-05-28 14:32:11 GMT from Germany)
"GIMP is available in the repository and there are no plans whatsoever to drop it."
Well, that this kind of slogan which makes people fed up with distributions:
my nephew can make nice pictures with the gimp, but I have to download for him, as he does not know anything about
package management (even if he had an Internet connection, that would not interest him).
This off hand claim ('anyway it is in the repos') illustrates the fact that software packaging and upstream copying (adapting, in some rare cases)
is not meant for users.
83 • 82 (by Brandon on 2010-05-28 14:50:49 GMT from United States)
I don't see why this would make people get fed up with a distribution. If the software is available in the repo's then what is the problem? It is at least available. I mean Windows doesn't come with Photoshop installed. It also doesn't come with Office, or even Openoffice. Those must be purchased and installed, or in the case of Openoffice downloaded and installed. I don't see the fact that WIndows doesn't come with these causing people to get fed up with Windows, so why do we hold distributions that give their work away for free to a higher standard in regards to what should come in the default install than the company that charges.
84 • RE 83 (by Pouvoir d'Achat on 2010-05-28 15:06:14 GMT from Italy)
"what is the problem"
This mere question illustrates the fact that GNUlinux fan boys are unaible to
understand the needs of the users (at least half of them have no direct IT connection) and hide behind
"M$ is crap, therefore, why should Linux distributions not be crappy, too",
by dropping something useful (one can get the GIMP without efforts by buying some distributions which
go on respecting their users...
The choice of
dropping
something useful and claiming it can be downloaded / bought is a regression, and makes the "high standard" claim a poor slogan.
BTW :I suppose you can sing some adresses where you can buy software,
and you have some "knowlege" about package management.
But are you skilled in making nice pictures?
85 • RE:Who's fed up with distrubutions. (by Eddie Wilson on 2010-05-28 15:25:14 GMT from United States)
"GIMP is available in the repository and there are no plans whatsoever to drop it."
What's wrong with that? I don't really know anybody that has a serious problem with Gimp not being installed by default. I'm sure that if your nephew can make nice pictures with Gimp he can, for example, in Ubuntu use the Ubuntu Software Center and in a couple of clicks he has it. Furthermore I don't see where that is an "off hand claim" There are only so many items you can put on a cd. I can somewhat see the reasoning behind your post. Sometimes software package managers can seem intimidating and a lot of trouble or a person may not have an internet connection and that can be a problem. Most good distros have a software center of some sort now that's very easy to use. With no online connection a person may have to think about changing their distro of choice to get what they want.
86 • 84 (by Brandon on 2010-05-28 15:44:58 GMT from United States)
It's not a their crap so we should be too attitude. It's a there is only so much room on a cd we have to decide what to include attitude. I personally don't use GIMP therefore I have no use for it, but if I did installing it wouldn't be a huge deal. The developers have to decide what they think is the most important software to include. That in itself means that not everyone is going to agree with their software choices. I would bet that almost everyone has to add some software that they use that is not included in the default install regardless of what distribution they use. Take me for example. I like gnome, but prefer K3B for my burning needs. Not to many gnome based distributions are going to include K3B so I have to add it. I also play online video games, and have a need to connect to Ventrilo servers. This means that I have to install Mangler. It's nothing I wouldn't have to do if I was using another OS. I would have to install the ventrilo client in both WIndows, and Mac in order to connect to those servers. I'm not going to down developers though because I use software that they don't think should be included on the disk.
87 • RE 85, 86 (by Piqure d'Epingle on 2010-05-28 15:57:57 GMT from Italy)
Comment deleted (disrespectful).
88 • Re: #76 & #80 Landor & Jessie (by Sly on 2010-05-28 16:05:57 GMT from United States)
How interesting!! The convergence of experienced and new Linux users at Ubuntu??? For me it's Mint, but whose splitting hairs. I'll admit, I have only been following distrowatch for a couple of years but Landor's comments are so surprising that I'm going to frame them. So newbies are on to something after all, and after years of to distro hopping, tinkering, tweaking , poking and proding, experienced users are saying the same thing, 'I just want it to work out-of-the-box'.
89 • Qimo---WARNING for newbies (by Anonymous on 2010-05-28 16:26:30 GMT from Canada)
The dww announcement says :
now you can add the qimo-session package from the Universe repository."
I did , But as soon as synaptic finished I shut down my comp. as I had to leave.
On returning I fired up and was very surprised to have lost my Ubuntu desktop colours and also thunderbird and glipper.
How in the hell do I get them back?
I suppose this would be a fascinating (and probably, trivial) puzzle for a geek.
I would suggest that the developer provide some directions for newbies.
I shut down again and restarted thinking that I had missed some window that allowed me to select which Os I wanted.
No such luck
help
Thanks in advance.
90 • @76, @80, etc (by fernbap on 2010-05-28 16:40:25 GMT from Portugal)
I agree with Landor on that one. It's nice for you to be able to tweak linux installations, but you will also have your own own desktop environment to do your daily work.
I found myself at home with gnome (which rules out several popular distros) and debian based distros, Ubuntu being the real engine behind user friendly desktop development.
I don't agree with some of the Ubuntu choices, though, so Ubuntu doesn't exactly cut it (at least for me).
That is the main reason why Mint is so popular. You get gimp and pidgin instead of ubuntu one, and Mint provides me with exactly what i want on my desktop, along with a set of nice custom made tools. Of course, you couldn't have Mint without the great work Ubuntu has been doing for the last years.
If a linux newbie asks me which is the distro most suitable for a complete outsider, my answer is Ubuntu or Mint, depending on your preferences.
I also like and use lightweight desktops to run on less powerful machines, in which case my choice is Lxde. Both Lubuntu and Mint Lxde are excellent, and offer to a complete Linux newbie an experience very similar to windows XP (which is still the most used windows version by far, which says a lot about the direction M$ took).
91 • qimo #89 (by Anonymous on 2010-05-28 16:43:15 GMT from Canada)
So I went to synaptic and removed completely the 3 qimo entries.and then shut down the comp.
guess what
On restarting I still have the new desktop and do not have thunderbird or glipper
any help would be greatly appreciated.
92 • @76, 88 (by Patrick on 2010-05-28 16:56:31 GMT from United States)
Now I have to wonder if this is the "real Landor" or if someone is impersonating him. :-)
93 • post 92 (by Jon Thomsen on 2010-05-28 17:17:34 GMT from United States)
No one is that masochistic.
94 • SalixOS 13.1 (by Caitlyn Martin on 2010-05-28 18:35:07 GMT from United States)
Since I stopped writing frequent reviews and refocused on development work I pretty much stopped distro-hopping. I use Red Hat/Scientific Linux/CentOS for my work. I've been looking at the RHEL 6 beta. (Yes, I plan on writing on that.) For routine home use I settles on SalixOS late last year and I've been completely happy with it: reliable, stable and it adds the missing bits (dependency checking and resolution, in particular) to Slackware while staying as close to the original as possible.
Anyway, I saw this in the SalixOS forum today from one of their developers (Gapan):
"...there's a very high chance that 13.1RC1 is going to be 13.1."
I'm downloading the 64-bit version now with the 32-bit to follow. :)
95 • RE:87, (by Eddie Wilson on 2010-05-28 18:39:38 GMT from United States)
Sorry if my answers offended you or others but I use Gimp and I don't feel disrespected because it's not installed by default and I don't understand the anger. Last post on this subject. YEA!!!
96 • RE:91,Qimo problem (by Eddie Wilson on 2010-05-28 18:45:22 GMT from United States)
At the login screen which session did you choose? You should be able to choose the which session you want to log into on the login screen.
97 • Zenwalk and Xfce 4.6.2 (by Claus Futtrup on 2010-05-28 18:49:05 GMT from Denmark)
Hi all.
It was not mentioned in the release of Zenwalk 4.6.2 that it actually sports the brand spanking new Xfce 4.6.2 (only 4 days between releases). I assume Zenwalk is the first to include the new Xfce.
Best regards,
Claus
(Zenwalker)
98 • Zenwalk and Xfce 4.6.2 (by Claus Futtrup on 2010-05-28 18:50:43 GMT from Denmark)
Ahem - correction - I meant to write Zenwalk 6.4 ... Xfce 4.6.2.
99 • RE: 77-80-88-92 (by Landor on 2010-05-28 18:59:29 GMT from Canada)
#77
That's one of the reasons Fedora only caters to a specific userbase. Ever read any of their wiki pages? Fedora clearly attests to the fact that in its own way, it's like Gentoo in a sense. It's not meant for the feint of heart or a newer user. So comparing the two distributions is like night and day. But in regard to social networking and integration, did you notice Fedora 13 has Pino? How much you want to bet a lot of Fedora Devs us twitter as much as anyone.
RE: 80
The point being made though Jesse, for the big four, is they're the ones that are really bringing Linux to the market, whichever market that is. Sure, and I'll be one of the first to agree, smaller distributions can do a lot for innovation, NimbleX comes to mine. Out of the four I listed I don't know if you can find Mandriva, but you can look around enough and find RH, SUSE and Ubuntu preinstalled from many OEMs. There's the reason to either support them directly or RH's/SUSE's community projects. If I have an older lappy or computer come my way, I'm obviously not going to throw KDE 4 or some heavy distribution/DE/WM on it. I'm going to look for something lower-end that will be a performer. I know many people still use really old hardware, but I'm wager, they're not the majority either.
#88/92
It's me for sure and I can prove it like this: Sly said that they just want things to work out of the box. I still can't stand that term. But to answer, no. lol They want ease of use and polished integration. That's why they, nor I, would even dream of considering using Mint..lol :)
----
I didn't do much tweaking to clean Ubuntu up in the way I need to, to fit with my ideals. Thus far anyway. This on my netbook for now. I even like their default theme. For appearance they've done really well and I just slapped on one of my favourite wallpapers (google images "dead space clean" and select the first image, simple but nice looking) then deleted the bottom panel, moved the top one down, switched to the main menu applet for space consideration, etc, etc.
Oh, and I have to say, I can't stand sudo, it's such a n00b mechanism..lol sudo su works for me. :)
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
100 • #69 (by Person on 2010-05-28 19:08:35 GMT from United States)
Do you mean you had to use Ubuntu Grub2 to get all your OS recognized by grub instead of just Fedora immediately booting itself without options?
101 • #96 quimo (by Anonymous on 2010-05-28 22:16:32 GMT from Canada)
Eddie Wilson thanks for the reply
There is no option offered
Just to make sure that I had not overlooked it I logged out and there was no option offered;
102 • @99: Fedora (by Reuben Perelman on 2010-05-29 03:13:18 GMT from United States)
I'm not sure why you consider Fedora so hard to use. It seems like you just run through the installer, and you've got a usable desktop on the first boot. In fact, it's the only distro that I've seen that work with my dual-head setup using zero configuration. Overall, I'd say it's good choice for any user, weather they are new or experienced that wants cutting edge software without mucking around with configuration.
103 • RE: 102 (by Landor on 2010-05-29 03:55:05 GMT from Canada)
Don't get me wrong. I think Fedora is a great product. Is it a product for new users? That's the thing here. I spoke of it earlier too. I wouldn't hand my sister or one of my remaining older living relatives Fedora any more than I would Gentoo, point to the wiki and such and say, have at'er. Gentoo's just not that. For the majority of us, it's easy to say, "Yeah, Fedora's pretty simple". Easy yes, but not accurate because we're making that common with a bias, due to experience. Fedora clearly states their user base is for the more technically inclined user. That's not a non-technical friend or relative.
Let's take a look at shotwell and yes I know it's slated for the next Ubuntu release as well. They took a perfectly working photo manager and replaced it with something less functional an fairly different, during a time when the project is still growing. That's what Fedora does, adds in new applications/functionality that are maturing and helps them along. They should be applauded for that. But is that something that a new user wants or can deal with? An ever changing landscape, but not only that, where you have this great functionality, then it's replaced with something less? If it was my sister, she'd say, "But I want the other one, this one doesn't even do some of the things I was able to with the one that was there for a while". They don't care that Fedora switched because they got rid of Mono for whatever reason (they stated to save space from what I recall reading). They also don't care that "maybe" in the future this might be a great application (which I personally hope it becomes), they care that the one thing they were accustomed to is gone. We've seen people here talk about how people dread change, there's a clear example of the truth of it.
Then there's the other areas of flux within Fedora, the massive amounts of updates is literally staggering. It became to such a point that it's been making news as of late that the community wants it to slow down. That's from the community, what about a new user?
I'll only briefly touch on the fact that to get extra functionality people have to add third party repositories. That's easy for an experienced user to do. For someone new looking for a distribution to use quickly and easily, again, Fedora's the wrong choice due to that.
What's easy to install doesn't mean it's easy to use.
The above is just my personal opinion though. I still believe people need to learn and shouldn't expect a GNU/Linux based OS to be a cake-walk for them. But I don't expect a new user to be able to fit into every distribution there is either.
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
104 • I'm not shure if I agree ... (by meanpt on 2010-05-29 10:00:06 GMT from Portugal)
... with everything beIng said around for desktop linux, except with one: we all need at least one reliable, UNDERSTANDABLE and fast OS in our OS portfolio and this is already a huge effort by the distro developers. That's where UBUNTU comes in mind. This damned thing may still to be perfected in its user interface but already reached a high degree of "user friendliness" and is pretty reliable.But then we need to be free to choose and install whatever we want, being it good or bad because . we all have more needs than the basic bread and butter. And again Ubuntu comes to my mind as the best positioned. This is true either in the home or the corporate environment. But because one distro can't fit it all, there is a whole left space for good specialized distros in dealing with portable hardware, touching devices, sound, CAD, 3D graphics animation, and so on, provided they are tweaked for those purpose (... and ... well, without trying to burn CPU's by over clocking them insanely). Seems the discussion has been around on the basic bread and butter only.
105 • re: 76 (by jake on 2010-05-29 12:17:55 GMT from United States)
Sick of tweaking? Not here. That way lies madness ...
I purchase the hardware to suit the OS and software that I (or my users) need to run. I set it up once ("tweak it"), and then forget about it. This is the way that sane computer users have done it since the year dot. Basically, figure out the needs of the enduser, spec the software for those needs, and then spec the hardware required to run said software, and then install it. In that order.
Expecting j.random shovelware to execute properly on JaneQPublic's low-end, bought at a big-box-store PC, with dodgy to begin with hardware, is a fool's errand.
Modern desktop computers are both complex, and complicated. "Ease of use" is a myth, and one that Apple should be ashamed of itself for perpetrating ... Yes, DistroO'T'Day runs on a great many boxes. Today. But next week?
Your "big four" aren't really "big" ... just the loudest. It's called "marketing". And "marketing" never helped an end-user, all they care about is shareholders.
106 • @102 (by Jesse on 2010-05-29 14:24:42 GMT from Canada)
Fedora is a great distro in many ways, but it's not really newbie friendly. Even if you grab the DVD, which has most of the software you'll want, there are a number of things which make Fedora a non-newbie distribution.
Such as turning off un-wanted network services. Adding repositories to get basic functionality (codecs, plugins, other popular software). Dealing with SELinux pop-ups and cryptic crash reports. The package manager isn't nearly as new-comer friendly as that of other distros. The upgrade cycle, the life of a Fedora release is about 14 months. I generally enjoy using Fedora and it's a great developer and beta-tester platform, but it's not targeting novice users.
107 • Fedora 13 (by fernbap on 2010-05-29 15:46:23 GMT from Portugal)
i always had problems with Fedora in the past (i have a ATI card), but never gave up giving it a chance, although knowing that installing flash and media codecs is a pain in the ass.
So, i downloaded/burned the live CD. Booted. Wow! looks like everything works! (ok, not the multimedia codecs, but i already knew that).
So i decided to install in one of my disk partitions. Install went smoothly and fast. Looks good. Now, reboot.
And all i got was a kernel panic.
I was never lucky with Fedora, and it looks like it's still happening.
108 • Qimo for Kids 2.0 (by DShelbyD on 2010-05-29 16:04:39 GMT from United States)
Burned a CD of the new Qimo release yesterday afternoon so a 4-year-old and her 5-year-old sister, both of whom we were caring for, might get some other-than-television entertainment while their parents and two elder siblings moved out of the house across the street to a new location. They took to it like ducks to water. I was amused and amazed at how engaging the games were and how much fun they was having . . . while learning. I can't say enought good things about Qimo. The sounds have quality, reinforcing correct choices and noting incorrect choices without overdoing it in a way that is so often offensive and annoying in typical computer games.
Kudos to the creators of Qimo. Great stuff! I gave the eldest sister in the family the CD with instructions to run it from the CD, noting that installing it as a game would wipe the HD (over-simplistic, but a way to avoid potential computer distaster for the family). The mom, however, said the family has a kids computer getting little use with Windows on it, so they may as well install Qimo. Hurrah! They'll have educational games as well as a useful Linux distro on it.
109 • @108 (by DShelbyD on 2010-05-29 16:06:33 GMT from United States)
Too much editing and a gross grammatical error: "... fun they WERE having ...."
110 • Qimo--solved (#91,101) (by Anonymous on 2010-05-29 16:17:51 GMT from Canada)
Had to go to login application to change it to Gnome.
111 • 100 Grub2 (by pfb on 2010-05-29 19:19:01 GMT from United States)
"Do you mean you had to use Ubuntu Grub2 to get all your OS recognized by grub instead of just Fedora immediately booting itself without options?"
Yes. Ubuntu was the last system installed and I was suitably impressed with Grub2, so I didn't replace it. I suspect I could have added the extra step of using Fedora to re-install grub, but why bother?
I think I am beginning to see the trend here in severely curtailing my distro hopping. I am currently using Fedora, Ubuntu, and Mandriva without much effort. In fact, when the new SuSE comes out, it will be hard to decide which to give up.
112 • NimbleX violates the GPL (by Caitlyn Martin on 2010-05-29 21:23:42 GMT from United States)
One of my main problems with NimbleX is that they don't provide source code in clear violation of the GPL. As I've said before, if a distro doesn't provide source code I won't use it. NimbleX is hardly alone in this.
113 • RE: 105-112 (by Landor on 2010-05-29 22:33:24 GMT from Canada)
#105
I'd have to say ease of use is a perspective more than anything else. :) An example is having to search out, then compile and install a security update/bug fix manually as opposed to an update manager that advises you of the change(s) then prompts you to choose to either allow the process to happen or not. The former without any further interaction on your part.
I'll agree that the big four have their own financial agendas. I've stated that with one or two of them many times, especially Canonical/Ubuntu. But everything has cause and effect, like ripples in a pond. When one of the big four make headway, as in Canonical/Ubuntu, we start seeing systems from the Big Box companies shipping preinstalled with those OS'. As that continues to grow we see wider adoption, which in turn means more of an interest from developers and hardware manufacturers of our once only thought of niche community. On the desktop that is.
A clear sign of some of the things that can happen was the netbook market. Linux is considered what, below two percent for the overall desktop market? In the netbook market Microsoft claimed in the area of ninety percent I do believe. That means that Linux pretty well dominated ten percent of the market. A huge difference from the normal two percent or less. I'd have to say though many ASUS netbooks shipped with a customized Xandros, Ubuntu was probably the bigger seller of that roughly ten percent of the market. That says a whole lot for what one of the big four can do to further things, especially if they have massive support.
#112
I do believe that's not accurate. I think there's a provision in the GPL that allows the source to be upstream from the original providers. I know Knoppix clearly states that the sources are located on the respective ftp servers of those original providers except for anything Knoppix specific such as the kernel, scripts, hardware detection. I haven't looked at NimbleX in this area, but it's possible they're doing similar.
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
114 • RE: 112/113 (by Landor on 2010-05-29 22:58:02 GMT from Canada)
I forgot to add, I believe the reasoning for this in the GPL was to eliminate the waste of resources duplicating the same thing.
And if it's not the case, it should be just for that reason.
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
115 • RE: 112 GPL (by Jesse on 2010-05-30 00:03:08 GMT from Canada)
A project doesn't have to voluntarily provide source code to be within the limits of the GPL. They do have to be willing to provide the source code upon request or, if they got the binaries from somewhere else, they need to be able to point their users to the upstream source.
So unless someone contacted NimbleX and asked for their source code and were rejected or ignored, they're not in violation.
116 • #113/115: Not correct (by Caitlyn Martin on 2010-05-30 01:43:36 GMT from United States)
Jesse/Landor, that just isn't correct. They do have to provide source code and they cannot point upstream. They don't have to provide it for free but it must be available. This was the whole basis of the complaint against Zenwalk a few years back.
Saying it should be that way doesn't make it that way.
117 • RE: 116 (by Landor on 2010-05-30 07:54:34 GMT from Canada)
I think I'm correct. The GPL V3 Section 6d states:
"d) Convey the object code by offering access from a designated place (gratis or for a charge), and offer equivalent access to the Corresponding Source in the same way through the same place at no further charge. You need not require recipients to copy the Corresponding Source along with the object code. If the place to copy the object code is a network server, the Corresponding Source may be on a different server (operated by you or a third party) that supports equivalent copying facilities, provided you maintain clear directions next to the object code saying where to find the Corresponding Source. Regardless of what server hosts the Corresponding Source, you remain obligated to ensure that it is available for as long as needed to satisfy these requirements."
The part where it says "the corresponding source may be on a different server (operated by you or a third party) that supports equivalent copying facilities, provided you maintain clear directions next to the object code saying where to find the Corresponding Source." Tells me, if I understand it correctly, all you have to do is point to where the source is and make sure that the source code is available for the duration of your distribution of the binary. If it's availability changes and you're still providing a binary, you have to take it upon yourself to make sure the source is available, otherwise the above is fine.
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
118 • Re: 105 (by Jake) (by Henning Melgaard on 2010-05-30 08:12:55 GMT from Denmark)
So in your opinion, what is the future of Linux on desktop/laptop computers?
Will it ever be used by more than 1-2 % of all computer users?
And if you think it will, how do you see that happening?
119 • Re: 118 (by jake on 2010-05-30 11:53:11 GMT from United States)
"So in your opinion, what is the future of Linux on desktop/laptop computers?"
Fuck "Linux" ... it's FOSS that's important[tm]. FOSS'll be here for the duration, and there is nothing that BigBusiness[tm] can do to stop it. And it'll keep getting better, by its very nature. That's all that matters.
"Will it ever be used by more than 1-2 % of all computer users?"
Unknown. I can't see the future. But over the long haul, probably ... All BigBusinesses fail, eventually. FOSS is here to stay. Do the math. Apple, Inc. did. (What percentage of desktops does Apple's flavor of BSD have these days? Shirley it's better than 1-2% ...)
"And if you think it will, how do you see that happening?"
Not my issue. I have more important things to think about ... like providing systems that my Mom, GreatAunt & Wife can use without pestering me with support calls. To say nothing of my actual paying clients.
[1] Don't get me wrong, I use Slackware as my base for desktop OSes ... but I'll drop the Linux kernel in a heart-beat if something better comes along (my servers are almost all BSD of one flavor or another). I'm not religious about it.
120 • Re: 118 (by jake on 2010-05-30 11:59:42 GMT from United States)
"So in your opinion, what is the future of Linux on desktop/laptop computers?"
Fuck "Linux" ... it's FOSS that's important[1][2]. FOSS'll be here for the duration, and there is nothing that BigBusiness[tm] can do to stop it. And it'll keep getting better, by its very nature. That's all that matters.
"Will it ever be used by more than 1-2 % of all computer users?"
Unknown. I can't see the future. But over the long haul, probably ... All BigBusinesses fail, eventually. FOSS is here to stay. Do the math. Apple, Inc. did. (What percentage of desktops does Apple's flavor of BSD have these days? Shirley it's better than 1-2% ...)
"And if you think it will, how do you see that happening?"
Not my issue. I have more important things to think about ... like providing systems that my Mom, GreatAunt & Wife can use without pestering me with support calls. To say nothing of my actual paying clients.
[1] Don't get me wrong, I use Slackware as my base for desktop OSes ... but I'll drop the Linux kernel in a heart-beat if something better comes along (my servers are almost all BSD of one flavor or another). I'm not religious about it.
[2] Never turn your back on an un-proofread comment when there are cats about :-)
121 • Re: 119-120 (by Henning Melgaard on 2010-05-30 12:14:27 GMT from Denmark)
Well, thanks for a quick response.
Some of it may have gone a bit over my head :-).
A year and a half ago, things you were saying didn't make much sense to me.
But after "fiddling around" with Linux for a while, it seems to me you have a point in what you are saying. Thats why I asked for your view on the larger perspective.
Why is FOSS the only thing that matters?
And what makes you so sure it will survive?
Keep an eye out for the cats though ._9
122 • RE: 116 GPL (by Jesse on 2010-05-30 13:06:57 GMT from Canada)
I can't speak on the details of GPLv3, but version 2 supports my comment. Note section 3, items B and C. It says the source code can either supplied outright, or supplied upon request or (in the case of non-commercial products) the distributor can simply point to upstream. And the project can charge, if need be, to cover the costs of supply the source code.
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.html
123 • RE: My comments supporting Ubuntu. (by Landor on 2010-05-30 20:20:18 GMT from Canada)
I used netbooks and Ubuntu as an example in my last comment. Here's an interesting thought in that regard.
What would have happened if there wasn't Ubuntu? Did anyone ever see any of the big name distributions (aside from ASUS' version of Xandros, which they dropped eventually) being shipped on a netbook from a large OEM? I know I didn't. Also, other than niche dealers, you don't see end-user desktop installs for other distributions from the big OEMs, other than Ubuntu. We only see an enterprise install, like SUSE, usually.
I honestly believe after the initial use (then dropping of it) of Xandros for ASUS, that's all we would have seen in the netbook market. Love it or hate it, Ubuntu creates options for end-users. Options we most likely wouldn't have had without them.
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
124 • Zenwalk, FOSS (by fernbap on 2010-05-30 20:33:43 GMT from Portugal)
Just installed Zenwalk in one of my partitions (displacing the failed Fedora experiment).
I'm impressed, works well, it's fast and light, no issue except from some programs installed from the repositories that don't work (need to check why).
"Why is FOSS the only thing that matters?"
Because noone can stop it. It's taking even the windows desktops by storm (Firefox, VLC, Virtualbox, Apache, MySQL, etc), and no company will be able to get rid of it.
On a side note, i have my own open source project, and had once a complain that i wasn't following GPL because i didn't include the sources of my php scripts :D
125 • Re: 121 (by jake on 2010-05-30 23:07:20 GMT from United States)
"Why is FOSS the only thing that matters?"
FOSS is a concept, not a product. Products come and go (when was the last time you purchased a buggy-whip? Full-body woolen bathing costume?). But concepts are here to stay (while we still take the buckboard or pony trap into town on occasion, you'll usually find me on a motorcycle when I need to run a few solo errands. And we know how to swim, but we're a trifle less modest than our Victorian ancestors).
"And what makes you so sure it will survive?"
FOSS has nowhere to go, as a concept. Unless all the governments of the world outlaw it, of course. Which isn't going to happen. Ubuntu, Debian, Mandriva, Mint and even Slackware will eventually go away. Even the Linux kernel itself is going to eventually go away (thus my rather intemperate interjection, for which I apologize[1]). But not FOSS. By it's very nature, FOSS will probably survive the heat-death of the Universe ... Not that humans will make it that long, of course.
"Keep an eye out for the cats though"
Other way around. The cats keep an eye on us ...
[1] My foreman and I were up all night, spelling each other walking a colicing stud-colt ... We let the field hands sleep & do it ourselves. Tired hands make mistakes. So do tired jakes, but my mistakes usually involve bad language in inappropriate places, not tractors & fencing ;-)
Number of Comments: 125
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