 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 376, 18 October 2010 |
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Welcome to this year's 42nd issue of DistroWatch Weekly! Every Ubuntu release is followed with great attention in the media, often accompanied by reviews, first look stories and other impressions. DistroWatch is no exception; this week's feature story, written by Susan Linton, presents Kubuntu 10.10, a distribution that always features the latest version of the popular KDE desktop. Does it deliver on the promise to be a one-stop distro for KDE fans? Read on to find out. In the news section, Ubuntu developer Dave Walker looks back at the development cycle leading to the "Maverick Meerkat" release, the MeeGo project objects to openSUSE's new netbook release called Smeegol, and Arch Linux delivers an updated 2nd edition of their excellent handbook - in both electronic and hard-copy forms. Also in this issue, an interview with Elizabeth Naramore, a newly-appointed community development manager at SourceForge, and Fusion Linux, a new addition to the DistroWatch database, whose developers try to provide a more user-friendly Fedora variant for beginning Linux users. Happy reading!
Content:
Listen to the Podcast edition of this week's DistroWatch Weekly in OGG (17MB) and MP3 (18MB) formats
 Join us at irc.freenode.net #distrowatch
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| Feature Story (by Susan Linton) |
First look at Kubuntu 10.10
 Lot of people were looking forward to October 10, 2010 for quite some time. Many since April! This date, of course, was the release of the Ubuntu 10.10 family of Linux operating systems. While Ubuntu has been getting most of the press, some folks require or prefer KDE. For those, Kubuntu might fill the bill.
Kubuntu 10.10 arrived with Linux 2.6.35, X.Org Server 1.9.0, GCC 4.4.5, and KDE 4.5.1. Many of the new features and improvements from Ubuntu have made it into Kubuntu as well. One of these is the revamped installer, which one can run before fully booting the live CD or from within the desktop environment. It seems more streamlined and faster. Perhaps some of that is because a portion of the process is conducted while files are being copied to your hard drive in the background. Additionally, your time zone and keyboard are auto-detected (possibly from hwclock) but require your confirmation. Perhaps the best new feature of the installer is the offer to install third-party typically closed-sourced code such as Flash or MP3 codecs. The hard drive boot seems a bit peppier, but the GRUB screen could use lots of attention.
Kubuntu 10.10 - the default desktop on the live CD
(full image size: 468kB, resolution 1024x768 pixels)
Any hopes for some customization of the GUI like Ubuntu faded rather quickly. In fact, it's practically default KDE - at least in appearance. For NVIDIA users, the KDE 4.5.x desktop might present further issues if the proprietary NVIDIA graphic drivers are used. KDE 4.5.x has known issues with NVIDIA drivers especially when using Oxygen decorative components. The live CD used the Nouveau drivers by default and displayed no negative issues. In addition, Nouveau allowed the configuration of resolution and even of dual displays through the KDE System Settings. On top of that, (K)Ubuntu is having issues with NVIDIA as well this release, but these are fixed with manually editing the xorg.conf file. However, even after fixing any graphics issues, KDE 4.5.x and X.Org on Kubuntu exhibit performance degradation that can be alleviated somewhat by restarting KDE/X every few days.
The major disappointment with KDE and Kubuntu was not being able to use Akregator with my admittedly long RSS feed list. Akregator did function very well with the few feeds found in the default Kubuntu install, but trying to import my list (exported from another Linux/KDE install) always resulted in crashing and escaping of the import process. Trying to copy the Akregator directory from another system didn't work either (which usually works in other distros). Exporting and importing my feed list is a standard procedure after a fresh install and this result was a bit surprising. Akregator is known to crash from time to time in every distro since KDE 4 became the standard, but I can usually count on importing my feeds and using it - even if putting up with periodic crashes. As a result, I employed and quickly adapted to Liferea, with all its pluses and minuses.
Those were really the only issues I had worth mentioning with Kubuntu 10.10. Minor annoyances include HTML default of KMail, the OSD notification (or new Message indicators) of every email message arrival, and no additional backgrounds, themes, icons, and stuff. While the graphics might present a major obstacle to some, none of these issues were a deal breaker for me. However, they do prevent me from saying Kubuntu is the best KDE distro I've ever tried. Conversely, they don't make me say Kubuntu 10.10 is the worst either. This is precisely the position I didn't really want to find myself. It makes for such boring reviews.
Some other updated features include KPackageKit. Ubuntu developers have been spending a lot of effort trying to update the Ubuntu Software Center and the new KPackageKit resembles their efforts a bit. When opened, the user is presented with icons and categories to explore such as Office or Themes and Tweaks. When the category icon is click, a list of available software is presented. Contrary to conventional experience, available software titles are listed in light italic font while applications already installed are normal font. Selecting applications to install is a bit awkward at first as well. A moving arrow indicates the application that is in focus and clicking upon this arrow sets the application for install. The background seems to change behind the arrow as a visual clue, but all in all it just feels a bit awkward. It does seem to function well though.
Kubuntu 10.10 - managing software with KPackageKit
(full image size: 355kB, resolution 1058x680 pixels)
Included software is primarily for the KDE desktop. You'll find applications like KMail, Dragon Player, Kopete, Gwenview, and OpenOffice.org. Fortunately, Kubuntu software repositories seem fairly well stocked. Which is good because you'll have to break out KPackageKit and install the GIMP yourself.
Rekonq is the new default web browser for Kubuntu. It features a simplified interface and is built on the much touted Qt WebKit. It also includes a Favorites screen of your favorite web sites much like Opera's Speed Dial or Firefox's Panorama. It also has a lot of modern amenities such as Java and Java script support, built-in ad block, cache and offline caching. Rekonq is YouTube ready (if you chose to include third-party software during the install). I'm a Konqueror user usually, but Rekonq is fairly slick too. Firefox can be installed with the included installer scripts with little more than a mouse-click.
PulseAudio as the default sound server for Kubuntu. There have been lot of complaints about PulseAudio since its introduction, but the only issue I experienced was a lack of volume control with an added TV application. In this one case, I had to use Alsamixer to control it. Everything else would show up in the mixer when executed. This is to allow individual application control rather than having them all lumped into one.
Another handy feature in Kubuntu is the offer to install codecs the first time the user tries to enjoy certain video or audio files (if needed). While some distros include them by default and some others leave it entirely up to the user, Kubuntu has found the happy medium by offering to easily install them. That way purists can decline if they so choose.
Finally, a word about the new Ubuntu font that Kubuntu included. Marvelous. The new font that has been in the works this development cycle turned out really well. It just looks great.
In conclusion, Kubuntu 10.10 might not bowl you over, but it seems to function fairly well if you're a bit forgiving. I would have liked to have seen a prettier desktop and I'd really like someone to look into the NVIDIA and Akregator issues, but overall it wasn't an unpleasant experience. This is the first time I've used Kubuntu for any real length of time, and at the end of my excursion, I am moving on (but I'm taking that font with me). Kubuntu won't be leaving my desktop with a lot of bad memories, it just didn't win me over. Like I said before, it wasn't the best desktop I've ever used, nor was it the worst. It's just stuck right there in the middle of the road. And sometimes, that's good enough.
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| Miscellaneous News (by Ladislav Bodnar) |
Looking back at Ubuntu "Maverick" release cycle, Smeegol versus Meego, Arch Linux Handbook and security guide
 Ubuntu 10.10 arrived eight days ago so last week was the time of first impressions. In between the usual horror stories of failed upgrades and complete amazement at an excellent release, the general perception of the distribution hasn't changed much over the last few years. It still rules the Linux desktop, but it hasn't succeeded in converting the masses. Nevertheless, sometimes small, incremental success stories are more important in the long term than dramatic landslide victories. So what makes "Maverick Meerkat" better than its predecessor? Ubuntu developer Dave Walker takes us through the major milestones of the development process in an article entitled "Ubuntu 10.10 - the release cycle in review": "As is increasingly common, with better quality assurance (QA) / testing than ever before – and wider adoption of the milestone and daily snapshots pre-releases – we are able to identify more bugs, earlier. It used to be the case that many of the rare or edge bugs were only discovered post-release, and were then either fixed as an SRU (Stable Release Update) or if minor, left until the next release to implement the fix. This generally means that with each subsequent release there is increased stability."
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 In last week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly we mentioned the release of Smeegol, an official openSUSE distribution combining the openSUSE base with the MeeGo user interface, to create a powerful and usable distribution for deployments on netbooks. Unfortunately, the MeeGo project wasn't impressed by a name that might be infringing on the project's trademark and has asked openSUSE to rename the release. Linux Weekly News reports in "Smeegol encounters a ring of power": "Smeegol is an implementation of the MeeGo user experience on top of an openSUSE base; the 1.0 release was announced on October 6. On the 14th, the project was told that it cannot use the 'Smeegol' name: 'It is not in the benefit of MeeGo project to use 'Smeegol'. We therefore can not approve such usage of MeeGo mark in 'Smeegol'. We understand that you've already announced it and we will be happy to work with you to come up with a different name (for the good of the MeeGo project).' Some Smeegol developers are not pleased by this development and have announced their intent to 'push back'; meanwhile, openSUSE community manager Jos Poortvliet has proposed renaming the distribution to 'DarkRider'. What the final resolution will be is unclear."
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  Arch Linux has experienced a tremendous growth in popularity over the last few years. But with the fairly technical nature of the distro, together with the developers' insistence that their users do RTFM, good documentation has become a must. Now it its second edition, the Arch Linux Handbook is a superb way to find your way around this excellent and powerful operating system. Dusty Phillips, the books editor, writes on his blog: "Over a year ago, I released the Arch Linux Handbook, a print copy of the Arch Linux Beginners' Guide. It proved to be far more popular than I expected, with nearly 400 copies in print. Of course, the Beginner's guide is a community edited document for a rolling release Linux distribution, and after a year, the Arch Linux Handbook became somewhat dated. So I've created a second edition. It is currently available directly from the eStore and will be available on Amazon within a couple weeks. The International Amazon sites, other booksellers, and brick and mortar stores should have the book available for order after about six weeks."
Speaking of great Arch Linux documentation, here is another excellent guide, written by Rene Rasmussen. It's called Securing Arch Linux and while it is written specifically for one popular distro, many of the concepts discussed in the article can easily be applied to other distributions: "The first question you have to ask yourself is: How paranoid are you? It is possible to tighten the security so much as to make your system unusable. The trick is to secure it without overdoing it. ... The first step actually already starts before you install the system. You should take a minute to consider your partition layout. There are many other things that can be done to heighten the security, but the biggest threat is, and will always be, the user himself. When you think security, you have to think layers. When one layer is breached, another should stop the attack. But you can never make the system 100% secure unless you unplug the machine from all networks, lock it in a safe and never use it! Be a little paranoid. It helps. And be suspicious. If anything sounds too good to be true, it probably is!"
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| Questions and Answers (by Jesse Smith) |
Interview with Elizabeth Naramore, Community Development Manager at SourceForge
Last month the open source hosting web site SourceForge announced they had appointed Elizabeth Naramore as their Community Development Manager. We got in contact with Ms Naramore and she brought us up to speed on who she is, what she does and what's happening behind the scenes at SourceForge.
DW: Could you start off by giving us a little background on yourself. Where you're from and how you got involved with SourceForge?
EN: I started as a PHP developer back in 2002 and this was my introduction to the open source world. Over the years, besides coding, I have been an author, speaker, and an active PHP community member, through organizing local and national PHP events and through our local user group (OINK-PUG). I am also President and co-founder of PHPWomen.org, a non-profit organization designed to bring women out of the woodwork and give them a place to connect with each other and the PHP community at large. I am a huge advocate of open source, and I also help evangelize projects like Spaz and Habari. I have always had a huge amount of respect for SourceForge and so when the pieces fell into place for me to work here, I was thrilled.
DW: What does a Community Development Manager do exactly?
EN: My job here is two-fold; first, I interact with our project leaders to make sure we're doing what we can to keep them successful and help them grow. Secondly, I help SourceForge help the broader open source community by interacting through outlets like Twitter and the blog. We want to help spread the word about community driven projects and events, and we want to help anyone running an open source project by giving them helpful information. Basically, we want to do what we can to help keep open source vibrant and growing.
DW: SourceForge has been going through a lot of changes in the past few years. There was the data centre move, the new look, new file release interface. What new things will we see next?
EN: Our engineering team has been hard at work on the new beta version of SourceForge.net. We've listened to our users and have implemented many changes, which they have been rolling out incrementally. Recent changes include changing to a permission-based file system, reworking the algorithm of our search engine, improving the stats for our projects, and as you mentioned, numerous UI improvements. We're also improving version control support, including Git, Hg, and SVN. You will soon see a streamlined version of the SourceForge.net beta, with even more improvements in UI and performance.
DW: Earlier there was some concern (and hurt feelings) over SourceForge blocking access to developers and users in countries due to USA law. Could you tell us how SourceForge is trying to balance staying open to the community with legal restrictions?
EN: Of course, this was an unfortunate situation for everybody. We are all bound by the laws of the country where we reside. Thankfully, we were able to come up with a compromise that still allows us to abide by US laws, but also satisfies the needs of our users. We now give each project the ability to decide if their projects are subject to export restrictions based on where they are. This export control has proven to be an acceptable method of keeping everybody happy.
DW: There are some other big names in the open source project hosting field, Google Code being a good example. What does SourceForge offer that other hosts don't? Is there anything the other hosts have you'd like to adopt?
EN: I'm personally a huge fan of the other open source repositories, and anything that helps open source gets bonus points in my book. I also think project leaders don't realize they can capitalize on the strengths of the different sites to fill their needs. For instance, it's possible to use Github and SourceForge.net together; if you wanted to use Github for collaborative development, and SourceForge to host downloads, that's entirely possible. SourceForge has a lot of great perks, such as the searchable directory, the extensive mirror network, and the fact that you aren't limited to one version control system. We are also going to start rolling out efforts to help promote our projects. That being said, I strongly feel that at the end of the day, it all comes down to personal preference -- using whatever tool fits the job.
DW: What do you think is the biggest barrier to getting end-users to adopt open source solutions?
EN: I think there are two main barriers, actually. The first is just getting the word out to the average consumer. I think that people are finally starting to embrace products like OpenOffice.org and VLC, but we still have a long way to go in promoting open source in general. I think if people knew just how many cool pieces of software were out there, that were free and readily available for them to use, we would see a huge growth spurt. Secondly, I think a lot of open source projects struggle with UI and documentation. Despite the fact that the software is free, if a non tech-savvy person is looking at a piece of software that doesn't look polished and professional, or if they have no documentation but a Wiki to go by, they are much less likely to use it.
DW: How does SourceForge decide which projects to approve or which to deny? Are there restrictions in size, licenses, legal concerns, do any developers get told "we don't need 1001 text editors"?
EN: We no longer "approve" projects per se; all projects are automatically approved, and then we remove any spam projects after the fact. Anyone is free to upload a project at any time, and in any category.
DW: Is there a project that isn't in place yet you'd like to see created? A void you think should be filled in?
EN: I would love to see more tools for educators in there. We have a nice selection available already, but many times teachers are limited by budget constraints, and it would be great to give them even more options. Free software helps them be better teachers, which in turn, helps us all.
DW: Is there anything you'd like to add regarding SourceForge or open source?
EN: The only other thing I want to add is that I am completely open to ideas, suggestions, and general comments from anyone (regardless if you host a project on SourceForge.net or not) on ways we can improve, or how we can help the open source community in general. That is our ultimate goal, after all, to help promote open source, and keep it a viable industry.
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| Released Last Week |
Super OS 10.10
Miguel Costa has announced the release of Super OS 10.10, an Ubuntu-based distribution with pre-installed multimedia codecs, extra applications, and other user-friendly features: "Here is Super OS 10.10, 32-bits edition. Changes: based on Ubuntu 10.10; easy installation of NVIDIA, ATI and Broadcom drivers, even without an Internet connection; USB Creator - live USB creator right from the DVD menu (replacing cd2usb); Java re-added, replacing OpenJDK (only Java works with some banking websites); all software in the Super OS repository updated to their latest versions; additional Multimedia support: VLC, DVD playback, MP3 and support and for other formats, including QuickTime, Real video, Windows Media video, Flash, DivX, Xvid; Internet software - aMSN, Skype, Opera, Google Chrome and Firefox (all browsers include Flash); other software: Ubuntu Tweak and GParted...." See the release announcement and release notes for a full changelog and a few screenshots.
Parted Magic 5.6
Patrick Verner has announced the release of Parted Magic 5.6, a specialist live CD with a collection of utilities designed for disk partitioning, disk cloning and data rescue tasks, with support for a large number of common file systems: "Parted Magic 5.6 includes some new features as well as bug fixes. The Nouveau X.Org driver was added and can be activated from the Fail Safe Menu at the first boot screen. Systester was also added. A default root password (partedmagic) has been added to make using SSH easier. The following programs have been updated: Linux kernel 2.6.35.7, GParted 0.6.4, gDisk 0.6.11, hdparm 9.33, stress 1.0.4, UNetbootin 490, NTFS-3G 2010.10.2, BusyBox-1.17.3 and udev 163." Visit the project's home page to read the complete release announcement.
Sabayon Linux 5.4 "SpinBase", "CoreCDX"
Fabio Erculiani has announced the release of Sabayon Linux 5.4 "SpinBase" and "CoreCDX" editions: "Directly from our server department, two new Sabayon editions officially thrown to the crowd. They are called SpinBase and CoreCDX. SpinBase can be used as a base to make new Sabayon spins, or customized Sabayon ISO images. CoreCDX is built on top of the SpinBase module and features X.Org and Fluxbox, our favourite tiny geeky environment. Shipping with X.Org, also means shipping with our new Anaconda full-blown graphical installer. Features: bootable image suitable for a CD or USB thumb drive; basic default networking; based on new GCC 4.4 and glibc 2.11; completely customizable system after install; desktop-optimized Linux kernel 2.6.35...." Here is the full release announcement.
Ubuntu Privacy Remix 10.04r1
Andreas Heinlein has announced the release of Ubuntu Privacy Remix 10.04r1, an Ubuntu-based live DVD with a goal of providing a completely isolated working environment where private data can be dealt with safely and to protect data against unsolicited access: "After a long period of work and testing, the UPR team has released the final version of Ubuntu Privacy Remix 10.04. We have extended and improved the following features: TrueCrypt has been updated to version 6.3a; we have written our own front-end to GnuPG, which replaces Seahorse, with it you can use GPG features like key groups or restoring original file names; the scripts for extended TrueCrypt volumes have been improved and the backup feature during close can backup other open containers as well; new applications: VYM Mindmapper, GIMP, Xterm (for enabling the 'repair file system' feature of TrueCrypt); simple creation and use of LUKS-encrypted volumes." Read the full release announcement for further information.
Tiny Core Linux 3.2
Robert Shingledecker has released Tiny Core Linux 3.2, a minimalist distribution with a graphical user interface in just 10 MB: "Team Tiny Core is pleased to announce that Tiny Core Linux 3.2 is now available. Change log: updated BusyBox to 1.17.2 + patches; improved language translation support in Appsaudit, Wallpaper, and Swapfile; updated AppBrowser, all tabs now allow mouse 'select for copy'; updated System Stats, all tabs now allows mouse 'select for copy'; updated Appsaudit and Appbrowser to eliminate trailing null item in FLTK browser widget; updated tce-load which now handles case of missing dependency file; updated filetool.sh: -d for dry run option, comparerestore boot code, and improved encrypted backup; updated filetool GUI to support options of None, Backup and Safe; updated tc-config: moved 'protect' and 'secure' after extension loading to support alternate layout keyboards...." For further details please read the release announcement.
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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 |
New distributions added to database
- antiX. antiX is a fast, lightweight and easy-to-install linux live CD distribution based on MEPIS and Debian's testing branch for Intel/AMD x86-compatible systems. antiX offers users the "Magic of MEPIS" in an environment suitable for old computers. The goal of antiX is to provide a light, but fully functional and flexible free operating system for both newcomers and experienced users of Linux. It should run on most computers, ranging from 64 MB PII systems with a pre-configured 128 MB swap partition to the latest powerful boxes. 128 MB RAM is the recommended minimum for antiX while the installer needs a minimum of 1.2 GB hard disk space. antiX can also be used as a fast-booting rescue CD.
antiX 8.5 - a lightweight MEPIS-based distribution with IceWM
(full image size: 619kB, resolution 1280x1024 pixels)
- Fusion Linux. Fusion Linux is a Fedora remix that adds all the best software that is available for Linux (free, non-free and even some non-open source firmware and applications for better user experience). It is an installable live DVD image that includes multimedia functionality out of the box, with added desktop tweaks for better usability, and additional software. Fusion Linux is 100% compatible with Fedora, including packages from Fedora and RPM Fusion software repositories.
Fusion Linux 14 Beta 8.5 - a Fedora remix with many user-friendly touches.
(full image size: 1,356kB, resolution 1280x1024 pixels)
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New distributions added to waiting list
- Linux MintPPC. Linux MintPPC is a Linux distribution for 32-bits PowerPC computers which is based on Linux Mint "LXDE" edition, ported to Debian/PPC. The idea behind MintPPC is to have a fast, good-looking and lightweight desktop manager, which runs well on older G3 and G4 machines. MintPPC is directed at desktop users who want a very fast system without the need to install the software themselves. It is easy to use and it is complete.
- 3MX. 3MX is an alternative, Debian-based distribution designed for the 400 MHz MIPS netbooks.
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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, 25 October 2010.
Susan Linton, Ladislav Bodnar and Jesse Smith
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| Reader Comments • Jump to last comment |
1 • Kubuntu and Linux Mint (by Sol on 2010-10-18 10:18:50 GMT from United States)
IMHO, the easiest and most complete distro is Linux Mint KDE version. Now, if the Linux Mint people would make a Linux Mint KDE-Debian edition to go along with their rolling releases, they'd have a good thing going. Or, maybe the aptosid people could do a combination of their OS along with Mint KDE, and we'd have a "complete" OS with rolling releases, and all of the latest of packages.
2 • kubuntu is.. (by tonny on 2010-10-18 10:41:00 GMT from Indonesia)
kubuntu is repeated failures IMHO. Tested it (10.04) on my netbook: plasma crashing everytime I try to modify my themes. Same with past version (can't use kde network tools, etc), etc..etc.. What a pity.. :(
3 • KDE-3.5.10 for Ubuntu (by Anonymous on 2010-10-18 11:03:49 GMT from United States)
There is a community maintained port of the time tested KDE-3.5.10 to Ubuntu 10.10. It is called Trinity and is found at http://trinity.pearsoncomputing.net/
I am running it on Ubuntu 9.04 Jaunty and IMHO KDE-3.x is still better than KDE-4.x
4 • The Lesser 'Buntus (by Rick on 2010-10-18 11:26:31 GMT from United States)
I really wish Canonical and the dev teams would start taking Kubuntu (and Xubuntu, not to mention get off the fence with Lubuntu) seriously. Stop trying to develop a different identity for each DE and unify the projects under one distro. The problem right now is the respins are effectively the same as "apt-get"ing the new DE and uninstalling Gnome, and it runs as if that were the case; as in poorly. I've never got Kubuntu working well whether I installed it over the Ubuntu base or straight off the KDE ISO; Xubuntu is OK, but that's not really saying a whole lot since XFCE runs on Gnome libraries; and of course installing LXDE over Ubuntu is simply catastrophic.
Strange how in other distros (Mandriva and openSUSE are prime examples) you can pick your DE, even install more than one, and nothing bad will happen, and they even go as far as to make some cohesion between the DEs, offering similar desktops, color schemes, icons, etc. Not to say I'd want a purple and brown KDE, but some customization would be nice...
5 • Xubuntu (by Gustavo on 2010-10-18 11:41:49 GMT from Brazil)
Xubuntu is the best of the Ubuntus (including the standard edition). Even with gnome dependencies it runs fast. XFCE is simple, functional, stable and good looking (after some minor tweaking).
6 • ... Oh ... how touchy ... smee Susy cannot "gol"? (by meanpt on 2010-10-18 11:43:36 GMT from Portugal)
... that's crazy, what the hell of a problem do the developers have against such a nice name? ... oh, it's better, maybe much better than the mego(nogowhoever) thing, and for sure that's the big problem ... now, instead of dark rider (this suggestion amuses me), why not call it the big crap rider to nowhere?
7 • NVIDIA (by Omari on 2010-10-18 11:58:00 GMT from United States)
My desktop motherboard was having issues with its hard drive controller, so I just ordered a new motherboard. It had no on-board video, so I had an NVIDIA graphics card.
For years I have wrangled with NVIDIA when installing a distribution or when there is a kernel upgrade. My laptops with Intel graphics have usually been trouble-free. So I made sure my motherboard has integrated Intel graphics.
Intel just gained a customer with its support of open source, while NVIDIA lost a customer due to its proprietary driver that is always a hassle to deal with.
8 • @5 • Xubuntu (by meanpt on 2010-10-18 12:01:13 GMT from Portugal)
... cof cof ... pardon me ... but the better (U)buntu around is Peppermint ...
9 • @8 (by Gustavo on 2010-10-18 12:09:19 GMT from Brazil)
Not a major/official variant.
10 • New Kubuntu (by Michael Raugh on 2010-10-18 12:16:53 GMT from United States)
Tried to play with this over the weekend on my Distro Odyssey machine. Interestingly, the installer seems to have issues with my motherboard's on-board RAID controller -- the list of partitions came up empty in both the GUI installer and the 'alternate' text-based one.
Out of curiosity, I backed up to the Lucid installer and had the same issue. The Jaunty installer worked fine, but no way am I going to install Jaunty and then sit through 3 upgrades to get to Maverick.
I know, I should file a bug report. Meanwhile, sticking with aptosid even though it's giving me issues with Flash and Adobe Reader.
MR
11 • buntus (by hotdiggettydog on 2010-10-18 12:34:09 GMT from Canada)
Not a kbuntu fan. Abandoned kde some time ago.
I installed lubuntu on a low spec laptop recently and was quite impressed with performance. Unfortunately, it is frustrating trying to get some of my needed extras to work properly.
I was not a Ubuntu fan until 9.04. In fact, I was disgusted with the earlier releases. They finally got their act together and turned out stellar releases since. So good, that I have wiped my windows partitions.
My distro-hopping days are over. Ubuntu supplies easy access to drivers and software. Everything works!
Super OS is my buntu of choice.
12 • antiX (by dolphin_oracle on 2010-10-18 12:53:48 GMT from United States)
Just a shout out for antiX. Even though its newly listed in distrowatch, antiX has been around for years, its just operated as a subset of MEPIS. Its very stable and highly functional. New or old systems, its a very nice system, especially if you are a fan of icewm or fluxbox.
13 • anti (by Leroy on 2010-10-18 13:01:21 GMT from Serbia)
Not that it matters- to me ;), but good to see Antix added. The base edition (with FB) is a thing of beauty.
@ 8 fanboyism notwithstanding, and I don't want to be rude, but Peppermint is a nonsensical distro. You have the exact same thing in Lubuntu only with a better wallpaper. I really respect what those guys are doing at Mint with lightweight distros... but Peppermint? Do I really need youtube in my menu? Gdocs in a separate app? What's my browser for? And do I need Linux bashing Microsoft fans promoting Peppermint around the web? That last thing really put me off, I must say.
14 • Curiousity/nVidia (by pfb on 2010-10-18 13:35:34 GMT from United States)
With newer computers having multiple processors and lots of memory, why do we need video cards? I would think it is about time for some programming genius to dedicate one of those processors to video and eliminate the need for separate cards.
"If we had that, and solid state drives, imagine how quiet our computers would be", he mused, while sitting among more roaring fans than a 747 pilot.
15 • AntiX (by Tom on 2010-10-18 13:55:29 GMT from United Kingdom)
WoooHooo, fantastic to see the developers have finally admitted it is a separate distro from Mepis.
I have always enjoyed using this distro when i have had the time to hunt through and find it but it has been lurking away in the background and been almost inaccessible for far toooo long.
Very fast and very light on old systems. Thanks folks!
Regards from
Tom :)
16 • Opinions (by Eddie on 2010-10-18 14:01:21 GMT from United States)
@1: The last good LInuxMint KDE version was LinuxMint 5 KDE CE. IMO the rest haven't been any better then Kubuntu.
@4: I'm one person who thinks Canonical should not try to put every little DE on one piece of media. It would have to be a dvd, (large download), tends to cause confusion among new users, (wondering which one is the best), and bloat. I believe only Ubuntu should be the main focus at Canonical. Kubuntu, Xubuntu, Lubuntu, are "lesser 'Buntus" as you say but not inferior as I've had no major problems so far in testing and playing with them. Your results may vary and this is just my experience.
@6: The reason the devs of MeeGo didn't like the openSUSE name of it's MeeGo version is because it sucks. Smeeglo is really bad and undermines the MeeGo name. Surely the openSUSE people must be able to pick something better then that.
I'm not a KDE DE fan in any way shape or form. I do like some of their apps tho. The limited time I use any KDE distro isn't long but Kubuntu did work well during that time.
Good to see AntiX get some mention. Its a good distro.
17 • intel vs NVidia ??!!? (by Tom on 2010-10-18 14:03:34 GMT from United Kingdom)
Seriously?? Intel, Ati and NVidia seem to have been competing for last place for several years now surely? Ati are pretty excruciating while NVidia have at least provided adequate support in a controversial way. Intel seems to consistently prove itself as truely hideously broken.
I have a decent ati card right now but hope to sell it for a sub-standard NVidia just because the linux support is better and the end-result is better. I don't see the point of having better hardware that performs so much worse and am tired of trying to stumble through the guides to tweak it when they just don't work. By contrast NVidia seems to have about 3 drivers at least 1 of which usually works :)
Intel are surely a joke in Gpus but superb Cpus?
Regards from Tom :)
18 • Frugalware review? (by nep on 2010-10-18 14:05:02 GMT from United States)
Could we have a link to a new Frugalware review on its DistroWatch site? The newest is 0.7 (0.8 link is broken) and the distro seems quite interesting.
19 • Is Ubuntu 10.10 the big disappointment of 2010? (by Sorath Panzer on 2010-10-18 14:15:11 GMT from Portugal)
I must say that i am a few long term linux user and i follow Ubuntu since his rebirth, i never had experienced many issues with Ubuntu, and i considered the previous release (10.04) one of the best, but a wave of big deception came to me in the Maverick Meerkat edition, not because of the lack of innovation has as been said many times, but a lot of serious bugs, one of them related with the Nvidia driver and since the final release t'ill now has been not resolved.
Well i found myself back to the Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Edition, is stable, and don't give me any problems, it works, pure and simple.
I will wait t'ill April 2011 for the next release hoping for a better Canonical development.
20 • Kubuntu, Canonical and things.... (by davemc on 2010-10-18 15:05:27 GMT from United States)
Kubuntu 10.04 is awesome. With PPA's you can custom install/upgrade to your hearts content. I am running KDE4.5.1 on the LTS base and had zero issues thus far and all is very stable and quick, and that is with an NVIDIA card (latest NVIDIA binary again via PPA). The usual whines and blah blah about KDE4.x and its always the same wrong crap in any case that I think just gets repeated wrongly and by those with no real experience (admitted by the reviewer above). The major clue into this is the usual "Kubuntu does not make its own artwork" rant. If artwork and themes are the highlight of any review, then that is a sure sign that its a very solid release. KDE has been rock solid since the KDE4.4 days and KDE4.5.x is fantastic. All the U/K/Xubuntu 10.10 64 bit releases have lightning fast boot times, so they are continuing the work towards a 10 second boot and have nearly achieved it (also not mentioned in this fairly pathetic review). The Akregator issues mentioned I have never experienced on any KDE distro newer than KDE4.3 (KDE4.x-KDE4.3.x was crap, KDE4.4.x-current is stable and full featured with no major stability bugs). I will look into this though.
See here -
Canonical, Ltd. Finally On Record: Seeking Open Core
http://lxer.com/module/newswire/ext_link.php?rid=143163
This concerns me. I think the author here is a paranoid schizophrenic, but some of the points made do remotely make sense. In any case, if there is even a grain of truth in these wild rantings, then it needs to be looked into. Open Core is a trap set and baited by those who have no interest in FOSS and for the sole purpose of a bait and switch scheme to sucker the community into freely contributing code and then slamming the door shut in their faces when the code base becomes stable and mature. Its the kind of thing Oracle is now attempting to do with OpenJDK. Its wrong, but any FOSS Developer dumb enough to fall for this deserves what they get IMO. In any case, Canonical does need to turn a dime at some point, and if we as a community wish to see Open Source survive and thrive then were going to have to help them (and all FOSS companies) find an acceptable way to do that.
21 • RE:19 xorg / nvidia bug (by Eddie on 2010-10-18 15:10:18 GMT from United States)
The only serious bug that I know of in Meerkat is the nvidia bug. If I'm not mistaking this is a compatibility issue between xorg-1.9 and the nvidia-96 and nvidia-173 drivers. There is nothing that can be done with the nvidia drivers because of them being closed source so it looks like nvidia will have to fix the problem.
At this time the nvidia-174 / xorg-1.9 problem has been taken care of. Now we are waiting on the fixed nvidia-96 driver.
I'm sure that there are other bugs but this is the only one that has been serious for a lot of people.
22 • Kubuntu rocks my world (by Leo on 2010-10-18 15:30:07 GMT from United States)
I have a desktop, a laptop and 2 netbooks. They all run Kubuntu. It is not as polished as Ubuntu, for sure, but I like KDE a lot better than GNOME, so that makes up for me. Now, if I had to recommend a *buntu in the abstract, I would recommend the GNOME default version.
23 • Mint 10 (by Gustavo on 2010-10-18 15:38:47 GMT from Brazil)
New Mint 10 really looks professional:
http://www.linuxmint.com/rel_julia_whatsnew.php
That theme is what Cannonical should use. Neutral and light. Easy on eyes.
24 • Ubuntu problems (by imnotrich on 2010-10-18 15:52:08 GMT from Mexico)
Ubuntu 10.04=Windows ME
Ubuntu 10.10=Windows Vista
Disasters all. Sent me back to Debian every time.
Hopefully future Ubuntu releases will put functionality and stability ahead of moving buttons around and adding features like Gwibber that hardly anyone except a few pimply faced teenagers wants...I mean, how can you have a successful distro if it doesn't do video?
25 • Reply to 14 (by imnotrich on 2010-10-18 15:55:42 GMT from Mexico)
We need video cards so we can see what we're doing.
Unless of course you're using Ubuntu, which has serious compatibility issues with many modern Intel, ATI and Nvidia cards. If you can't see the screen, what's the point?
Ubuntu is the first distro specifically for psychics. You're supposed to read the computer's mind to know what's on the invisible screen.
26 • @13 (by Anonymous on 2010-10-18 16:02:16 GMT from United States)
Hey Leroy, the only connection between Linux Mint and Peppermint is the fact that the developers of Peppermint used lots of bits from Mint and it's parent distro Ubuntu. I suppose that that sort of name confusion is what this whole meego smeegol fight is about. I must say smeegol is a better name than the proposed replacement "dark rider", at least it's neutral to non nerds that don't know any lord of the rings characters, but dark rider sounds like a name for a death metal band not an OS. Surly they can do better.
27 • Linux (by The Brat_Patrol on 2010-10-18 16:57:30 GMT from United States)
Comment deleted (no content).
28 • Scientific Linux (by Open Source Software Torrents on 2010-10-18 17:10:22 GMT from United Kingdom)
I noticed that there are new isos up on the scientificlinux.org ftp sites. Is there likely to be a new release of this soon as I don't see it listed in the upcoming releases. Their latest release is 5.5 but there is a folder on the ftp called "6rolling". http://ftp.scientificlinux.org/linux/scientific/6rolling/
29 • RE:24,25 I Wonder Why. (by Eddie on 2010-10-18 17:12:32 GMT from United States)
By your post I can understand why.
30 • Linux browser are faster than windows (by funclub on 2010-10-18 17:23:13 GMT from India)
Fastest Browser Test 2010 Today I am going to share my personal experience with modern fast browser and its side effects. I am not going to provide you any bench mark because its my personal experience it might differ from your experience . From all the big Tech. website you will get the bench mark Score of various......
read complete review here
http://www.cellguru.co.cc/2010/10/side-effects-of-fastest-browser.html
31 • Kubuntu 10.10 the best at least for me. (by MacLone on 2010-10-18 17:36:33 GMT from Mexico)
Earlier Kubuntus were really a headache for me but for some strange reason this version (10.10) is working flawlessly even with my nvidia 9600GT and latest drivers. I don't use Akregator so i could not comment.
The new KpackageKit is awesome compared to the earlier versions, it is rock solid and do everything without telling me to use Synaptics for some harder stuff.
32 • One more for AntiX (by Joe Ferrare on 2010-10-18 17:54:21 GMT from United States)
I've been recommending AntiX to people looking for a lightweight distro for the last couple of years and have snuck it on a few systems. Light, fast, and it uses Fluxbox an Rox-Filer, but has the Mepis utilities. Quite a rare combination and a very nice distro.
33 • AntiX (by Saleem Khan on 2010-10-18 18:50:54 GMT from Pakistan)
Antix is not only good as a a lightweight distribution but can also be used as a base to install debian testing/sid with any DE.you like. I am using antiX with KDE4 and installed it with
antiX-core-686-b1.iso
( http://www.mepisimo.com/antix/Testing/ ).
This thread
http://www.mepislovers.org/showthread.php?t=27828
has lot of info for those who are interested to use antiX as a base to install a rolling release debian based system with remastersys fully working on it.
AntiX+ext3+grub-legacy+liquorix-kernel+Remastersys+debian testing makes it a great combination .
Regards,
34 • Could you spell out what the Kubuntu+NVIDIA problem is? (by eco2geek on 2010-10-18 19:20:32 GMT from United States)
Or post a link? Curious minds want to know.
(For me, KDE doesn't seem to display its effects as fast or fluidly as GNOME does, but I'm using KDE's built-in effects rather than compiz-fusion. And I've never had a problem with the Oxygen windec, other than there's prettier ones out there.)
Yeah, Kubuntu 10.10's kind of an aesthetic blank slate. So was 10.04. Fortunately, the controls for wallpaper, windows decorations, desktop themes, and plasma widgets now all come with buttons that bring up dialog boxes linking to kde-look.org, so you can download your own. Linux Mint definitely does a better job in this regard.
35 • Unbreakable Linux (by Anonymous on 2010-10-18 20:25:51 GMT from United States)
I was a little leery at first, but after installing Unbreakable Linux on a spare machine, I have to admit I was impressed. It was simple, clean, and very little needed extra fiddling. Goodbye Canonical, hello Oracle!
36 • #28 Scientific Linux, #35 Unreakable Linux (by Caitlyn Martin on 2010-10-18 21:08:32 GMT from United States)
#28: Scientific Linux is a binary recompile of Red Hat Enterprise Linux with the Red Hat branding removed and their own added. This is essentially the same as CentOS. SL also adds a small number of additional packages. (See: https://www.scientificlinux.org/distributions/5x/features/added ) Their versions track Red Hat's. There are, in fact, two new RHEL versions in the pipeline: 5.6 and 6.0.
#35 Oracle Enterprise Linux is also a binary recompile of RHEL, just like CentOS and Scientific Linux. The Oracle Unbreakable kernel is tuned for performance with Oracle's commercial database products. Aside from kernel tuning, logos and some claimed bug fixes there should be no real difference from RHEL. If you don't use other Oracle products I don't believe there is any advantage to this distro over either CentOS or Scientific Linux and some may find the Oracle license a bit much to swallow.
37 • Mr. Hanky on Fusion Linux? (by Shawn on 2010-10-18 21:17:05 GMT from United States)
I was looking at the screenshot of Fusion Linux and saw the "Install to HD icon" looks like it has Mr. Hanky on it waving. Definitely not a good impression to give if you're going to commit physical hardware to an OS in my opinion!
Since someone mentioned Oracle, my 2 cents says that I don't know if I trust them or their motives. They killed off a good community distro in Open Solaris and were mum on the issue ever since they came into the market looking to be Red Hat's competitor in Linux. Not sure if I'm not giving them a fair chance or not, but they're not too open or in the news other than when it comes to profits or looking to sell something. To me, they're simply Orakill.
Good review on Kubuntu as well. I don't mind KDE, but I'm definitely a Gnome/LXDE/Enlightenment fan. It is too bad Kubuntu seems to be the black sheep of the family because they've been trying to create something as good as Ubuntu and share the name regarding quality and having a solid user base. I still think it's a toss up between Mandriva and openSUSE as far as the best KDE distro. Chakra is pretty solid too.
38 • @14 (by Adam Williamson on 2010-10-18 22:14:07 GMT from Canada)
Well, that's sort of happening in the long term - partly in reverse: NVIDIA is increasingly promoting the use of its cards for general-purpose processing. But in the short term and in detail, your suggestion doesn't entirely work. High-end dedicated graphics cards still do 3D graphics stuff considerably faster than current Intel/AMD CPUs could thanks to their focus on graphics work. If you don't need high-end graphics performance, you can buy any number of motherboards with built-in graphics which will do basic 2D and compositing stuff fine, and don't have much if any system noise / power consumption implications. If you need high-end graphics performance you're going to have to live with the noise.
There is the llvmpipe project for new-generation OpenGL support via the system CPU(s) - Phoronix covers it regularly, last article was http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=mesa_llvmpipe_28&num=1 - which gives some considerable improvement over the old software GL code, but it's still nowhere near the performance of a dedicated card.
39 • Kubuntu 10.10 (by Brandonj Sniadajewski on 2010-10-18 23:12:32 GMT from United States)
The 10.10 upgrade went smoothly and is running great. Like 34, I haven't had the the problems that others are having with Nvidia cards and Oxygen decorations.
40 • Integrated GPUs vs discrete graphics (by Ralph on 2010-10-19 00:23:09 GMT from Canada)
@ 38, 14 - I had the impression that 14 was talking more about integrating the GPU with the CPU die rather than the being a loner on the motherboard, along the lines of Intel's Sandy Bridge. In that case the graphics performance is getting near the performance of a dedicated card. Here are some benchmarks from Anandtech:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/3871/the-sandy-bridge-preview-three-wins-in-a-row/7
41 • Kubuntu (by Landor on 2010-10-19 01:02:48 GMT from Canada)
I wasn't a big fan of the later releases of Kubuntu, but I must say, I really liked Kubuntu's overall feel for their 7.04 release with KDE 3.5. It worked extremely well while I used it and my son enjoyed it as well. I personally believe that it's KDE4 that has changed a lot in regard to any distribution offering up KDE now. Not just Kubuntu.
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
42 • kde and mint10 (by Josh on 2010-10-19 01:53:17 GMT from United States)
Good review of Kubuntu. They do ok, but they could have decorated a bit, maybe even added the kubuntu logo on the kickoff menu. Personally, I like what fedora and opensuse have done with kde. I just think it looks more integrated into the theme of the distro and not something they just threw on top of what they already had.
As for decorations, I really do like what mint 10 is showing for the next version.
KDE 4.x has come a long way so far. I guess problems are to be expected when you redesign things. But, it seems to be for the better. I'm using Gnome at the moment, but from what I'm seeing coming from KDE, I might just switch and see how things go. I'm not looking forward to Gnome 3 in its current state.
43 • antiX: lightweight, superior repository, user-friendly (by jhsu on from United States)
I'm glad that antiX Linux is now listed as an official distro here on Distrowatch. I am a satisfied user and consider this to be the gold standard.
If you like Puppy Linux, you'll like antiX Linux even better.
Only antiX Linux offers ALL of these three attributes:
1. Lightweight: I can vouch that antiX Linux runs well on old computers, including my IBM NetVista with only 256 MB of RAM and a 1 GHz processor and even on my Dell desktop with only 384 MB of RAM and a 467 MHz processor. Yes, antiX Linux works on computers from the Windows 98 era.
2. Superior repository: antiX Linux uses the Debian repository, which has over 30,000 packages.
3. User-friendly: If you want the challenge of Debian, Gentoo, Slackware, or Arch, this isn't the distro for you. antiX Linux comes equipped with applications for word processing, spreadsheets, web browsing, email, and more.
No other distro offers this combination of attributes. Ubuntu is user-friendly and has a superior repository, but you need at least 512 MB of RAM. Puppy Linux is lightweight and user-friendly, but it has a weak repository. Debian has a superior repository and can be made lightweight, but it is not user-friendly, because there is so much tweaking you have to do to make it fully functional.
I have tips on getting started in antiX Linux on my web site at http://www.jasonhsu.com/linux-antix.html.
44 • Fusion Linux (by Anonymous on 2010-10-19 05:05:13 GMT from Canada)
Is that Mintmenu they are using? Good choice! I will check it out some time. But first things first. Limux Mint 10. Burning it slow now! :-)
45 • Xfce (by Duh on 2010-10-19 07:02:25 GMT from United States)
Xfce is the one true DE. I just can't take any other DE seriously, considering all the problems KDE and Gnome cause with their bugs and their obsession with integrating everything into fewer apps instead of dividing the apps they have into smaller, more robust apps that require less fuss.
46 • @43 .'only Antix' (by Denizen on 2010-10-19 10:13:36 GMT from Norway)
Not quite - see CrunchBang :)
47 • Addendum.. (by Denizen on 2010-10-19 10:37:10 GMT from Norway)
BTW, I meant the recent Crunchbang 'Statler' (Debian base) - not the previous 'buntu based releases.
Sure , statler is currently in 2nd 'alpha' but i have to say that i have _never_ used anything that is so light, yet so functional, user friendly and still * 'conventional'* under the hood.
And it is rock solid ! - alpha ? - you would never know it . ..
48 • 38 & 40 (by pfb on 2010-10-19 12:39:17 GMT from United States)
Thanks for the input! Sandy bridge looks like the answer, as long as I do not need the super graphics. I will have to look for that before I buy my next computer. But for now, I am still waiting for SSDs to become affordable.
49 • ... (by Leroy on 2010-10-19 13:46:15 GMT from Serbia)
@26 I probably didn't express myself well.. writing in a foreign language and all that. I do know that Peppermint is based on Lubuntu, not Mint, but the guys who make it also work on a number of Mint spins, and their work over at Mint, I respect very much. Peppermint, not so much.
@47 For people who generally prefer Debian, and then like Fluxbox I'd say antiX (base edition) is the distro. For Debianites who like standalone Openbox, Crunchbang is great and other than its Arch-based clone Archbang the only serious standalone OB anywhere. But I wonder what the future of the project is, that is, if it has any.
Also I had to smile yesterday when I saw Mint Gnome RC new look... I bet it's making Ubuntu *green* with envy :) Imagine having Ubuntu as polished as possible, little useful tweaks all over the place, with pretty much everything working ootb, without all the annoying commercial stuff, and now, better looking too. Ouch.
50 • @13 • @49 (by Leroy (by meanpt on 2010-10-19 15:21:56 GMT from Portugal)
:) ... I'm only a fanboy of lightness and after testing exaustively I found the peppermint lxde respins, the so called "one"(s), do perform better than ubuntu lxde or even the min lxde 9 onwards, once you start to sqeeze their resources. The cloudy stuff don't bother me at all, it even have became handy in some situations and I can install anything I need that is not provided by default. I'm almost sure that, for the moment, you'll not find a lighter 10.04.x buntu. Unless you're keeping a secret ...:)
51 • #50: Another one coming (by Caitlyn Martin on 2010-10-19 16:16:16 GMT from United States)
The next release of Debris Linux will be based on 10.04.x. (See: http://debrislinux.org/index.php?topic=502.0 ) No word on when that may be out yet but I did ask again today :) Debris is one of the lightest Ubuntu variants and certainly the smallest to offer a fully functional GNOME desktop as one of it's two options. I've been impressed by Debris Linux and I would very much like to see what a Lucid based release might be like.
52 • Mint 10, Debris Linux (by fernbap on 2010-10-19 18:04:43 GMT from Portugal)
Glad to know Debris is not dead. It would certainly be my light desktop distro of choice, if the available Debris was not so outdated and impossible to update.
Trying Mint 10. Mint went a long way to polish its desktop, the result is simply gorgeous.
No issue at all so far in my hardware (i use an ATI card).
All mint tools continue to be improved, and Mint is one of the very few distros where every new release is better than the previous one.
53 • RE:50 Good One (by Eddie on 2010-10-19 18:27:26 GMT from United States)
"I bet it's making Ubuntu *green* with envy :) "
At least Mint is starting to get away from the green somewhat. It got to where it was just butt ugly. The metal look is really good and even tho I still don't prefer the Mint Menu it's pretty sharp. I do like the overall theme a lot. Even tho it's a very nice and polished distro it still is not enough to make me change from Ubuntu. I consider Ubuntu to be very polished and I've been using it since 5.04. I used KDE up until then. If I was going to choose another distro that is Gnome based I believe it would be Mint. I also like the fact that Mint has no intentions of changing their base from Ubuntu. They have a good relationship and that's the way it should be.
54 • RE:52, I Agree (by e on 2010-10-19 18:31:43 GMT from United States)
This is one of the best releases of a Mint I've seen in a while. I really do appreciate that this release is so different then Mint 9. It's a great improvement over past versions. Good job Mint.
55 • Linux Mint - KDE (by Jim on 2010-10-19 18:58:50 GMT from United States)
Linux Mint has announced the first beta of Mint 10, but only of GNOME.
What happened to their promise of bringing KDE into the fold as an official release?
56 • Debris and Wolvix (by Neal on 2010-10-19 19:14:05 GMT from United States)
Would be awesome to see some updates to two classic Linux distros. Debris on Openbox standalone is a solid performer on older hardware and Wolvix is a great classic XFCE DE that is tough to beat if you prefer a bug free DE.
Only problem is....where are they now?
57 • @50 (by Leroy on 2010-10-19 19:24:48 GMT from Serbia)
"I'm only a fanboy of lightness..."
Sorry about that bit in my initial comment, that was a stupid thing I wrote. Rude and uncalled for.
What about Mint Fluxbox- no full DE, true, but it's pretty complete nonetheless..
@53
Mint mentions Ubuntu in the release notes as often as Ubuntu mentions Linux that's to say, not a lot. Ubuntu is listed as an "upstream component", along with the kernel, Gnome, X, etc.
58 • #56: Where are they now? (by Caitlyn Martin on 2010-10-19 19:38:41 GMT from United States)
@Neal: Wolvix has not had a final release since 1.1.0 and their website is down more than up. I don't know if that project is viable at all.
I wouldn't compare Debris Linux with Wolvix. Yes, it has been almost a year since 2.0 was released. However, the 8.04 upstream base is supported until April, 2011 and if you read the thread I linked earlier renegat3 sees that as the deadline for a new release. The forum and the developer are active.
Since Debris tracks LTS and only that belatedly it will never be a cutting edge distro. It falls into the category of conservative distros that release infrequently but do an outstanding job when they do release. Only if April comes along and there is still no new release your lumping Debris together with Wolvix would be fair comment.
59 • antiX (by Joe on 2010-10-20 00:14:15 GMT from United States)
Excellent distro - glad to see it is now being tracked here.
I recently installed the latest version of antiX on my very old Compaq laptop (model 770 - Pentium 233, 192 MB ram) and it works very well. It even recognized my linksys pcmcia wireless card w/o any tinkering on my part (after failing to recognize a similar netgear card notwithstanding much frustration). Updates work well etc.
I've always had good luck with MEPIS, especially when debian (as opposed to Ubuntu) based. antiX is derived from MEPIS, and seems to do well what it is designed to do: work on older, low power computers.
60 • @51 • #50: Another one coming (by Caitlyn Martin (by meanpt on 2010-10-20 08:45:46 GMT from Portugal)
Caitlyn, thanks for the hint. As everything else in life, gravity also made its inroads on ubuntu, which has turned heavier from release to release. I'll test the Debris 2.0 and for sure I'll keep it in a virtual machine, as I already do with some older releases, namely with the "plain" 8.04 and the "colinuxed" portable version, the later working pretty well within windows XP. Lets see how the Debris developer introduces some anti-gravity in the buntu moon, when releasing its next creation :).
61 • 57 • @50 (by Leroy (by meanpt on 2010-10-20 08:56:58 GMT from Portugal)
:) ... hey, Leroy, don't worry and no need for apologizing, it was not an offense in my culture. but more the sort of a teaser. And despite finding the Mint Openbox 8 to be lighter on ram, it worked slower than the lxde. But I'll try the openbox 9 and see what's going on. Thanks for remembering. :)
62 • 1% linux usage? (by Tom on 2010-10-20 10:56:04 GMT from United Kingdom)
HI :)
Late last week someone gave this link to help find stats about % of linux usage
http://www.dudalibre.com/gnulinuxcounter
Obviously the often quoted 1% is very old now and was generated by a MicroSquish sponsored study anyway so it's accuracy even back when it first appeared is somewhat dubious.
Is there a good place to find recent % of linux usage? Preferably a neutral report or at least slightly more neutral than FSF or MicroSquish.com ?
Regards from Tom :)
63 • @62 (by Tim on 2010-10-20 13:45:40 GMT from Germany)
This article by Caitlyn Martin
http://broadcast.oreilly.com/2010/09/debunking-the-1-myth.html
and links therein like
http://www.osnews.com/story/21035/Ballmer_Linux_Bigger_Competitor_than_Apple
are a nice place to start your research.
According to a Microsoft internal analysis (see the second link) the Linux desktop marketshare is more than 1%, it seems to be around 4 to 5%, on par with MacOSX.
64 • @ 63 Tim (by Tom on 2010-10-20 16:18:07 GMT from United Kingdom)
Thanks :) Looks good. About 4% feels about right considering i kep bumping into people that use it or have tried it too briefly
65 • antix (by subg on 2010-10-20 18:33:28 GMT from United States)
Antix is a great non-gnome/kde distro, well thought out and maintained. It has worked well on old equipment - flawlessly for a couple of years on an old PIII-733 with 192mb of ram. It really needs 512mb now to comfortably run Opera or Firefox and avoid thrashing about with the hard drive swap space. Some great tools are provided, although a few things take some tinkering, such as changing font sizes (icewm).
Good to see antix tracked under its own name - well deserved.
66 • Bang (by Neal on 2010-10-21 14:31:41 GMT from United States)
All this talk about Archbang and Crunchbang....how about a Slackbang?? Just keep the slackware installer simple like Absolute or Zenwalk so normal people can use it.
Slackbang........that sounds like a killer project.
67 • LinuxMint 10 (by Jon Thomsen on 2010-10-21 17:00:23 GMT from United States)
Well, the anti Ubuntu and its derivatives people are going to be very, very unhappy.
Or .............. perhaps just more unhappy than usual.
LinuxMint 10rc is "da bomb."
Now, it just remains to be seen how good Mint Debian will become and just how much louder the whiners will whine.
68 • @40 (by Adam Williamson on 2010-10-21 19:29:42 GMT from Canada)
"@ 38, 14 - I had the impression that 14 was talking more about integrating the GPU with the CPU die rather than the being a loner on the motherboard, along the lines of Intel's Sandy Bridge."
I know that. Sandy Bridge is what I was talking about when I said "Well, that's sort of happening in the long term". When I said "partly in reverse" I was referring to NVIDIA's effort to do the same thing from the other end, by making its GPUs capable of general-purpose computation.
I think you're rather overselling Sandy Bridge's current capabilities, though. From the article you linked: "Is it enough to kill all discrete graphics? No. But it's good enough to really threaten the entry level discrete market."
There's a gigantic difference between the performance levels of an entry-level discrete card and those of a high-end discrete card, or even a mid-range discrete card. So yeah, Sandy Bridge is getting near the performance of 'a' discrete card, but not by any means close to the maximum or even average capabilities of *current* gen discrete cards (and both ATI and NVIDIA have new generations due soon, IIRC).
69 • 1% linux usage (by forlin on 2010-10-22 14:15:22 GMT from Portugal)
Recent reports in the net stated that Linux’s Desktop is Dead. This is a recurring lie promoted and spread by M$, across the net and the news, at regular time intervals.
There's simply no way to confirm linux usage because Linux distributions are not subject to registration.
The true fact is that Microsoft is highly concerned about Linux superiority among super computers, servers, embedded and mobile devices, as well as its current progress and expansion in the IT industry.
Linux is not more spread in the desktop, yet, due to MS's lock-in practices, that keep users all over the world tied to their overpriced and under quality products.
M$ use their deep pockets to promote massive marketing campaigns, to buy journalists, lobbying organizations, politics and governments, and to buy embrace and engage competitors to extinguish and exterminate them.
The 1% Linux usage is a convenient hoax invented by M$, to avoid massive questions by the public and by the authorities, about the reason why every shop, at every place in the world, only sell computers with Windows inside it, while there are other OSs who have a similar performance and at certain instances can even do a better job.
M$ knows that going much under 90% in the desktop market, may mean the beginning of the end as to the kind of company they are known to be today.
70 • ... what's in a name? (by meanpt on 2010-10-22 15:33:46 GMT from Portugal)
Of a total of 14 "latest reviews" board in the DW starting page, 13 are related to Ubuntu and/oir to their official and semi-official distros ...
71 • RE: Reviews (by Eddie on 2010-10-22 17:07:19 GMT from United States)
That's one reason that I don't really put much effort into reading reviews. Sometimes they can be helpful but more often than not they only give a person's opinion and that is usually bias.The only way a person can tell the performance of a certain distro or application is to try it themselves. I do read the reviews that are in DistroWatch Weekly and I read some hardware reviews also. There are a few good reviewers but lots of times you will find just one page on a blog. That's when you say, "Ill find out for myself." I believe most people here are smart enough for that.
72 • #70/71: Reviews (by Caitlyn Martin on 2010-10-22 18:08:03 GMT from United States)
You two have hit on a good point. I write the style of reviews I do: after actual in-depth usage, in detail, pointing out the good and the bad, because too many so-called reviews have very little information. I try and give a picture of what someone will find if they try the distro I am reviewing. I don't always succeed but that is the goal. It's easier to meet the goal now that I am not writing reviews week in and week out.
73 • Stellarium (by Herr Puyol on 2010-10-22 18:10:04 GMT from United Kingdom)
Hi,
Can I suggest Stellarium for the next DistroWatch donation?
It's a brillant software released under GNU GPL used by amateur as well as professional astronomers, to browse the night sky. Simply amazing. Highly recommended, even if you're just curious about the stars above your head and have no idea what they are. Even better, you'll have fun discovering!
Ubuntu: $ sudo apt-get install stellarium
Fedora: $ sudo yum install stellarium
http://www.stellarium.org/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stellarium_(computer_program)
74 • 72 • #70/71: Reviews (by Caitlyn Martin (by meanpt on 2010-10-23 12:16:23 GMT from Portugal)
:) ... you and Jesse do wright nice reviews ... after reading some of the listed reviews about the "x-buntus, they're a bit crappy ... lots of images to fill the space where knowledge lacks, trying to generate traffic and direct visitors to the advertisement's jungle ...
75 • Reviews (by Jesse on 2010-10-23 13:30:09 GMT from Canada)
@74:
Thank you. One of the reason I started writing reviews was I kept finding these blog posts which would essentially be a walk-through of the installer with a lot of screen shots, but no real information on the workings of the system. I like to think the reviews we have here are more informative.
76 • @30 (by Blue Knight on 2010-10-23 20:10:02 GMT from France)
> "Linux browser are faster than windows"
This is wrong! E.g. Firefox in Windows is *always* faster than in Linux...
77 • RE: 14-40-48-68 76 (by Landor on 2010-10-23 23:45:20 GMT from Canada)
#14-40-48-68
Although for 14 alone, and someone mentioning it last week as well I believe, SSDs are truly amazing. I don't understand the logic of not getting one at present either. I don't have one, but fully intend to purchase one very soon. They've come down in price a lot and in comparison to mass storage in mechanical drives, the cost will not justify the comparison in storage. Right now 60 gb SSDs are the price of what 30 gb SSDs were, and less.
But to the graphics from Intel and Sandy Bridge. I don't see Sandy Bridge as a good thing. A lot of people had pinned their hopes on Intel producing a discrete card which would definitely be a boon for the open source community. I don't know if we can honestly have that hope anymore, due to the fact that they're building towards this kind of solution. If I'm right, it's a shame in my opinion.
#76
I agree completely. about Firefox in Linux. I actually had a conversation about this not long ago in e-mail with someone in our community. I am a huge supporter of Firefox and I wish it wasn't the case.
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
78 • RE: 77 Correction (by Landor on 2010-10-24 00:01:04 GMT from Canada)
I meant to say that the cost for an SSD wouldn't be justified in comparison to mechanical drives for a long time, so shouldn't be a factor in the reasoning of not purchasing one.
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
79 • re#77 (by hab on 2010-10-24 00:16:21 GMT from Canada)
I'm kind of not so much in a hurry about these kinds of drives.
They don't have anywhere near the track record that conventional hard drives do. Up to three terabytes currently i might note, thanks to WD's announcement this week.
I personally have some old drives that are twelve years old or older. Quite ancient but still working! Yes they may go south any time but still, a dozen years and still functioning! And i suspect. working older drives than mine are not all that rare. O, BTW nothing valuable or irreplaceable on 'em!
SSDs are going to have to go a ways i think before they will impress me enough to make me want to buy one. Even related tech like flash drives are not anywhere near as reliable as a conventional drive.
I'm gonna wait a while before i get all hot and wet enough to want one!
cheers
80 • #77, 79 SSDs (by Caitlyn Martin on 2010-10-24 02:14:49 GMT from United States)
hab wrote: SSDs are going to have to go a ways i think before they will impress me enough to make me want to buy one. Even related tech like flash drives are not anywhere near as reliable as a conventional drive.
On what do you base your statement regarding reliability? Most of the recent studies I have read indicate that SSDs should have at least the lifespan of conventional drives or perhaps much longer lifespans. I've been using an SSD in my netbook for a year now. I've had no problems. It's fast and it is very quiet.
Yes, conventional hard drives have much higher capacities available than SSDs so if you need lots and lots of storage they are probably still the better answer. That is the only advantage I see in a conventional hard drive at this point.
81 • RE: 79 - 80 (by Landor on 2010-10-24 03:05:16 GMT from Canada)
I agree with you Hab, on the amazing lifespan of mechanical drives, or some of them anyway. I know full well just how amazing it can be, even in regard to old MFM and RLL drives that still exist. :)
Think about some of the advantages. CM spoke of speed, that's a given for sure, but just to touch on that for a moment, the higher end SSDs now are the actual real upgrade other than changing your cpu (which in many cases means a motherboard as well) to give you an extreme performance boost, instead of how people used to believe RAM did.
Not only that, but there's the energy consumption issue advantage over a platter. For any mobile computer this is a huge positive. I've read that some don't really consider it an advantage, but I'm guessing someone who uses their computer for work and has the extra power to send out that critical e-mail to a client, where the previous hard drive would have expended the battery by that time, would argue that the person saying it's basically non-measurable is wrong.
Again though, back to speed and touching on power consumption. Most laptops and netbooks come with a 5400 rpm drive, mainly to save power, cost too of course, but power is a huge factor. If an SSD can outperform even the fastest mechanical drives, what kind of performance is a laptop going to have?
There's one other issue that really makes them better in my opinion than a conventional drive, almost no heat. I know you're aware of this, but it's worth stating, heat is a bane to electronic components, anything that doesn't produce heat, or next to nothing at least, is definitely a huge advantage. :)
Keep your stick on the ice...
Landor
82 • 81 • RE: 79 - 80 (by Landor (by manpt on 2010-10-24 11:36:56 GMT from Portugal)
"almost no heat" ... friendly Landor, my HP tx amd turion x2 64 burned completely tree times in 2 years, while the hd managed to survive. Maybe the current main source of heat isn't the disk but the processor and your SSD may not help you on that.
83 • re#80 SSD (un?)reliability (by hab on 2010-10-24 13:24:55 GMT from Canada)
Get back to me on the state of that SSD in ten years time. I'm figuring it will last no where near that long!
I've had half a dozen or so flash drives, various recognizable brand names, crater on me in the last year or two or three. These drives typically worked for about three years after purchase, had not been in constant or severe use and .......died! Undramatic-ally but thoroughly dead. Not overly impressed yet with SSD tech.
But as always, to each their own.
cheers
84 • #81, #82, #83: SSDs continued (by Caitlyn Martin on 2010-10-24 16:42:59 GMT from United States)
#83: I'm not at all sure that USB sticks, SD cards and other Flash RAM devices are built to the same standards as internal SSD drives meant to replace conventional hard drives. I am quite certain that SSDs made just a few years ago aren't nearly as good as where the technology is today.
hab, my very first Lexar USB stick is more than six years old and still works fine. It got very, very heavy use at one time. Back then my consulting work involved heavy travel. It's small by today's standards (512MB) which is the main reason it gets relatively little use now. That is just as valid as yours that failed after three years. They are all single data points and they don't represent nearly enough data from which to draw any conclusions.
While my netbook may still work 10 years from now I seriously doubt it would be very useful. How many of us make heavy use of 10 year old tech today?
#81: Without turning this into a mutual admiration society I must say all of Landor's points are good ones. You don't have to be a business user to be frustrated when your battery dies in the middle of a flight or when you are out and about. Sure, I can carry an extra netbook battery or buy and use HP's high capacity battery in my netbook. Those solutions add weight and volume and at least partly defeat the purpose of having a very small, very light device.
#82: meanpt, of course you are right that a drive is not the only source of heat and maybe not even the primary source of heat in some systems. In laptops, netbooks and tablets that tend to use low power consumption, low heat CPUs, though, the drive is significant. Anything that reduces both power consumption and heat generated is a plus.
Have I changed my desktop hard drive to an SSD? No, not yet. Am I considering it? Yes!
85 • re#84 USB flash drive vs sata (by hab on 2010-10-24 17:33:01 GMT from Canada)
@Caitlyn
Just did a quick read on wikipedia here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB_flash_drive and here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solid-state_drive not that wikipedia is authoritative but it is a quick and ready mostly accurate reference.
It appears that the difference's are more in the interface, that is, usb vs sata, than any thing else. I think that enough similarity exists that a certain amount of extrapolation is allowed.
Not suggesting that that you would be using your laptop ten years from now, but it is not unreasonable to yank a ten year old drive and put it to different use!
cheers
86 • About SSD. (by Blue Knight on 2010-10-24 17:57:35 GMT from France)
SSD are much too expensive, at least for now... I have better to do with my money and my computer has no real need for this kind of thing...
87 • 84 • #81, #82, #83: SSDs continued (by Caitlyn Martin (by meanpt on 2010-10-24 20:20:36 GMT from Portugal)
... :) ... "How many of us make heavy use of 10 year old tech today?" ... well, I'm currently posting "heavily" from a Dell latitude d 400 ... I believe this model has been around in my hands for about 8 years ... and you know why I use it? ... because it's the only one that survived :)
88 • Re: 84 (by jake on 2010-10-24 20:51:55 GMT from United States)
Ten year old tech? Well, this laptop's 7 years old, it's my primary machine, and perfectly serviceable. I see no need to replace it any time soon. (HP Pavilion, zv5000 upgraded to 2 gigs of RAM soon after I purchased it [yes you can, the second memory slot is under the keyboard] It runs Slackware 13.1 perfectly well.). My one remaining Windows machine is a Win2K box that has been in use since 1999 (almost always air-gapped these last 6 or 7 years).
But that's nothing ... My "friends & family" ftp, gopher, email, usenet & new-fangled HTTP server is a Sun 3/470 "Pegasus" ... She is nearly 23 years old, and has out-lived three dead-screen laptops that I had in place as fall-back machines. Before you ask, she's behind a BSD-based stateful firewall. She has been running non-stop for over 20 years at her current location, under Bryant Street in Palo Alto, and may be the world's oldest "colo" machine. Why? Because it's an amusing hobby :-)
89 • @86 (by Josh on 2010-10-25 04:23:08 GMT from United States)
Blue Knight, I agree with you. Sure a brand new SSD might give me a nice little performance boost, and definitely less heat, but is it really worth the money. I looked it up on newegg to see the cost of replacing my current 200GB hard drive. Its $500 USD. That was the cheapest one I could find.
I then compared how many mechanical drives of similar size I could buy with the cost of 1 ssd drive. I'd say around 5 or 6. Is it really worth the price for the performance, I think not right now.
90 • #89 SSD+harddrive (by zygmunt on 2010-10-25 08:23:39 GMT from United Kingdom)
Of course one could always use both SSD and hard drive in a similar manner to a paging system. Then one would get the increased performance without too much outlay until such time as SSD prices fall away and mechanics become extinct.
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