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Reader Comments • Jump to last comment |
1 • Signal Private Messenger (by Elcaset on 2017-09-04 00:13:29 GMT from United States)
Comment deleted (off-topic).
2 • poll (by DaveW on 2017-09-04 00:29:14 GMT from United States)
My vote was that the package manager is not important. That is true in that it does not affect my choice for a distro. However, if it is not easy to use or does not work properly, then it becomes very important.
3 • Package manager (by Voncloft on 2017-09-04 01:00:36 GMT from United States)
The package manager is important to me: not the name or its method - but I have tried Linux From Scratch before and I flat out having to compile EVERYTHING! for every update of every package for every new feature - it is exhausting, I much prefer it be automated.
Rarely (while running Gentoo) will I compile from source manually.
4 • Is the package manager important???? Really! (by tom joad on 2017-09-04 01:22:08 GMT from Panama)
Holy Moly!!!
YES, the package manager is important. For me that is a make or break with an OS. The package manager can make or break an experience with a distro. Put another way, if one can not keep the system up to date in an efficient, effective way the system will struggle and the user will cut his losses and move on.
There is nothing worse than some cutesy, home brewed, ultra clever, esoteric and likely poorly documented package manager.
For me that is a resounding NO Thanks.
5 • Is the package manager important? (by JDNSW on 2017-09-04 01:32:09 GMT from Australia)
I answered "somewhat important". The reason for this is that explanatory text refers to the "default package manage". I use Mint KDE mostly (also Bodhi) and while I think the package manager is important, it is not necessarily the default one I use - I find synaptic much easier to use than Mint's package manager!
6 • package manager (by bhrich902 on 2017-09-04 01:36:01 GMT from United States)
I think the question should of focused on graphical package manager. I personally could care less if the end of the package is a .rpm, .deb etc.... All the command line tools will, at the very least, install/remove, update and resolve dependencies.
However, a graphical package manager that does those basic things along with a graphical update manager is very important to me when choosing a distro to play with.
7 • Package manager (by OhioJoe on 2017-09-04 01:39:58 GMT from United States)
I am not a command line kind of guy, so I prefer a graphical package manager. Synaptic is fine. Void had OctoXBPS, but I am not sure it is still available.
8 • What is inside the package? (by Fired Manager on 2017-09-04 01:46:14 GMT from Canada)
Does anyone ever care to open a package for a inside look whats in there, with a manager already fired?
9 • package manager (by kleshas on 2017-09-04 01:49:37 GMT from Canada)
I only use arch for daily use. For cert. studying, I have other OS's and the package manager is irrelevant.
10 • Package manager (by Bobbie Sellers on 2017-09-04 01:50:42 GMT from United States)
Of course the package manager is important when running a rolling release as I do, PCLinuxOS64. There about half a dozen packages I add to any release in order to have my tools handy. In addition in PCLinux we have lately frequent kernel updates which the excellent package manager Synaptic lets me install to try out without hassle. Presently have 4.12.10 working like a charm on both the community pclinuxOS64 kde and Tde(Trinity Desktop Environmen) as well as here on the HP Pavilion with the KDE Plasma 5 version. .
11 • Package manager importance (by Doug M on 2017-09-04 02:05:13 GMT from United States)
I voted somewhat important as I didn't feel the other 2 options fit. Which Package manager is unimportant, as long as it does the job that it is supposed to do. If it can't do the job, that distro gets wiped quickly as I am not enough of a Linux guru to keep a system up to date without a package manager that resolves dependencies.
12 • peeking into packages (by tim on 2017-09-04 03:50:16 GMT from United States)
@8 yes, I often peek at package contents or, for uninstalled packages, package manifests.
I was asked recently: "Does the debian 'font-manager' package actually install any additional fonts?" and was able to browse https://packages.debian.org/stretch/amd64/font-manager/filelist to find the answer (no, that package does not install any additional fontsets)
Similarly, a recently-read question led me to go check "The firefox-esr from Debian still supports alsa, right?" https://sources.debian.net/src/firefox-esr/52.3.0esr-2/debian/browser.mozconfig.in/ (yes, the configuration in Debian's firefox-esr 52.3.0 package does specify --enable-alsa )
On a Debian system, you can view per-package "list of installed files" via (dpkg-query at commandline or) via the Synaptic package manager GUI. I usually choose the latter.
After downloading a *.deb package from a non-debian (github, sourceforge) repository, I nearly always use the gdebi utility to inspect the package contents. Doing so avoids running into "gotchas", a frequent one seems to be ubuntu-specific install destination paths.
Supplemental to what Jessie covered in Tips-n-Tricks, Void Linux provides an interfaces to search/browse their packages. https://www.voidlinux.eu/packages/
We can, for instance search firefox-esr, and clickthru to https://github.com/voidlinux/void-packages/blob/master/srcpkgs/firefox-esr/files/mozconfig and read that their current firefox-esr is v52.2.0 (and the config doesn't mention alsa). Does Void patch their build to change mozilla's specified default --enable-pulseaudio? From what I can see, they do not: https://github.com/voidlinux/void-packages/tree/master/srcpkgs/firefox-esr/patches
13 • ext4 apparently evaporated! (by OS2_user on 2017-09-04 04:10:48 GMT from United States)
First: I'm only describing trying to USE Linux this week.
Had a drive problem to fsck, so went into Terminal first time on PCLinux 2017.04 install and got sidetracked immediately: I CANNOT READ BLUE OR RED TEXT EVEN IN LARGE FONT, though have normal color perception, so LS output of directories in blue and the red prompt are NEARLY USELESS, and with the GREEN text it's just cartoonish! -- I want PLAIN white on black text, ALL the text, ALL the time. I'll figure out which is what soon as I can READ it. Normal folk gave up on multi-color text in the 90s after brief novelty. Even Microsoft has readable command line by default. EVEN MICROSOFT. (I see in Jesse's review above: "There are some other odd design choices too. For example the virtual terminal application has a bright blue background. The default fonts tend to have a tall, thin look which I found hard on my eyes after a while.")
First must name a "profile", but that's only learned after selected color scheme and hit "OK". Then I can embiggen the font: that worked. Resume trying to figure out why the text color doesn't actually change as seen to sides: OH, the "scheme" changes only what you type, rest still infuriating blue and red with no obvious way to change. I try the color picker, but can't figure it out, and the dialog box dies; its "OK" and "Apply" and even "Cancel" buttons just don't work, can only get rid of by Close. It leaves part in the prior dialogue, must re-open. -- Every time tried. -- Give up in disgust: if picking colors is THAT difficult, I'll just do so little as possible in Linux!
On to SECOND GOTCHA. Tiny green text again in new terminal window even after thought had properly entered a named profile. Nope. Though a field on one tab accepted it, actually you must FIRST go into "Manage Profiles" to enter name, THEN can select profile, THEN set colors and font size. And yet later go back and set it as default.
About then, recalled why CRINGE every time think of going to Linux command line. Can't have even text PLAIN the way I like without long trial-and-error learning how to UNDO needless obstacles.
By luck, forgot and typed "dir" as in MS-DOS, got directories in white text! Hooray! Now only prompt is stupid red. Lucky again when "fsck" caused mention of fsck.ext4 which has decent help built-in.
After 15 minutes wasted, back to the drive problem: first, figure out what the hell to specify! Each drive has least four possible names: here "sbd" in partitioning, that and "sdb1" in \dev, "primary" automatically appeared in KDE; and long string of alphas and numbers in the message that it was gone! -- SHEESH! -- NO, guys, it is NOT reasonable once "learned". Partition naming is not only arbitrary, it's MULTIPLE, and highly confusing. To keep simplest I make only one partition per drive, and would like same / similar name: point here is Linux has defaults I don't know how to change, and error messages of apparently random numbers and letters STILL wouldn't be easily related to drive. Lucky have only two drives and of differing size!
HERE'S A SHOCK! -- Problem appears not the 2-month-old WD 3T drive, but that ext4 file system simply rotted! Most subdirectories became empty, and a bit later BOTH superblocks faded too! KDE removed it from list. Fsck could do nothing! -- Reboot got it to appear again in KDE list. Formatted normally, then testing works, but so did prior 2T of data last for a while...
Oh, well! Only a FEW hours to copy a couple terabytes from OS/2 over 100Mbit FTP! -- Now, I've used FTP to Linux for backups since 2007, and it HAS BEEN reliable through three or four systems (with random used drives!), but now I'm not sure: this looks like progressive failure of ext4, not the NEW drive. -- I should get a gigabit switch expecting the latest ext4 to fall apart often? But big gain here: learned more Linux, how to use fsck.ext4!
Guys, your too-complex software built on creaky 1960's design is truly becoming UNUSABLE. -- And I admit that my IQ drops from barely adequate to single-digits when INFURIATED by cartoonish color text but that's because it's WORSE than 1960's monochrome!
Anyway... Yes, thank you, it's worth every cent I paid, and I DO know where to stick my advice. That won't fix the problems with Linux, though.
14 • Nitrux (by Andy Prough on 2017-09-04 04:38:31 GMT from United States)
Got to wonder how many distros in the database are totally non-functional messes like this one? Good job trying to review it Jessie, and good job getting it to work even in a VM. This is why Distrowatch's user ratings are so important.
15 • @13 - OS2 user (by Tony on 2017-09-04 04:58:05 GMT from Thailand)
Firstly: PCLinuxOS is at version 2017.07 Don't use old versions Secondly : I am a 72 year old fart with an average IQ and I certainly am not an expert. I use PCLinuxOS without trouble and without any of the problems you describe. Thirdly: If you have problems, don't put them on Distrowatch.Go to the pclinuxos forums. There are dozens of people to help you
16 • Nitrux and Ext4 (by RJA on 2017-09-04 05:08:20 GMT from United States)
The Nitrux review was mixed, can't believe it's failing on a desktop. @Jesse, did you see a kernel panic? And if you did, was it this or similar?:
kernel panic-not syncing: VFS: unable to mount root fs on unknown block x,y
Some Linux kernels for some reason seem to hate some ATA controllers for no very obvious reason! I know that it seems that the mainstream/mainline? kernel, if not all in the past, hated the ATA controller on a Dell Dimension 2350 and/or at least on a couple of socket 775 motherboards made for Dell made by Foxconn, the Vostro 200 and Inspiron 530s and would give a kernel panic like that.
17 • Package manager: why it matters to me (by Brenton Horne on 2017-09-04 07:10:55 GMT from Australia)
I favour distributions that have two major package management features:
(1) VERY extensive repositories, especially their official repositories, including all, or at least most, of my favourite software (which includes some proprietary software like RuneScape's NXT Client)
(2) Ease of creating one's own packages (in case the software I want is not in the repos of the distro already) and bumping the package version for existing packages in the repositories in case the maintainer gets a little slack/busy/lazy/other.
(1) is satisfied best by Arch Linux (and its derivatives) and, to a lesser extent, Gentoo Linux. (2) is best satisfied by Arch Linux and to a lesser extent Gentoo Linux and RPM-based distros like Fedora and openSUSE.
18 • Package manager (by Kazlu on 2017-09-04 09:38:30 GMT from France)
Apparently different people understood the poll differently this week... I answered according to my comprehension, being: "is the low-level command line default package manager (apt-get, pacman, urpmi...) installed on your distribution important?"
I answered no since I couldn't care less about the default package manager used in my distro... as long as it's there. Similarly to #11 I also need it to resolve dependancies, but if the low-level package manager does not resolve dependancies and there is a graphical front-end that does it instead, that's fine (I don't know any example of such a configuration). So in my opinion, what package manager itself is not important but the OS must be able to manage dependancies in order to ease software installation.
19 • @13, Linux ease of use (by jg on 2017-09-04 09:47:18 GMT from Poland)
@13 I use Linux (WEB browsing, movies) since 2001 and I am not a developer/programmer and I can give you this advice free (I hope it's worth more than what it was paid for) - if and when doing something that is new to you or you do it first time - in Linux - it pays extremely well to first research the subject on Google or relevant forums. Most often reading 1-2 items that appear on Google results page would be enough. Even today, every now and then, when undoing that mess I created I say to myself - why didn't I ask a stupid question on Google first?
Without doing that, you just get what you paid for - nothing.
I had similar problems with Gnome terminal, but I must say I quicly deciphered the Profile/Session riddle and changed the terminal looks the way I wanted. As to 3TB drives, this really should prompt you to do a little research - GPT, ext4, etc. If you don't like pclinuxos, (another free advice) try Ubuntu Mate - the latest 17.10 beta 1 is pretty stable, fully functional out of the box and practical for a home user. I used to run Xubuntu (XFCE) but unfortunately it really starts showing its age.
20 • @13 Coloured text (by Charles on 2017-09-04 10:31:17 GMT from United Kingdom)
"By luck, forgot and typed "dir" as in MS-DOS, got directories in white text!"
I know this won't change your opinions on Linux but in the interests of trying to help, I strongly suspect that in your ~/.bashrc file you have this line: alias ls='ls --color=auto'
Comment it out/remove it and then when you 'ls' you won't have coloured text.
21 • Package Manager (by jymm on 2017-09-04 10:51:24 GMT from United States)
Yes the package manager is important to me. I will only use distributions that have APT and Synaptic. Probably because my first OS was Debian based. I am familiar with that package manager and have no great desire to learn another list of commands. I also love Synaptic, which lets me look for packages I might not otherwise be aware of their existence or use.
22 • PCLinuxOS/package managers (by Dave Postles on 2017-09-04 11:24:46 GMT from United Kingdom)
@13 My default console in PCLinuxOS has white for user and red prompt for root. That's it.
Package managers. I have no issue with using urpmi, dnf, or apt-get, but I do NOT like emerge.
23 • The question for Package Manager perhaps is built wrong ... (by Gerhard Goetzhaber on 2017-09-04 12:22:27 GMT from Austria)
... for it should better sound like this: "What package format do you prefer, respectively NEED?" As of these days, on many a Linux distro you can work a lot, and results will be fine - if you're satisfied by screen output as well as by input through keyboard and mouse or touch-screen! In a lot of cases, however, you want to connect AND OPERATE things like a printer, a scanner or (if using a desktop station) an uninterbreakable power supply. All such peripherials for most require a driver. The joke is: Today more and more manufacturers do deliver Linux drivers, but their packages are either .rpm or .deb, and the sources combined with such support are quite specialized to make same type packages. On the other side, distro families like Arch, Slackware, Gentoo, LFS or even more exotic systems cynicly spare any useful documentation of their inner system architecture and of package (and within dependency) name conventions! When you then try to modify a driver to get used with any of those systems you will heavily fail unless you are a professional systems' analyzer. Me, I have a Canon Colour Laser Jet which requires Canon's UFR2LT driver enhancement for CUPS (big problems there even on Ubuntu and Debian with recent CUPS versions!), an Epson Perfection V370 Photo scanner also depending on some proprietary software, and an UPS from the British manufacturer Eaton communicating with the dsektop or server by IPP software only. The conclusion is: Whenever tempting work on Linux together with peripheral hardware anyhow challenging you cannot do but staying with Debian, Ubuntu, RedHat/Fedora, OpenSUSE or their derivates ...
24 • Nitrux, Package Manager (by dragonmouth on 2017-09-04 12:54:17 GMT from United States)
Nitrux & BackSlash: Why do we need another Ubuntu-based dsitro with KDE desktop if we already have Kubuntu?! What is the advantage of Nitrux or BackSlash over Kubuntu? A different look and feel? Nitrux and BackSlash are a perfect example of proliferation of unneeded distros. What Nitrux attempts to bring to the table can be handled by installing some packages from Kubuntu repositories or from PPAs. The macOS look can be added to Kubuntu by installing an appropriate theme. There is no need for an entire new distros just to do this. I know that one of the basic tenets of Linux is 'choice' but to crank out a distro just because one most often results in something barely usable like Nitrux. How many of the 570 dormant and discontinued distros in the DW database are similar in quality and utility to Nitrux?
Package Manager: Whether a distro uses RPM, APT, Pacman or Emerge as a command line package manager is not important in my choice of a distro. The CLI products always work. When it comes to GUI package managers, I have yet to find a more useful and functional one than Synaptic. It may be old and it may not have a 'modern' look but it does not try to replace functionality with glitz and eye-candy.
25 • @13 OS2_User: (by dragonmouth on 2017-09-04 13:02:51 GMT from United States)
Did you ever hear of 'Settings' to change the look of your Desktop and Terminal? I also use PCLOS and my console background is light green with black test. My Terminal background is sunshine yellow with black text. Instead of complaining how bad Linux in general and PCLinuxOS in particular is, experiment with your Settings and/or Themes.
26 • Package managers (by Bonky Ozmond on 2017-09-04 13:12:56 GMT from Nicaragua)
I use Gentoo / slackware or derivatives generally And quite like Emerge though spent most of my 11 yrs compiling an having more control of what i get...
I have no issues with Pacman which is quite good....
I like Voids offering.
Never been a Big fan of the GUI based things much prefer any CLI types...
I do wish we had more developers making apps / programs for linux it seems we are all using the same things on every distro these days
27 • Package Manager (by Stan on 2017-09-04 13:15:53 GMT from Netherlands)
Are we serioysly going to discuss this?
Update your entire system from 1 line of code vs manually updating user land software or manage 10+ individual update manages?
28 • Package managers... (by OstroL on 2017-09-04 13:57:51 GMT from Poland)
Package managers are good, if they do what they are supposed to do, and they usually do that. As we are always on the "development," sometimes a package manager could trouble you by uninstalling a very good working app, just because it is old or some of the needed dependencies for that app. So, to keep such apps from getting damaged by the package manager trying to update the whole system, you have to make the package manager blind to that app(s).
So, the need of self-contained apps, such as AppImages, Flatpaks and Snaps. This way you need to update only your system, not the apps. You can also use an old app without the worry that the 'package manager' trying to do you a favour by uninstalling it.
29 • Is the package manager important? Of course (by Andre on 2017-09-04 14:21:27 GMT from Canada)
I'm with @4 on this one. The package manager is a make-it-or-break-it thing.
I have some very specific requirements of my package manager, and find a lot of the ones currently available across the Linux landscape rather unsatisfactory. In fact, one of the biggest reasons I don't use Debian-based distros is because I find APT and friends quite limited in what they allow you to do. And no, an assortment of GUI front-ends is not the answer.
Package management is nowhere near where it should be on most platforms. The only people who will tell you otherwise are the ones who do nothing else but use the upgrade option.
30 • Package manager's role (by Jordan on 2017-09-04 14:46:07 GMT from United States)
"...how big a roll...?" Bear claws are nice big rolls. ;)
How big of a role? ;).
31 • @12 peeking into packages (by Hendryk on 2017-09-04 15:38:18 GMT from Germany)
Void linux builds firefox-esr with alsa support.check the firefox-esr template: https://github.com/voidlinux/void-packages/blob/master/srcpkgs/firefox-esr/template
Also a note to jessie, regarding the xbps-src discussion (which was a nice one to see here, thanks): ./xbps-src is the command to run the framework inside the void-packages folder (which is by the way the only script to work with in there, so all other commands would _not_ need ./ prefixed)
./xbps-src install does in fact not install pacakge in your system but inside the build enviroenment as the "install" subcommand is the explicit call of the named build phase (under the circumstance it has been compiled via subcommand "build" before, as well as all other phases have been run too). For actual installation of a manually built package, the call of "xi " inside the void-packages folder does the job, as "xi" is a wrapper for "xbps-install " which takes the xbps-src reporitoy into account automatically. plain "xbps-install " would not. (see man xtools for more).
Cheers and have a nice week
32 • Mint’s “new” progress bar feature (by SuperOscar on 2017-09-04 16:02:45 GMT from Finland)
From the news:
”The Linux Mint team has unveiled a few new changes that will be coming to the distribution in the near future. One feature grants applications the ability to share progress information with the desktop environment, which allows a progress bar to be displayed in the task switcher.”
Isn’t that what KDE Plasma already does and has done at least since version 4 point something?
33 • Package Manager Poll (by cykodrone on 2017-09-04 16:43:22 GMT from Canada)
I'm no n00b but I'm no server room maintainer either (I wish I was, I'd set up a cot in their, lol), that being said I've tested, poked, prodded, crashed on purpose, performed autopsies on and researched many distros to death over the years, I had to give every base flavour (Slack, Gentoo, Debian, Red Hat, etc) a chance. PMs that build apps from source, while really cool and a great idea, don't always work and can take a long time, if it cries for a dependency, you'll be stuck in the PM even longer. Binary package managers (rpm and deb being among the oldest and most popular) took on the dependency issues, which is all good if you don't mind aging and stale apps. In my experience, it boiled down to a battle between rpms and debs, the distro didn't matter, as long as it had a decent GUI and it worked. The final most important issues to me were the amount of available packages, package reliability, available backports/3rd party repos, and functionality of the package manager itself (in and out of a GUI, I'm GUI spoiled). Debian (apt) based distros solved most of those problems and have been the most reliable, but I'm a desktop guy running GUI distros on self-built PCs, everybody has their own needs and wants. I went from Mepis to Ubuntu based (pre spyware and bloat) to Debian (pre-systemd) to Devuan. I keep PCLinuxOS on another drive solely because of FF Multi Converter, and even PCLinuxOS deals with its rpms with apt (Synaptic).
While I've never tried Nitrux, I highly doubt it will be snappy on a 5 1/2 year old low end budget processor. It's Ubuntu based (complete with kernel/system suffocating systemd) with a Plasma based GUI, I dumped KDE/Plasma years ago because of bloat and functionality issues. Xfce seems to be the only old school GUI left on survivor island that's reliable and compatible with most apps and processes.
34 • Your Future Is Void (by Arch Watcher 402563 on 2017-09-04 17:44:03 GMT from United States)
The key thing for a package manager is checking package sigs for security. After that, dependency management. After that, speed/interface/etc.
Void's hybrid binary/source approach is nearly unique in Linux distros, although I gather a few Gentooish ones now go that way, and NixOS after a fashion.
The following in-depth reviewer thinks very highly of Void. He says it's the future of Linux. What makes him worth hearing is age and experience. He's a dinosaur and used all major distros.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fzkl2xcqQOI
35 • Package manager (by Jyrki on 2017-09-04 20:26:12 GMT from Czech Republic)
package manager is not important at all, as long as it's pacman. For me package manager is one of the decision maker for go or not go with the distro. I hate all the gui frontends to package managers, this is the very first thing I turn off and uninstall.
36 • Package Manager = OS (by david esktorp on 2017-09-04 21:40:03 GMT from United States)
The package manager (or lack thereof) is The Prime Distinguishing Feature of all Linux distributions. When you look at the differences between the mainline 'independant' distributions, the key difference is always package management. Change the package manager and it's a different OS. Whether the end user notices the differences is another story.
37 • Manjaro dropping 32-bit support/Is the package manager important? (by A-holeLinux on 2017-09-04 22:01:50 GMT from Netherlands)
Sometimes I think…..Who Is actually selecting and asking the Questions on Distrowatch ? Is it a Kid? Is it some one very very Educated? Or is it Artificial?
And we all answer so nicely….
Manjaro dropping 32-bit support. No problem, that is good. Never have used Manjaros 32bit Phenomena.
Pacman or Emerge? I do not know..You narrowing down, for what?
Greetings to all Thank you DistroW.
38 • #36 (by Microlinux on 2017-09-04 22:22:56 GMT from France)
Here's at least ten differences between Linux distributions: 1. package manager 2. quality of documentation 3. release cycle 4. support cycle 5. stable vs. rolling release 6. low-risk updates for enterprise use 7. installer 8. default software selection 9. available software in repos 10. free as in {speech,beer}?
Cheers.
39 • Package Managers (by edked on 2017-09-04 22:41:43 GMT from Canada)
While I'm usually fairly easygoing about package managers (I've only really interacted with apt-based distros and pacman-using arch-based ones), and move fairly easily between GUI and command line (I find CL more reliable and oddly less hassle for system upgrades & updates, but appreciate a GUI for browsing and individual application installs), if there's one thing that makes me wary of a distro, it's a review (here or wherever) with a line like "Prawn Linux uses its own unique custom-written package manager, PoopyButt, which has a number of idiosyncrasies and unusual defaults." I usually hit the brakes on my interest pretty hard when I see something like that.
40 • @39, etc. (by claudecat on 2017-09-05 01:06:31 GMT from United States)
"...if there's one thing that makes me wary of a distro, it's a review (here or wherever) with a line like "Prawn Linux uses its own unique custom-written package manager..."
See, that makes me more interested, not less. I most respect and enjoy using distributions that do things in original ways, and package management is one of the few areas left where there's room for something new.
Sure, it may be reinventing the wheel to some degree, but I'd rather see original approaches to packaging and the management thereof than yet more glossed-up 'buntu/Debian progeny working with the same infrastructure of packages.
Examples of such original distributions would be Void (excellent yet at times cryptically documented), Gentoo (and other Portage-based entities), Solus, Pardus (back when it was a thing and maybe again with Pisi), Slackware of course, and others with which I'm less familiar.
The oddball distro to me is PCLOS, which uses apt/Synaptic with RPMs, and very smoothly. I've always wondered why more distros haven't used this approach. Everything else gets borrowed/stolen/shared...
All that aside, my favorite package managers would probably be pacman (speed, elegance) and Gentoo's emerge/Portage, which I hope one day to fully understand.
Least favorite? Anyone remember Foresight Linux and conary? Maybe a great idea, but it didn't work (out) so well.
41 • Package Managers / PClinuxOS (by Winchester on 2017-09-05 02:43:13 GMT from United States)
As far as the old Foresight Linux and its package management goes,it gets much worse than that.
Open Mamba package management was not all that great. Stella,which is based on RedHat 6.8 with Gnome 2,has a graphical package manager which looks similar to Synaptic but is crippled in comparison. The search function is horrible. Otherwise that distribution runs very well on some old,limited hardware (Asus EeePC).
Package management is one of the very few drawbacks of the Puppy distributions. Trying to go from FireFox 52.2 ESR to 52.3 ESR in LxPupSC,I ended up with both versions of the browser,the newer one without any modifications to the default settings carried over. Otherwise,a great distribution.
PClinuxOS is a fine operating system. Synaptic in PClinuxOS offers the option to "Verify Package Signatures". In my installation from the Trinity Big Daddy community iso,I have to log into the root account in order to launch Synaptic. You can also use apt-get to install updates via the "Update Notification Applet" (as a normal user) which launches the XTerm and prompts for a password. There is also "KPackage" which I haven't really experimented with so far.
Regarding post # 13,apparently not a KDE Plasma person,at least not in PClinuxOS,so I would recommend trying PClinuxOS with another environment such as the aforementioned Trinity "Big Daddy" edition or the LXDE community edition,or maybe just install a window manager. Using the ext3 file system and something other than a Western Digital hard drive which can be hit or miss depending on the model. I would go with HGST (owned by Western Digital but generally better than most Western Digital branded drives) for a mechanical drive. HGST can be thought of as a higher-end Western Digital. For a solid state drive, Crucial or maybe Intel seem to be the best.
My Xterm,by default,has an off-white background with black text. My Konsole terminal,by default,has a white background with black text. In Konsole,you can just go to the "settings" tab and then "Schema" in the drop down,then choose from 18 different color schemes although some of them appear to be the same or very similar and I have not yet figured out how to save a scheme as the default other than the original default. I haven't looked into it yet but,I imagine that I would just have to copy the scheme into my home folder and edit the konsolerc file in /.trinity/share/config/ .
Regarding post # 17,if you want very extensive repositories,PClinuxOS is a solid option in that regard as well.
Regarding post # 16, kernel 3.16 (Debian Packaged) and kernel 3.13.125 (on SalentOS 14.04 64-bit) both work without panic on a Dell Inspiron 530s.
42 • @40 (by edked on 2017-09-05 02:54:58 GMT from Canada)
Oh, Gentoo and Slackware are definitely not like the others, being "mother distros" that have been around almost as long as linux itself, so their package managers don't evoke the same wariness, due to their venerability. I'm more talking about newly-popped-up operations, especially where the homebrewed PM is created for a distro based on a family that already has plenty. Oh, and I'm well out of Debian/'buntu apt-land, having moved happily to planet pacman. If I want to try a new package manager, I'll move over to an rpm distro, or actually try Gentoo or slackware, rather than fiddle with an experimental PM while going back to apt-land.
43 • Packaging in the Distant Past (by Peter Besenbruch on 2017-09-05 06:26:45 GMT from United States)
When I sought to try Linux starting back in 2002, I read books. They explained that there were two kinds of distributions, DEB distros and RPM distros. RPM distros put you through something called "dependency hell." DEB distros fixed all that. I tried a variety from both camps, encountered dependency hell, and stuck with DEBs from then on. Eventually, as I got better, and Debian got easier, I moved to Debian itself.
Nowadays, lots of package managers do their job well, but "apt-get" has a special place in my heart. It has successfully gotten me through countless major upgrades, to say nothing of the minor stuff.
44 • Package Managers (by Alessandro di Roma on 2017-09-05 08:22:33 GMT from Italy)
But what do you mean with "package manager"? The package system (DEB, RPM...) or the package management tool? In the first case my answer is "very important", in the second one is "somewhat important".
I use Xubuntu, which as a Debian-derivate has DEB package system, but has not preinstalled synaptic, my preferred package management tool. Of course is not a problem to type "sudo apt -y install synaptic". In fact I use both "sudo apt" on terminal and synaptic.
In order to keep the system up-to-date I wrote a one-line script (named "upgrade") containing:
sudo apt -y update && sudo apt -y upgrade && sudo apt -y autoremove
45 • Pacman and Apt (by Guido on 2017-09-05 08:51:56 GMT from Philippines)
I have used Manjaro 32 bit for some time. It has Pacman. I got used to it. Now they decided to drop the support for 32 bit machines, cos they are based on Arch Linux, which drops also. Now I am back on Ubuntu with Apt. Beside the commands are different, it is not so important, what package system you are using, as long as they are really working! Pacman is faster, Apt maybe smaller... Both systems are excellent. For both are managers available with small differences. In other words, all packages are good, as long as they are working and being up-to-date.
46 • 32-bit (by Winchester on 2017-09-05 14:40:39 GMT from United States)
Correct me if I am wrong but,didn't Debian and Ubuntu both announce plans to phase out 32-bit support over the course of the next few years?? I know that they still support it right now but,I don't think that they plan to continue moving ahead into the future.
The same goes for ArchBox. You can install ArchBox 32-bit right now but,being based on Arch Linux,obviously,32-bit seems doomed with that distribution as well.
That would leave the Gentoo family,the Slackware family,the Puppy Linux family (those using Slackware Packages) ,SliTaz,and TinyCore / CorePlus as options for 32-bit machines. Maybe a couple of others but,not many.
47 • @38 (by david esktorp on 2017-09-05 18:19:05 GMT from United States)
That's why I said "The Prime Distinguishing Feature" and not "The Only Difference" ;)
48 • Phasing out 32-bit (by david esktorp on 2017-09-05 18:28:06 GMT from United States)
Something else to consider regarding 32-bit and/or 'legacy' systems is the possibility of simply sticking with outdated yet stable operating systems. For example, if a system is not used for any important financial tasks, security, etc.. there is virtually no reason to need an 'up-to-date' system. Security updates are way overhyped in many situations.
If a user decided to install Ubuntu 10.04 and disable all updates, there is still almost zero chance of getting 'hacked' or being victimized from some corner-case security vulnerabilities.
Overblown 'bleeding edge' security update hysterics is one of the Linux communities biggest problems.
49 • Main Differences Between Distros (it's all about perspective) (by M.Z. on 2017-09-05 20:35:47 GMT from United States)
@47 & @38 I think the big things that make a difference for desktop users are 1) the Desktop Environment & 2) the tools used to admin the OS. The first point is obvious on the level of day to day interaction, & the second makes a huge difference in over the course of using the distro. For instance, there are big differences between Mint Tools that come in a variety of forms (independently created software manager, repo manager etc.) & the centralized Mageia/PCLinuxOS control center. From where I sit each individual Mint Tool feels designed to be friendlier to average desktop users, while the Mageia/PCLOS Control Center offers something more cohesive, but also a bit more technical. One prime example would be the installing software from Mint Software Center vs launching drakrpm in MCC (or Synaptic in PCLOS). In the control center case you get a fairly simplistic text based GUI package manager, but you can switch to doing updates or most any other admin task without a second password, where Mint feels friendlier for the single task of installing software with a more GUI oriented UI that includes more pictures & user reviews; however, you'll end up entering your password more to do other admin tasks.
Anyway, the DE & admin tools are fairly important for most users, while the back end stuff can feel very interchangeable. For instance in the case of PCLOS & Mint, both can use Synaptic even though there are significant differences going on underneath the hood with Deb or RPM packages. For some users that like Synaptic this could make the two nearly equivalent from a package management perspective, but then there are a lot of other factors that could could be important to other users. I could care less about my init & go back & forth between Mageia & PCLinuxOS on different PCs fairly often, but some people may avoid one or the other due to systemd. The init thing seems fairly silly to me, but it's a matter of perspective, much like focusing on 'Only Libre Software', or having 50k software packages vs having the few packages I really need & the DE I want by default.
Given that there are millions of Linux users & a large number of major projects creating distros, you are going to end up with a fairly large set of things that are important way to differentiate for some users & not important to others. It all depends on what you are looking for & what is important to you when looking for a distro.
50 • Not concerned about package managers? (by Silent Warrior on 2017-09-06 03:48:30 GMT from Sweden)
I voted 'Nope'. Now excuse me while I download a Nitrux image for testing in VirtualBox for the experience of using .deb packages with pacman. Because I'm so very consistent. :-)
51 • Dropping 32-bit (by FOSSilizing Dinosaur on 2017-09-06 12:31:27 GMT from United States)
From what I've seen,downloads of new ISOs 64-vs-32 run 2:1. That suggests interest, at least. One reason for using 32-bit is performance; one reason for dropping it is reducing (duplication in?) development overhead and workload.
52 • CLI vs package manager (by frenly on 2017-09-07 00:30:36 GMT from Australia)
There are thousands of linux apps out there. but when you search for uncommon apps in a package manager like synaptic you can never find them. It only shows the most common apps.You need to "add repositories" for more apps. Where are these repositories? Why aren't they already added?
In Susestudio you can make your own distro. But you can't find those uncommon apps listed there either - even after adding all their repositories. Apparently you need to add even more (external) repositories or import the apps directly.
But there are no such problems when you use something like APT on the CLI. Just search for the app name, download it, and it is installed automatically. So official package managers seem unnecessarily restricted by the need to add obscure repositories.
53 • @52 (by Black Knight on 2017-09-07 02:31:30 GMT from France)
Maybe I don't understand well your post but this is wrong.
Apt seeks the apps in the repos which are on your system, exactly as Synaptic and other packages managers. You must have the repos also for Apt. Both works in the same manner. If you have not the app that you want in the repos on your system, it does not matter if you seek it with Apt or with the packages manager, you won't find it.
54 • Searching for apps (by Kragle von Schnitzelbank on 2017-09-07 02:37:04 GMT from United States)
@52 • @53 ... and some apps aren't in any repository. Uncommon, like 'e said.
55 • package kruft (by frenly on 2017-09-07 04:30:21 GMT from Australia)
@53 Well, GUI package managers list not only apps but also dependencies: libraries, addons, extensions etc. With the CLI you just need to know the app name. Or, you can get a portable app via flatpak/snap/appimage,
And trying to build a distro with Susestudio or Slax online builders is difficult because of all the dependency listings that you need to wade through to find what you want.
56 • 32 bit and PowerPC (by Knut Stormfoss on 2017-09-07 07:43:04 GMT from Norway)
PowerPC ports (32 bit PowerPC) were phased out from most distros a few years ago, but a few still had support until last year. This started with Ubuntu around 12.10 and trickled down to the other distros over time. Most distros never supported PowerPC at all, so the only real options were Debian-based. Ubuntu spins like Lubuntu and Ubuntu MATE supported PowerPC until 16.04 LTS whiich means there are a few more years of life in these machines. I think Lubuntu only has three years of support on the LTS, while Ubuntu MATE might have the full five years. Users of PowerPC Macs from 2005 have pretty underpowered hardware by now, so it is not unreasonable for distros to phase out support to avoid some extra work when only a few enthusiasts really use these machines any more. The PowerPC Luddite and similar blogs are still out there, but the activity is really low by now.
32 bit x86 has generally not been used on real hardware since the end of the netbook craze around 2010. Almost all distros have had support for this architecture until Arch dropped support last year. Ubuntu and Debian dropping support seems somewhat early, but on the other hand, Ubuntu 16.04 LTS and all the respins will be supported until 2021, and many other distros specifically for lower end hardware will probably support 32 bit x86 at least until then.
By that time, netbooks and lower powered laptops with 32 bit x86 processor will be pretty underpowered. (More so than the high-end G4s and G5s Apple shipped in 2006 are today. These go up to quad core 2,5 GHz G5s with 16 GB RAM and high-end graphics cards.) It is not unreasonable for distros to start thinking about dropping support when it involves extra work and critical bugs can hold releases back. And if Cannonical start thinking about it now, they still have to support 32 bit x86 until 2021. Debian is slightly more surprising, since they have generally kept support longer and since they do not have LTSes, the newest Stable release have to have support for people to be able to use their distro at all.
Generally, the fewer ports a distro has, the faster new releases can come out and the more focus can be used on polishing things up instead of fixing bugs for architectures few people use. It is good for AMD64 to have some competition from other architectures, but to have two different x86 architectures from the same manufacturers isn't competition. ARM is getting more important every day, but it is a pity that there isn't one instruction set, but more, and that distros need to make ports for each of them if they want to support ARM hardware well. It would be really good if there were four or five competing processor architectures around, but that within each architecture, there would be only one instruction set and hence only need for one port of each distro.
In reality, most distros will never go beyond x86, but for those that do aim at being more universal (like Debian), people cannot demand a port for their architecture without also contributing time and/or money. The reason why Debian had to drop PowerPC support after Jessie is that there were too few porters and testers on the platform to make it viable. If people want 32 bit X86, then they need to step up and do the work.
57 • Package Mgr (by argent on 2017-09-08 04:56:37 GMT from United States)
Yes, a package manager is quite important to me! Good way for me to look at a new application quickly, such as size, dependencies, etc would be by Synaptic. Helps me keep KDE, Qt or any undesirable dependencies off my install.
Synaptic also allows a viewer to see other packages they may want to install. Searching with Synaptic can either be by name or by description along with other search possibilities.
Have used Octopi and Pacman depending on the DE/Wm and distribution.
Package management is very important and with a GUI so that those who aren't yet quite savvy on installing from source, or even knowing just exactly what they need is important.
58 • BackSlash Linux (by Sanjay Prasad (Kolkata) on 2017-09-08 10:23:16 GMT from India)
BackSlash Linux looking awesome, I am not a fan of MAC but customized shell that runs on the KDE Plasma desktop 5.9.x is great, going to download 1.7GB iso ....
59 • Post # 48 (by Winchester on 2017-09-08 11:53:09 GMT from United States)
That's a new take. I have never heard any advocate for the usage of old and unmaintained distributions.
My e-mail is crippled in old web browsers,even FireFox 45.9 ESR. For it to work properly,I need to use at least 49 or 52.x ESR.
It just doesn't seem like the best idea to use an unmaintained distribution unless there are no other options for the given hardware. And there are other options for 32-bit hardware. I could see having one on a partition in a multi-boot system or in VirtualBox but not as the only or primary operating system.
60 • Use old distro, new appimage? (by Somewhat Reticent on 2017-09-08 12:28:50 GMT from United States)
@59 • Perhaps your favorite old distro combined with new appimages (where new is better) would give the best of both? :: @48 • I would agree that most updates are advertised with little or no explanation (or, therefore, justification). If new software is all compiled for 64-bit hardware, would 32-bit hardware require re-compiling from source? Might be good to have a fairly automated build system.
61 • Most Updates Are Good (by M.Z. on 2017-09-08 21:37:34 GMT from United States)
@48 & @59
"If a user decided to install Ubuntu 10.04 and disable all updates, there is still almost zero chance of getting 'hacked' or being victimized from some corner-case security vulnerabilities."
I think the far better scenario in a case similar to that would be to run a Mint LTS release & use the Mint Update to to filter out everything except security updates & probably level 1 or perhaps level 2 updates, which have virtually no impact on system stability. Why ask for trouble, when you can have important security updates with minimal unneeded ones? Also, I have found many distros from Mint, to Mageia & Debian to be plenty stable, so I'm not sure why you would reject updates altogether. It just seems like a bad idea if you are connected to any network to not at least apply security updates. Other updates can bring nice bug fixes even if no one can be bothered to read about all of them. I do see some sense in not applying fixes that aren't necessary, but applying no updates seems far worse than updating everything blindly.
62 • Poopy Butts and Bleeding Hearts (by Arch Watcher 402563 on 2017-09-08 23:37:15 GMT from United States)
@39 Where can I find PoopyButt, I want to try it. This is DistroWatch.
@48 Here's hoping your heart won't bleed. Linux security hysterics as a big overblown community problem, thank you! I needed a deep belly laugh. Clearly you haven't run OpenELEC with its public root password, or Puppy with its rooted user. Find methods you may like in comments 4 and 63 at http://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20151116&mode=67
63 • insecure by design (by tim on 2017-09-10 01:08:42 GMT from United States)
In addition to the examples mentioned (OpenELEC and PuppyLinux), several of the for-RaspberryPi distributions ship with defaults insecure-for-the-sake-of-convenience. PiHole, DietPi...
"Desktop" distributions, in general, seem to ship with way too many unneeded / unwanted services autostarted. Many users probably do no realize, do not care, but the unnecessary autostarts represent wastefulness and potential vulnerability vectors.
64 • Updates / Post # 61 (by Winchester on 2017-09-10 02:48:53 GMT from United States)
The point is that Debian / Ubuntu / Mint etc. will ,as I understand the situation,be phasing out 32-bit support in a few years.
Therefore,at that point,what updates will there be for 32-bit systems using those OS??
That would leave the Gentoo family,the Slackware family,the Puppy Linux family (those using Slackware Packages) ,SliTaz,4M Linux, UpLOS, Mageia, and TinyCore / CorePlus as options for 32-bit machines to receive updates. Maybe a couple of others but,not many.
65 • Still Plenty of Options (by M.Z. on 2017-09-10 20:19:08 GMT from United States)
@64 "The point is that Debian / Ubuntu / Mint etc. will ,as I understand the situation,be phasing out 32-bit support in a few years."
Perhaps my previous post didn't take into account that aspect of the context, but regardless of that, there are plenty of options existing right now & any idea of not applying any updates at all is a very bad notion. Holding back certain updates for the sake of stability is widely practiced in IT & can be the best solution if it is done right; however, running an old vulnerable system on a network is bad for everyone. You would essentially be like an anti-vaxer nut who is hurting herd immunity. In this case that means increasing the vulnerability of everyone else on the web by intentionally leaving a machine networked that is easily co-opted for malicious purposes. It's bad enough when unaware users with old windows machines do that sort of thing, but we are talking about supposedly intelligent Linux users here & they should darn well know that there are options.
Even when I get very picky about how I exclude everything downstream of distros Debian & Ubuntu from a search here on DW just for i386- i686 that are for desktop, beginners & old PCs I come up with over 50 options. I would personally prefer support for non 64 bit desktops for at least a few more release cycles in the Debian family; however, there are plenty of other options. If you are leaving an unsupported version of Debian on some old corner PC that never touches a network & is just there to print documents if your main desktop fails that is fine, but networking an insecure system is just stupid.
It's also worth pointing out here that if you include all the other possible distro categories in a search for non Debian family OSs with i386-i686 support you get an extra 30 or so results for things that you could do with that old PC. In my case I've often reused junk PCs as pfSense based firewalls. That way I actually make myself & everyone else more secure, rather than causing possible problems by networking an insecure machine. There are of course other many possible tasks one could do with such a machine & many could be more satisfying & useful than creating an anemic & insecure desktop. Perhaps you could figure out how to create Network Attached Storage, or just plain play wit some new Distro on an old machine you can afford to mess up.
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• Issue 1043 (2023-10-30): Murena Two with privacy switches, where old files go when packages are updated, UBports on Volla phones, Mint testing Cinnamon on Wayland, Peppermint releases ARM build |
• Issue 1042 (2023-10-23): Ubuntu Cinnamon compared with Linux Mint, extending battery life on Linux, Debian resumes /usr merge, Canonical publishes fixed install media |
• Issue 1041 (2023-10-16): FydeOS 17.0, Dr.Parted 23.09, changing UIDs, Fedora partners with Slimbook, GNOME phasing out X11 sessions, Ubuntu revokes 23.10 install media |
• Issue 1040 (2023-10-09): CROWZ 5.0, changing the location of default directories, Linux Mint updates its Edge edition, Murena crowdfunding new privacy phone, Debian publishes new install media |
• Issue 1039 (2023-10-02): Zenwalk Current, finding the duration of media files, Peppermint OS tries out new edition, COSMIC gains new features, Canonical reports on security incident in Snap store |
• Issue 1038 (2023-09-25): Mageia 9, trouble-shooting launchers, running desktop Linux in the cloud, New documentation for Nix, Linux phasing out ReiserFS, GNU celebrates 40 years |
• Issue 1037 (2023-09-18): Bodhi Linux 7.0.0, finding specific distros and unified package managemnt, Zevenet replaced by two new forks, openSUSE introduces Slowroll branch, Fedora considering dropping Plasma X11 session |
• Issue 1036 (2023-09-11): SDesk 2023.08.12, hiding command line passwords, openSUSE shares contributor survery results, Ubuntu plans seamless disk encryption, GNOME 45 to break extension compatibility |
• Full list of all issues |
Star Labs |
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SUSE Linux Enterprise
SUSE Linux Enterprise is an interoperable platform for mission-critical computing. SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop is an enterprise-quality Linux desktop that's ready for routine business use. It provides interoperability with existing systems and many office applications. It also delivers flexibility for desktop and notebook clients, thin-client devices, and high-end technical workstations. SUSE Linux Enterprise Server is designed to handle mission-critical workloads. It is an open, scalable, solution that comes with integrated Xen-based virtualization, application security, and systems management across a range of hardware architectures. SUSE Linux Enterprise Server provides interoperability with Windows and other platforms, and it provides a secure foundation for a broad range of edge, departmental and data center needs.
Status: Active
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TUXEDO |
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Star Labs |
Star Labs - Laptops built for Linux.
View our range including the highly anticipated StarFighter. Available with coreboot open-source firmware and a choice of Ubuntu, elementary, Manjaro and more. Visit Star Labs for information, to buy and get support.
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