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libpng isn't entirely trivial, but it's actually very simple to use, and quite flexible as well—e.g., it's easy to make the library handle all the weird cases automatically itself, but the option exists for you to handle them too if desired.

Then why is it that searching for "simple libpng example" turns up stuff like this? I count four abort() in the read function and another six in the write function. That means that between each of them there are four calls to libpng in the read function and six in the write function. I'm only asking it to do two things, why do I have to call it ten times? Not to mention I have to call setjmp() all the time because for some reason the damn thing can't simply return an error code.

It's vastly better designed than many other image libraries (e.g. all the horrid examples that only support whole-image I/O into some awful least-common-denominator image format).

You mean the ones that just do what you want? Hey, I'm all for having options, but there's one option you don't get with libpng: the "just load the fucking image into a buffer" option. ...and that's just stupid since in 99% of cases thats all anyone wants to do.

See my reply above for an example from the library I use. It's one function call and it just returns NULL if it fails. You can't get any simpler than that, and strangely I'm not suffering from the lack of flexibility that libpng offers.

-- AC, who watches his posts for replies.

You sure it wasn't the Penguin Liberation Front?

SPLITTERS!!

You sure it wasn't the Penguin Liberation Front?

One caution, do not install from the Live CD because they did bork those default choices because of the limited space. Also, don't waste your money on the PowerPack Edition as you can add the full repositories via PLF above (sans the 3rd-party apps the PowerPack provides access to).

Mandrake lived and died by RPM

As much as Debian died by dpkg, in other words, not at all. I guess you didn't try urpmi (which was in a released version of Mandriva before apt was in a stable release of Debian)?

Mandriva's not even run by the guy that founded Mandrake. So everyone that remembers the old Mandrake should remember that this is just somebody else with sorta the same name doing the distro now.

So, when no more founders of Microsoft are employed by Microsoft, they should change their name, or their customers should consider switching?

What really made Mandrake, and continues to make Mandriva, is not one person, but the combination of employees and contributors. While many of both have come and gone, a lot of the contributors from the Mandrake era still use and contribute to the distro, and new contributors join quite often.

If you bothered to look, you would probably find that Mandriva is more open than Ubuntu or Fedora (not sure about "Open"SUSE).

Oops, I forgot to mention: they also have a version named "Free", that includes absolutely no proprietary apps or drivers.

Don't forget, adding non-free codecs and apps is as simple as adding the PLF repository from http://easyurpmi.zarb.org./

It's patented. You need to pay the patent holders, and get a license.

They provide _no_ licenses for Linux use, the last time I looked. The case is even worse for DVD encoding, which the DMCA protects, which is why the libraries to decode DVD's are easily accessible from overseas sites such as the Penguin Liberation Front at http://plf.zarb.org/, but not available directly on any distro built in the USA.

The intellectual property owners are _unwilling_ to sell licenses for Linux, which is why playing DVD's on Linux is such a delicate issue in selling Linux laptops.

Yeah I'm a fanboi and I have tried ubuntu but found it to be a little too dumbed down for my likes.

The Powerpack is a really nice package due to it having some things that are really really nice. Trying to install the Citrix client, you'll need Motif 4, which is included in the power pack.

Want to run an ATI card with xorg 1.6, the Power Pack comes with working drivers.

Want to run Firefox plugins on x86_64? Mandriva got that one right too.

Want to D/L the MS and Real codecs for mplayer? You can get them from the Penguin Liberation Front at http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/

Want to set up a mythtv backend? Let Mandriva look for updates during an install or tell it to add "Distribution Sources" and all you need to do is type: "urpmi mythtv-setup mythtv-frontend mythtv-backend" and follow the instructions.

Mandriva is, IMHO, the most flexible Linux Distribution available; and yeah, I'm going to pony up the pesos to buy the PowerPack.

I agree with you. I have installed Mandriva at work and i laugh all the time because of co-workers that have Ubuntu giving them configuration nightmares.. Mandriva Control Center is light years ahead of anything Ubuntu can throw in....

Yeah I'm a fanboi and I have tried ubuntu but found it to be a little too dumbed down for my likes.

The Powerpack is a really nice package due to it having some things that are really really nice. Trying to install the Citrix client, you'll need Motif 4, which is included in the power pack.

Want to run an ATI card with xorg 1.6, the Power Pack comes with working drivers.

Want to run Firefox plugins on x86_64? Mandriva got that one right too.

Want to D/L the MS and Real codecs for mplayer? You can get them from the Penguin Liberation Front at http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/

Want to set up a mythtv backend? Let Mandriva look for updates during an install or tell it to add "Distribution Sources" and all you need to do is type: "urpmi mythtv-setup mythtv-frontend mythtv-backend" and follow the instructions.

Mandriva is, IMHO, the most flexible Linux Distribution available; and yeah, I'm going to pony up the pesos to buy the PowerPack.

It's been improved... the best way to handle your update repositories is to use the Easy URPMI site at http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/ - just click and it will automagically add the sources for you.

I've been running the Beta and RC versions on my laptop and a desktop, it's been working well. Gonna start torrenting the release version shortly.

If you like that, then you'll really love the Penguin Liberation Front ! Except, of course, they are an anti-terrorist organization, since they are for Linux and against Windows :-)

Mandriva is in the trenches already. See the Penguin Liberation Front: http://plf.zarb.org/

That's funny, Google thinks that PLF is something completely different.

I'm not exactly sure how the repositories for Ubuntu work, but for the other distros I have used, they include the install media as a resource in the package manager's repository list. Some of the times, the Install media is copied to the hard drive during the install so it is more or less transparent when the package manager requests something on the install medium. Instead of asking for CD1 or CD3, it would just get it from the hard drive.

Something you might notice when looking for packages, is there might be more then one version, lets say for something like fetchmail. you might see fetchmail-6.2.13 and fetchmail-6.3.8 . If you select the newest version, it would pull from the Internet. If you select the older version which came on the install media, it would either ask for the CD containing it or install from the hard drive. There might even be a setting that hides older versions so if a newer version is available, you won't see the older one. My understanding is that you can have more then one repository setup. In mandriva, there is a thing called the PLF which deals with stuff that is somewhat questionable in freedom/legality and not officially supported by the distro. And when I say somewhat questionable, I mean stuff like NTFS drive support, stuff that might be free to use but not open source and so on. I don't mean illegal or anything like that. It looks like they are doing some work for Ubuntu so if it isn't already available, it might be soon.

Maybe someone with some experience with the mechanics Ubuntu uses can chime in with more accurate information. I'm basically going off of my experiences with other distros which I think the concepts should be the same even if the actually deliver is different.

Mandake/Mandriva's product didn't change all that much between the name change to mandriva after merging with conectix or whatever it was. the product was basically the same with a few improvements that you would normally see in between releases. I mean Mandrake is mandriva- Mandrake remained the company producing the product and changed their name. But they didn't abandon the product and start over, they kept the product and improved it.

That's sort of a pet rant I have. They are one in the same. It is like calling "windows 95" Chicago and then getting corrected because it is windows 95. But more to the point I was replying for. You mentioned RPM as if you didn't know about URPMI and Mandrake.

URPMI is mandrake's package manager that resolves most of the problems people have with rpms. Usually You can use it directly on an RMP built for simular setup like redhat or whatever. In short, it was available since 7.2 or 8.0 times and already did what you liked about debian causing you to end up sticking with debian for some time. Just like with debian and Ubuntu, you have the different repositories that you can set up. There is even a website that has been setup to help find repositories including official and non official ones.

Anyways, No to knock your choices, but as the GP said, I don't see anythign in ubuntu that Madriva doesn't offer and seem to do better. I don't know how long it will stay that way though, one of the Mandrake founders is supposedly working with the Ubuntu team now (has been for almost a year or so). But I think they will always trail Mandriva in a lot of ways. If you didn't know about URPMI and are in one of those checking things out moods again, you should look at some of the mandrake/mandriva offerings again.

However, I'm now in a position where I want to install subversion and tomcat, and it's really not easy.

As a fellow Mandriva user, I have to point you to Easy URPMI set up the PLF as well as the standard main and contrib update sources, and most packages can get installed automatically.

To keep a stable release up to date with security and bug fixes, you simply need to run MandrivaUpdate regularly - nothing more than that.

You can indeed upgrade from a previous version to a later one. Simply download the later version (you need one of the regular installer editions - Free, Powerpack or Powerpack+ - not One), boot the installer, and you will be given the choice of a fresh install or upgrading your old installation.

Upgrading from 2007.0 (which you have) to 2007 Spring (A.K.A. 2007.1, the current stable release) generally goes very well, from the reports I've seen.

You can also do an 'Ubuntu-style' upgrade simply by using a mirror finder like Easy URPMI - http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/ - to configure repositories for 2007 Spring, then either using rpmdrake's facility to upgrade all available packages, or using this command at a console as root:

urpmi --auto-update -v

However, the installer is able to resolve conflicts and migrate settings that this method sometimes is not, so we recommend less technical users and those who just don't want hassle to use the installer upgrade rather than the urpmi / rpmdrake upgrade option.

I'm not sure about the Mandriva Repositories, which are quite large, but once you use Easy URPMI to add the contrib and PLF sources, then I don't think there's a piece of software that I haven't been able to find.

Oh, and I forgot to mention: we've had a PHP5 package since release 10.1:

http://sophie.zarb.org/rpmfind?mversion=10.1&searc h=php5&st=fuzzyname&submit=Submit+Query&qcount=20

10.1 came out in October 2004.

"Mandriva wasn't able to deal with my setup of a dual boot with Vista, Mepis and Kubuntu. It wanted to format the hard drive."

Some of us have been using Mandriva since back in the day when the conversion happened (think Mandrake, not like any noobs remember that ol' thing). Mandrake was always Redhat on steroids. Mandriva followed the same path. It had so many apps that could be configured, easily, via http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/ . I run 4 linux distros, and I still like Mandriva. Debian and Suse fanboys, what's your rational? Some people like rpm package management, others apt-get. Fine, fair enough, to each his own. NO, I don't like the French either. And yes, mandriva has some serios issues when it comes to wireless cards (ndiswrappwer DOES NOT work unless you compile from source with almost any car other than a BCM4xxx chipset). Overall though, they do a decent job, unlike debian, which doesnt have all the apts available, and its a bitch to get the network set up on an alienware SLI graphics card setup. I won't defend the French, but fanboys piss me off.

Then you can install a Mandriva, and use the external packages repositories from PLF (you can use easyurpmi for that).
Those people provide packages that Mandriva does not want to provide because of legal concerns. Note that they don't provide illegal packages, only packages that could be illegal in some countries (because of patents and things like that), which Mandriva can't do, because they distribute their product worldwide.

Then you can install a Mandriva, and use the external packages repositories from PLF (you can use easyurpmi for that).
Those people provide packages that Mandriva does not want to provide because of legal concerns. Note that they don't provide illegal packages, only packages that could be illegal in some countries (because of patents and things like that), which Mandriva can't do, because they distribute their product worldwide.

Mandrake had OK management, actually, good management for the pay-version, but the free version had to either hack something together to use their freely accessable but intended for-pay package servers or hunt down updates for every package manually.

Then you probably don't know http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/

You've never heard of easy urpmi? I just update the mirror and run 'urpmi.update -a'. I've had smooth upgrades all the way from Mandrake 9.2 to Mdv 2007.

If you want lots of packages, and you like Mandriva, you might want to try using the PLF sources, via EasyURPMI. They provide tons of packages, and I very rarely find a piece of software for Linux that isn't available via this channel. Makes installing software a breeze.

• Penguin Liberation Front
• Seer of souls

PLF (Penguin Liberation Front) is a repository of RPMs that cannot be included into the Mandrake distro for legal reasons (copyright/license/patent)

Hi,

Considering the hoops that I had to go through to make Mandrake do multimedia AND DVDs, your friend might as well be as skilled as 'Mr. decss' Johansen to get video or music playback.

I am not as skilled as Mr decss Johansen. Nevertheless, I got multimedia AND DVD reporduction very easily.

One option, is to buy the boxed version, which comes with support for all the proprietary stuff. I don't know if you know, but "Mandriva Free" only includes free (as in Freedom) software by design. This option (boxed version) works great for people not that expert in Linux.

Another option is to do what I did:

I went to Easy URPMI website, selected the PLF repositories, configured follogwing the instructions on that page (copy&paste), launched the GUI install program, searched for "codecs" and all the other files that had "mp3", "ogg", "dvd" , etc in the name , installed them all, and presto!:

* multimedia works like a charm: mp3, ogg, avi, mpeg... (using amaroK and gmplayer), even web-embeded content.
* I view my legal (read, protected) DVDs easily, with gmplayer or kaffeine or...

It is very easy, really. Even I can do it :)

I used the info found in this link. I found this link at "Mandriva Linux" entry on Wikipedia. All is explained very well.

Peace!

Yes it does.

It is called urpmi.

For Debian users:

urpmi is apt
rpm is dkpg
rpmdrake is synaptic

Urpmi comes both in command-line and GUI front-end. Urpmi also comes with a "WindowsUpdate-like" tool called MandrivaUpdate.

There is even an online urpmi configurator tool, where you can even select the program sources "forbidden" in the USA, as they contain pre-packaged programs and modules that will allow you to watch DVDs, have 3D acceleration with ATI and nVidia cards, and a whole bunch of programs that its legality is doubtful in USA, as well as non-free programs.

Peace!

Very enlightening. Particularly the third (this one).

I noticed that the stock xpdf that is installed by Ubuntu's repositories (Universe) is the regular one from foolabs.com, which "respects" the nocopy/noprint flags; however the discussion on the Debian mailinglists seems to indicate what appears to be a consensus for including a version with a flag option ("--ignoreperms" or similar); does anyone know if any of these patches have been integrated into the mainline Debian version? I couldn't find any information just by looking at the package's site; since Ubuntu is branched from debian-unstable I'm guessing that it's not been integrated.

IMO it should; integrating a "Are you sure you want to ignore settings?" patch seems totally in line with at least my understanding of the Debian philosophy.

A computer is like a pocket knife. It's a tool, which has many uses. It's not the responsibility of the maker of the tool to look over the user's shoulders. Powerful tools can by their nature be used for good and bad, in the same way that I can use a pocket knife to carve wood or stab someone. (Albeit perhaps ineffectually; maybe that analogy would have been better with an axe or nailgun.)

Going offtopic here for a moment: Some days I wish the people at the PLF would put out a distro. Call it "Useful Linux." Combine together all the tools that are prohibited or that you have to jump through obnoxious hoops in order to use in various parts of the world -- proprietary driver licenses, encryption, DVD playback, audio codecs, DRM removal/ignorance. The hell with the licenses, the hell with local laws, put it all in there, release it as a Live CD, hosted only from Free countries / on PirateBay-type BT trackers. I think it would just blow people away to use an OS that didn't have any artificial limitations on it out of the box, just for once; an OS created as it ought to be created in the absence of political meddling. Not so much as an actual distro -- I'm not suggesting that it be maintained -- more as just a statement, a one-off curiosity.

Will linux have DRM in the future? Maybe. It could be mandated by law, or some other dirty trick.

The bad side is that it will happen in the future. The reason may not be the DRM or DMCA staff, but a patent lawsuit that will outlaw use of something under Linux, unless done as the patent holders intend it to be used.

The good part is that it won't happen in the EU. I will be able to use my European Linux distro, with all the non-US packages. This situation is not so far fetched. For example mplayer is illegal in the US, and distributed only by non-US distros. And not to forget the Penguin Liberation Front which is dedicated for all the outlawed packages...

The bottom line is that users in the US are already legally allowed to use only a crippled version of Linux. But on the other hand, I'm not living in the US :-)

Not a direct comment on ReinoutS answer but when using Mandriva PLF - Penguin Liberation Front is a must. If you lookup Easy urpmi it will give everything you need to get a proper Mandriva Update setup. Then you can just enjoy a better Mandriva ;) .

Not a direct comment on ReinoutS answer but when using Mandriva PLF - Penguin Liberation Front is a must. If you lookup Easy urpmi it will give everything you need to get a proper Mandriva Update setup. Then you can just enjoy a better Mandriva ;) .

I'm just guessing here, but I would think that unless you could prove that the freeware codecs were true clean-room reimplementations that didn't involve any of AT&T's IP (which it doesn't seem like anyone except AT&T has actually seen), then those codecs might have to get moved off of US servers and onto ones on friendlier shores.

I think the Penguin Liberation Front would probably be willing to host it.

A safer way:

1. Exit graphical enviroment and go to console (Ctrl-Alt-F1)
2.login as root and switch to runlevel 3 (telinit 3)
3.urpmi.removemedia -a
4. go to http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/index.php and set up sources for the release you want to upgrade to
5. urpmi --test urpmi (test if urpmi's upgrade works)
6. urpmi urpmi (if you get no errors in previous step)
7. urpmi --auto --auto-select --test (we want to make sure upgrade will work) If you have non-official rpm's/files, remove them and try again
8. urpmi --auto --auto-select
9. urpmi kernel
10. reboot

i. it downloads all needed rpm-packages
ii. it tests the installation and provides quite clear error messages
iii. it does *not* delete downloaded rpm-packages
iv. it does *not* change your current programs
v. when happy and you do not use "--test", as all the packages are already downloaded, your upgrade takes less time.
vi. if you had to remove any packages in step #7, after completing the upgrade, install new version with "urpmi offendingpackage"

you'll be up and running before you even get mandrake^H^H^H^Hriva iso's downloaded

Actualy, it will be faster to be up and running with Mandriva.

You can either download only one ISO image, or you can download the 12MB ISO for a network install, with fully GUI installer and all. I believe that debian netinstall ISO was around 85 MB.

This way, you can start installation after just downloading and burning an 12MB ISO.

And as for the software available for Mandriva, you have 12306 packages, plus the PLF packages.

So, right now, both Debian and Mandriva have more or less the same (very high) number of packages readily available with urpmi (CLI) / rpmdrake (GUI)

Peace

Since 9.2 onward, Mandrake's 'urpmi' tool has been excellent. It's the only other distro that I think compares with apt-get on Debian (I haven't any experience with portage, only ports on BSD).

The problem with RPM isn't the format, it's simply the RPM managers that have come previously weren't very good. apt4rpm and Yum are ok, but the repositories for Fedora Core and RH/Centos etc seem woefully incomplete compared to what you can find for Debian and mandrake. The end result is that you end up with a disillusioned feeling about RPM and package management with it in general.

If you set up good Mandrake repositories for PLF, JPackage, main, contrib, and updates, you can find most stuff, and urpmi is a very decent package manager. I've since switched from Mandrake to Kubuntu since the Kubuntu repositories just plain have more packages, but Mandrake/Mandriva is nonetheless excellent and it's still high on my list of good distros. I recommend that you give it another try if you're actually interested in Mandriva, and check out the current urpmi situation - it's a hell of a lot improved over the 8.2 days :)

Also, there's EasyUrpmi out there for setting up your package repos all in one shot with no annoying fiddling and googling for repos.

Or is there some aspects of the system that aren't GPL and can't be uploaded?

Yep. The powerpack versions (either the full DVD or 7 CD set) contain closed-source software and aren't redistrutable. The 4CD version (1 more than the publicly available download version) that's available to the lowest level of club membership should be alright though.

As always with Mandrake all the software available in the powerpack, except the closed-source stuff, and more is available through the mirrors listed at http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/

Easy way to do install MythTV-
Install Mandriva.

Go to Easy URPMI to setup your URPMI sources. The only one needed for MythTV is PLF Free. Use URPMI to install MythTV. Follow instructions from MythTV Wiki docs to setup. It is pretty easy if you have a basic clue in setting up a Linux system.

Almost all sound issues are due to a crappy onboard Sound Chip, avoid generic AC'97 sound like the plague. Realtek Audio chips will be ok. Video issues are usually a horsepower issue. If you are not using a PVR350/250 tuner, you really need something better than 1Ghz for the CPU. You probably need 2Ghz+ if you doing dual cheap tuners. While ATI cards cn be forced to work, it is a lot easier if you use an Nvidia card. (This assumes you are using a TV out, if you hooking up to say a projector with VGA, then just use the onboard video.)

I also recommend a MicroATX board. If money is no object then go for a Pentium M board. Otherwise save money and get a Socket 754 board and stick in a Sempron or Athlon64. Something like an Antec Truepower PWS with the thermal control fans would be nice. The Antec Neopower seems a bit overkill but the modular wiring would be a godsend in some MicroATX cases.

Well, take this: http://plf.zarb.org/logo.php

-A Test-

I personally like Linux, it does what I need, and it isn't an OS on training wheels or a system for the clueless by the monopoly. I spend the vast majority of my time being productive on my computer instead of maintaining it or calling support which costs money and time; and with no basic knowledge a Linux box runs very sweetly. The command line jokes are quite a dead horse, I have experienced having to go to command line on three occasions since Mandrake came out and that is because I don't use commercial versions, where all this is installed easily. Once was because of Java (proprietary), another was because of Flash (again proprietary, how strange); and the last was because of NVidia (proprietary, see a pattern ?). Other than that most application do NOT crashes and those that do (often experimental features, so I expect them to crash) are gentle and no information is lost. The only application that crashes sometimes is the Flash plugin (so it is Java in fact); It doesn't crash actually, it eats my CPU, which is worse, but is not always immediately perceptible in Linux, as Linux manages this so well you don't even notice sometimes. I can't remember a time that I lost what I was typing or the work I was doing. I do my professional work on a Linux box, and I play and relax on a Linux box (and sometimes one of my consoles); I have been a Linux user since I tried a Red Hat copy I bought in 1998. And to those that say Linux does not progress fast enough, go back and try Red Hat 7 or Mandrake 6; and try to say nothing has happened.

Linux gets its bad name from users who don't know how to follow some simple instructions on a site like "easy urpmi" (http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/); who willingly install development versions Firefox or Thunderbird by hand when stable and tested ones are available right from their distro. And from poor software packaged like in windows, doing what poor package does best : do not install or hose the package system for the worst ones (like Firefox).

Sure it has driver problems, but with proper precautions taken I have never experienced them.

-A Test-

Go to http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/ You can set up your sources for software with just a few clicks and a copy and paste into a terminal and away you go! Then you just remove the CDs as repository sources and you are all set.(do that through the MCC)

www.mandrivalinux.com
Click Download (in left hand menu like on most websites)
It clearly lays out the 3 options you have for it (club membership, boxed set and download edition). Now look in the table on the row that says 'Download Edition' go across to 'Download from public FTP mirrors'.
The next page is a list of mirrors by location.

How simple is that? You obviously didn't try very hard.

Also once you've installed it you can setup your software source automatically to get all the rest of the software (more than is in the boxed set almost, except for closed-source packages) by going to http://easyurpmi.zarb.org./

I would be very interested in finding these free urpmi repositories as every time I tried to find more, I kept running into "join mandrakeclub first"

The list is here: http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/

This is the answer to about half of the Mandrake related questions on any discussion board 'just go to easyurpmi, setup your sources and then install it from there'. Also in the latest version (2005LE) they have a convenient button in the software sources manager to setup all these free repos automatically.

There was no guessing as to "will this rpm have all the dependencies or do I have to search for those too?"

Not if you setup your repositories (which you have to do with Ubuntu's apt-get too BTW).

The Enterprise level doesn't have additional packagaes over the Mandrake Club Version. The Mandrake Club Version only has extra binary/non-free packages added.

To clarify, the Enterprise version is just a garunteed stable version, much like Debina stable. They also garuntee support for it for 5 years. There is nothing in it that you don't get with the regular version, except only security updates get applied to the Enterprise one for 5 years. For the small time user, big whoop.

To download the free version click here. It was like three clicks to find it.

I personally have found that Ubuntu does not have as good of hardware support as Mandrake/Mandriva. It is also a good idea to check the errata first as well.
EasyURPMI is a nice resource to add additional sources for packages.

I switched to Mandrake at mdk7.2. I was futzing around with RedHat 7.0 and not enjoying myself. The thing that did it for me was urpmi(not having to figure out RPM dependencies) and the fact that if I install tuxracer or any other app, it would be available under Gnome, KDE, Icewm, fvwm . . . twm via the pull down menus. That niceity is still there. What puts Mandriva on top of virtually everything else is the RPM repositories. With a broadband connection, you could just download the first ISO then use easy urpmi http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/ for the rest of the media. There is the main distro, contribs and, best of all, PLF. PLF has RPMs that aren't as "free" as we like (like lame, libdvdcss etc.) but it makes building typically difficult things like mythtv easy.

I still believe that mandriva is one of the best distros for noobs but it's advanced enough to make the harder things easy.

I am a member of the club $60.00/year, that and the RPM repositories available through PLF, I'm set. $60/year is IMHO less than windows costs at least for what I do with my system. If I weren't a member, I'd have to wait three or so weeks for the free ISOs to become available. If three weeks isn't worth $60 then don't pay and just wait a little.

As for the ISO availability versus bittorrent, the beta distro is NOT supported and will very likely be superceded in a few weeks. There WILL be showstopper bugs in the beta versions and unless you're interested in helping out and making bug reports, the beta isos aren't really worth downloading.

FWIW, Mandriva bought out Lycoris, so there could be a Mandriva-based Tablet OS sometime...

Mandrake was one of my favorite distros when I still had a Linux box running - urpmi meant no RPM hell (if you grabbed from urpmi repositories, of course, but with Easy URPMI, that wasn't bad at all). I remember HATING Red Hat. I don't care for Ubuntu. I'm giving Xandros (Open Circulation, of course) a try on Virtual PC, FWIW.

My recent upgrade from 10.0 to 10.1 is riddled with problems

do the people who download FREE versions of the distro get screwed?

I noticed that some software in RPM format asks you for a disk you never got in the download version