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A First Look At The Xandros Desktop

Gentu writes "OSNews has an exclusive article regarding the awaited Xandros Desktop. Xandros is the company who purchased the Corel Linux source code and rights, so in essense, this is the second generation of the once promising, Corel's Linux. OSNews previews beta 3b and they say that this distribution, along with Lycoris, Lindows (and possibly Red Hat 8), is the one to compete for the purely-for-the-desktop Linux market."

125 of 409 comments (clear)

  1. Here's a hint. by whizzmo · · Score: 3, Funny

    When showing off a new desktop, at least put a decent skin on Mozilla.

    I recommend Pinball .

    Your preferences may differ.

    --
    nuclear presidential echelon assassination encryption virulent strain
    Whizzmo
    1. Re:Here's a hint. by LinuxInDallas · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Most likely the reason they left Mozilla with the old-style Netscape skin was that a vast majority of us are very familiar with it. I instantly associate that look with Netscape. If you want the desktop to look familiar to Windows users then a Netscape look-a-like browser is a good start.

  2. Any one notice the resolution switcher? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    In screen shot 4 theres a resolution switcher ala windows where the hell has this been for the other distros?

    1. Re:Any one notice the resolution switcher? by dogas · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Even more interesting is the refresh rate switcher. That's certainly a sight for sore eyes.

      --
      'When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.' -HST
    2. Re:Any one notice the resolution switcher? by MsGeek · · Score: 2

      Lycoris does that.

      --
      Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
    3. Re:Any one notice the resolution switcher? by e_n_d_o · · Score: 2

      The current RedHat beta also introduces a "resolution switcher"... I agree, it's about time!

    4. Re:Any one notice the resolution switcher? by G-funk · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Unfortunately, the biggest problem with various distros, is most of them suffer from the worst kind of Not-Invented-Here syndrome :(

      We need a distro that just selects the best parts of others (say apt from debian, installer from redhat, etc etc), and start from a "best of breed" (god forgive me for using that phrase) linux and work from there.

      --
      Send lawyers, guns, and money!
    5. Re:Any one notice the resolution switcher? by falser · · Score: 4, Funny

      and start from a "best of breed"

      Does that mean we get to call it Linux BOB(TM) ?

    6. Re:Any one notice the resolution switcher? by Kynde · · Score: 2, Informative

      In screen shot 4 theres a resolution switcher ala windows where the hell has this been for the other distros?

      CTRL-ALT-KP_MINUS and CTRL-ALT-KP_PLUS ?
      Been around in X for quite some time.

      Or am I missing something?

      --
      1 Earth is warming, 2 It's us, 3 it's royally bad, 4 we need to take action NOW
    7. Re:Any one notice the resolution switcher? by SomeOtherGuy · · Score: 2

      We could call it "Linux Cannibal V1.0".

      All kidding aside...I think that was the best question of the day. You would think someone would piece together a distribution that included all of the varied "little things" that all of the other distributions have created over the years.

      --
      (+1 Funny) only if I laugh out loud.
  3. Re:No thanks by GoatPigSheep · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Thats too bad that it looks like win98, if they want windows converts it's going to have to look like winXP.

    --
    GoatPigSheep, the 3 most important food groups
  4. Rip on it all you want, but . . . by AriesGeek · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'm personally sick of my parents complaining about how slow their computer is, even though they only use it for e-mail and web browsing. I have been wanting to get them off of Windows 98 for a long time now, but since they are so computer illiterate, I have been afraid to. This could very well be the OS that will get the away from Windows. We'll see.

    The point is that this isn't necessarily the right distro for us, but it could very well be for our parents/grandparents/sons/daughters/alien sex fiends.

    As usual, just my dos centavos.

    --
    Insert offensive troll-style sig here. Please mod or respond appropriately.
  5. Completely missing the point by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful
    I can see it now--there will be a deluge of posts here from people debating whether Linux should look like Windows, how wildly configurable the UI should be, etc.

    But this completely misses the point. The thing that's keeping Linux off the desktops of all those millions of Windows users is the lack of compatibility with the programs that those users want to run. Got a way to run all of MS Office, including all macros, keyboard shortcuts, etc.? How about Quicken? How about the stack of games the user or his/her kid has at home? How about the one text editor that the user finally found that he or she likes (and without having to spend hours reconfiguring a Linux editor to mimic it)?

    All the pretty UI work in the world won't make any difference at all to users if the system won't run what they think is important.

    1. Re:Completely missing the point by billstr78 · · Score: 2

      You're absolutly correct. Sort of. Correct me if I am wrong, but doese'nt WINE give emulate a windows environment and allow the execution of many win32 apps? Also, many newbs and kids still in grade school have a shot at starting out on the alterternatives like OpenOffice or the KOffice suite if they are activly developed and contributed to by companies like Corel.

      Inovate, Don't Imitate.

    2. Re:Completely missing the point by dioxide · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You're absolutly correct. Sort of. Correct me if I am wrong, but doese'nt WINE give emulate a windows environment and allow the execution of many win32 apps? Also, many newbs and kids still in grade school have a shot at starting out on the alterternatives like OpenOffice or the KOffice suite if they are activly developed and contributed to by companies like Corel.


      yes.. but its so friggin hard to make a lot of programs work, it isnt feasable to expect anyone not in the scene to do it themselves.

    3. Re:Completely missing the point by cornice · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I mostly agree with you but there is still room in this world for a Windows clone that works better than Windows - more stable, more secure, more free. There are plenty of distros that are not Windows clones. There are projects that are inventive, that do ground breaking work. I don't blame anyone for trying to fill this particular niche. It's a big niche if you do it just right.

    4. Re:Completely missing the point by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Precisely! It can look like Windows all it wants, the fact is, Linux != Windows, it doesn't run Windows binaries, and there will be an infinite number of places where the "it's Windows, really" delusion/illusion falls flat on its face.

      Frankly, I'm unsure that sending someone who is used to Windows this distro is any good -- they get confused, think Linux is just like windows, find out it doesn't quite work like they expected, doesn't run half their programs, emulates the other half with half-assed versions from vendors that truly don't give a shit, and then decide that "Linux sucks."

      When I switched to Linux from Windows 2000, I ran Blackbox with bbpager and the "operations" theme. Was it entirely different? Yes. And no shit, it's a different OS, with differing apps. What did you expect?

      Xandros claims to target Windows users. But if you really want Windows, go run the real thing, please! If (when) you're truly ready to try something different, cast away your previous ideas about what a computer can do and how it should respond to you, and try out a different way of interacting with your machine!

    5. Re:Completely missing the point by dead+sun · · Score: 2, Interesting
      I think the point is to make something presentable. If it runs everything the user wants, but behaves like Win95 I don't think the end user is going to be as happy either. There are alternatives to many apps out there that are pretty decent. And really, most home users, the desktop sitting there in the family room user, probably don't care much about full macro support for their word processor. That's businessy stuff. They want something that will let them do what they need, most likely web and email with some light word processing and maybe some other stuff. Important stuff like solitare or minesweeper.

      That said, the screenshots on that page looked absolutely god-awful. I wouldn't let that theme sit there for a second. I personally don't care if it looks like windows or not, but the screenshots looked like the desktop was a cold, lifeless thing, not something I would want peeking out around my apps. If you're pushing pretty UI work like you say won't make a difference, at least do that well. I think that without both usability and a bit of aesthetics you're going to lose users. Not many Joe-users I know want to their desktop to look like its going backwards, regardless of how progressive it may really be under the hood.

      --
      If not now, when?
    6. Re:Completely missing the point by IamTheRealMike · · Score: 2
      LOL, that's a good pick of apps you've got there.



      Codeweavers/Transgaming Wine does every single one of them. It does Office, it's in beta testing for Quicken, it plays games, and it runs TextPad which is imho the best Windows text editor.



      Windows compatability gets better every single week. Just read the kernel cousins!

    7. Re:Completely missing the point by James+Durie · · Score: 2, Funny

      > Think nothing is impossible? Try slamming a
      > revolving door

      That's easy!

      Just make sure someone is coming through before you slam it.

      James

    8. Re:Completely missing the point by Anonymous+Conrad · · Score: 2, Informative

      Windows compatability gets better every single week.

      Does Microsoft give Office technical support for WINE installs?

      Why run it in an emulator at all when you could run the real thing?

      If you're willing to shell out for the Office suite, why aren't you willing to buy or use the OS?

      And Win2k *is* stable.

    9. Re:Completely missing the point by CurlyG · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Hmm, obvious troll, but here goes anyway, just in case someone that's not already totally cynical about these issues is reading...

      Does Microsoft give Office technical support for WINE installs?

      No. But it doesn't charge for it either. If you want the benefits of *nix without the enslavement of The Microsoft Way, and you *must* have 100% compatibility with your colleague's MS apps, it's a no-brainer. (Anyway, have you personally ever actually tried to get any of the 'support' that's offered with MS consumer products?)

      Why run it in an emulator at all when you could run the real thing?

      Just because you must run Office for some reason doesn't mean you have to pay for software that you don't want or need, particularly when that software is deficient in ways that are significant to you.

      If you're willing to shell out for the Office suite, why aren't you willing to buy or use the OS?

      Why would I buy a product that I don't want, and that can't do the job I want satisfactorily? Would you buy an Intel web-cam just because you've got a Pentium CPU on your mobo?

      And Win2k *is* stable.

      If by that you mean that it's more stable than its predecessors then yes, there's no doubt at all. If, however, you mean that it's capable of staying up under load for months or years at a time, of having its major services patched on the run without a reboot, and of having its source-code analysed line-by-line by a customer until an unreported bug is found and cured... well... do I have to draw a picture for you?

      --
      You know they call 'em fingers but I've never seen 'em fing. Oh, there they go.
    10. Re:Completely missing the point by Anonymous+Conrad · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Maybe I *am* cynical. Or maybe I haven't been brainwashed that WINE on Linux is the universal panacea :-p

      This story's about *desktop* installs. Win2k makes a very good desktop. It does everything you'd expect of a desktop machine. You can get all the usual suspect GNU utilities ported to it. I don't need my desktop to stay up under load for months or years. I can patch almost everything without reboot, barring a handful of shared libraries or in-use drivers. I know it runs Office as well as anything because Microsoft will have QAed Office on it. I don't expect to have to trawl through the source line-by-line if there's a problem - that's why people pay MS for their software. It's not commercially sensible that I have to maintain the source of the OS I'm using in work time when we can shift that burden for a few hundred bucks a seat.

      I haven't *needed* to use MS support since 1994. We had a Win3.11 network problem. They were very helpful.

    11. Re:Completely missing the point by MeNeXT · · Score: 2
      Yes!! Great point!


      Where are my moderator points when I can use them?

      --
      DRM? No thanks, I'll just get it somewhere else...
    12. Re:Completely missing the point by TandyMasterControl · · Score: 2
      Does Microsoft give Office technical support for WINE installs?
      No of course not. And you won't be missing anything not having it.

      Why run it in an emulator at all when you could run the real thing?
      You will be able to run Office from a central app server thanks to X, with one installation for multiple users. This is already possible with Codeweavers for a fee. Soon it will be free.

      -why aren't you willing to buy or use the OS?
        • Lock in ?

        • Reboots?

        • Horrendous fucking Licensing Terms and Costs?

        • Nazi auditors tossing your MIS offices upside down?

      I think those are all the reasons any sane person would ever need.

      --
      Johnny Quest has two Daddies.
    13. Re:Completely missing the point by ZaMoose · · Score: 2

      "Patch almost everything without reboot"? Errrm, SP3? Office SPs? IE updates? Media player? Anything that's from Microsoft? Last I checked, every bloody one of those required a reboot...

      Non-MS software can usually be "patched" sans-reboot, although I've noticed a distrubing trend in games to force/reccommend a reboot after an install/patch procedure.

      --
      I wish I had a kryptonite cross, because then you could keep Dracula and Superman away.
  6. No offense... by Wakko+Warner · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...but why is it that every Linux Desktop Environment invariably looks like Windows 98?

    - A.P.

    --
    "Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
    1. Re:No offense... by VivianC · · Score: 2, Interesting

      ...but why is it that every Linux Desktop Environment invariably looks like Windows 98?

      Simple, so you don't have to retrain every secretary in the office on how to find a word processor. A better question might be "Why does every Windows OS look like Apple's from 1985?" Have we really reached the apex of GUI design?

      --
      Viv

      Gmail invites for ip
    2. Re:No offense... by Foaf · · Score: 2, Insightful

      like windows 98 but with shittier fonts. Those screenshots didn't exactly scream "use me!".

    3. Re:No offense... by gmhowell · · Score: 5, Funny

      Not the secretaries: the execs. Secretaries, janitors, fry cooks, etc. are trainable. Executives OTOH...

      --
      Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
    4. Re:No offense... by Zork+the+Almighty · · Score: 4, Funny

      ...but why is it that every Linux Desktop Environment invariably looks like Windows 98?

      Because if you show people an OS with a more efficient interface AND it doesn't crash, they will just freak out. That's why Macs have such a low market share, as soon as people see one, they go running out the door screaming for help.

      I'm sure someone can do something good with THAT...

      --

      In Soviet America the banks rob you!
    5. Re:No offense... by Bartab · · Score: 2

      Blackbox looks like Windows? Could have fooled me.

      --
      Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo.
    6. Re:No offense... by evbergen · · Score: 2, Insightful

      They are, but somehow I don't believe that anybody uses those for day to day work, or even play. I couldn't help thinking "what's the use, other than the visual experience that you'll be able to endure about 5 minutes". It's nice as an artwork example, but completely useless as an example of a well designed GUI.

      --
      All generalizations are false, including this one. (Mark Twain)
    7. Re:No offense... by Jason+Earl · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You are absolutely correct in what Microsoft should do faced with the growing competition from Linux, OpenOffice, and the rest. Microsoft should drastically reduce their prices, cotton up to OEMs like Dell, and generally do a better job of pleasing their customers.

      However, if you think that this is what is actually happening, then you are smoking crack. I completely agree with you about the question of stability. For the most part Microsoft's newest OSes are stable enough, especially for the desktop.

      Your belief that Microsoft is lowering prices, however, is completely false. The vast majority of home users stick with whatever OS (and software) their computer came with. There never really was an upgrade market for home users. Corporate users, on the other hand, are finding that Microsoft is pushing them inexorably towards software leasing. That way Microsoft gets paid no matter if they write new software or not. The new corporate licensing schemes are far more expensive than their predecessors for all but the most gung-ho bleeding edge Microsoft users.

      The reality of the situation is that Microsoft has got to keep growing their business or their stock price is going to head even further south, and they are going to have to do so without being able to grow their market share. For years Microsoft's server revenues have grown at the expense of Novell and commercial UNIX, but Linux has finally cut them off. Further gains in the server market are going to be much smaller than in the past. Microsoft also can't count on too much growth in the desktop software. The first world countries are saturated, and the second and third world countries have massive piracy rates or are looking seriously at Linux. No matter what happens those folks aren't going to pay Microsoft prices for software any time soon. And don't even get me started on the XBox or any of the other businesses that Microsoft is dabbling in.

      So where is Microsoft going to get the growth that they need to keep their stock prices up? They are going to get it by squeezing the customers they already have. The new licensing plans are just the beginning. You see, Microsoft management and employees simply have too much of their money tied up in Microsoft stock. If growth and revenues flatten out then their stock price will suffer.

      I agree wholeheartedly with the rest of your piece. The race is no longer about stability. The battle now is between Microsoft's more familiar (and more consistent) GUI and their wide array of applications against Linux's price and flexibility. I just happen to think that Microsoft is going to turn up the burner a bit on price, at least for corporate users.

    8. Re:No offense... by Arandir · · Score: 2

      Sigh... Why is it everyone thinks *NIX desktops looks like Windows?

      Windowmaker, Blackbox, Enlightenment, XFCE. No comparison. Let's move on...

      IceWM. Okay, there is a resemblance. I suspect it's deliberate. Let's move on...

      The big two desktops on *Nix: KDE and GNOME. What exactly makes them look like Windows as opposed to Mac, OS/2, BeOS, CDE, etc?

      As near as I can tell, it's because they have icons on the desktop, a panel on the bottom, a root menu on the panel, and window decorations with min/max/close buttons. But that's like complaining that Fords look like Chryslers because they both have hoods, trunks and steering wheels.

      Looking at OS/2, Mac, CDE, BeOS, and QNX, I find that they all have those same elements. Some of them had them before Windows did. Some of those elements even predate DOS!

      --
      A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
    9. Re:No offense... by perlyking · · Score: 2

      yeah... like XFCE :-)

      http://www.xfce.org/snapshots.html#TOP

      Seriously though I agree, this just looks like a bad attempt at copying windows and looks worse than normal KDE into the bargain.

      --
      no sig.
    10. Re:No offense... by mpe · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The reality of the situation is that Microsoft has got to keep growing their business or their stock price is going to head even further south, and they are going to have to do so without being able to grow their market share.

      Which is something they cannot do indefinitly anyway. It's only a matter of time before Microsoft falls over, unless they radically change their business model.

    11. Re:No offense... by edremy · · Score: 3, Informative

      Still, the majority of Windows users are still probably using an older version of Windows with their 2-3 year-old desktop machines, and are in no rush to buy a new computer.

      Actually, no. The numbers are basically dead-even, at least according to the Google Zeitgeist: 49% of users are Win98/95, 46% are on XP/W2k/NT. (ME's not listed, probably buried in Other.) We've gotten rid of 98 (in favor of W2K) on our campus with the exception of a few old laptops that won't run anything else and other schools I know of have done the same.

      --
      "Seven Deadly Sins? I thought it was a to-do list!"
    12. Re:No offense... by arkanes · · Score: 2

      Except for the horridly ugly gnome/tk style widgets. Spit. Love the menu and title bars, though.

    13. Re:No offense... by Schnapple · · Score: 2

      Actually something I've noticed with XP is that most stuff that required reboots before now don't anymore. I use W2K at work and XP Pro at the house and things I install on both will require a reboot on 2K and not on XP. Sometimes I'll reboot XP just to be safe (God, that's almost depressing). I think it has to do with the "DLL-Hell" curing aspects of the Fusion notion in Whistler products (like .NET server).

    14. Re:No offense... by Jason+Earl · · Score: 2

      Generally speaking any company with the kind of revenue and profit margin that Microsoft has is going to seem pretty healthy. However, Microsoft is somewhat different than most companies. The reason for this is the amount of money that Microsoft and their own employees have invested in their own stock. For example, if Microsoft had to expense their stock options, then they would actually be losing money. What's making the difference is that Microsoft has been able to keep their numbers positive enough that the investment community is more than happy enough to keep the price of Microsoft stock up. Microsoft then uses their stock options to pay their employees. Since this doesn't cost Microsoft any money (on paper anyway), they come away smelling like a rose. Every once in a while they announce a big stock buy back (usually when their stock is a little soft) and things are good.

      This is part of the reason that Microsoft isn't paying dividends right now. They know that the second that they start acting like an established business and not a high growth start up that investors will start treating them more like Sears and less like the high flier that they always have been. In the long run this would be good for Microsoft's business, but it would clobber their stock price in the short run, and since most Microsoftees are heavily invested in Microsoft stock that is not an option that they are likely to take lightly.

      The fact of the matter is that Microsoft could destroy Linux if they were focused on business goals and not on the stock price. Instead of raising prices on corporate customers they could be lowering them. The fact of the matter is that no one really wants to switch. Switching is hard and costs money. However, the savings possible with Linux (especially on the server side) are simply too great to be ignored. Instead of lowering their prices and hanging onto these customers Microsoft is raising their prices on corporate customers. Once again the problem is that Microsoft has structured their whole business around their stock price, and eventually that is going to bite them.

      This is not even mentioning the real threat to Microsoft's business either. The real threat is that individuals and companies will start using less expensive office suites. Both HP and Dell are now bundling PerfectOffice, and OpenOffice is looking pretty good. Switching to Linux is hard, switching to PerfectOffice or OpenOffice is much easier, and it saves far more money.

  7. Well... by NamShubCMX · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I'm not sure I love the look, but it seems I found the distro I'm gonna install on my parents' box...

    --
    We've always been at war with Eurasia.
  8. windows 98 by ottothecow · · Score: 2, Insightful
    looking like windows 98 is fine for someone who WANTS to change and needs a nice learning curve

    but, this is so close that an average user might just look at it and think, "this looks a lot like windows, it must be a cheap knockoff and probobly crashes even more" and then the same person might look at osX and think "this is pretty cool looking and I have heard a lot about this and its nothing like the windows gui, it must also crash a lot less"

    maybe if there was a newbie installer that gave the user a 5 minute or so period in several different gui's in which they were assigned a few simple tasks to complete (open a word proccessor, find some settings, go to a web pate, etc.) then they would have something to base their choice on in a friendly manner

    --
    Bottles.
  9. but... by emmons · · Score: 2, Informative

    Aye, but he's not the man who founded OSNews, nor is he the man who's currently in charge. In fact, he didn't even write the article- that person is Eugenia Loli-Queru of BeNews fame.

    So no, nothing fishy here.

    --
    Do you even know anything about perl? -- AC Replying to Tom Christiansen post.
    1. Re:but... by emmons · · Score: 2

      Ok, but my point still stands.. the poster is trying to make a conspiracy theory out of nothing. Eugenia isn't covertly trying to boost RedHat's stock price or anything through this article. The only mention of RedHat is "Comparing this distro to Lycoris Build50 beta or the latest Red Hat Null beta, well, it does not look as sexy or good-looking". I don't see any terrible bias in that, do you?

      --
      Do you even know anything about perl? -- AC Replying to Tom Christiansen post.
  10. You can configure it. by Mustang+Matt · · Score: 2

    I used to have my system setup so I could hit control,shift,+ or - and go up or down between my programmed modes.

    Great fun.

    --
    The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
  11. What is it with these reviews of commercial stuff? by dbarclay10 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Seriously. I've been seeing this more and more. NewsForge and linux.com, in particular, are pretty bad for this.

    You see a review, and it says something like: "the big players in the Linux "purely-desktop market" are Lycoris, Lindows, ELX and the much awaited Xandros".

    Good god! Mandrake, anybody? What they really mean is "the big players who may actually give us money to review their products are Lycoris, Lindows, ELX, and Xandros".

    Absolutely pitiful. I see gobs and gobs of sites reviewing commerical *nix software these days, COMPLETELY IGNORING the more stable, mature, full-featured, robust, and easier-to-use open source/free software alternatives.

    OSNews hasn't been as bad for this, in my experience, but I'm going to be watching very closely from now on.

    --

    Barclay family motto:
    Aut agere aut mori.
    (Either action or death.)
  12. 2 Requests for the Xandros Team by mbourgon · · Score: 3, Insightful

    1) Work on those taskbar icons. Y'all can do better.
    2) PLEASE let there be an easy "Internet Sharing" wizard.

    --
    "Sometimes a woman is a kind of religion, she can save your soul & set you free from all your sins" - Bad Examples
  13. Re:More choices by MaxVlast · · Score: 3, Funny

    Then how can it do presentations? I wanted to make PowerPoint presentations. I was told Linux could do that. How do I make it print envelopes?

    --
    There should be a moratorium on the use of the apostrophe.
    Max V.
    NeXTMail/MIME Mail welcome
  14. Re:More choices by Com2Kid · · Score: 2

    Then how can it do presentations? I wanted to make PowerPoint presentations. I was told Linux could do that. How do I make it print envelopes?

    Don't laugh, I got this one from a person yesterday.

    Bleh.

  15. The little penguin... by '57 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I just wanna know if Xandros will have the cute little plastic Tux included in the box like Corel did!

  16. Contributions from slashdot?! by krokodil · · Score: 3, Funny
    http://www.xandros.com/linux.html :

    As a software company in the Linux space, Xandros benefits from and recognizes the phenomenal contributions of the following groups (to name a few): The Linux Kernel Archive, The GNU Project ... Slashdot .

    I wonder what Slashdot contribution is: first posts of idea bewoulf clustering?

  17. Why Win9x style? by gotr00t · · Score: 2, Interesting

    One of the very minor reasons why I switched to Linux some time back was because I didn't like the look of M$ Windows. It was ugly, blocky, and generally gave me hardly any options to customise the widget and window decoration, which is what I like about KDE. It allows me to do that, plus a lot more stuff which Windows dosen't even hint at. Purely at a desktop OS stance, I feel that they made a bad choice going for the Win9x look, as it looks repulsive and just gives a bad feel to the distro, as it appears to be a cheap ripoff. Many people have labeled KDE a Windows Desktop clone, which I do not believe, as it is FAR superior to the Windows desktop. It supports applets in the panel, and the panel looks much better when it's in normal mode, and not small mode (like in the screenshots). This distro only heightens their claim. A good solution is not to try and clone the Windows desktop, but rather to make something better than it.

  18. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  19. Thoughts on a more modern GUI by mkldev · · Score: 3, Insightful
    I'm probably going to get modded down for this, but.... :-)

    It occurs to me that what the Linux community needs is not another hacked-up KDE knock-off, but a real ground-up GUI. By GUI, I don't mean an X11 WM, I mean a complete GUI. Some lessons can be learned from Mac OS X's graphics system.

    Point 1: Dump X11 entirely. It's a lot easier to write libraries to display X11 apps in a different environment than it is to make X11 into a modern graphics environment. Its development began 18 years ago (released 14 years ago), and frankly, its age shows, both in performance and in functionality.

    Point 2: OpenGL compositing a la Quartz Extreme. Windows become patterns mapped onto a plane. 3D graphics are tightly integrated into the same screen model.

    Point 3: With the exception of bitmaps (which you map as a pattern), draw all the 2d windows using 3d primitives, say as a variant of splines that have thickness, located just in front of a 2d plane.

    I'm not sure how hard this would be, but the basic thinking behind this idea is to take a traditional PDF or PostScript-style bezier curve model and map it into 3d primitives so that it can be rendered in hardware.

    I suspect that such a design may go farther than is practical given current graphics hardware speeds, but if someone were to write such software, eventually the hardware would catch up and such a thing would then become practical, assuming it isn't already.

    Point 4: Do not use a client-server model. It made sense in 1984. It doesn't make sense in 2002. Most people don't have graphical terminals connected to big centralized servers these days. A client-server model can easily be grafted onto a local model if it is designed correctly. By contrast, local communication via a client-server model tends to cause a speed penalty.

    Before you ask, no, I don't have the time to design such a system, and it would be a conflict of interest if I did. That having been said, I certainly think it would be cool if someone pulled it off.... :-)

    --
    120 character sigs suck. Make it 250.
    1. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by rhysweatherley · · Score: 5, Insightful
      Those who don't understand X are doomed to re-invent it ... poorly.

      Point 1: Dump X11 entirely. It's a lot easier to write libraries to display X11 apps in a different environment than it is to make X11 into a modern graphics environment. Its development began 18 years ago (released 14 years ago), and frankly, its age shows, both in performance and in functionality.
      X11 has great performance. Unfortunately, few toolkits use it well. It works best when you think of it as a stream: you send asynchronous requests to the display server and it handles them, responding with asynchronous events. As soon as you make a request to the display server that requires a synchronous response, performance is gone.
      Point 2: OpenGL compositing a la Quartz Extreme. Windows become patterns mapped onto a plane. 3D graphics are tightly integrated into the same screen model.
      Point 3: With the exception of bitmaps (which you map as a pattern), draw all the 2d windows using 3d primitives, say as a variant of splines that have thickness, located just in front of a 2d plane.
      Berlin was doing this. Ain't exactly taking over the world at the moment. 99% of all apps don't require anything more fancy than 2D drawing primitives and a few icon pixmaps. For every canvas-based, client-side, anti-aliased app I've seen, I've seen 10 boring apps written by people who understand X11 that perform 10 times better.
      Point 4: Do not use a client-server model. It made sense in 1984. It doesn't make sense in 2002. Most people don't have graphical terminals connected to big centralized servers these days. A client-server model can easily be grafted onto a local model if it is designed correctly. By contrast, local communication via a client-server model tends to cause a speed penalty.
      Client/server is fundamental to the design of both Unix and X11. Try this: administer your parent's Windows or Mac machine from your home 100 miles away, as though you were sitting right there. Can't do it? Now try this: install Linux. Ssh in and type linuxconf. There's a reason why this works in Unix systems: clear separation of client from server.

      The speed penalty only happens because people don't use X11 asynchronously, or they try to use it in raw bitmap mode instead of learning what all those pesky XDrawLine, XDrawString, etc functions do.

    2. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by spitzak · · Score: 3, Interesting
      I agree with most of your points except about client-server. Client-server is actually one of the fastest ways to get things done because it is naturally multi-threaded. Check up on what the most advanced graphics cards have on them before you say that client-server is obsolete (hint a "graphics processer" which is (in X terms) a SERVER!!!)

      Basically a correctly designed client/server requires many ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE fewer context switches to get data on the screen. Not a measly 2 or 3 like people claim kernel servers give you, I'm talking about a reduction of 10000 times in system overhead. The reason is that it is trivial to batch requests together.

      The known problem with client-server is latency. This has to be addressed anyway if you want any kind of remote interaction, even if it is supposed to be an add-on like VNC. Also everybody doing network programming is well aware of latency, and latency between the program and the screen ain't so bad if there is also latency between

      The other problem with X is incredibly bad design such that many of the calls require a round-trip synchronization with the server. If you want to draw in arbitrary color c you must send c to the server, wait for it to respond with a "color cell" n and send n as the current color, and then you are ready to draw a thousand line segments in that color. But if you want to draw 1000 line segments in different colors, suddenly you have 2000 times more system overhead than before! Of course you could cache the colors, but that just shows the bad design of X so that you have to write complex stuff on the local end to talk to it. Any sensible design would take the original color c directly to set the color. (of course my description is simplified, but X is loaded with this crap).

      PostScript was originally designed to be a 3-D system with perspective projection (I'm not sure if they intended to do depth buffer, probably not). 3D projections should not be much overhead if you have a bit that detects it so you use the 2D pipeline when possible. Some hardware will do a 4x4 perspective matrix multiply as fast as a 2x3 PostScript matrix, so it may not matter.

      Variable-width splines are best handled at the near end. A more efficient communication would be to send the outline of the resulting fill area.

      Pixmaps (what I think you meant by "bitmap") should be 3D as well, drawing them should be transformed through the 3D projection so that each pixel is a 1x1 square in the input coordianate space with z=0. All 3D graphics hardware can do this easily, it's what texture mapping is.

      "Windows" could be off-screen images that you draw, using the normal graphics, and these are then mapped through 3D transformations and comped on the screen, giving you not only overlapping with transparency but the ability to distort windows arbitrarily without messing up programs that assumme they can read the bits back.

    3. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by renoX · · Score: 3, Interesting

      > X11 has great performance. Unfortunately, few toolkits use it well. It works best when you think of it as a stream: you send asynchronous requests to the display server and it handles them, responding with asynchronous events.

      Asynchronous request are good for performance, but bad for responsiveness.
      A Berlin-like scheme where the server can show the pop-up etc should have better responsiveness.

      > 99% of all apps don't require anything more fancy than 2D drawing primitives and a few icon pixmaps.

      What's your point ?
      The idea is to be able to have real transparency, independency of resolution GUI not especially fancy effects.

      As for Berlin not taking over the world: why are you using Linux?
      It is not currently taking over the world!

      > client/server is fundamental to the design of both Unix and X11. Try this: administer your parent's Windows or Mac machine from your home 100 miles away, as though you were sitting right there. Can't do it?

      AFAIK remote GUI can be done in Windows with VNC, so it shows that you can have fast,responsive local GUI and remote GUI at the same time.
      Just don't use X11.

    4. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by cgenman · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Your heart is in the right place, but there is something fundamental that you are missing. A GUI can only be as clean and understandable as the information it is trying to convey. Putting a pretty GUI on linux just serves to point out how totally non-intuitive most of Linux is for the home user.

      I think it is time for a radical fork. Desktop Linux.

      Desktop Linux would put everything you would normally find on the first level of your hard drive into a "system" folder in a "linux" folder. That linux folder would also hold the configuration and kernel utilities that are normally hidden from anything but a command prompt call. It would assume root status for specific actions of the local user if prompted by dialog box, and would auto-mount any drive it was given. There would be no remote administration utilities. A more crash-resistant low level format for the hard drive would have to be chosen, as would many, many little utilities. Nothing would require the command line. And of course, (the impossible) binary compatibility with existing Linux apps would have to be preserved.

      No, I don't think it is possible either, and I rather think the better idea is to help invest in OpenBE or another desktop-oriented Open Source project.

      Linux, not surprisingly, still isn't a desktop-oriented OS project.

    5. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by sjmurdoch · · Score: 2

      X11 has great performance. Unfortunately, few toolkits use it well.

      Could you please tell us which toolkits use X11 well - this would be very useful for future reference.

      I've seen 10 boring apps written by people who understand X11 that perform 10 times better.

      Again any examples - preferably open source - I would like to try them out and see how they work?
      --
      Steven Murdoch.
      web: http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/users/sjm217/
    6. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by infiniti99 · · Score: 2

      The problems with X that people have are really not the fault of X11, but instead XFree86.

      Want to know the number 1 reason a Linux box freezes? XFree86 !

      Ever seen X-win32, or other X servers for Windows? That's what I want on Linux. What this gives us is an abstraction of display layer and X server, which means that X would probably never have the power to bring the system down.

      Instead, the graphics / display layer would be handled by DirectFB (http://www.directfb.org/). I can go on about the many reasons why this is a better model:

      1) With the Linux Framebuffer (and DirectFB), we use the kernel for our graphics driver, which is something we should have been doing all along. Ever tried to combine XFree86 and svgalib? or the framebuffer? It's shaky ground, and most often results in a loud *BOOM*. With the kernel managing all of your video and actually knowing what the hell is going on means much better video stability.

      2) On a similar note, DirectFB also uses whatever mouse you have setup in your kernel. No config files, it just works.

      3) The Linux Framebuffer does not require root access to use. Rather, you just chmod your /dev/fb device. Easy! Why are we running around with XFree86 as setuid root?

      4) Applications can access the local video directly for fast graphics access, and if they want they could use X also. This is the opposite of the current design, which is that you are always remote and you have to "ask" for local priveledge. Does anyone else find it totally backasswards that Quake requires X11 to run?

      In short, don't dump X. But I say reorganize this whole display layer mess. We really can have our cake and eat it too. Just look at X-win32... and MacOS X....

      DirectFB is really looking cool. I'm actually using it right now for my X display (and I'm only running X apps, so I'm not really gaining any accel at the moment). All in all, the DirectFB desktop is still not yet ready for prime time, but I'll be waiting :)

    7. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by Wiwi+Jumbo · · Score: 2, Interesting
      X11 has great performance. Unfortunately, few toolkits use it well. It works best when you think of it as a stream: you send asynchronous requests to the display server and it handles them, responding with asynchronous events. As soon as you make a request to the display server that requires a synchronous response, performance is gone.
      I'm sorry, perhaps I don't quite understand this, but are you saying that if I click on a icon to select it (say highlighting it blue or something), that's something that X11 isn't good at?
      --
      Wiwi
      "I trust in my abilities,
      but I want more then they offer"
    8. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by mbourgon · · Score: 2

      Please don't mod on this - yeah it's offtopic, but the best forum to ask is /.

      What are the downsides to DirectFB? I'm looking at the site now, and some of the FAQs and the like are down. I believe that DirectFB is part of ByzantineOS, in which case one downside is that DFB requires a Vesa 2.0 card, which apparently my Dimension l500c doesn't have(?!). Granted, it's a 3-year-old machine (and I now date myself), but what's considered modern enough?

      What other advantages to DFB are there?

      Many thanks. So much for my +1 on that other thread...

      --
      "Sometimes a woman is a kind of religion, she can save your soul & set you free from all your sins" - Bad Examples
    9. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by tuffy · · Score: 2
      As for Berlin not taking over the world: why are you using Linux? It is not currently taking over the world!

      Berlin doesn't have any significant apps yet, AFAIK, which really puts a damper on adoption. Linux and XFree86 actually had plenty of programs available for them when they were built - which is why we're still using X11 now.

      AFAIK remote GUI can be done in Windows with VNC, so it shows that you can have fast,responsive local GUI and remote GUI at the same time. Just don't use X11.

      VNC isn't particularly fast, and it can't compensate for the "1 user per computer" paradigm that many OSes are built with. For example, using X11 clients, several people can all use GUI applications from a single remote computer; VNC would realistically only allow one person to use the desktop at a time because it's basically a KVM-over-ethernet.

      In any case, a replacement for X11 is likely to have its client-server capabilities anyway. But without apps, nobody's going to bother to switch no matter how much better such a replacement might be.

      --

      Ita erat quando hic adveni.

    10. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by infiniti99 · · Score: 2

      Pro:

      From what I understand, DirectFB provides something similar to what DirectX does on Windows. Basically there are a set of operations that DFB can do, and it will try to do them in hardware if possible, otherwise it will fall back to software mode. The Linux Framebuffer does not provide an abstraction like this by itself, which is why we need DFB.

      Con:

      Limited driver support. You can use any card that has a kernel fb driver (even VESA, with software rendered transparency and everything :) ), but you'll only get acceleration if DFB has support specifically for that card. From what I can tell, only the Matrox has near-full support. The rest are lacking.

    11. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by renoX · · Score: 2

      I'm not saying that VNC is fast, I'm saying that you can have a very fast & responsive "single node" GUI as BeOS and implement on top of it a remote GUI layer as VNC does.

      When you have a remote GUI, it won't be as responsive as a local app anyway, so why not add the burden there instead of paying it also for local application?

      I'm not saying that the "remote GUI functionnality" should be optionnal: I use it everyday at work, I mean that it should be at the right place so that we could have fast local GUI and export display.

    12. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by Ian+Bicking · · Score: 2
      VNC isn't particularly fast, and it can't compensate for the "1 user per computer" paradigm that many OSes are built with. For example, using X11 clients, several people can all use GUI applications from a single remote computer; VNC would realistically only allow one person to use the desktop at a time because it's basically a KVM-over-ethernet.
      VNC can be made faster if you tune it for a particular environment. The server and client find a lowest-common-denominator of communication, so you can increase the efficiency of either side without losing backward compatibility (and if both server and client support high level graphical descriptions and toolkit integration, you should see speedups).

      Of course, VNC cannot make Windows multiuser. But VNC does not impose any single-user paradigm on a computer. It is entirely possible to have multiple VNC clients connecting to multiple VNC servers on the same computer, each as a different user.

      VNC, as it is, does not integrate terribly well with the native user paradigm -- it won't start up new sessions when a user first logs in, for instance. This is not a big problem, just one that no one has bothered to solve.

      In any case, a replacement for X11 is likely to have its client-server capabilities anyway. But without apps, nobody's going to bother to switch no matter how much better such a replacement might be.
      Any realistic plan to recreate a graphics system involves porting the major toolkits -- at least GTK and Qt. GTK I know has a significant abstraction layer which hides Xlib from the program entirely. By porting GTK you will have ported most GTK applications -- and people are doing just this (the Win32 porting effort, and the handheld efforts). I believe Qt is similar (especially since it's already cross-platform).

      Yes, several older toolkits would be left out. That is not a significant problem.

    13. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by captaineo · · Score: 2

      Have you actually benchmarked it though? I have done kernel traces of X interacting with client programs. The read()/write() overhead (copying data across the socket) is insignificant compared to the "extra round-trip" problems that spitzak describes.

    14. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by spitzak · · Score: 2
      It's not clear that OS/X is doing 3D texture mapping or any kind of transform of the off-screen window images. I certainly don't see them using it: the "genie" effect appears to be a pixel-skipping effect that does "affine" transforms rather than the perspective transformation you would expect of a 3D system, and the miniature dock icons do not update, both of which would be easy to do if this could 3D texture-map the offscreen windows.

      The resizing could be sped up to avoid reallocation by 2 things: first clip all windows to the size of the screen and don't store data outside that. Then when somebody tries to resize, the first time they need more memory than they are allocated it should allocate a screen-sized area. Then it never needs to be resized. Also don't reallocate when the window gets smaller. Then at some "garbage collection" step you can reallocate all windows to match the current size. It may make sense to always keep the full-screen-size buffer around.

    15. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by captaineo · · Score: 2

      I am 99.99% certain that OSX 10.2 (Jaguar) uses hardware texture mapping to blit/composite offscreen window buffers to the desktop. (previous versions of OSX did NOT use the hardware like this; it is a new optimization in Jaguar). Any Mac website should have the details.

      I am not sure why they wouldn't use better filtering for the window-scrunching effects. I haven't used Jaguar myself yet so I don't know if this has changed. (obviously bilinear filtering would be very expensive in pre-Jaguar software mode).

      Thanks for your ideas on resizing... I think OSX does actually perform eager allocation when enlarging windows; the slow resizing that most OSX users complain about may simply be due to the software 2D rendering... One complicating factor is that, as far as I know, OSX requires that ALL pixels in ALL open windows be stored all the time, even for portions of the window that are outside the screen. (I assume this is to eliminate the need for "damage/repaint" events; however the memory costs are quite substantial...)

    16. Re:Thoughts on a more modern GUI by spitzak · · Score: 2
      You may be right, I only just got Jaguar and was basing my observations on 10.1.

      I don't see how you can avoid damage events as without them a hostile program can easily wipe out the system by asking for huge windows. It also seems they are necessary for resizing the windows anyway. An examination of the Cocoa objects may show whether they are needed, I doubt it is possible to support them without exposing the "repaint" method in the base class of widget.

  20. Gah! Multiple desktops by bilbobuggins · · Score: 2
    A note to all Linux interface designers:
    Most users have a trouble enough with one desktop to worry about - stop putting a desktop switcher in the taskbar by default!

    Multiple desktops are cool _if_ you know what you're doing, but even experienced users take some adjusting at first, and if you have trouble w/ computers as it is then the desktop switcher just serves to take up space and scare the sh!t out of you all at the same time.

    that being said I'm psyched about the gui resolution control

  21. Re:What is it with these reviews of commercial stu by dbarclay10 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'm not saying they should be an "open source news site". That'd be silly.

    No, I'm saying they're doing reviews while completely ignoring a HUGE part of the market they're doing these reviews for.

    Tell me, when you want an office suite, and you're looking for reviews, won't it seem a _tad_ odd when the only ones you can find reviews for are ones that charge money?

    Perhaps a better example would be, what the heck, Unix-based desktops. How would _you_ feel about a site that reviewed software from a little-known newcomer while completely ignoring software from vendors that has been proven and established?

    --

    Barclay family motto:
    Aut agere aut mori.
    (Either action or death.)
  22. Umm by bogie · · Score: 5, Interesting

    that's been around since Corel put it there in their original Corel Linux. I've been pointing that out to both users and distros for years now how easy it was to change to resolution and refresh rate in Corel linux and yet to this day I've been ignored.

    That's one thing that drives me nuts about the linux distros. Clearly each one of them has one or more features that they do better than any other distro. Yet for each distro they all go their own way and going from distro to distro you end up getting 50 different apps that do the same thing. As another example, why isn't Mandrake's font importer used in every linux distro? It's been around forever and is the easiest way to get your windows fonts on your linux box.Even Debian who just NOW is starting to work on a GUI installer when working gpl GUI installers based on Debian have been around for years. The day Stormix and Corel came out is the day Debian should have been picking the best GPL pieces out and using them.

    Unfortunatly this appears to be the "linux way" at least when it comes to desktop apps and config tools. And Yes IMHO we are reinventing the wheel over and over by not cherry picking and then using the best GPL apps. Is my view oversimplied? Yes. But is foolish pride preventing say Redhat from using some of Mandrake's better GUI tools? Who knows.

    I thought one of the benefits to the GPL was code Darwinism?

    --
    If you wanna get rich, you know that payback is a bitch
    1. Re:Umm by Bartab · · Score: 2

      The day Stormix and Corel came out is the day Debian should have been picking the best GPL pieces out and using them.

      Uhm, Debian is not a business. The only 'customer' worth anything are the people working on the distribution themselves, and for the most part (even now) a fancy gui installer is not a priority.

      When you're buying redhat, or mandrake, or one of those other rpm based crappy distributions, your handing over of money gives you certain rights to moan and bitch about the priorities of development for the distribution, but for things like Debian, or Gentoo, or any of the others that don't even attempt to be a business, submit your code or keep your yap shut.

      --
      Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo.
    2. Re:Umm by evbergen · · Score: 5, Insightful
      I thought one of the benefits to the GPL was code Darwinism?
      Oh, and you thought that when an individual of an evolving species picked up a nice feature, all the other members instantaneously picked it up as well and implemented it in exactly the same way? You think evolution happened in a straight line?

      I think what you're seeing is very healthy behaviour. Everyone thinks that he can do slightly better than the other guy who has already done it. Of course, only 5 % will be right in that assessment, but who cares as long as in the end it does improve the state of the art.

      People should be cautious not to suffer too much from a 'not invented here' syndrome, but reinventing the weel once in a while isn't bad at all if that makes a better mousetrap.
      --
      All generalizations are false, including this one. (Mark Twain)
    3. Re:Umm by kigrwik · · Score: 5, Insightful

      > Even Debian who just NOW is starting to work on a GUI installer when working gpl GUI installers
      > based on Debian have been around for years.

      No GPL-based GUI installer available for "production" meets the requirements for Debian: *mostly* the 11 architectures Debian supports (all spinoffs concentrated mostly on i386), but some other things too, like being able to scale between newbie and guru. Most GUI installers cater to the needs of the newbies, or the ones that don't need absolute control, but some people need more and they can find it in the current installer.

      Debian users have different expectations from Debian software than the users of other distros.

      In particular, NO ARCHITECTURE IS SUPERIOR TO THE OTHERS, it's true for the installer, for X, and for pretty much everything else. So an installer either works for all architectures, or it's not the official installer. See the amount of work done to port PGI.

      I hope that makes it a bit clearer.

      --
      -- don't discount flying pigs until you have good air defense
    4. Re:Umm by egghat · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I have to agree wholeheartly.

      Look at PartDrake from Mandrake -- Good tool, noone but Mandrake uses it.
      Look at HardDrake from Mandrake --> Good hardware detection (one of the main problems for Linux), noone but Mandrake supports it.
      Look at apt4rpm --> wonderful stuff from Connectiva, noone but Connectiva uses it.

      This is a real shame.

      But the thing I miss most: Something as userfriendly as Mandrake based on .deb.

      Bye egghat.

      --
      -- "As a human being I claim the right to be widely inconsistent", John Peel
    5. Re:Umm by zmooc · · Score: 2
      Certainly it is not intended to make the installation process objectively easier or more flexible - nothing about a GUI is inherently necessary for this.

      The GUI is the first impression users get of a distribution. Many of them are used to work with familiar elements like windows, textboxes, buttons etc. and will find the lack of those rather annoying or even difficult to work with. A GUI may not be inherently necessary for making the installation process objectively easier. But for users that are mostyly familiar with GUI's, a GUI is simply the easiest to work with. And almost always a GUI does a much better job at presenting information in an understandable way simple because everybody is familiar with the elements that are used to present it; dropdownlists, radiobuttons blabla.

      --
      0x or or snor perron?!
    6. Re:Umm by kigrwik · · Score: 2

      This is partly true, but when you'll do some
      serious developing, you'll learn that the ability to test some piece of software on multiple architectures is priceless.

      Lots of bugs are uncovered because they explode in some archs, whereas they're just screwing up silently on others. (stack corruption, out-of-bounds writing to memory...). Remember to switch compilers, too, as they all make different assumptions.

      Now, Debian made a choice, and their choice you must respect. Remember that bugfixes coming from those other arches (XFree, anyone ?) will benefit you too !

      --
      -- don't discount flying pigs until you have good air defense
    7. Re:Umm by kigrwik · · Score: 2

      (are you a troll ? Or just a frustrated user ?)

      Nevertheless, I'll bite, because the Newbie/Guru question is a recurrent and important one.

      The two most difficult problems the ones who hack the Debian installers are:

      1. multiple archs, problem known, best luck to porters.

      2. flexibility vs ease of use
      This is actually the hardest part, because it
      does not have a technical answer. Debian installers have always been very flexible (need something special ? Alt-F2 and open a console, now do your stuff and get back to the install process), and both butt-ugly and slightly too technical for a non-technical user.
      The future installer will keep the same degree of flexibility while at the same time making it easier for first-time users, adding hooks making it possible to reuse the installer for automated installation (something like FAI) or for remote-controlled installation, or many other wild things.

      Whenever an elegant solution is found that meets the needs of both flexibility maniacs and new users, it is used. But Debian will not lose flexibility and alienate its usual user base to attract new users at any cost.

      Finally, to answer your completely, I'd conclude that people migrating from windows will feel more comfortable using other distros (I check out every major release of Mandrake, just to see their progress).
      When/If they need the degree of control and flexibility that Debian provides, then Debian'll be there for them. But the spirit of Debian lies elsewhere. I wish good luck to the RedHat, Mandrake, ... hackers in their work to make Linux a nicer place for new users, but let me hack my Debian boxes precisely the way I want them.

      Find a distro that suits you, learn it, like it, show it to others and we'll both be happy.

      Have a nice day

      ps: I'm not particularly smart but instead I have hard-bought knowledge, I want power and control over my own box, and I evangelize Debian to all of my friends who can appreciate it, and Mandrake to those who just need a penguin that works.

      --
      -- don't discount flying pigs until you have good air defense
    8. Re:Umm by Ogerman · · Score: 2

      No GPL-based GUI installer available for "production" meets the requirements for Debian: *mostly* the 11 architectures Debian supports (all spinoffs concentrated mostly on i386), but some other things too, like being able to scale between newbie and guru. Most GUI installers cater to the needs of the newbies, or the ones that don't need absolute control, but some people need more and they can find it in the current installer.

      Right on, man. I fully expect the GUI debian installer to be the best around once completed. All those whiners who claim the Debian project is elitist are gonna wind up with their foot in their mouths. Maybe this will also put an end to some of the worthless Linux distros once even an idiot can install Debian.

  23. You are partially correct by Monkelectric · · Score: 2
    Will it run 8-5, M-F, without downtime?

    Yea w2k is MS's golden child, but MS Office is still the red-headed step-child. Office is unstable on any OS and thats where the opertunity for linux is.

    --

    Religion is a gateway psychosis. -- Dave Foley

  24. Themability is unimportant by Sanity · · Score: 5, Insightful
    If the initial theme is good - nobody should need to change it. I recently installed the Redhat 8.0 beta, and decided to stick with the default theme which is attractive and consistent, my only minor gripe being that it would be nice if they found a matching theme for Mozilla (they managed to do this with Xmms).

    I have long believed that the obsession with themability is a huge red-herring, and is totally unnecessary in a desktop OS. Select an attractive consistent theme for the various themeable applications, and 99.9% of users won't need to change it.

    1. Re:Themability is unimportant by Darren+Winsper · · Score: 2

      What about the people who do want to theme? Why not allow it and ship a decent default? After all, if I'm going to stare at my computer for ungodly amounts of time, it's nice to be able to make it look pleasing.

    2. Re:Themability is unimportant by Sanity · · Score: 2
      What about the people who do want to theme?
      What about the people who would rather that the developers spent their time on more important things?
    3. Re:Themability is unimportant by Darren+Winsper · · Score: 2

      They can either pay the developers, or quit bitching about somebody who developed the theming system in their own time, using their own money for their own enjoyment.

      How would you feel if I told you to stop playing a game you loved to instead play a game you find painfully dull?

  25. Re:What is it with these reviews of commercial stu by dbarclay10 · · Score: 2

    Xandros et al do provide typical Unix daemons. "server software" in other words. They just don't focus on it.

    Say, like, Mandrake.

    --

    Barclay family motto:
    Aut agere aut mori.
    (Either action or death.)
  26. Re:Rip on it all you want, but . . . Lycoris? by MsGeek · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Heh, ripping on Lycoris with your Anonymous Coward mask on...

    Anyway, Lycoris is a spiffy little distro. I am enjoying the hell out of it. In fact as I speak I am installing the Beta build.

    You are going to find teething problems with all the desktop distros. However, Lycoris has their stuff more together than most. It installed like a dream on every box I've put it on. And it does seem scarily like Win2K in places...it's designed for smooth transitions for Windows refugees.

    There is going to be some hella-cool news coming from the Lycoris camp real soon...keep your eyes and ears peeled.

    --
    Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
  27. Re:Also check out: by packeteer · · Score: 2

    what about mandrake?... i know mandrake can be used as everything else but its best as a desktop distro... personalyl i find it to be VERY easy and have used it to convert many windows users... also mandrake 9.0 comes out any day now...

    --
    unzip; strip; touch; finger; mount; fsck; more; yes; unmount; sleep
  28. Re:Get some PRIORITIES! by Afrosheen · · Score: 2

    " More importantly though, what do thousands of dead bodies give a "good god damn" about?"

    I dunno...faster respawn times?

    *cue snare hit and duck*

    thank you, thank you, I'll be here all week. Don't forget to tip your waittress.

  29. Re:Yet another GPL violation by goingware · · Score: 2
    Xandros has NOT distribute anything via money to anyone YET. So, there is no GPL violation YET.

    I can't comment on Xandros in particular because I haven't checked it out, but it is not necessary to charge money for distributing something to have a GPL violation.

    Even giving away something for free is a GPL violation if you don't provide source.

    However, my understanding is that you don't have to give away the source up-front, you only have to provide a written offer to provide the source for some number of years. You're allowed to charge a nominal amount of money for the distribution media.

    But note that even if there is some delay you have to distribute the exact source for everything you distribute in binary form, even "beta tests".

    Sometimes Unix apps are ported to windows by using the Cygwin DLL, and then given away for free, even with all the source code. But the Cygwin people are always very careful to ensure that people who do this provide the source code to the same version of the Cygwin DLL they link with; they have to give the source away themselves, it is not sufficient to provide a hyperlink to Cygwin's website.

    --
    -- Could you use my software consulting serv
  30. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 2

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  31. "I hate Windows...I am afraid of Linux" by Newer+Guy · · Score: 2

    Hmmm..
    I wonder how many of people feel that way.....
    Here's one more likely: "I hate Windows..I have never heard of Linux".
    Maybe this distribution will help both of these phrases.

  32. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  33. Re:Will making an excellent UI attract developer by Graymalkin · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Just because the interface is attractive looking doesn't mean it has any attractive functionality. Who cares if it looks like Windows if developers don't have any consistancy in their apps? If all of the menus look like Windows but follow no standard convention what good is the software?

    Traditionally UNIX apps have always had a dozen different conceptions of interfaces. Take ten command line apps with even a maginally similar function and none of them will use the same command flags or command format. Too many open source developers carry on this ridiculous tradition with their GUI apps leading to confusion and inefficiency. There's more to good GUI development than merely looking like Windows. Despite its problems at least apps on Windows act the same way.

    --
    I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
  34. OOo helps linux ... by Moritz+Moeller+-+Her · · Score: 2

    ..by spreading open document formats, by making the switch to linux painless, by establishing confidence in good open source software.

    --
    Moritz
  35. Sweet! by Erpo · · Score: 2, Interesting

    When you reboot, everything is in graphical mode, you don't see any kernel or init messages going on, but rather the Xandros logo animating in the screen while loading the OS. I should point out that in the beginning you get three options, to load the OS in normal mode, safe mode or expert configuration mode (just in case something gone wrong you can actually see the text messages from the booting procedure).

    Finally, a linux distro has (by default) hidden those hundreds of lines of text that come up every time the system boots. For the average linux newbie, they do nothing but create confusion and panic. "Was that an error message that just flew by?" "What does that mean?" "Hmm...2645 bogomips? Will I need to remember that later?"...and so on.

    I'm not saying they're not useful; in fact, they can be a life saver. Without all those printk's and init messages, it would be awfully hard or even impossible to diagnose and fix many problems. There's just no reason for them to be there when everything's working properly.

    1. Re:Sweet! by Qrlx · · Score: 2

      You are right. I can find out what I need to know by pressing ESC when Windows 98 boots. One line, saying like "press ESC now to see what's happening" would be fine, and everyone sees pretty clouds.

      Sometimes I watch that UNIX shit go by on the screen and I think that in the old days, no one would ever see that shit go by because the cold electron gun in the display took like three minutes to warm up.

  36. Re:For people who hate windows by spitzak · · Score: 2

    Maybe when you stop complaining when every single little attempt to innovate in Linux (like doing point-to-type) is met with "that's user unfriendly because it does not match Windows!".

  37. Re:Why is the Windows interface so heavily copied? by spitzak · · Score: 2
    We have tried and all you guys do is complain that "it doesn't match Windows and therefore is not user friendly".

    I would dearly love to see point-to-type be the default on a "novice" system. I would also REALLY like to see them stop raising the windows when you click on their contents.

    This would be a HUGE breakthrough, I think similar to the invention of insertion mode-always back in about 1980 or the treatment of Newline as an insertable character, both of which made huge differences to the ability to use text editors, and both (I know because I was forced to write 4 freaking pages in a manual about how "insert mode" worked in 1984) were considered considerably user-unfriendly and geeky.

    I do think there has to be some differences from Windows. User interface design has pretty much been frozen now for 7 years (since windows 95). Innovation does not necessarily mean "3d desktop" or "mind reading interface", it means remembering the forgotten ideas of ten or fifteen years ago, realizing what was good, and trying to introduce it to a public that has been brainwashed by never seeing anything other than a Mac or Windows.

  38. No more security pants? by PsyQ · · Score: 3, Funny

    From their "So Secure" page:

    "Secure means users are less prone to virus attacks and security breeches as well as the down time, damage, and inconvenience they cause."

    With Windows, I always felt claustrophobic below the waistline. Now that Xandros got rid of my pants, I can truly be free again. Thank you, Xandros, in the name of the entire office.

  39. Re:Why is the Windows interface so heavily copied? by IamTheRealMike · · Score: 2
    There is a very simple reason why many Linux boxes superficially resemble Windows, and that's because GUI research is practically dead. The purpose of an UI by the way is to make you work faster, not to look sci fi. As it happens the Windows style task switcher with app button UI is pretty efficient, and it's also what everybody is used to.

    You can make your Linux box resemble nothing else. Just install an "alternative" WM like E, FluxBox and so on. Often, people who take the time to learn them find they work faster, but most people don't want to break the habit of years to gain a modest increase in user efficiency. So we have interfaces that resemble Windows.

    As for Apple, I've seen many posts saying "It looks just like Windows, Apple is so innovative", or some such bull. The MacOS user interface is now a blend of the old MacOS UI (designed 10+ years ago) and NeXT (ditto). It's absolutely not new, or innovative, unless you class high colour themes innovative. It's also useless for ex Windows users, it requires a huge amount of effort to get used to its quirks. If you've just spent $1000+ on a new Mac then of course you will invest the effort required to adapt, it's either that or admit that you've thrown out a lot of money due to lazyness. Having used Macs but never bought them, I can testify to just how irritating it is to learn new habits for no real gain in productivity. So please quit it with the Mac trolls, OS X is largely irrelevant for the "common user", as computers are at saturation so the type of person this distro is aimed at anyway needs to be broken in gently.

  40. Re:LSB? by spitzak · · Score: 2
    I don't mind that but I don't like the fact that their file browser shows a fake hierarchy just like Windows. I consider this very confusing because the same directory can appear twice (ie MyDesktop on Windows). Also it does not match the arrangement that is revealed by file open/save dialog boxes.

    These designers have to make a rule that the browser shows exactly the real hierarchy so there is never any confusion.

    Of course the default hierarchy is confusing. There are a two ways to fix it:

    First, make the program open already navigated to somewhere other than root, such as to your desktop or to the "My documents" type of folder.

    Second, ignore the LSB and make it make sense to the user. In their example "/disks" makes sense, but why aren't the MSDOS disks in there? They should be, though they can name them C: if they want (this is a perfectly legal Unix filename).

  41. Re:No! by PigleT · · Score: 2

    "What every distribution should focus on, is to contribute to the opensource projects with functionality they think is lacking."

    Bingo, so well said!

    Right from the word go, the whole idea of "*the* Xandros desktop" makes me wonder why anyone would want something with a cut-down installation - these commercial distributions seem only interested in saying "this is your desktop, these are your packages, WE CONTROL YOU NOW!!", sort of thing.
    At least RH tend to GPL anything they write, including linuxconf (oh boy did that go down well), as do debian of course...

    --
    ~Tim
    --
    .|` Clouds cross the black moonlight,
    Rushing on down to the circle of the turn
  42. Any one notice the voodoo card? by YeeHaW_Jelte · · Score: 2

    Jeez, there was a lot of static about this Eugenia person a few days ago in the story about her review of Yast2, and man, now I understand ... how serious can you take anyone using a Voodoo 5 card, for christs sake?!

    --

    ---
    "The chances of a demonic possession spreading are remote -- relax."
  43. Best line in the review by Qrlx · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This is definitely the best line in the review:

    Xandros looks and feels quite a bit like Windows98 in places, possibly this was intentional.

    I dunno, maybe it was a complete fluke that the Xandros Group came up with a Launch! button where Start is, a resizable Quick Launch area, applications tiled as buttons on the Taskbar, a System Tray, and a Clock. (A clock. Holy shit. I should have patented that.)

    C'mon, people. You could have at least tried to put the Trash in the bottom right corner or something. I'm no big fan of current trends in IP law, but this is a total ripoff of the Windows(TM) desktop.

    I think there might be a few improvements, like the little up-arrow at the end of the taskbar buttons to pop up another colums for when your drunken porn cruise has OnLoaded and OnUnloaded so many windows that the buttons are taller than they are wide. The four desktops thing is good if you have four monitors (which video card does that again??) But seriously, this desktop looks a whole lot like my current Windows XP desktop. Maybe I can install Xandros on the secretary's computer over the weekend and she'll never notice. :-)

    WARNING!! Singularity Approaching! Open Source computer indistinguishable from Monopolist Capitalism.

  44. Stupidify is good for Joe. by miffo.swe · · Score: 2

    If the averege user is ever gonna use Linux it has to be a distribution out there for the newbie. If they use it and later feel the would like something harder/more configurable there are dozens of very good distros to try later on. As a beginners dist i think Xandros seems pretty good and it might even work handy dandy for regular users too.

    No matter what we personally think about these distros they have a huge benefit for us who are a bit more advanced in linux. Something that many übernerds tend to forget is that with comercialism we also get some benefits as a spinoff.

    A bigger userbase gives us better drivers, more comercial apps and overall better support for linux and i cant imagine that being bad. If they fsck up then adios amigos with them and we pick something else to use.

    The diversity of linux is what makes it great and thats something we really should hold precious. Not to the expence of compability. Stick to the LSB and we should be just fine even with thousands of different distributions.

    --
    HTTP/1.1 400
  45. It's probably nice, but... by GauteL · · Score: 2

    .. dear god my eyes hurt!

    Seriously though, couldn't they have come up with better icons than this? Even completely reusing some of KDEs or GNOMEs work would have been better. It just looks horrible.

    I do understand why they have tried to make it as windowsish as possible, but having it look like a very unprofessional unpolished version of Windows does it no good at all imho.

  46. Re:If I were a windows user switching to linux.. by Qrlx · · Score: 2

    That would be cool. I want one where the computer is part of this 1960's ergonomic console like on Star Trek, where you had to take panels off of furniture once in a while. I want a computer as big as my living room, with integrated furniture and space-age martinis.

  47. It 'apes' Windows. Bad idea. by Qbertino · · Score: 2

    It tries to be a windows rippoff, forfeighting all that would make people give up the Windows Platform for Linux!
    Why don't these guys have the gutts to take a perfect linux setup with added usability and all (f.e. Fluxbox WM default behaviour) cool looking Themes and just close the holes that are then left over (crappy fonts on Linux, office package, textmessage bootup and shutdown)?
    Why the hell does everybody in the buisness consider M$ the reference for end user usability (which is - mind you - utter bullshit)???
    Do a mac rippoff if you will - but this grey in grey Win98 copycat? I'm gonna recomend Windoze migrators SuSE 8 Pro as the Linux n00by choice. It might suck as update, but the install is grafical all the way trough to bootup and shutdown and, damn, it may be green but it shure looks cool.

    --
    We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
  48. Another Linux Desktop... by blakespot · · Score: 2

    Great, another desktop interface for Linux.

    The more the better, right? ...hmm...actually...ahem...I'll go back to OS X now.

    blakespot

    --
    -- Heisenberg may have slept here.
    iPod Hacks.com
  49. that's the problem! by Ender+Ryan · · Score: 3, Insightful
    I instantly associate that look with Netscape

    That is exactly the problem! Why would anyone think it was a good idea for people to associate Mozilla with Netscape. Netscape used to be decent, but 4.x became a total disaster, devolving into a total bloatware mess, with an ugly interface to-boot. It got lost in a never-ending cycle of bugfixes and new bugs, slowly(quickly?) becoming more and more unstable, and never coming close to implementing any of the newer standards, etc.

    Why the Mozilla developers decided it would be a good idea to have that skin with those icons, and especially making it the default, I don't even want to guess. I consider that to be their biggest mistake. Everything else about Mozilla I really like, except that damn skin and it being the default, it just really upsets me, especially when I hear of people who throw Mozilla away and never give it a second chance JUST BECAUE OF THAT DAMN SKIN! People don't realize right away that they can change that, and they DO NOT want to use something that they think is still Netscape...

    </rant>

    --
    Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
  50. Re:What is it with these reviews of commercial stu by GauteL · · Score: 2

    Mandrake is NOT into the "purely-desktop"-market. Have you seen whats included on those Mandrake CDs? Apache, PHP, postgresql, mail-servers, etc..

    Mandrake tries to make a "jack of all trades" distribution, just like Red Hat and SuSE. I personally welcome the pure desktop-solutions.

  51. Get it in my hands by oldstrat · · Score: 2

    .
    I respect Redhat
    I like Mandrake
    I can tolerate Lycoris
    I WANT Xandros!!!

    Of course. I want any new/revised distro and right now, but Corel Linux was the smoothest (maybe along with Stormix R.I.P.) of the installs I've ever used.

    I don't care what the front end looks like, or I should say that Win-ish isn't to be feared, but there should be enough difference so that I, or anyone else using it KNOWS they are not using MSWin.
    Just for safety sake. It can't be Windows and if your moving from platform to platform like I do, it's actually easier to be in alien atmosphere not in something that feels the same but puts you down a rabbit hole at odd momemts.

  52. Re:No thanks by N3WBI3 · · Score: 2, Insightful
    Unless you have used it you cant tell if 'the advantages of linuz' are lost. The power of Linux lies in the terminal (imho) the rest is just window dressing. How is this interfce any different than gnome/kde? The button looks different? no default pager in the 'start bar'? If its as stable as Linux, if it offers a terminal shell you have all the advantages of linux.

    I am not to fond of M$ either, but their interface is very simple, and this is what jon and jane doe are looking for. Linux would/has do/done well to borrow very selectively from the M$ interface (if you dont like it put fvwm on ;) features like the 'start' button have worked their way into the linux world with desktops like KDE, Gnome, Enlightenment, dont get pissed if I did not put yours here. I use FVWM all the time not, but if at one point I could not have an OS that looked somewhat like windows I would still be on windows. It was not until I learned that all you need is knowledge of how to use the terminal I moved to a less busy interface.

    So I say lets give 90% of the computing world what I guess what I am saying is not specific to this distro (a distro release is hardly news unless is something like Mandrake, Redhat, (insert market share measurable linux here), or an innovation.

    --
  53. quit complaining -- make one yourself! by Coolfish · · Score: 2

    Come on people, people whining about tools not being used when they should be, and they could be because their GPL'd.

    If there isn't a distro out there that takes all these great tools and puts them together, then shouldn't there be? It is afterall open source, and that's exactly the kind of thing you'd expect.... so why is no one doing it? Why aren't YOU doing it?

    I'd call it The Best Linux Distro In The World, Ever (TBLDITWE for short).

  54. Illegal Provision of Circumvention Device by Billly+Gates · · Score: 2

    MOTION PICTURE ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA, INC.
    15503 VENTURA BOULEVARD
    ENCINO, CALIFORNIA 91436

    UNITED STATES
    Anti-Piracy Operations
    PHONE: (818) 728 - 8127
    Email:

    April 1, 2003

    Via Fax/Email

    RE: Illegal Provision of Circumvention Device
    Site/URL: http://www.kernel.org [and mirrors, with unknown IP addresses]
    Reference#: 343313

    Dear :

    The Motion Picture Association (MPA) represents the following motion picture
    production and distribution companies:

    Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc.
    Disney Enterprises, Inc.
    Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc.
    tro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc.
    Paramount Pictures Corporation
    TriStar Pictures, Inc.
    Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation
    United Artists Pictures, Inc.
    United Artists Corporation
    Universal City Studios, Inc.
    Warner Bros., a Division of Time Warner Entertainment Company, L.P.

    We have received information that the above referenced Internet site is providing a circumvention device commonly known as Linux. Linux is a software utility that circumvents the protection afforded by the Microsoft Windows Operating Systems DRM implementation, therefore circumventing the schemes designed for consumer content protection and permitting the copy of protected contents in whole or partially. As such, Linux is an unlawful circumvention device within the meaning of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, Title 17 United States Code Section 1201(a)(2)(3). Providing or offering Linux to the public on your system or network violates the provisions of Section 1201(a)(2) which prohibit the manufacturing, importing
    or offering to the public, providing, or otherwise trafficking in an unlawful circumvention device. (Title 17 United States Code Section 1201 et seq. hereafter is referred to as the DMCA).

    We therefore demand that you take appropriate steps to cause the immediate removal of Linux from the above identified Internet site, along with such other actions as may be necessary or appropriate to suspend this illegal activity. Failure to comply with this measure will subject you to liability as described above.
    We also request that you:

    1. maintain and take whatever steps are necessary to prevent the destruction of all records, including electronic records, in your possession or control related to this Internet site, account holder or subscriber, and

    2. provide appropriate notice to the subscriber or account holder responsible for the presence of Linux on your system or network, advising
    him/her of the contents of this notice and directing that person to contact the undersigned immediately at the email address provided above.

    By copy of this letter, the owner of the above referenced Internet site and/or email account is hereby directed to cease and desist from the conduct complained of herein.

    On behalf of the respective owners of the exclusive rights to the copyrighted material at issue in this notice, we hereby state, pursuant to the DMCA that we have a good faith belief that the acts complained of are not authorized by the
    copyright owners, their respective agents, or the law.

    Also pursuant to DMCA, we hereby state, under penalty of perjury under the law of California and under the laws of the United States, that the
    information in this notification is accurate and that we are authorized to act on behalf of the owners of the exclusive rights being infringed as set forth in this notification.

    Please contact us at the above listed address or by replying to this email if you should have any questions.

    Thank you for your cooperation in this matter. Your prompt response is requested.

    Respectfully,

    Haminshu Nigam
    Director
    Worldwide Internet Enforcement

  55. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 2

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  56. lower price means lower revenue ...? by Lewis+Mettler,+Esq. · · Score: 2

    Your point is well taken.

    If Microsoft lowers its price to compete with Linux, its gross revenue is likely to decline. Any economist or business person for that matter can tell you that if you lower your price and your sales volume does not increase sufficiently to offset that lower price, your gross is going to take a hit. And, once that begins for Microsoft it will not end.

    Raise the price and loose customers to linux. Lower the price, reduce gross revenue and loose stockholders.

    It is a tough call to make.

    And, if the same idiots who testified before the court are advising Microsoft now they will get it wrong and harm Microsoft even more. But, my guess is they were just lying in the court room hoping to fool the court.

    The key to the future for Linux on the desktop is going to be the combination of SUN at the corporate account level, Xandros, Lindows and others at the consumer level and Redhat/Mandrake and others at the developers level.

    And, then you have DELL who is beat up for trying.

    My guess is that IBM and HP will follow SUN's lead in regard to linux on the desktop and give it a real effort. As for DELL, GateWay and a few other Microsoft OEMs, they do not really depend upon Unix/Linux servers for a major part of their business. Maybe DELL thinks it does. But, they have been told what they can and can not do by the idiots at Microsoft.

    --
    NexuSys - Linux support by the best
    1. Re:lower price means lower revenue ...? by Lewis+Mettler,+Esq. · · Score: 2

      I would agree that a better Wine makes desktops more doable. But, look at what SUN is doing.

      There are actually trying to make Unix/Linux Servers work well with Linux Desktops. We are not talking about independant desktops perhaps logging on the internet and doing some stuff but rather real business.

      And, that is where HP and IBM should be taking SUNs lead. Major corporations have little interest in independant desktops that fail to work well with their servers. And, yes, they will always have servers. They may serve files. Or, they may serve the desktops themselves by way of updates, etc. Either way, SUN is focused upon that and HP and IBM remain ignorant. Or, at least they look ignorant because they ignore the need for hundreds if not thousands of desktops to connect appropriately with the Unix/Linux based servers they claim they want to sell.

      We are not talking about making a Linux PC compete headon with a Microsoft PC serving a single user. We are talking about corporate information systems. SUN is focused. IBM and HP are "out to lunch". The only coordinated products they offer along that line are Microsoft based. They are stupid. There is a hugh market for corporate information systems technologies. And, you do not just look at a single PC and say "why not?". Single independant PCs are not what the corporate market wants or can even use. They need organized systems. They need systems that offer a lower total cost of ownership and support. And, Microsoft desktops and Unix/Linux based servers are just like "oil and water" as long as Microsoft has anything to say about it.

      Corporate accounts and the major OEMs need to wake up.

      SUN sees the need. And, they see the easy picking. And, they will pick that fruit. And, those corporations that want a lower total cost of ownership with hundreds if not thousands of PC type systems will benefit from shopping SUN. Today with HP and IBM they get screwed. And, it is due to the short sightedness of those vendors.

      If you are truly dependant upon Microsoft technology, that is fine. But, many corporations only think they are. And, when they find out that substitutes are available from the top vendors in the business, they will fly.

      --
      NexuSys - Linux support by the best
  57. Re:What is it with these reviews of commercial stu by dbarclay10 · · Score: 2

    Lindows et al also provide daemons.

    They just don't focus on them. Like Mandrake.

    --

    Barclay family motto:
    Aut agere aut mori.
    (Either action or death.)
  58. non linearity by jbolden · · Score: 2

    > Speaking of which, what's the deal with GUI installers in the first place?

    Non linearity is the importance. A gui installer can show non linear information to the user that can be important in trying to make choices. For a simple example the Mandrake installer shows all the installation steps down the left hand column. That way the user knows:

    a) What issues they are likely to need to address in this step

    b) What issues they are likely to need to address in later steps

    c) how to back if an earlier choice becomes wrong in retrospect

    I'll choose an install I did about a year ago as a good example. I had a laptop with a broken video card so the only reasonable use for this machine was to set it up as a server. I wasn't sure where I turned powermanagement off:

    1) Did I make sure not to install power management packages?

    2) Did I have to do this post install?

    3) Was there going to be a seperate step?

    I could shoot ahead to certain places that power management might show up see what the steps were and thus knew that I didn't have to worry about this in the later steps.

    Another thing I did was because the harddrive was not large was shoot forward to the "resolve dependencies" part to get an idea of how much space I had left then popped back to package selection. This non linearity (i.e. resolving dependencies multiple times) is an atypical need but allowed me to learn vital information for the package selection process.

  59. Blanket reply to all dissenters: by Wakko+Warner · · Score: 2

    Note, I said desktop environments, not window managers. I am well aware that Enlightenment, IceWM, BlackBox, and WindowMaker all look different. They are not, in and of themselves, desktop environments, though, like KDE and GNOME are.

    - A.P.

    --
    "Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
  60. Re:Also check out: by laymil · · Score: 2, Insightful

    ln -s /bin/umount /bin/unmount

    because its intuitive to type the un sometimes...and people fuck up :)