LinuxOrbit Looks At Libranet GNU/Linux 2.7

GonzoJohn writes "Linux Orbit has reviewed Libranet GNU/Linux 2.7: Other Linux distribution companies have tried to create commercial Linux products based on Debian GNU/Linux, but few have achieved long term success. Progeny Linux comes to mind as a commercial Linux distribution company whose Linux product met with good reviews, but couldn't remain in business. Libranet is a rare exception to this rule. Libranet GNU/Linux has been around quite a while and continues to build a devoted Linux user base on a commercial product based on Debian GNU/Linux. With their most recent release of Libranet GNU/Linux 2.7, Libranet continues to improve on an already solid Linux distribution."

Comments

slackware

[Anonymous Coward]

The only Linux distro I would run on a server is Slackware because it is the least performance hungry and most stable distro out there and I have used almost everything. Debian is great on workstation, but not servers because its just a bit more resource hungry then Slack, but it is easier to use for common tasks! Frankly all my servers run BSD except for database boxes for which nothing beats Solaris with Oracle running on top, but most firms and people cant afford Sun Servers so they should run BSD for things like Apache and MySQl. Now you can comment away.

Re:slackware

[weierophinney]

I can't comment on BSD, but I can comment on Slack vs. Debian.

I've used Mandrake, Slack, and Debian for my server. Mandrake almost maxed out my 2GB harddrive (/home was a separate 3GB harddrive, and was used for all data), Slack had it at approximately 53% disk usage, Debian currently has it at 37% usage. In addition, I noticed significantly better performance immediately under Debian, and much better stability (I had something like 5 kernel panics over the course of 6 months under Slack, none so far in 8 months under Debian). Security updates are also much easier to perform on Debian (a crontab entry to do updates from security.debian.org can do them unassisted in most cases). I liked Slack... but maintaining it was too non-trivial to justify my time.

Re:slackware

[schon]

I had something like 5 kernel panics over the course of 6 months under Slack, none so far in 8 months under Debian

What did you change?

I've been running Slackware for 5 years (on a couple of dozen servers, and on my home and work desktops and laptop), and have never _once_ had a kernel panic, in any version (from 3.0, up to and including Slack 8.1)

Performance was fine too - I don't know what you mean by "significantly better performance", perforance doing what?

crontab entry to do updates from security.debian.org can do them unassisted

You've never run an important box then, because no sysadmin worth his salt would ever trust something as critical as security updates to an automated process. You manually test each update on an offline machine to make sure nothing breaks (like maybe the config file changed?), then deploy it on the live machines. Trusting software install to a script is just asking for trouble.

Re:slackware

[Anonymous Coward]

Immposible. First off, security updates should not be left to some automatc script, thats just asking for trouble. Second, Slackware is rock Stable. Kernel panics are almost unheard of. You must have added something to the Kernel or compiled one of the non-standard Kernels, or a old kernel release (or something like Kernel 2.5). Did you try Kernel patches, they can be a lifesaver? Frankly, I love RPM's, but for servers they are stupid and waste more resources than binaries. Slackware has the smallest footprint (is that the right word English isnt my language?) of all the Linuxes out there meaning it wont swallow resources. By resources I mean clock cycles and Ram as well as Hard Drive space. Its a very efficient release as opposed to Debian which installs standard with a billion mostly pointless packages. You can add to Slackware, but the default install is both stable and doesnt include tons of useless packages. Debian also enables way to many stupid services by default likw ypcat. Slackware does this also, but to a lesser degree. So I can spend less time closing local security holes. After all who wants their users typing in ypcat > passwd. The problem with Slack is that it is always a bit outdated. Its a small project and doesn't have the huge base that Debian does. Its Slackwares own fault. Because its standard C compiler used to be egcs in a g++ world, but that is history! If you are a sysadmin this really shouldn't matter. I remember the day when Slackware was king. So again I repeat myself for servers Slackware is the best, but only as far as Linux goes, because BSD is even better. Slackware is loosly based on BSD, but I wont go into all that. For Wokstations Debian rules with Mandrake (only because of it excellent support and GUI's) in a close second. For crucial databases when money is no option Oracle on a sun box is unbeatable. Frankly Windows also has its uses (games) as does the lowly Mac. Every OS has its good points the trick is not to live in a 1 OS world and be stuck always using tools that aren't necessarily the best for the given job. Hell before my OS/2 box died I used it almost daily well into the year 2000 so if it works for you use it!

Re:slackware

[RealAlaskan]

>>crontab entry to do updates from security.debian.org can do them unassisted >You've never run an important box then, because no sysadmin worth his salt would ever trust something as critical as security updates to an automated process.

With the stable distribution, using apt-get upgrade, you'll probably never get screwed up doing this. It's STABLE, which means that things don't change. You're still right about the wisdom of testing, but you're very unlikely to get burned on anything with stable.

Re:slackware

[Anonymous Coward]

First it sounds like you installed the full boat (KDE and GNOME) to get over 1 GB on a slackware install. Second, As the others said, you have got to be doing something wrong. I've had a slack box that has never been restarted except for hardware changes and to upgrade to 8.1.

Re:slackware

[Anonymous Coward]

You've never run an important box then, because no sysadmin worth his salt would ever trust something as critical as security updates to an automated process. You manually test each update on an offline machine to make sure nothing breaks (like maybe the config file changed?), then deploy it on the live machines. Trusting software install to a script is just asking for trouble.

You've never administered a Debian Stable box, then. After a couple of years of manually testing all the security patches you would look back through your notes and realize that you had never seen an update break anything, and say "hmmm, maybe all of this manual testing is a waste of time, given how thoroughly tested the patches are before they go on the server".

Seriously, the updates to stable are a completely different world from MS service packs and hot fixes.

Re:slackware

[gray peter]

Doesn't matter. You only need for it to crap out once to lose your job. I would never install anything on a production server without testing it first. It's just asking for trouble. Isn't that like the first rule of sysadm?

Re:slackware

[Jason Straight]

What a load of crap - the distro is only as resource hungry as the apps YOU chose to run on it or install. Unless you are talking about the kernel, in which case just compile a new one. It doesn't matter which distro you run, just how you configure it. I've seen plenty of distro's pass 200 days uptime easy, and have a Mandrake machine with over 400 days uptime right now, which is a router,accounting,firewall,QoS machine routing multiple T1's.

Re:slackware

[Anonymous Coward]

It is official; Netcraft now confirms: *BSD is dying

One more crippling bombshell hit the already beleaguered *BSD community when IDC confirmed that *BSD market share has dropped yet again, now down to less than a fraction of 1 percent of all servers. Coming on the heels of a recent Netcraft survey which plainly states that *BSD has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. *BSD is collapsing in complete disarray, as fittingly exemplified by failing dead last in the recent Sys Admin comprehensive networking test.

You don't need to be a Kreskin to predict *BSD's future. The hand writing is on the wall: *BSD faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for *BSD because *BSD is dying. Things are looking very bad for *BSD. As many of us are already aware, *BSD continues to lose market share. Red ink flows like a river of blood.

FreeBSD is the most endangered of them all, having lost 93% of its core developers. The sudden and unpleasant departures of long time FreeBSD developers Jordan Hubbard and Mike Smith only serve to underscore the point more clearly. There can no longer be any doubt: FreeBSD is dying.

Let's keep to the facts and look at the numbers.

OpenBSD leader Theo states that there are 7000 users of OpenBSD. How many users of NetBSD are there? Let's see. The number of OpenBSD versus NetBSD posts on Usenet is roughly in ratio of 5 to 1. Therefore there are about 7000/5 = 1400 NetBSD users. BSD/OS posts on Usenet are about half of the volume of NetBSD posts. Therefore there are about 700 users of BSD/OS. A recent article put FreeBSD at about 80 percent of the *BSD market. Therefore there are (7000+1400+700)*4 = 36400 FreeBSD users. This is consistent with the number of FreeBSD Usenet posts.

Due to the troubles of Walnut Creek, abysmal sales and so on, FreeBSD went out of business and was taken over by BSDI who sell another troubled OS. Now BSDI is also dead, its corpse turned over to yet another charnel house.

All major surveys show that *BSD has steadily declined in market share. *BSD is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If *BSD is to survive at all it will be among OS dilettante dabblers. *BSD continues to decay. Nothing short of a miracle could save it at this point in time. For all practical purposes, *BSD is dead.

Fact: *BSD is dying

Re:slackware

[Anonymous Coward]

Fact: *BSD is dying

Hey! I just replaced Debian with FreeBSD, so glad I did!

Re:slackware

[Anonymous Coward]

Not true. Its the way in which standard packages and apps manage to work with the Kernel. Every distro has different tools mandrake has tons of slow power hungry gui's slack has text based screens etc.. Some distros have different folder structures Bsd based versus standard etc..We are also talking about default installs and what you get. Some distros are messy and bulky by default while others are neater it all a matter of how things are packaged. Some distros like slack take security very seriously while mandrake is notorious for poor security even in its stable releases. Slack comes default with many closed services and ports that lesser distros like mandrake leave open! SLACK IS JUST BETTER!

You can run X windows on a Solaria box but do you really want to since its so slow? Optimizations are key some distro are just better.

Problem with commercial Debian

[Dionysus]

I think the problem with commercial Debian derived distributions is that there are no 'guaranteed' future income. Debian makes it so damn easy to upgrade.

When I used RedHat, I always bought a CD for each upgrade (from 5.0 to 5.1, to 5.2, to 6.0 etc). The reason: upgrading meant manually download individual packages and installing them in the right order. When I recently upgraded from Debian 2.2 to 3.0, all I had to do was change the sources.list, do apt-get update, and apt-get dist-ugprade. All dependencies and installation order was taken care of.

With RedHat (and I suspect other RPM based distributions), they were 'guaranteed' money from me, since I wanted to upgrade. With Debian based distribution, I no longer feel the need to buy a CD to keep current (even on dialup).

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[PCM2]

When I used RedHat, I always bought a CD for each upgrade (from 5.0 to 5.1, to 5.2, to 6.0 etc). The reason: upgrading meant manually download individual packages and installing them in the right order.

But wouldn't you agree that this makes Debian a better distro for people who want to learn any kind of serious syadmin chops vs. something like Red Hat?

Speaking as somebody who upgraded a production Red Hat 4.2 box to glibc2 by hand, I still cringe every time I overhear somebody asking for help with their Linux problems, and the first thing out of the "guru's" mouth is, "Which version of Linux are you using?" Not kernel version, not software versions -- Linux version. And of course they mean which version of Red Hat is installed.

To me, Red Hat version numbers are almost completely meaningless -- unless you're not actually using your box.

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe you aren't the company's target.

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[Anonymous Coward]

While it certainly may be the case that 'which version of linux' meant which version of Redhat, it's also quite possible that they meant which distro are you using... Seems to me, that you're assuming the guru only knows redhat, and thus putting those words in his mouth... *shrug*

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[PainKilleR-CE]

But wouldn't you agree that this makes Debian a better distro for people who want to learn any kind of serious syadmin chops vs. something like Red Hat?

I think he was trying to imply that while this makes Debian a better distro for most people, it causes problems for people trying to sell it. If it's easy to update a system via apt-get or whatever method that OS uses, even to new versions of the distro, then the users will probably not go out and buy the box for the new version.

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[mandolin]

I still cringe every time I overhear somebody asking for help with their Linux problems, and the first thing out of the "guru's" mouth is, "Which version of Linux are you using?" Not kernel version, not software versions -- Linux version. And of course they mean which version of Red Hat is installed.

I don't see why that's such a problem. Various distros have corresponding libaries/kernels, although the next question should be "have you kept up with the updates?". And the user (probably) knows what distro they're running whereas they (probably) don't have the other information offhand; your guru may be talking userspeak to keep from scaring them off or to get an immediate answer. Finally, sometimes it actually helps to know the distro ("where are the init scripts located", etc.)

OTOH if the guru/sysadmin has direct control over that box, he should be able to get in remotely and find out the necessary bits himself. Why trust the user's answers?

Of course the best question in this situation is "what was your username again?" :)

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[Surak]

Two words: Gentoo Linux. Two more word: emerge rocks! :)

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[Green Light]

I still cringe every time I overhear somebody asking for help with their Linux problems, and the first thing out of the "guru's" mouth is, "Which version of Linux are you using?" Not kernel version, not software versions -- Linux version.

And what is the problem with this? Wouldn't a perfectly good answer be "I am using Red Hat 7.2" or "I use Debian GNU/Linux 2.2 (`potato')". These are "versions of Linux", yeah, they are "distributions", but they are versions too. There are lots of versions out there, and the "guru" should certainly find out what it is that they are helping with.

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[messiertom]

With RedHat (and I suspect other RPM based distributions), they were 'guaranteed' money from me, since I wanted to upgrade.

Mandrake (an RPM based distribution) has urpmi, at the simplest level an apt-get for RPM. If I want to upgrade my whole system, I do:

urpmi.update -a
urpmi --auto-select

I can also just update a single package by doing urpmi foopackage; urpmi will even figure out the deps for me and download the packages. This is where Mandrake beats out RedHat, imho (Please Don't Flame Me!). But now I hear RedHat has such a feature... anyone?

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[bribass]

emerge: package `rocks!' not found.

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[maaleron]

I used RedHat up until a month ago when I had to switch to Win2k for a apecific program. I upgraded from RH7.0 - RH7.3 using apt-rpm. When i switch back, I'll be able to upgrade to 8.0 with the same old CD's.

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[castlan]

The problem is, the corrept answer to that question would be "2.2.19" or "2.4.19-ac3", or "2.5.9".

Red Hat is not a version of Linux, Linux is a kernel. Libranet is a distribution. GNU is the OS. Maybe a guru would literally ask "Which version of Linux are you using?", but only the the query was directed at a fairly knowledgable Linux geek who had compiled their own kernel, if not rolled thier own installation. Being that this thread in in a story about a Commercial distribution of GNU (Libranet GNU/Linux that is) it is probably safe to assume that the user is a "luser" who didn't roll their own.

It could even acceptable to ask "what system", as in what Operating System are you using... even though this may be offensive to myopic so-called "Linux" fanatics, it would be valid and not totally incorrect. Red Hat and Libranet both distribute different variations of the GNU OS, so you might say "I am using Red Hat 7.2" as your OS. At least you aren't saying you use "Linux 7.2"

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[Tomun]

$ apt-get install rocks
Reading Package Lists... Done
Building Dependency Tree... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed:
rocks

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[vrt3]

They should be asking "What distro are you using?" and possibly "What version of that distro?", or even "What version of RedHat are you using?" iff they can safely assume they are running RedHat. But they should never say 'Linux' when they mean the distro.

Re:Problem with commercial Debian

[Trevelyan]

if only i had mod points for you, however
rocks looks like it could rock too:

$ apt-get install rocks
Reading Package Lists... Done
Building Dependency Tree... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed:
rocks
0 packages upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 45 not upgraded.
Need to get 74.3kB of archives. After unpacking 250kB will be used.
0% [Connecting to wwwcache.bangor.ac.uk]
excalibur:~# apt-cache show rocks
Package: rocks
Priority: optional
Section: net
Installed-Size: 244
Maintainer: Guus Sliepen
Architecture: i386
Version: 2.4-2
Depends: libc6 (>= 2.2.5-13), libssl0.9.6
Filename: pool/main/r/rocks/rocks_2.4-2_i386.deb
Size: 74260
MD5sum: eea2f47e02ea6d72d17fe664d9100c27
Description: Make network sockets reliable in a transparent way
Rocks protect sockets-based applications from network failures, particularly
failures common to mobile computing, including:
.
- Link failures (e.g., unexpected modem disconnection);
- IP address changes (e.g., laptop movement, DHCP lease expiry);
- Extended periods of disconnection (e.g., laptop suspension).
.
Rock-enabled programs continue to run after any of these events; their broken
connections recover automatically, without loss of in-flight data, when
connectivity returns. Rocks work transparently with most applications,
including SSH clients, X window applications, and network service daemons.

$

now I have an isp that disconns u after 2 hours this looks like a cool package!

These Names Suck

[Pave Low]

Libranet GNU/Linux? Can anyone seriously say this without getting tongue-tied or feeling stupid?

Seriously, open source software just does not name their products well. Who in God's Green Earth this is a good name for their product? It's not sexy or cool, and is too convoluted for such a simple product, which is Linux.

And the number of times this articles says GNU/Linux is more than enough to make me nauseous.

Re:These Names Suck

[Otter]

And the number of times this articles says GNU/Linux is more than enough to make me nauseous.

What I'm wondering is why the submitter thought that six "GNU/Linux"'s were necessary, while another six "Linux"'s were allowed to slip through. (Not counting the "Linux Orbit"s and "Progeny Linux".)

Re:These Names Suck

[Anonymous Coward]

Linux is a kernel.
Linux is not an operating system.
Libranet does not make a kernel.
Libranet makes an operating system.

Re:These Names Suck

[Anonymous Coward]

Libranet GNU/Linux? Can anyone seriously say this without getting tongue-tied or feeling stupid?

If you genuinely get tongue tied saying "Libranet GNU/Linux" then I have sympathy for you but I would imagine that you have speech problems in general. I agree it's not a great name, but it's certainly no tongue twister.

If you feel stupid just for saying the name of a product (again, not a great name I agree) then you need to work on your self confidence. There is nothing stupid about saying "Libranet GNU/Linux" if that's the name of the product you're referring to and, even if you get tongue tied, there is no reason for you to feel stupid when you say it. Your speech problems do NOT make you stupid.

HTH

Re:These Names Suck

[Anonymous Coward]

Libranet makes an operating system.

Oh, of course they don't. Libranet makes press releases and unbelievably amateurish web sites.

New Users, Huh?

[Mandi Walls]

(I'll try to leave my usual Debian-disparaging comments out of here. You can check my past comments for some of those)

But I will say the Libranet GNU/Linux 2.7 does NOT use X Windows for the graphic installation routine. Instead, Libranet uses easy to follow ncurses-based text menus for its install method is disturbing. After having walked 17 new-to-UNIX students through an ncurses-based ftp install of Red Hat, I will tell you that ncurses is not the way to go for new users.

Why? Because there is NO work-alike in the Windows world. What do I mean by that? Well, occasionally, you'll end up with a new-to-UNIX user who remembers DOS, or has used a terminal-based app before at work. What have they probably never seen before? ncurses. You are throwing them right into the fire, and giving them nothing that looks familiar to work with.

Talk about pain. And misunderstanding. And confusion about what the icons really represent and the cursor-flow mechanisms.

GUI install is where it's at. It's the best way to get a new-to-UNIX person onto a UNIX-alike system from install on, because you're building on something they are already familiar with - clicky clicky buttons and menus.

But you can ignore me. I just teach this stuff. :)

--mandi

Re:New Users, Huh?

[iggymanz]

nonsense, remember the ncurses-like installs of the later versions of DOS? GUI assumes you have proper driver for graphics card and mouse, not always a good assumption given space limits of install media.

Re:New Users, Huh?

[Yohahn]

Intuition is in the eye of the beholder. Even the nipple is not intuitive (it uses two reflexes that don't always work together.)

I don't know what age of people you teach, but the people I run into, where I teach, are half Windows only. The older people are more familliar with DOS and this kind of interface.

I'll give you, in the future GUIs will be more prevalent, so they should move to GUI in the long run. Even there, however, you have to account for the tradeoff: ease of video card config vs. ease of gui installer.

The students I see have barely heard of Linux, it's just some buzzword. What's worse, they know enought not to waste resources on a buzzword,so they want to install it on a 386 out of the 80's.
They don't realize how hard that can be.

My point? The ncurses can be useful on older machines that aren't going to have easy video card config. More importantly (and more relavent) this kind of interface is MORE fammiliar for older students.

Re:New Users, Huh?

[JLester]

I agree. We have users call the help desk pretty often when they have to force a reboot of their Windows machine. It of course runs scandisk while booting and then asks them what to do if it finds problems. They are very puzzled when their mouse doesn't seem to do anything (you have to use the arrow keys to select the options). Text-based interfaces just aren't intuitive to many modern users.

Jason

Re:New Users, Huh?

[frozencesium]

there is NO work-alike in the Windows world

Um...maybe I'm the only one here who has ever installed NT??? I mean...it's not like the fist half of ANY NT based install startes out with an ASCII interface that some people find even harder to use than ncurses.

Well, occasionally, you'll end up with a new-to-UNIX user who remembers DOS, or has used a terminal-based app before at work. What have they probably never seen before? ncurses

As others have mentioned, this type of interface was not only prevelent during the DOS days, but many of these interfaces weren't as easy or intuitive as ncurses. When I finaly made the switch to linux (about 5 years ago), I had no problems with the install interface. Now granted I might be a rareity, but if I can walk new users through it all the time, and they don't complain...then from what I have seen, your argument is not very valid. Of course the others are right, it's also nice to have access to an install interface that is not video driver dependant.

Ok, ncurses isn't as flashy as a GUI, so maybe we start out with some simple ncurses stuff untill we can get X11 installed and running a svga xserver to compleate the installation...just a thought, but it should be feasible...

As for your regular Debian bashing...I can't imagine why you would want to bash Debian. True the install system isn't as easy as Redhat, but with 3.0 they have made a lot of improvements. Debian is IMHO easily the most stable distro out there. Even Debian's Sid (unstable) is fairly rock solid in my experiance. For those less daring, the stable distro simply does not break. Granted you won't be running the latest and greatest versions of software, but with the stability, simplicity of package management, the ease of security patching (just proper lines in your sources.list and an addition of a cron job), and the ton of pre-packaged software availible...it's a damn good system. If stability is a primary concern, I can't think of a better distro. After all...what is one of the biggest complaints of windows people? "It crashes all the time"...

I teach this stuff too...just my $0.02

Re:New Users, Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Those who can, do. Those who can't....

Re:New Users, Huh?

[Accelerated Joe]

Why? Because there is NO work-alike in the Windows world. What do I mean by that? Well, occasionally, you'll end up with a new-to-UNIX user who remembers DOS, or has used a terminal-based app before at work. What have they probably never seen before? ncurses. You are throwing them right into the fire, and giving them nothing that looks familiar to work with.

Have you bothered looking at your BIOS configuration screen lately? That's pretty similar, and I think many people have seen that screen on their windows based pc.

I don't mean that people who have never configured their BIOS should also not install a new OS, but I'm just giving a counter-example that proves your statement was wrong. Make whatever logical conclusion you want from it.

Re:New Users, Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Libranet's ncurses install is easy and contains helpful instructions, and, like you say, it's imprudent to rely upon X to install an OS. I'm sure we all have our own examples of horror stories due to graphic installers.

Re:New Users, Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, if we're talking about intuition, it's just based on previous experience, so the only way to get windows users, is to mimick there UI.

To get computer virgin users, there's nothing more to do than just display the minimal command set at start, and then pray that this new user knows about RTFM when stuck.

Besides, MS Windows has also a sort of ncurses UI at the begining of install sessions. How do they deal with it ? Read the previous paragraph to know more.

Re:New Users, Huh?

[borwells]

So you've never installed Winnt 3.1/3.5/4.0/Win2K/XP? The first portion of the install for these is text based. So, anyone who has installed any version of Winnt should be comfortable with the installation interface for Debian, Libranet and any other distribution with an ncurses based text install.

Gui is not where it is at, especially if you want to install a headless server. But you can ignore me. I just teach network administrators how to use this stuff.

Re:New Users, Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

yes, the installer is improved.
I wonder how many people who parrot the conventional wisdom that Debian is hard to install
have ever tried it, or tried it lately ?

The hardest thing about an install is as much a function of hardware driver support compiled into
kernel as anything else.

Re:New Users, Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

As a newish Linux user, I finally settled on Debian after doing the usual distro churning on the mistaken assumption the GUI installs and system configuration would help me learn Linux. Bad idea. Debian required me to lurk and learn, and I'm better off for it. I'm neither l33t nor a zealot, but Debian works very well for me. The proliferation of well-intended "easy to use" distros IMO can be a disservice to newbs.

Re:New Users, Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

"there is NO work-alike in the Windows world..." "nothing that looks familiar to work with..."

Unless they've fiddled with the bios.

*chuckle*

[Anonymous Coward]

Reading that long winded pro-Libranet story header, one has to think of Calvin and Hobbes:

'You know, I'm not sure if I'm reading an advertisment, a review or the product itself' ;-)

Re:It's not...

[Poor Master]

GNU/Linux and Linuz are different conceptual thing . Linuz hides the fact that most of accompaning softs are written by GNU .

Thank you

Corel

[qurob]

Corel's Linux was based on Debian, was it not?

It didn't get them anywhere....not to say it's Debians fault. It was a decent product, however.

Re:Corel

[CentrX]

No it wasn't. It was an insecure piece of shit, with a few nifty closed-source add-ons to make it unique.

Re:Corel

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes it was.

And yer right it wasn't Debian's fault that Corel
couldn't market it properly. They started out well
but let the whole thing go to hell after a few months
for one reason or another.

Why Pay?

[dcstimm]

Libranet seems like a good idea, but to expensive for me. I cant waste my money on a linux distro at the moment, because 9 times out of 10 I wont like something about it and I will go try another free distro. Im very picky about my computer, it has to do what I want, and if I buy a product and its nothing I expected I will be really mad. Why pay for this when you can grab Gentoo linux and build a better system for free? Yeah it might take alittle longer but who cares, Its a hobbie isnt it? Oh well Ill stick with Gentoo linux they are the only distro currently that has Phoenix 0.2 running perfectly with Gtk2!

Re:Why Pay?

[gray peter]

Yeah it might take alittle longer but who cares, Its a hobbie isnt it?

Um... no. It's a job. It used to be a hobby 'till I started getting paid ;-)

Re:Why Pay?

[Anonymous Coward]

There is a 30day refund if you want to try it.

Re:Why Pay?

[Homebrewed]

Why pay for this when you can grab Gentoo linux and build a better system for free? Yeah it might take alittle longer but who cares, Its a hobbie isnt it?

Hey, I put Gentoo on my home box and liked it so well I put it on my work machine. It only takes longer to do the initial install. After that, updates are a piece of cake. I find Gentoo to be the easiest distro to administer that I've ever used. I even think it's nicer than FreeBSD.

Re:Why Pay?

[dcstimm]

so? What works for my hobbie also works for my job.

Re:Why Pay?

[Anonymous Coward]

Debian stable is even easier (you use cron to check for and apply security updates every eight / twenty four / whatever hours and essentially forget about it unless changes need to be made.

Gentoo's packaging needs a lot of manual changes, still.

UHM PROGENY STILL IN BUSINESS

[waspleg]

www.progeny.com

for those of you who don't know it is a commercial company founded by the original creator of linux and is based in indianapolis

eventhough it appears that they are no longer releasing their own distribution just modifying debian they are certainly NOT out of business

Re:UHM PROGENY STILL IN BUSINESS

[Mandi Walls]

Progeny was founded by Ian Murdock, the original creator of Debian.

Not Linus Torvalds, the original creator of Linux.

See their about page

--mandi

Re:UHM PROGENY STILL IN BUSINESS

[drgnvale]

I wasn't aware that Ian Murdock created Linux. I always heard that Linus Torvolds made linux... oh wait,, you meant the guy who created Debian GNU/Linux... Okay.

Re:UHM PROGENY STILL IN BUSINESS

[Anonymous Coward]

Progeny is still in business, but they no longer sell their Debian-based distribution; they have upgrade instructions for current customers to migrate to Debian Woody. So far as their being a distro vendor, Progeny is out of the market.

Re:UHM PROGENY STILL IN BUSINESS

[chriskenrick]

In fact, I heard Linus _Torvalds_ made Linux :)

offtopic????

[Ser\/o]

Zodiac signs. . .humor. . .Offtopic???? Sheesh

Re:offtopic????

[saintan]

wtf's the big deal with being offtopic anyway? i'm sick of you know-it-all slashdot snobs. can a guy have some fun? u don't like, MOVE ON COWBOY! and if you were just joking then i apologize :()

GNU

[Glanz]

GNUness gracious! Gnuys! I'm GNUnna try it right GNUow.

Re:GNU

[Nailer]

Chaos is freedom

GNU/Freedom!

Re:GNU

[Glanz]

GNU GNOW it!!!!

I am Chaos.
I am the substance from which
your artists and scientists build rhythms.

I am the spirit with which
your children and clowns
laugh in happy anarchy.

I am Chaos.
I am alive, and tell you
that you are free.

-Eris, Goddess of Chaos, Discord, and Confusion...

wireless setup

[Anonymous Coward]

I've used Libranet and loved it. For a desktop, it was more user friendly than Redhat, and even Mandrake.

My only bitch is the lack of GUI wireless PCMCIA card setup, which is present in Mandrake, Xandros, etc. In MS Windows, you plug it in and it works. In linux, it's not that simple at all.

Re:wireless setup

[Anonymous Coward]

lack of wireless, hey ?
well, linux is coming along nicely, used to be
it was complaints of current hardware that was
sometimes problematic rather than stuff that has only recently showed up from just around the horizon.

Tux, you have come a long way, baby !

Re:wireless setup

[baxshep]

Have you got wireless up and running in Libranet? If you have, I'd like to trade notes w/ you.

Re:It's not...

[The Bungi]

Well I guess that wraps it up then. Never thought about it that way.

<snort/>

Re:It's not...

[Poor Master]

Linuz is not just the kernel . You Microsoft-Lover . There are games still in GNU/Linux . OK??

Re:New Users, Huh?-Show-stopper "stopper"

[Anonymous Coward]

True however remember Linux has many roles. It can be a desktop OS. It can be a server, and it can be both. A ncurses interface is sutiable for either a server install, or worse case your having video driver issues. Turns a show-stopper into a minor nusance.

BTW I'm wondering if anyone has done a "role" switcher? e.g you install a desktop config, and whish to easily change to a server role, or visa versa. The codes there for configuring a machine for a particular role already.

WRONG!

[metalhed77]

The menu paradigm in the GUI world was taken from that of NCURSES. All you need to know is TAB, Arrow Keys, Spacebar, and Enter. The menus usually have some sort of message like 'Use the tab key to move between fields' and sometimes the same for the Enter and Spacebar keys.

Ncurses is fine, it takes literally one paragraph for someone to learn how to use it, and most pick it up intuitively. If you're going to run a distro like libranet and you can't figure out NCURSES then you'll suck a lot when it boots up too. There's a reason mandrake and lindows exist

Re:WRONG!

[james_underscore]

It doesn't matter if it only takes one paragraph to learn how to use it. It wouldn't matter if it only took one *word* to learn how to use it, people refuse point blank to ever RTFM. No one will ever do it. People designing computer interfaces just have to accept that - just like anyone in any other branch of design.

ncurses was fine (and great) when it was the only way to get things done (e.g. all those ncurses-style DOS installers), because every computer user at the time knew how to use it. But this kind of interface is dead, most computer users need a mouse.

Sure it has its uses - the ncurses linux config is handy if you don't have a working X-Windows system, but you wouldn't (honestly now) use it if X was working and you could use the X based linux config.

I don't mind ncurses myself, because I have experience with it, but you cannot say it is nearly as easy to use for someone who has only used Windows/MacOS.

How is it better than plain Debian?

[Ian Bicking]

I read the review, and it wasn't clear to me how this was significantly better than plain Debian. It seems to have a better installer -- and that's nice, but it's just not enough to make another distro worth it. They mentioned an admin tool, but again... that's just one tool (but if it was all-encompassing, that would be cool, but I didn't get that impression).

Sure, there's lots of apps -- but that's because it's Debian. Why is it really better?

Re:How is it better than plain Debian?

[iomud]

Basically this distro's bread and butter are that it's debian with all the current packages one might want while running debian. XFree 4.2, kde 3 etc, and while I know these are avalible from unsupported apt sources not everyone who runs debian might know this or care to risk the stability and security of their system. I have no clue how stable or secure libranet is but I'm just pointing out some possible concerns. For instance my laptop requires that I have XFree 4.2.x which debian doesnt provide unless you want to install branden's not-ready-for-prime-time packages, it just makes using debian a tiny bit more difficult. That said I'm glad libranet is around it cant hurt to have a little healthy competition.

Re:How is it better than plain Debian?

[ilias]

Easier installation: I was never able to install Debian Potato, but I was able to install Libranet 1.9 (based on Potato) with little trouble.

The admin tool Xadminmenu makes life easier. It is pretty much all-encompassing, if you're an average joe. It lets you do pretty much everything you need including installing a new kernel with just a couple of clicks.

The Libranet community can be another reason to go with Libranet. It's much smaller than Debian's community which makes it easier to develop relationships with people. Perhaps, it's more newbie friendly, but I don't have much experience with the Debian community.

You may also wanna check out my older comments on Libranet.

Re:How is it better than plain Debian?

[greenskyx]

The real reason that it's worth it is that it comes with a few extras right off the bat... (gnome2, kde3, etc)... The admin tools are very well done. Libranet also has very good technical support which helps if you run into problems. If you are really poor it might just be best to use debian, but time is money and Libranet will save you time...

Re:How is it better than plain Debian?

[pben]

Libranet is Debian with KDE 3.03 and a few other newer packages (see Libranet) Libranet tends to have newer packages than the current stable. Due to some delays that the KDE maintainers have put on the KDE waiting for a bug free release, KDE 3 is not on the offical mirrors of Debian right now. There are unoffical debs available and you can always go to the source code, not the way to go on a binary release. Debian has chosen to support many different platforms and therefore is forced to be slower than a one platform release like Libranet.

The problem is if there isn't a deb supplied by Libranet you forced to the source. I found that out when I went looking for Kwintv. If I wanted the deb from the offical Debian mirror I would have to uninstall 150+ packages, all of KDE3, needless to say I canceled that option.

Re:How is it better than plain Debian?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not better than plain Debian for all users, but it probably is for some users.

Users who want the more current major components and apps, (kernel,X, KDE, Gnome, Mozilla, etc, integrated into the stable version of Debian .
Of course, this can be done with regular Debian, but some people don't know how or aren't inclined.
Plus, a good collection of tools for compiling
kernels, true type fonts, etc.
Good Support, and at a nominal price.

Quite frankly, if you care about Debian, you should wish Libranet well, if they bring new
users to Debian and Linux.

True, they may move on in time to pure Debian, but that is cool too.

Re:UHM PROGENY STILL IN BUSINESS-Linus

[Anonymous Coward]

"for those of you who don't know it is a commercial company founded by the original creator of linux and is based in indianapolis"

WOW! Linus is working in Indianapolis. Now I know I'm in geek heaven.

Re:It's not...

[Poor Master]

Not yet .

*Oops*

[The J Kid]

Can you say Story is OLD...

The Previous /. article

Re:*Oops*

[monthos]

No its not, the story you showed stated it was released, and this story is about how its not dying liek other debian forks have.

Seriously, dont look at names in articles and quickly post how its a repost just becouse you have a hunger for kharma, you really do look very stupid.

Too many syllables

[Anonymous Coward]

"Libranet GNU/Linux" just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?

Gimmie a freakin' break. Thanks to Stallman's sycophants for three needless syllables.

Re:Too many syllables

[phlebas_belfast]

guh - new Seems more like two syllables to me.

typo

[waspleg]

yea yea i meant to type debian linux not linux, it's been a long day of tests and my brain skipped it

Re:typo

[drgnvale]

>>yea yea i meant to type debian linux not linux, it's been a long day of tests and my brain skipped it
Hehe, no worries. I just saw a nice chance to get some karma ;-)

I refuse

[Anonymous Coward]

I refuse to buy any operating system that calls itself gnu/anything. Call it linux, and only linux, or you don't get my cash.

Re:I refuse

[Anonymous Coward]

I refuse to buy any operating system that calls itself gnu/anything. Call it linux, and only linux, or you don't get my cash.

Yeah, well to get my cash they mustn't have an "L" anywhere in their name, so they failed twice for me. When will people learn how much money there is to be made in customising the distribution with the exact name the particular customer wants?

Just a reminder... Xandros due out shortly

[mbourgon]

And another commercial distro, Xandros, based off of Corel Linux 3 (which is, in turn, based off Debian), is due out in the next 3 weeks.

http://www.xandros.com/anticipated.html

"Our manufacturer indicates the product should be available for shipping in the week of October 21."

Strange Pricing

[sterno]

So I went to look at libranet's product because I like debian but would like something with a better installer and hardware detection. I thought to myself that I could just download the ISO from linuxiso.org but that maybe I should help support them and pay for a real copy. So I decided to look at the prices.

They offer 4 different prices, one for past customers, one for new customers, one for students, and one for corporate users. There is not an immediately obvious difference between any of these releases and I can still download the ISO's from linuxiso.org. A student discount makes sense, fine, but then why does a corporation have to pay more per copy than a home user?

It seems like a much better model to offer two levels of product. The first is a retail model (possibly with an available student discount) with instructions, limited technical support, etc. Then you offer corporate contracts where you agree to provide a higher grade support (24 hour service, increased response time, etc) and you provide that at a higher rate. I see no evidence that as a corportate customer I would get anything better for my extra $40/copy, especially when I can just download an ISO.

Re:Strange Pricing

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe you meant decreased response time...

Re:Strange Pricing

[baxshep]

You can only download their older release from linuxiso.org. You HAVE to buy 2.7

My Libranet Experiences

[greenskyx]

I've been using Libranet since the 1.x days. I've found it to be a very good distrobution. I found the Libranet install to be very easy and I love apt-get. Libranet reminds me of what Mandrake used to be in it's earlier days. It is a lot like Debian but with a lot of extra value added in. My favorite feature is their kernel compiling setup. They have a very easy to use process that lets you recompile your kernel. After you recompile the kernel it adds the newly recompiled kernel to lilo and keeps the old kernel as a lilo option so you can switch back if you have any problems.

Re:My Libranet Experiences

[CentrX]

After you recompile the kernel it adds the newly recompiled kernel to lilo and keeps the old kernel as a lilo option so you can switch back if you have any problems.

You can do this in regular Debian too, with kernel-package.

Re:My Libranet Experiences

[castlan]

Everything you can do in LibraNet, you can do in Debian... theoretically. The difference is, LibraNet automatically recompiles Linux for your machine as part of the standard install. As in, you don't need to install Debian, RTFM about stuff, become root to apt-get kernel-package...

Nobody said that Debian Can't DO That... the point is that LibraNet is nicer, easier, and better supported (because you are paying them for it!) Eventually Debian will get these features... that is good. LibraNet does it now, and the installation leans more toward hand holding then saying RTFM you clueless newb!

Not that I have anything against Debian... it is great. Maybe you were just enlightening us vanilla Debian users so that we don't get LibraNet envy, so I shouldn't think of you as taking a lame pot-shot against a valuable part of the Free Software community that values dpkg. But I really think that we should let LibraNet brag a bit... having a commerical version of Debian, that has stayed afloat as long as it has, and isn't harming the Debian community, is a VERY Very Good Thing. Please recognize that, and consider that at this point in time, a capital generating version of Debian should be Respected and Encouraged. Especially in light of Progeny, who I was full out rooting for, who has done significant good for Debian, and who is sorely missed.

Re:My Libranet Experiences

[CentrX]

He said "It is a lot like Debian but with a lot of extra value added in. My favorite feature is their kernel compiling setup." I was simply saying that this feature, at least as it was described by the poster, was an instance of "extra value" on top of regular Debian. I did not intend to slight Libranet at all.

Re:My Libranet Experiences

[CentrX]

Sorry, I was saying that the feature, as described, was NOT an instance of extra value over Debian.

GNU/Linux

[tomthebomb]

Why even bother?
Just call it Libranet Linux, jeesh.
It's the same thing, no reason to add three letters on just because some group got all greedy.

Re:GNU/Linux

[Anonymous Coward]

Just call it Libranet Linux, jeesh.

Or Libranet GNU, that'd be even shorter.

Still Debian for me

[dh003i]

I'm still not sold on this new Debian-based distribution. I'm not an idiot newbie user, so i can handle Debian's text-based approach to installation, administration, and customization.

So why should I shell out $60 dollars for Libranet? All of these applications it has can be downloaded and installed in Debian. The one major exception appears to be Adminimenu, which you can only get (to my knowledge) by ordering the Libranet CD or downloading the ISO. If you really want the program that bad, just download the ISO and burn it on a CD. Then find it in the CD.

But there's a reason (a good one) why Debian is always "behind the times" and doesn't include the latest software. Stability and continuity. Are all of these latest applications really that essential to get? No, most of them aren't. So let other users and other distributions struggle with their bugs.

Here's a thought

[incripshin]

Instead of it being GNU/Linux (four syllables), it could be called GNUL? Huh? HUH? Pronounced like NULL so it would only be one syllable. On second nobody'll listen to me.

Bad business model & big whiners

[dh003i]

A few comments.

(1) Giving away a ISO for download is all good and fine for non-profit Linux distributions like Debian. It makes sense. It doesn't make sense, however, for a corporation trying to make money off of it to do that. The Linux community is not going to chastise the company because they don't offer ISO downloads. Think the path of least resistance. If you want to sell a product, you shouldn't also make it available for free.

(2) I stand by my earlier assertion that this isn't worth the extra $60 as opposed to downloading Debian. Almost all the additional software apps it has can be downloaded. And there's a reason why Debian doesn't always include the latest greatest software -- because it usually has problems. Debian prefers to let other distros walk through that minefield and benefit from the knowledge gained.

(3) For those of you talking about how much more "resource hungry" one distro is as opposed to another (i.e., many saying Debian more resource hungry than Slackware), do try to remember that they're all based around the same thing. You can remove anything you don't like, and if you remove enough stuff, Debian eventually looks like Slackware.

(4) For those of you whining about having to say all those extra syllables in GNU/Linux. Get over it. Its three extra letters to write, and if your giving a speech you don't have to say it every time. Distributions can simply be referred to by their distribution name (i.e., Debian) for short. But when something is written formally or said for the first time, it should be "Debian GNU/Linux" or "Redhat GNU/Linux" or whatever it is. Because that's what it is. Most of the tools and utilities and programs you use in a distribution are GNU stuff. Its only appropriate to say Debian GNU/Linux when speaking (at least upon any introduction; it need not be said more than once upon entering a new topic, after which simply Debian suffice's). It is not that hard to type in Debian GNU/Linux at the beginning of a paragraph.

Credit should be given where it is due. If your going to mention the kernel of an OS like Debian, you should also mention all the software around it. Hence, formally, Debian GNU/Linux.

I get sick of hearing how the FSF and Stallman are so greedy and unreasonable by expecting us to (at least formally) call a distribution like Debian "Debian GNU/Linux". Asking for due credit is not greedy or unreasonable. And, quite frankly, the reason they're asking isn't because of vanity, but because few new Linux users have any idea about Free Software and what it means to them.

Stallman was right when he said that he was being written out of history. GNU/Linux supporters don't want to bother telling new users about that wierd, long-haird, hippie guy who's always talking about this silly notion called Freedom. People afraid to talk about Freedom in the context of software because they think it makes them seem weak and foolish.

Re:Bad business model & big whiners

[Otter]

The Linux community is not going to chastise the company because they don't offer ISO downloads. Think the path of least resistance. If you want to sell a product, you shouldn't also make it available for free.

If there is one thing that I can say with utter certainty, it's this: If you don't offer ISO downloads, the Linux community is going to chastise you.

Actually that could probably be generalized to: Whatever you do, the Linux community is going to chastise you. (If your Red Carpet service offers free downloads and free updates, and you add some faster, dedicated servers for an optional paid service, the Linux community is going to chastise you.)

Re:Bad business model & big whiners

[Anonymous Coward]

Is this Off-Topic Rant day?

Re:Bad business model & big whiners

[HiThere]

I prefer to not download large files (dial-up connection). I don't like a lot of hassle when setting up a new system (I switch systems too often for that to be palatable). And I even have one computer that doesn't have any modem at all. To me LibraNet is quite worth the cost. ($60 is only the first time. Updated CDs are cheaper.)

My problem was that it didn't do what I wanted. Appearantly the problem I was having was with the recent kernel version, as going back to RH 7.2 fixed things. But with the new kernels, one of my computers was too slow to use. Mandrake 7.0, Red Hat 7.2, those work well. But 7.3 crawled! So it's back to 7.2, and hit up2date. (I thought that the problem was KDE, but even iceWm was too slow [that's what LibraNet thought I should use].)

Re:Bad business model & big whiners

[mandolin]

It doesn't make sense, however, for a corporation trying to make money off of it to do that.(ie, ISO downloads)

I'm going to assume libranet has a very small userbase. If I was them I'd want to build my userbase before I started making it hard for potential customers to try my distro out and get "hooked". Even if I lost a little money (no Profit! jokes please). I'm not defending ISO downloads in particular, just the convenience principle.

Re:Bad business model & big whiners

[castlan]

Too bad you didn't just try an earlier version of LibraNet. Especially since if it fixes the problem (maybe by using an earlier revision of the kernel) you can then apt-get to the more featureful apps included with later versions (especially since you already bought the newer version).

Whether or not it was Linux, the kernel causing the problem, you probably should have reported it back to LibraNet. since you bought it, you should be entitled to some support, and they can then improve LibraNet for everybody.

If Red Hat is getting the job done, then Kudos. But if you have to reinstall, maybe you could give LibraNet a heads up to fix your problem.

Re:Bad business model & big whiners

[HiThere]

That would probably have worked too, but I had already tried Red Hat 7.2 (and Mandrake 7.0) and I *knew* that they worked. I tried Mandrake 7.0 first, but all the mirrors seem to have removed it, so I wasn't geting any of the security updates installed. So I switched over to Red Hat, and I'm updating it now.

Lingux

[iamacat]

This way we'll get RMS off our backs (it has all leters of GNU in it) and we don't have to change the way we pronounce it.

Re:Lingux

[benjamindees]

Dude, so close, yet so far away. Lignux

Leenucks is dying? That's sad.

[Baron of Greymatter]

My sympathies go out to Mrs. Nucks and the rest of the Nucks family. I'm sure Lee will be missed.

Leenucks may be dying but Linux is very much alive and well.

Or am I mistaken and leenucks is another term for Microsoft? We know it's dying.

Libranet GNU/Linux 2.7 boxes

[Anonymous Coward]

Imagine a Beowolf Cluster of THESE!!!

Uh, Progeny *is* still in business.

[Anonymous Coward]

Progeny Linux comes to mind as a commercial Linux distribution company whose Linux product met with good reviews, but couldn't remain in business.

I guess I have Santa Claus to thank for the paychecks I've been getting every two weeks for the past 2 years plus, then.

Progeny did discontinue its Progeny Debian product, but we remain in business and continue to do interesting things, IMO.

Linux Naming FAQ

[asv108]

Obivously the poster didn't read this. :)

Re:Linux Naming FAQ

[neanti]

What a f****ng moron! Obviously some people *were* born yesterday.

Ever install windows 2000?

[petard]

The initial interface of the Windows 2000 installer bears a strong resemblance to ncurses. I think it's even still there with XP. The long and short of it is, if users want to install any OS (as opposed to just using it) they'll probably have to learn something new, GUI or no.

Uh, Progeny *is* still in business

[Overfiend]

[Sorry, repost. I had cookies turned off in this browser so my login didn't work. Please mod down the Anonymous Coward version as redundant, not this one; thanks.]

Progeny Linux comes to mind as a commercial Linux distribution company whose Linux product met with good reviews, but couldn't remain in business.

I guess I have Santa Claus to thank for the paychecks I've been getting every two weeks for the past 2 years plus, then.

Progeny did discontinue its Progeny Debian product, but we remain in business and continue to do interesting things, IMO.

Re:It's not...

[Anonymous Coward]

Nobody's forcing you, The Bungi, to name your distro "GNU/Linux." Libranet chose to call their distro "GNU/Linux" for some very good reasons so get over it.

dh003i is NOT an "idiot newbie user"

[baxshep]

Obviously if I want to have the godlike status and ego that the above poster has, I MUST run Debian.
Of course, if you can't run Debian or even worse, choose not to, you are an "idiot newbie user"
"But Linus himself runs Redhat" you say? Doesn't matter in the sheer omnipotence of the uber dh003i.
I wonder if this guy has ever contributed to any Linux distribution. That is the real reason I bought Libranet. I tried it. I liked it. I support it. Well maybe he's helping by castigating newbies on Slashdot.

Hello ? more important than gui or ncurses

[Anonymous Coward]

is how well designed the installer in that interface is.
gui doesn't gaurentee it will be intelligent or intuitive.
the first time I saw an ncurses ui , I thught it was a funny looking gui.
It is what it can do , not what it looks like.

I use Libranet 2.7

[baxshep]

I use Libranet 2.7 and love it. In my eyes it is kind of a "niche" distribution. You can't be a complete newbie to use it but you can get all of the benefits of Debian. As noted in the article, the amount of packages that comes w/ this distro is amazing. The install is extremely easy to use-just as easy as a GUI one if you know how to use Tab, Space, and your arrow keys. It was kind of a surpirse to me to see that Libranet supported my ATI Radeon M7 graphics card in my laptop whereas Mandrake didn't until the final release of 9.0. After using Mandrake, Suse, and Redhat for over 2 years, apt-get is a joy to use. Feel free to ask me any questions you might have about it.
Now if some kind soul would help me w/ my CDBakeOven problems, I'd be much obliged.

Re:Leenucks is dying? That's sad.

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice attempt at being funny, but if you actually think that Microsoft is even close to dying, you might as well just find the nearest cliff and jump off it. Head first, preferably..doesn't sound like there's much up there worth saving anyway.

Re:Problem with commercial Debian-RH APT

[Anonymous Coward]

It does. Over on freshmeat.rpms someone ported apt over. Actually it's a bit better than mandrakes apt.
One the man page is more complete. Two the list of sources is more complete. Unfortunatly a lot of the mirrors out there are still hosed.

You must work for a jerk

[Anonymous Coward]

if he will can you for one mistake.

Most people who use debian servers don't test offline on test boxes.. they just apply the updates. Debian updates are designed to update smoothly.. not "kind of smoothly" or "usually smoothly" like an rpm upgrade, but *always* smoothly.

Couple of Corrections...

[RedBear]

First, there is no difference between the different "releases", because they're all the same release. Just different levels of support, and they decided to give a break to people who upgrade. Although I would have given a better discount to upgraders than to students, but whatever.

Second, you can't download the ISO of Libranet 2.7 anywhere. Libranet are the ones that only offer the previous version free to download (so right now version 2.0 is available on their website and LinuxISO.org for download, but not version 2.7, the latest and spectacularest). They had a beta program for 2.7, but that only went on for a few weeks.

The pricing levels don't bother me as much as the fact that the prices more than doubled since the last version I purchased. Version 1.9.1 cost me $25 and was well worth it. $60 is getting a little steep for what amounts to a somewhat polished Debian install.

That said, Libranet is a great distro for a new Linux user, especially if you're looking to get into Debian and want something that isn't slow as molasses in January on an older system (if you've tried any recent Mandrake up to 8.2, you know what I'm talking about. Ugh. Looking forward to trying 9.0). Libranet sets up a nice, working system from which you can fiddle around and graduate to plain Debian later on if you're inclined that way.

Huh? Debian.....? Errr...

[Bowie J. Poag]

Debian? People still use that?

(BRRRSshehahahahaaa.. Sorry, I couldn't resist!)

Yeah, "New" Users...

[castlan]

I disagree that GUI install is where it's at, unless you are teaching somebody who already has some experience using a desktop computer productively. To somebody who has never used a computer, avoiding the mouse is a good thing. Have you ever tried to teach a "newbie" over the age of 45 how to simulaneously click the proper button, while the cursor still pointing at the proper icon? I highly doubt it.

NCurses is great for basic installation... the focus doesn't change while you are trying to punch the enter key. Anybody who has used a computer before, even an utterly mouse dependant Mac OS 6.x user, can learn to use "TAB, up, down and enter" in under five minutes in a classroom setting. Try that multibutton mouse with someone whos hand-eye coordination has declined since the dawn of the PC era, even one-on-one. I dare you.

BTW, it seems likely you haven't used an NCURSES based Installation like Debian/Libranet. There are no "Icons" to be confused about, just highlighted words and phrases. As for the confusion over flow, explain the whole "top to bottom" flow that most civilizations active for the past two milleniums have been using, let them watch the highlight rotate around as they press the tab key (harmlessly) about twenty times, and they usually get the hang of it. Engourage them to read the phrases on the screen, and point out the significant items that they will need to actually look at. On a Debian derived system, this should almost always be the topmost item in the list, right in the upper-middle portion of the screen. You don't even have to clean out the grimy mouse ball which won't track on the filthy desk, which has no room because it is cluttered with papers and textbooks!

Maybe you aren't leveraging the average computer user's Win/Mac experience, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. In fact, it is the perfect opportunity for some re-education... don't press ctrl-alt-del if something doesn't look right... don't necessarily shutdown or reboot multiple times daily... don't eject a floppy disk without warning the system... don't expect to run the cutesy little "dancing elves" attachments some friend sent from their Windows computer... I'm sure you have plenty you could append to this list as a computer teacher.

Last Post!

[alpg]

THE LESSER-KNOWN PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES #8: LAIDBACK

This language was developed at the Marin County Center for T'ai Chi,
Mellowness and Computer Programming (now defunct), as an alternative to
the more intense atmosphere in nearby Silicon Valley.

The center was ideal for programmers who liked to soak in hot tubs while
they worked. Unfortunately few programmers could survive there because the
center outlawed Pizza and Coca-Cola in favor of Tofu and Perrier.

Many mourn the demise of LAIDBACK because of its reputation as a gentle and
non-threatening language since all error messages are in lower case. For
example, LAIDBACK responded to syntax errors with the message:

"i hate to bother you, but i just can't relate to that. can
you find the time to try it again?"

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