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The State of GNU/Linux in 2002: It was Good.

Posted by michael on from the well-duh dept.

An anonymous reader writes "This year has proven most interesting for GNU/Linux. While there was not any amazing surprises, there were numerous events that are noteworthy for review. The upshot to all of this is that most of what happened was good overall for the Free Software community. Read the full story."

47 of 347 comments (clear)

  1. just good? by SHEENmaster · · Score: 5, Funny

    It rocked! Then again: I'm using Debian/Woody which is about a year old so I wouldn't know...

    --
    You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
  2. best part? by SHEENmaster · · Score: 4, Informative

    The Sharp Zaurus!

    200+mhz in my pocket along with 64mb of ram, and Debian GNU/Linux as soon as that damn SD card I ordered comes in!

    --
    You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
  3. Fonts That Don't Suck! by occamboy · · Score: 5, Interesting

    To my mind, the best thing, and it's a biggie, is that we finally have a distribution (Redhat 8.0 -- perhaps others?) that, out of the box, renders fonts so that they look good to non-nerds. This is the first step towards bringing Linux to the masses!

    Next we need to radically cut the number of choices that the average user needs to make at install-time (Gee, which of the following 87 libraries should I install? And what the hell is a library anyway?)

    If some entity (Redhat? IBM?) just grabs the bull by the horns, we'll have a good Windows replacement in a few months! Pleasepleaseplease somebody do it!

    1. Re:Fonts That Don't Suck! by Dark+Lord+Seth · · Score: 5, Insightful

      There is a huge line several miles wide between what is useful for servers and what is/could possibly be useful for desktops. Unfortunately, this line is so wide most people would fail to notice it even if they hit said line head first. I often see that so called "desktop distros" include stuff such as PERL, Apache, MySQL, PHP, ProFTPd... What the hell would one random computer user do with these programs? And with "random computer user" I mean those kind of people who do nothing about security at all, double click everything that contains the word "naked" "nude" or the name "anna kournikova" and their parents/ofspring/aunts/cousins/grandparents/lovers /mistresses/pets, you name it. I'm not even going to mention out-dated FTP/HTTP/SSH servers that might be exploited because random users don't ever update or turn off programs... ("But I like having so many programs running...")

      On the other hand, we have so called "professional" distros that are far better. If you want to use them as a desktop, sure, click anything you want. Server? Just select everything you want for that one. However, these distros will never be destined for the normal user ("Where is my mouse? Yes, I know it's on my mouse mat, just where is it on my screen!? GPM? Wha? Not in X yet?") unless installed and secured by one random friendly non-introverted Linux hacker from around town...

      So, get rid of all the stuff people never use on desktop distros such as Apache and the like. The people who DO use it prolly aren't happy with the default included package and will most likely build their own anyways. The professional distros are fine with me atm, no-nonsense and no marketeer buzzwords. (Yes, I just visited redhat.com)

      Although the one thing that could improve all of linux is the removal of X. God, it is SLOW, Windows 98 booted faster on my p300 with 64mb and this is an AMD at 1667mhz with 1024mb! While I haven't seen the source code myself (yet), I heard it is about as bloated and obscure as it is. Lose it, replace it with smaller, non-server client orientated graphic systems. Random users want SPEED, not the ability to link up 100+ terminals to the computer.

      --
      Hate me!
    2. Re:Fonts That Don't Suck! by kien · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I totally agree that RH8 was a great step forward for GNU/Linux on the desktop of Joe_Average this year. I still prefer *BSD, but I'm a Joe_Geek. :)

      For me, the biggest sign of Linux success in 2002 was that non-geeks recognized the word "Linux" when I mentioned it. They still don't quite understand what it means (and some of them think I have a stutter because I always say "GNU/Linux" which comes out sounding like "Guh-New-Linux") but the simple name-recognition was a huge sign of progress to me. I give Wal-Mart a huge ton of credit for this.

      Another poster (quite rightly) mentioned that a weak economy is not necessarily good for F/OSS because of the risk-factor involved for companies to implement new software. I work for a very large telecommunications company, and it sure does help sell GNU/Linux to management when you can mention in a business case that Wal-Mart sells PCs that run the operating system. (Big-wigs like business precedents.)

      I can't wait to see what will happen in 2003!

      --K.

      --
      Sig: Bad people happen. Try to avoid being one of them.
    3. Re:Fonts That Don't Suck! by psamuels · · Score: 3, Insightful
      I often see that so called "desktop distros" include stuff such as PERL, Apache, MySQL, PHP, ProFTPd... What the hell would one random computer user do with these programs?

      Uhhhh. What is "PERL"? Closest match I found is "Perl", a scripting language heavily used in system maintenance procedures. Kind of important if you want to, say, install packages and stuff. (Actually I don't know about RH8, which is what we're presumably talking about here, but a lot of Debian packages require a minimal Perl install to support the packaging scripts.)

      Oh - for future reference, saying "PERL" rather than "Perl" is a lot more damaging to your credibility than any mere spelling mistake I can think of. (:

      Although the one thing that could improve all of linux is the removal of X. God, it is SLOW, Windows 98 booted faster on my p300 with 64mb and this is an AMD at 1667mhz with 1024mb!

      What, praytell, do you propose to replace it with?

      While I haven't seen the source code myself (yet), I heard it is about as bloated and obscure as it is.

      Then you should listen less to people who don't know what they're talking about. (Yes, that means reading less Slashdot.) On my box X takes about 3 seconds to start. This is so dwarfed by the startup time for GNOME, it's not even funny. If I logged in and out often enough for it to matter (hmmm, looks like my last login was 1 Dec), I think I'd switch back to vanilla fvwm2.

      Now I know that it is fashionable in certain circles to assume that since X is 15 years old and has "unnecessary" features like network transparency and is still binary compatible after all these years, that it must be the cause of all of life's bloat problems. Sorry, but it just ain't so. Not that X couldn't be improved - it's being improved all the time. But it's not the pig you think it is.

      --
      "How can you claim that you are anti-crack, while still writing a window manager?" — Metacity README
    4. Re:Fonts That Don't Suck! by mbadolato · · Score: 5, Informative
      Hello Nitpick, PERL still is and always has been an abbreviation of "Practical Extraction and Reporting Language"

      Um, no it isn't. Right from the FAQ:

      What's the difference between "perl" and "Perl"?

      One bit. Oh, you weren't talking ASCII? :-) Larry now uses "Perl" to signify the language proper and "perl" the implementation of it, i.e. the current interpreter. Hence Tom's quip that "Nothing but perl can parse Perl." You may or may not choose to follow this usage. For example, parallelism means "awk and perl" and "Python and Perl" look OK, while "awk and Perl" and "Python and perl" do not. But never write "PERL", because perl is not an acronym, apocryphal folklore and post-facto expansions notwithstanding.

    5. Re:Fonts That Don't Suck! by psamuels · · Score: 3, Interesting
      Hello Nitpick, PERL still is and always has been an abbreviation of "Practical Extraction and Reporting Language" and as far as I have learned, abbreviations are spelled with all caps.

      Little credit here? Duh, I know what Perl (once known as "Pearl", by the way) stood for. But no, abbreviations are not always spelled with all caps, and they are not always treated nunc et semper as abbreviations. In this particular case, nobody in authority - from the legions of Perl hackers out there to Larry Wall himself - refers to it as PERL any more. I believe that practice died out well before the release of Perl 5, say '93 or '94. Indeed, referring to it in all caps, like prounouncing Linux Lienux, is a very efficient way to telegraph the fact that you are out of touch.

      What, praytell, do you propose to replace it with?
      Something else.

      As I thought.

      Like I stated before, who here actually USES the client-server capabilities of X? Apart from a small bunch of people, I presume almost none.

      I do, as do many people I know, but that's not really the point. The point is, you have not yet proven or demonstrated that X is bloated to begin with - or, if it is, that its bloat is even measurable on current desktop setups - or, even if it is, that the client/server design is to blame.

      It's old, it's archaic and it's in need of something sleek, small and fast to follow it up.

      Nice set of assertions you got there, backed up with some lovely handwaving.

      My counter-assertion is that while X is old (and "archaic", whatever that means here), it was designed so well to begin with that it has aged gracefully and is not at all in need of replacement. I further assert that your miserably slow experience with Linux on your Athlon has little or nothing to do with X per se and should be blamed on something else.

      designing an graphics sustem would be quite impossible for me atm.

      Then, pardon my bluntness, but you're not really qualified to comment on whether an existing graphics system is even good or bad, much less whether its design and implementation are so horrible as to warrant a complete redesign. I happen to think that X's shortcomings (yes, it has some) are for the most part fairly easy to fix or work around, thanks to its excellent original design.

      And hey, aren't you the one who thinks all abbreviations should be in caps? What's with "atm"? (:

      I'm pretty sure there are people working on alternatives atm though.

      Yes. The best-known would be Fresco, which (though I have no first-hand knowledge of this) looks to be a lot more feature-rich / bloated than X. (I believe Fresco uses CORBA throughout, for one thing. If you thought network transparency was an unnecessary layer of abstraction, aka "bloat", check out CORBA. And yes, it's spelled in all-caps.)

      --
      "How can you claim that you are anti-crack, while still writing a window manager?" — Metacity README
    6. Re:Fonts That Don't Suck! by Daengbo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      who here actually USES the client-server capabilities of X? Apart from a small bunch of people, I presume almost none.
      In fact, I use it, and so do a growing number of schools and businesses as a way to recycle old hardware and limit administration headaches. IceWM on my little P133 16Mb RAM X Term takes about 10 seconds from ON to autologin... slow because it's got a 10mb NIC. It runs OO.o Moz 1.2.1 and Gimp 1.2.3, all at the speed of the server.
      This makes it easy and profitable. Dropping the server client aspect of X11 would be really silly as people in your country ready themselves for a touch screen with network sound in every room.

      --
      Put identity in the browser.
  4. PDA Good || Server Bad by fozzy(pro) · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Many Linux users have been waiting for Linux to break out and start converting more users. Walmart certainly helped supporting Lindows, which i hope succedes as a desktop replacement. I think It's demize is the generally high price of the Subscription. In other light I know of schools and many other instutions switching to MS bassed mail systems due to ease of maintence and webacces they offer (Yes Many Linux solutions exist I like them myself). But a switch to MS Products is very bad for Linux on the server side...espically considering security issues as Windows is insecure.

    I agree ith the PDA article. I found the Sharp to be just as usefull as the Palm software and almost as easy as WinCE. I think the Small evices market could easioly be dominated by Linux because software for those devices needs to be customized by a manufacturer and the cost quickly becomes cheaper for manufacturers due to little to no cost for the Linux and abou tthe same cost to customize it as any other OS (ie Drivers for the hardware and customicing software).

    I hope the economy gets better
    Happy New Year

  5. Re:what about decimal ? by Salsaman · · Score: 3, Funny

    Yes it's all been replaced with binary now.

  6. next year will be better..... by oliverthered · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Well if not for Linux, then for the users....
    Key projects are starting to mature and become more 'user friendly' which is important for the desktop usage Linux is missing.
    a few examples are:

    Desktop+ performance features have made it into the 2.6 kernel, things like pre-emption, lower larency, higher frequency clock, async-io, better threading, alsa.. All great news for desktop users.

    Support is under development for older video cards (often build into modern chipsets) in the DRI project, giving decient X performance to most users.

    KDE and GNOME had a lot of new features in the latest releases, the next couple of revisions should see the features maturing, with performance gains, more universality/intergration &co...

    CDRecord has added support for IDE drives (without having to run ide scsi) application like arson are making cd burning easy... all good news for the home user.

    Wine is comming along in leaps and bounds....

    Xine and Mplayer now work for more-or-less every format out there, hopefully next year will see Moz plugins.

    This year was good, next year will be better...

    --
    thank God the internet isn't a human right.
    1. Re:next year will be better..... by dmelomed · · Score: 3, Insightful

      KDE and GNOME are not Linux specific.
      cdrecord is not Linux specific.
      wine is not Linux specific AFAIK.
      Xine and Mplayer are not Linux specific.
      The year was good for Unix, not only Linux.

    2. Re:next year will be better..... by Combuchan · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Nugget's Law: 95% of the time when a Linux user says "Linux" they really mean "Unix". The other 5% of the time they're referring to an aspect that only applies to their particular distribution

      </troll>

      --
      "[T]he single essential element on which all discoveries will be dependent is human freedom." -- Barry Goldwater
  7. I think its amazing by pavera · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I've only been using Linux for about 1.5 years now, and it amazes me how fast things get better in the OSS world. I mean sure Linux has been around for 10 years so maybe that's not "so fast", but in the last year I've noticed huge strides.

    The first time I installed linux (redhat 7.1) it took me a few tries to get it to see my mouse, my laptop video card didn't play nice, my desktop sound card didn't get found and took like 3 weeks of teaching myself kernel compilation stuff to get it up and running, my desktop NIC was a hassle, and I thought the desktop choices were attrocious (KDE 2.2 and gnome 1.4 I Think...)

    Not to mention any software to do real work (Office apps, decent browser) or to have any fun (IM, Decent mail client) had to be installed after the fact requiring more compilations, and messing with the system...

    More recently I installed RedHat 8 on my desktop and laptop... Oh the beauty... Gnome 2 is a truly nice system if you ask me. the new theme is easy to look at (finally!!) All the apps I need (OpenOffice, Gaim, Evolution, Mozilla) are the defaults and are already installed. All of my hardware was perfectly and flawlessly recognized, even my wireless network card was setup during the installation (Shake a stick at that WindowsXP!).

    All in all, night and day, in 1 year its gone from taking 1-3 days to get a desktop linux system really ready for production to about 30 minutes... If the next year holds as many leaps and bounds of usability MS will be in dire straights soon.

    I have still done WindowsXP installs during the last few months that don't recognize all of the hardware in a box, especially wireless network cards (the linksys wpc11 most notably). Besides the fact that from a clean install of WindowsXP you still have to install all of the software (office, developement environment), it still takes at least 2 hours to get a windowXP box really ready for use, then another 4 to do all the updates it needs... (granted, it takes about 2 hours to download and install all of the redhat updates since the 8.0 release.. but it all happens in the background and doesn't require a reboot, while with WindowsXP and windows update, there are at least 4 updates that you have to download *alone* and then reboot after each one, meaning to do the updates, you are going to reboot 5 times and you have to babysit the box while the updates are happening, times reflect downloading on 1mbps DSL).

    In this users opinion, its been a GREAT year for OSS and Linux, and I hope it just keeps getting better.

  8. Q: Why is linux like sex? by Lord_Slepnir · · Score: 5, Funny
    A: Because Even when it's bad it's still good.

    A: Bill Gates doesn't get it.

  9. I could be wrong, but... by Dthoma · · Score: 3, Insightful

    ...can't you just pick a profile from the list of install options, and it takes care of the packages for you? I could be wrong.

    Besides, some of us like the look of the sans-serif non-anti-aliased fonts. ;-)

    --

    Note to M1-ers: a curt but otherwise insightful message is not "Flamebait" or "Troll".

  10. Other reasions why 2002 was great by Znonymous+Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Other reasions why 2002 was great:

    Phoenix 0.5 - http://mozilla.org/
    Chimera 0.6 - http://mozilla.org/
    The Open CD - http://www.TheopenCD.org
    GNU Win II - http://gnuwin.epfl.ch/en/index.html
    yEnc - http://www.yenc.org/

    --

    Karma: The shiznight, mostly because I am the Drizzle.

  11. Re:GNU/Linux? by glenstar · · Score: 5, Funny

    To see how rapidly GNU's alternative to the Linux kernel is moving along, look at the Initial GNU HURD announcent in 1991 and the last announcement. Note the following phrase in the last announcement:"Popular PC devices are generally supported." What a fantastic 12 years it has been for GNU!

  12. anecdotal evidence, plus rant re: video stuff by timothy · · Score: 3, Insightful

    My step-brother (more than "computer literate" but not someone who likes to spend *all* his time tweaking his computers) told me at Thanksgiving that he's finally been mostly converted from Windows to Linux by Red Hat 8.0. He's a good example of how good 2002 has been, even with the crunch that some companies are going through.

    Red Hat and Mandrake (which I name only because they seem to be the most visible in non-specialist stores) both produce distros which are relatively sane to install, and come with far (*far*) more extra-Operating System software included than the obvious conventional competitors do.

    Which brings on an optimstic rant:

    The included software with the usual distros varies a lot, by category and in quality. Saying that RH8 has x-jillion packages, though, is nice for exploring, but not helpful when the one thing a potential user would like to use is not among the x-jillion.

    If Red Hat, or debian, or lycoris, or *any* distribution of [Linux + GNU utilities] were to come with an video editing app with ease of use approaching iMovie ... well, that is what would impress me most about the coming year in software. And I'd certainly count such an app being developed and made available via apt / apt4rpm ;)

    I think that Windows now comes with a video editing app as well. When will plugging in a firewire video camera for dumping footage in order to do simple, cut-and-paste scene rearrangment be as easy as it is under Mac OS? Hats off to the developers of Cinelerra, Kino, etc, but what I'd like to see is something like "Cinelerra Lite" , or perhaps "Cinelerra Ultralight" ;)

    Such a beast would have to be simple, reliable, fast, pleasant, and with the ability to save to VCD/SVCD for DVD-player compatibility, and to DiVX;) or other free video format for long play. Wouldn't it be nice to have a complete toolkit for making low-budget video production using all free software?

    This would also be a cool way to show off / play with the capabilities of Xiph's in-progress video format, eh? Eh, eh?!

    (iMovie, though a well-made app and IMO sufficient reason for non Mac users to try out the Mac OS, does not make it easy -- and is it even possible? -- to create VCDs or DiVX;) disks.) I'd love for someone to point me to a tutorial indicating otherwise :) This is not hypothetical -- I'd like to start converting family videos to digital format, editing down to reasonable / watchable lengths. Right now, this means I'm thinking of spending more than I'd ideally want to on a large external drive for my iBook, just for that one reason.

    All in all, thanks to the distro makers and application developers who have made GNU/Linux so much more accessible and friendly. Hope you have a good year!

    timothy

    --
    jrnl: http://tinyurl.com/c2l8yr / foes: http://tinyurl.com/ckjno5
  13. Who is kidding who? by Woodrow+Stool · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Microsoft has $40B in the bank and is still making money like they have a license to print it.

    The Linux vendors have fallen to beg mode, "please give us money or we will vanish" (Mandrake). VA Linux Labs, now VA Software (stock symbol: LNUX) says "We are in no way a Linux company - we are a proprietary software company". Red Hat made a $300K profit last quarter, first ever, on a market cap of about $1B, what a complete joke.

    Yes, yes, we have Apache, we have MySQL, we have numerous charity cases, but there is no way in hell that this has been a "great year" for Linux. If you can't make a buck, you can't eat, and sooner or later, you will stop breathing.

    In the meantime, Borg-like entities like IBM (for Christ's sake) are adopting Linux (should I say "swallowing up Linux"?) and this is somehow a twisted victory for "the cause".

    I want to throw up.

    1. Re:Who is kidding who? by markov_chain · · Score: 3, Interesting
      We have:
      • mplayer/mencoder
      • open office
      • mozilla
      • gnome 2 and kde 3
      These apps make me very, very happy.

      I hope IBM is itching for revenge after OS/2.

      --
      Tsunami -- You can't bring a good wave down!
    2. Re:Who is kidding who? by Kunta+Kinte · · Score: 5, Insightful
      If you can't make a buck, you can't eat, and sooner or later, you will stop breathing.

      I think you're missing a big part of the picture.

      Financial advances are extremely important but aren't the only advances to take into consideration. All your arguments dealt with the "financial" state of linux and open source in general. Slashdot is a geek site, and so it's understandable that most people are discussing the technical changes for the year.

      In terms of technology, 2002 was an outstanding year for linux.

      Still, you brought up an important aspect few open source advocates are willing to discuss. That is, how does open source sustain its current growth?

      It is said that statiscally, by tomorrow or day after, Microsoft would have made more money than linux vendors make all year, given the market stays the same as it was last few years. That is, MS makes in 2 days what most linux companies make in a year. I hate to throw unchecked stats around, but even if this is remotely the case, then opensource companies have a long fight ahead of them.

      I believe open source users have to find ways to spend more on open source in the year 2003. Money is the life line of business, not good will. Yeah, it's free so why spend?

      Well if you "support" open source but you buy a dell desktop, a compaq ipaq, or you influence any buying decisions that acquire these things, then you all the open source advocacy is for nothing. Because your vote that really counts, your dollars, is going to Microsoft.

      --
      Based on upvotes, Ageism is the only "-ism" Slashdotters care about and think isn't SJW
    3. Re:Who is kidding who? by Jeremi · · Score: 5, Insightful
      [Some Linux vendors are struggling] ....and this is somehow a twisted victory for "the cause"


      Well, yes. Linux, like all open source software, is a cultural phenomenon, not a corporation, and so its success should be measured by how ubiquitously it is used, not by how much money any particular company is making or losing while trying to sell it.


      Your post makes no more sense than trying to judge the success of Microsoft based on how many people are working on the Windows source code.

      --


      I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
    4. Re:Who is kidding who? by 0x0d0a · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Controversy sure is the bread and butter of Slashdot. Okay.

      Microsoft has $40B in the bank and is still making money like they have a license to print it.

      Wow. Jump up and down, clap hands. And they differ from fallen industry "angels" IBM, DEC, Compaq, Cisco in *what* way again? Making money this year doesn't say much about what happens over the next few years...in the computer world, market leaders have been turned to chutney in that amount of time. The point is that, while they have a lead, Linux is finally a viable alternative for many people, and gaining strongly in seats used.

      Remember, MS makes more money per installed seat than, say, Red Hat. So if RH makes $10M in revenue in a year, and MS makes $500M, RH may still have more users. Are we at that point yet? Nope. Are we getting there? Yup.

      MS is a much older company than RH. They're established, and they have a lot of money.

      The same thing was true of IBM and MS a few years back.

      In the meantime, Borg-like entities like IBM (for Christ's sake) are adopting Linux (should I say "swallowing up Linux"?) and this is somehow a twisted victory for "the cause".

      Who cares if IBM has influence? IBM makes some great products. They happen to charge an arm and a leg, but they get their revenue from hardware and services, not software. They appear quite willing to let the software world do its own thing, and just fund parts of it that are most beneficial to it.

      --
      May we never see th
    5. Re:Who is kidding who? by IamTheRealMike · · Score: 3, Interesting
      I hate to throw unchecked stats around, but even if this is remotely the case, then opensource companies have a long fight ahead of them.

      I think we all knew that. What amazes me is just how frigging many of them there are. There's no way the market can support as many commercial distros as there currently are.

      I'll stick my head out and predict that 2003 will see the herd thinned somewhat: I can't see a good future for Mandrake (as a company). Out of Lindows, Lycoris and Xandros, only one will remain (I'd bet Xandros). Geographical dominance will continue to be the name of the game, with Redhat taking America and parts of Europe, and SuSE taking Europe and parts of America, Conectiva in Latin America etc.

      On the other hand, those that remain will be stronger, which can't be a bad thing. RedHat will start making money reliably I hope - their standing themselves in good stead for taking over the corporate desktop at this rate.

      Hmm, while I've got the post comment page open, I'd just like to throw in some anecdotal evidence of my own. I started using Linux in early January of last year, so I've seen exactly a year pass in Linuxland. The progress I've seen is unbelievable: Linux got pretty artwork, got usability, speed, good fonts, a good office suite, a good web browser (moz1.0), KDE3, GNOME2 (and GTK2) and an easy to use "just works" version of Wine came out (no, really!), and finally I started my own project [grin]

      It'll be fascinating to see where 2003 gets us. Look out Microsoft!

  14. The best thing by jsse · · Score: 5, Funny

    happened for Linux in 2002 was that our boss put himself into this situation:

    PHB: "It's a well known fact that Linux is developed by a bunch of ameutars, a toy.", in a meeting with big Boss and many others, "There's no proof in saying that Windows server is unstable! Look at our file server, it hasn't had a single downtime since it started!"
    another non-PHB: "but sir, but your staffs told me that it's actually a Linux running Samba service."
    PHB: "Is it?!...."

    He should have talked to us more.

    1. Re:The best thing by jsse · · Score: 3, Informative

      what does "PHB" mean?

      Pointy-Haired-Boss, as in Dilbert. Refers to dumb bosses who don't know how to manage their people

  15. And not just during the *install* by kfg · · Score: 5, Insightful

    But afterwards too. I've recently installed Mandrake 9.0 and it installs *seven* terminal programs. Seven? What on earth does the geekiest geek on God's green earth need *seven* terminal programs for?

    Here's the deal, either you don't give a damn and will use whatever default shows up in your prefered enviroment, or you have a fave that you just can't live without for some reason and you'll manually install it from the CD anyway. If you're that picky you're sophisticated enough already to handle this.

    If you're *not* that sophisticated the plethora of choices of terminal programs is at best confusing, and getting rid of the unwanted ones ( if you can even figure out which ones are unwanted, and why) may well be a somewhat daunting task.

    Because free software is free as in beer to the distro makers they can throw in everything including seven "kitchen sinks," so they do. This doesn't mean it's a Good Idea.

    I've got something of a rep as an Ubergeek in meatspace, but even I don't want a distro that just dumps the entire universe of software (including some pretty alpha stuff) on my HD just to prove it can.

    Here's what I want to see in a default desktop install. A choice of KDE or Gnome ( I use a couple of others as well, but I'm perfectly content to install those seperately after I'm up and running for a bit), ONE terminal, preferably the default for the enviroment. ONE office package, preferably the default for the enviroment. A basic collection of utilities and, well, that's about it.

    Clean, simple, and covering about 99.9% of all typical desktop funtions in one go, with no cruft.

    For a newb throw in a special section in the manual explaining that one of the things free software is about is choice, how the CD's offer them many extras to play around with if they want, and clear, simple directions on how to install, and *UN*install, them.

    Kinda like installing Windows, only better.

    Installing a system should be an additive process, not like hacking away at a mighty oak with a chainsaw to release the inner OS.

    Small is Beautiful.

    KFG

    1. Re:And not just during the *install* by Satai · · Score: 3, Informative

      What on earth does the geekiest geek on God's green earth need *seven* terminal programs for?

      I can see up to four being useful.

      1. KDE -- konsole. This for integration with KDE; having it in the konq window and so forth.
      2. GNOME -- gterminal, for full integration with a GNOME desktop.
      3. Eterm/Aterm/rxvt for colorful, purty output, for mutt sessions and the like.
      4. Xterm, for that one application that needs the tektronix emulation, or the peculiar mouse button behavior.

      BUT, yes, all in all it's overkill. Anybody that needs tektronix emulation can sure as hell grab it themself, ya know? (And yes, I know xterm is part of the XFree86 distribution. :)

    2. Re:And not just during the *install* by jcr · · Score: 4, Insightful
      What on earth does the geekiest geek on God's green earth need *seven* terminal programs for?

      I can see up to four being useful.

      ..and I (for one) see this as symptomatic of the fundamental problem with Linux: No Standardization.

      Okay, maybe some people like having six or seven window managers to argue over. Frankly, it all looks like a steaming pile to me. You guys want to take over from windoze? Then figure out who's going to be the UI czar for Linux, get a standard written, and excoriate any app writer who doesn't conform to the UI guidelines.

      Want to know why Apple's got the best GUI in the world? It's because Mac users don't tolerate sloppy UI work.

      -jcr

      --
      The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
    3. Re:And not just during the *install* by HiThere · · Score: 3, Insightful

      There are problems, and then there are problems.

      As problems go, lack of standardardization is smaller than standardization. Another word for standardization is monopoly. Another word for lack of standardization is choice.

      That said, it makes sense for a default simplified install to pick a single selection. But there's sure no reason for every distro to pick the same one. What's needed is open file formats, and api specs. And those we've got. The apps that don't work well will tend to drop away, through lack of maintenance if nothing else.

      Still, that's different from saying that they should all be installed. But I've experienced problems adding apps, e.g., OpenMotif, after the install rather than during it. If I tell the installer to install it, then it is somehow handled, but if I tried to add it later, then I got what seemed an unlimited number of application conflict messages, and even compiling from source didn't fix it. Still, this isn't a basic install we're talking about here. (I eventually ended up with "install everything", and then it worked, but I'm sure that there was a simpler approach, if I'd been able to figure it out.)

      --

      I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
  16. Re:This year: good, next year: ? by Raiford · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Free Software will have a bad year when it is no longer free. The question is how long can free software that is entering an enterprise arena remain just that: Free ! Unfortunately the way that distributers are working such as RedHat I think the line between free/not-free will become somewhat blurry and then you will get the dilution effect that comes from corporate preferences.

    --
    "player 4 hit player 1 with 0 stroms"
  17. to me, Sharp is not a success story--yet by g4dget · · Score: 4, Informative
    The stated premise behind both the Sharp Zaurus GUI and KDE is that non-commercial open source efforts simply can't deliver a high quality GUI--open source supposedly needs companies like Troll Tech to help with GUIs. If that is true, I think it really calls into question the entire open source effort.

    However, I don't think it's true. First of all, owning a Zaurus myself, I find its use of QPE the biggest problem with the device--it means I can't use it for what I primarily want to use a Linux PDA for: running regular Linux software. Almost any software that uses a GUI needs to get ported. I can't script with my favorite scripting environments (Tcl/Tk, wxPython, fltk-lua), I can't use my favorite image display programs, etc.

    Fortunately, the folks at handhelds.org have been working busily on putting together a high-quality X11-based handheld distribution. And the Opie versions of the Sharp/QPE applications have been recompiled for X11.

    To me, Sharp will be a success story when it really does run the entire Linux environment: command line and graphical. Let's hope that in 2003, Sharp will base their Linux distribution on X11. Because of Qt/X11, the user experience and applications will remain unchanged (well, things may actually get a little faster with X11, but that's not going to be that important on a 400MHz XScale).

  18. Linux doesn't need money by David+Jao · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Your facts are all correct, but what you are forgetting in this instance is that free software, unlike commercial proprietary software, does not need corporate financial support in order to progress and improve.

    A commercially backed OS like MacOS or OS/2 or NextStep will die without corporate success, but Linux already has more developers working for it for free than MacOS or OS/2 or NextStep ever did for pay.

    The only way Linux and its free software friends will ever die is if laws like the SSSCA are passed to make it illegal.

    1. Re:Linux doesn't need money by starX · · Score: 3, Funny

      The only way Linux and its free software friends will ever die is if laws like the SSSCA are passed to make it illegal.

      That law is way too extreme, the only way it could possibly pass is if we had a corporation bought president whose party has complete control of congress, and whose congressional leaders are on good friendly terms with him.

      Oh wait...

      Well in any case, the only way it wouldn't get struck down is if we had a judiciary filled with ultra-conservatives who promote corporate interests at every turn, and THAT won't happen unless...

      Oh crap.

  19. Re:wrong on both counts by colmore · · Score: 3, Funny

    That man is all teeth...

    --
    In Capitalist America, bank robs you!
  20. Re:/.ed? - Here's the text by packeteer · · Score: 3, Interesting

    First of all posting article text is illegal. So for one thing i dont want slashdot to make web sites angry for taking their content without them getting ad revenue. Also you need to watch out for people who are karma whoring. People have said they dont care about karma whoring but i think they need to. People can get their karma up to the level where they get a +! bonus and troll away. That DOES lower to level of quality on slashdot and its something that i would like to not see happen.

    --
    unzip; strip; touch; finger; mount; fsck; more; yes; unmount; sleep
  21. Re:GNU/Linux? by uninet · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Just as a bit of info, here is why I use GNU/Linux in my articles covering Open Source/Free Software (including the one these comments are about). It's simply because I see GNU and Linux as two parts to our "success." If you take away GNU from Linux, you no longer have a working operating system. Likewise, if you take Linux away from GNU, you don't have a way to use all of your tools.

    Thus, we don't just have GNU or Linux, to have a real competition for other operating systems, we depend on GNU and Linux (GNU/Linux). Why not celebrate both major core components to our wonderful operating software?

    -Tim

    --
    -------------
    "You would not get a high grade for such a design" -- Andy Tanenbaum on Linus' Linux design.
  22. What's in a name? On Slashdot, too much. by 0x0d0a · · Score: 3, Funny

    True.

    There is some argument that it's a bit burdensome to say exactly what you mean anymore when specifying a group of OSes on Slashdot, though.

    Let me give an example. I might say "Unix had a good year with mplayer", except someone would be sure to pop up and "Linux isn't Unix...it's a Unix-like OS". Okay, that we can deal with. Then we run the dilemma of whether "Unix-like OSes had a good year with mplayer" means "all operating systems that are like Unix, but are not, in fact, Unix", or whether it means "all operating systems that are or are not Unix, as long as they resemble Unix". You could say "Linux had a good year with GNOME 2", but then you get nailed by a FreeBSD guy that says that GNOME 2 works *fine* on FreeBSD as well, and another Stallmanite or Debianite who says that what you *really* mean to say is "GNU/Linux", not "Linux", which refers only to a kernel. "Red Hat Linux" would refer to a whole operating system, but only one distribution of such. Now, one must be sure not to say only "Unix and GNU/Linux have excellent text processing tools", as someone will be sure to mention that GNU/Hurd can handle those same tools as well, and is being shortchanged in your original comment. One could say that "Sun's make is only supported under Solaris" -- is that in fact true, or is it also supported under SunOS?

    At this point, we may think we see a clever loophole. "Free operating systems achieved an enormous boom in the last year." However, that would be sure to get Stallmanites pointing out that you do not mean "Free", since BSD is not Free (or perhaps it is -- even with an almost 24/7 tech habit I can't keep up with what the FSF believes). Instead, perhaps you mean "free". Also, Red Hat may or may not be Free, based on their previous inclusion of Netscape Navigator. But you aren't talking about "free" operating systems -- that would include BeOS and Apple's System 6.0.8. You might change to "open source", whereupon you are informed that several companies consider their operating systems to be "open source" but only to some people or under some restrictions. Instead, you must mean "Open Source" operating systems. Well, even assuming you're familiar with ESR's exact rhetoric and can tell what falls under the "Open Source" moniker, at this point you're probably a bit bewildered.

    I've reached the point where I just transpose the proper term, the one someone meant, whenever I see "Linux" or "Unix" or "open source operating systems" on Slashdot. It just isn't worth trying to be perfectly accurate, since a term to properly define the set you're talking about is probably at least two sentences long. :-)

    --
    May we never see th
  23. Re:Software Installation by 0x0d0a · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Okay, I'm not going to say things are perfect, but I'm sitting here with a RH 8.0-based box with apt-get. (Granted, I could use a GUI and make it *really* friendly, but whatever.) apt-get is *painless*. Compare this to the Windows world, where you have lots of different installers, each of which is a little program that may or may not run and takes up your entire screen and has to be located somewhere on the manufacturer's website (or, as is most common in the Windows world, purchased from a store).

    So, let's compare.

    Me:
    1) apt-get install galeon.
    2) Do something else for a while

    Them:
    1) Drive to store
    2) Purchase box
    3) Take box home, stick CD in drive
    4) Wade through non-standard *interactive* installation process.

    As an example, my brother got his hands on an old Windows 98 box today. He asked me to add Divx and CD burning support to the thing. First thing I do is install EZ CD Creator. Installs fine, takes up whole screen, requires a reboot. Upon reboot, starts spewing warnings about applications not being able to launch because of a lack of mfc42.dll exports, as well as another install screen (completing the installation). Okay, turns out he needs mfc42.dll. I go, download that (impossible to find on MS's site even with Google, so I have to get it in a zip file from a third party. No pretty automated installer...drag and drop a dll).

    Then, download Divx installer. System gives error about installer being truncated (it's not). Download zip file containing divx codec for manual installation...we'll see how that goes.

    I'm sorry, but ease of software installation on Windows does not *compare* to ease of software installation on Linux. I'm not even going to discuss how hard it is to keep software up to date on Windows.

    --
    May we never see th
  24. Re:/.ed? - Here's the text by CoolVibe · · Score: 3, Insightful
    It's called fair use.

    It's fair use when you use a snippet of the text. The root post of this thread quoted the whole text, so yes, it's breach of copyright.

    Oh, IANAL by the way.

  25. Linux: NEVER Ready for Prime Time on the Desktop by Dr.+Mu · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Linux continues its endless, asymptotic approach to desktop nirvana. Will it ever get close enough? I doubt it. The main problem for Linux's wide acceptance is a congenital failure of the free software model, namely, that there is too much ego and not enough subservience to a standard. I have a Redhat/Gnome box. I daily suffer at least six different graphical file selection paradigms of various capabilities and presentations. One lets me scroll with the mouse wheel; another doesn't. One lists files in strict ASCII order; another ignores capitalization when sorting by name. And none approaches the ease and uniformity of the Windows standard. Don't get me wrong: I think Windows is the OS from hell, reliability-wise. But at least Microsoft has the luxury of dictating to their programmers that they SHALL adhere to a common look and feel. That never can and never will happen with Linux -- or any product of a developemnt model that subjugates responsibility to freedom.

    The second big problem Linux faces is that its written by the OS-infatuated for the OS-infatuated. It very clearly lacks the "common touch". All I want is an OS that does what it's supposed to, then stays the hell out of my way. With Linux, I'm constantly tripping over piss-ant details and indiosyncratic quirks. The control is nice, and so is the ultimate reliability. But at what price? There's a line in one of the many HOW-TOs I've waded through that goes something like this:

    If you don't understand this, contact your sysadmin. If you are the sysadmin, God help you.
    God help us all!
  26. X is not slow, apps are by Turmio · · Score: 3, Insightful
    For 4793th time, please stop calling X slow.

    It takes the time to initialize graphics mode (like 0.1 secs to 2 secs, depends on your graphics device but it's the same for all graphical systems using the device, Windows included) plus a few milliseconds overhead even with old machines to get X up and running. Hardly slow for me, but perhaps you've got something better to offer.

    What you're calling SLOW is the desktop environment running on top of X, GNOME or KDE or something. And I certainly can't argue with you that there wouldn't be lots of room for improvements here. But it's not fault of X, it's the bloat in applications.

    So one thing that could improve all of Linux in terms of speed would be removal of GNOME and/or KDE, X is irrelevant here. Oh, wait a second. Actually that sentence doesn't make sense at all, you can't remove X or GNOME or KDE from Linux since it's not there. Linux is just the kernel. Let's try once more. One thing that could improve all of Linux distribution somedist in terms of speed would be removal of GNOME and/or KDE. But then again, I wouldn't use mydist if they took my GNOME desktop away.

  27. Re:Software Installation by IamTheRealMike · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Okay, I'm not going to say things are perfect, but I'm sitting here with a RH 8.0-based box with apt-get.

    You just described the ideal scenario, one that unfortunately doesn't happen very often. In particular, the number of RPMs available via apt4rpm on RH8 is incredibly small. When apt works, it works great, hence the fact that we're stealing from it liberally in autopackage. Usually though, it doesn't work, unless you use Debian, and then the inertia that attempting to package nearly every piece of software on the planet implies (gentoo are having problems with this too) means packages are often out of date.

    The Windows scenario as described is also sort of unusual, although as Windows software installation was grown rather than designed yes, it too is far from perfect.

    What's needed is for developers to be able to produce portable binary packages, and then have a distributed and decentralised DNS style network to replace apt. The interface is still the same: "package install galeon" and wait, but unlike apt it scales.

    Of course, that makes it sound easy. It isn't. For instance, the GNU ld.so (dynamic linker) contains design, ah, issues which make producing portable binaries quite hard (to do with link trees). We're figuring out what to do about that now, talking to libc-alpha, distros etc. We may (worst case scenario) end up having to distribute our own linker, luckily ELF allows for plug and play linkers.

    Then you've got the myriad differences between distros. Every distro except debian uses the FSF version of install-info. Debian based distros use their own, slightly incompatable version. File locations differ and most packages built with automake are not relocatable. We have solutions for those things too.

    OK, end rant. It's going to be a long haul, but believe me, we will end up with the most kickass software management system in the world. It'll be like apt, except it works more often (hopefully one day, always works), and it'll look good too. Will we make v1.0 in 2003? Hmmm, maybe so, maybe no. We'll have to wait and see. If not 2003 then definately 2004.

  28. Some highlights of 2003 by IamTheRealMike · · Score: 4, Informative
    Some highlights of 2003

    What can we look forward to this year? Off the top of my head:

    • XFree 4.3 - featuring 24bit with alpha channel animated cursors, expect to see lots of cool themed cursors on the X11 theming sites. New in this release also is the R&R extension, allowing on the fly resolution switching. No, we don't have transparent windows in this release, this currently is being held back by performance issues and internal rearchitecting. Nonetheless, everybody likes eyecandy, and this release will satiate our appetites at least for now.

    • GNOME2.2: Lots of goodies in this release, including Fontilus (drag and drop font installation/preview), a Network Neighbourhood style view, more font config options (as seen in redhat8), unified theming system, startup notification (but done properly this time), and more. It also features....

    • GStreamer! Now with KDE bindings too, hopefully 2003 will be the year that Linux multimedia gets started. Although still some way from 1.0, some parts of the gnome2.2 desktop will be using GStreamer. Just bear in mind if you write apps that use it - it's not API stable yet. In particular, it'll be boosted by ....

    • ALSA, which sports better support for sound cards and a cleaner architecture, as well as a whole host of other cool things. If only somebody would get off their ass and write a mixer/resampler server shim between libasound and the kernel, the message "another program is using this device" could be banished forever. But as far as I know nobody has picked up the gauntlet. ALSA is of course part of .....

    • Linux 2.6 which will be released sometime in June/July apparently. Some key desktop enhancements in this, including low latency and preempt, which is a step forward for desktop responsiveness. Think: it always feels like there's no CPU load. Kind of.

    • KDE 3.1 (I hadn't forgotten ;) which other than being a lot more secure now, sports tabs in Konqueror, better support for freedesktop.org standards, new default (pretty) artwork, folder icons that represent the folders contents, desktop sharing built in and a whole load more

    • The Gimp 1.4 - much better looking now, with revamped user interface, better text support, a vector tool, named cut/copy buffers and support for more plugin langauges.

    • More usability work both in and out of the desktop efforts. Expect to see the HIG mature and lots more apps become compliant, already non-GNOME apps like Gaim and XChat are getting higified (if you try their devel versions you'll see what I mean).

    • Probably lots more I've forgotten about...

    Mmmm, toys :)

  29. Only a passing mention of Mozilla 1.0 ... by Etyenne · · Score: 4, Informative

    Likewise, while it really offers only a few major advantages (and some disadvantages) over KDE's Konqueror, Mozilla 1.0 finally did arrive on the scene attracting attention from many mainstream sources. While its impact on the "browser wars" may be minimal, it does promise a real alternative to Internet Explorer on pretty much any platform.



    I think the author downplayed the importance of Mozilla 1.0 :

    • It's the first closed-source program gone OSS that achieved wide success. Netscape betted on OSS in 1998 and they won. Actually, Mozilla outlive Netscape.
    • Lot's of people where denigrating OSS, pointing finger at how Mozilla was getting nowhere, would stay in beta perpetually, etc. Release 1.0 proved they where wrong and that OSS can work.
    • For once, we have a end-user OSS application that is the best of his class. You can argue that IE is best in this or that regard, but overall Mozilla seriously kick all the other option's butt.
    • Mozilla is pretty much the only serious alternative to the monopoly of IE as web browser (being multiplatform, standard compliant and feature-complete).


    For me, Mozilla 1.0 is THE event of the year 2002 for OSS.

    --
    :wq