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First Mandrake 9.1 Review Out
icantblvitsnotbutter writes "With Mandrake Linux 9.1 right around the corner, it's OSNews first out of the gates with a review of this desktop-oriented distro's latest release. The review is actually pretty bland, skimming the surface to linger on some of Eugenia's pet peeves. Having used 9.1 in a production environment since beta 3, I can say that the improvements to the installation and the signature Mandrake tools are much-appreciated. Don't forget that Mandrake Club members get their own set of mirrors, as well as being eligible for extras like the voting process that selected the packages for the 9.1 release." Update: 03/25 18:29 GMT by T : anyweb also points out a review of Red Hat Linux 9 on the same site, writing "an informative article -- well I had to say that, I wrote it ;-)"
They are in bankruptcy court. Bankrupt != out of business.
They are going through the French equivalent of bankruptcy IIRC. They are restructuring themselves and ridding themselves of unprofitable ventures. I can't remember if they have emerged from bankruptcy or not, but development on Mandrake Linux never really stopped.
Why, o why must the sky fall when I've learned to fly?
Too many people are distro-biggots so they assume everybody is, thanks for the comment..
Installation
.doc files that one word processor can read, but the other can't, so I need to have all three installed to check out which one does each time). Mozilla 1.3 and Gaim 0.59.8 come pre-installed along with a large number of other applications, including mySQL, PostgreSQL, Apache, Samba, a large number of 2D/3D games, XFree86 4.3, XMMS, Xine, Quanta, BlueFish 0.9 etc. In the third CD I found "closed" applications included, like Java, Opera, RealPlay 8, AcroRead and more. Java applets work perfectly on Mozilla, but they would load and then not run on the distro's main browser, Konqueror (yes, Java was activated on Konq's prefs). As for Opera 6.12, it would crash on every page that it had java in it.
The installation has been completely revamped. It looks good and its interface is cleaner with fewer steps required by the user (however, the power is still there if you need it, hidden under some 'advanced' buttons on in the 'Summary' screen). I also liked the little 4-option menu asking you how to proceed with the installation regarding partitions, I found it intuitive, clean and better than the competition's. The only things the user needs to do is pick the language, keyboard, mouse, hard drive/partition and the package family and fire away the package installation. After the packages are installed, the user is asked to add a new user and choose the root password. Before the rebooting there is a summary screen, very similar to the one found in SuSE's installation where the user there can do some more advanced configuration (e.g. configure the ethernet card, printer, sound card and monitor) or leave it as-is (autodetect) and reboot the machine to enjoy Mandrake 9.1. I don't have major complaints about the installation procedure, except maybe a single bug I encountered: the installation would pick the audigy() driver for my first generation SBLive! instead of the emu10k() driver, and it would not turn on ALSA on boot by default. I installed Mandrake 9.1 twice and both times the same problem happened, I had no sound at all, until I turned on ALSA and picked the emu10k() driver manually (older versions of Mandrake didn't have problem with this card).
Using the System
Mandrake's kind of slow to boot as it loads a large number of services by default, but that's configurable via Mandrake's control center. KDE 3.1.0 is the main desktop environment, as always. But this time, we get a Mandrake with a... twist. The default widget theme and window manager theme is now original and applies to both Gnome and KDE (in the same way Red Hat did with BlueCurve). The new theme set is called "Galaxy" and it is indeed very cute, especially its widget set. While I still personally like better the BlueCurve window manager theme for its clearly defined buttons (something that Galaxy lacks and can be a problem to users who need more accessibility), Mandrake's widget-set theme is probably the best found today on any Linux. Detailed, clean, with soft on-mouse-over effects that don't distract. Additionally, new icons made their appearance in this release. I do feel that MandrakeSoft has put a real effort in this release in both the usability and looks of their product.
The "What to Do->" menu is not there anymore, but the annoying "Terminals" menu in the root Kmenu which lists 5-6 different... terminals is still there (that's obsolete and geeky, in my humble opinion). KOffice, OpenOffice 1.02 and Gnumeric are also there, but there is no AbiWord (sometimes I get
Using the System II, Conclusion
It was a positive surprise to see Gnome 'taken care of' by MandrakeSoft, as now its default setup is not the Gnome default, but a panel that resembles KDE's (and the other way around of course). The menus are the same as in KDE, and MandrakeSoft has included a utility to edit the menus of Gnome, KDE and WindowMaker. Enlightenment, IceWM and Blackbox also come with Mandrake Linux 9.1 (I would like to see a stable version of XFCE 4.x included in the next Mandrake as well).
The Mandrake Contr
On their website there is now a link to all the 9.1 features, it's on http://www.mandrakelinux.com/en/9.1/features/
The best of all with this new release, in my opinion, is that the level of quality is very high. I couldn't find any bug yet - Mandrake improved much in the debuging area as well!
Great to see such a great product - it's really _the_ event in the Linux world...
Mandrake has been the ONLY distribution that will run on my wife's IBM Netvista Flatpanel PC. The others distros wouldnt even boot up the Install screen. I tried Debian, but spent maybe 30 minutes n finding the right monitor, but no joy. Nothing else can detect that stupid monitor.
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
SuSE8.0? You're kidding, right?
I bought the Pro-Pack. Yup, I dropped $80 bucks (US) on it only to find out that when I went to update it, it totally b0rked itself. Nice. Oh, I had to DL the new RPM manually, and install that. OK, not that big a deal, I was used to RPM hell at that point. Oh, well there were 20 or so dependencies for that dependency. Err... well, 30 or so to get those dependencies of the dependencies installed cleanly. Oh, well, I still had to hack at some config files. Well, but that really wasn't enough since I still had to re-update somethings. I'd love to watch "Joe Six-Pack (tm)" do that.
I switched to Gentoo.
Perhaps SuSE 8.1 is better. I honestly don't know, and to be quite frank, I don't intend on finding out. Portage is FAR superior to YAST.
This is just my opinion.
I'm not a prophet or a stone-age man,
I'm just a mortal with potential of a super man.
When you finish the installation of Mandrake (or Redhat or SuSe), you usually have a fully working system. You might want to tweak here or there, or install a newer X driver but, generally, it works. Now compare this with debian, or even better, Slackware. Debian and Slackware force you to fix things, they force you to know what is happening in your computer and they force you to look around man pages to fix it. Don't get me wrong, I think it is excellent that people don't have to manually select modules from a never ending list or try to guess what options in the module might do, but where is the fun in that?
If you want a system that just works, just install Redhat, Suse or Mandrake. If you want to learn, just dive in and use Slackware for the raw *nix experience or Debian if you think you canno live without dependency checking.
Mother is the best bet and don't let Satan draw you too fast.
One of the reasons that release candidates and beta releases exist are to get copies of the software that a company will release into the hands of reporters and reviewers. The expectation is that there will not be significant changes between the softare being reviewed and what ends up in customer's hands.
Strange as it may seem, a lot of people put beta software into production environments. Then again, I understand there are people who use "Windows", knowing that the software is considered to have some rather well known holes, and the company that maintains it has been known to re-introduce holes when patching others.
While the software developers recomend against using beta, or even release candidate software in a production environment, if your production environment needs something that is in that release, you may decide to run with it, and work around the bugs.
One example of a feature that may be enough to move to RC3 of Mandrake 9.1 is the fact that 9.0 would not properly support some tablets, yet 9.1 RC3 does. In my case 9.0 would not support a Wacom Graphire 2, but both rc2 and rc3 of 9.1 have.
If you are a graphic artist, I suspect that this would be a deciding point.
Then again, that's just my opinion. I may be wrong.
-Rusty
You never know...
scripsit tyrann98:
Just use Debian, it's the universal OS! ;)
Seriously, though, the commercial distros have to have something that distinguishes their offering from the rest if they're going to get noticed. I don't care for that, myself, but I'm not sure you can convince them to give up what it is that they've cooked up to make themselves stand out.
In principio creauit Linus Linucem.
You use betas in your production environment and we're supposed to listen to you? :)
X11 is old and therefore needs to be replaced - much like the wheel.
Ita erat quando hic adveni.
Having myself gone through every Mandrake version since 7.0 I can appreciate this. However, I think you may find that ultimately, it would be better in the long run to plan for upgradability.
/, /usr and /var every upgrade. Put all my personal stuff in /home and /usr/local and copy every file I modify into /usr/local right after I do it. i.e. if I hack up /etc/sysconfig/... or /etc/ppp/... I copy it and save it away, I can then easily figure out what I did later and re-apply changes as required. This only applies to manual changes I make with vi, not to things that I configure with tools.
....Paul
I think that several upgrades using a tool like you mention, no matter how well designed, would still leave a bunch of OS lint lying about.
I personally format
It usually only takes a few hours post-install to get back to everything humming the way it was.
Of course, this assumes that you have enough disk space to create all these partitions in the first place...
F U NE X N M? Son: "Dad... How do you spell 'hourly'?" Dad: "0 * * * *"
The design of X11, and its current implementation, allows for too many different dialog styles and interfaces - it's not standardized
What in the world does this have to do with X? That's the job of the various Desktop Enviroments / Window Managers, not X.
If you're complaining that there are several different ways of doing things *and have the choice between them* and are also finding that freedom a problem, go back to Windows. BillyG will be glad to have you back.
I'm not a prophet or a stone-age man,
I'm just a mortal with potential of a super man.
Sure we can get rid of her, STOP READING OSNEWS. Without the page hits, their ad revenue drops, and they Go Away. Shrug. Refuse to buy (by reading it) their product. Vote with your 'wallet' (and mouse button).
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
Mandrake's problem has been that it does not show clear difference from Redhat. Mandrake has more packages, more enjoyable toy stuffs, and some delicate French flavor. But these are not attractive enough for users to adopt Mandrake rather than to use Redhat. It may be somewhat late but I hope Mandrake can establish itself as a *desktop* Linux distribution, differntiating it from Redhat. That's the way they can overcome their current financial unstability.
:)
However, nobody's still sure of any kinds of business model on Linux desktop distribution. Would Dell adopt Linux desktop sometime in near future? HP? Gateway? Wal-Mart?
Mandrake was the first distro I ran, and I got no end of shit for that from some hardcore linux people. That stigma seems to have moderated. I have tried Mandrake versions 7.1, 7.2, 8.0, and I might futz around with 9.1. The thing is that I see RedHat as being around for the long haul, and I am not so sure about Mandrake. I'm using RedHat in production servers as I write this, but I don't think I'd be comfortable doing the same with Mandrake.
To some extent, I realize that I am falling victim to "everyone goes where everyone is" thinking rather than looking at underlying technical issues, but it really sucks when a vendor that you rely on for critical stuff goes belly-up on you. I am not trying to flame Mandrake -- I have used and I like their stuff. I am just concerned about their finances and whether they will be there for me in five or ten years.
GF.
Lots of petrified grits
But using Mandrake to learn Linux? I don't think so.
Sorry, but I don't agree. Nothing is holding you back from learning on Mandrake. There are people who start messing with their system, installing software from source, editing initscripts. Sometimes (often) it breaks, but it's possible to view that as a learning experience, at least that seems to be their motivation.
I learned Linux on Mandrake (I used Suse for a year before Mandrake), and it felt really good to dive into it, everything seemed at the right place. You can still compile your own kernel, compile things from source, or learn how to build rpms. Tweak different settings, etc.
Well, don't worry about that. We can get you back before you leave. (Dr. Who)
Hold the phone, I thought CmdrTaco was a guy!
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
Yep, add the a 9.1 media to urpmi , then do this : urpmi.update -a && urpmi --auto-select Of course you still have the old kernel from 9.0 There is a cool "upgrade" option in the 9.1 installation. I've done this 4 times and it never failed.
-beer
Yes, you can use urpmi --auto-select after adding a suitable source. Seee www.urpmi.org or aso plf.zarb.org for more info on setting up urpmi.
At the very least you'll want to add sources for security updates (Mandrake Update will do this automatically) and for contributed software.
Live barefoot!
free engravings/woodcuts
So easy to use, no wonder it's 9.1!
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
you obviously haven't been a victim of emerge/ebuild hell. gentoo is a great idea that needs a little maturity (read: robust package management).
;) ), but so does portage. the fact is that all these other systems have more testing behind thier binary packages which makes them more stable and more useable. these other systems also have more testing/engineering behind them to make them more robust. mainly problems arrise from these systems when users go to install packages outside of the officially released and supported packages.
wanna get the latest version of kde? well, sorry you're going to need the latest version of xfree (kde doesn't really have much hooks at all in xfree let alone having 3.1.1 needing a uber-modern version of xfree. xfree 4.3 on the other hand has BUSTED fonts in gentoo).
emerge is nice and fun. it's still a toy until it gets extremely more robust management. a user should be able to "lock" certain config files, while leaving others for the system to handle. better yet, the package management system should know if i've changed a config file, other wise it can handle it.
YAST/rpm/apt-get may have their issues (ok deb users will claim that apt doesn't have issues
untill i can easily get my printer/webcam/scanner/video acceleration/audio/etc working nicely under gentoo, it's time to find something stable. i said that a few months back and tried RH 8.0. at the time that was worse than the gentoo that i had (at least i could print from RH). so finally, i gave up and installed win98 so i could use my devices when i wasn't surfing the net.
"Having used 9.1 in a production environment since beta 3"
Ummm... Mandrake in a production environment is bad enough, but a BETA? Isn't that like pulling your pants down, holding your ankles while in the middle of a stampeed of horses?
That's the equivalent of "If it compiled, it must be good code."
The spell checker and grammar checker are never an excuse for releasing articles with errors!
Yes, I realize he put a smiley at the end, but I've seen this kind of attitude all too often. If there are errors, it is always the fault of the author and not the spell checker!
(I'm sure someone will point out some error I made in this comment, but I'm not shirking responsibility! All errors are the fault of the author and not Office, OpenOffice, Slashcode or anything else!)
Never confuse feeling with thinking.
How are you going to learn how to use Debian if you can't get it installed? Most Linux users don't have any friends, never mind friends that can come over to their place and teach them how to install a distro.
That said, it is worth noting that you CAN learn a hell of a lot using Mandrake. I used it for just under a year as my primary OS before ditching Windows, and just over a year before switching to Debian. The install was fine, but trying to get my devices working, bootloader booting, and things like that would have forced me to reinstall Windows had I not learned such things under Mandrake.
If you think that Mandrake is without problems, then you surely haven't used it. And even if it did everything perfectly, it wouldn't matter since most people would rather install their OS and be using it an hour later, not recompiling crap or trying to make their mouse work.
It is a sad day when people put down an operating system because it "just works."
Did you even bother to read the article? Or did you just read the slashdot summary and take that as gospel?
Because the thing is, if you had bothered to read the article, you'd have found that her review is really very favorable to Mandrake 9.1. Here's some direct quotes from her conclusion:
"With this release I see a very serious and very respectable effort from MandrakeSoft to create a better Mandrake Linux. It is just obvious that this is not 'just another release', it really feels that it had extra care ...."
"I would urge everyone to download Mandrake 9.1 and give it a go when it is released. It is a worthy distribution and especially this version is a sincere effort from MandrakeSoft to create something better and competitive ...."
And there's heaps more praise in the article. She also discusses hardware detection and the speed and usability of the system (two of your other uninformed criticisms, as I recall) and she doesn't (AFAICS) try to start a flame war over window managers.
Yes, she does point out some problems with the distro. But do you seriously expect a reviewer to give unconditional praise to a product?? Gee, I mean, I could just read what Mandrake's web site says about 9.1 if I wanted that! What's wrong with some constructive criticism?
(and FWIW, I've used Mandrake as my main distro since 2000 (I also play around with crux linux when I don't want bloat :) and have generally found it to be the best of the major distros)