'Sneak Preview' of SUSE 9.1

Roblimo writes "SUSE 9.1 won't be out until May, but Joe Barr got access to a 'secret' beta download and tried it out. He liked some of what he saw, and found things he didn't like, too, but is willing to overlook some of the negatives because, he points out, 'This is a beta. Bugs are expected. Work will be done before it goes gold.' The review's at Linux.com." Linux.com and Slashdot are both part of OSDN.

Comments

Can we have some too?

[baudilus]

It would be nice if they offered the beta version for public use, eh?

I prefer GNOME, so I guess we'll have to wait until the release. I'll share the ISOs too, I'll just strap on my backpack and share the wealth!

Re:Can we have some too?

[PepsiProgrammer]

I doubt it will be much different than suse 9.0 with the 2.6.4 kernel and a few updated packages.

Im currently running SUSE 9.0 with the suse 2.6.4 kernel, and Ximian Desktop Unstable (Gnome 2.6 :)) and its a pretty sweet desktop combination, unfortunately SUSE 9.0 doesnt handle wireless that well, and some hotplugging functionality got lost when I upgraded it to 2.6.4.

Here's looking forward to 9.1

"Dumbing" Down?

[sirmikester]

The next least favorite thing for me was the dumbing down of menus to a single choice of application, especially when I found myself disagreeing with the choice in almost every instance.

I don't think a new user of a linux system would mind having some simple defaults to choose for. Since SUSE is aiming to please more than just hard core linux enthusiasts, I think that having a single choice is important.

Re:"Dumbing" Down?

[rjstanford]

For instance the first time you log in, a script could ask if you'd like to change what programs you use for chat/E-mail/Web Browsing/etc.

Considering that this edition is aimed at least partially at first-time users... how do you expect them to know?

Computer: "Do you want to use Firefox or Galeon?"
User: WTF? This is weird... I just want to get the internet...

After all, its not as if they can't add other software in the future. Its like the classic Microsoft Help question, "This is the first time you've used help. What sort of database do you want me to build?" Meaningless and intrusive. You only get one chance to make a first impression, and giving unnecessary choices to the user is not the impression you want to make.

Remember, most people don't want to "use the computer." They just want to "get the TV listings," or "write a letter." Huge mindset difference.

Re:"Dumbing" Down?

[Maestro4k]

• Considering that this edition is aimed at least partially at first-time users... how do you expect them to know?

  Computer: "Do you want to use Firefox or Galeon?"

  User: WTF? This is weird... I just want to get the internet...

Perhaps I didn't make myself clear, I agree that a question like that would confuse the hell out of newbies. What I had in mind was a question like:

Computer: "Would you like to choose a different program to browse the web with, or will the default be ok?"

except more of a single question that when you answered yes would take you to something to chose. If you said no, it'd just go away and that'd be that. Given that type of choice, most newbies would just accept the defaults, but power users could go in and tinker to their heart's content.

Re:"Dumbing" Down?

[Maestro4k]

• SuSE 'limiting' your choices? Oh that's funny, considering they have one of the largest distributions on the market. SuSE 9.0 fills an entire DVD before you add in the source files.

  ...

  Furthermore, SuSE/Novell are shooting for a corporate market and corporate markets do not want choice, they want a standard. Most sysadmins will further reduce the available choices even more.

If you've been reading the posts about this, the general feeling is that Barr was actually reviewing a beta of the Personal edition. That edition is NOT aimed at the corporate market, but at the individual user at home. As far as limiting choices, your comment about SuSE 9.0 filling up an entire DVD is a non sequitor, the DVD could be full of videos showing you how to configure things or some-such. I'll assume (because I'm pretty sure it's true) that it does come packed with software. That's great, now when Joe Average installs SuSE and it boots up with all his programs set and doesn't even ask him if he'd like to change them, where's the choices? Joe Average won't even realize there are alternate choices ON the DVD, much less how the hell to change the defaults.

It's this type of attitude that hinders Linux adoption by the general public. You seem to forget that the vast majority of computer users are doing good to find the power switch some days. We can't assume we know which programs are good for them either, because if they feel like the only program they can use to browse the web is Konqueror and they absolutely hate it, then they're probably going to hate Linux and go back to Windows. That'd be a shame because they might find Mozilla/Firefox to be perfect for them if only they knew there were choices and could figure out how to change them.

Having something offer to allow you to change the defaults not only allows power users to change the defaults, it alerts the user that there ARE alternatives if they don't like the default. Then they'll know to look for a way to change it, and not only may end up loving linux for it, but will learn more about linux as they look for and find how to change their defaults.

As far as complaining, I certainly wasn't. You sound like you're complaining because someone dared say SuSE wasn't perfect though, so calm down. SuSE's doing great, we're just commenting on things that could make it even better. Everything can be improved, so don't even try saying SuSE's perfect as is.

Re:"Dumbing" Down?

[Finuvir]

Why ask at all? Just make it possible for power users to change their prefered programs (which I assume it is). Don't bother people with pop-up questions, just let them do what they want to do. Yes, people will usually just pick the default, but it'll make them uneasy. They won't know that they're making the right choice, and they may very well think they're making irreversible descisions. It's better just not to bother them.

Re:"Dumbing" Down?

[Finuvir]

Why would a geek need an 'advanced' button? Just make the power-user options less visible and the geeks will still find them but the novices won't. There's no need to ask for an experience level and list of qualifications before deciding what options to offer a user. Besides, how does the user know what the developers consider 'advanced'? I'm sure I'd want some of the advanced options, but I'm new enough to Linux. Which should I choose?

Re:"Dumbing" Down?

[Archibald Buttle]

Don't forget that your average new user would have absolutely no idea what "Firefox" or "Galeon" is. They could be just about anything, as could "Mozilla" and "Konqueror". In fact they all sound like game titles.

Apple is just as bad with "Safari", although in most other areas they're better with "Mail", "iTunes", "iChat" etc.

Microsoft on the other hand has "Internet Explorer" which kind of makes sense for a web browser, but "Outlook Express" doesn't make much sense to me as an email program.

There's plenty of examples of applications with duff names that don't really match what they do which all serves to make computers seem strange and complicated to the uninitiated. Whilst we may all know they're not really that complicated they look complicated which puts people off.

Default choices are most definitely a good thing. Providing users with a limited set of options presented in a plain and clear manner is also a good thing, but defaults are generally better.

Advanced options are fine, but for about 95% of users they're useless, and the remaining 5% will only want to use them rarely. Why expose the 95% to needless complexity when it will only alienate them?

It's similar to the old RISC vs CISC debate - in a CISC instruction set about 5% of the instructions were used 95% of the time. The RISC people saw this as a big opportunity and concentrated on doing that 5% really well, and sure enough their initial chips were much faster than their CISC equivalents.

How Fair...

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone looks at a beta and it gets mentioned that "bugs will be fixed before it goes gold." If someone sees a leaked Microsoft beta, however, they say how awful it is that bugs are still in it. Ahh, hypocrisy...

Re:SuSE?

[justsomebody]

??? What's wrong with Fedora?

I run it without flaws. And I must say the most impressive distro ever. At least from Gnome user view point.

I can hardly wait FC2. SELinux, Gnome2.6, Kernel2.6.... :):):)

Even beta2 runs almost perfectly without SELinux, with SELinux there are unfinished policy settings and unwanted restrictions which might cause some problems, so it's not yet for production

Yeah...

[bonch]

...heaven forbid someone complain about something non-techies consider important, like poor anti-aliasing, the inability to compile packages, and the usability of GRUB and LILO.

I read a review once where Eugenia complained about the spacing between menus. Yes, believe it or not, those are things that graphics designers would care about because it has to do with subtle factors in user interaction.

But, go ahead and stick to the reviews that are techie-only if you wanna.

Re:Yeah...

[DrWhizBang]

Eugenia's reviews are actually the better reviews on OSNews. OSNews often publishes some really poorly done reviews from people who have no business even blogging, let alone on a public site. It's really hit-or-miss (more miss than hit.)

poor anti-aliasing and improper spacing are valid complaints. ripping a distro because their default is gnome or kde is pointless.

Re:The Problem With Linux

[Anonymous Coward]

By "power", you must mean "constantly tethered to a pager which goes off multiple times a night and bound by SLAs written by lawyers which contractually make me the world's bitch".

This review..

[jvagner]

..doesn't bother to explicate what makes SUSE any different from any other distro. Why not Fedora, or Mandrake? What makes SUSE, well, SUSE?

He never says.

Re:This review..

[RPoet]

You're too kind. This "review" provides no information at all. I'd like to hear about hardware integration, how well the distro specific tools worked and how well they fit with the desktop environment. This is just a brief story about one guy trying to make SUSE as much into Fedora as he could. All he says is "it came with KDE, so I installed GNOME, and it didn't go smoothly, but this was a beta anyway, bye."

Re:Interesting screenshot

[blackmonday]

Does SUSE make a PowerPC edition? If so it's not unreasonable to think someone could install it on an iMac. At least they didn't use an aluminum G5 case as the icon.

SuSE is commerical - and that's good.

[DR SoB]

The Linux community _needs_ a vendor that is commerical based, it helps spread the word. I recently attended SHARE in L.A. and the only Linux retailer there was SuSE.

SHARE is mostly a mainframe conference but since z/OS (and s/390) now supports omvs (Unix System Services) it makes sense to start pushing more Linux.

I can recommend SuSE to some of my less technical friends and they will see that it's easy, and has good commerical support.

Re

[Anonymous Coward]

Damn truth.

What a Rant

[adler187]

I really didnt like this review. He complained that the menus were too simple. I have used SUSE since 8.0 and am currently running 9. As far as the menu's go in 9, if you only have 1 app of a certain type, it defaults to renaming that app to whatever type it is. For example, in a default install you will only have Konquerer for a browser, so when you go to Internet->Web Browser, it will launch Konq. Now if you have Mozilla installed too, Web Brower will become a sub menu containing both Konq and Mozilla.

One way to get around the small font in the install he complained about was to change the resolution. Before you hit enter at the install bootloader, hit F3 (i think) and it will give you a list of resolutions to use. The menu is located at the bottom of the bootloader. He also complained that it didnt come with the stuff he wanted. Well cry me a river because you are a little more advanced than their target audience and are too lazy to install and configure the apps to your liking.

Also, in YAST there is an autocheck dependencies which should automatically resolve all dependencies when installing things, so he shouldn't have had to figure out what was not making his GNOME install. Maybe it is disabled for some reason in the beta, or maybe he didn't see the checkbox down there?

Maybe he should complain less and use the system more.

Re:SuSE?

[Anonymous Coward]

I known this is unsolicited advice but try not being so much of a 'fan' and more of a normal person. That is, don't let your emotions determine which distro you want to run but instead focus on the real differences between them. For example, it would only take a short period of time to install SuSE, Fedora, Mandrake, and Knoppix (and any of the other live CD distros) and then you could choose one based off of actual experience and not loyalty.

Re:I've said it before ...

[Homology]

And I'll say it untill something else replaces the fact that SuSE is the best all around distribution. From linux newbies looking to switch from windows for the very first time to system administrators needing to drop in a box here or there that they can setup and never think about again. Moreover, the so-called minimal install is not minimal when it insists on installing X and qt, when it should not.

And if they need to think about it again they can remote administer it through YAST or SuSE's desktop sharing.

Since I bought the last three SuSE Professional, it's fairly clear that I think it's a good distribution. The written documentation that is part of the package is very useful, and the Pro version contains two books (User Guide and Administration Guide) of about 1000 pages in total.

YAST is very nice, and one useful aspect is that it has a curses based counterpart for administration thorough SSH. However, I think that SuSE Pro is better as a desktop than server. You see, the configuration tools does not always work (say, Apache2 configuration is broken in SuSE 9.0). That would be OK, if not the entire configuration system with scripts and all is so opaque and hard to grok.

So, eventually I quite simply migrated over to OpenBSD. Much easier to administrate and understand what is actually going on.

SuSE Pro : desktop very good. As as server : not quite up to it, unless you want to run Java (SuSE is now a Source Partner with Sun)

Re:likes?

[Quantum Jim]

FYI, SuSE produces Knoppix-like bootable CD called "SUSE LINUX for i386 Live-Eval". I revieved a copy via a magazine. It is kinda slow and not the best for using from the CD-ROM, but it provides a good intro and demo of SuSE Linux without having to install it to your hard drive.

Notes: I recommend that you try it if you have enough memory - 256MB isn't enough,but 512MB or 768MB should work well (since it has to be loaded into RAM with no HDD install). I perfer Fedora Core 1, but my advice should give you an easy way to try SuSE.

menu options

[zogger]

I like that idea a lot! Just expand on it easily. Menu *options*,and I don't mean emphasize "theming" and all that hoo-rah, the apps themselves, something like you get 3 choices a single click away, default-basic (one of everything basic, web, text reader/writer, media player, email client, chat client, etc), intermediate (more apps for different purposes, choices for each style of app),then power user with the entire kitchen sink in the menus, I mean every single last steenking teeny tiny app installed on the box.

I also think that every app should have an easy to read listing of WHERE all the files relating to the app are stored, so that if the user is confronted with having to go tweak into unknown land, they can at least find the file to tweak easily. That's the intermediate level that causes so much grief I think,(does for me anyway) going from pure point and click noob to intuitive command line.

Lame Lame Lame

[brunes69]

Disclaimer: I have viewed this Joe Barr guy as a complete lamer ever since his huge rant against MPlayer for not supporting his buggy GCC

This is a really really lame review. The whole thing can be summed up in about three lines:

"I installed SuSE Linux. The install went great, but I don't like KDE and none of my Gnome apps were installed off the bat, and I couldn't install them properly because I don't know how to work YaST, so it sucks. Hopefully this will be corrected when it goes gold".

Basically, he installs it, and is upset to find out that all the default apps are KDE apps. Well hello, SuSE has *always* been a KDE distro. And guess what, that is the exact same way *I* feel eevry time I am forced to install RedHat, and I have to use all Gnome apps.

If you want a Gnome-centric distro, why are you using SuSE at all?Another waste of everyone's time by Mr. Barr.

Good choices

[Tarantolato]

Personal Edition, on the other hand, is for "non-professionals" in home environments, and Novell/SUSE doesn't want to overwhelm these consumers with too many options, Schlaeger said.

Ya know, much as I'm a big gnomefanboy and all, I think this is a good choice. My girlfriend (big guineapig on all ease-of-use issues) gets freaked out when she sees two different [x] available.

Re:Just say no to OSNews

[Angry Pixie]

For fuck's sake, anti-aliasing is very much a tech issue. No all of us wear glasses. Those of us who don't would like to avoid needing to in the future. When you spent hours late at night, everynight, reading reports and calculating figures, anti-aliasing makes it possible to get by without a bottle of eye drops and an Advil. Human interface design is a science, not a cutesy artform with the sole goal of producing 3D icons and splash screens.