SUSE 9.2 Released

peterprior writes "Novell have issued a press release announcing SUSE Linux 9.2. The new version comes with kernel 2.6, KDE 3.3, Gnome 2.6 and features (amongst other things) enhanced wireless support as well as Evolution 2.0 with Groupwise / Exchange connectivity. The WYSIWYG web development tool Nvu is also included. The new release is expected to hit the retail shelves in early November."

Comments

Wireless

[jeffkjo1]

But will it work natively (read: no ndiswrapper) with my Linksys WMPP54G wireless card (stinkin Broadcom chipset.)???

Re:Wireless

[blowdart]

512Mb of RAM to make it useful? That's taking being a Windows replacement a bit too far.

Re:Wireless

[epohs]

I certainly hope they have figured out some way to enhance support for wireless network cards.

I've got a WMP54GS card that i've been completely unable to get working with ndiswrapper.

I absolutely love gentoo, but if SuSE can get this working I'll move back. (haven't used SuSE since 8.2)

P.S. if anyone has info on getting a Linksys WMP54GS wireless network card working with gentoo, i'd really appreciate a nudge in the right direction.

Re:Wireless

[Homology]

I used to feel that Debian was that, but they can't manage to get Atheros and Prism2 wireless support in their mainstream releases that will install in 32mb of ram (yea, I want to turn old machines into access points. Yeah, I know I can use pebble. But there are reasons I don't want to).

Then install OpenBSD. If the card is Prism2 based, you can easily turn your shiny new OpenBSD gateway to an access point. No support for Atheros based card due to the propertiary and binary HAL component needed to make them work. OpenBSD does not accept unfree drivers.

For wireless security the authpf - authenticating gateway user shell is quite handy. Or you can just use VPN that is part of base install.

Re:Wireless

[spoonyfork]

I have SuSE 9.1 (2.6 kernel) running on boxes with 128 MB RAM. What do you mean won't install? The installer pukes out or coded to stop?

Re:Wireless

[norite]

Bollocks. Read the effing article first, my friend. SuSE 9.2 requires 128Mb of main memory. 256Mb is recommended.

Here you are:
http://www.suse.com/en/private/products/suse_linux /preview/sysreqs.html

Re:Wireless

[dankney]

This is simply not true. I have it running on an older machine with 128 megs. It works fine out of the box.

It is unbearably slow in KDE with less than 256, but since I'm using Windowmaker, it's just fine.

Amazing how many knee-jerk reactions to the parent post without checking the actual requirements.

And as a side note, I've installed 9.1 on 2 different laptops and 5 different laptops. The only driver that didn't work "out of the box" was a VIA chipset's sound card (don't remember the chipset number -- I'm across town from the system right now). It was a lousy soundcard that needed upgrading anyway (working great with my Audigy II).

Re:Wireless

[beejhuff]

I'd like to echo on this point. I was literally amazed when I completed my first OpenBSD 3.5 install on an old Compaq Presario 1920 laptop. It recognized and configured my NetGear wireless pcmcia adapter and also a REALLY old linksys 10/100 ethernet card I had difficulties with even on previous Linux installations.

I was so impressed I took a plunge and attempted the 3.5 install on a new Averatec laptop with a built-in Intel wireless adapter. It properly detected and auto-configured the wireless adapter AND the crappy Realtek based 10/100 interface.

Really, I think MAJOR kudos should go out to the OpenBSD team for the 3.5 release. The latest failover utilities (carp and pfsynch) and driver support have really made it easier for me to setup and maintain WAPs on my ever-growing collection of used laptops. I've always been a bit paranoid about setting up wireless networks for friends and family but it's becoming much easier for me to do so with this latest release.

If you also consider the latest kernel support for the VPN Accelerator products from soekris (obligatory link - www.soekris.com) they've also come a LONG way to providing a platform for incredibly secure enterprise firewall and wireless access point systems. Given the cost of the soekris hardware (even their high end stuff) comes in at about HALF of what you'd pay for comparable cisco gear EVEN ON EBAY, I can't but help to throw some props their way.

Give the latest 3.5 release a shot. And order the CD if you like it. If for no other reason buy it for the HILARIOUS audio track of their Python-tribute. You'll piss yourself laughing...or at least I heard that some people did that....

Exchange ?

[mirko]

I guess this one very feature might begin to frighten Microsoft : it's remained their most private app for a long time...

Re:Exchange ?

[stratjakt]

Why? I'm sure they love OSS exchange clients. They don't have to support it, and the per-seat licensing revenue for Exchange server comes in either way. Businesses can superficially "switch" to linux on all the desktops, and they can still charge per-seat in the backend.

Why is this so? Because "IT" dopes are ass backwards. They put linux on the desktop and MS in the server room.

Re:Exchange ?

[Timesprout]

It is indeed. I think many here overlook the influence exchange servers have had on the desktop. The Outlook - Exchange combo makes a formidable partnership. I know Outlook gets a lot of grief here but it is an excellent email client and PIM, and capable of almost infinite extension, its easy to start building workflow and management systems on top of them, a feature which proved extremely attractive to the enterprise.

Re:Exchange ?

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

This is an interesting point because while most people say the Office (word, excel, access, and so on) are M$'s cash cow, truth is the only real reason that Enterprise stays with M$ is Exchange.

Re:Exchange ?

[afidel]

Give me a replacement for Exchange that has group calandering, shared folders, works seemlessly with Outlook as well as an open client and doesn't have an ugly front end like Groupwise or Notes and I'll be sure to check it out. The truth is there isn't one out there that doesn't cost at least as much as Exchange does. So there is little incentive to go through the expense, pain, and risk of migrating.

Re:Exchange ?

[MikeBabcock]

A lot of people give me a hard time because I sell people Dell servers with Red Hat Enterprise 3 on them as their back-end and Dell desktops running Windows as the clients.

My clients love it -- they get a desktop they recognize and the stability of a Linux server while not paying licensing to Microsoft for anything beyond the Dell MS tax.

For what its worth, yes, some of them even run Open Office on Windows.

Re:Exchange ?

[T-Ranger]

While true, you miss the point.

Outlook runs on Microsoft Windows. You have to pay Microsoft for Windows. Outlook is sold as both a standalone product, and as a component of Office. You have to pay Microsoft for both of those.

If Linux - anything that is not Microsoft - replaces a Microsoft product, they loose twice. First, they loose money from not having the next upgrade, and far more importantly their strangle hold gaurenteeing lots of money from future upgrades is loosened. The later (long term revenue) is so important that they have often given away the former (quick money from a license today). Think IE. Think all the features of Windows, that they could have charged for, that they give away -- things that prevously could be had by 3rd party vendors.

If any non-Microsoft product replaces a Microsoft product then the whole system starts to fall apart.

Re:Exchange ?

[afidel]

Unfortunatly OpenMail went EOL at HP and the company that bought it doesn't have the resources to really support it. It's unfortunatly a legacy product at this point. You're right though if HP had held onto it I would be using it at quite a few places right now.

Re:Exchange ?

[Deagol]

Could someone make a decent argument why Exchange is so damned "important" in the private sector? I'm serious here. Managerial groupthink does not count.

I was once an admin for a M$ shop, and ran the Exchange Server 5.5. The higher-ups would get so damned pissed at me 'cause I simply refused to use the entire calendar/planner/contact-list crap that was part of LookOut. I just couldn't (and still can't) stomach that stuff. Yet I somehow managed to get the important shit done.

Please, will someone tell me what's so useful about the Exchange/Outlook combo (or either half, for that matter) that a business will spend the money on the MS Server, the Exchange Server, CALs, and the Windows/Outlook licesnes?

In an age of such fierce competition and cost-cutting measurse to increase the bottom line, I fail to see how a business can justify canning decent employees and cutting benefits, yet they're still willing to pay the MS crack dealer the annual licensing fees. Providing pet features for management doesn't seem like a good reason to me.

In all honesty, I continue to be stumped by this practice. The open source solutions we have available today are light years ahead of the commercial offerings we had ten years ago. Yet, we somehow managed with the tools back then. This isn't about not enjoying progress -- I'm no software Luddite -- it's about freedom (in the RMS sense). Isn't a little growing pain and inconvenience worth not having to worry about the BSA and the annual software audit?

Re:Exchange ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yet another "I don't have a use for it so nobody must have a use for it" post. When you work in a department with 160 people and you have schedule meetings for say 20 of those people it is extremely difficult without Outlook/Exchange. With a click of the button I can find the optimal time to have the meeting so that everybody can attend.

Assistants can also maintain their boss's calendar, managers can assign tasks for their staff, storing everything on the server makes upgrading to new machines easy, and having everything together in one app just makes sense.

Now the benefit for a 40 person small business is pretty much zero but for once you get over 100 people the per person cost really isn't that much considering the savings in time and aggravation. You can piss on a lot of things from Microsoft but Outlook/Exchange (especially Outlook 2003) and Excel are two areas I will defend to the death (ok maybe not literally).

Re:Exchange ?

[pyros]

You can download all the updates as source RPMs, build them, and install them. You can even download RHE (any version) in it's entirety as source RPMs and build it. Have a look a whitebox linux (it's RHE built from the publically available source RPMs). I don't know about the yearly subscription for updates.

Re:Exchange ?

[cwiegand]

Simple. Shared calendars.

No open-source solution has shared calendars on the desktop. Oh, sure, if you want a separate web app, you can go to lots of apps. And email? IMAP allows sharing folders, no problem. LDAP takes care of contacts (so long as you're willing to hear your users complain that they can't update the LDAP directory themselves, or don't care to use umpteen billion tools which are badly UI designed in order to do so). But iCal/vCal, for whatever reason, just hasn't (yet) taken off as the protocol to store shared calendars on a common server. That's the only argument my CEO was able to give me that actually had water when he wanted to switch from Cyrus IMAP to Exchange 2000. And so he won.

Even these days, Evolution still doesn't seem to support having a calendar folder that's also stored on the server, although it does appear to at least support reading iCals (I think). And we do still run Windows, for the most part, here. I'm seriously looking to GroupWise as we are slowly migrating to Linux, and it'd be nice to have something cross-platform.

Re:Exchange ?

[Deagol]

Yet another "I don't have a use for it so nobody must have a use for it" post. When you work in a department with 160 people and you have schedule meetings for say 20 of those people it is extremely difficult without Outlook/Exchange.

Oh, gimme a break. It's not just me -- thousands of people plan stuff w/o Exchange just fine. I submit the many cases where hundreds of people planned on USENET, IRC, IM, or email. Look at flash mobs -- you think they have an aan Exchange server managing this stuff?

Damn, I'd love some of the cozy features of the expensive luxury cars, but I can't justify the cost to my family. So I am pretty content to "settle" on our current car (by no means a luxury car).

My point isn't that "if I don't need it, why does anyone else?". It's closer to, if we made due without all of those fancy features a few years ago, why do companies feel the need to spend so much on those features now?

This calendar stuff is much like people refusing to buy a car without cup holders. Oh, the horror! How will I even drink my latte on the way to work! People manage just fine, thanks. ;-)

I still don't get it. Why are these silly (IMO) features such deal breakers for some people when the cost and freedom benefits of the alternatives are far superior? Isn't the goal of business to be fiscally efficient? Is there really a positive ROI for you to have Exchange in your office?

Re:Exchange ?

[ckaminski]

Or worse, take a perfectly working sendmail/Netscape based email system and a 3rd party calendaring system that was distributed throughout the world on 8 boxes, and replacing each site with a clustered exchange host, burning a million+ $$$$ in the process...

Yeah, who's kid works at Microsoft and needed to make quota?

Re:Exchange ?

[William Baric]

FUD? You may believe whatever you wish, but I have far more problems with my mandrake 10.0 box at home than with Windows 2000. Oh, most of the time it's not big problems and I can find workaround. But I'm to a point where I'm fed up with Linux distros. Why the hell mandrake use totem by default? XMMS works great, but no, they had to use the shiny thing that crash like if there was no tomorrow. And I'm not even talking about their configuration tools. For example, this stupid things can't understand that I have two sound card on my computer. Sure, using vi to edit modules.conf each time their tool rewrite my file is not that hard, but it's certainly annoying to redo the same thing again and again.

Don't get me wrong, I know Linux is fine on servers... I install them. Of course some things are to be avoided (like 2.6.x or LVM) but overall it does the job.

What pisses me off is people who pretend everything is fine. I remember when I first tried 2.6.2 on my home computer. After 15 minutes I had my first hard lockup (guess what chipset I was using). I don't really blame linux for those lockups but I certainly blame all morons who were saying there was no problem with nforce2 and linux. A few weeks ago, I upgraded to 2.6.8. And guess what... yep, no more CD burning. But you can still find people who say this is not true.

Now, you say that you have a lot of problems with Outlook. Sorry, but THIS is FUD. Yes, there is some bugs in Outlook and I believe you when say "you've had whole inboxes eaten". It even happened to me once (although it was a long time ago with Outlook 97/windows 95). But the fact is those kind of problems are very rare.

Now back to mozilla... Single data point? Well, no it's not a single data point. Just test the damn address book for 45 minutes and you'll find errors. When I say Mozilla's address book is unusable it's not because of a single error. I tried (again) thunderbird not long ago and it took me 5 minutes before a contact disappeared. For God's sake, 5 minutes of testing! (BTW, I'm using thunderbird at home, but since my address book has only 10 contacts, everything works fine)

You may think losing a whole inbox is worse than losing a contact... no it's not. All my clients have at least daily backups. The most they can lose is one day of e-mail. If they received anything important, they can ask the person to re-send the e-mail (I know, I had some people who deleted their inbox by mistake). If it happens once in a blue moon, that's annoying but acceptable. (BTW, most of my clients use an IMAP server and every e-mail, incoming or outgoing, is permanently saved on a backup server, so even if their local hard disk crash or if they erased all their mail by mistake, they won't lose anything)

OTOH, when you have to check your address book every time you send an e-mail to a group of person because contacts disappear regularly, that's bad. When you send an e-mail to the WRONG ADDRESS, that's even worse.

You want to think everything that I say is FUD. Fine. But then don't be surprised if management don't want to hear about OSS after a bad experience.

Hold on, its not released yet

[eGuy]

Articles I've read say that it will be released in November. But it does sound nice :) Here are some of the articles: vnunet tectonic linuxelectrons

Re:Hold on, its not released yet

[media_Assassin]

... which everyone would know, if they only RTFA ...

"Novell today announced the November availability of SUSE® LINUX Professional 9.2, providing Linux newcomers and enthusiasts with the latest advancements in open source technology.

Gnome and KDE?

[Xpilot]

I've never tried SuSE Linux after it was acquired by Novell (who also owns Ximian). A lot of people have said SuSE is KDE-centric, but now that Novell has put a KDE team and a GNOME team under one roof, is the Linux desktop experience more "unified"? When Redhat tried to unify the desktops, there was a backlash of sorts... but I haven't heard from SuSE. How does the SuSE desktop feel, in both KDE and GNOME modes?

Re:Gnome and KDE?

[Jahf]

Gnot yet, but expect that to change when they have Novell Linux 10 completed (probably another quarter or so) and the Ximian products are integrated with the SuSE distribution.

Screenshots of Novell Linux 10 have been primarily using a Ximian-like GNOME desktop. It appears that while KDE will continue to get development, the "face" of Novell Linux will be the Ximian product.

That makes sense given how much influence the Ximian employees have retained in Novell's Linux decision making process.

Re:Gnome and KDE?

[IceFox]

Well although you couldn't tell it here on slashdot
1) The gnome and kde developers arn't arch enemies.
2) Distros that want more users want both desktops.

What does this mean? A lot of colaberation, quite a bit through freedeskop.org. Little things like all my gnome apps now show up in the kde start menu without any effort on my part are a big deal (and vice versa). Everyone understands that the better the two desktops behave together (not code wise, but behavior wise) the more the user wins.

One neat project which I don't think (might be wrong) anyone is working on right now is a common icon set. When gnome or kde load up the icon "cut" it should be the same. Help create an icon set (without a slant to the current gnome or kde) and then get it in freedesktop.org and I bet you that distros would adopt it. If you are interested in helping with this or other colaberation projects head over to freedesktop.org.

Some other ones that would be nice to have:
-A common bookmark and cookie storage standard (way to many browsers these days)
-Along with a common icon set, a standard for the default toolbar format (size, and with or without text and text placement)

Down the road expect distros to be less and less KDE or Gnome only.

-Benjamin Meyer

Re:Gnome and KDE?

[AvantLegion]

>> Maybe 2.8 wasn't ready in time for the release?

Probably. It hasn't even been moved into "unstable" in oh-so-bleeding-edge Gentoo. :)

KDE 3.3's been out for an extra month, which I'm sure helped.

SUSE

[stateofmind]

I love SUSE. :) But wow, I've never seen Nvu before, it looks like it could go head-to-head with Dreamweaver?

Has anyone used Nvu in a production enviroment and/or used Dreamweaver as well? I'd like to know how your experience was, versus the two of them.

I already have the majority of the programming team using SUSE for Java development. I'd like to move over our developers. (they build out HTML/JSP/PHP pages for us and the designers)

The only thing stopping them is, is their love of Dreamweaver. (Which I've never liked, it's a resource hog)

Josh

Re:SUSE

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd suggest you give quanta a try, it's much more mature than nvu. While nvu is pretty nice for building your personal web page if you don't know html or just want to get it done fast, imho the project is still to young to compete with dreamweaver. But it's certainly getting there.

Btw., just thought I'd mention that Lindows is behind the development of nvu and that the chief developer for it is the guy who developed mozilla composer (on which nvu is based).

Re:SUSE

[Anonymous Coward]

Nvu is essentially Mozilla Composer with a few improvements. I think, at least for the time being, Quanta is substantially more powerful, especially for server-side stuff. I'd say that would be a better plan. In the 3.3 release of KDE, it has a link checker, mass find and replace tool, and a ton of other things. Nvu seems to be just an HTML editor (like Composer before it), at least for the time being. Quanta is a full-featured XML (and derivatives, like XHTML) editor, and does PHP, as well. (also ColdFusion, I think...). It is a KDE app, so that should be factored in to any consideration, I suppose...

X.org

[Anonymous Coward]

"The X.Org Foundation's new X Window System X11R.6.8.1..."

Will this include the new Composite and XDamage extensions?

Re:X.org

[twener]

XDamage is standard part of X.org 6.8.1, and the SUSE 9.1 binary packages of X.org 6.8.1 also contain the Composite extension but not enabled by dfeault.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Personal Edition?

[Anonymous Coward]

German news sites heise and pro-linux are claiming that Suse will not release a personal edition this time.

However, it doesn't seem to be clear yet, if Suse will just not release a boxed version of the personal edition, or if they even stop the distribution of the personal edition iso for free downloads.

Any infos?

WTF ? Released ?

[rainer_d]

It's a paper lauch !
Currently, it's as much "released" as Longhorn.

The correct headline would have said "SuSE 9.2 announced", or sometime like that.

Rainer

NOOO!!!!

[Dante Shamest]

I just installed SUSE 9.1 !!!!!! =O

Announced, not released

[fstrauss]

The title should read
SUSE 9.2 Announced

It's due for release early November

Novell buying SuSE could be the best thing for SuS

[ShatteredDream]

Under Novell's leadership they released the first free version of SuSE on ISO that I can ever recall hearing about. Before that I didn't know anyone who gave SuSE the time of day because they were the only vendor that was remotely popular without free CD images. Now, SuSE has the chance to actually gain marketshare against RedHat and force them to work harder on Fedora.

SuSE was better some time ago...

[fionbio]

I've started using SuSE in 2000 when I was in Germany. My previous distro was RH, which deeply offended me by shipping broken gcc 2.96 (and refusing to adopt KDE for a while before that). I was impressed by SuSE's stability/quality, a nice feature of being able to save a list of selected packages in the middle of installation (IIRC), and also the fact that my old scanning prog kscan was included in Alpha section (I was far from being a good C++ programmer when I wrote it...)

Now I see an unpleasant tendency of including prerelease software in SuSE. As far as I remember, they were shipping a prerelease gcc 3.3, which caused problems with my (in-house) project and some prerelease of X11. Overall quality of the distro degraded. Also, I just don't get why they have Qt compiled with -DQT_NO_STL. As result, C++ programs that use STL have problems with system's Qt/KDE. This doesn't save memory/improve performance/etc., gcc shipped with SuSE has no problems with STL - so why?

I don't know whether SuSE is improving or getting worse now, as I'm currently deeply buried in .NET brain damage stuff. But next time when I'll be able to work under Linux most of time, I think I'll switch to something like Gentoo.

Re:Which version of 2.6???

[Hockney Twang]

From the press release: "SUSE LINUX Professional 9.2 core technology includes the new enhanced Linux kernel 2.6.8"

So, yeah, that version.

Suse is nice

[BelugaParty]

I found Suse to be a very good mix of windows (profesional grades) and linux. Having tried linux sporadically since '95, it is definitely one of the most polished distributions I have ever seen.
Looks aside, I think YaST is one of the most useful configurator/installers/admin panels I have ever used.
The downsides of 9.1 are its wireless tools (I have a broadcom chip, so I had to use ndiswrapper... switching between networks required admin commandline work.) The other problem, which is a problem with many linux distro's but still hasn't been addressed for my situation, is ACPI. Yes I use a laptop. No, Suse did not pander to me with easy to install packages... meanwhile, it did install at least 4 different packages for bluetooth, which is one thing I don't use.

In general, though, I would tell anyone to give it a try.

Re:Suse is nice

[M1FCJ]

I'm not a big fan or SuSE, I used to use RedHat all around the place... But FC1 and 2 were nothing but dissapointments for me. After screwing my Debian installation and waiting for too long for Gentoo to finish compilation, I switched all of my boxes, including an obsolete Sunsparc box to SuSE. I still hate Yast's limitations but I find its packages at least usable.

Strange though... Two years ago I could reccommend at least five distros to people. These days it is either FC or SuSE. I won't reccommend Gentoo or Debian to a newcomer and although Mandrake 10 was good, I had too many people coming back to me stating "their modem didn't work"...

Re:Suse is nice

[twener]

Ubuntu will need at least another 6 months (2nd release) to catch-up with SUSE excluding configuration tools. And much more time after to catch up with SUSE's YaST functionality (if they don't start to use it too :-).

Latest?

[balster neb]

Press release says "SUSE LINUX Professional 9.2 comes with latest open source functionality". But it only comes with GNOME 2.6. GNOME 2.8 was out about 3 weeks ago

Anyway, lets hope this release has more than half-hearted GNOME support. The previous version included GNOME, but barely. It's going to be interesting to see how Novell balances KDE and GNOME in the future, given their conflict.

suse reflections

[uberjoe]

I used suse for two releases (9 and 9.1) and I really liked it. For the most part it just worked, I think even my mom could have used it just fine. But I rarely learn anything about my system by having it work all the time. I've learned more about linux by using slackware, which has very few gui tools, and a lot of cli tools. In suse my wheel mouse was setup automatically, in slackware it worked perfectly AFTER I researched the problem with google and found the lines to add to my xorg.conf file. I guess what I'm trying to say is that suse is great but it's not for everyone, not me anyway.

Re:Which version of 2.6???

[MikeBabcock]

That's just FUD. I use 2.6.8.1 at home right now with Fedora Core 2 and it runs cdrecord and cdrecord-ProDVD fine on my combo DVD/CD burner.

For what its worth, I compile my own kernel with my own options, but no patches applied.

Also, it runs Wine fine, and I play Morrowind regularly with it.

Re:Novell buying SuSE could be the best thing for

[MKalus]

Up until Version 7 they had ISO images available. They changed their policy because they wanted / needed the revenue, and in essence there is nothing wrong with it, now is there?

I bought 9.1 and I might download the 9.2 iso and upgrade, we'll see when the time comes.

Outlook server?

[Doc Ruby]

Novell offers the Open-Xchange server for SuSE (and other Linux) as their groupware replacement for MS Exchange. But to connect to it with Outlook, you have to install their MAPI store, iSLOX, on the client machine. Yesterday, PalmOne announced they've licensed the Exchange server sync protocol, so they can offer Outlook-type clients, that connect to actual Exchange servers, without the (usually clueless) client user having to add any software at all. Sure, it's criminal for Microsoft to lock down their protocols, locking competitors out of the market they dominate. But at least they're licensing it to competitors now. Novell's got a lot of money; why don't they license it to include an "Exchange stub" in their O-X server?

Re:Outlook server?

[julesh]

Because the license will almost certainly include an NDA, and ISTR they've released openexchange under an open source license now (is that right, or was I imagining it?), so they can't.

What's advanced here?

[Bruha]

I paid for 9.1 Professional, Gaim was broke and you couldnt get a new 64bit compile from suse of the fixed version to save your life. They just farmed me out to ask the community for a fixed version. With no true workstation install you have to get all the compilers and such installed. And even then the 64bit version was missing packages that the 32bit version was not. So you couldnt compile a 64bit version if you wanted.

I had high hopes of Novell buying SuSe only to see not much being done with it. Patches to broken applications if made available need to be recompiled in a timely manner and be available to the users. Telling a customer to find it on the web is the wrong answer.

So close! When will we get the perfect SME-server?

[zuse]

While this discussion is mostly about the fantastic new features of some new desktop package, what I'm wondering about is if SuSE has managed to improve SuSEs server setuptools.

I'd been running samba/samba-tng network for the last 4/5 years on different distros but I have yet to see a distro that makes it easy to set up a basic serversetup for a small business network (dhcp,bind,samba and nfs) without having to use the commandline +++.

The shocker is how close SuSE is to achieving this in 9.1 - but that they didn't bother to go the last mile.

This would make it a kickass product for many SMEs.

As of 9.1 the following things are missing:

• Autogeneration of the initial LDAP-database. I know some think ldap sucks but actually most of the other parts of ldapsupport is allready there.
  
• A yast interface for simple Certificate Authorty handling.
  
• Simple configuration of dynamic dhcp/dns updates. I tried to use yast in 9.1 but it just plainly didn't work and was buggy.
  
• A suggested roadmap for how you should use a SuSE server to integrate your Windows, Linux and Mac-boxes. This should include suggested loginscripts, ways to use the same mozilla profile accross OS'es and a simple way to set NFS shares to the same shares as samba uses.
  

The press release says that they have adressed these issues (aehm, it says a redesigned user interface to permit easier setup of SAMBA, DNS and DHCP servers whatever that means), let's hope they have.

Notice They're Using Bleeding-Edge X.Org

[Lethyos]

The X.Org Foundation's new X Window System X11R.6.8.1 also contributes to overall better hardware support.

So does this mean SuSE is going to be one of the first "user-friendly" distros to offer OSX-esque eye-candy like drop-shadows and transparency?

Kontact's Connectivity

[twener]

The poster seems to prefer Evolution, so please note that SUSE's Kontact has also Groupwise and Exchange connectivity besides SLOX, eGroupware and Kolab.

Network mounting netware filesystems natively

[rlgoer]

SUSE 9.2 is all well and good, as another Linux distro.

But how well does it integrate with Novell's own products?

For example, can SUSE 9.2 network mount a Netware volume? Or do we have to use Novell's 'native file access' and export it using SMB (ugh)?

Also, if we can mount Netware volumes, can we do anything significant with them? E.g., can we set rights?

Is ConsoleOne actually working (with all the plug-ins we have under Windows) with SUSE 9.2?

I'd be pleased to hear that all these things were possible, but I'm inclined to doubt they are given what I've seen thus far....

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[account_deleted]

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I, for one,

[Gothmolly]

welcome our new green chameleon overlords.

Re:I, for one,

[Scud]

Better known as the order of the stoned lizard.

Re:Which version of 2.6???

[Daengbo]

I'm not going to dispute you, but this is a well-known bug, not FUD. Many of us are still running 2.6.7 in Debian because 2.6.8 (any version) is still broken. I don't know what you did to get it to work, but the Debian bug report says that 2.6.8.1 wasn't fixed.

How they feel on 9.1 Pro (and 8.0 Enterprise)

[Roadkills-R-Us]

Gnome is pretty much Gnome, KDE is pretty much KDE. I did end up with both a KDE and a GNOME "home" icon on my GNOME desktop, but I had some issues related to conversion from legacy SLackware and RedHat config file sin my home directory, plus I installed in a couple of stages, so it's hard to say whose fault that is.

I prefered the version of GNOME that came in RH8, but the new one is plenty GNOMish under SuSe. I'm less familiar with KDE, but it certainly looks and feels like KDE to me.

Since I'm running SuSe on a 500MHz system, I explored all the desktops, then switched back to ctwm. 8^/

FWIW, we also have a couple of dual Opterons at work running 8.0 Enterprise (or whatever they call it). KDE and GNOME also seemed pretty normal there.

now I can wait on my failed 9.0 = 9.1 upgrade

[e40]

Perhaps 9.0 => 9.2 will work.

Basically, the upgrade failed (and left my system in a partially upgraded state, requiring me to restore from backup tapes) due to some internal error. Yes, I have an older system (dual Celeron 500's). Red Hast was happy on it before the upgrade to SuSE 9.0, though.

Since I purchased the professional, I figured I'd get support. Not so. I was told, because of the error I got, I had to do a "manual upgrade", but that's not covered by professional support. And, I had to wait weeks to be told this. Perhaps it was the language barrier.

Since the system involved is fairly critical, I deicded to leave it at 9.0. I'm a little wary now of SuSE.

I knew this was coming!

[jht]

This announcement was inevitable. Because I just got around to installing 9.1 on test hardware from the kit Novell just sent me a few weeks ago.

From what I've seen of 9.1, though, it's maturing rapidly - and that's got to be good. Personally, I use it mainly on a VM under Virtual PC on my PowerBook. Performance is surprisingly good, and much better than XP under the same environment (with all the XP eye candy turned off). I also run it on a PC VMware VM, where it behaves well, and so on.

I do think the two releases per year target is kind of arbitrary and silly for the most part, though. Novell/SuSE should be concentrating on supporting and updating the existing release over a year or so, and then release a new version when enough spiffy new stuff is out there to justify it. Other than Bluetooth support, improved wireless, and some new apps I don't see a lot of real justification for this version.

Re:No Ximian??

[riggwelter]

Well, Ximian patches for GNOME go into the SuSE builds (reading the RPM changelogs is fascinating).

In any case, most SuSE GNOME users prefer ULB GNOME.

Re:Novell buying SuSE could be the best thing for

[theendlessnow]

Under Novell's leadership they released the first free version of SuSE on ISO that I can ever recall hearing about.

Then you must only be a few years old. Come on! SUSE had free ISO downloads clear up to 7.3... while that may seem ancient, remember 8.0 came out in 2002! Support for 7.3 and the ability (apart from mirrors that still exist) to get ISOs ended December 2003.

SUSE has provided a mechansim by which their software can be downloaded... perhaps not as convenient as ISOs for some, but you can always get ISOs from your local LUG... I'm sure that someone there will burn you a set for free.

Now, SuSE has the chance to actually gain marketshare against RedHat and force them to work harder on Fedora.

SUSE actually has more marketshare than you realize. Do you not know that over 90% of large scale enterprise deployments occur using SUSE?? Why? Because Red Hat was VERY, VERY late to the game when it came to supporting things like the mainframe.

When IBM was looking for vendor distribution support for the mainframe, SUSE dropped them a release on their doorstep. Red Hat came armed with contracts and "deals" (before they would even consider supporting the platform).

Which enterprise dist was first to provide logical volume support? Dynamically resizeable live file system support? A graphical and TEXT(!) based administration utility? Key integrated Unix features like NIS and NFS? Even LDAP?
Then ask, what enterprise dist was first to provide an unreleased private fork of GCC and its libraries, graphical-only administration tools (e.g. just like Windows requires a graphical head...), numerous kernel hacks that were not well tested, an NIS subsystem and automounter that is not well behaved or integrated, ...

SUSE's motto is "Have a lot of fun!". Now... we can all argue that having a lot of fun doesn't put bread on the table... but the guys sure are motivated when it comes to trying to their best to come out with solid technology that's easy to use.

IMHO, Novell brings the typical American business angle to SUSE (now they can be just like Red Hat). While some might argue that Red Hat is the most pro open source company out there... remember they also have vigorously protected their trademark (there's a whole story on that... but too long to write about here) to prevent those "free" CD's from bearing Red Hat's name. In many ways, Red Hat has shown more old-style IP protectionism than people realize. They're just a whole lot slicker (stealthier) about how they do it.

I liked SUSE better as a private company. However, IBM needs a real enterprise level player to help them provide enterprise level solutions... so you can kind of blame IBM for the whole Novell acquisition thing.. it brings a large scale support arm (that dwarfs Red Hat) and the flexibility of SUSE which has always had a better Unix integration philosophy (Red Hat is a GNU/Linux dist, SUSE is a GNU/Linux dist with the experience of former large scale enterprise Unix types).

Anyone who has been in the industry can tell you that Red Hat tends to have a "if it's not Linux, then it sucks" attitude. SUSE tends to have a "hey if we change this a bit, we'll integrate better with existing Unix systems" attitude. Now, which style is more enterprise focused??

With that said, Red Hat was the first publically traded American based Linux dist. Being publically traded goes a LONG way with American businesses (you protect my tail, I'll protect yours). It's easier to make "deals" when you are dealing with a public company. It's a "safer" business situation for large enterprises (sort of a good ole boy system). Anyone who has help take a company from private to public can fill in the details about what I mean there.

Well.. now there's Novell/SUSE. But the problem is that large enterprises got somewhat burnt by Novell in the past (doesn't matter if it's just perception... perception is all that matters). So, now businesses will choos

Nvu?

[dfj225]

Has anyone tried Nvu? I never heard about it until today. If it works, it seems like a great program, as I currently don't use FP (because it sucks) and Dreamweaver because it is expensive. I think I'll give it a try on my OS X box when I get home tonight.

Re:there will be no personal any more

[PeterPumpkin]

"As of version 9.2, a personal edition is not being offered anymore."

You're making stuff up...

[aber]

From the SuSE site:

Main memory: At least 128 MB; 256 MB recommended

And that's probably for the default kde desktop install. If you use something lighter you should be ok with less memory.

And, of course, it will probably install even if you're running on much less than the minimum req.

Re:You're making stuff up...

[gasp]

Try it before you say stuff. SuSE 9.1's installer flatly refuses to install on less than the minimum memory requirement. I expect the same from 9.2.

Nvu

[musselm]

I tried Nvu about a month ago but put it away because it lacks too many things I rely on in Dreamweaver.

The biggest missing part at this point is the file-management Dreamweaver has tackled so well. In Dreamweaver you can define a local site as well as a remote site, work on local files and upload them easily, browse remote files, etc., etc.

But Nvu so far lets you define one site, that site being your remote, live site. Too non-useful yet.

That said, Nvu will get there eventually, and it should rival Dreamweaver's rich features, including syntax-coloring, find-and-replacing, and on and on.

Re:Which version of 2.6???

[Daengbo]

Bug #267338 (note the "Update 2: The problem is NOT fixed in 2.6.8.1"

From here: Consensus on this seems to be that the kernel will not be fixed, that the old way the userland tools used to speak to the burners involve security holes, and thus the userland tools (cdrecord and co) need to be fixed.

Another thread here: http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=13501 &highlight=

I understand that cdrecord works properly when run as root, so maybe that's what you're doing (maybe suid)?

Re:Which version of 2.6???

[Jeff Mahoney]

No, not that version.

Distribution kernels typically add a number of patches to the vanilla version in order to better meet the needs of their users. This includes features like lkcd or external filesystems, but more importantly, it means that it has critical bug fixes that weren't released into a vanilla release kernel.

The SUSE Linux 9.2 kernel carries the version number of 2.6.8, but is actually based on 2.6.9-rc2, with critical bug fixes beyond that. Since 2.6.9 isn't yet released, it would be inaccurate to call the kernel 2.6.9, but it's hardly vanilla 2.6.8.

You can see just what's in the kernel by checking out SUSE Kernel of the Day, which is built from the CVS tree, and picking the appropriate subdirectory under there.

Cost vs. Value

[bill_mcgonigle]

Budget limitations being what they are, we had to go with bottom of the line Dells (2.2GHz Celerons, 256M , 20G, internal Broadcom Wifi)....Initially, of course, I wanted to run Linux, but after 25-30 hours of various misconfigurations, I gave up, reinstalled XP Home, and everything just works.

Unless your time is worthless you would have been better off putting some money into a decent laptop with a wireless card from a vendor that doesn't solely provide windows-binary drivers and no specs as Broadcom does. Especially if linux was the goal of the hardware.

It's hard to buy hardware with no linux support from a linux-hostile vendor and be surprised when linux is hard to get working.

I've heard good things about IBM and Toshiba laptops, though I use an Apple myself (who unfortunately uses Broadcom in their newest wireless cards). Mandrake and Redhat have searchable databases if you want actual recommendations.

Quanta not wysiwyg

[Anonymous Coward]

More powerful? Yes. Can do more? Yes. XML editor? Yes. KDE app? Maybe. Doesn't come with a base KDE install unlike a lot of other KDE apps that come with base KDE. Doesn't come on Knoppix. Doesn't come on some other distros that include KDE.

wysiwyg? Not. The Quanta developers show the same disdain for wysiwyg that developers who use vi for page layout show. They hate wysiwyg so much that they didn't even bother calling their version wysiwyg, instead calling it "VPL", or visual page layout, or their superior version of wysiwyg. In other words, they are redefining what wysiwyg to what they think it should be, not what it really is. And if you don't like it? Write it yourself.

And you have a problem with Quanta? If you didn't read every bit of documentation, if you didn't search every corner of the email archives, if you didn't read the minds of the developers, if you didn't contribute code they pre-approved after reaming you out on what you think vs. what they are doing, if you didn't contribute money to an individual who couldn't be bothered to incorporate as a non-profit for deductability, if you don't get your question exactly right in a form and outline as approved by the lead developer after divining the correct form without asking, if you aren't already a developer who's made his bones and sees web development in the exact manner as the lead developer, if you aren't a code programmer who also happens to web develop, be prepared for your castration and beheading when you post on the mailing list.

wysiwyg is for novices. If you use Quanta Plus and don't contribute funds or some other help to the project, can't install the absolute latest version (not the one on the web site you fool, not the one that came with your distro you fool, you have dependency issues you fool? You don't know what header files are, you fool? You don't know what development packages are, you fool? expect to have your knees capped if you have the temerity to bother the developers.

If you are not a coding, kernel, distro, guru capable of compiling, using cvs, patching, and have many other talents, basically if you haven't made your bones in the linux development and coding fields, you simply have no business using, or daring to ask about, Quanta Plus. To do so is to waste valuable developer time. Go back to Windows, go back to Frontpage, go back to your miserable life in wysiwyg land.

Why Exchange

[DragonHawk]

"Managerial groupthink does not count."

When it comes to people making purchase decisions, perception is reality. A lot of people are convinced they need the Outlook/Exchange combo. How good or bad of a decision that is does not matter -- they are convinced. If I (as a systems integrator) don't offer Exchange as an option, customers go somewhere else, I go out of business, and Microsoft gains more traction.

Now, as far as pros and cons go, the Exchange/Outlook combo has a number of things in the "pro" category. For one, I'm honestly not aware of anything out there that offers that level of integration in one package. Mail, tasks, schedule, and contacts all wrapped up in one interface is something a lot of people like. (Whether or not you or I like it, again, does not matter. We're not talking you or I, we're talking everybody.)

Exchange, done properly (note: this is expensive) is very stable and reliable. As long as you can throw the hardware at it, it can handle gobs of data. That is important. I'm continually amazed by the number of people who keep every single message they have ever received in their inbox. People with 5000 or more messages in their inbox is common. I think it's crazy, but apparently some people like it that way.

Aside from large numbers of messages in one folder, we also have large attachments. Today's 20 megabyte MPEG movie that everyone has to forward to everyone else. Or maybe just a big MS Excel spreadsheet. Exchange has a feature called Single Instance Storage which makes this very efficient. I'm not aware of anything in wide-spread use that offers the same functions.

Sure, with retraining and different work habbits, you could get the same thing done with a lot less IT resources. It might even be more generally efficient in the long run. But in the short term, it would mean a lot of retraining and a lot of procederal changes, and that's not gonna fly in many organizations.

Welcome to the real world.