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Ubuntu For PPC, And As A Live CD

Jeff writes "Ubuntu is just sweet. For Mac users it is even sweeter, as you can read in this review: it supports hardware like a charm ad now with a live CD out everyone can taste ... sorry, test it." And Chris writes "Gnoppix 0.8.1 now appears to be Ubuntu Linux based. At OSDir, we've got over 50 screenshots of the Gnoppix 0.8.1 release, including the controversial Ubuntu desktop background images." (See this earlier story; the default background images have been changed in Ubuntu proper, so the "controversy" need not keep you up nights.) The Gnoppix version is a very nice Gnome-based live CD, with fewer apps but more polish than most live CDs I've tried. (Note that this is not the same as the official Ubuntu CD, and that the PPC version is not a live CD.)

15 of 289 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Controversial theme? by punkrockguy318 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Right here: http://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20041025#f dow

  2. Re:Controversial theme? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    Login Screen Clicky 1

    Background Clicky 2

  3. Re:Controversial theme? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    you can view a log of the meeting here http://people.ubuntu.com/~thom/ubuntu-artwork-meet ing.log

  4. Re:Linux on the Mac is for Masochists... by Bob+Davis,+Retired · · Score: 1, Informative

    Why not? I never said 'Don't install Linux on your Mac', I said 'Linux on the Mac is for masochists' and it's true. For me, I just have no desire to dick around with Linux while I have a perfectly serviceable Unix (tm) available.

    As far as the Mac not being a real Unix, it is far more of a 'real' Unix than Linux. It's directly descended from AT&T Unix. It has a microkernel design, and is definitely BSD. That rant's amusing, but just because it doesn't do what that guy thinks a modern BSD should doesn't make it not BSD. His comment about Apple forking the code so they could take and not give back hold about as much water as your average sieve.

    By the way, here's how the genius you quoted could use WPA on OS X:

    "Kudos to the Macs for having a very simple WPA configuration. These are complete instructions to connect to dcs-wpa from any Mac running OS X 10.3 with a wireless ("AirPort") card.

    Select "Other..." from the list of available wireless networks, either in the wireless ("AirPort") status menu or via Internet Connect, and enter the following information.
    Wireless Security: WPA Enterprise
    Network Name:
    User Name:
    Password: "

    From UIUC's department of CS.

  5. Re:Not good as adevelopment environment by BenjyD · · Score: 4, Informative

    I use Xemacs in ubuntu fine - just enable the universe repository (uncomment the line in /etc/apt/sources.list). It would be nice if they moved it to main, but I've had zero problems with it so far.

  6. Re:what is gnoppix for? by wilebill1381 · · Score: 4, Informative

    Gnoppix Live CD works, whereas for many of us the Ubuntu Live CD does not. Tried all the listed boot options, went over to to morphix.org and tried such of their stuff as seemed possible. No good. The Ubuntu distro looks excellent, but the Gnoppix CD works on my hardware, while Ubuntu does not.

  7. Re:Linux on the Mac is for Masochists... by polyp2000 · · Score: 5, Informative

    This is somewhat of a stock remark.

    There are very good reasons to run linux on an OSX machine.

    I used to run linux on several Mac's at my old workplace.

    Reason OS9 is useless for serious web development work - sorry but dreamweaver and go-live are not my bag. Its also useless as a half decent web-server platform. I could have done some of these things on OSX granted but

    a) it wasnt possible to persuade the powers that be to purchase OSX (not that I even asked)

    b) on older Mac's - linux just performs much faster compare the speed of YDL on a blue G3 (333mhz) to OS9 running on the same machine - the latter is like a snail in comparison.

    Now dont get me wrong - OSX is great and all - Someday soon I might treat myself to a powerbook.
    There are things that make OSX superior to Linux eg:
    availability of "cool" livestyle applications iMovie, iTunes, iPhoto, iWhatever - The other attraction for me about OSX is the avalability of proper decent Music Sequencing / Composition software like Reason / Logic and Cubase. All this cools stuff and the inner peace that "it's not windows/micorosoft" and "theres a unix variant under the hood" are the reasons I find it attractive.

    Linux however is still IMHO better as a server platform because it enables you to cut out all the crap that goes with the OSX gui. Its much easier to set-up , configure and run in headless operation. Its easier to patch and keep up to date. OSX can be more expensive to keep running if you manage to get yourself into the upgrade cycle.

    While OSX is a very capable OS in both the server and the desktop space. And in addition it can run lots of your fave Linux apps via Fink et.al. For serious server-side development all the sexy gui stuff "Just gets in the way" whereas for Joe sixpack "It Just Works". We had am OSX server at my old place I rarely used it because it was such a pain to configure apache and friends.

    IMHO Linux PPC
    is great on older Macs as a desktop or a server / development platform

    IMHO OSX
    is great on shiny Mac's as a desktop and as a point'n'clicky server for less experienced staff.
    Its also great if you have an eye candy fetish and an open source fetish.(you can still use many of your favorite apps), but also need use some of the proprietary apps that just dont exist on Linux.

    Nick ...

    --
    Electronic Music Made Using Linux http://soundcloud.com/polyp
  8. I'm running it on my tiBook by torpor · · Score: 5, Informative

    .. dual-boot with OSX.

    Mine is the rev-a powerbook (the one with the firewire problems), so maybe its my hardware, but the default X config that ships with Ubuntu is s-l-o-w .. you can see visible tearing with rect updates in the manager, though the system generally feels (from the cmd line) about as fast as it should be.

    It is pretty darn nice, sloppy GUI aside, to be running Linux on this machine, which has been a trusty and productive computer (running OSX) since I got it. It truly is pleasurable to have the two best operating sytems around as a selection on my powerBook .. and with Mac-On-Linux (installed, but not properly config'ed .. yet) I'll be in real heaven, using OSX for candy and Linux for hard-core work.

    OSX is a great Unix, anyway, but for the things that I can't be bothered porting (or using fink to install), and just want to check out anyway, a quick boot into Linux to have a complete 'standard-ish' Linux system to apply that code to, is really productive.

    If you've got a PowerBook, I urge you to dual-boot it with Linux/OSX. It will give you some serious reflection about the power of your computer, I think, to see Linux running on it, and OSX side-by-side, as well ..

    --
    ; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
  9. Morphix Based by bmsleight · · Score: 5, Informative
    And Chris writes "Gnoppix 0.8.1 now appears to be Ubuntu Linux based. "

    The Ubuntu LiveCD and the Gnoppix LiveCD are based upon Morphix, which basically takes away the hard work of re-mastering a Knoppix CD. The base, the part based upon Knoppix contains the kernel, kernel modules, hardware detection, etc. This base is left untouched. You can either a change a mainmod or add lots of minimodules to make different liveCDs

    The Ubuntu LiveCD is built using one of Morphix Tools Module Maker. Feed you XML file into module maker and out pops your mainmodule for the LiveCD.

    There are a range of tools Morphix tools available to make a LiveCD. Such as Module Maker ibuild and TROM. It is even possible to save you files, configuration and setting to the Morphix LiveCD you using using CD persistant, ready for next boot up. Did I mention the GUI Morphix installer ?

  10. Re:That is fucking ridiculous by elFarto+the+2nd · · Score: 5, Informative
    http://img62.exs.cx/img62/4553/screenshot4.png http://img61.exs.cx/img61/7370/screenshot-1.png http://img51.exs.cx/img51/4012/screenshot-2.png

    Here are the images from the thread, and I agree with you. What sort of a fucked up world do we live in, where we can show images of people killing other people, but not of 3 people caring for each other.

    Regards
    elFarto
  11. Ubuntu is anything but a newbies distro ! by bushboy · · Score: 4, Informative

    A Newbie to Linux is not going to have much fun installing the Ubuntu Warty 4.1 release, unless they just let it "do it's own thing" which will more than likely end up destroying all the data they have on thier hard drive, namely, windows.

    Perhaps a "newbie to Debian" would be a more accurate description.

    I tried it recently and as a slackware 'fancier' I must admit it didn't suit me. In fact, I've never been able to get used to the idiosyncracies of Debain based distributions, even though it's supposedly so easy.

    I installed and am giving it the benefit of the dought - who knows, perhaps I'll become a convert and learn to love the Debian way as much as I like Slackware !

    But Ubuntu a newbies distro ? - wow, maybe the LiveCD, but the i386 I tried is anything but !

    --
    A slashdotting - you get the stick first and then the carrot !
  12. Re:Linux on the Mac is for Masochists... by Achoi77 · · Score: 2, Informative
    Depending on whose numbers you use, there are more Linux Desktops than Macs. Even the conservative numbers put Linux about equal with Macs.

    Do you have a link to back up this statement? All the site I've googled up (aside from the fact that most of the figures were 2-3 years old) showed that the overall percentage of linux desktop usage was about 1/2 of mac desktop usage. And a lot of these figures were pre-osx.

    OK let's back away from this 'Linux vs. OSX' thread before it's too late. Whoops, too late.

  13. Re:Linux on the Mac is for Masochists... by thephotoman · · Score: 2, Informative

    Samba: easy
    Scanner: downloaded the HPOJ drivers from Universe. Works immediately. (I use an HP PSC 950.)
    USB Printing: works out of the box
    Burning CDs: Very, very easy. Data just needs to be dragged and dropped in the burn:/// folder, ISOs just need right-clicked. Music needs XCDRoast, available in Universe.
    Bluetooth: no experience, but I think it's built in.

    Not hard at all.

    --
    Haec merda tauri est. Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.
  14. Re:Linux on the Mac is for Masochists... by violajack · · Score: 2, Informative
    OK let's back away from this 'Linux vs. OSX' thread before it's too late. Whoops, too late.

    It's always too late. It's inevitable in a story about linux on PPC the first comment will always be "why would anyone want to run linux when OSX is just soooo amazing." Well, here it is, get ready.....some of use just prefer linux. That's it. Just prefer it. No subjective better than/worse than arguments will change personal preferences. Not even objective but I can't put my iBook to sleep arguments will deter some.

    I have all kinds of machines around. I have a monster laptop that's mostly been banished to my desktop for size/weight/lack of battery concerns, so I haul around a beat up old little 12" G3 500 iBook that I happened to come by super cheap when a friend was selling an old one. I like having a consistent working environment. I like using OOo calc to keep track of my students and it just looks like crap and runs about the same in OSX. I like playing Kpat to kill time. I was running Ubuntu for a while, but switched back to Mandrake when the 10.1 for PPC hit RC2. I'm also running Mandrake on my desktop, cause I just like it. I actually like KDE (let the next set of flames commence) which is part of why I left Ubuntu.

    I really wish we could leave these my-os-is-better-than-yours arguments out of the discussions and just talk about the distro from the article on it's own without having to compare it to everything else first.

    I found Ubuntu to be really nice distro. The wake-from-sleep issue seems to be particular to certain iBooks, and I tend to blame it on the kernel becuase I'm having the same problem with Mandrake 10.1 RC2, but never had the problem with 9.1 or YellowDog 3. I found the packages that are included in Ubuntu to be a nice balance between not including too much stuff and having everything I like to use installed by default. I'm a big fan of only having to download one CD for the whole installation. I'm also finally understanding what all those debian fanboys are talking about with the vastness of the deb repositories. There are about a bagillion packages out there that can be installed, even if they're not officially suppossed to work with Ubuntu. The defualt brown theme was intereting for a while, but I much relieved to get back the Mandrake blue. I know themes can be changed, but I'm talking first impressions with the default theme.

  15. Re:Linux on the Mac is for Masochists... by strider_starslayer · · Score: 2, Informative

    Why run PPC linux? I run linux happily on my littel G3 imac; gentoo PPC is running about 33-45% faster then OS 10.2 was (and I'm sure as hell not shelling out for 10.3 when linux is running just fine). Also, there are more bloddy programs ported to PPC linux then there are FOR OSX natively, including some of my faviorate old school games (or there equivalents); like Gnomebots! (Not much more you can use on a 333 Imac then gnomebots, even when it is running 33-45% faster)

    --
    -Millions of Monkeys, Millions of typewriters, 6 hours of sorting through faeces encrusted pages to find: This post