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Red Hat Fedora Core 4 Test 1 Now Available

krunchyfrog writes "The first test release of Fedora Core 4 is now available from Red Hat and at distinguished mirror sites near you, and is also available in the torrent. New features in Fedora Core 4 test 1 include previews of GCC 4.0, GNOME 2.10, and KDE 3.4, as well as support for the PowerPC architecture. Please file bugs via Bugzilla, Product Fedora Core, Version fc4test1, so that they are noticed and appropriately classified. Discuss this release on fedora-test-list. -- The BitTorrent link is already there."

300 comments

  1. PPC by BibelBiber · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Hopefully PPC works as expected. It's a shame that this platform is so poorly supported.

    1. Re:PPC by tabkey12 · · Score: 2, Interesting
      EVen more important as Yellow Dog Linux is moving inch by inch to a subscription model for their products.

      (For reference, Yellow Dog Linux is probably the biggest supplier of PPC LInux and the only supplier that sells Mac Hardware with Linux preloaded.)

    2. Re:PPC by commodoresloat · · Score: 2, Interesting

      All the more reason to use Debian on PPC. There is a gentoo port too these days. Personally I prefer OS X on this hardware, but there are still a few linux choices out there.

    3. Re:PPC by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      EVen more important as Yellow Dog Linux is moving inch by inch to a subscription model for their products.

      Niche market, bills to pay? Who'd have thought?

    4. Re:PPC by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      All the more reason to use Debian on PPC

      What, so the only serious developers willing to invest in PPC Linux and support it can wither and die?

      Can't you spare them a buck or two?

    5. Re:PPC by tabkey12 · · Score: 1

      By the way, I understand that YDL are servicing a niche market, and what they are doing is entirely fair, but I still feel that people need free alternatives to try out Linux. Maybe having an Open Circulation Edition a lá Xandros would be a good idea.

    6. Re:PPC by codeguy007 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      As long as you want either all 32 or 64Bit libs. APT still can't handle multilib installs.

      If you can handle a pure 64Bit distro debian is fine. But man I know I prefer not seeing those puzzle pieces in FireFox when I hit a flash site.

    7. Re:PPC by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      "If you can handle a pure 64Bit distro debian is fine. But man I know I prefer not seeing those puzzle pieces in FireFox when I hit a flash site."

      But man, you will see them no matter what on ppc linux, as there is no flash plugin for ppc linux, whether its 32 or 64bit.

    8. Re:PPC by RedHat+Rocky · · Score: 1

      Gentoo support for PPC is very good.

      I run it on a couple of boxes, "It just works". :)

      --
      Anything is possible given time and money.
    9. Re:PPC by 4of12 · · Score: 1

      As long as you want either all 32 or 64Bit libs. APT still can't handle multilib installs.

      Running Fedora Core 3 on x86_64 I'm not convinced that Fedora has this multi-library 64/32 problem completely resolved either.

      Releasing a 64 bit OS is not difficult at all under Linux; it's been around since the Alpha days. What's hard is managing the transition environment where multiple environments need to co-exist on the same platform at the same time.

      --
      "Provided by the management for your protection."
    10. Re:PPC by leinhos · · Score: 1

      You can download YDL iso's free, you just have to wait for Terrasoft to post them a while after the release to the subscribers on ydl.net.

      The YDL yum repository is also free, and somewhat faster with updates.

    11. Re:PPC by paulatz · · Score: 1

      The shame is that the wireless card are not supported. Of course, it is not linux fault.

      --
      this post contain no useful information, no need to mod it down
    12. Re:PPC by Donny+Smith · · Score: 1

      >I still feel that people need free alternatives to try out Linux. Maybe having an Open Circulation Edition a lá Xandros would be a good idea

      What makes you think they need free alternatives?

      Most PowerPC customers are big and medium enterprises and they don't want to try out stuff - once the server gets bought it'd better go online as soon as possible (unless it's a test machine - even then, it's usually tested using the same OS as their main production PPC machine(s)).
      Because of that, most PPC customers don't give a shit about choices, tryouts and such.
      They want to go online and forget about the OS (including any problems such as compatibility with Oracle, backup tools, SAN and other details). That means that even if they want to try it out first (those are very few), they won't want to use a free distro and certainly not beta (!) version of a free (!) distro such as Fedora.
      Even if it worked fine - what would you do - buy a PPC server and run it on Fedora? Of course not - you'd want to buy a stable and supported distro that will live more than six months.

      SuSe offers a free trial of their PPC version:
      http://download.novell.com/Download?buil did=fOx0vY fWu6g~

  2. Quick RPM Version Check by rimu+guy · · Score: 5, Informative

    Just been poring over the new RPM versions...

    I see FC4 includes MySQL 4.1.10 a nice wee jump up from 3.23. Apparently RedHat are now happy with the MySQL licensing terms.

    It has Eclipse 3.1, dovecot, bash 3 (with debugger), Tomcat 5 (but only 5.0, not the declared stable 5.5.7), Xen 2. And that is about all that caught my eye.

    Having just been recompiling the RHEL4 sources I'm struck by how similar the versions all are. I'm presuming that rhel4 split off fc4 or vice versa a month or two back. I'd be curious how/if they co-ordinate all the patches and source code between the two different brands.

    --
    FC3 (now!) and RHEL4-based (soon!) VPSs

    1. Re:Quick RPM Version Check by tbspit · · Score: 5, Informative

      They seem to have used a 2.0 beta version of OpenOffice.org as well (rpm has version 1.9.83).

    2. Re:Quick RPM Version Check by Baal+Sebub · · Score: 5, Informative

      It's already in DistroWatch. Check it out for a quick overview of package versions.

      --
      120 chars are not enough for a signature. I have discovered a truly remarkable proof which this margin is too small to c
    3. Re:Quick RPM Version Check by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative
      Having just been recompiling the RHEL4 sources...

      Umm, why bother when you can just grab CentOS 4.0 instead?
      (or one of the other RHEL-rebuild projects like Tao or Whiteboxlinux)

    4. Re:Quick RPM Version Check by rimu+guy · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Presuming you're not trolling...

      But we will be hosting lots of servers for our customers with some RHEL4-based distro.

      I want to make sure that when an update comes out from the source, that I am not wholly dependant on a middle man that not be able to or capable of a prompt update release.

      I'm still testing our recompile version. If it works out, then great. Otherwise, I'm confident now that even running a non-North American Enterprise Linux Vendor version of RHEL4 I can always compile and distribute the errata udpates I need. (Well maybe except for a few kde packages, dbus and iproute which are spitting out heinous c++ errors at the mo).

    5. Re:Quick RPM Version Check by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      Presuming you're not trolling...

      That is correct. :)

      I want to make sure that when an update comes out from the source, that I am not wholly dependant on a middle man that not be able to or capable of a prompt update release.

      Fair enough. I'd rather try compiling just the update SRPMs rather than building everything from scratch. (maybe I'm just getting lazy)

      I'm only a fairly new CentOS user, but out of all the RHEL-rebuild projects I looked at, it appeared to be the best project wrt. releasing updates in a timely manner. It also seemed to have the most active "community" around it.

      (Well maybe except for a few kde packages, dbus and iproute which are spitting out heinous c++ errors at the mo).

      What are you using for your buildroot? I believe CentOS used a fully-updated Nahunt-beta2.

    6. Re:Quick RPM Version Check by unixbugs · · Score: 1

      Our operation doesn't have much of a place for these FC installs. Someone can request it, sure, but by the time they hose their install there is allready a new version out. Might be convenient but damn, whats the point of releasing 4 a year? Personally, when it comes to server, I think Debian has a better outlook on all of that.

      --
      You are about to give someone a piece of your mind, something which you can ill afford...
    7. Re:Quick RPM Version Check by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Might be convenient but damn, whats the point of releasing 4 a year? Personally, when it comes to server, I think Debian has a better outlook on all of that.

      That's not the target market. If you want server you install RHEL or a clone, e.g. CentOS.

    8. Re:Quick RPM Version Check by doc_traig · · Score: 1


      How difficult do you find it to make the initial installation build and then do the source compiling? I'm thinking about doing something similar in my shop.

      --
      So long, michael. Don't let the door hit you...
    9. Re:Quick RPM Version Check by Espectr0 · · Score: 1

      It has Eclipse 3.1, dovecot, bash 3 (with debugger), Tomcat 5 (but only 5.0, not the declared stable 5.5.7), Xen 2. And that is about all that caught my eye.

      Eclipse 3.1M5 or 3.01?

      Anyway you seem to forgot to mention the biggest change other than gcc, and that is that eclipse is a native application now, using open source java tools like classpath and gcj.

      They didn't include tomcat 5.5.x because it requires java 1.5. Tomcat 5.0.x is the last version that supports java 1.4. There are some compatibility libraries though.

    10. Re:Quick RPM Version Check by quantaman · · Score: 1

      Eclipse 3.1M5 or 3.01?

      3.1 M5

      Anyway you seem to forgot to mention the biggest change other than gcc, and that is that eclipse is a native application now, using open source java tools like classpath and gcj.

      native eclipse == damn cool!!
      IMHABO (In My Humble And Biased Opinion) I feel that the open source java stack in FC4 is the coolest part. Like it or not java is a major part of the computing landscape and we really shouldn't need to use propietary software if we want to use java.

      --
      I stole this Sig
  3. Can I update FC3 to FC4 Test 1 using yum? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Well, can I update to FC4 test 1 using yum?
    Is it even possible? Since I know everyone will advise me against this, but I just want to know ;)

    1. Re:Can I update FC3 to FC4 Test 1 using yum? by irchs · · Score: 5, Informative

      Yes, just update the to the relevent fedora-release rpm and make sure the yum version of FC4T1's version, and run yum upgrade Jan

      --
      Jan
    2. Re:Can I update FC3 to FC4 Test 1 using yum? by hey · · Score: 1

      Is this really so wise?
      Another way is to download the .iso's and mount with with ftp and loopbacks.

    3. Re:Can I update FC3 to FC4 Test 1 using yum? by irchs · · Score: 2, Informative

      I have done it before, its really straight forward, just update fedora-release, update to corresponding version of yum, run yum upgrade, and reboot, and enjoy the new version.

      I am even confident enough to do it over SSH.

      Thanks

      Jan

      --
      Jan
  4. Feedback on Fedora? by dotslashdot · · Score: 0, Troll

    I wanted to try Fedora to put another feather in my Linux cap. What is good/bad about Fedora? And whasup with the Fedora/Red Hat icon guy. He looks like he's never seen the Sun.

    1. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by Abasher · · Score: 3, Informative

      Bad: The upgrade path (which forces you to burn a new CD-set for each new release), lacking multimedia support and confusing extra RPM-repos (these intertwine, since multimedia support can be added quite easily, IF you find the right repos, which doesn't cause version confilcts). Good: Rather stable, bleeding edge, large community and company backing it up.

    2. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Bad: The upgrade path (which forces you to burn a new CD-set for each new release),

      That's fairly common, though, isn't it? Besides, you can always use CDRWs :-p

      Besides, I find the install-over-FTP works well. Might even be able to use my FC3 network boot CD to install FC4T1?

    3. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by BenjyD · · Score: 1, Interesting

      Good: Looks pretty, up-to-date software, bugfix releases (eg will upgrade foo 1.1 to foo 1.2 if it fixes bugs), fast, SELinux built in, lots of software available

      Bad: Buggy, upgrades frequently break stuff, short release cycle with no recommended upgrade path beyond reinstalling, yum is much slower than other package managers, FC users are guinea pigs for RH.

    4. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "And whasup with the Fedora/Red Hat icon guy. He looks like he's never seen the Sun."

      That's so we can relate to him.

    5. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by davidkv · · Score: 1

      Wrong. The upgrade path is by burning a CD/DVD and selecting "upgrade". You can also upgrade through yum or up2date, but it's not supported.

    6. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by BenjyD · · Score: 1

      I hadn't seen that - does it keep settings etc, or is it just a scripted delete the system partition and replace it?

      Not that I'd go back to FC any time soon, anyway. *shudder*.

    7. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by OneSmartFellow · · Score: 2, Informative

      There is no requirement to burn a new CD, you can easily install over HTTP, or FTP from any up to date mirror.

    8. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by stor · · Score: 1

      I hadn't seen that - does it keep settings etc, or is it just a scripted delete the system partition and replace it?

      It may mostly just upgrade relevant packages, remove obsolete ones and installs new packages. I haven't looked at the code however and I'm sure it does more than that.
      It seems to try to do the right thing i.e. retain current settings. It usually doesn't get everything right however (it's damn hard to when you think about it) and things break. Years ago it often broke things badly, these days I've found it to be OK.

      Cheers
      Stor

      --
      "Yeah well there's a lot of stuff that should be, but isn't"
    9. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by northcat · · Score: 3, Informative

      It doesn't lack multimedia support. It only lacks support for mpeg and others which are covered by software patents.

    10. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by davidkv · · Score: 2, Informative

      It replaces packages through rpm. I've upgraded machines since at least RH7 up to FC3 both by CD and by using apt/yum/up2date. No user data is ever deleted.

      Usually there are some small stuff that needs to be manually fixed, but it's hardly surprising since there are a few major changes in some upgrades (like SELinux, 2.6 kernel, udev and so on).

    11. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by Ph33r+th3+g(O)at · · Score: 2, Informative

      Which, practically speaking, is the same thing.

      --
      I too have felt the cold finger of injustice.
    12. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by codeguy007 · · Score: 1

      I upgraded from FC2 to FC3 and nothing was broken at all. The only issue I faced was that new packages offered in FC3 where not installed because no previous version had been. IE I had to add thunderbird with a yum install thunderbird after upgrading. Not a big deal at all.

    13. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by ManikSurtani · · Score: 2, Informative

      You also can upgrade using yum or up2date. yes, you'd need to make sure you've dloaded aind installed the rpms for the latest yum and up2date packages, but after that it should be a snap.

      --
      -- Manik Surtani
    14. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by LnxAddct · · Score: 2, Informative

      You should definitly give it a shot. It is fast, supports SELinux, and comes with all kinds of nice software, and is very stable. Yum is very easy to use and they are setting up an Extras repository for additional packages. Upgrading (despite what the above posters said) is very easy, just grab the newest version of yum and type yum upgrade, or do the recommended thing and download the new cds, and at the install screen hit "Upgrade". Very easy and works really well. Despite the 6-8 month release cycle, after the main Fedora project drops support for it, Fedora Legacy still will support it for 1.5 years and possible longer if the community is interested in providing help. I've been running FC since its very first day and it has since replaced all but one of my Debian servers (which is only still running because I dont want to reset its uptime :] )
      Regards,
      Steve

    15. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by ObsessiveMathsFreak · · Score: 1

      Yum WAS very easy to use. Then they changed it to yum 2. Now it sucks. Http errors abound, the app downloads the repos entire primary.xml.gz file EVERY single time it starts, no matter what you are doing, and they still haven't supported download resuming.
      I'm still waiting for a better updater app for RPM distros. I guess I'll just have to wait a little longer then.

      --
      May the Maths Be with you!
    16. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by SirTalon42 · · Score: 1

      Then use APT.

    17. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by LnxAddct · · Score: 1

      Apt is always an alternative, but Yum for FC4 has apparently undergone a huge revampment and is supposedly significantly faster. I'm not sure about the download resuming though.
      Regards,
      Steve

    18. Re:Feedback on Fedora? by LnxAddct · · Score: 1

      It has full support for any open source codecs or patent free codecs. It can also play audio cds just fine. It supports many media formats. If you want to add DVD and mp3 support, simply go to fedorafaq.org and they'll tell you how to. Its very simple, just add an entry to your yum.conf and then "yum install xmms-mp3". Personally, I'm very glad they made the move, I've never used so many open formats in my life and now I only buy ogg compatible players (which there are plenty of). Two years ago all my music was mp3 format, now I have over 12 gigs in ogg. Ogg also gives you the same quality with less space so its good for my harddrive too:)
      Regards,
      Steve

  5. Download size question by IDkrysez · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Why are the binary torrent images listed as being bigger than the sources?? Er, am I being thick, huh?

    --
    Was it a bat I saw? Racecar. Stack cats. A man, a plan, a cat, a ham, a yak, a yam, a hat, a canal--Panama!
    1. Re:Download size question by lachlan76 · · Score: 4, Informative

      Source code compresses better than binary.

    2. Re:Download size question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Source code compresses better than binary.

      Oh, and what does that mean? Are you saying the uncompressed source and uncompressed binary are the same size? Are you saying that there's a fixed ratio of source code size to binary size? Because I don't think either of those are true, and without them you don't seem to have a relevant point.

    3. Re:Download size question by IDkrysez · · Score: 1
      Ah yes, I had just come to that too. I my late-night confusion, it seems somehow unfortunate.

      The binaries are compressed too, and shouldn't the overall information in the binaries, accounting for the density-differential and compression, still be less? It just isn't...

      --
      Was it a bat I saw? Racecar. Stack cats. A man, a plan, a cat, a ham, a yak, a yam, a hat, a canal--Panama!
    4. Re:Download size question by IDkrysez · · Score: 1
      Across linux sources I've seen, binaries are less that source, uncompressed. So while it is obviously not a fixed ratio, the ratio of [uncompressed] source to binary is usually greater than 1, yah? ;)

      If it really isn't relevant, please elucidate...

      --
      Was it a bat I saw? Racecar. Stack cats. A man, a plan, a cat, a ham, a yak, a yam, a hat, a canal--Panama!
    5. Re:Download size question by lachlan76 · · Score: 1

      But because of the redundancy of the source code of not one, but hundreds/thousands of packages, the compression is much more efficient.

    6. Re:Download size question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But because of the redundancy of the source code of not one, but hundreds/thousands of packages, the compression is much more efficient.

      If they were compressed that way, maybe. But the SRPM ISOs are an uncompressed collection of individually compressed package sources so there's no cross-package gain.

    7. Re:Download size question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      OK, let's consider this mathematically. And to keep it simple, let's say that the ratio of source to binary is fixed:
      X = size of program source
      c = ratio of compiled binary size to source size
      a = compression ratio of source
      b = compression ratio of binary
      i.e.
      cX = size of binary
      aX = size of SRPM
      bcx = size of RPM
      and so this thread has gone
      "Why is SRPM smaller than RPM?" i.e. aX < bcX
      "Because source compresses more" i.e. a < b
      That's not proof though: a < b does not imply a < bc unless we know that c > 1. But as you said
      "ratio of [uncompressed] source to binary is usually greater than 1, yah?" i.e. 1/c > 1, i.e. c < 1
      So you can't actually deduce the result "SRPMs smaller than RPMs" from Lachlan76's "source compresses more".
    8. Re:Download size question by m50d · · Score: 1

      The sizes are usually around the same, so presumably they've done something to bloat the binaries. Perhaps lots of things are statically compiled, or they're unrolling/prelinking/etc. lots of things? Or just luck. It's usually pretty random which comes out bigger, at least IME.

      --
      I am trolling
  6. KDE 3.4 translations by magi · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I hope they'll wait for KDE 3.4.1. The .1 releases have traditionally been translation releases (unless something has changed recently).

    It's rather frustrating to do translations, and then notice that they are never packaged in some Linux distributions, because the packagers don't have patience to wait for the translation release. Other than English-speaking people use Linux too, you know.

    Well, probably most of the translations get in time for 3.4, so the problem isn't that big.

    1. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by Vo0k · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Honestly, I'm glad I learned English, comparing to translations.

      Sometimes the translations are okay or nearly okay. Sometimes they are terrible. And worst if you get used to "native" version and then when translation appears, keyboard shortcuts are remapped to match new words. I LOATHE when suddenly aumix stops responding to Q for Quit and I must read help to see that now it's K as "Koniec" (and not W for Wyjdz, Z for Zakoncz, O for Opusc which are synonyms).
      I feel thoroughly lost in "translated GIMP". Suddenly finding an option becomes tricky. "SOTA Chrome" becomes "Krysztal" while "Cristal" is being renamed to something yet different, and only by remembering the position in menu I'm able to guess where it is. Sure it's about "getting used to", but then some things are simply translated incorrectly and guessing their meaning in your native language is just impossible...

      Learn English. It pays.

      --
      Anagram("United States of America") == "Dine out, taste a Mac, fries"
    2. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by MaDeR · · Score: 2, Funny

      Damn, Poles are everywhere... I fear to open fridge. ;)

      --
      What modern Obelix would say today? Of course, "Those crazy Americans!".
    3. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by kiwibird · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Users: learn English. Translators: keep translating.
      Not just because of the importance of keeping languages alive (which is a controversial and "feely" issue no matter what), but because there'll always be users who don't have that much comprehension of English (and it's better to have some understanding of a program than none), and it'll expand the Linux user base. All of M$' programs are translated into my native language, why should free software be behind there? And users of free programs have the choice of using the original languages, whereas users of say Office buy a version in just one language. Keep translating...

    4. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by MrHanky · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Learning English is generally a good thing, but well translated software certainly has its place. The examples you mention show the opposite: remapping keys and translating proper names creates confusion, especially for the bilingual user.

      My impression, however, is that one reason why somewhat competent users don't like software in their native language is because they don't really see that the English words they are already used to are all metaphors, but this becomes painfully obvious -- and weird -- when they see it in their native language. But the metaphor can be important for understanding how the UI is supposed to work. A child learning both computer use and English as a foreign language at the same time might be better off learning the localized metaphor for Firefox's 'tabs' and the everyday meanings of the word 'tab' in English.

      Good translators can be hard to find, though. Especially if they are supposed to work for free.

    5. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by anpe · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I wish I had mod points. You're right, both sides are needed.
      Not just because of the importance of keeping languages alive
      I just read an article that correlated the use of a local language (as opposed to english mostly) with the vitality of the local research.
      That is, the more you use your own language for research the more your research field is "creative" in your country.

    6. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by swillden · · Score: 2, Interesting

      the more you use your own language for research the more your research field is "creative" in your country.

      Interesting, but I suspect the causality runs the other direction. That is, if the study of a given field is very active in a given country there is sufficient cross-pollination of ideas nationally to make international discourse less necessary, making local language publishing more attractive.

      --
      Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
    7. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by Linux_ho · · Score: 3, Funny

      Learn English. It pays.

      Are there a lot of people reading Slashdot through Babelfish or some other translation service?

      --
      include $sig;
      1;
    8. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So what you're saying is that Linux application translators effectively forgot Poland.

      The last person to forget Poland lost the U.S. Presidential election.

    9. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by cant_get_a_good_nick · · Score: 1

      I learn Z for Zywiec, damn good beer.
      Mmmmm, thermometer beer (it has one of those color sensors that change color based on temp).

      Yes, I am (part) Polish. I had Zywiec in Zakopane.

    10. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by Bananenrepublik · · Score: 1

      When exactly did the last Nobel prize go to France? This study sounds bogus.

    11. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by Baal+Sebub · · Score: 1
      Where's the point?

      It's gibberish to begin with.

      --
      120 chars are not enough for a signature. I have discovered a truly remarkable proof which this margin is too small to c
    12. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by Bananenrepublik · · Score: 1
      There are features in the English language which make it well-suited for the GUI interfaces of computers, but which at the same time make for traps which make it hard to translate. To name a few:
      • most nouns can also be used as verbs (think "file", the activity of "filing" [e.g. saving] as well as operations on "files" [e.g. file-relatedpreferences] fall under this word fairly naturally
      • most words are short "Edit" is "Datei" in German, "Options" is "Einstellungen", etc., meaning a less-cluttered interface
      • bad translations won't happen in the original language. If someone gives a menu a misleading or confusing name, a native speaker will hopefully clean it up, but by then the bad name might have already been translated.
      • translations can hardly be of better quality than the original
      • finally, the only versions of Windows that are (or have been, I haven't checked lately) available across the globe are the English language versions, and MS still hasn't figured out runtime-switching of languages. Research labs therefore often buy English-language versions of the software to make the transition easier for people travelling between research institutions in different countries

    13. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by anpe · · Score: 1

      Well, the field were France research is the most advanced is mathematics, and, as you know there is no Math Nobel prize.

      However, check the Fields Medal palmares, one of the highest distinctions in Maths, you'll see french people in 1994, 1998, 2002. And the price is given every four years.

    14. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by Bananenrepublik · · Score: 1

      This is incorrect. 1998 didn't have a French winner: Maxim Kontsevich is a Russian, working in France. Also, 2002 and 1994 seem to be the only years with French winners, but I may not have looked closely enough.

      Finally, this doesn't contradict my point: the French are very strongly concerned about use of the French language in research, not only officially, but also practically (I worked at the CNRS [national center for scientific research] for a time, so I know this from my own experience), and their research is far from the top. Not that Nobel prizes are necessarily a good measure of that, but feel free to show me evidence to the contrary.

    15. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by MrHanky · · Score: 1

      English might be better suited for GUI descriptions than some other languages, but I sort of disagree with your points 3 and 4. Of course, you're not going to have a bad translation when there is no such thing, but you can have a bad choice of metaphors, or mixed metaphors. Your first example can be used here: File is both a noun and a verb, so it would be more meaningful if we didn't discard the metaphor of the file when we save something. Saving is, in fact, the act of creating or managing the file, i.e. filing. Personally, I think it would be better, both linguistically and logically, to say that you file the document (or picture or whatever you're working on). But what do I know, I'm not a native English speaker.

      As for a translation being better than the original, think of it as the possibility of a C program being better (or worse) than the prototype programmed in Python. It's how well the expression works that matters, not the semantic similarity to the original. If my first example was sound (and I'm not sure it is), a good translator would fix it in the localized version. Of course, this didn't happen in Norwegian, and we "lagre" (= save, store) files instead of "arkivér", which would make more sense.

    16. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, metaphors...
      Now I get a CAM (Comp. aided manufacturing) program translated from German to English. And I see entry "Secure Tool".
      Now I'm perfectly sure this is something about attaching current tool in the spindle of the machine.
      Then I see "Secure relief". Probably servicing automated workpiece attachment devices?
      Then "secure curves". Errr, what? After a while, I groan.
      Yes, "Save" is definitely a metaphor.

    17. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by Citizen+of+Earth · · Score: 1

      I just read an article that correlated the use of a local language (as opposed to english mostly) with the vitality of the local research.

      Or maybe the local researchers are just independently re-inventing the same things as English-speakers elsewhere.

    18. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      i don't speak english, i speak default :-)

    19. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      thought you can just forget about us?

    20. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by magi · · Score: 1

      Honestly, I'm glad I learned English, comparing to translations.

      Don't generalize if your particular language has been translated badly. Quality depends entirely on the local group doing the translations. In many languages, the KDE and other translations are very good.

      If the quality is bad, give feedback to the translations, and better yet, start doing translations yourself. Soon you'll find out that translating is not so easy after all...

      KDE and other Linux translations may not be important for those who have learned English, they are essential for the rest of the human population. And yeah, those people are still relevant.

      Inconsistensies with shortcut keys are sometimes unavoidable. Usually the control keys, such as ctrl-Q, are NOT localized. Alt keys are, because they have to be a letter from the GUI string.

    21. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > Q for Quit and I must read help to see that now it's K as "Koniec" (and not W for Wyjdz, Z for Zakoncz, O for Opusc which are synonyms).

      I don't know what language these words are, but I *LOVE* its mindset. *4*! synonyms for "quit"? How many are there for bored-to-death-tired-to-a-grind-don't-talk-I-am sleeping? :-)

    22. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by anpe · · Score: 1

      I found the article (only an extract tough) here

    23. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      (actually these synonyms were corresponding to Exit, End and Leave)

      As for the other word, here you go...

      Wykonczony
      Padniety
      Zdechly
      upierdolony (robota,) [vulg]
      Ma dosc
      przepracowany [official]
      przytloczony [somewhat poetic]
      zajezdzony
      ujebany [vulg]

      But for the real strength of Polish, ask for list of synonyms for "fuck", "cock", "cunt", "bitch" etc.

    24. Re:KDE 3.4 translations by MaDeR · · Score: 1

      What 'us'?? I'm Pole, too. This is why I comment grandparent's post. Well, EOT 'cuse it is offtopic.

      --
      What modern Obelix would say today? Of course, "Those crazy Americans!".
  7. Re:GCC Version by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I don't know what you mean by that makefile making bad code thing, but gcc 4.0 sports a new optimization infrastructure. I have been experimenting with it since October, and I found it to be far superior to 3.x. Also, the compilations times are reduced somewhat.On the whole I'm quite impressed by the improvements, though I'm not sure I'd base an operating system on a compiler which is not released yet...

    Anyways, Gnome 2.10, Xen 2.0 and GCC 4.0 are quite enough reason for me to download FC4 Test 1 and try it out.

  8. Re:GCC Version by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    My makefiles make bad code on FC1

    Uh, so fix your makefiles? Luser error?

  9. IA-64 Support by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I am actually curious to see what this will do with the IA-64 arch. Not to mention what kind of performance increase you see in IA-64 with the 2.6 kernel. Anyone care to comment on anything they've witnessed?

    1. Re:IA-64 Support by codeguy007 · · Score: 0

      I can't afford to play with $20,000 dollar "science projects" as IBM called Itanium.

  10. Release notes here by julie-h · · Score: 0, Redundant
  11. Ubuntu too! by vasi · · Score: 1
    They've got full PPC support, I had much better luck with it than Yellow Dog, Gentoo or Debian. But when one distro doesn't work another usually will, yay for variety and forking.

    The (unofficial) PPC version of Fedora Core 3 unfortunately didn't work too well for me, so I'll be trying it again when FC4 final is released.

    The full list of PPC distributions: here

    --
    "Hey, who took the cork off my lunch?" -- W. C. Fields
  12. PPC Expectations? by nurb432 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Can i expect the PPC version to run ok on my G3 Bronze?

    What sort of stuff isnt going to work? ( yes, i did RTFA, didnt see what i was looking for )

    --
    ---- Booth was a patriot ----
    1. Re:PPC Expectations? by Average_Joe_Sixpack · · Score: 1

      Yellow Dog Linux uses Fedora Core. They list audio issues with the 2.6 kernel for that model G3. I can't imagine KDE being too snappy, Firefox would be a dog.

    2. Re:PPC Expectations? by nurb432 · · Score: 1

      Audio would be no big deal to me.

      I currently run KDE ( freebsd ) on a PII/400 thinkpad and it does fine, so the G3 shoudl be better then that..

      --
      ---- Booth was a patriot ----
    3. Re:PPC Expectations? by saintlupus · · Score: 1

      Audio works fine on my G3 bronze running Debian. The software is there, it's just a matter of how YDL or Fedora has things set up by default.

      That's one of the reasons I cling to this laptop; it's not the fastest, but everything from the sleep capability to the wireless to the audio works perfectly in Debian.

      --saint

  13. fedora 4 and filesystems by mdew · · Score: 1, Interesting

    can users choose Reiserfs or XFS when installing fedora 4?

    --
    http://www.fanboy.co.nz/adblock/
    1. Re:fedora 4 and filesystems by lbruno · · Score: 2, Informative

      try saying:

      linux xfs

      at the "boot:" prompt (ditto reiserfs)

    2. Re:fedora 4 and filesystems by alba7 · · Score: 3, Informative
      --
      Post tenebras lux. Post fenestras tux.
    3. Re:fedora 4 and filesystems by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't know about XFS, but installing Reiserfs for the boot and root partitions is likely to be maintained from Fedora Core 3. I've been running an all Reiserfs system for all test and release versions of FC3 (when installing, you boot from the first CD, type linux reiserfs, and the install in /boot and / will be Reiserfs. I suspect using XFS would be a similar process.

  14. Video4Linux 2 by cerberusss · · Score: 1
    It's a shame that the included GnomeMeeting only supports the first version of the video4linux interface.

    There are a few drivers (like sn9c102) for USB cameras that only support the v4l2 interface. And what's worse, the kernel will support your webcam and will correctly issue no error message; but GnomeMeeting will try to find the device and won't locate it without so much as a warning!

    --
    8 of 13 people found this answer helpful. Did you?
  15. Hope they get more bugs sorted out before release. by pklong · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Looking at the updates directory of core 3 there are gigs of updates in there. It didn't even install on my nVidia nForce system because of bugs in the SATA drivers in the 2.9 kernel. (It's fixed in 2.10 I believe.)

    Installing the nVidia drivers (because shock horror I wanted 3D) froze then system on boot because of the rhgb red hat graphical boot thingy. The switch to udev caught me out here. Luckily I figured out what was happening and sorted it.

    I also had weird sound corruption in some programs which I tracked down to arts. Turning the sound down in that sorted it but I can't find any kind of a config file, let alone a GUI application that sets a sound level which survives a reboot. I sorted it my adding an entry in rs.local.

    Also why on earth don't they compile NTFS reading into the Kernel. (Captive NTFS would also be nice as an option...)

    Sadly your average tech fiddler on the street would have given up with this pallava and installed Windows.

    XP Installation went without a hitch and worked perfectly first time. It can even play MP3's out of the box ;)

    So for all you Slashdotters out there who think a Linux install is easier than I Windows install, well it can be. Provided nothing goes wrong. Which is unlikely.

    --

    Philip

    Signatures are broken

  16. RHEL4 vs Fedora Core 4 for a home server by smartin · · Score: 1

    I'm due to update my home linux server from RedHat 9 and have been debating whether I should put core 4 on it when it comes out or RHEL 4. This machine does file serving, web serving, runs mysql for various small databases, etc.

    Is there any compelling reason to use one or the other for this type of machine?

    --
    The difference between Canada and the USA is that in Canada healthcare is a right and gun ownership is a privilege.
    1. Re:RHEL4 vs Fedora Core 4 for a home server by tux_deamon · · Score: 3, Informative

      If you don't mind re-installing your OS every 6-12 mos, go with FC. It's always going to have the latest features. If you're looking for something with about 5 years of official support go with RHEL or an RHEL clone. For the type of service you're describing, you're probably fine with the present capabilities for some time to come.

    2. Re:RHEL4 vs Fedora Core 4 for a home server by LnxAddct · · Score: 5, Informative

      Its important to note however that the 6-12 month reinstall cycle doesnt include a full format. Going from FC1 to FC2 certainly caused some minor problems for some folks, but since then I've seen very few complaints about being able to upgrade through yum and/or just inserting the CDs and updating. So in that regards its not too much different then a Service Pack in Windows world, except its a really really effective and useful service pack:) Also, Fedora legacy will support it for 1.5 years at a minimum and possibly more if the community sees interest in it. I'm looking really foward to this release, seems to have a ton of potential (although Core 5 seems like its going to be the big release of this year once Fedora Extras gets all figured out)
      Regards,
      Steve

    3. Re:RHEL4 vs Fedora Core 4 for a home server by LnxAddct · · Score: 1

      See my reply to the previous poster to your question Here. Personally, I've been very pleased using both RHEL and FC as servers for business and at home. If you'll be using this for critical stuff though go with RHEL and get the support if you can. Your list of requirements though isn't much and Fedora easily covers it all. My rule of thumb is usually: If its a profitable server, go with RHEL, otherwise go with FC.
      Regards,
      Steve

    4. Re:RHEL4 vs Fedora Core 4 for a home server by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      If you don't mind re-installing your OS every 6-12 mos

      False. You can go longer than that if you go with the Fedora Legacy project. It still doesn't buy you as much time as RHEL, but much longer than months.

    5. Re:RHEL4 vs Fedora Core 4 for a home server by TheOrquithVagrant · · Score: 1

      You don't need to reinstall; upgrading works, if you know what you're doing. My fileserver, currently running FC3, started out as a RH7.0 install, and has been upgraded from there to what it is now. The last bunch of upgrades have also been done remotely and "live", since the machine no longer has a graphics card in it. This is not something I recommend for newbies though; complete "distro-upgrades" with apt-rpm don't tend to be trouble-free. If you have the skills to work around the problems, it's quite doable, though. I tend to upgrade all my machines that way; lets me continue working while the entire distro-version changes underneath.

    6. Re:RHEL4 vs Fedora Core 4 for a home server by Illbay · · Score: 1

      I figured out (rather quickly) how to upgrade from FC2 to FC3 using YUM only. No CDs or DVDs were burned making this move. I can see why you might want to "reinstall" from time to time, but it really doesn't appear necessary. Oh, regarding your tagline: don't you feel rather silly now that we KNOW Saddam was developing WMDs? http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/13/international/mi ddleeast/13loot.html?8bl

      --
      Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.
    7. Re:RHEL4 vs Fedora Core 4 for a home server by stefanlasiewski · · Score: 1

      $179 is the miniumum price for a RHEL licence. The official server versions is $349. That is too expensive for my vision of a home-server, but might work for you. Of course, there are free alternatives which are 100% compatable with RHEL, such as CentOS.

      Also, Fedora has a very active user community. If you want to experiment with different packages, there are often RPMs which are better supported by the community then the regular source code. For RHEL, you usually need to build from the sourcecode, which just means that it may be harder to get support from your peers.

      --
      "Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
    8. Re:RHEL4 vs Fedora Core 4 for a home server by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      7 years of official support, actually.

      https://www.redhat.com/security/updates/errata/

  17. When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by z1d0v · · Score: 4, Interesting
    It seems that there are a lot of people starting to defend the use of the debian package for the easiness of dependencies treatment (and I'm not talking about debian folks like myself). So one might ask: will distros like Redhat/Fedora change the package manager in the future?

    Since I don't use a RPM-based distro for a long time, I also feel the urge to ask: how is the dependencies treated nowdays?

    1. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by davidkv · · Score: 4, Informative

      Dependencies are handled much the same way as with .debs. You can use apt, yum, up2date or red-carpet for automatic resolving/retreiving.

      I doubt that Red Hat will change to another package manager in the foreseeable future. If something needs to be implemented, they'll change the rpm application/behaviour (as has been done numerous times).

    2. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by bobsalt · · Score: 1

      I been using apt-get on fed since version1. I prefer it to yum. I started out using freshrpms apt-get, but have since migrated over to atrpms.net. (I believe they use the same reps?) very easy and fast to upgrade a new system.. wget http://download.atrpms.net/other/packages/fedora-3 -i386/atrpms/atrpms-kickstart-25-1.rhfc3.at.i386.r pm then type in apt-get update & apt-get dist-upgrade

    3. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by codeguy007 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Simple answer No definitely not. Though Synaptic is nice, apt cannot handle multilib dependencies like FC x86_64 provide. Yum is getting a graphical frontend (yumex) as well that though not working 100% is looking pretty good and in some ways is a lot nicer than Synaptic.

    4. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by Jagasian · · Score: 1

      So basically even though the RPM based distros were already using APT for RPM for years, Fedora decides to ditch it in favor of an inferior package manager Yum, and then they continue to update and improve Yum until it actually has some advantage (though tons of disadvantages still) over APT for RPM. It seems like it would have made a lot more sense to make APT for RPM official and simply add multilib support... as opposed to force everybody that was already using APT for RPM to switch to Yum which was slower and had less features.

    5. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by Ih8sG8s · · Score: 2, Insightful

      *.rpm or *.deb.

      Both of these things describe a specification for package file format. The file format specification determines the logistic layout and conventions used in the format of a package file, like header structure, byte boundaries, supported data types for given structure data, etc. The package format is purely data structuring, and actually has very little to do with packages.

      It is important for people to understand that a file format specification has no tangible effect on user experience. A lot of people are confusing tools with formats.

      Maybe it was a mistake for Redhat to call both their file format specification AND their userland tool RPM. RPM has never been a good user land tool insofar as features go. Apt if a great tool, as is yum, as are others I'm sure I have not used. Please realize, Apt, yum, rpm, all of them have nothing in common with the file format specifications, ecept that they follow specification when dealing with a file format as defined by the rpm, deb, or some other format specification.

      So you love Apt or yum. Great. Apt does not mean .deb. Apt can still do its normal great things using rpm formatted packages, so clearly the greatness comes from the tool, not the package specification.

      Personally, I have done a lot of (work)low level work with RPM packages. The specification is a good one, and well thought out. The documentation is horrible in my opinion, but the format is sound. Sound enough for the LSB.

      To answer your question, RPM package distributions will never change to deb. There is no reason to, and doing so would mean a break from the rediculously late and political LSB.

      If you mean when will RPM distributions start shipping with Apt, I don't know. You can use apt-for-rpm now in exactly the same way you would with deb files.

    6. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by pyros · · Score: 1

      Come down off your high horse. RH isn't forcing anybody to use anything. Their own tool, up2date, can handle RHN, yum, and apt repositories. Their adopted tool, yum, works pretty damn well. I think the only advantage that apt has is pinning, but so far the only help I've ever received from anybody on how to use it, on #debian, is "don't." Red Hat even hosts the Fedora Extras master repository, which contains apt. So park the whambulance and just use whatever you feel best suits your needs.

    7. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by juhaz · · Score: 1

      So one might ask: will distros like Redhat/Fedora change the package manager in the future?

      No. Because deb isn't superior to rpm there is no reason to change. Both can do few things that the other can't, but mostly offer equal functionality.

      Days of apt being the only capable automatic dependency handler are long past, and the only issue left with yum+rpm is basically not having quite as large official repository as debian.

    8. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by Coryoth · · Score: 1

      So basically even though the RPM based distros were already using APT for RPM for years, Fedora decides to ditch it in favor of an inferior package manager Yum, and then they continue to update and improve Yum until it actually has some advantage (though tons of disadvantages still) over APT for RPM.

      Come now, everyone knows Smart is the future of package management. Yum is clearly just filling in time until Smart becomes the standard (even on Debian).

      Jedidiah.

    9. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by Coryoth · · Score: 4, Interesting

      So you love Apt or yum. Great. Apt does not mean .deb. Apt can still do its normal great things using rpm formatted packages, so clearly the greatness comes from the tool, not the package specification.

      The fuure of package maangers, like Smart, make this even clearer. Smart is like apt (but has better dep resolution algorithms) except it supports pluggable backends - that means currently Smart supports .deb, .rpm, and even slackware .tgz. It can manage those from apt repositories, yum repositories, urpmi repositories, re-carpet channels, whatever. You can even do a mix and match between formats and repository types if you want (though that, of course, can get messy).

      The point is that package management and dependency solving are largely independent of package formats (as long as the format contains some dependency information). We can have a global package manager that works everywhere and doesn't care which package format it happens to be working with.

      Jedidiah.

    10. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's just a shame that yum really blows -- it blew when Red Hat started using it, and it still blows now. I mean for fuck's sake... it *still* can't work with dial up modems -- if your modem disconnects it will just sit there forever. It'll never restart, never time out... jsut sit there.

      And worse... Yum only *just* gained the ability to use reget... how very early 90s, FFS. It's a pile of shit.

    11. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by raver31 · · Score: 1

      Dependencies are handled extremely well under mandrake using urpmi. I have this PC here on a multi boot with mandrake, fedora core 3, windows 2000 and ubuntu hoary. Mandrake is probably the easiest one to upgrade, honestly, urpmi works better than apt-get, and gives no chance of breaking what is already there, the way apt-get can. OH and for Windows users looking at Mandrake.... yes, urpmi --auto-select will let you upgrade from Mandrake 9 to Mandrake 10, or 10.1 or 10.2 depending on what repositories you use, and this IS the equivilant of upgrading Windows 98 to Windows 2000 or Windows XP.... and you do NOT need and install disk, just urpmi --auto-select no probs

    12. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There is no RPM Dependency hell... every RPM I install on FC3 works perfectly

      although, I'm starting to use apt-get on FC3 more and more

    13. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by guacamole · · Score: 1

      .deb does not handle the depedencies automatically. It's just a package format. apt-get does and you can have apt-get, up2date, and similar tools running on top of rpm based distributions just fine. In fact, if I wasn't afraid to be murdered in my sleep, I'd say rpm is a better package manager for its ease of use and some features which seem to be either absent from dpkg or not properly documented the (like, something similar to rpm
      s -V, the verify mode).

    14. Re:When will RPM-based distros change to .deb? by wayland · · Score: 1

      rpm and apt are different kinds of tools.

      Imagine three classes of tools:

      Package manager: does stuff with packages on your system

      Repository manager: gets packages to your machine

      Dependency resolver: works with the above to figure out which packages to install

      rpm and dpkg (debian) are both Package Managers. apt, yum, up2date, and the like are repository managers + dependency resolvers in the one (which depend on the package managers). This irks me because by doing both, they are breaking the Unix tool rule of doing one thing, and doing it well.

      Disclaimer: I'm the developer of Arpmats (arpmats.sourceforge.net) which wants to use package managers and repo managers, but wants the dependency resolver to be optional.

  18. So.... by WindBourne · · Score: 4, Insightful

    With Linus now doing ALL of his work on the PPC, and that IBM is making a big move into Linux on PPC, do you think that it will see a massive investment in time? I do.

    --
    I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
    1. Re:So.... by goon+america · · Score: 2, Funny

      You forgot that the Xbox 2 is supposedly going to be PPC-based. That should spur some interest in PPC Linux!

    2. Re:So.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Linux works as a concept because it runs on commodity hardware. PPC does NOT fit that description. Ergo, PPC will remain a marginal factor in the Linux equation regardless of what Linus is running.

    3. Re:So.... by WindBourne · · Score: 1

      ppc is cheaper than x86 on mips/$. The only reason why x86 remains a big seller is because of MS. As MS loses its' monopoly (assuming that it does), the X86 will lose the #1 status.

      --
      I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
    4. Re:So.... by Agarax · · Score: 1

      Xbox 1 had a risc processor.
      nothing new

      --
      Remember folks, slashdot doesn't have a -1 "disagree" moderation!
    5. Re:So.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Really? Now, does that number pertain to the just the CPU itsself, or to the total system cost, and where are you getting that from? I'm sceptical...

    6. Re:So.... by WindBourne · · Score: 1

      I have seen several studies in the past that show that ppc (and most of the risc chips) are mips/dollars cheaper than Intel. I was just googling, but I have been up 25 hours, so I am not finding any that go either way (but a 400MHz PPC chip with PCI,networking, etc is less than US$28 (less than 1 watt of power to boot); a 1.4GHz is less than US$36).

      As to system costs, ppc uses the PCI bus. Therefore it has the same costs as the intel arch.

      --
      I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
    7. Re:So.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Considering that MIP means Millions of Instructions per Second, and that RISC is Reduced Instruction Set Computer, it stands to reason that the fewer the instructions you have, the faster you are able to execute them.

      Now how that translates into getting something done is a whole other matter and why MIPS rating is pretty worthless to compare between different architectures. eg. One CPU has 3x the MIPS rating of another, but takes 5 instructions to perform the same task that the other does in one..

      And I'm not even going to get into the CISC/RISC debate because the whole classification has been dead and meaningless for the last decade or so.

    8. Re:So.... by T-Ranger · · Score: 1

      Bzzt. Wrong. Thanks for playing.

      The XBox's main processor is a Celeron 733.

    9. Re:So.... by guacamole · · Score: 1

      Nonsense. Yes, less users and developers use Linux on PPC. But you also need to remember that the hardware on non-x86 platforms is a lot more uniform than what you have in the x86 arena. Therefore, driver availability and support for PPC platform does not necessarily need to depend on a large userbase.

  19. The Big Question... by CastrTroy · · Score: 1, Interesting

    The big question is, does it support MP3 out of the box (off the CD?). This was one of the major things that turned me away. I know it's easy to fix, but that isn't the point. It's 2005. They'd better have MP3 support.

    --

    Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
    1. Re:The Big Question... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      That's hardly the big question now is it?

    2. Re:The Big Question... by TravisWatkins · · Score: 1

      Has the patent expired yet?

      --

      "But I'm still right here, giving blood and keeping faith. And I'm still right here."
    3. Re:The Big Question... by BenjyD · · Score: 1

      Isn't the fact that it's 2005 in "the age of the software patent" the problem?

    4. Re:The Big Question... by k98sven · · Score: 4, Informative

      The big question is, does it support MP3 out of the box (off the CD?).

      No, it does not, and will not as long as the patent is in force.

      Red Hat would end up being liable to pay Fraunhofer licensing for RHEL, and possibly for FC4 too.

      Are you going to pay for that license? No? Then quit bitching about Red Hat and put that energy towards the real problem here: Software patents.

    5. Re:The Big Question... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's 2005. They'd better have MP3 support.

      Actually, the patents covering MP3 don't expire for at least another decade.

    6. Re:The Big Question... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If that's "the big question" for you, then please...go back to Windows now,or OS X is another viable alternative.

    7. Re:The Big Question... by kosmosik · · Score: 1

      No, it does and probably will not support MP3, DVD decss and other stuff... It is due this stuff is non compatible with GPL/non-free (at least in US where Red Hat resides). And Fedora as given away for free is free (as in speech) itself. Use Ogg instead.

    8. Re:The Big Question... by CastrTroy · · Score: 1

      Well, how come every other linux distro doesn't have this problem. AFAIK, FC (maybe redhat) is the only distro that doesn't support MP3 out of the box. Doesn't the patent license only cover commercial use of the CODEC? Isn't personal use licensed for free? How come so many other companies give away free mp3 codecs for free?

      --

      Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
    9. Re:The Big Question... by CastrTroy · · Score: 1

      No, actually I'll just stick with Mandrake, which is still Linux, and has still found a way to include MP3.

      --

      Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
    10. Re:The Big Question... by IamTheRealMike · · Score: 1

      It's actually because all the (good) MP3 codecs are GPLd, and distributing them is technically a violation of the terms of the GPL. If there was a good X11/BSD licensed codec for Linux it'd be distributed. At least, this is what I've been told.

    11. Re:The Big Question... by mshiltonj · · Score: 1

      parent_mod++

    12. Re:The Big Question... by Naikrovek · · Score: 2, Informative

      distributing GPL software is not against the GPL... if it were the GPL would have died long ago.

      its not a GPL issue, its a software patent issue. even if your code is GPL, if what your software does is covered by someone else's patent, you're in patent violation. if you distribute patent-infringing software, you make yourself liable.

      that is why redhat won't include mp3 support with their distros. GOSH!

    13. Re:The Big Question... by k98sven · · Score: 4, Informative

      Well, how come every other linux distro doesn't have this problem. AFAIK, FC (maybe redhat) is the only distro that doesn't support MP3 out of the box. Doesn't the patent license only cover commercial use of the CODEC? Isn't personal use licensed for free? How come so many other companies give away free mp3 codecs for free?

      No, the patent license covers ALL use. However, Fraunhofer says that they won't enforce it against free software. There is nothing written on that, and it is not legally binding.

      SuSE and Mandrake think that's enough of a guarantee for them and obviously are willing to take that risk. Red Hat decided differently. (Which is reasonable; they're the biggest vendor, and thus the most likely target, not to mention that they're based in the litigation-happy USA.)

    14. Re:The Big Question... by slashzero · · Score: 1

      If you're using mp3s, you must be a pirate! die pirate!

    15. Re:The Big Question... by Pros_n_Cons · · Score: 1

      No, actually I'll just stick with Mandrake, which is still Linux, and has still found a way to include MP3.

      Yes, that is a great reason to choose a whole distro. You don't have to yum install xmms-mp3. You can't run a command so you will switch distro's.

      --

      -- "of course thats just my opinion, I could be wrong." --Dennis Miller
    16. Re:The Big Question... by CastrTroy · · Score: 0, Troll

      If Fraunhofer decided to get enforce it's rights, and take a patent royal, what percentage of the $0, the amount I pay for Fedora Core, do you suppose they should get? 10%, 100%, 1000000%? How do you declare patent royalties on something a company gives away for free?

      --

      Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
    17. Re:The Big Question... by Maffy · · Score: 1

      IANAL but...

      Frauenhofer is not required to accept royalties in return for patent licensing. The damages would be decided by a judge. Furthermore, I understand that, since Red Hat is clearly aware that MP3 violates Frauenhofer's patents, the damages are tripled.

      Matt

    18. Re:The Big Question... by the_maddman · · Score: 1

      Patent licenses don't have to be a percentage. The patent owner can demand a flat fee. Fraunhofer could declare that RH would have to pay $10 for every copy of FC downloaded, and most likely make it stick. I just wish there was a single codec for all apps on our linux boxes so it was easier to fix on my own.

    19. Re:The Big Question... by LnxAddct · · Score: 1

      Actually, if you ever let someone else get a copy of any of your mp3's, you'd be liable for $50,000 for using the mp3 codec. Companies can buy mass licensing for their customers for a couple hundred thousand dollars if they see the need. Red Hat's software has always consisted of pure open source. The nice thing about using FC is that you have no worries about patents, everything is open. They abide by this policy more strictly then Debian. Since my switch to Fedora, I've switched all my music to Ogg and only buy ogg compatible players. Yes it required some minor initial efforts, but its worth it now and I'm very pleased with Red Hat's choice.
      Regards,
      Steve

    20. Re:The Big Question... by LnxAddct · · Score: 1

      Fine, stick with Mandrake and support software patents. Mandrake is taking a huge legal risk here, while also not fully supporting open soruce efforts. Switch all of your music to Ogg, its really not hard and there are tons of really good players out there for it.Or just go to fedorafaq.org and with two seconds of reading you'll see how easy it is to add mp3 and dvd support. I however no longer choose to even install mp3 support, I won't support software patents and I like my system to only consist of free software. Red Hat abides by its free software only policy in the most strict sense.
      Regards,
      Steve

    21. Re:The Big Question... by k98sven · · Score: 1

      If Fraunhofer decided to get enforce it's rights, and take a patent royal, what percentage of the $0, the amount I pay for Fedora Core, do you suppose they should get? 10%, 100%, 1000000%? How do you declare patent royalties on something a company gives away for free?

      You're just making stuff up as you go along?

      By that rationale, you won't be liable to pay any compensation for distributing copyrighted films and music either, if you weren't charging for it.

      And people would be free to break the GPL without damages too, since most GPL software is not sold for a profit either.

      Licensing royalties don't have to be percentages, either with patents or copyrights. They don't even have to be money; the GPL works by demanding your changes to be put under the same license. There's such a thing as contractual freedom. You can make any agreement you want, as long as you don't violate the law.

      The way this works, if you haven't charged money, is that the Court decides on an amount corresponding to what they think the thing would be worth commercially (even if you didn't sell it) and makes an estimate of what the commercial loss to the rights-holder would be. And then they usually add a punitive fine on top of that, since you broke the law.

    22. Re:The Big Question... by MSG · · Score: 1

      distributing GPL software is not against the GPL.

      Of course not. To clarify: The GPL states that no restrictions to user's rights to use and distribute the software for any purpose, beyond those present in the GPL license, may be added. It states that if you can not comply with this requirement due to patents, for instance, then you can not distribute the software.

      Due to that clause, mp3 codecs can not be distributed under the terms of the GPL. The license specifically forbids it. Therefore, Red Hat has no valid license to distribute most of the mp3 software that's available.

      The situation would be different if the software were BSD licensed. That license would not forbid distribution with patent restrictions, and Red Hat would at least be able to decide whether or not they want to risk distributing a patent encumbered piece of software. However, where GPLd software is concerned, liability doesn't even come into the picture.

    23. Re:The Big Question... by Boolio · · Score: 1

      Step 1. Download apt and install: http://apt.freshrpms.net/ Step 2. apt-get update Step 3. apt-get install xmms-mp3 Step 4. Listen to mp3s with xmms Step 5. Say that was really difficult and complain some more. -==-

    24. Re:The Big Question... by cfalcon · · Score: 1

      The big question is, does it break the law and open RedHat up to a massive lawsuit out of the box (off the CD?). This was one of the major things that turned me away. I know it's easy to fix, but that isn't the point. It's 2005. They'd better break the law and open RedHat up to a massive lawsuit.

  20. SATA Drives by Nexum · · Score: 1

    Does it install properly on all SATA drives now?!

    --

    This sig has been deprecated.
    1. Re:SATA Drives by codeguy007 · · Score: 1, Informative

      Sure. The drives have never been the issue. The SATA chipsets on the other hand are a different story.

    2. Re:SATA Drives by Monkey · · Score: 1

      I have to say, FC3 with its 2.6 kernel supported SATA a lot better than the commercial RHEL3 with its 2.4 stuff. In one case I ended up having to go with FC3 over RHEL3 for this reason.
      Fortunately RHEL4 released last month fixed this issue.

    3. Re:SATA Drives by DragoonAK · · Score: 1

      I've read that people have had problems with SATA drives where the same chipset and driver worked for other drives. NCQ capability is the likely culprit here.

    4. Re:SATA Drives by codeguy007 · · Score: 1

      Any problems like that are hardly FC related. If FC doesn't have proper support for NCQ drives on specific chipsets it's a libata issue if it's related software at all. Thus it would affect any distro running the same kernel.

    5. Re:SATA Drives by DragoonAK · · Score: 1

      FC related or not, it's something someone trying to use SATA drives on Linux might want to know.

  21. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Err... I thought this was a test release? Test releases aren't traditionally known for their stability and ease of use.

  22. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by _randy_64 · · Score: 2, Informative

    Of course they will, that's why this is a test version. FC3 had (I think) three test releases before the final released version.

    > Also why on earth don't they compile NTFS reading
    > into the Kernel. (Captive NTFS would also be nice
    > as an option...)

    Just like with MP3 playing, I believe there are licensing/patent issues with NTFS that Fedora/RedHat just avoids by not distributing those functions.

    > Sadly your average tech fiddler on the street
    > would have given up with this pallava and
    > installed Windows.

    Test releases are really not for the "average tech fiddler on the street". If you're not ready to commit a system for testing purposes, then you/they really should stick with FC3 for now. A normal or finished user-based distro (e.g. SUSE, FC3, Mandrake..) would generally not have such problems with the install. FC4 will be the same way when it's done and not in testing.

    --
    I mod down all the "free iPod"-sig losers.
  23. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by davidkv · · Score: 5, Informative

    You can find answers to most of (all?) your problems here:
    http://www.fedorafaq.org

    Shipping NTFS and MP3 is encumbered with legal problems, that's why they're not included by default. Google can tell you that within seconds.

  24. Why should they? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    "It seems that there are a lot of people starting to defend the use of the debian package for the easiness of dependencies treatment"

    It seems there are a lot of people who don't know what they are talking about. debs don't resolve dependencies, apt does, as does yum, yast, urpm for rpm distros. And guess what, apt is also available for rpm distros, so what exactly is your point here?

  25. Frong Qwestion. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The big question is, why aren't you using vorbis instead?

    1. Re:Frong Qwestion. by pklong · · Score: 1

      Maybe he uses a portable MP3 player, not many support vorbis and the ones that do are not cheap.

      --

      Philip

      Signatures are broken

  26. It is illegal to include by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    And it being 2005 doesn't change that.

  27. YDL by losman · · Score: 0

    First thing is that YDL has been a great solution on the PPC platform. I have had an WGS 8550, G3 Server and a G3 Yossmite running YDL 3 and YDL 4 for a good while and it is great! Support and community rocks as well.

    Regarding a "free" distribution, YDL is free. If you want to pay for YDL.net you get access to releases earlier along with other great features. If you want installation support alone you can by the product with it. If you want to just buy the CDs you can as well. And if you want to just download the ISOs for free you can.

    I paid for my CDs without support to help chip to a fablous company!

    --
    Q: I am short, useless and provide no value. What am I? A: a sig
  28. Please tell me why by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

    I don't understand why they haven't make a major change to the taskbar (the task panel). With the release of GNome 2.10, I eagerly downloaded to be disappointed by see it almost the same.

    The task panel is used very often by users. I has to allow users to use the mouse to resize it. It has to keep the icon the same (user preference on this), not to expand them. A dedicated area for open windows and folders' icons and a dedicated area for quicklaunch items. Yes, you can say it should work just like windows That's not to say it copies windows, but that's how I think most logical to the users.

    So, why they haven't change this? Probably the most used item on a GUI desktop.

    1. Re:Please tell me why by Spudds · · Score: 1

      I'm a little puzzled by your post.

      The panels are very configurable. You can add multiple panels if you want, a drop down to switch between windows and a "window selector" that works like Microsoft Windows in that it shows you what is open and allows you to click to bring those windows up and switch between them.
      You don't need a "dedicated" area for quick launch icons because you can put them where ever you want in the panel, so just put them in a "dedicated" area.

      From reading your post it simply sounds like you're used to using windows and want it to act and feel like windows, and hey, more power to ya. Thing is: with a little configuring, you can make a panel do exactly that; look and feel like windows.
      It's possible that I misunderstood, but I think perhaps a little time in learning about or messing with configuring panels might alleviate a lot of your concerns.

      From my personal perspective, with the advent of multiple and virtual desktops and such configurable workspaces allowed in gnome, I never need to use a drop-down list or window selectors to find a window, I just keep them open and orgainze my work by desktops. My panel is mainly for launch icons and monitoring apps.

    2. Re:Please tell me why by slashzero · · Score: 1

      Yes, a panel gets kinda useless once you get a handle on the beauty of virtual desktops.

      Linux' beauty is in that it is developed by users of the interface so you get some inavative and useful features (although virt desktops have been around for a while)

      I personally am trying out ratpoison to see where the experimental ui's are going. It takes the ui into an interesting turn. It keeps windows in maximized frames. So that nothing is hidden in less you want it hidden. Take a look.

    3. Re:Please tell me why by 1veedo · · Score: 1

      I actually like the panel in linux (FC3: KDE specifically) better then the borring Windows task bar. It is much mroe customizable: give it a right click and add some things. Custom menues, quick buttons, Sound Mixer (3D Depth and Center make music in Linux awsome), etc. In GNOME I especially like the eyes. It looks more like a work envirement then KDE and can even display the current weather. If you want the panel to look like Windows, I'm sure you can acomplish this. More power to you if you want your settings to look plain ;P

      --
      -- 1veedo
  29. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by m50d · · Score: 1

    That doesn't match my experiences at all. Mandrake installation goes without a hitch and plays mp3s fine (I don't think it will encode without an external lame.so or something, but playing is no problem). Drivers were better than on windows (I thought XP had no SATA support at all?). And kmix (the default "sound mixer" program, like you get when you click the speaker in the system tray, just like in windows) restores sound levels at kde login, plus most distros will save them when you shut down and restore when you boot up.

    --
    I am trolling
  30. Re: yum (Was: Feedback on Fedora?) by pp · · Score: 2, Interesting

    yum should be quite a bit faster in fc4test1, they've recently added a new xml parser (cElementTree) for the metadata which whips libxml2 ass (in fact, it's not much slower than reading plaintext in :))

  31. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by codeguy007 · · Score: 1

    The worst thing about the XP install is you need a SATA driver floppy to install to the sata drive. Most manufacturers ship the drivers on CD. Considering Microsoft said the floppy should be in the 1998 Computer, why in the world do they still require one for installing in 2005.

  32. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by pklong · · Score: 1

    Err, no the problem is with arts, quick search reveals (analog real-time synthesizer) not the sound system which works perfectly. arts seems to have it's own sound level.

    --

    Philip

    Signatures are broken

  33. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by codeguy007 · · Score: 1

    THat should be shouldn't be in the 1998 Computer.

  34. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Err... I thought this was a test release? Test releases aren't traditionally known for their stability and ease of use.

    Read it again. He's telling us about his problems with core 3, which *is* released.

  35. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by pklong · · Score: 1

    I didn't need one. Mind you my windows install CD had service pack 2, maybe that make sa difference.

    --

    Philip

    Signatures are broken

  36. When will all disros change to a ports-tree? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    In light of the debate surrounding package management systems (yum, apt, synaptic, .rpm, .deb, etc, etc) I have only the following. I am honestly asking myself "Why can't there be a community-maintained heirarchy of Makefiles containing retrieval URLs, compiler flags, configuration directives and configuration scripts to compile and install the extracted source code by users simply typing 'make install'??" This is (obviously) the same question asked by the BSD developers yonks ago. That's all you need. A heirarchy of Makefiles and a client-side program (cvsup) to occassionally update those Makefiles. Ports are reinstalled, deinstalled according to the POLS ... 'make deinstall && make reinstall' if you still don't get it. These Makefiles even contain the extraction/compilation/installation procedures for the inferior package management systems .rpm and .deb. To me, as a FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD user, it means so much to have such a reliable software management system. Say I want Firefox; I can just go:
    # cd /usr/ports/www/firefox
    # make install
    Done. I can't understand why there needs to be this reimplementation (with associated interoperability issues) of a problem we have already solved. Like the rest of the BSD community, I haven't bothered to pipe up on /. about this. Until now.

    1. Re:When will all disros change to a ports-tree? by Ih8sG8s · · Score: 1

      First let me say that I love BSD ports. I think it works though because of the central management of the system layout, and distribution. I can't see several companies wanting to adhere to the requirements in order for this to work for Linux.

      The Linux Standard Base was started YEARS ago as a bunch of stakeholders trying to define a standard layout of a base system, in order to give application developers (read commercial companies) a way of creating one package that would install on all distributions. It's a politically charged thing as you can imagine. To this date, it isn't complete, and I don't think anyone has it on the front burner.

      Ports works with BSD because there is one distribution, centrally controlled. I can't even imagine the complexity of maintaining makefiles for every package, for every Linux distribution centrally. total nightmare I think.

    2. Re:When will all disros change to a ports-tree? by dirty · · Score: 1

      And on Fedora I can just type:

      yum install firefox

      On Debian its something like (I'm not a Debian user):

      apt-get install firefox

      Both will resolve and install all dependencies for you and will finish a lot faster since they don't need to compile, just download and install binary packages. It's all about personal preference.

      Besides, I think Gentoo has a BSD style ports tree.

      --

      -matt
    3. Re:When will all disros change to a ports-tree? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't think my fellow AC meant a central repository for all linux distros but rather one for each linux distro.
      Not a bad idea considering there is still the functionality of 'pkg_add' on top of such a ports-tree.

    4. Re:When will all disros change to a ports-tree? by rpdillon · · Score: 1

      Some distros really *liked* ports, though (as you do) and used it just for thier distro, like Gentoo. It is no accident Gentoo's package manager is called "portage". =)

    5. Re:When will all disros change to a ports-tree? by Ih8sG8s · · Score: 1

      Bah I guess I may have misread. Oh well. In any case, what would individual distributions gain from switching?

      I know ports works well, but I'm less convinced about portage. Last time I looked it was a bit of a mess in that there were far too many hands in the pot. Ports works so well bcause it is so tightly controlled. I don't believe portage is.

      I also find that this type of package management or build management dictates development methodology.

      Moving to this would be like starting from scratch, especially for those distributions that are based on another (like say Mandrake and similar).

      I guess I just wonder what the gain would be from going this way for a Linux distribution. How do source packages differ?

    6. Re:When will all disros change to a ports-tree? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If one wanted the "fast" way to add a software package on a BSD:
      # pkg_add -r firefox
      This too requires no compilation.

  37. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I didn't need one. Mind you my windows install CD had service pack 2, maybe that make sa difference.

    No, most new motherboard-integrated SATAs, particularly the RAID ones, still need drivers on top of an XP SP2 CD. IIRC it isn't possible to install on a SATA drive on a pre-SP2 XP install CD anyway - one of the guys here spent a day banging his head against it on a mixed SATA/parallel system.

    However, if you've got one of those then chances are your BIOS will handle USB storage. You could probably throw the drivers on a USB device, or you can pick up a USB floppy drive quite cheaply.

  38. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by codeguy007 · · Score: 1

    Cool. I haven't seen an Windows XP with SP2 disk yet.

  39. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by pklong · · Score: 1

    Err no. These are my Core 3 experiences. I expect Core 4 will at least recognise my SATA drives, but I doubt any of the other problems will be fixed.

    --

    Philip

    Signatures are broken

  40. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by wild_berry · · Score: 1

    http://www6.tomshardware.com/howto/20040908/ -- Make your own single-disk installer.

  41. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by networkz · · Score: 1

    Check this out for SP2 on Windows XP install CD: linky

  42. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by pklong · · Score: 1

    Woa thats a good resource. rhgb really needs to be fixed though, just freezing up is inexcusable.

    It wouldn't help me with my biggest problem, with the hard disk though!

    It's a pitty you don't get instructions like that as part of the release notes.

    I don't see why the kernel NTFS driver would have legal problems (captive-ntfs is another matter.) It can only read but it's better than nothing. There is suppost to be limited write support available if you write to existing files and dn't change their size, but I'm not sure I would trust it.

    --

    Philip

    Signatures are broken

  43. FC4 v Ubuntu Hoary by lewiz · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Not a comparison but a series of questions. I installed FC3 prior to Hoary as it specifically had an Internationalization Project. I very quickly discovered that it did, but getting foreign input working (say Japanese) without running the whole thing in Japanese was not straightforward.

    This didn't seem to be lost on just me either, many people seem to have written it off as a result.

    Hoary wasn't instant but the process of installing the input method and adding two lines to my .gnomerc was very straightforward and almost certainly faster (better?) than sorting the same on FC3.

    So, I'm curious to know how FC4 handles:

    Foreign input,
    Wireless support (Atheros/Madwifi),
    Alternative packages (I know this should be straightforward but I had a lot of trouble trying to install the madwifi stuff without updating the rest of my system to those packages in that repository).

    In fact, now that I remember... FC3's up2date was slow and very buggy. Has this been fixed?

    1. Re:FC4 v Ubuntu Hoary by Slack3r78 · · Score: 1

      I can't speak for the other issues, but installing Atheros support on Ubuntu is fairly simple compared to other distributions I've used.

      I'm doing this from memory, but the basic process should be open Synaptic, go to the "Base System (Restricted)" category, and then install the restricted modules for whichever kernel you're using.

      The reason they're distributed in restricted is because MadWifi uses a closed source HAL since it's a software controlled-radio and would run the risk of running foul of the FCC and FAA otherwise. (Apparently something to do with concerns about being able to overlap ATC radar by fiddling with the frequencies in software. Never delved into it too much though, so that could be a vast over-simplification).

      HTH. :-)

    2. Re:FC4 v Ubuntu Hoary by Jman314 · · Score: 1

      As to foreign input, Fedora is supposed to be moving to IIIMF. You may want to check out the Internationalization Project

  44. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by imemyself · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I don't think the legal issues can be that serious because pretty much every other distribution out there supports MP3 with their audio packages, and quite a few support NTFS. I think its more of RH not wanting to admit their wrong.

    Regardless I'll go happily along with SuSE. It has new packages, great hardware detection and is usable as an everyday desktop.

    --
    Every time you post an article on Slashdot, I kill a server. Think of the servers!
  45. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I think its more of RH not wanting to admit their wrong.

    Or maybe RH's lawyers are better, or more cautious. After all, what's the point of getting your asses sued off over a side project you give away for free?

  46. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I couild just as easily compare a failed XP install to a successful Linux one and reach the same (invalid) conclusion.

    But that's almost the point. When'd you last see a failed XP install?

  47. It's Microsoft spyware by thisisauniqueid · · Score: 1

    It's all the spyware that Microsoft inserted while you weren't looking. It's a ploy by Microsoft to buy Novell through their involvement with Mono, and infiltrate the CVS repositories that Novell share with RedHat. One small step for Microsoft, one giant leap for Big Brother.

  48. Compilation? by thisisauniqueid · · Score: 1

    Or maybe it's debugging symbols? Or just GCC 4.0?

  49. Don't release by gr8_phk · · Score: 1

    So KDE shouldn't do an official release until the translations are done. Obviously you consider translations a critical feature, and I'd agree with you. There should be some translations of 3.4.0 available from day one (IMHO). Perhaps with more to follow, but certainly with the same version number for a major release. Don't blame a distro for putting in the latest "official" release.

  50. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by pklong · · Score: 2, Insightful

    "Your ignorance is astounding and complete" Thank you for the kind complement. You must be a really fun guy to be around.

    "If these kinds of issues make them give up then they aren't tech fiddlers. Just common every day dime a dozen users who like to think they're tech inclinced. ie point and click monkeys."

    Maybe they just have a life and have better things to do that spend hours and hours trawling the Internet downloading source, searching bug lists etc. for really simple basic problems that shouldn't exist anyway. When your installer tells you you don't have any hard disks you have a problem.

    When I was installing it 2.10 wasn't out and the bug wasn't resolved. I had to revert to the deprecated driver to get it working. Later I had to edit the Kernel source, which got the SATA_NV driver working (now that would really really scare a point and click monkey) before finally 2.10 came out, which worked!

    Point and click monkeys would also give up when their system just freezes up on booting as with my rhgb problem. At least with doze there is safe mode, and you can even revert to the 'last known good configuration' which I have seen get a system working again (once, I know it can leave your system in a bad way though)

    "Next time you post make sure you have at least an hour of experience beyond the trained monkey stage and try to at least pretend you have half a clue. I doubt you'll fool anyone though."

    Not even worth bothering to reply to this one.

    --

    Philip

    Signatures are broken

  51. How about FLAC by gr8_phk · · Score: 1
    FC3 allowed me to rip CDs to FLAC, only to discover there was no player included that could handle the format. No patents either, just a glaring inconsistency.

    BTW, I assume the patent issue is also why there isn't a mpeg video player, but I do understand that.

    1. Re:How about FLAC by tuffy · · Score: 1
      FC3 allowed me to rip CDs to FLAC, only to discover there was no player included that could handle the format.

      FC3 includes the xmms-flac plugin which adds FLAC playing support to xmms. If you've compiled xmms by hand (for mp3 support), just move the single .so file in xmms-flac to your xmms input plugins directory and it'll work just fine.

      --

      Ita erat quando hic adveni.

  52. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    SATA drivers in the 2.9 kernel. (It's fixed in 2.10 I believe.)
    <smartass>Dude!?! What happened to the 2.7 development track or the 2.8 release track?!? Man, Linus must REALLY be working his ass off.</smartass>
  53. Xen 2.0 built in = performance hit? by thisisauniqueid · · Score: 1

    Xen 2.0 requires the OS to run in ring 1. This results in a few % performance decrease in most tasks. Is this enabled by default? Or is it some commandline option?

    1. Re:Xen 2.0 built in = performance hit? by SirTalon42 · · Score: 1

      I believe only Xen's 'guest' OS runs in ring 1, not the host OS.

    2. Re:Xen 2.0 built in = performance hit? by j-pimp · · Score: 1

      Last time I looked at the rawhide rpms there were seperate regular and xen kernel rpms. I've been playing with XEN for a while on a dual PIII 450 and coldfusion runs fine on it.

      --
      --- Justin Dearing http://www.justaprogrammer.net/ We're just programmers.
  54. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by Mr.+Frilly · · Score: 1

    You can't really blame Fedora for the NVidia versus rhgb problem. I stumbled into that one to, and it's just one of the hits you gotta take for running an external binary kernel module on your system.

    I gotta assume the audio stuff will be fixed, it seemed like it was just conflicts between ALSA and gstreamer.

  55. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    SATA drivers in the 2.9 kernel. (It's fixed in 2.10 I believe.)

    Wow, where are these 2.9 and 2.10 kernels? That's beyond bleeding edge!

  56. Bug-free Linux distributions by barrkel · · Score: 1

    Are there any Linux distributions which specialize in modern, up to date, bug-free, non-beta, only >1.0 software?

    I've played around with dozens of distributions, only to be turned off them by discovering various half-baked flaky apps mixed in with more polished apps. In other words, I should never see a core dump more than (say) once a month, while trying out *all* the programs in the distro.

    I'm looking for a distro with consistently high QC, in terms of feature completeness and bug-free implementation. Who should I be going with?

    1. Re:Bug-free Linux distributions by tilleyrw · · Score: 2, Interesting

      For a stable Linux distribution, you should experiment with Debian.

      • New programs first enter Debian testing. Be careful using this as there may be unknown errors.
      • After becoming more stable, packages move into Debian unstable. This is a fairly solid set of packages but unknown problems may exist.
      • After more testing and declaration of stability, packages move to Debian stable. This distribution is slightly outdated, but extremely stable.

      I run Debian unstable as my desktop and can count the number of problems I've had in the past year with my hands behind my back (i.e., none).

      The best feature of Debian is the way is the fabled system update feature: apt. This simple tool allows you to update all packages on your system with one simple command; "apt-get update;apt-get upgrade". This command updates the database of available packages and then upgrades all packages on the system.

      I won't even touch on how this simple tool can be extended via rules to only update certain packages, packages from a certain source, packages for a certain bit of software (i.e. the KDE desktop), etc.

      If you've never used Debian, a bit of time spent learning the various features would be time well used. I've used Corel Linux, Mandrake, Red Hat, and when I tried Debian I knew I had found my Final Distro. No more "RPM-Hell" for me!

      Thank you, Bob

      --
      This post encoded with ROT26. If you can read it, you've violated the DMCA. Handcuffs please, sergeant.
    2. Re:Bug-free Linux distributions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The best feature of Debian is the way is the fabled system update feature: apt.

      But everyone has one of these nowadays. Fedora has "yum update".

    3. Re:Bug-free Linux distributions by tilleyrw · · Score: 2, Interesting

      No. Plain and simple. No.

      Yum is a hack for RPMs. At their base, their very format invites dependency problems. Red Hat has simply studied this problem and found a hack that deals with most problems.

      The Debian format, .deb, was designed to overcome the perceived problems with .rpm. It achieves this with stunning success.

      --
      This post encoded with ROT26. If you can read it, you've violated the DMCA. Handcuffs please, sergeant.
    4. Re:Bug-free Linux distributions by pyros · · Score: 1
      Yum is a hack for RPMs. At their base, their very format invites dependency problems. Red Hat has simply studied this problem and found a hack that deals with most problems.

      Care to elaborate?

    5. Re:Bug-free Linux distributions by barrkel · · Score: 1

      For a stable Linux distribution, you should experiment with Debian.

      I do have some recent version of Debian (R3, I think) on 7 CDs, although I had difficulty trying to get the installer to install all packages. There were some issues, I don't recall them now, it was several months ago.

      The best feature of Debian is the way is the fabled system update feature: apt.

      None of my Linux systems have ever been connected to the Internet, seeing as I don't have Internet access at home.

      This is the reason I'm looking for single stable quality distro to experiment with: something I can play with without finding out I have to upgrade X to Y in order to try out feature y, but in order to get Y I must download Z, A & B, while B requires C & D, and C requires ... etc. You get the idea. When your system doesn't have Internet access it isn't clear what to download at work to bring home and install. Invariably I end up with some package missing, and eventually I just give up.

    6. Re:Bug-free Linux distributions by CPUGuy · · Score: 1

      When you install a deb, it goes out and gets any of the dependencies that you may need, RPM makes you go and find them yourself... which really isn't all that bad now, but back in the day, it was a PITA.

    7. Re:Bug-free Linux distributions by SirTalon42 · · Score: 1

      APT runs on Fedora.

      How come no one will _EVER_ say real reasons why Deb is better than the 'evil' RPM? You say 'dependency problems' but on all the computers I've installed Fedora/RH on I've never had a problem with dependencies.

    8. Re:Bug-free Linux distributions by pyros · · Score: 4, Informative
      When you install a deb, it goes out and gets any of the dependencies that you may need, RPM makes you go and find them yourself... which really isn't all that bad now, but back in the day, it was a PITA.

      You're comparing a dependency resolver (apt) to a package format (RPM). The only things you can compare are DEB vs RPM (formats), dpkg vs rpm (single package installation/removal tools), and apt vs yum/up2date (dependency resolvers included with a standard install of debian and fedora, resp.). Fedora also has apt included in the official Fedora Extras repo on download.fedora.redhat.com.

      I want to hear features of the DPKG format absent in the RPM format which make the job of dependency resolvers easier.

    9. Re:Bug-free Linux distributions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They don't mention APT/yum for fedora because they want people to think you have to use Debian, the pure as virgin snow OS if you really want divine peice of mind. Basically they're uninformed nuts...

    10. Re:Bug-free Linux distributions by Maffy · · Score: 1

      I think your ordering of stable, testing and unstable is wrong. Stable is more stable than testing, which is more stable than unstable as this page describes.

      If you've run unstable for a year with no problems, that's pretty good!

      I used to run testing/unstable but switched to FC3 a few months ago (just for a change). I don't find one much better than the other, though.

      Matt

    11. Re:Bug-free Linux distributions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      I want to hear features of the DPKG format absent in the RPM format which make the job of dependency resolvers easier.

      Unrelated, but I have found all operations on .debs and the local .deb database to be much faster than anything to do with rpms via apt,yum etc.

    12. Re:Bug-free Linux distributions by Mishura · · Score: 1

      Get a copy of SuSE 9.3 Pro when it comes out. I've used SuSE over the years and it usually comes with most every concievable type of software you need, all on about 5-CDs or a DVD. I usually never have to go and download extra software unless I want something that is much more uncommon.

      Plus, YaST and SuSE's slick desktop (KDE) is a great selling point.

    13. Re:Bug-free Linux distributions by Teflik · · Score: 1
      The best feature of Debian is the way is the fabled system update feature: apt. This simple tool allows you to update all packages on your system with one simple command; "apt-get update;apt-get upgrade". This command updates the database of available packages and then upgrades all packages on the system.

      On FC, you can update all packages on your system with one simple command: "up2date -uf". This command upgrades all the available packages on the system.

      It has worked flawlessly, out-of-the-box, on any Fedora system I've installed in the past year or so.

      No more "RPM-Hell" for me!

      Me neither. That's one of the reasons why Fedora is so cool.
  57. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by pklong · · Score: 1

    I can blame rhgb for freezing up just because it can't start an X server. If it just failed and booting continued I wouldn't be complaining.

    --

    Philip

    Signatures are broken

  58. Install it now on your PC with no worries: QEMU! by Jagasian · · Score: 2, Informative

    Windows and Linux users can install FC4 test1 on their PC right now without any worry by using the PC emulator QEMU, the free and opensource vmware! Personally, I am already using FC3, and I want to make sure that I like FC4 before I switch. I also want to help find any bugs and report them during the test releases, so that they can be fixed before FC4 goes gold.

  59. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by pklong · · Score: 1

    OK so I forgot the 6, get over it

    --

    Philip

    Signatures are broken

  60. DNS Resolve Issue by flatass · · Score: 1

    I hope they did something to fix the DNS resoulution issue that was shipping with the latset FC3 release.

    I installed FC3 a month ago, hoping to replace my XP installation. (only distro that will work on my abit/raid mobo easily) however, after a day of searching for an answer to a simple DNS issue, i could not get it fixed.

    As we all know, its small things like this that keep the average user from making the plunge.

    1. Re:DNS Resolve Issue by Monkey · · Score: 1

      Interesting. I thought I was the only one who was having that problem because my installation was screwy. Once in a while on my FC3 desktop the resolver will refuse to look up certain addresses for no apparent reason.

    2. Re:DNS Resolve Issue by hey · · Score: 1

      Well, what's the problem?
      I use FC3 and DNS requires resolve OK for me.

    3. Re:DNS Resolve Issue by flatass · · Score: 1

      There is a 4-7 second delay in receiveing the DNS response. I have searched several fedora forums and tried all the suggestions, to no avail. One was to disable IPV6 support, which also netted no results.

    4. Re:DNS Resolve Issue by hey · · Score: 1

      Is it possible your primary DNS server was/is dead?

    5. Re:DNS Resolve Issue by flatass · · Score: 1

      I do appreciate the concern, but it was a duel boot system, and i compared the DNS info on both windows and FC3, and they both matched, and windows did not have the problem. I disabled IPV6, made sure my resolv.conf file was correct, and my roouter does not suply DNS services, it goes direct to my ISP.

    6. Re:DNS Resolve Issue by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Don't know what you are talking about. There were no issues with DNS in FC3. Haven't been any DNS issues for years. Perhaps you should talk to BillG (your employer) about posting to /. instead of buying ad time like respectable software companies.

    7. Re:DNS Resolve Issue by rngadam · · Score: 1

      Interesting... I'm having the same problem at work with Debian Sarge. Most of the time, it seems to resolve ok but once in a while a query is sent to the DNS server, times out because of no response and 5 seconds later falls back to the the next DNS server. I've confirmed with Ethereal that the request is sent ok but no packet is received in the other direction.

  61. Stop Griping About Short Release Cycles by theManInTheYellowHat · · Score: 2, Insightful

    By now everyone should understand what Fedora is all about. It is not a production distro, it is not meant for anything but getting the new stuff working and stable FOR a production release. Thusly the releases are going to quick and should not necessarily be an easy upgrade. The fact that you can upgrade from release to relaase if you don't break anything yourself with yum IS impressive, and requires extrodanary effort from the team.

    Strong Work Fedora Crew!!! Very wonderful effort.

    1. Re:Stop Griping About Short Release Cycles by burns210 · · Score: 1

      If yum supported the feature to in-place upgrade distros (FC2 -> FC3, etc) without anything more than a single command, then I wouldn't mind in the slightest. But the upgrade cycle for Fedora is too awkward at the moment to enjoy a 6 month cycle.

  62. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by pklong · · Score: 1

    I just popped out in my Delorian and got them on nano inch disk

    --

    Philip

    Signatures are broken

  63. Isn't fedora for suckers? by ylikone · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I mean, why would anybody want to run an OS which is just a test platform for the real, non-free product? I mean, the days of redhat being the obvious number one choice for servers is gone in my opinion... I personally wouldn't think of letting FC getting anywhere near my servers. And why would I want to pay for RHE when I can just install a great and stable product like Debian or Slackware? I don't need RH support or their upgrade hassles and I'm sure as hell not going to pay for them.

    /sorry if this sounds like a troll, but I'm serious

    --
    Meh.
    1. Re:Isn't fedora for suckers? by toolshed7 · · Score: 1

      "I personally wouldn't think of letting FC getting anywhere near my servers."

      I am still pissed at Porshe for selling me a car I could not take four wheeling, even though it says in the manual, that this car is geared toward highways only. Screw them.....ahhhh.

      Dont try to eat soup with a fork.

      --


      Deserving got nothing to do with it.....shuffle
    2. Re:Isn't fedora for suckers? by ylikone · · Score: 1

      What you implying with this? That Fedora wasn't meant to be run on servers?

      --
      Meh.
    3. Re:Isn't fedora for suckers? by Bert690 · · Score: 1
      'cause it works really well?

      Does for me, anyway.

    4. Re:Isn't fedora for suckers? by LnxAddct · · Score: 2, Informative

      Actually, yes it was. And it is run on many hosting companies as a choice of operating system. I run it on many servers and it is the most stable OS I've used to date. I only have one debian server left running and that is only because it has a very high uptime and I'd hate to reboot it :) Don't make judgements about Fedora without extensively using it. And if you do test it, don't use a test release, use a stable release. Just keep an open mind. I've tried at least 15 or 16 different distriubtions pretty extensivly and I've been by far most pleased with the Fedora series. More so then the older Red Hat line, and signifcantly more pleased then with Suse and Mandrake.
      Regards,
      steve

    5. Re:Isn't fedora for suckers? by juhaz · · Score: 2, Informative

      I mean, why would anybody want to run an OS which is just a test platform for the real, non-free product?

      If it were JUST a test platform for the real, non-free product, you're right, nobody would want to run it. But since it isn't "just" but "also", I fail to see the relevance here.

      You're right in that FC isn't particularly good choice for servers if updating every year or so is too often, but it is a good and quite stable desktop OS with up to date software and well integrated GNOME desktop. Should I happen to help in testing, that's because it will make FC a better desktop too, not just RHEL. If they happen to make some money out of what is basically supported-for-longer-time version of the same product, I see nothing wrong with that, quite contrary, since it helps them continue giving quite a few gtk, gnome and gcc hackers a day job and thus vastly help development, and whatever else they may be currently funding, it's a GOOD thing.

      Bitching about that is just as nuts as going ballistic because Xandros or Lindows benefits from your usage of Debian, so it's basically "just a testing platform" for real, "non-free" product.

    6. Re:Isn't fedora for suckers? by LnxAddct · · Score: 1

      Sorry for replying twice, but this may be of interest to you: Netcraft shows that Fedora is by far the fastest growing server OS, growing 122% in 6 months.
      Regards,
      Steve

    7. Re:Isn't fedora for suckers? by toolshed7 · · Score: 1

      I was implying that RHEL is for servers. Fedora is their test bed. That does not mean that FC will not work just fine as server. I am sure it will run about anything you want and just as stable. I have not had any complains. However the docs say Fedora is for basically beta release and you should treat as such, instead of trolling, like the people who complain about cell phones not being phones anymore but PDAs. I just hate it went people make obvious comments or just say stuff without thinking. I think Fedora is kickass, works great for me. As far as one choice being gone, I think that to is not correct. From techinical stand point, it never was a choice. RHEL is great thing in my opinon the turnover is lot lower.

      --


      Deserving got nothing to do with it.....shuffle
  64. Correct me if I'm wrong, but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...wasn't Core supposed to have just three releases? IOW, Fedora Core 1, 2, and 3? The idea was to stabalize the "core" components (hence the name), and then to move on to bigger and better things. So shouldn't this be something like Fedora Desktop 1 or whatever?

    1. Re:Correct me if I'm wrong, but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You're wrong. RedHat's ultimate goal is to make the non-Enterprise releases look as unstable and rushed as possible, in order to scare businesses into buying RHEL (or Windows Server..)

  65. Of course it is released by AppyPappy · · Score: 0, Redundant

    I just burned a whole set of Core 3 CD's.

    I burned 9 tons of info onto a box and it looks nekkid as a picked bird. Fedora is the antiMandrake.

    --

    If you aren't part of the solution, there is good money to be made prolonging the problem

  66. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by Maffy · · Score: 1

    A normal or finished user-based distro (e.g. SUSE, FC3, Mandrake..)

    I wouldn't include any FC release in a list of "finished" distributions. As I understand it, the main point of FC is that you get a nice, free, pretty cutting-edge distribution and Red Hat get a lot of free testing. If you want something to work out of the box on a wide range of hardware, you are a lot safer with something like SUSE or Mandrake.

    Having said that, I use FC (3, at the moment, but will probably upgrade to 4 at some stage) and have installed it on a number of machines with no problems.

    Matt

  67. Heise reports Mono has been dropped, true? by egghat · · Score: 1

    Yesterday Heise had a stroy about the new Fedore beta and they mentioned, that Mono had been dropped from Fedora Core due fears regarding patent infringments. Read the translated news here.
    The part that matters ist this:

    "That contains however also the free NET implementation mono, which is probably not taken up to Fedora from fear of patent claims on the part of Microsoft."

    which means sth like this:

    Suse however contains the free NET implementation mono, which is probably not included into Fedora due to fear of patent claims on the part of Microsoft.

    Anyone has more insight?

    Bye egghat.

    --
    -- "As a human being I claim the right to be widely inconsistent", John Peel
    1. Re:Heise reports Mono has been dropped, true? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't see mono SRPMs in the lastest set, but then I don't see them in core 1, 2 or 3 either.

      I'm not impressed if they leave mono out just for that :-/

    2. Re:Heise reports Mono has been dropped, true? by DragoonAK · · Score: 1

      I don't think Fedora has ever included Mono. That said, the Mono group has made a Fedora repo so it's fairly easy to install.

      They're not going to include Mono until the patent issues are completely clear.

  68. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by CPUGuy · · Score: 1

    I just broke down and installed a floppy drive on my system, it comes in handy once in awhile.

  69. Slashdot in french! by ghislain_leblanc · · Score: 3, Funny

    - Immaginez un tas de loups bioniques de ça!
    - Nathalie Portman pétrifiée avec du gruau dans ses pantalons;
    - http://www.SexeAvecUneChèvre.cx
    - 1. Quelque chose de bête;
    - 2. ???
    - 3. Profits! (ceci est en fait bilingue!)

  70. What to change server to? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I started using Red Hat on my home server about five years ago. It's been a pretty reliable distro. But given the facts that I'm frugal (read cheap), that Red Hat no longer has inexpensive support options, and that individual Fedora package upgrades have, at times, been less than felicitous for me, I've been thinking of switching.

    I switched my home desktop machine to Ubuntu (from FC3) about six months ago and have been extraordinarily happy with it (BTW - Note to Red Hat: After using Ubuntu for a while you start noticing how clunky BlueCurve actually looks. Try to be a little more crisp), but given that it is not necessarily a server-oriented solution, I'm somewhat hesitant to put it on my server. In general, I've found the Ubuntu system to give me *no* problems with package upgrades and seems to be amazingly solid.

    So, my question is what people would reccommend for a good server distribution for me. I'm not really interested in huge amounts of eye candy on the server (I do most of my admin via SSH) and, in fact, a server set up that didn't need a bunch of craptactular GUI stuff to be loaded would be just fine (GUI's are for desktops, not servers). But I would like a distro that's well enough supported to have have relatively frequent binary patches for new kernel versions and that has a relatively simple upgrade mechanism. I really don't want to take the Gentoo or LFS route (I'd like to actually use the server as a server, not a compilation engine). In short, I'm loking for a quick and easy, well supported, minimalist server distro. Right now, I'm about ready to roll my own using Debian as a base, but without much more than a kernel and the few server packages I want, but if anyone has done this already, I'd sure like to know about it. So, any favorites out there?

  71. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by cowbutt · · Score: 1
    I don't think the legal issues can be that serious because pretty much every other distribution out there supports MP3 with their audio packages, and quite a few support NTFS. I think its more of RH not wanting to admit their wrong.

    Say you're someone who feels "Linux" infringes your "Intellectual Property" Rights. Who would you sue? If you don't pick Red Hat (or Sun or IBM, if you can find a way of getting them on the hook), you need to step down from the board.

    Red Hat know they're #1 (or #3, at least) target, and so respond by being extra-cautious.

  72. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by juhaz · · Score: 1

    I don't see why the kernel NTFS driver would have legal problems

    Patents.

    I agree that RH Legal can sometimes seem bit to be bit overcareful, but as the saying goes, better safe than sorry...

    Be as it may, ntfs (and mp3, and other things that are "questionable" but not outright illegal) support is in rpm.livna.org, so it's just a matter of adding one repository and yumming away.

  73. Does anyone actually use this distro? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    How can people use this crap?

    The package manager is the slowest damn thing on the planet. Something about RPM, I don't know, but holy crap is it slow. Resolving dependancies my ass.

    Get a new distro people! *

    * Or hey Fedora developer farktards, maybe switch to a decent packaging system?! .deb maybe?

    1. Re:Does anyone actually use this distro? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      * Or hey Fedora developer farktards, maybe switch to a decent packaging system?! .deb maybe?

      Or hey .deb fucktards, implement multilib dependencies for split 32/64-bit installs! Can't switch if it don't work.

  74. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I just broke down and installed a floppy drive on my system, it comes in handy once in awhile.

    Yeah, absolutely - they're like $10 if that. But if you've with a whole room of machines (like we're accumulating here) then a USB floppy does the job. As does a loose floppy drive and a screwdriver.

  75. Sweet by martin_b1sh0p · · Score: 1

    Maybe my sound will start working again with FC4. It worked fine with FC3 and then one day after I had done several up2dates I rebooted and I haven't had sound since.

    1. Re:Sweet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Try looking here: https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-list/2005-J anuary/msg03432.html

  76. only the editors by _randy_64 · · Score: 1

    That's why we see so many dupes - they read their submissions after they Babelfish them, so no two look alike!

    --
    I mod down all the "free iPod"-sig losers.
  77. How's the torrent going? by krunchyfrog · · Score: 1
    So, was it a good idea to post the .torrent link on /.?

    I can't download it yet cuz my home connection is down.

    --
    printf($randomline(sigs.txt) \n "-- "$randomline(authors.txt));
    -- myself
    1. Re:How's the torrent going? by jroysdon · · Score: 1

      Uhm, the more folks downloading off torrent also means more folks uploading. With bittorrent, more is better.

  78. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by m50d · · Score: 1

    OK, fine (I've had my share of problems with both arts and alsa) but kmix, the kde volume tool, still saves and restores sound levels.

    --
    I am trolling
  79. Jeez by p4ul13 · · Score: 0
    Can't somebody take the time to add a torrent link to big files for a change!?!?

    Oh wait.... sorry

    --
    Paul Lenhart writes words!
  80. Re:GCC Version by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This is not always "luser" error. Fedora (RedHat, et al) do so much stuff in a non-standard way that it's not even funny. This tends to break stuff and you need special conditions just for RedHat/RPM systems.

    Screw that. They should work to the official standards.

  81. Did you really mean AMD64/EM64T? by AHumbleOpinion · · Score: 1

    Did you really mean AMD64/EM64T? AMD's current and Intel's upcoming 64-bit extension of IA-32? IA-64 is regrettably something completely different, Itanium.

  82. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by kosmosik · · Score: 1

    > Looking at the updates directory of core 3
    > there are gigs of updates in there.

    So? After clean install is like 200MB download for common system (when you do something like install every package it will be more of course) - this is something unusual? They actually are fixing things so there are updates. Duh.

    As you obviously need to compare to XP - with XP you *need* (yes, you certainly need to do it) download like 200MB service pack.

    Also keep in mind that XP is bare system (yeah useless WMP, MSIE, MSOE, Wordpad, Sol), installed Fedora is fully equiped workstation for lots of activities.

    So it is a draw here.

    0:0

    > It didn't even install on my nVidia nForce
    > system because of bugs in the SATA drivers in
    > the 2.9 kernel. (It's fixed in 2.10 I believe.)

    Well it is hard to judge here because I don't understand you quite well - next time you write about some imaginary bug in kernel 2.9 (hint: current kernel is 2.6) please also post URL to Bugzilla entry and if you don't find such entry - open one for you. How you wish to get things fixed if nobody knows about them?

    As for me I've just installed contrib RPM packages with nvidia driver and it worked without any further tweaking needet (but I've tweaked it anyway - I like to tweak).

    Also a draw here since no arguments were given.

    0:0

    > Installing the nVidia drivers (because shock
    > horror I wanted 3D) froze then system on boot
    > because of the rhgb red hat graphical boot
    > thingy.

    I haven't noticed that. But that may happen - nvidia module conflicts with vesafb sometimes, but that is stated in README. Also I will put a draw here. My answer will be "I've installed Windows as default and in 5 seconds it was compromised by some worm from Internet" - like I should know about it. :)

    0:0 still...

    > The switch to udev caught me out here.

    udev is actually very nice if you manage to get how it works. :)

    (...)

    > I also had weird sound corruption in some
    > programs which I tracked down to arts.

    Well arts sucks. :)

    > Turning the sound down in that sorted it but I
    > can't find any kind of a config file, let alone
    > a GUI application that sets a sound level which
    > survives a reboot. I sorted it my adding an
    > entry in rs.local.

    Hmm. Well I don't know, my Fedora does store sound mixer state on shutdown.

    > Also why on earth don't they compile NTFS
    > reading into the Kernel. (Captive NTFS would
    > also be nice as an option...)

    Well this is due to legal problems with NTFS. I belive in US it is not compatible with GPL (due to patents or smth.) so it is not free (like in speech). Fedora is distributed for free (as in beer) also RH belives in free/openess so they won't distribute and base their distro on non-free stuff.

    But it is fairly easy to get NTFS support in FC3. Try google around it.

    > Sadly your average tech fiddler on the street
    > would have given up with this pallava and
    > installed Windows.

    Well. No. I consider myself an average tech fiddler. And considering situations like yours - f.e. if I would somehow get unsupported (by Linux) audio card I would rather buy new supported one than use Windows. :)

    And it is not about zealotry that I say "Linux is the best, Windoze suxxors". Nothing like that. I just like running Linux - it suits me. Also I like to be free which Linux offer me. Probably Windows is better in some ways but I would not sacrifice my freedom for it... It is what it all is about - freedom.

    > XP Installation went without a hitch and worked
    > perfectly first time.

    Oh! Here I would give 1 point to Linux. Man Windows installer sucks ass... I know it is suitable to do home system install on one computer. But this installer can't do anything. F.e. it cannot do part

  83. No stable personal RedHat distro?! ...went Debian by mrflash818 · · Score: 1

    I _was_ a loyal RedHat personal distro purchaser (purchased every copy because I wanted to give them my financial support). Started with version 4, and kept using them to version 9.

    I wanted a stable Linux distro to use as my workstastation, surf the web, do my programming/experimenting with Java, C/C++, Postgres, etc., etc....

    Once they made the business decision to stop selling/packing/distributing a stable personal distribution version I had a dilemma.

    So, after lots of research... finally made the tough call, and got Debian 3.0r4.

    Oh man! Love it!

    On the same hardware box (old Athlon 700, 384Mb RAM, 15Gb IDE hard drive) as what I ran RH9 on, it seems quite snappy and RAM friendly.

    So, a sincere "thank you" for RedHat to for:

    1. Having a good personal distrobution for versions four to nine.

    2. Discontinuing selling "personal" distributions, as then I would never have met and switched Debian.

    Me

    --
    Uh, Linux geek since 1999.
  84. Re:Freedom Research (was: KDE 3.4 translations) by kiwibird · · Score: 1

    I'd go careful with generalizing from one example though... there are an incredible amount of factors (fiscal, political, cultural etc.) that contribute to a country having something as vague as "top research" - or "creative research", for that matter.

  85. FYI - PPC Disc1 ISO is currently corrupt by r0d3nt · · Score: 1

    Can't get Disc1 .iso to mount in OS X or work in a NFS install. Pulled the corrupted Disc1 .iso down from bittorrent and the fedora site. Downloading the DVD .iso using bittorent right now...

    --
    You are not root, go away.
  86. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by Davoid · · Score: 1

    You are asking Red Hat / Fedora Core engineers to anticipate the loading of a proprietary driver that they have no control over?

    I agree that it would be better if rhgb just failed and continued booting.

    Or Nvidia could have modified their installer so that the correct links are made in /etc/udev/devices. Personally, I think it is more Nvidias fault than FCs. Fortunately all of this was in the Release Notes for FC3 (or linked from it). I know this because I never ran into that problem on my systems where I use Nvidia drivers.

    -DU-

    --
    "Don't sweat the technique."
  87. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by CPUGuy · · Score: 1

    It's just such a pain to have to wait for it to access the floppy, and then wait to read/write to it. I find it so wierd that 3.5in drives never got any faster until years later, after CD-Rs, with Super-Disks, which never even caught on.

  88. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by DragoonAK · · Score: 1


    Installing the nVidia drivers (because shock horror I wanted 3D) froze then system on boot because of the rhgb red hat graphical boot thingy. The switch to udev caught me out here. Luckily I figured out what was happening and sorted it.


    Realize that this is partly Fedora's fault and partly Nvidia's fault. Their latest releases are a lot more udev friendly though - fc4t1 with all nvidia patches hasn't had any Nvidia problems yet, and it just worked.

  89. Warning Warning! And some tips by DragoonAK · · Score: 1

    Anyone who downloads this expecting stability is fooling themselves - this is basically the development tree or rawhide packaged up.

    That said, here's some installation notes.

    1) Mediacheck doesn't seem to work. At least I haven't seen anyone who can get a PASS for the DVD or CD isos. I've booted directly from a checked iso and still FAILed.

    2) Despite what you tell it, the installer will install grub on your MBR, not on a partition.

    3) Firstboot doesn't work on first boot. This is fixed in rawhide by installing gnome-python2-gnomevfs, which also fixes the system-config-* utils.

    4) The packaged GDM eats CPU. "yum update gdm" before logging in through GDM or regret it.

    Gnome 2.10 has some nice improvements, but nothing amazing. Unless you're willing to do a lot of testing, don't bother. That said, the only thing really stopping me from using this instead of FC3 is a lack of other repos - FreshRPMS, Extras for FC4 - and a sata_sil regression for my SATA drive always hanging.

    1. Re:Warning Warning! And some tips by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You could always wait another six weeks, RH will probably have FC5 ready to test. Six weeks after that FC6 will be ready.... Isn't this getting a little tedious?. I went back to SuSe from FC3, there where to many updates with FC. Fedora is a bit like Jennifer Lopez.. Beautiful, but tedious and hard work, and is ready for a new version after six weeks.
      Have fun and stay FREE...
      Ellyll.. sadly labeled an Anonymous Coward... Strange we never met.

  90. RTFP by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    XBOX2 != XBOX

  91. Fedora NTFS rpms by sbszine · · Score: 1

    NTFS on Linux has no legal problems. It's all reverse-engineered using only a hex editor (i.e. without the use of copyrighted code or patened algorithms), and Red Hat is the only distro not to include it by default.

    You can get NTFS RPMs fro the latest Fedora here.

    --

    Vino, gyno, and techno -Bruce Sterling

  92. Re:Hope they get more bugs sorted out before relea by pklong · · Score: 1

    Late reply I know, but here we go.

    First point: Service Pack 2.

    Service Pack two was available on many magazine coverdisks soon after it came out, so there is no need to download 200mb at all. Updates since have been quite small, I can't remember how small but certainly only a few megabytes. Now I purchased my XP for real money. Shocking concept I know for the average visitor here, but the genuine OEM disk purchased with my machine came with service pack 2 already on it. So there was no need to download it at all.

    Thank god Fedora comes with packages, because if I had to download it all it simply wouldn't be an option for me on dialup. I dread to think of the hassle involved in downloading all the different components required for a system. I would kill for setup.exe software installation ease on linux, installer package size be damned.

    The is plenty of software available for Windows that will bring it up to the same level of functionality as Fedora. Some of it is even free and the same as you will find on Linux (Fedora, OpenOffice etc.). Guess what, it's even easier to install it.

    Understand that I have no problem with Open Source Software, in fact I prefer it. I am merely pointing out the difficiencies in some of the attitudes towards the poor bod who actually ends up using it and in one particular product, Fedora itself.

    3 Points to Windows.

    3:0

    Second Point: SATA problems

    OK so I forgot to put in the .6, so shoot me. Some responses on here have just been shooting me down for that minor brain fade. This shows the attitude problem some Slashdotters have clearly. Rather than just correct me (as you have done), some piss taking allowed, ridicule the poster for a minor error in an attempt to make them look silly and not challenge them about the point they were trying to make. I am not a machine, sometimes I make still errors, get over it. Not that I expect better on Slashdot mind you :)

    You wanted bugzilla entries, try here and here. Not a lot that would help the average user. You shouldn't need to be a programmer to install an operating system anyway. Infact not many answers at all, just silently fixed in 2.6.10. Please don't assume I haven't already posted it to Bugzilla next time.

    Argument: Fedora won't even install, XP has no problems and didn't even need a driver disk. Pretty simple eh?

    1 Point to Windows

    1:0 - Ah can't be bothered with the silly scoring any more.

    rhgb: It happens without fail. My main problem is with it freezing and not just giving up and allowing you to boot in text mode. Also why haven't they added a non rhgb startup option to the bootloader anyway if it is unreliable.

    We all know Microsoft and a secure computer don't sit well together. But they are working on it at last. I've had no problems at all - yet - cross fingers sacrifice first born. Mind you I do keep the patches up to date, use the firewall and keep my virus checker up to date.

    My installation media came with service pack two and my virus checker was installed before connnecting to the internet. Some common sense is required here however...

    Mind you I'd rather clean a virus attack off a doze box than a linux box. God knows what would get changed, what back doors would be left around. If linux ever catches up with windows, I would be really supprised if it didn't suffer the same level of attacks, virus infections etc.

    udev may be nice, but my first priority is a system that works. If it isn't broke then don't fix it ;). Actually thats not quite true, if you are going to break it in a way that will affect an awfull lot of users at least disp

    --

    Philip

    Signatures are broken