Looking Forward, Ubuntu Linux 6.06
SilentBob4 writes to tell us that Mad Penguin has an interesting look at the upcoming version of Ubuntu. From the article: "All in all, Ubuntu 6.06 is gearing up to be quite an impressive release. Granted, I saw some bugs during my stay on the distribution, but can I really complain? It's not a full release, so it deserves some breathing room. Considering some of the horribly authored software I've looked at over the years, I feel that Ubuntu in pre-release form is more stable than other distros when they reach final release status. It's not quite in the league of Slackware and Red Hat/Fedora in that respect yet, but it's surely getting there in a hurry. As I said before, it smoked Fedora Core 5 performance-wise, so in that department it's solidly ahead."
digged and slashdotted on the same day.
Features
* Linux kernel 2.6.15-18 PREEMPT
* X.org 7.0
* gcc 4.0.3/glibc 2.3.6
* GNOME 2.13.94
* Firefox 1.5.0.1 web browser
* Evolution 2.5.92 email/groupware client
* OpenOffice 2.0.2 productivity suite
* Gaim 1.5.0 instant messenger
* Gimp 2.2.10 image editor
I haven't been keeping up with the 4.0 branch of GCC, but is 4.0.3 really stable enough for the average home user?
It's Dapper Drake. (translation: Good-looking male duck.)
I found this book helpful: Linux Desktop Pocket Guide
It covers Ubuntu, Fedora Core, Gentoo, SuSe, and Madriva. It should have enough information to get what you need done.
Have you tried searching the Ubuntu forums?
1) No iTunes clone. amaroK - yeeeeech...
You can always apt-get banshee. Banshee allows you to manage your ipod, and the daapd plugin (which is also in the apt repositories) allows you access iTunes music shares, as well as share your own library with iTunes clients.
What's the ugliest part of your body? Some say your nose, some say your toes, but I think it's your mind. -Zappa
Get 6.06 here.
What's the ugliest part of your body? Some say your nose, some say your toes, but I think it's your mind. -Zappa
Fedora Core tends to walk a thin line between the two styles of releases, in that they'll frequently update packages to add new features, but they also test them at least a little before sending them out to the general public. I've been using Fedora Core on my work PC since FC3, and generally it's been rock-solid, despite the frequent updates. But some people seem to have had bad experiences with it, so YMMV.
TFA reviews Flight5. Ubuntu is now testing Flight6. You can find the daily build here.
Remember, it's still alpha.
All you need to do is install gstreamer-mad from either the universe or multiverse repositories. The package name should vary slighty from that, but those are the two key words, and a search in synaptic for "gstreamer" will bring it up. Once you've done that, you should be able to play mp3's just fine.
Here's the new link. :)
As you even said in your post, it's an alpha verison. I couldn't even install X.org on my system at around flight 4. If you're not prepared for major things to potentially break, don't run versions that are intended for testing.
I'm eager to try out the new Ubuntu when it comes out. Will we be able to upgrade to 6, or will we need to do a complete reinstall?
You know that wonderful "apt-get" program you like so much in Ubuntu?
apt-get has you covered:
1. Back up your "/etc/apt/sources.list" file. 2. Edit it with your text-editor of choice, changing all the spots where it says "breezy" to "dapper". 3. Update by typing "sudo apt-get update" and 4. upgrade by typing "sudo apt-get dist-upgrade". Wait for downloads, and all should be good. 4 steps (5 if you count the waiting) to the upgrade process.
"What do you think?" "I think 'What, do you think?!'"
Hey, I was in the same boat for a while. I never had the solid block of time to learn all of Linux, so I weaned myself in rather successfully by doing the following:
1) start by using win32 versions of some popular OSS for your daily or occasional tasks. You probably already use Firefox, but OpenOffice and the GIMP are good ones to put on a windows machine. Perhaps the best lessons for me at this stage were installing Apache, MySQL, and PHP, but go with whatever you use.
2) use them. Go through an upgrade or reconfiguration, and use them for your day-to-day tasks. Linux becomes a really quick thing to pick up if you're already comfortable with all the apps you'll be using. Seriously, if you have experience with all your apps, then it's just a matter of getting stuff installed and set up, and you're at near 100% productivity instead of having to learn how to format paragraphs in your word processor.
3) make your first install on a computer other than your main computer. If absolutely necessary, dual-boot your main computer, but getting set up on a secondary computer is useful for two reasons-- if something's not working correctly or you're in the middle figuring something out, it doesn't stop your day-to-day computing. Also, while you're working on one, you can be browsing the web for guides and tips on the other.
4) don't try to install every package you might possibly need at once. start with a basic setup, then add and configure apps as you have a need for them. all the big distributions have strong app-adding capabilities, so don't worry about not being able to add X after you get the box up and running.
5) three tools you should make sure you have and get familiar with-- google, man, and a text editor.
hope this helps
Let's clear up the misrepresentation.
n ounce/2005-December/000028.html
Breezy (5.10) uses hotplug and udev. This is the nice, comfortable way with which most people using Linux 2.6 are probably at least vaguely familiar. Dapper (6.06) has ditched hotplug and uses udev. Why? Linux 2.6.15 and udev perform everything that the older 2.6.12 kernel, udev, and hotplug performed. Read more here [0].
Next, Dapper currently has v1.1.1 of the ipw2200 driver, and it supports "wardriving" just fine.
[0] https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel-an
1) Fat32 doesn't support partitions above a certain size. However, the installer should catch that.
/etc/apt/sources.list
2) reconfigure
In Capitalist America, bank robs you!
As far as AC97 support goes, AC97 is the codec the sound chipset uses, not the chipset itself, there are various chipsets using the AC97, though I believe the Realtek 8*0 are the most common, the majority of motherboards I looked at when I last upgraded had the 850, though one or two had the 870, which is generally regarded as giving better sound quality. Therefore while many chipsets utilizing AC97 may have kernel support in the default kernel that comes with Ubuntu/Knoppix, others may not.
Unless the package manager in Ubuntu does some really cool things that Fedora's stock yum frontends can't do (install, remove, groups, dependencies...), how can it beat really beat the shit out of anything?
Well, considering that Fedora's stock yum frontends can't do anything at this current time, that shouldn't be a problem.
Yum is an ongoing disaster. Inferior to apt in every single facet of its conception and design. It can't even do dist upgrades. It's also a huge resource hog. Up2date regularly hangs and crashes, so it would be easy for any apt frontend to surpass all this.
I've used Fedora since FC2 and I have to say that my biggest complaint throughout has been the woeful package management system. Quite frankly, just using plain rpms is often faster than trying to coax yum to work. If fact, the workaround for a lack of a dist-upgrade option is to use rpms.
Like a stubborn mule, Fedora won't let go of yum, lest they use apt and become "another debian os". Consequently, Fedora is a great distro, with a lousy package management system. It's a real achilles heel on an otherwise great workstation OS.
May the Maths Be with you!
You might want to look at this article about Espresso, the GUI installer that one runs from the Dapper Drake Ubuntu Live CD.
I'm curious to know your reasoning. No-one's talking about adding KDE packages to Ubuntu by default, so I'm afraid I can't understand why you think that developing KDE as an alternative to Gnome would add bloat to the distro.
Um.
It is developed as an alternative. It's called Kubuntu. I think you mentioned it earlier. You can even just apt-get install kubuntu-desktop.
I've upped my standards, so up yours.
I'm sorry, but you're absolutely wrong in this respect. I have upgraded to the next distribution at last twice that I can recall, using Yum.
See HERE for the "secret recipe."
It was relatively painless.
As you can see from the site, it has been possible to upgrade distributions using Yum since FC1--so I'm not sure where you got your information.
I used to use APT with Fedora, until FC4 when Yum became facile enough to use on an ongoing basis. Since then, I've abandoned APT entirely. The fact that the Fedora project officially supports Yum, and that they have improved it dramatically over the past year, seals the deal for me.
Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.