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openSUSE 10.3 Public Release
Shizawana writes "The latest version of openSUSE was released this week. The site has a sneak peak of all the new features and additions, including highly anticipated changes to the YaST package management. The official announcement of the release offers a few highlights as well: 'The openSUSE team is proud to announce the release of openSUSE 10.3. Promoting the use of Linux everywhere, the openSUSE project provides free, easy access to the world's most usable Linux distribution, openSUSE. openSUSE is released regularly, is stable, secure, contains the latest free and open source software, and comes with several new technologies. openSUSE 10.3 will be supported with security and other serious updates for a period of 2 years. This version contains new beautiful green artwork, KDE 3.5.7 and parts of KDE 4, SUSE-polished GNOME 2.20, a GTK version of YaST, a new 1-click-install technology, MP3 support out-of-the-box, new and redesigned YaST modules, compiz and compiz fusion advances, virtualisation improvements, OpenOffice.org 2.3, Xfce 4.4.1, and much more! Read on for details of what is new and available in openSUSE 10.3, and for all the necessary download links.'"
I remember trying out suse 10.1, and a fresh install was full of bugs. Various suse utilities seemed to break immediately after running update.
Have they made much progress towards more stable releases (marketing blurb aside)? Is it worth checking out?
So where is it...
SUSE is being pretty aggressive in terms of key packages like gcc, glibc and the kernel. 10.3 provides GCC 4.2.1, glibc 2.6.1 and the 2.6.22.5 release of the kernel.
My one serious complaint with YaST is the time wasted waiting for the package manager to download metadata every time you enter it. I've taken to just leaving it running on a separate desktop. Please, YaST folks, apply some caching; it should take at most only a few seconds to bring up package manager if it has been run in the last few hours. If I should need to ensure absolutely current metadata provide a simple means to force a full update, otherwise get the thing open as quickly as possible. Yes, it's probably possible to work-around, tweak or otherwise get this behavior now... I want it out of the box.
Lurking at the bottom of the gravity well, getting old
I smell a patent lawsuit with Amazon
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
knowing that Micro$oft won't sue me since I'm using an MS approved Linux from Novell! :)
Promoting the use of Linux everywhere, the openSUSE project provides free, easy access to the world's most usable Linux distribution, openSUSE.
That's an interesting statement. Is there a distribution that aims to hinder the use of Linux everywhere?
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
How do you sneak a mountain?
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
Is that a peak that sneaks up on you? Like a volcano or something?
thegodmovie.com - watch it
21% downloaded already. Thought I am considering switching from the x86_64 version to the 32-bit version this time. My only really solid reason for this is the lack of a 64-bit Java browser plugin, and I don't even use it that much (but the kids like Runescape, so qhat can I do).
more of the same on Twitter.
Fedora might be more quirky...but it's from a company that never made any deals with the Devil.
Once bitten twice shy.
Namaste
Unlike MS bloatware, you don't have to install any of that stuff. MS usually forces you to install whatever crap they deem an "enhancement", whether you want it or not (for example, Internet Explorer).
What, they made you get rid of "linuzzz" in the sig, so you moved it to the article tag?
All of the things mentioned are optional. Try disabling some of the Windows equivalents sometime.
Not completly true, but the point is: the argument usially used when MS adds, for example, animations to the Windows, 3d font rendering, transparent borders , etc is: " is they only used those programmers and resources to fix bug or to do SOMETHING USEFUL... instead they do that crap. But when MacOZ or some Linuzzz distro adds it, nobody thinks about those infamious resources... no, that is the RuLeZ!!!!!!
It's time to realise that Abble's products are the biggest abomination these days. Just say NO to the dumb iAbble way!!
What are you talking about ? If you're talking about Compiz Fusion, then it's optional. KDE4 is optional. I don't see how it is bloatware.
wtf.n0x.org
Hrm, I disagree. Those are all legitimate enhancements. If you don't want them, they're not baked into the operating system. On Windows, even though Aero is pretty (like Compviz) it's part of the OS, and is always there. Same with the browser. On the other hand, SUSE's parent company, Novell, has signed agreements with Microsoft, which is disconcerting. I myself run Windows at home, as I am realistic, no current OS is as good as the one which does what I need, and Windows does that. Linux, BSD, Solaris, Sky, Menuet, etc are trying to, but just simply don't. On the other hand, I trust the checks and balances of a user community driven project over that of a corporate committee. As a consequence, my Windows runs a lot of Open Source software, or paid software made by independent developers (like yourself).
Eternity is a time bomb.
Yes they have fixed those very annoying bugs from 10.1 -- I have been using SUSE since 9.1 and you speak of my most hated release. It seemed Novell crammed a bunch of their Zen Management tools into the 10.1 release and they mostly came out broken. By 10.2, SUSE was back to its standard, highly-polished state.
Sometimes you gotta go backwards before you can go forward. I am usually on top of new SUSE releases, but I'm so pleased with 10.2 I will stay put until a KDE4 version of SUSE is released.
I went to eat some animal crackers and the box said, "Do not eat if seal is broken." I opened the box and sure enough..
Does this violate any Amazon patents?
Listen, El Lobo, we know you are the anti-twitter-wannabe, with your own cult of followers (apparently, you are so many that you could tag this article "linuzzz").
But you don't have to post your bullshit about how PROUD (as in "pride parade") you are of windows in every linux-related article. Pretty soon everybody will get tired of you and you'll have to create a new account here.
I'm not a fan of Suse but if you work hard on something and then have to write a announcement I'd say brag too. Of course hands on use and time will tell (I hated the last release). But getting upset because they talk nice seems kind of silly.
Quack, quack.
They finally added metadata caching in 10.2 - but you're right it was way overdue.
I went to eat some animal crackers and the box said, "Do not eat if seal is broken." I opened the box and sure enough..
Try it you might like it :)
No but seriously the update manager was based on zen-updater in 10.1 and 10.2. That functionality has been removed in openSUSE because a.) you don't need ZENworks stuff updating from your house and b.) it's bloated and kind of broken
Here's to the crazy ones
openSUSE is just that - the Community edition. Please relax.
Here's to the crazy ones
I love my MonopoLiniux, keeps me free from lawsuits of MS IP!
"better ways of doing things eventually just replace the inferior things" - Linus Torvalds 09-08-07
I remember when that was announced a while back, nice to see it in a major free distro.
Too bad the source code isn't freely distributable, but I'll take the binary with thanks.
I am PROUD just because...in this place it seems like using Windows is a shame. Well, I'm not ashamed of that. Oh, and I use Linuzz as a server, and I have a Mak as well, but nobody here finds THAT to be insulting. Go figure.
It's time to realise that Abble's products are the biggest abomination these days. Just say NO to the dumb iAbble way!!
There is a Unix, OSX.
It's even got the Mono MS poison software installed :)
Damn, what's with the blue plastic window borders?
I won't say anything else on the account of flaming or trolling, but damn. Fisher-price?
Please note that my home is MS Windows-free. (3 OS X, and 1 Linux)
If you don't know what AltaVista is (was), get off my lawn.
SUSE has always been good at providing Torrents of the CD and DVD ISOs, but I was wondering if there's a torrent of the installation repository available? I prefer to dump the install repository on one server somewhere, then net-install all my other machines, but I've always had to mirror with wget -r, and I'd rather torrent the lot...
... as in, a torrent for the entire tree of RPMs and stuff, not for an ISO file?
Nick Waterman, Sr Tech Director, #include <stddisclaimer>
How can they provide MP3 support out-of-the-box? Does it mean that they can't distribute their distro in the US?
Who is John Galt?
Oh, and BTW, I never post annonymously.
It's time to realise that Abble's products are the biggest abomination these days. Just say NO to the dumb iAbble way!!
I know, don't feed the trolls, I'm sorry but someone might actually believe this idiot and it's not going to take much effort to prove them wrong.
Look at this image: http://news.opensuse.org/wp-content/uploads/2007/09/yast-list_thumb.png that is YaST giving the user the option to install whatever desktop environment they like, under the cursor is XFCE whos tagline is '...and everything goes faster'. It's very lightweight, ideal for older computers and does not include any of the things you're complaining about.
Welcome to the GNU/Linux world, where you get the choice of what software to run. That's rather the point with Vista, Microsoft will force people to upgrade to it even if they have to buy a new computer to do so. My apologies if that offends your sensibilities as an MS fanboy, but I'm afraid we don't support bullying in the form of forced upgrades 'round these parts.
I'm going to transform myself into a mighty hawk. Either that or I'll just go and work at Dixons, haven't decided yet.
Heh. Is it any great wonder that the article was tagged '!ellobo'?
I've just installed a new OpenSUSE. All these little bugs from previous releases are gone. Yast software installer finally works with a good speed. Desktop responsiveness is amazing - KDE 3.7 works faster than GUI of Windows 2000. The default green artwork is very nice and gives a distinct feeling to this distro. Hardware detection is very good. My graphic card - nvidia 7600 and audio card - Creative Audigy 2 were working out of the box. Even installation of ADSL modem was a breeze - it is a cheap Sagem modem, used by the all telcos controlled by France Telecom, and most linux distros has problems with it.
What is especially important to people in countries with stupid law (read USA) - OpenSUSE gives you mp3 playback out of box, due to legal fluendo gstreamer plugins. In addition, there are provided Flash 9, newest Java runtimes, RealPlayer and seamless Wi-Fi support.
In the last year I've tried quite a few linux distros - Fedora, Ubuntu, Sabayon, Mint, Mandriva... nothing even come close to the OpenSUSE. Quality of Deutsch engineering.
Anyone else trying to download this and noticing really slow speeds? Also interesting is the apparent ease to install this version with a flashdrive. Hmmm..
the argument usially used when MS adds, for example, animations to the Windows, 3d font rendering, transparent borders , etc is: " is they only used those programmers and resources to fix bug or to do SOMETHING USEFUL... instead they do that crap.
Microsoft, being the organisation employing those coders, gets to tell them what to work on. The majority of open-source developers write code on a volunteer basis. Nobody gets to tell them what to work on. It's not even remotely the same situation.
PS: If you want people to actually take you seriously, quit the name-calling and immature attitude, stop SHOUTING, use a spelling checker and don't use multiple exclamation marks. Each of these things is like a sign telling everybody else you are a child.
The principal problem is that Novell has been tainted by the Microsoft reverse philosopher's stone: turning gold into lead (witness the ISO process). As said entity hasn't exactly endowed the world with graceful, law abiding and ethical behavior (and is known to not exactly be a friend of Linux) it is natural that anything in close proximity ends up sharing the stench. Maybe that was THEIR whole idea of partnering with the house that holds IMHO the best distro (I *said* iMho :-).
It would thus be a very good idea if someone could point at a list of reasons why their deal with Novell will not introduce risks in OpenSuSE - and I mean well argued, logical reasons, no emotional claptrap, we see enough of that from both sides already.
I'm asking this as a longtime fan of SuSE. I was disappointed to see that OpenSuSE is the only 64bit distro that doesn't see both disks on the SATA controlled HP DL320 G3 I have to play with, so off it went and on came Fedora 7 but I'm willing to try 10.3 (as a matter of fact, the DVD is being downloaded on another machine right now). But for a production box I'm reluctant to go near it because I don't have the time to identify if there IS a risk, which means I have to follow the "smoke means fire" algorithm, IMHO not good enough but I (like many others) don't have the time to go through the whole involvement.
The only thing I *do* know for sure is that this deal is with a multiple times convicted monopolist who has yet to change its behavior in any noticeable way, which doesn't really incline me to assume no risk.
Insert
You're welcome, it only takes one tagger early in the article, but it never stays there for long if its just one :)
My Babylon
I recently overlayed my laptop installation of SuSE with Ubuntu Feisty because of problems I had with YaST. YaST update performance was so slow and unreliable I gave up and started using the various SuSE yum repositories. That worked pretty well for me for a while, and I certainly appreciated the good multimedia support in SuSE. About the only thing I didn't like was lack of usable ACPI with my laptop.
However a couple of weeks ago the bubble burst. A yum upgrade pulled in some new packages, a kernel and so on. When the upgrade was done I lost my wireless connectivity, and reverting back to the old kernel didn't help. Basically I was hosed. I did a fair number googles, posted some questions and got pointed to pages written by others with similar problems with the Intel 3945abg that I had. Eventually I gave up. I thought of waiting for 10.3, but decided to try Ubuntu first. I am glad I did. Not only did the install go MUCH faster, but the Debian package manager Ubuntu uses is WAY nicer and faster. Hardware detection was nearly flawless, and even the ACPI works. The overall performance of the GUI is also considerably better than SuSE's.
As far as I am concerned the problems I had with YaST plus the obvious quality of apt-get etc. have made me an Ubuntu convert.
Now I am really looking forward for Gutsy, and would not go back to using SuSE on a bet. The only thing I have found that SuSE handled better was the multimedia stuff, and I am working on understanding what I can do to make my Ubuntu do what I need in that regard.
I don't realy care how they do it, f I can download it, or need to buy a box of the shelve, but I would like it if somehow SuSE came with DVD support. My Medion laptop I bought 1.5 years ago has a separate linux partition with a DVD player. It boots when you push a special "play DVD" button, without running Windows & friends. Even comes with the source for the kernel and other stuff that's on there, not the DVD players software though.
But my conclusion is, that commercial closed source DVD playing software exists for Linux and I don't see that if every Windows PC can have PowerDVD on it, then a Linux distro can't do the same, at least for it's non-OSS off-the-shelve boxes.
Don't get me wrong, I would prefer a free legal DVD player, but am also willing to pay for a non-free one, if it saves me a lot of hassle.
RogerWilco the Adventurous Janitor
I think you hit on something here. The idea of bloatware is something you are stuck with. If the ability to remove or replace the boat was available instead of being forced onto the user, it would be enhancements instead.
Or at least that is the way I see it. If product X (whatever that may be) offers options and feature A, B, and C, as long as they let me disable them and not load it when I don' need or want them they are specifically options. But if they force me to load and use them when I don't want to need to, then it is bloat. "Bloat" seems to revolve around your needs and wants and ability to not use things in the program or operating system.
nt
ftp://ftp.ussg.iu.edu/linux/opensuse/distribution/10.3/
Finally OpenSuSE 10.3 is good enough to be on the "man" end of the relationship.
Note that big smile on Beastie's face. Yep, we always suspected he preferred to receive.
IMO it is worth mentioning that you can easily install OpenSUSE side-by-side with windows on motherboard-chipset-based RAID conotrlers, such as intel ICH5-9R, NVRAID, etc.
Mo special configuration needed, openSuse installer supports this.
This is simply the most useable Linux distribution I have ever tried. I highly recommend new Linux users to check out this release :)
Last time I tried OpenSUSE (10.2), I quickly dropped it once I found out that it is the only distro on which Intel's debugger (idb) doesn't work. I simply get errors saying that it can't load the symbols. idb works with Fedora, CentOS, Ubuntu, etc. I need to use idb for debugging Fortran programs with data in shared modules; gdb doesn't work for that case.
Wow this is great. I can't believe this has got mp3 support straight out of the box! I've never seen that before. This is teh advanced operating System!!@!
I must say, they on;y get better as tiome goes on. So far it found the Nic Card on my Dell which 10.2 did not. I did have trouble install;ing from NFS using a 10.2 DVD to boot. Installing from a 10.3 CD went much smoother and folks are right! The package manager is a lot faster!
-- Many men would appreciate a woman's mind more if they could fondle it
The new one click install is not only slow, but plenty apps fail to even load after a "successful" install. It may have a swishy installer but Opensuse 10.3 really isn't all that good.
I've used Windows all my life and I'm wondering which desktop would be the one for me (Gnome or KDE). I realize there are differences, I'm just not sure what they are, and what can be easily overcome simply by installing the software into the other desktop.
:D
Also I'm wondering whether openSuse or Fedora is more newbie friendly (again not meant as flamebait!). Having looked at the two websites, openSuse certainly seems to have the better features, however the Fedora website is certainly inferior to the openSuse one so it could just be the information's there.
What I want to do on my computer would be to:
* Play muds
* Surf the web
* Edit several locally stored wikis (great format for storing certain info).
* Use beagle (or some alternative)
* Use office software
* Compile Java, C++ and C
* Use Wine (or some alternative) for Windows software that hasn't been ported.
My concerns on either distro are:
* Ease of installation and use - I've tried installing Linux before and it was not newbie friendly enough.
* Partitioning - Do you have to have a linux partition, swap partition and a Fat32 partition to be able to access files from both Windows XP and Linux? Does the installation CD handle that? Or do I have to do it myself? If I have to do it myself any free software someone can recommend for Windows XP
* Detecting networks and peripherals - The last time I tried installing Linux (I can't remember the distro) this was a particularly bad problem.
* Being able to compile and run programs in Fedora 7 (my university computers have Fedora 7 so I want to be able to write it in openSuse if I go with that and have it run in Fedora and vice versa).
Thanks a lot to anyone who can help without flaming
Using openSUSE instead of Windows since 9th of October, 2007 and liking it.
Why not try this?
I love SuSE, it's my favorite distro.. But I just find the linux community funny sometimes.. Case in point.. 'MP3 support out of the box.' Come on people that should have been an 'out of the box.' feature in 2000. This is 07' And people wonder why MS still sells their OS.
Yes, by trolling every single article even remotely related to Linux, you're definitely demonstrating how unfanatical you are.
Looks like you need a hobby.
You said you have tried quite a few linux distros, among them Ubuntu, and you claim nothing comes even close to OpenSUSE.
What, then, are the big advantages of OpenSUSE over Ubuntu? I know both distros, and I do not see that clear superiority of OpenSUSE. I think both distros have their respective strengths and weaknesses.
So why do you disagree and think that OpenSUSE is a clear winner?
1. Freedom from political correctness, which seems to be strong among Ubuntu followers. All these Nelson Mandelas etc... :)
2. YAST. What can be said? Only on the SUSE I could easily install soundfonts for my audiocard, set up a SAMBA or NFS shares for home network, configure scanner. bluetooth interface for my cellphone, set up rules for firewall. All of this is doable by console, of course - but I have too little time to play an admin to my one personal computer. I just like setting up such things quickly.
3. Installation. The installer for Ubuntu is simple. Too simple actually. I like to add crypto partitions during installation. Suse installer lets me do it.
4. KDE. KDE implementation on Kubuntu is a weak one. Ubuntu is gnome-centric, and in my country KDE is way more popular. Suse-style menu for KDE is fantastic and in 10.3 local system search through Beagle is very fast. And now there are KDE4 packages in the distro...
5. Non-OSS packages on the DVD: Its good to have Flash, Java, ICC profiles, WiFi drivers working out of box.
6. Multimedia support - MP3 build-in, other codecs installed by a few clicks.
And most importantly - stability. Since my installation of 10.3, and rather intensive usage, nothing from userland had crashed. With Kubuntu 7.04 I had some issues.
I believe these are enough to judge OpenSUSE as better distro than Ubuntu.
The good:-
/SMB connection just led to hanging apps, zero responsiveness, burp, hang, burp.
The installation worked without any major problem. GUI installation took a while, but picked up all the hardware on the basic machine used to test.
The various settings and install items were easy to follow and setup.
The look is a little more polished, as one would expect. The new menu set by default is nice, and works well enough.
The installed set of applications looks reasonably balanced. The menu is easy enough to use.
The Bad:-
The network share management seemed nice at first. But this fell apart straight away. Attempting to play media files through any of the multi media programs through
If you can't build a basic desktop that connects and works with servers, what can really be said. Copying the files to the local machine meant the files played without issue (MP3s).
When testing Linux desktops, this one again being no different, the feeling is clunk clunk, clunk. The mouse pointer just has a weird feeling, like its being pulled round on elastic and bungie cables. Of all the systems I play with (Amiga, Mac, Windows, Linux) its the worst, has always been poor and its never improved in Linux releases. It looks like its here to stay. The graphics feel old, even though they are polished. The toolkits leave large areas un-used, and the feeling is just one of ugly disconnection from the desktop. Playing with the KDE themes, the ones supplied varied from one ot two good ones to some really terrible hi vis and hi/low contrast themes. Making changes throughout lead to clucky hanging, and then followed by lots of writing as various files/settings are updated. This works, but is slow, and simply clunky.
I do not know the underlying core issue here. Simply put, the more polish that is applied, the more I get frustrated by the ongoing clunky, slow, 'bad feel' nature of the windows managers. If its going to go on like this, perhaps its time people really considered fixing and replacing X-windows with something better. Ongoing polish is now not covering the other failings.
I hate hitting issues within minutes of install, however I did with this. Tommorow I will spend a little more time on it, but its already dead. If SMB connections and networking *don't* work, or only work in some crippled way, its already a dead stick.
*Note*
I know, many of you won't be bothered by the gremlins, you'll work round them, ignore them, or just pretend they are not important. I simply look at this as anyone from 'outside' would. If basic things don't work, it gets a fail. Right now, you have Vista there, and people are falling down on offering something else that works.
We`re all equal