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.'"

Comments

have they fixed bugs?

[sentientbrendan]

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?

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Anonymous Coward]

You must be a dumb ass. I have been running it since 9.2 and have had no problems. Best distro I have ever used. So quit being a dumb ass.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Anonymous Coward]

You fucking idiot. SUSE RULES! You fuckinh Ubuntu "user"... Death to all Ubuntu newbies. The worst thing that happened to Linux is Suckbuntu. Now we have these "linux wannabe suckers"

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Anonymous Coward]

"This version contains new beautiful green artwork"

So, it IS new AND beautiful. Stop complaining, it's PRETTY!

I'm formatting all our servers in anticipation.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Culture20]

Parent is not a Troll. zmd.exe (the default updater) is a mono app, and is prone to hanging. I've had to kill zmd and restart novell-zmd several times to get updates to work whenever I notice that a cron-run update is still in the process list 8-10 hours later.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Maelwryth]

I installed it last night........it's beautiful. Definitely worth checking out :).

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[maxwell demon]

Just throw off zmd from your system and use opensuseupdater instead of zen-updater.

Before I did that, openSUSE managed to make a dual-core system almost unusable: One core was running zmd at nice 0, the other one was running beagled-helper at nice 0. Now I only get one core filled up from time to time, and therefore only need to kill or at least renice when I need full processor power. For normal operation one core is enough, and beagle can have the other one.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[trolltalk.com]

Just remove mono and zdm.exe, and use guru or the smart updater. Mono sucks, pegs the cpu, and IMNSHO (in my not so humble opinion) there is NO excuse for having a file that ends in .exe on a linux box.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[smilindog2000]

No can do... gotta stay away from pure evil.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[mrsteveman1]

If you knew what you were talking about you would have known that opensuse 10.3 doesn't even have ZMD, not turned on, not included by default, not installed.

Besides that .exe files are PE executables, wine uses them just fine, so does mono. Do you refain from using Wine out of some fear of PE executables? DO you even know what a PE executable is?

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[grommit]

Yeah, 10.1 was easily the worst release of OpenSUSE. 10.2 fixed a lot of problems but IMO it wasn't as good as 9.3. I've tried out 10.3 RC1 and it is *much* better than 10.2. They've done a lot of work on this release and it definitely shows. I had been trying out other distributions recently to see if I want to switch away from OpenSUSE but if 10.3 stays as good as my initial look at it, I'll be sticking with OpenSUSE for a while.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[trolltalk.com]

Screw that. In the real world, Mono is a disease, Wine is something you drink. Sure, wine might be necessary for getting some external (read Windows) crap to run, but there was NO excuse for making a wine-requiring product a core "feature". "PE", or "Portable Executable" isn't. Its proprietary to Windows only.

Most of us who use opensuse day to day have gotten rid of zdm.exe, killed off beagle, and would like very much for Miguel to take mono and shove it. We already have a better OS than Microsofts' ... why mess it up trying to immitate their crap?

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Culture20]

If you knew what you were talking about you would have known that opensuse 10.3 doesn't even have ZMD, not turned on, not included by default, not installed.
GGP was talking about opensuse 10.1, not 10.3. Please read more fully before reacting.

Besides that .exe files are PE executables, wine uses them just fine, so does mono. Do you refain from using Wine out of some fear of PE executables? DO you even know what a PE executable is?
Actually, I don't know what a PE executable is, but it's irrelevant to the discussion since zmd.exe runs via mono by default (on opensuse 10.1, 10.2, SLED 10). That extra interpretation eats up my CPU(s). Only thing worse would have been if they wrote their daemon in lisp or perl.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Grishnakh]

But Miguel works for Novell, since Novell bought his company Ximian, so they can't just leave his crap out of SuSE.

This is one of the reasons why I now use Ubuntu (kubuntu actually), even though I had used SuSE since 6.3. 10.1 was the last version of SuSE I used, and after the zmd debacle and the stupid agreement with Microsoft, I decided to move to greener pastures.

Ubuntu is much nicer; the company really does believe in open-source, they don't believe in signing deals with Microsoft, they don't include Mono crap by default, and apt-get and the universe repositories are far better than rpm and slow, slow, YaST.

Personally, I no longer care if SUSE has cleaned up its act. Too little, too late. Ubuntu is leading the way now.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[und0]

Only thing worse would have been if they wrote their daemon in Python or perl.
There, fixed for you.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[trolltalk.com]

> "But Miguel works for Novell, since Novell bought his company Ximian, so they can't just leave his crap out of SuSE."

Looks like they're actually doing just that as far as the package management system is concerned, and about time.Don't be surprised if openSUSE 11 doesn't have any mono in it by default.

IF Ubuntu was readily available as a horking large DVD with the ability to select all the dev packages, etc., I'd consider it. As it is, I like the ability to slap a DVD in my box, select 7 gigs of software, and come back an hour later to a fairly complete development environment.

... we all have different needs, and different distros fill those niches.

I wasn't happy about the Microsoft agreement either (it was predictable that Microsoft would try to spin it as something it wasn't), and Mono is a real tar baby (in both senses of the term), but I balance that with the work Novell has done with linux, and the heavy lifting they're doing against SCO et al., and I'm sticking with them. They deserve a bit more patience from the community than they've been getting, all things considered.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Anonymous Coward]

You should look a bit harder :)

http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/dvd/current/

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[jack455]

Fair enough, but I do have .exe files on my linux. But I'd be pretty pissed if an updater opened up in wine.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[hb253]

Troll

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Anonymous Coward]

What was the point in typing "IMNSHO" if you just had to type out what it means?

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[hitest]

"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?" I'll also be very curious to hear if Suse 10.3 is worth a look. I enjoyed Suse 9.3 and !0.0. 10.1 was garbage. Is 10.3 worth a look? I'm now happily using Slackware, Debian and FreeBSD. I'm rather pragmatic in nature. I'll use a distro if it is exceptional.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Hymer]

I've got the same problems on my SuSE 10.2... I've removed zen updater from my system..

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Daengbo]

I use Ubuntu, too. Sorry to break it to you, but Tomboy Notes is a Mono app, included by default in Ubuntu 7.10.

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[shakesoda!]

What are you, 12?

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Hucko]

Come on, it isn't pure...

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Maelwryth]

".......he said, as he stared into the eyes of the half naked succubus". There, feel better now? :)

Re:have they fixed bugs?

[Grishnakh]

Hmm.. I've never even heard of this application, much less used it.

As long as they don't put in any system apps (those that run constantly in the background by default) written in Mono, like zmd.exe was, then I don't really have a problem with it. There's tons of applications installed by default that I never use.

Great!

[El Lobo]

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, new and redesigned YaST modules, compiz and compiz fusion advances,

Great... Let bash MS for adding more "bloatware" (Use this word only when it's related to MS). When Linuzz, MacOZ or other non-MS system adds it, please call it "great enhancements".

Re:Great!

[Anonymous Coward]

Great... Let bash MS for adding more "bloatware" (Use this word only when it's related to MS). When Linuzz, MacOZ or other non-MS system adds it, please call it "great enhancements".

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).

Re:Great!

[Anonymous Coward]

What, they made you get rid of "linuzzz" in the sig, so you moved it to the article tag?

Re:Great!

[Anonymous Coward]

All of the things mentioned are optional. Try disabling some of the Windows equivalents sometime.

Re:Great!

[El Lobo]

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!!!!!!

Re:Great!

[BokLM]

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.

Re:Great!

[Xybre]

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).

Re:Great!

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

Re:Great!

[El Lobo]

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.

Re:Great!

[El Lobo]

BTW... It seems that many people feel insulted cause my tag of Linuzzz but every single article about MS is taget M$, haha, etc... No reaction... Oh, and I don't care about being labeled troll (BTW, my karma at this moment is excellent), which means that not evry slashdoter here is thasst fanatical and a lot of moderators actually agree with my ideas.

Oh, and BTW, I never post annonymously.

Re:Great!

[jeevesbond]

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.

Re:Great!

[Anonymous Coward]

Heh. Is it any great wonder that the article was tagged '!ellobo'?

Re:Great!

[brunascle]

but every single article about MS is taget M$

no, none of them are. you cant put a $ in a tag.

Re:Great!

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

Re:Great!

[ericrost]

You're welcome, it only takes one tagger early in the article, but it never stays there for long if its just one :)

Re:Great!

[sumdumass]

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.

Re:Great!

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

Re:Great!

[Cairnarvon]

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.

No Microsoft Logo?

[Anonymous Coward]

So where is it...

Thoughts

[TopSpin]

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.

Re:Thoughts

[FranTaylor]

My Fedora machine is running 2.6.22.9, what's so modern about 2.6.22.5?

YaST is a piece of junk. If you use rpm to install a package, you have hopelessly screwed up YaST and it will never behave correctly again. It's why I gave up on SuSE. Maybe there's a way to fix it, but there are plenty of distributions that behave correctly and don't require putzing around.

Re:Thoughts

[mj01nir]

From the 10.3 announcement:

The package management team have been working hard on improving the new openSUSE package management, and there is a lot to show for it now. It is reliable, more mature, and an awful lot faster. There is no more parsing during startup, greater compatibility with tools like yum and smart, and increased speed for the most common use-case: installing a package.

Sounds promising.

Re:Thoughts

[grommit]

I wouldn't say that it's fast now but it is definitely faster than any previous version of YaST's package manager. Ubuntu's package manager is extremely fast and it would be difficult to match that speed but thankfully I don't install/uninstall/reinstall packages very often so 10.3's package manager speed is fine for me. I would like it if the OpenSUSE team would work on having the package manager do multiple package processes at the same time such as downloading the next package while the previously downloaded package is being installed. Currently it is a very linear Download > Apply Delta > Install/Update > Download Next Package process.

Re:Thoughts

[WhiteWolf666]

I'm using it, and yes, its fixed. It's cached, and at each package manager startup it checks the cache versus the online version, and even if it needs update the cache update is an order of magnitude faster than a normal startup of the package manager used to be.

It's quite useable now; time from clicking "software manager" to a usable interface is similar to using SMART.

Speed seems to be one of the primary focuses of this release; from the package manager to the boot sequence.

Re:Thoughts

[WhiteWolf666]

That hasn't been my experience, and I install quite a few packages via rpm command line.

YaST was borked for 10.1 and 10.2. It made sense to try and use an alternative package manager.

As 10.2 matured, YaST started to work properly, but was slow.

In 10.3, YaST is quite speedy, very capable, and runs very solidly. Plus, the one-click-install thing works really well.

Re:Thoughts

[griego]

Go into "Installation Source" in YaST and turn off Refresh for the slower repositories. Then refresh them manually once a month or something.

Re:Thoughts

[FranTaylor]

Well, my employer's customers use SuSE 9 and SuSE 10, so that's what I have to use. None of this openSuSE stuff. Hey, we still support VMS. What can I say?

Re:Thoughts

[plazman30]

You know with Zenworks, I couldn't update through our work's authenticated proxy. But I could using Yast. Now that 10.3 is out, they ripped out Zenworks and somehow managed to break Yast updates through an authenticated proxy.

Re:Thoughts

[M1FCJ]

That's SLES you are talking about, it's a different beast - just like the difference between Fedora/Fedora Core vs. Redhat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). Much longer support and release cycles, stable and out-of-date code, just like Debian (grin).

Patent

[maxwell demon]

a new 1-click-install technology

I smell a patent lawsuit with Amazon ... :-)

Finally I can be worry free. . .

[saterdaies]

knowing that Micro$oft won't sue me since I'm using an MS approved Linux from Novell! :)

Re:Finally I can be worry free. . .

[kjj]

Actually you can still be sued if you just download a copy because you are not a Novell customer. The coverage does not extend to anyone outside of those paying Novell for a support, not even developers who contribute to the Novell code base.

Re:Finally I can be worry free. . .

[hasbeard]

Actually, I don't think OpenSuse is covered by this agreement.

Re:Finally I can be worry free. . .

[saterdaies]

The comment was actually meant as a joke, but it's good to see people taking it seriously :) Just wanted to get a little dig in at Novell.

Re:Finally I can be worry free. . .

[BokLM]

I guess the people who answer understood it was a joke. But a comment that say something wrong, even if it is a joke, still says something wrong.

Re:Finally I can be worry free. . .

[Miguel de Icaza]

Never, ever, feel tempted to write the word 'Microsoft' with a dollar sign instead of an 's'. It wasn't even funny the first time, several decades ago, and it just makes you look like a prat.

Re:Finally I can be worry free. . .

[marcello_dl]

I'd add that unfortunately openSuse is a distro that is more likely to contain lawsuit material from MS. With all the respect for the achievements of openSuse team, i'm not touching it.

Re:Finally I can be worry free. . .

[Anonymous Coward]

Stop spreading FUD. What software packages within openSUSE contain patented code by Microsoft that other distributions do not contain?

ok

[User 956]

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?

Re:ok

[niteice]

Windows.

Re:ok

[Arcturax]

You haven't heard of Windows?

Re:ok

[Anonymous Coward]

yes. Gentoo!

Re:ok

[Anonymous Coward]

Is there a distribution that aims to hinder the use of Linux everywhere?

Yes, it's called openSUSE by Microsoft.

Re:ok

[nwbvt]

Actually, I think Windows Vista has done more than virtually any OS release to promote the use of Linux.

Re:ok

[ultramkancool]

Nah, maybe LFS.

Re:ok

[Derek Loev]

People love to make Gentoo jokes. I started using Linux when I was 14. My first distro, Gentoo. It's NOT hard to install, it DOESN'T take 2 weeks to compile packages. Please, Slashdot, before making any more Gentoo jokes, try it out for yourself. I can get Gentoo installed in under an hour. And guess what, do I sit around watching KDE compile? No! There's times when I don't have to be on the computer, seriously.

Re:ok

[JudeanPeople'sFront]

Give it up Derek, it's pointless. Wise-ass Gentoo jokes are a Slashdot meme, just like the Soviet Russia jokes or Balmer's chair throwing jokes. Once they are put in circulation, nothing can end them. Ignore them, or even try to find them enjoyable :)

Sneak peak

[$RANDOMLUSER]

How do you sneak a mountain?

Re:Sneak peak

[maxwell demon]

How do you sneak a mountain? You walk on it with sneakers?

Re:Sneak peak

[Duct Tape Pro]

How do you sneak a mountain? Easy. You swap its name with some other mountain. Then tell people you snuck both mountains into each other's place. No one will have observed you sneaking either mountain, so your sneaking skills will be proved superior.

Sneak peak?

[rrohbeck]

Is that a peak that sneaks up on you? Like a volcano or something?

Re:Sneak peak?

[theskipper]

Wanna bet the spell checker caught "sneek" before the article was posted?

(my karma's finally excellent...just kidding Zonk!)

Re:Sneak peak?

[Anonymous Coward]

In Soviet Russia peaks sneak up on YOU!

21%

[Metaphorically]

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).

Re:21%

[ericrost]

Ubuntu gutsy has a 64 bit flash and java.. I was surprised it wasn't advertised in the new features (as they didn't have adobe flash for 64 bit in feisty). Come on in, the water's fine.

Re:21%

[Metaphorically]

I've been toying with the idea of going to Kubuntu for a while but I haven't had the inclination at the right time :)

It isn't that 64-bit Java doesn't work, it's that there's no plugin for a 64-bit browser. This is even a problem on Windows XP x64 (the red-headed step-child of XP). I could, supposedly, install a 32-bit version of Firefox and use the 32-bit Java plugin but I didn't get that working.

I did discover that 64-bit Konqueror somehow figured out how to run Java applets (though there's no sound) and the kids use that for now.

Re:21%

[WhiteWolf666]

32-bit java on 64-bit firefox on 64-bit suse works just fine.

nsplugin has grown in leaps and bounds.

Re:21%

[Metaphorically]

I guess that settles it, I'll do the 64-bit install and see how things look. Thanks.

Im sticking with Fedora

[Anonymous Coward]

Fedora might be more quirky...but it's from a company that never made any deals with the Devil.

Once bitten twice shy.

Re:Im sticking with Fedora

[bluelip]

Nah, it's just that Redhat wants to be the aforementioned devil.

Re:Im sticking with Fedora

[renegadesx]

Alot of people have been telling me if you were ever going to go back to Red Hat, Fedora 7 is a good time to do so.

I've been sticking with Ubuntu for a long time as its been a great system. It's interesting that alot of the new distro's are really catching up and getting hype. I should really test SUSE 10.3 and Fedora 7 before Ubuntu hits its final version, the beta has a few bugs but overall it runs pretty sweet.

As far as the "buggy" remakrs, I remebmer there was a problem with their update system that was abit of an embarrasment. Mind you I have been let down on quite a few distros that turned out to be buggy, Mandriva and Freespire come to mind.

I've been considering with my next box setting up a distro that doesn't really require frequent system upgrades (maybe Debian) and run my OS's under Xen.

Re:Im sticking with Fedora

[hollywoodb]

I'm running Fedora 7 now, and it is really nice. I think Fedora 8 (due in little over a month) will be a nice forward step since it includes things like "Codec Buddy" and the RPMFusion repository (a collaborative effort by formerly separate repositories) should be entering full swing. Fedora is a fast-moving distro though. Fedora 7 is finally settling down (fewer updates) and it has been out for quite a while.

Also, if you're considering running more OSes virtualized and are thinking of considering Xen, CentOS might be worth looking into. For VMWare it doesn't really matter if you run a Debian or RedHat/Fedora system, but CentOS's Xen integration is pretty solid.

I tried OpenSUSE 10.1 and there were a *lot* of things that rubbed me the wrong way. From what I've read 10.3 has addressed basically all of my concerns and I'm downloading the installation DVD now. Their Gnome setup looks nice in screenshots, will have to see how it handles in practice. I doubt it'll pull me away from my beloved Fedora & RHEL, but I feel compelled to give it an honest test.

Re:Im sticking with Fedora

[VGPowerlord]

Fedora might be more quirky...but it's from a company that never made any deals with the Devil.

I haven't done any research, but are you sure Redhat has never made a deal with the BSD groups?

Re:Im sticking with Fedora

[l0g0s]

Speak of RedHat, SOMEBODY'S sticking to it! 3 Clicks and here's what I got... Forbidden You don't have permission to access /opensuse/distribution/10.3/iso/torrent/openSUSE-10.3-GM-DVD-i386.torrent on this server. Apache/2.0.52 (Red Hat) Server at linux.nssl.noaa.gov Port 80 So the torrent file (which is either missing or not permissible to access) is hosted on a Red Hat server for SuSE? NICE!

"Giver"

[planckscale]

The little Giver app looks nice. If I had a new network to set up, I would consider this distro for all the clients, 20 barebone machines with OpenSuse installed and maybe Google Apps for a suite - simplicity!

Re:"Giver"

[rustalot42684]

Do they have a "Receiver" app too?

One of Many Sneak Peeks

[apokryphos]

The Sneak Peek linked to is only the final one in the series, there was many more:

• Greatly Improved Boot Time, with Stephan Kulow
• 1-Click Install, with Benjamin Weber
• New Package Management, with Duncan Mac-Vicar Prett
• Compiz and Compiz Fusion, with Matthias Hopf and Jigish Gohil
• KDE 4, with Dirk Mueller
• SUSE-Polished GNOME 2.20, with JP Rosevear
• 1-CD Installation & Multimedia support, with Michael Löffler
• Virtualisation, with Frank Kohler
• A Plethora of Improvements, with Andreas Jaeger

Re:One of Many Sneak Peeks

[Anonymous Coward]

One of the things I really like the look of is: Giver. It automatically sees other Giver users on the local network and allows sending and recieving files to and from them. It also integrates with many desktop apps, so you can drag and drop from F-Spot, Tomboy etc.

This really is a blessing for those of us who use GNU/Linux at home (or home office) but don't have the time/inclination to setup a proper network with LDAP/Kerberos.

Re:One of Many Sneak Peeks

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds userful. How does security work with "Giver"? Are users authenticated and files encrypted in any way?

Re:One of Many Sneak Peeks

[Anonymous Coward]

They went the Microsoft way: giving up security for the sake of performance. For example, the firewall used to be started at bootup, but in 10.3 they are waiting until after the network and the GUI is/are up. Yes, it only leaves your computer vulnerable for a few seconds at bootup, but that might be all it takes to get in!

Yes They Have

[TheNinjaroach]

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.

Re:Yes They Have

[neurovish]

By 10.2, SUSE was back to its standard, highly-polished state. A polished turd is still a turd. How can you still trust a distribution/company that screws something as fundamental and important as updates as Novell did? Does 10.3 still rely on Zen and mono?

Re:Yes They Have

[NoseyNick]

% cat /etc/SuSE-release
openSUSE 10.2 (i586)
VERSION = 10.2
% rpm --query zen
package zen is not installed
% rpm --query mono
package mono is not installed

10.2 doesn't, nor did 10.1, nor 10.0. What are you talking about?

Re:Yes They Have

[mrsteveman1]

No

Anything else? You could have just turned off ZMD like the rest of us did, its not even included anymore.

And by the way, the software manager and updater work perfectly now.

Re:Yes They Have

[WhiteWolf666]

The standard 10.2 install included zmd and mono, for sure.

Libzypp has since replaced zmd, and I think they made it the default in one of the 10.2 updates, and then updated the disk images.

But I'm 100% sure that the standard backend at 10.2 release was ZMD.

Re:Yes They Have

[NoseyNick]

... so you un-tick the box for ZZZ package you dislike. If you've broken something by doing so, it says "XXX needs YYY or ZZZ", you didn't like ZZZ so you tick the box for YYY instead.

I'm not sure I remember what a "default install" is (I think you have a choice of about 12 different types of "default install" in SUSE), but anyone who complains about a default install should probably try a non-default install before pretending the entire distribution sucks "because it uses ZZZ", particularly when in reality it doesn't need to.

Re:Yes They Have

[TheNinjaroach]

> cat /etc/SuSE-release openSUSE 10.2 (i586) VERSION = 10.2 > rpm --query zmd zmd-7.1.100.0-46 I never mentioned mono once. What are you talking about?

Re:Yes They Have

[NoseyNick]

I never mentioned mono once. What are you talking about?

I was replying to a post after yours (modded Troll, so maybe you didn't see it) which said "Does 10.3 still rely on Zen and mono?"
... and since you mention it...
% rpm --query zmd
package zmd is not installed
I probably deliberately un-ticked "mono" during install and spent a few seconds helping it satisfy dependencies. SUSE MAY install mono if you just select a default bundle, but it certainly doesn't NEED to install mono, or zen, or zmd...

Re:Yes They Have

[TheNinjaroach]

NoseyNick knows. That's exactly what happened, I looked right over his troll.

Re:Yes They Have

[WhiteWolf666]

IIRC, libzypp wasn't an option in the original DVDs, so a bunch of people who upgraded right at the beginning of its (10.2's) release got burned.

It was resolved in a month or so, but at release you couldn't choose not to install ZMD without breaking the install completely.

One Click Install?

[GroundBounce]

Does this violate any Amazon patents?

You've been trolled by a...press release?

[msimm]

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.

Is openSuse blessed by Microsoft?

[pembo13]

Is openSuse a Microsoft blessed distribution? Does it come with the enhanced Windows compatibility that I have heard about?

Re:Is openSuse blessed by Microsoft?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's even got the Mono MS poison software installed :)

10.2 Caches

[TheNinjaroach]

They finally added metadata caching in 10.2 - but you're right it was way overdue.

Re:10.2 Caches

[Culture20]

Not out of the box. With Opensuse 10.2, I still have to wait for timeouts when I want to install something from one repo while others might be unavailable, or remove a repo that's been shut down.

sh17

[Anonymous Coward]

*B

Yes.

[flydpnkrtn]

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

Can we get over these childish trolling comments?

[flydpnkrtn]

openSUSE is just that - the Community edition. Please relax.

I love my MonopoLiniux

[Filter]

I love my MonopoLiniux, keeps me free from lawsuits of MS IP!

Thank you Fluendo for the free MP3 support

[schwaang]

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.

openSUSE is the leading KDE-centric distro

[traveller604]

In my opinion anyways and I love it. Installed 10.3 last night. It feels far faster than 10.2. Stability, can't say. Hasn't crashed yet at least.

OSX

[Zombie Ryushu]

There is a Unix, OSX.

Fisher-price theme?

[Tibor the Hun]

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)

Torrents of installation repository?

[NoseyNick]

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?

Re:Torrents of installation repository?

[wwrmn]

It's simple:

1) Torrent DVD
2) mount -oloop DVD.iso /mnt/cdrom
3) cp -ar /mnt/cdrom/* /path_you_want

Viola! You have a net installation depot.

Unless I'm missing something...

Re:Torrents of installation repository?

[NoseyNick]

I meant the "repo/oss" and "repo/non-oss" trees used by net installs.
No, they're not the same as the DVDs, though I'll concede there's a fair bit of overlap.

MP3 support

[bioglaze]

How can they provide MP3 support out-of-the-box? Does it mean that they can't distribute their distro in the US?

Re:MP3 support

[wile_e_wonka]

It doesn't provide MP3 support out of the box--that was misleading. The first time you try to play an MP3, Amarok says, "You currently can't play this file. Would you like to downloa MP3 support? Yes / No" or something along those lines. So really it's one step away from MP3 support out of the box. The difference looks like a legal fiction to me, but it is technically not shipped with an MP3 codec.

Re:MP3 support

[eimikion]

Not true. There is a gst-fluendo-mp3-2.7.rpm package on the goldmaster DVD. MP3 playback works out of the box. Eat this, american law system.

Re: MP3 support

[Dolda2000]

Actually, I was quite surprised when I installed Debian Etch in a VM the other day, and found gst-plugins-ugly installed by default -- including, of course, MP3 support. I know that Debian has a non-US repository, but I cannot remember choosing to download an explicit non-US DVD.

I've no idea how it works legally, though.

Re:MP3 support

[J.Y.Kelly]

Not true. There is a gst-fluendo-mp3-2.7.rpm package on the goldmaster DVD. MP3 playback works out of the box. Eat this, american law system.

The American law system won't lose any sleep over this. Fluendo are a commercial venture who have paid the licensing fees for a number of different multimedia formats. They then give you MP3 support as a freebie in the hope that you will pay for other formats. Kind of the drug pusher mentality applied to codecs.

Re:MP3 support

[postmortem]

Yes it does, all you need is to fire up Banshee, not Amarok.

Just after installation of 10.3

[eimikion]

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.

Re:Just after installation of 10.3

[casanon]

Hello, I successfully installed openSUSE 10.3 x86_64bit. Here are my HW specs: Motherboard : Gigabyte 965P-S3 Processor : Intel Core 2 Duo 2 6600 @ 2.4GHz BIOS : Award v F11a, 21/06/2007 RAM : 2048 Mb Graphics : NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GT ~256 Mb NIC : Marvell Yukon 88E8056 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Chipset : Intel(R) ICH8 Hardrive : SATA 160Go All HW is perfectly recognised except the Sagem ADSL modem. Could you please show me how you successfully set it up and configure it? Thanks in advance. Regards,

Slow Dowload

[Anonymous Coward]

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..

I think it would help if this risk was clarified..

[cheros]

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.

Tired of SuSE

[the eric conspiracy]

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.

Re:Tired of SuSE

[NoseyNick]

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.

The problems with YaST are allegedly fixed. Personally I'm in the exact opposite situation as you, whereby I tried switching from SUSE to Ubuntu on one of my laptops and I'm now bitterly regretting it and will almost certainly now switch it to SUSE 10.3. Ubuntu seemed to be vastly slower for "most things", whereas SUSE was only slow for YaST package-management (allegedly now fixed, but not exactly a day-to-day activity anyway). I also have a wireless card that needed all sorts of hackery for Ubuntu but "just worked" on SUSE. To get "normal" stuff (java/shockwave/acrobat/mplayer/i-don't-remember) working I needed to locate and add all sorts of extra repositories to Ubuntu, only one (packman) to SUSE (and even THAT sounds like it's now really easy).

My user number is probably lower than yours.

Close, but nope. Can we leave these threads for the slashdot-is-10 stories though? :-)

Re:Tired of SuSE

[the eric conspiracy]

I did not need any additional Ubuntu repositories to get Java or Flash. These are available from the base Ubuntu repository. My WiFi function also uses a proprietary Intel firmware load and was supported using the basic installation. The only non-base repository I am using is to support multimedia.

While as you say package management is not a daily activity, if it doesn't work properly you can become hosed like I was because it is such a fundamental piece of a modern Linux distribution. As far as YaST being fixed, I will wait and see; now that I have a fully functional laptop for the first time under Linux there is no reason for me to change at the moment.

Re:Tired of SuSE

[Anonymous Coward]

Been using it since RC-1. Not a hiccup, and yast is much, much faster than before.

Re:Tired of SuSE

[Anonymous Coward]

Ubuntu is fine but lacks working kdm. I've posted numerous questions on the forums but no answer. I guess it's just the userbase that is rotten ... ;-)

Re:Tired of SuSE

[tehBoris]

Well, I don't know what causes this (I don't know much about the kernel... upgrading hoses module-loading configuration?), but in Ubuntu you have to reinstall the 'binary blob' nVidia driver when you install an upgrade to the kernel, easy stuff with Synaptic, otherwise it breaks (failed to load the kernel module, it says). Perhaps you had to do that too with the driver for your wireless card in Suse?

Now for DVD support

[RogerWilco]

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.

Re:Now for DVD support

[Anonymous Coward]

It's just one click away: http://opensuse-community.org/Restricted_Formats/10.3

Re:Now for DVD support

[RogerWilco]

That link has been bookmarked, it's realy nice.

fuck you all, i'm going back to slackware

[hyperstation]

nt

Super bandwidth full iso download via FTP

[Culture20]

ftp://ftp.ussg.iu.edu/linux/opensuse/distribution/10.3/

Re:Super bandwidth full iso download via FTP

[Anonymous Coward]

Hi, if I follow the link you provided down to
ftp://ftp.ussg.iu.edu/linux/opensuse/distribution/10.3/iso/dvd/
I can only find an ISO file that is about 115 MB in size. Am I missing something here? I have tried to download it all day from the main SuSE site without any success. Do you have any other links? Thanks

I got yer "Giver" right here!

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

OpenSUSE supports fakeRAID out-of-box

[postmortem]

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.

Most useable Linux distribution ever

[usv]

This is simply the most useable Linux distribution I have ever tried. I highly recommend new Linux users to check out this release :)

Doesn't work with Intel Debugger (idb)

[loftyhauser]

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.

MP3 support? Sweet!

[Anonymous Coward]

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!!@!

Y. A. G. S. R. or Yet Another Great SuSE Release

[croftj]

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!

Not FLAMEBAIT!!!!

[speaker of the truth]

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.

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 :D

Re:Not FLAMEBAIT!!!!

[PtrToNull]

Both distros claim to support and do all of the above. If you compile your program on SUSE, you want that binary to work on Fedora 7? Most likely not. Just compile it again on Fedora 7.

OpenSUSE 10.3 looks quite promising. I've been using SUSE since 8.2 and by far this is the most polished release in the 10.x series. I also recommend KDE, and I don't buy this "KDE is for power users only". I have KDE 3.5 setup on the kids computer (6 years to 12 years) and they never complained, being able to use all of the programs seamlessly. I never liked Gnome, but perhaps my personal choice. I do believe though that KDE has a superior architecture and its potential is not fully realized. With KDE4 on the way, it would be a great desktop experience.

Re:Not FLAMEBAIT!!!!

[NoseyNick]

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.

There's license differences, which most people won't care about, there's graphical differences, but either one is so configurable it can be configured to look a lot like the other. Apps from one will run pretty seamlessly in the other if you have both sets of libraries installed (and the package managers will do that for you, you don't need to worry about it). Personally I chose Gnome because it's a bit more GNU, but I doubt you'll be too offended by either.

Also I'm wondering whether openSuse or Fedora is more newbie friendly (again not meant as flamebait!)

Having used both, I suspect SUSE. Fedora probably has more packages in the distro, but SUSE seems to have now made it incredibly easy to add extra community repositories anyway. SUSE's installer has felt more polished than fedora's for quite a while.

What I want to do on my computer would be to: [...]

Are MUDs still telnet-based these days? To be honest, you'll find just about ANY linux can do all the things you just listed, though I'm hoping you're not expecting Wine to work for EVERYTHING. It's not bad, but it's a perpetual catch-up game for the wine developers.

Ease of installation and use - I've tried installing Linux before and it was not newbie friendly enough.

SUSE was widely reported as being easier to install than windows, and that was several releases ago, and it's got better since... However, that's probably just saying WINDOWS installation isn't newbie friendly enough either. When it comes down to it, OS installation is not simple, though SUSE is probably simpler than most, including Windoze. :-/

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?

Linux really deserves a Linux partition AT LEAST for booting. Windows can't read linux filesystems (easily), so yeah, you probably want a data partition that's readable by both for transfers between them. Linux can read just about any Windows filesystem as long as it's not encrypted.

Another possibility is to run windows inside vmware or xen or something, and share files between them with something like samba, whereby linux serves parts of its filesystems over the network (which needn't be a real physical network) to windows boxes.
swap partition - theoretically you can have a swap FILE instead of a swap partition, but you'll get better performance out of a dedicated partition.

Does the installation CD handle that? Or do I have to do it myself?

SUSE will make a damned good guess and say "here's what I intend to do", and you can accept it, or edit it if you're feeling clever.

Detecting networks and peripherals - The last time I tried installing Linux (I can't remember the distro) this was a particularly bad problem.

SUSE is pretty damned good at this, better than several other Linux distros I've tried, and arguably better than recent Windows releases, HOWEVER you may still find some hardware is ONLY Windows compatible (because the manufacturers refuse to work with developers who have offered to write drivers for free). There's also quite a lot of hardware that is ONLY Linux compatible (especially some of the older stuff, and some of the more scientific stuff), but you're obviously unlikely to have any of that :-)

Being able to compile and run programs in Fedora 7

Interesting. USUALLY this will work and you can just copy the binaries across. On those rare occasions when it doesn't "just work", you can usually take the

Re:Not FLAMEBAIT!!!!

[speaker of the truth]

Thanks, I'll have to give Suse a try. It seems like its much easier then the last distro I tried (and yes muds are still telnet based. I just included it to be exhaustive ;)).

Re:Not FLAMEBAIT!!!!

[orcrist]

I just wanted to add one more tip to all that great advice from the GP:
Forget the FAT32 partition. There is a pretty decent ext2 driver for Windows now, and SuSE installs everything as ext3 by default, which can be mounted as ext2.

Just to be clear, ext3 is the journaled version of ext2, so you can access your Linux partitions using that, with the caveat that it will not be journaled when using it in windows (i.e. make sure to force a file-system check in Linux if Windows doesn't end cleanly). Another problem would be that windows cannot list a directory if it contains filenames which are legal in Linux but not in Windows, e.g. ':'. But you couldn't write files like that to a FAT32 partition anyway. As long as you're sure to separate the data you want to share in it's own folder, it shouldn't be a problem. I would recommend that you install 3 partitions: swap, root (/), and home (/home). Then mount only your home dir in Windows.

Re:Not FLAMEBAIT!!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Suse with guru repository has fuse ntfs-3g....
This makes it possible too write data on ntfs...

Hope this any help...

Re:Not FLAMEBAIT!!!!

[speaker of the truth]

I just wanted to say thankyou very much for for recommending openSUSE and KDE. I've used both for a little bit now and there's definitely a learning curve, but already I'm seeing the advantages to the differences. Also installation was absolutely painless. Much easier then installing Windows. So thankyou.

nspluginwrapper

[Anonymous Coward]

Why not try this?

I love SuSE but

[dragin33]

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.

Re:I love SuSE but

[NoseyNick]

This isn't a programming problem, it's a silly licensing / patent / legal problem...
... and only really in the US, in fact.

What makes it better than Ubuntu, in your opinion?

[jopet]

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?

Re:What makes it better than Ubuntu, in your opini

[eimikion]

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.

Tested

[AdmV0rl0n]

The good:-

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 /SMB connection just led to hanging apps, zero responsiveness, burp, hang, burp.
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.