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A Trip Down Distro Memory Lane

Posted by timothy on from the early-nostalgia-is-the-best-kind dept.

M-Saunders writes "What did the Linux world look like back in 2000? TuxRadar has republished a distro roundup from Linux Format issue 1, May 2000. Many distros such as SUSE, Mandrake and Red Hat are still around in various incarnations, but a few such as Corel and Definite have fallen by the wayside."

20 of 238 comments (clear)

  1. SuSE Ruled... by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...until Novell bought them out. When it became apparent that Novell wasn't going to uphold the SuSE quality, I switched over to Ubuntu. Haven't looked back since.

    1. Re:SuSE Ruled... by Shuntros · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I'd be interested if you could give a full breakdown of what SuSE's shortcomings are since Novell took them over. I've used SuSE since the late 90s. It was never foolproof, no distro is, but despite trying a number of other distros I still find it preferable to all of them, including Ubuntu.

    2. Re:SuSE Ruled... by IANAAC · · Score: 5, Insightful
      Except that Novell has done some good things too. Yast is still pretty amazing. Oh and Novell opened it up and set it free.

      It's OK to not like a company, but give them credit where they actually deserve it.

    3. Re:SuSE Ruled... by Xoron101 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I've always thought that Debian was a great Distro. Stable, lots of packages that can be installed, and lots of resources on the web.

      Ubuntu (based on Debian) ties it all together with a nice, easy to use installer and GUI. Great choice for desktops, but I'd stick to Debian for servers.

    4. Re:SuSE Ruled... by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 5, Funny

      The first SuSE version released from Novell broke on my system, wasn't worth the time to fix, and I went back to the previous version. If that was the best Novell could do with SuSE, then I would try another distro. When it came time to rebuild my file server, I went with Ubuntu since it just work when I installed it. These days I prize working out the box over calling forth my grandmother's spirit to recompile the kernel to run on ordinary PC hardware.

  2. Slackware rules! by spaceyhackerlady · · Score: 5, Interesting

    In 2000 I was a seasoned Slackware user, and had been so for several years. I did my Master's thesis in LaTeX on a Pentium 233MMX box (which I still have), complete with diagrams done in xfig.

    I did a lot of course work on that box: Viterbi decoding, polyspectral analysis, lots more.

    ...laura

    1. Re:Slackware rules! by morgan_greywolf · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Slack was and still is a nice distro for folks that know what they're doing, want a solid, stable system and don't care much about fit and polish or having the latest goodies. I was Slack user and proponent myself for a couple of years.

      The main thing I don't like about Slack is that lack of real package management. I like the power and convenience that tools like Synaptic and apt-get provide -- a lot. And the fit and polish that desktop-oriented distros like Ubuntu offer is a guilty pleasure for me and an absolute necessity for my techno-angst-ridden wife.

      --
      My blog
    2. Re:Slackware rules! by GreatDrok · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I started out with Slackware in late 1994 on a 486DX33 with 8MB of RAM. It was amazing. 40 floppies to install it since I had no CDROM drive. I bought a 14.4 modem and had access to my university e-mail (pine FTW). X11, gcc, Netscape, FTP, the lot. All on a machine with 200MB of disc. I reckon I could function quite happily on that machine even today apart from Netscape which would have to be replaced with Lynx I guess.

      By 2000, a Linux distro was incredibly easy to install by comparison. Today it is even easier. You barely even need to worry about compatibility.

      --
      "I have the attention span of a strobe lit goldfish, please get to the point quickly!"
    3. Re:Slackware rules! by dbcad7 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Slackware is what I started on.. I remember getting the Cds, making a root and boot disk and installing.. It was during the time of modem internet and I specifically bought a modem that would work (non win-modem).. getting that baby to work was a challenge but always satisfying once the puzzles were solved. I kept that modem through several upgrades and new systems.

      I think the order of discovery for me, was.. Slackware, Redhat, Mandrake, Debian .. once I got a taste of Debian, it's been Debian based distro's ever since.

      Things sure have come a long way.. but I don't regret the hours I spent solving problems way back then.. as I said there was a certain satisfaction to getting something to work.

      --
      waiting for ad.doubleclick.net
    4. Re:Slackware rules! by Peter+Simpson · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I built a Slackware system and had it dual-booting on my 486-33 at my new job. I was using it (with X11 and Motif) as an Xterminal off our UNIX system to do schematic capture, after I got fed up with Win3.1 and QEMM (which was what I was supposed to be using).

      That the same hardware could perform so much better running Linux (versus Win3.1) was a real eye-opener .

      Have not thought a Microsoft OS was worth paying for since.

    5. Re:Slackware rules! by JK_the_Slacker · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I beg your pardon. You're referring to dependency management. Slackware has had "real" package management for YEARS.

      For real people... stop the FUD!

      --
      I'm waiting for a "-1 somepeoplejustshouldn'tgetmodprivileges" meta-moderation.
  3. Mandrake Mandriva by fyoder · · Score: 5, Funny

    Many distros such as SUSE, Mandrake and Red Hat are still around in various incarnations

    Mandrake started out well, but then suffered some sort of identity crisis, had a sex change, and become the totally flakey bitch named Mandriva. Some say she's been to rehab and is much nicer now, but she is ancient history as far as I'm concerned.

    --
    Loose lips lose spit.
  4. It was a nightmare for regular users in 2000... by WiiVault · · Score: 4, Interesting

    and look how far it has come. Seriously, despite some remaining imperfections Linux has turned into a really pleasant desktop experience. I remember when installing Linux was a nightmare, with dozens of configurations, tons of unsupported hardware, and the need for highly advanced skills just to make it usable. Now it is rare to have to mess with the details- for the most part it just works. I'm primarily a Mac user, but I do a lot of stuff on my Ubuntu install as well, I am just shocked at how far Linux has come and quite interested in what is to come.

    1. Re:It was a nightmare for regular users in 2000... by Rhabarber · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You say it, in 2000 I set up a Gentoo system on one of those early Pentium III Notebooks. Yes, sure, it took me a couple of hours. But guess what, I still use it every day, exclusively. Just copied it from box to box over the years. So I'd say that time was quite a good investment ;)

    2. Re:It was a nightmare for regular users in 2000... by Vlobulle · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Well, in 2009 the audio system is still a complete mess and the screen configuration (setting the resolution and multiscreen settings) not far behind.

  5. Re:I've got your 2000 right here... ;) by morgan_greywolf · · Score: 5, Funny

    None of the silly pissing matches about which distro was the best.

    Now I know you're lying!

    --
    My blog
  6. Sad To Remember by hduff · · Score: 4, Interesting

    You'll find my name in the contributors for documentation in Mandrake 7.0, and it was an excellent distro in 2000 and remains so today. They would likely be a more significant distro today had they not experienced near-fatal management problems (mostly a re-focus of resources on computer-aided learning). Corporate bankruptcy did not help even though they emerged from it, a rare occurrence in France. But their biggest failure was to develop admin tools for their Red Hat-clone in Perl rather than what Red Hat used, Python, probably the combination of developer preference and a desire to be "NOT" Red Hat. They also introduced a number of incompatibilities just because they thought their way was better (and it may have been). Their style/icon/theme choices were not the best either (plain and cartoon-ish) and failed to appeal to younger Linux enthusiasts. They had a good concept with "Red Hat done better" and should have stuck with that. It is still my distro of choice, even with my familiarity of Red Hat (I've been a Red Hat Fedora Unleashed co-author). But it's sad to remember the opportunities squandered at Mandrake/Mandriva. I would suggest that anybody give it a try, especially if you have not yet selected a favorite distro. It now does have a nice feel and polish and "just works".

    --
    "I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
  7. Anyone Remember the Four Yorkshiremen Distro? by Dogtanian · · Score: 5, Funny

    I started out with Slackware in late 1994 on a 486DX33 with 8MB of RAM. It was amazing. 40 floppies to install it since I had no CDROM drive.

    That's nothing. I ran Linux 0.03 on my Sinclair ZX81 in early 1982. It were stored on 300 C90 cassettes, took 18 days to load and I had to hold the RAM pack to stop it wobbling.

    And you try and tell the young people of today that ..... they won't believe you.

    --
    "Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
    1. Re:Anyone Remember the Four Yorkshiremen Distro? by ebh · · Score: 4, Funny

      Cassettes? Luxury.

      I read Linus's mind in 1974, keyed what would later become Linux 0.0.01 into the front panel of an IMSAI 8080 with 1K of RAM, and once I got it running, backed it up using the paper tape punch of the ASR-33 I used for the console.

      The first application I wrote for it was an ESP transmitter which I used to beam the Apple II monitor ROM bits into Steve Wozniak's brain.

  8. Re:A 'get off my lawn' moment by Peter+Simpson · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I have in my hand, a CDROM marked "December 1993" from Infomagic, I also have Infomagic's 2-CD Linux Developer's Resource from June 1994, with (it says here):

    - complete snapshots of TSX-11.MIT.EDU and sunsite.unc.edu Linux archives

    - SLS 1.05 with kernel 1.0

    - Debian 0.91 beta

    - Preliminary versions of the WINE code

    and a "complete live filesystem!" ...and lots more. Wow. Hard to believe, huh?

    (now, get off my lawn...and here, take this Ubuntu disk and try it out at home)