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Corel Linux Beta Program
Gameaholic writes "Corel is currently looking for beta testers for the upcoming Corel® LINUX® operating system. Corel LINUX is a Linux distribution specifically designed for desktop computer users. It is based on Debian and includes KDE as well as new applications and enhancements from Corel. " The battle for the desktop continues.
Ok, I'm all for yet another distribution... and I think Corel has the punch to pull it off. What I really want is a distribution that is friendly, simple, and pretty enough that my mom will go get it, install it, and run it.
:)
Right now we have several niches... Slackware for the "I want to do it all myself" hardcore type, redhat and mandrake for the middle of the crowd bunch who either don't have the time or inclination or just plain want a "push button" install but still want a nice hackerish system, and debian for the long-haired suspender-wearing "here's a nickel, kid, buy yourself a better computer" crowd that wants an easy to build, clean system with all the power and a lot less glitz. What we still don't have (although redhat and mandrake seem to be trying to get there) is a distribution for our moms. Maybe Corel can fill that niche, maybe not, but at the very minimum anything they do to move towards that is good for the linux community as a whole.
Best of all, if Corel just manages to pull it off my mom just might quit calling me and asking me to troubleshoot her windows problems.
-- Gary F.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
They're package management system has lagged behind Red Hat's due to lack of developers for a while.
Has it? Is there a feature in RedHat's system allowing you to automatically update from a server? (I honestly want to know, I'm not trying to start a flameware here). That feature is one of the major reasons I use Debian.
I don't belive there is a need for this feahttpture to be rolled into the rpm codebase. autorpm is quite good at pulling updates from a distribution company web site automaticaly. It's quite good at keeping an rpm based system up to date from any number of mirrors ( handles mirror rotations and such).
With other utilities such as rpmfind and the very useful rpm database at rpmfind.net, an admin of an rpm based system has all the tools they need to manage the system.
OMNSHO, a system to act as a front end to all three would be an even better boon to the community.
--
James Michael Keller
"Linux is not our destination, it is simply the open road to tommorow"
Among the FAQ's is:
I suspect this one falls into the old "RTFM" category.
D. Keith Higgs
CWRU. Kelvin Smith Library
My office has been taken over by iPod people.
Look at their Beta Requirements:
[...]
Windows® 95, Windows 98 or Windows NT® (4.0)
[...]
my PnP sound card setup runs only on Windows
Personally, I prefer to stick to 'genuine' Creative Labs cards (they are better supported even under Windows -- or so my Windows using friends say). I have been able to successfully get a couple of generic clone sound cards working under Linux, the first being a "Digital Research Labs" (free after rebate from CompUSA) which uses the ESS 1869 chip set. I used the isapnp utilities to initialize the card, and then the RedHat sndcfg utility could be persuaded that it was a SoundBlaster and it worked. The second card is an old (pre PnP jumperless) Aztech Sound Galaxy 16, which I was able to get working with the OSS drivers supplied with SuSE. As far as I can tell most sound cards can be made to work with Linux with a little bit of research. Being impatient, its generally easier for me to just get a Creative Labs card...
Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvolds, at least in the U.S.A. Technically Corel is a Canadian company, but I suspect that they will abide in general by U.S. trademark laws, since a large percentage of their business is with the U.S.
According to their FAQ, they won't release source code until they make their final release. Doesn't that violate the GPL? I thought you always had to release source if you released binaries...
The cake is a pie
But the thing I see people overlooking is the fact that this is most likely a limited beta program. From the site:
Ok so now everyone on /. is rushing in their forms, etc. You have to pause and think that Corel more than likely doesn't want too many geekmeisters like most slashdotters testing the thing. Yeah, there will be openings, but I bet that they are more interested in useability testing and interface bugs than security right now. What i'm attempting to drive at here is that their server is probably being swamped by the /. effect and thus making it difficult for johnny aolScriptKiddie to sign up for the program. now i'm not saying that johnny is any better at using linux than the general reader around here, but hey, this might be a way to pull johnny out of his stupidity as an AOL lamer and maybe get him on a decent OS and possibly let him learn a few new things too. I guess what I'm saying is that, from the perspective of the general advancement of linux, this story shouldn't have been posted: simply because of the tendancy /. has to flood sites with eager people.
I don't know that Corel is having any problems, although I did read someone's post about having script errors on the beta submission page... I'd have to guess that they are feeling some strain.
So for linux's sake, don't slashdot Corel!! :-)
just my $0.34
(oh, and sorry about the italic tags. This post is not lynx compatible. :-)
From a motherboard manual, error beep codes: S-L-L-L-SS: Speaker Error
Not really. Some idiot tried to trademark "Linux" as a music-related term, and then sue Linux the kernel for infringement. As part of the settlement, the trademark was assigned to Linus, so Linus now owns a worthless trademark for the word "Linux" that only applies to some narrow music-related field. Even if it was broader, the trademark would be unenforceable by now, since Linus has not vigorously protected it (barely at all). Does Debian have a written contract allowing them to use the term Linux? What about Red Hat? SuSE? Slackware? If not, they're all in violation of the trademark, and since Linus hasn't done anything bout it, his claim on the trademark can be assumed to have been reliquished.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
OK, they made a few boo-boos regarding forms and generic requirements documents. Please consider that the office staff don't necessarily understand Windows or Linux, they've been given boiler-plate copy by someone who does, and they'll have to get new boiler-plate now.
They'll also have to comply with existing software licenses - which means if any Beta tester asks them for the source of an already GPL-ed program that Corel is distributing, Corel will have to give it to them. It might take a bit of explaining to get this through to them, but the Debian folks can handle that quite well. If Corel wants to put the GPL on any entirely new stand-alone software, it's Corel's choice when they do that, and they have the right to hold back the source until the GPL goes on it.
Expect some growing pains as a formerly windows-centric company ventures into Linux. Give them a little time.
Bruce Perens
Bruce Perens.
IIRC, WINE can be configured either to use existing Windows .dll's that are installed on the machine, or to use its own native versions. I believe one of the goals of the WINE project is to re-implement the non-free Windows libraries, just as LessTif freely re-implements Motif.
I heard something a few months ago about Corel contributing resources (manpower?) to the WINE project, but haven't heard anything about this in quite a while.
Address-collecting spam robots don't know how to crack ROT13. Do you?
Are you smoking crack or what? Debian package management suite is and was far superior to anything that redhat had. dpkg/dselect/apt, never break and are pretty much rock solid. You can sync your system with ftp mirrors with just 2 commands. Hell you can upgrade the whole system with apt-get dist-upgrade command from ftp/http/cdrom/whatever. dselect and apt also take care of dependencies and conflicts automatically. There are other benefits too, these are just a few that I got from top of my head. RedHat LAGS in this area, sorry.
I haven't used a debian install before, so I'm not going to get into which is better with debian folk. However just because rpm's own codebase dosn't have those features is irrelivent. Other packages handle those functions you belive it lacks, work just as well doing the same things. They don't replace, but work with rpm. Rpm handles the package databasing, installing, removing, etc. Autorpm has all the networking code to go out and check the ftp servers and download anything new - and if you set it to - update the rpms. It's especially good when you point it at redhat's update dir on the ftp server, so when I read something on bugtraq or redhat-list about a patched package update -- it's already on my system.
Rpmfind handles finding and meeting dependencies. It too, simply uses the rpm system - vs bloating rpm itself with functions.
The problem with automagickal download and installs is it only works when your system is rolled in a consistant basis. Ie BSD's ports collection system is great - it will download and install anything needed to install the package you needed in the first place. However that only works because the entire system is set up to do version checking for libraries and such. It's also a source based system. If your dealing with binaries - as most people using rpm do - you get into all sorts of problems.
If you always use say --sources for your rpmfind call, and recompile the src.rpm files all the time you get the same effect.
The downside is not every package is going to be up on an ftp server in rpm format. I think what rpm really needs is a much better source/binary rpm packaging system. More exactly a front end that generates .spec files. Rpm handles the generation just fine. That way if you can't find anything but tarballs of the latest and greatest file you - or the developers or packge mantainers - could create a standard .spec based on a valid template. Something where you could move around and tag files as documetation, binaries, etc and pick the paths. And output a valid .spec file.
That wouldn't help for when you have to create patches against the source Makefiles to add in rpm environment vars, but even that could be automated by such a system looking for hard coded paths in Makefiles and such.
--
James Michael Keller
"Linux is not our destination, it is simply the open road to tommorow"
Not really, it is mostly just a simple statement of fact. I imagine a lot of (for example) Mac owners could say the same thing. Although, unlike them, I have had to go out of my way to keep from buying any copies of Windows (like buying mainly only used hardware or building it myself). It would be a much bigger feat for a Mac owner to be able to say they had no copies of MacOS, since it is even more difficult to buy Mac hardware w/o MacOS than it is to buy PC hardware without Windows. It wouldn't be much of a statement if I said I owned no copy of OS/2 or BeOS, or whatever, since it is easy to buy hardware without them. If it weren't for Linux and/or the *BSD's, I probably wouldn't own any x86 PCs.
Actually I don't believe that is correct at all. From what I remember, the person who filed the original trademark that prompted the court case that ended with the trademark being assigned to Linus specifically claimed the trademark on "computer operating system software" and then tried to hold up the Linux distributers and book publishers for money. You may be getting the "Apple Records" vs. "Apple Computer" case confused with this one here.
As for having to "vigorously protect" a trademark, IANAL, but I don't see Debian, Red Hat, SuSE or Slackware (or any of the other distros I know about) as having tried to usurp the trademark. They are not calling something that is not Linux, "Linux". Furthermore, every Linux distro I've seen has specifically acknowledged Linus as owning the trademark, and as being the original author of the Linux kernel. I don't believe that you necessarily need a contract, written or otherwise, for using a trademark provided you do so within the framework of the trademark law.
So therefore I'd say that no enforcement action on Linus's part has been necessary, so there would be no reason to assume that his trademark has been relinquished.
At any rate, if a trademark is relinquished because of falling into general use, it means that nobody else can claim that term as a trademark.
If someone has good reason to believe I'm wrong (especially a lawyer), then let's hear why...
So yeah, there has to be something made clear here: part of the reason Debian works so beautifully is that the distribution itself consists of ~3000 packages maintained by various people, all held to the same standards.
:)
:), the first thing I do is a
... I do :) in like 4 months, since there hasn't been a working version of gtkglarea. Unlike RedHat, there's no rufus repository with tons of builds of different versions of everything. On the other hand, in my experience (ran RedHat for a long time) a lot of stuff on Rufus didn't work because it was impossible to meet its dependency requirements, since there was no central control over the type of machine it was built on. In Debian, the latest version of each package in the Stable or Unstable (woohoo unstable!) trees is always built to work with the latest of everything else. It's only because of this that the auto-installed dependency thing works at all.
... let me set up a masquerading ppp line machine in about 3 minutes (of course less 45 minutes toying with isapnp to get the bloody pnp modem to work :). I just answered the config questions, gave it the network info, phone number, account, and password, and BANG! it worked. Hehe, way easier than doing the same thing years ago under Slack 3.2 :)
:) It's pretty ugly, and not to be approached if you mind rtfm'ing ...
The result is that for 99.5% (at least that's the number on my system) of stuff you want, you use the distro's official version/build, which is guaranteed to work perfectly. On my system, I have ~530 packages installed. There are only 3 that are not native Debian packages -- the only 3 things I've found that I wanted that weren't available. So I downloaded the rpm and installed 'em with alien
It's kind of a similar philosophy to BSD, in that the OS consists not just of a kernel and a set of basic stuff, but of everything. In a BSD this is true because everyone's running THE official BSD -- no distros. In Debian, there's the same kind of mentality. By comparison, RedHat's distro is sparse (granted most of the difference is in packages that very very very few people are interested in).
Whenever I find out about a new program I find I need (happens all the time, this is Linux after all
dpkg -l "*progname*"
to see if there's already a Debian package. Exactly 3 times, there hasn't been one. If Debian wasn't behind on processing developer applications (they're focusing efforts on catching up with bug reports) I'd have already built debs for these apps.
Sometimes the system doesn't work so well: as an example, there hasn't been a working version of XTraceroute (maybe you don't consider that essential
The result is impressive.
I've run a lot of both distros. I came to the conclusion Debian was superior because it has everything in a compatible, working version. That makes my life a lot simpler. In addition, Debian packages have Config scripts that make setting up a lot of stuff stuff easy even if you're not familiar with the specific config file formats
Man, that was way offtopic. I do intend to try Corel's stuff tho. I hope the license on their config stuff is good, cause Debian's idea of a "user-friendly" install is, the "voice" of the person who asks you various questions and tells you what's going on (in text mode) during the install, is pretty chatty and likable
IANAL either, but I thought that it was required to license a trademark in order to sell a product using that trademark as a name. RedHat labels its products as "RedHat Linux," not "RedHat OS which contains the Linux(r) kernel." If Red Hat wants to call their product itself "Linux," and Linux is a registered trademark, I think it would be necessary to obtain a license to do so (perhaps for free, but it'd still have to be done officially).
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
If the people doing the IA-64 port are not considered to be "copying" or "distributing" amongst themselves the modified Linux kernel, GNU libc, etc. they're doing for the port, then the GPL doesn't oblige them to make the source available to others, nor does it mean they can't stop any of those people from "distributing" the programs or the source to the programs to others.
The impression I have from what I've seen is that the NDA will end when Intel releases all the details of IA-64 (unless I've missed something, they haven't released the full details, just those details that would be used by application developers).
I myself think we need more software support in the way of applications.. not in the way of more Linux distributions. Ugh. More GPLed drivers also good.
I already have trouble tracking all of the Linux distributions we have now (actually, for the most part, I don't even bother any more). It's getting to be almost as bad as the fact that we have something like 80 or so flavors of Unix. Do we really need to fractionalize even further? I'm all for choice, but when fragmentation begins to occur on a widespread scale, that's not neccesarily a good thing.
Isn't fragmentation the entire reason why Unix fell to Windows in the first place (seems like a good thing to keep in mind since Linux is "a UNIX-type operating system")? While we may not always be able to make the BSD folks happy (I like the three flavors of BSD [yes I'm ignoring BSDI because it's commercial, of course] about as much as any other free OSes), it would be nice to have a little bit more coordination among the different distros. It would be sort of annoying to see a lot of software crop up that only runs on a specific distro. I mean, I like Red Hat and all, but I don't think I have too much use for software that is specific to Red Hat (remember.. not everything that is going to be released for Linux is going to be GPLed or whatever, which would make it easier to port like crazy if we really want to if it was).
Besides, when there are so many different choices (a la 80 flavors of Unix), the average end-user becomes rather confused about what to get and so chooses whatever is popular (which is why I doubt Red Hat will lose its popularity lead any time soon.. popularity only tends to breed even more popularity in this industry because you can use your popularity as a leverage.. people go for what's hot, after all). A little bit of consolidation couldn't hurt.
At any rate, I don't think it would be a good idea for me personally if I decided to buy software from a company whose caps lock key gets stuck when they are typing in the name of their product and neglect to fix it, IMHO. The only places I tend to see all caps are in places where the author apparently doesn't want you to read the all caps in order to see what is really written there (like, say, legal statements, licensing agreements.. the really important parts of them, anyway). Seems like a product name would be an odd place to test out that particular technique.
Laugh. It's funny.
- yet another sleep-deprived post.. yay! -
~ Kish
(whether they know it or not).
I am seeing a lot of posts here to the effect "Corel Linux is designed for newbies, and so Beta Testers should be newbies." While I can see the angle these people are coming from (and i suspect Corel agrees with them) may I beg to differ?
I think that Corel Linux should have a large number of Wizard level Beta testers. Certainly a lot of newbies need to test it to, but I think at least half of the users should be experienced Linux users.
Why? First, because It is not impossible for an experienced user to construct a simple interface. If it is, we are all doomed. Bluntly, an experienced user who is bothering to consider user interface issues will come up with BETTER suggestions than a non-experienced user, simply because of his wider experience.
Second, Experienced users might actually fix the bugs!. An novice user is unlikely to fix a bug, even if it's just a missing entries on the start menu! Certainly, any non-transparent bug will not be diagnosed in a meaningful way.
Third, An experienced user will do a better job of reporting the bug. C'mon -- how many of us have gotten help desk calls to the effect of "It doesn't work right".
Finally, a non-experienced user will accept bugs that an experienced linux user would not. People who've never run Linux before are used to rebooting their computers three times a day!!! They will accept bugs that I would report (and likely fix).
For the reading impaired: I am not saying corel needs no novice users -- I'm just saying that's not ALL they need.
If Corel Linux is going to be a success in the market they are aiming for, it needs to be much better than windows. Making it better from a novice users point of view is going to be an uphill battle -- the things novice users care most about (pretty pictures) are already reasonably well done in Windows. Corel need all the help they can get if they are going to compete.
-- Slashdot sucks.
Love the generic (and incorrect) links on the side of the page linked to above - specifically "Minimum Requirements". Guess I don't meet them,
as I don't have "Windows® 95, Windows 98 or Windows NT® (4.0)" installed.
Even the actual form is rather silly. "TSRs"? "Windows version"? "Type of documents you produce"? The first two are pointless for evaluating
a Linux product and the third's probably cut from a form about Wordperfect. I really hope Corel's actual distribution is a lot well thought out than
their web site advertising the beta test is.
Still, the FAQ link is somewhat encouraging, though there are potential problems with this:
| Will Corel be releasing the source code for applications it has created such
| as the Corel File Manager?
| Corel will be making the source code available for such applications. The
| exact terms of the license under which the source code
| will be distributed has not yet been announced.
People who care won't like it unless it's GPL.
-- Rick
I am wondering why a Beta Test has to be closed to only a few chosen applicants? Is the spirit of open source to allow everyone access to your code for peer review?
...if you assume they have a windows based installation program that they want the beta group to test. I don't know if that's the case, though.
--
Fuck the system? Nah, you might catch something.
Of course it requires windows! That way for each beta tester they get that is one LESS windows user out there.
It's brilliant!
Now lets see we need about 80 million beta testers......
Bitcoin pyramid: Join here: http://www.bitcoinpyramid.com/r/1427 it's FREE!
They haven't released any binaries yet. It's still in-house. That's means it's not released. Circular logic, but true. Until they DISTRIBUTE it, the GPL does not kick in. You may not like it, but tough, that's the GPL. Even though the beta testers may not be Corel employees, Corel Linux has still not been released.
When Corel puts the distribution up on a generally accessible server, or begins selling it, then they have released it. As long as Corel employees or its contractors (including beta testers who have to fill out an application first) are the only ones with access to the programs, they are not released.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
"But this doesn't sound as if Corel is truly dedicated to the GPL"
Pardon me for asking, but why should Corel be "truly dedicated" to the GPL? This is strange term to use, and one usually reserved for religions, political causes and spouses. The closest of the above would be a political cause (because the worshippers keep telling me it's not a religion).
I'll ignore the question of why the cause should be an individual license and not Free Software itself, but ask instead "why should Corel follow your cause?" Aren't they allowed to have their own causes? Aren't people allowed to think differently than you without arising the suspicions of the citizens committee? And most importatnly, why is no one is talking about possible violations of the Artistic license, or the QPL, or the MPL?
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
I've noticed a lot of posts commenting on their beta test requirements. In paticular the windows requirement. I don't think it's a typo, or an out of date page. The Corel distribution is "specifically designed for desktop computer users."
I think really what they mean is that it is meant for people migrating from Windows desktops to Linux. So, if you're not running Windows now, they won't be able to guage the friendliness of the migration. Let alone if you don't even have Windows, you won't run into configuration problems if you're a Linux wiz who wants to go mess with Corel's config files.
The same applies for Macs.
Joseph Elwell.
Corel is a familiar name to most Windows users, definately the most visible software company (besides the recent marketing of RHAT) to jump in with both feet. Seeing them get serious about Linux could be a VGT in winning some converts. I think they're on track... a beta now, a release before the EOY... most of the work has already been done by those of us using Debian GNU/Linux (on which CL is based). I would guess the 'beta' part would be the installation and package management. Debian is fantastic 'under the hood,' but the face is pretty ugly. If Corel could beautify the interface on apt and the installation, that'd be marvelous. Imagine this: a five CD set, with CL, CorelDraw/Linux, Corel Office/Linux, for $99. Think a lot of people would jump at the chance to have practically all the software they'd ever need for $99? I'd be quite interested in that. Linux needs Corel Draw, and could use a great distro that isn't RedHat. It'll make RH, Caldera, SuSE, and the rest better. Competition is good. And Corel gets points for using the fantastic Debian package system, allowing for painless software installation and upgrades, something the other commercial distros sorely lack.
Come on, what better way to test it than to dump it on an ftp site and let people try the distro? Even Red Hat drops their alphas/betas out there as a preliminary to actually releasing a burn.
Well it appears, as they are using the name Linux that they are releasing a distrubution of a GPLd software. So one, they can use the license given to them properly or they can try to skirt around it by finding loopholes and what not. Hopefully this is not their intentions, but I was just simply pointing out that they arn't following the licensed they choose for themselves by making a linux distrubution. (and no I would not consider myself a GPL fanatic, accually I'm not all that concered personally as I still primarly run M$ windoze. But I do believe, by personal feelings that all software that interoperats with other software should be open for inspection. All driver specs should be open so that the hardware can be used to its full potential. And that all file type artitecture should be open (aka wordprocessor document formats, graphic formats etc.) So that anyone can compete on a level playing field. Is this too much to ask???!!
I find it hard to believe that every distro has personally asked Linus (or his lawyers) for permission to use the Linux trademark. Slackware has been using it since before it was registered - did Patrick ask Linus for licensing of the trademark after it was trademarked?
I still think the whole trademark is invalid - if you look at the filing, it's all wrong. It claims August 1994 as the first use of the word, when it was in use long before that.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
When Wall St. gets wind of the fact that Corel is coming out with their own Linux distro, will it's stock (which is currently at something like 5 3/4) suddenly become really really valuable? I mean, even if the distro ends up sucking ass, won't it increase like gangbusters just on what RHAT did?
I for one am betting it will; I'm taking some of my profit from RHAT and putting it into CORL and crossing my fingers -- the worst that can happen is I'll have to pay less taxes next year.
Hopefully Wall Street is as much on crack as I think it is, and I'll see ya'll while I'm flying over in my private jet. =)
----
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.