I presently own a PalmIIIe. For the most part it's great. Sometimes it crashes, sometimes I wish it could do more, but if I had a pile of money and the chance to do it over again I'd probably just get a IIIc.
My biggest beef about the Palm is that I can only write 4k notes. Now I know you can get around this with a shareware program (SuperPad), but I'm not sure if that'll sync with my Linux machine.
The Palm is great. No thanks to 3Com it has great Linux connectivity, and the uber-geeky palm keyboard is the handiest add-on ever. I've used my little Palm to write several essays and reviews. I love it.
If the OS doesn't have silly limitiations (like the Palm) if it's easy to use, inexpensive and syncs well with my Linux box, then I'll think about upgrading/switching.
Does anyone out there know the status of PDA's and Linux? The Palm works well, CE'd be a bust (I'm guessing" but what about all of these Linux-based PDAs? What about embedded QT? Do they provide syncing with Linux desktop machines? The Yopi? Etc.
That, and no stupid file limits (4k for the apps, 32k hard.. sheesh.. what were they thinking?) is what I want.
Oh, and since they don't have to pay MS, it had better be cheaper than the current crop..
What is it with people on Slashdot lately? Did anyone READ the article, or did you all just denounce it as "evil" before you lost patience waiting for the (now slashdot'd) server to go down? Seriously!
This article has been up on dot.kde.org for a few days now, and (while I initially wasn't too excited about the idea) is a very interesting read. What the author has basically done is lay the foundations for good solid bindings for any language. His initial cut was for Objective-C , and now Java.
There are no licensing issues here, as these are simply language bindings that allow you to use KDE and the very capable Qt to write GUI apps that integrate well with the rest of KDE. As was pointed out at the dot, this is meant for java the language, not java the platform. As was also pointed out, the possibility of gcj+kde bindings could eventually make for a fast compiled app in an easy to write for language.
Oh, and for the record, this was started for Gnome back in 1998:
http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gtk-list/1998-Nov em ber/msg00481.html
http://news.gnome.org/gnome-news/961253384/index _h tml
One of the things that Gnome-toting Slashdotters often criticize QT and KDE for is the lack of language bindings. Well, now they have Python, Java, Objective-C, C, Perl (in some state) and more on the horizon. So now that this has been addressed you feel you have to blast them for doing precisely this?
The page also praises GTK for it's portability. When was the last time you read a Gnome page that made reference to anything done by KDE in a good light?
Come on, everybody needs to grow up here. KDE doesn't suck, Gnome doesn't suck, Java doesn't suck. They all have their place. Java is a fun language to program in. A nice compromise between C and SmallTalk. Be nice here.
My girlfriend has informed me that Sid was the bad kid in the first movie. I haven't seen it though, so don't quote me on it..
Ben
New 2.4.x Compilation issues under Debian unstable
on
Kernel 2.4.2 Released
·
· Score: 2
Hi.
I'm not too sure what's going on, some can someone help me: I downloaded 2.4.2 and was hapily compiling it until at the end of "make bzImage" I got an error about ld not being able to find "binary." The line in the makefile was something along the lines of:
(forgive me if I'm a little off, I'm away from the machine at the moment..)
I quickly flipped through the ld manpage and saw that -oformat is a valid option. I then tried recompiling 2.4.1 which I had installed cleanly when it came out and got the same problem. I looked at the Makefile in 2.2.18 and there is no -oformat for the ld call there.. at last I can still compile it..
Does anyone have any ideas about what my problem is? I don't know too much about the Gnu linker, but it looks like maybe the version in sid doesn't jove with the Linux kernel..
I never claimed that 2 800's are as fast as one 1.6GHz. I understand the limitations of SMP, but for MY main uses (which I outlined in my original posting) the dual processors are more appreciated.
However, for your run-of-the-mill Win9x gamer, the 1.6GHz is certainly a better option. This isn't my needs..
Seriously, 1.6GHz sounds VERY impressive, but I'll take more CPU's and better components over a faster CPU any day.
I've had my Dual 466 Celeron for over a year and a half now, and it's absolutely fantastic, and rock-solid stable. Sure, I've upgraded the RAM over that time from 128MB to 512, but through it all I've felt no need to upgrade the processor(s)
The motherboard recently went south on me and I had to replace it. I got looking around and noticed that Asus now has a dual PIII board for ~$230CDN. I ended up just RMAing this board, but I know when I do eventually need to upgrade there's no WAY I'll be going back to a single processor board.
If you're running Linux, FreeBSD or Win2k (or even BeOS) an SMP system makes a world of difference under heavy load. Recompiling? Encoding MP3's? Running VMWare? These operations are sped up very noticeably.
For people looking for a new machine: Save your precious dollars on the fastest processor. Fill up on RAM, get a good video card, and get an SMP board. I'd rather have 2 800MHz chips than a 1.6GHz any day of the week.
AMD: I'd rather get an SMP chipset out of you than Yet Another "Fastest" Processor. I'd much rather own a Duron or Athalon than a crappy Celeron or PIII, but I'd take an SMP Celeron over a single Duron..
Almost every month I buy both the Linux Journal and Linux Mag. I love the detailed articles on LJ and the lighter but still somewhat meaty LM.
I bought an early Maximum Linux and was slightly embarassed by the fact that it read so much like a PC Gamer mag from about 5 years before. My girlfriend just bought me the latest (and last?) ML mag, and while the Route66 article was pretty good, the rest of it was pretty thin. I was hoping to learn something detailed about ICQ clients, I didn't. The Heavy Gear review was no better than the one that I had read in LJ (and LM too if I recall..)
Linux, while fantastic, still isn't as big as Windows or Mac. It's hard to sustain threee magazines that cover different aspects of Linux. I mean, LJ is really for admins/programmers, LM for "mainstream" users (does such a thing exist?) and there just isn't enough going on in the gamer/home market to sustain a "light" mag like ML is/was.
All the same, it's sad to hear. I'd rather it be them than LJ or LM.
Anyway, as long as the magazine is good, I'll keep buying Linux mags. I really wish that there had been a mag with at least a little space dedicated to BeOS. At least most of the Linux stuff in LJ applies to FreeBSD (and indeed any Unix.)
Hey, I found a cool British mag called "The Linux Magazine" not to be confused with Linux Magazine. It was pretty good. Maybe it'll take off.
Someone already posted a comment about this, it was at -1 and I was going to mod it up 'till I read it all. The last paragraph really was flamebate.
So, here's the content:
KDE and QT can do AA fonts etc too, it's not in the official QT yet, not the official KDE but it looks like it should make it in to Qt 2.3ish and KDE2.2ish. These versions guesses only.
Some articles are:
The status of QT and AA:
http://dot.kde.org/981146691/
Anyway, I've seen many similar screenshots and it looks great.
BTW: If you haven't checked it out recently, Konqueror (KDE's web browser) has vastly improved with 2.1B2. Check it out for sure! It does a lot of the things people are waiting for in Nautilus (and it lets you use Evolution at the same time;)
That's a nice theory, but I've just recently read about how it takes something like 16 months just to become an official debian contributor.
That's a longe time.
The other thing is that no matter how noble Debian's goals are, the community as a whole isn't overly focused on the end-user experience.
I love Debian, but I've read too many arguments on how it should remain techincally difficult to install just to keep the barrier of entry high enough to ensure the "assume smart user" mentality og Debian.
You know what, that's cool. If that's how Debian wants to run I support it 100%. I think that Debian's goal IS servers and experienced users. That leaves a place for the Progeny's, Corel's and Stormix.
Cheers,
Ben
(A happy Debian GNU/Linux user for my PC and Alpha..)
I was just thinking out loud about yet another Linux distro. Sorry. Sounds too corny re-reading. I think I need another cup of coffee..
Ben
Sad news, great distro, fantastic home-grown apps
on
Stormix Bankruptcy
·
· Score: 2
Man, Most embaracing typo yet. And in the title too.. Guess I fit right in here..
Anyway, I've proof-read it now, and am reposting:
REPOST:
This is really sad.
While the original Storm Linux was a little rough, and had many installation issues, their newest version (Rain 2.0.6) is absolutely fantastic.
The installer is very slick, and SAS and StormPkg are great tools! I use them all the time. I installed Stormix and immediately upgraded to Woody without a hitch.
My question is why doesn't the Debian community pick up their great stormpkg apt front-end and run with it? All of their stuff was GPL'd. To be honest, I really can't see the difference between what Stormix was and what Progeny is hoping to be.
As for someone else picking it up and maintaining it, I really hope that Debian takes a close work at the work they did. It was great.
Stormix was what got me on to Debian. Since then I've taken the time to get accustomed to it, and I honestly believe that I'll stick with a Debian based distro forever.
This is very sad. They had a very good product. I wish the people well in their future endeavours.
Nice T-shirt!
Ben
END REPOST
Now, a question: I'm thinking that it might be interesting to try to grab their distro and make a new one out of it, similar in concept to Corel's in that it only uses the best of Linux software be default.
Would anyone out there be interested in working with me on it?
I'm thinking Stormix (So Debian) based with the newest versions of the following apps:
- Linux Kernel
- XFree
- KDE
- Gimp
- XMMS
- Some development tools
- Gnometoaster for CDR creation
- Not much else
We could cover all of the bases with only the best available, and add a few custom tools where needed.
Maybe I'm crazy for suggesting this on Slashdot, but it's just an idea. I'm honestly not looking for a flame here... I'm getting to the end of my degree and am looking forward to what I might do afterwards..
Cheers,
Ben
Sad news, great distro, fantastic home-groen apps.
on
Stormix Bankruptcy
·
· Score: 3
This is really sad.
While the original Storm Linux was a little rough, and had many installation issues, their newest version (Rain 2.0.6) is absolutely fantastic.
The installer is very slick, and SAS asn StormPkg are great tools! I use them all the time. I installed Stormix and immediately upgraded to Woody without a hitch.
My question is why doesn't the Debian community pick up their great stormpkg apt front-end and run with it? All of their stuff was GPL'd. To be honest, I really can't see the difference between what Stormix was and what Progeny is hoping to be.
As for someone else picking it up and maintaining it, I really hope that Debian takes a close work at the work they did. It was great.
Stormix was what got me on to Debian. Since then I've taken the time to get accustomed to it, and I honestly believe that I'll stick with a Debian based distro forever.
This is very sad. They had a very good product. I wish the people well in their future endeavours.
Sorry to say it, but their BSD site was utter garbage.
I'm not kidding.
I've got a few BSD servers, I'm running Linux on my workstation, I love both. TUCOWS did a great job with Linuxberg, but their feeble attempt at a BSD site did WAY more harm than good.
Did any of you complaining about the BSD community actually visit the site before they shut it down? It sucked. It really sucked.
It had potential, if they had had a few people who actually used and believed in BSD products. They didn't. They slapped it together, made gross inaccurate statements about BSD, and never chnged their ways.
Sorry, it had to be said. If it had been a Linux site, the Linux community would have chewed them out at least as badly.
1) IE runs on Solaris and HP-UX. I've used the Solaris version. It's very good. OExpress for Solaris is also excellent.
2) Konqueror. The 2.1 post beta builds are simply amazing. Abosultely! I now use Konqueror for 99% of my web browsing. I've only had one site that renders it improperly. It even uses Netscape plugins, so I've got a good browser that's fast, standards compliant, has good javascript support, excellent Java support, and the good 'ole Flash plugin. (Now there's someting that ought to be OpenSource'd..)
Really, Konqueror has arrived. It's so awesome now that I don't use anything else. Check it out!
Oh, and in case people don't know, it has pretty decent XML support too! I've used it to check out a few XML+CSS pages I made and it did a better job than IE, almost as good as Mozilla in this regard.
While there products are meant to mimic some of the functionality of some MS products, the look and behaviour vary a lot.
Apple may have successfully sued people for copying it's UI, but you can't sue someone simply for making an IDE (which, I seem to recall, wasn't even started by them..) or for making a flowchart program.
What you can do is sue someone for blatently copying a UI (like, oh say Evolution-Outlook or Gnumeric-Excel...)
It would be funny to see MS trying to sue someone for making a copeting product..
I first got exposure to the Reiserfs with Mandrake 7.1. I was very impressed.
It is very fast, has been (mostly) stable and makes hard reboots very tolerable. Also, I don't tend to get the errors I would on an ext2fs, theoretically because it's journaling.
ReiserFS is a lit more than just a journaling file system though. Those interested should really check out namesys.com. They're striving for a filesystem with plugins, so it would be very extendable. Also, they way it stores information and searches is quite different.
A few words of caution though: I had major issues with a few of the bundled ReiserFS tools with the 2.4.0test series patches on my Debian Woody machine. Maybe they've stabilized since then, but I ruined my filesystem trying to fix some very odd ReiserFS related errors.
To be fair, I was running tools that clearly stated they were a last resort. When they warn you not to do something, believe it.
I am presently running 2.4.0 with the ReiserFS patch from namesys. I've been running it since 2.4.0 came out and have had no issues, but I'm still using the tools that ship with the latest 2.2.x patch, as they are more stable for me.
So, try ReiserFS, you?ll like it. Also, if you?re going to use the tools (like mkreiserfs) use the tools from the 2.2.x branch of patches. (ReiserFS version 3.5.x rather than 3.6.x) as they seem more stable..
Anyway, the end result is that my system is very stable and very fast. Having seen the obvious deficiencies with ext2 (a server at work has 100+GB of RAID Ext2fs partitions. We had an NFS bug that caused flooding and crashing a while ago. It took about 45 minutes to an hour to reboot.) the ReiserFS seems like a great improvement. I'm glad to see that it'll enter into the main kernel.
Hmm.. of course another obvious drawback with all of these new filesystems is that, to my knowledge, there are no tools for other Operating Systems to read the new filesystems. For example, you can mount ext2 partitions in BeOS, but ReiserFS is out. So, if you?re running multiple OSs then you may want to keep at least one ext2 or maybe a FAT32 partition.
I don't know about benchmarks, but my dual 466 w/256MB RAM and a Voodoo 3 2000 has always been great with:
- tux racer
- UT (and UT demo)
- Quake3
- Sof demo
- Sin demo
- anything else I put it through.
I'm running Debian unstable w X4.0.2 and 2.4.0, but it was also just as fast with 2.2.18 and the 2.4.0test kernels.
The nVidia may be faster, but I challenge anyone to find a more supported video card than my Voodoo 3... (Linux, FreeBSD, BeOS, QNX, oh, and Win32 too..)
I'd gladly send you my XF86Config file, if you'd like. Also, I've read that using fancy video modes in LILO can have an adverse impact on your card's speed. I'm not too sure about that though.
Hmm, try disabling some unneeded services too, Mdk 7.2 throws in a _lot_ of stuff by default.
I certainly do, but as my posting stated, 2.2.18 isn't too different from an end-user POV. You're talking server.
(For which I typically use FreeBSD)
Oh, and for the record, I'm using 2.4.0 on my main workstation (a dual 466 celeron.) While the 2.4x kernels bench a bit faster when compiling, I really don't see an incredibly noticeable difference. (Apart from my APIC errors in 2.4.x, these have to do with heat and the notorious BP6.)
Every OS (and OS distribution) has its place. For simple IPMASQ have you checked out Coyote Linux? Pretty sweet!
I've DL'd 2.4.0 and applied the reiserfs 2.4.0test12 patch from www.namesys.com. It went okay, and the kernel seems to be compiling without issues. Just thought I'd let you all know.
(On a related note, if you're making new reiserfs partitions I'd use the tools that come with the 2.2 kernel patches, as the 3.62 utils don't seem to work too well for my SMP Linux box. Could just be me though.;)
Slashdot Mirror
I presently own a PalmIIIe. For the most part it's great. Sometimes it crashes, sometimes I wish it could do more, but if I had a pile of money and the chance to do it over again I'd probably just get a IIIc.
My biggest beef about the Palm is that I can only write 4k notes. Now I know you can get around this with a shareware program (SuperPad), but I'm not sure if that'll sync with my Linux machine.
The Palm is great. No thanks to 3Com it has great Linux connectivity, and the uber-geeky palm keyboard is the handiest add-on ever. I've used my little Palm to write several essays and reviews. I love it.
If the OS doesn't have silly limitiations (like the Palm) if it's easy to use, inexpensive and syncs well with my Linux box, then I'll think about upgrading/switching.
Does anyone out there know the status of PDA's and Linux? The Palm works well, CE'd be a bust (I'm guessing" but what about all of these Linux-based PDAs? What about embedded QT? Do they provide syncing with Linux desktop machines? The Yopi? Etc.
That, and no stupid file limits (4k for the apps, 32k hard.. sheesh.. what were they thinking?) is what I want.
Oh, and since they don't have to pay MS, it had better be cheaper than the current crop..
What is it with people on Slashdot lately? Did anyone READ the article, or did you all just denounce it as "evil" before you lost patience waiting for the (now slashdot'd) server to go down? Seriously!
v em ber/msg00481.html
x _h tml
This article has been up on dot.kde.org for a few days now, and (while I initially wasn't too excited about the idea) is a very interesting read. What the author has basically done is lay the foundations for good solid bindings for any language. His initial cut was for Objective-C , and now Java.
There are no licensing issues here, as these are simply language bindings that allow you to use KDE and the very capable Qt to write GUI apps that integrate well with the rest of KDE. As was pointed out at the dot, this is meant for java the language, not java the platform. As was also pointed out, the possibility of gcj+kde bindings could eventually make for a fast compiled app in an easy to write for language.
Oh, and for the record, this was started for Gnome back in 1998:
http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gtk-list/1998-No
http://news.gnome.org/gnome-news/961253384/inde
One of the things that Gnome-toting Slashdotters often criticize QT and KDE for is the lack of language bindings. Well, now they have Python, Java, Objective-C, C, Perl (in some state) and more on the horizon. So now that this has been addressed you feel you have to blast them for doing precisely this?
The page also praises GTK for it's portability. When was the last time you read a Gnome page that made reference to anything done by KDE in a good light?
Come on, everybody needs to grow up here. KDE doesn't suck, Gnome doesn't suck, Java doesn't suck. They all have their place. Java is a fun language to program in. A nice compromise between C and SmallTalk. Be nice here.
My girlfriend has informed me that Sid was the bad kid in the first movie. I haven't seen it though, so don't quote me on it..
Ben
Hi.
I'm not too sure what's going on, some can someone help me: I downloaded 2.4.2 and was hapily compiling it until at the end of "make bzImage" I got an error about ld not being able to find "binary." The line in the makefile was something along the lines of:
ld -elf [..] -s -oformat binary bootsect.s bootsect.o
(forgive me if I'm a little off, I'm away from the machine at the moment..)
I quickly flipped through the ld manpage and saw that -oformat is a valid option. I then tried recompiling 2.4.1 which I had installed cleanly when it came out and got the same problem. I looked at the Makefile in 2.2.18 and there is no -oformat for the ld call there.. at last I can still compile it..
Does anyone have any ideas about what my problem is? I don't know too much about the Gnu linker, but it looks like maybe the version in sid doesn't jove with the Linux kernel..
Help?
Ben
I never claimed that 2 800's are as fast as one 1.6GHz. I understand the limitations of SMP, but for MY main uses (which I outlined in my original posting) the dual processors are more appreciated.
However, for your run-of-the-mill Win9x gamer, the 1.6GHz is certainly a better option. This isn't my needs..
I have used both Evolution and KMail with complete success on mailandnews.com. Try one of these out.
Seriously, 1.6GHz sounds VERY impressive, but I'll take more CPU's and better components over a faster CPU any day.
I've had my Dual 466 Celeron for over a year and a half now, and it's absolutely fantastic, and rock-solid stable. Sure, I've upgraded the RAM over that time from 128MB to 512, but through it all I've felt no need to upgrade the processor(s)
The motherboard recently went south on me and I had to replace it. I got looking around and noticed that Asus now has a dual PIII board for ~$230CDN. I ended up just RMAing this board, but I know when I do eventually need to upgrade there's no WAY I'll be going back to a single processor board.
If you're running Linux, FreeBSD or Win2k (or even BeOS) an SMP system makes a world of difference under heavy load. Recompiling? Encoding MP3's? Running VMWare? These operations are sped up very noticeably.
For people looking for a new machine: Save your precious dollars on the fastest processor. Fill up on RAM, get a good video card, and get an SMP board. I'd rather have 2 800MHz chips than a 1.6GHz any day of the week.
AMD: I'd rather get an SMP chipset out of you than Yet Another "Fastest" Processor. I'd much rather own a Duron or Athalon than a crappy Celeron or PIII, but I'd take an SMP Celeron over a single Duron..
I'd like to strongly disagree on this one.
Almost every month I buy both the Linux Journal and Linux Mag. I love the detailed articles on LJ and the lighter but still somewhat meaty LM.
I bought an early Maximum Linux and was slightly embarassed by the fact that it read so much like a PC Gamer mag from about 5 years before. My girlfriend just bought me the latest (and last?) ML mag, and while the Route66 article was pretty good, the rest of it was pretty thin. I was hoping to learn something detailed about ICQ clients, I didn't. The Heavy Gear review was no better than the one that I had read in LJ (and LM too if I recall..)
Linux, while fantastic, still isn't as big as Windows or Mac. It's hard to sustain threee magazines that cover different aspects of Linux. I mean, LJ is really for admins/programmers, LM for "mainstream" users (does such a thing exist?) and there just isn't enough going on in the gamer/home market to sustain a "light" mag like ML is/was.
All the same, it's sad to hear. I'd rather it be them than LJ or LM.
Anyway, as long as the magazine is good, I'll keep buying Linux mags. I really wish that there had been a mag with at least a little space dedicated to BeOS. At least most of the Linux stuff in LJ applies to FreeBSD (and indeed any Unix.)
Hey, I found a cool British mag called "The Linux Magazine" not to be confused with Linux Magazine. It was pretty good. Maybe it'll take off.
This is also very similar to what TkWorld does.
Check it out! It's a nifty way to learn the syntax.
Someone already posted a comment about this, it was at -1 and I was going to mod it up 'till I read it all. The last paragraph really was flamebate.
3 /
;)
So, here's the content:
KDE and QT can do AA fonts etc too, it's not in the official QT yet, not the official KDE but it looks like it should make it in to Qt 2.3ish and KDE2.2ish. These versions guesses only.
Some articles are:
The status of QT and AA:
http://dot.kde.org/981146691/
More details WRT KDE support:
http://dot.kde.org/980951106/980972801/98097392
Anyway, I've seen many similar screenshots and it looks great.
BTW: If you haven't checked it out recently, Konqueror (KDE's web browser) has vastly improved with 2.1B2. Check it out for sure! It does a lot of the things people are waiting for in Nautilus (and it lets you use Evolution at the same time
Ben
Actually, the 2.1b2 builds have been in Debian woody for almost a week now.
Hey, if anyone else using woody is having odd Konqueror behaviour let me know..
Sorry Bruce,
That's a nice theory, but I've just recently read about how it takes something like 16 months just to become an official debian contributor.
That's a longe time.
The other thing is that no matter how noble Debian's goals are, the community as a whole isn't overly focused on the end-user experience.
I love Debian, but I've read too many arguments on how it should remain techincally difficult to install just to keep the barrier of entry high enough to ensure the "assume smart user" mentality og Debian.
You know what, that's cool. If that's how Debian wants to run I support it 100%. I think that Debian's goal IS servers and experienced users. That leaves a place for the Progeny's, Corel's and Stormix.
Cheers,
Ben
(A happy Debian GNU/Linux user for my PC and Alpha..)
(sp?) Yup, Plethora.
DISCLAMER:
This spell check was brought to you by the guy who accidentally wrote home-groen in the title. Take it at face value.
Ben
I was just thinking out loud about yet another Linux distro. Sorry. Sounds too corny re-reading. I think I need another cup of coffee..
Ben
Man, Most embaracing typo yet. And in the title too.. Guess I fit right in here..
Anyway, I've proof-read it now, and am reposting:
REPOST:
This is really sad.
While the original Storm Linux was a little rough, and had many installation issues, their newest version (Rain 2.0.6) is absolutely fantastic.
The installer is very slick, and SAS and StormPkg are great tools! I use them all the time. I installed Stormix and immediately upgraded to Woody without a hitch.
My question is why doesn't the Debian community pick up their great stormpkg apt front-end and run with it? All of their stuff was GPL'd. To be honest, I really can't see the difference between what Stormix was and what Progeny is hoping to be.
As for someone else picking it up and maintaining it, I really hope that Debian takes a close work at the work they did. It was great.
Stormix was what got me on to Debian. Since then I've taken the time to get accustomed to it, and I honestly believe that I'll stick with a Debian based distro forever.
This is very sad. They had a very good product. I wish the people well in their future endeavours.
Nice T-shirt!
Ben
END REPOST
Now, a question: I'm thinking that it might be interesting to try to grab their distro and make a new one out of it, similar in concept to Corel's in that it only uses the best of Linux software be default.
Would anyone out there be interested in working with me on it?
I'm thinking Stormix (So Debian) based with the newest versions of the following apps:
- Linux Kernel
- XFree
- KDE
- Gimp
- XMMS
- Some development tools
- Gnometoaster for CDR creation
- Not much else
We could cover all of the bases with only the best available, and add a few custom tools where needed.
Maybe I'm crazy for suggesting this on Slashdot, but it's just an idea. I'm honestly not looking for a flame here... I'm getting to the end of my degree and am looking forward to what I might do afterwards..
Cheers,
Ben
This is really sad.
While the original Storm Linux was a little rough, and had many installation issues, their newest version (Rain 2.0.6) is absolutely fantastic.
The installer is very slick, and SAS asn StormPkg are great tools! I use them all the time. I installed Stormix and immediately upgraded to Woody without a hitch.
My question is why doesn't the Debian community pick up their great stormpkg apt front-end and run with it? All of their stuff was GPL'd. To be honest, I really can't see the difference between what Stormix was and what Progeny is hoping to be.
As for someone else picking it up and maintaining it, I really hope that Debian takes a close work at the work they did. It was great.
Stormix was what got me on to Debian. Since then I've taken the time to get accustomed to it, and I honestly believe that I'll stick with a Debian based distro forever.
This is very sad. They had a very good product. I wish the people well in their future endeavours.
Nice T-shirt!
Ben
Sorry to say it, but their BSD site was utter garbage.
I'm not kidding.
I've got a few BSD servers, I'm running Linux on my workstation, I love both. TUCOWS did a great job with Linuxberg, but their feeble attempt at a BSD site did WAY more harm than good.
Did any of you complaining about the BSD community actually visit the site before they shut it down? It sucked. It really sucked.
It had potential, if they had had a few people who actually used and believed in BSD products. They didn't. They slapped it together, made gross inaccurate statements about BSD, and never chnged their ways.
Sorry, it had to be said. If it had been a Linux site, the Linux community would have chewed them out at least as badly.
A few things:
1) IE runs on Solaris and HP-UX. I've used the Solaris version. It's very good. OExpress for Solaris is also excellent.
2) Konqueror. The 2.1 post beta builds are simply amazing. Abosultely! I now use Konqueror for 99% of my web browsing. I've only had one site that renders it improperly. It even uses Netscape plugins, so I've got a good browser that's fast, standards compliant, has good javascript support, excellent Java support, and the good 'ole Flash plugin. (Now there's someting that ought to be OpenSource'd..)
Really, Konqueror has arrived. It's so awesome now that I don't use anything else. Check it out!
Oh, and in case people don't know, it has pretty decent XML support too! I've used it to check out a few XML+CSS pages I made and it did a better job than IE, almost as good as Mozilla in this regard.
Cheers,
Ben
Now way,
While there products are meant to mimic some of the functionality of some MS products, the look and behaviour vary a lot.
Apple may have successfully sued people for copying it's UI, but you can't sue someone simply for making an IDE (which, I seem to recall, wasn't even started by them..) or for making a flowchart program.
What you can do is sue someone for blatently copying a UI (like, oh say Evolution-Outlook or Gnumeric-Excel...)
It would be funny to see MS trying to sue someone for making a copeting product..
Cheers
Hmm.. not so! There is a working Alpha port (and likely others in the works..)
Oh, my main machine is an SMP x86, I've never had any SMP related issues (though there apparantly were some a while back
Ben
Hi.
I first got exposure to the Reiserfs with Mandrake 7.1. I was very impressed.
It is very fast, has been (mostly) stable and makes hard reboots very tolerable. Also, I don't tend to get the errors I would on an ext2fs, theoretically because it's journaling.
ReiserFS is a lit more than just a journaling file system though. Those interested should really check out namesys.com. They're striving for a filesystem with plugins, so it would be very extendable. Also, they way it stores information and searches is quite different.
A few words of caution though: I had major issues with a few of the bundled ReiserFS tools with the 2.4.0test series patches on my Debian Woody machine. Maybe they've stabilized since then, but I ruined my filesystem trying to fix some very odd ReiserFS related errors.
To be fair, I was running tools that clearly stated they were a last resort. When they warn you not to do something, believe it.
I am presently running 2.4.0 with the ReiserFS patch from namesys. I've been running it since 2.4.0 came out and have had no issues, but I'm still using the tools that ship with the latest 2.2.x patch, as they are more stable for me.
So, try ReiserFS, you?ll like it. Also, if you?re going to use the tools (like mkreiserfs) use the tools from the 2.2.x branch of patches. (ReiserFS version 3.5.x rather than 3.6.x) as they seem more stable..
Anyway, the end result is that my system is very stable and very fast. Having seen the obvious deficiencies with ext2 (a server at work has 100+GB of RAID Ext2fs partitions. We had an NFS bug that caused flooding and crashing a while ago. It took about 45 minutes to an hour to reboot.) the ReiserFS seems like a great improvement. I'm glad to see that it'll enter into the main kernel.
Hmm.. of course another obvious drawback with all of these new filesystems is that, to my knowledge, there are no tools for other Operating Systems to read the new filesystems. For example, you can mount ext2 partitions in BeOS, but ReiserFS is out. So, if you?re running multiple OSs then you may want to keep at least one ext2 or maybe a FAT32 partition.
Hope this helps,
Ben
I don't know about benchmarks, but my dual 466 w/256MB RAM and a Voodoo 3 2000 has always been great with:
- tux racer
- UT (and UT demo)
- Quake3
- Sof demo
- Sin demo
- anything else I put it through.
I'm running Debian unstable w X4.0.2 and 2.4.0, but it was also just as fast with 2.2.18 and the 2.4.0test kernels.
The nVidia may be faster, but I challenge anyone to find a more supported video card than my Voodoo 3... (Linux, FreeBSD, BeOS, QNX, oh, and Win32 too..)
I'd gladly send you my XF86Config file, if you'd like. Also, I've read that using fancy video modes in LILO can have an adverse impact on your card's speed. I'm not too sure about that though.
Hmm, try disabling some unneeded services too, Mdk 7.2 throws in a _lot_ of stuff by default.
Ben
I certainly do, but as my posting stated, 2.2.18 isn't too different from an end-user POV. You're talking server.
(For which I typically use FreeBSD)
Oh, and for the record, I'm using 2.4.0 on my main workstation (a dual 466 celeron.) While the 2.4x kernels bench a bit faster when compiling, I really don't see an incredibly noticeable difference. (Apart from my APIC errors in 2.4.x, these have to do with heat and the notorious BP6.)
Every OS (and OS distribution) has its place. For simple IPMASQ have you checked out Coyote Linux? Pretty sweet!
Cheers,
Ben
2.2.18 is great, it has the AGPART stuff, the DRI modules and all of the USB backported!
This means that 3D Acceleration works with XFree86 4.x, so all of the newest games are a go!
Really, from and end-user point of view there isn't much difference between 2.2.18 and 2.4.0.
As for slack, never used it, but Debian Unstable sure is sweet!
Cheers,
Ben
I've DL'd 2.4.0 and applied the reiserfs 2.4.0test12 patch from www.namesys.com. It went okay, and the kernel seems to be compiling without issues. Just thought I'd let you all know.
;)
(On a related note, if you're making new reiserfs partitions I'd use the tools that come with the 2.2 kernel patches, as the 3.62 utils don't seem to work too well for my SMP Linux box. Could just be me though.
Cheers,
Ben