Having used both, I have likes and dislikes about both of them - Gnome does look better, and "feels", whatever that means, like a more complete and professional product.
That said, KDE is faster. Much, much faster; On older hardware, this is a pronounced difference. Every time my old P2/233 goes bobbing for objects in the Corba barrel, it takes an awfully long time to come up for air.
If the UserLinux project is only meant to run on hardware made from this day forward, that's cool, I'd go with Gnome. But if not, I'd definitely include KDE - It's cruel to say so, but the choice between Gnome and KDE is, in my house, very much dependent on the choice between new or old hardware.
If you're a new to all this, and you're a little intimidated by all the options you get from running "make menuconfig" or "make xconfig", here's a tip - if you're running Knoppix, or have one of your current kernels around in/usr/src, you can pull over your old configuration files from/usr/src/kernel and just copy them in the new kernel's source directory, if you're willing to compile the source.
Then run xconfig, make sure you've got console support compiled in (this point is key) and off you go. make, make install.
It's worth saying again, no matter how many times it's been said, that Linus and his band of merry coders are doing incredible work. On older machines, like my humble P2/266 laptop, a recompile actually feels faster, a lot faster in fact. If you're running older hardware, it's worth it to give these test kernels a try for that alone, if nothing else.
I do believe in UFOs, as in "things in the sky which haven't been identified". It's a long stretch from that to aliens, of course.
One of my favorite lines from an old conspiracy show about aliens was a backlit, voice-modified guy saying "Look, it's not aliens; it's military research. The fastest non-rocket-powered vehicle in the air right now that the public knows about is Lockheed-Martin's Blackbird, the SR-71, and that was designed forty years ago. Forty years before that, the fastest thing in the air was a biplane, a Sopwith Camel. Forty years before that, the fastest thing in the air was a balloon."
Well. there is that, but I don't have a reason to mail.doc resumes to a recruiter.
But you can understand, I trust, why in this economy people might want to. And, to respond to the other reply, are you sure that works? Is it going to come out decently formatted at the other end?
If I was trying to get a job, I'd want to be absolutely sure.
I've done the other half of Mark Pilgrim's five-hour WinXP install, trying to install RedHat 9, and let me tell you, the experience sucked.
That bit about how easy it is to install wireless cards? Bullshit, linux-compatible or not, if you've got the wrong distribution. And even when you do, it might break: I've just managed to apt-get-upgrade my way out of a working wireless setup, and it's going to take a more lot of my precious time to wallow through bash scripts and config files to find out what's wrong than an XP driver reinstall would. Windows users have problems with software installing itself when you don't ask for it? Hey, look, RedHat will install SendMail, Cups and a stack of other stuff even when you specifically tell it not to.
If you're willing to download some software to make your XPerience a bit better, get TweakUI, turn off the popups and leave it be. It'll take five minutes, and you're done, forever. Star Office runs well on windows? Woo. Whoopee - try using MS Office for a bit. It's only about a billion times better. Windows doesn't come with that product because it is good enough to sell: in comparsion, Star Office is clearly only good enough to give away.
I run Linux exclusively, and you know what? It sucks. I don't know if you've been informed, but it really does. Just a few weeks, ago, Keith Packard made it possible to change the resolution and color depth of X-windows without actually restarting the server. I've been able to do that in every other UI I've used since approximately tbe bronze age. Christ, it's only recently that I've been able to eject a CD by pressing the button, and wasn't that a breath of fresh air.
Mod this whatever you like, I could not possibly care less. Here's the news: this kind of blind, patronising zealotry exists so that the zealots can feel superior, and maybe chortle amongst themselves. It's for losers, in other words.
The thing that's sold me on Knoppix is the ease of getting rid of stuff I don't want. As much as I like being able to apt-get stuff (and check out Rick Moen's apt sources list, all you new knoppix users) the cleanliness of apt-get remove and deborphan are the best, especially on older systems.
Not Lucas' fault, mind you. The person responsible is my buddy Sean, who part way through The Phantom Menace turns to me and says "I've figured it out. When they say 'midichlorians', the mean 'semen'."
...that as much as you might joke that spammers should be lined up and shot, that gets a lot less funny when you're dealing with the Chinese government.
One of the most common arguments I've heard against free software from management types is that since no specific corporation made it, there's no specific corporation liable when it goes wrong - the argument, whether you buy it or not is summed up as "there's nobody to sue".
I know - the rebuttal is typically "have you looked at a shrinkwrap license, do you realize that you can't sue them either" and so forth, but that "nobody to sue" perception carries a lot of weight in manager-land.
One of the most important questions that I hope will be resolved soon is exactly that: whether or not a shrinkwrap license is legally binding, either in the client's inability to own the product or the manufacturer's exemption from liability, or any of the other restrictions.
Either way, it'll be important. Either you can't sue anybody, so everybody's on a level playing field where quality, one hopes, wins out. Or, other way, you can sue the fuck out of everybody - if those exemption clauses suddenly aren't applicable, then all the major distros are going to be on the hook for the quality of their product just as quickly as MS will - no small thing, either way the stakes for secure and reliable software suddenly get very much higher than they are. (Assuming, of course, that these actual costs are real costs, not just fictional ones - saying it costs half a gazillion dollars in sysadmin salaries to do what they'd be doing anyway, patching and updating systems and so on, if Nimda had never been written is a bit disingenuous.)
To get some idea on how much of a windfall this is for the locals, take a look at the CIA World Factbook entry for Tuvalu.
Consider: Arable land, zero. Pastures, crops, zero. Changes in sea level, a major issue. If you could put saltwater in a car, the world would have beaten a path to their doorstep, but it's not and they haven't. This little purchase is a little over four times their listed GDP, for crying out loud. Me, I'm happy to see countries with very little else going for them in the high tech world be able to make a buck off of things like this.
Yes, for you "this is old news" jokers, the old Wired Magazine article is here.
I monitor the forensics list on securityfocus, and there was discussion that this might be mostly a myth.
That may be, but it's worth remembering that the gold standard that both the government and military use for file deletion is the physical destruction of the media. While this is something I've only been told about, with respect to the U.S at least, I've seen no shortage of government auctions here in Ottawa listing X number of computers available, no hard drives included.
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Having used both, I have likes and dislikes about both of them - Gnome does look better, and "feels", whatever that means, like a more complete and professional product.
That said, KDE is faster. Much, much faster; On older hardware, this is a pronounced difference. Every time my old P2/233 goes bobbing for objects in the Corba barrel, it takes an awfully long time to come up for air.
If the UserLinux project is only meant to run on hardware made from this day forward, that's cool, I'd go with Gnome. But if not, I'd definitely include KDE - It's cruel to say so, but the choice between Gnome and KDE is, in my house, very much dependent on the choice between new or old hardware.
Then run xconfig, make sure you've got console support compiled in (this point is key) and off you go. make, make install.
It's worth saying again, no matter how many times it's been said, that Linus and his band of merry coders are doing incredible work. On older machines, like my humble P2/266 laptop, a recompile actually feels faster, a lot faster in fact. If you're running older hardware, it's worth it to give these test kernels a try for that alone, if nothing else.
One of my favorite lines from an old conspiracy show about aliens was a backlit, voice-modified guy saying "Look, it's not aliens; it's military research. The fastest non-rocket-powered vehicle in the air right now that the public knows about is Lockheed-Martin's Blackbird, the SR-71, and that was designed forty years ago. Forty years before that, the fastest thing in the air was a biplane, a Sopwith Camel. Forty years before that, the fastest thing in the air was a balloon."
"That hasn't stopped happening."
But you can understand, I trust, why in this economy people might want to. And, to respond to the other reply, are you sure that works? Is it going to come out decently formatted at the other end?
If I was trying to get a job, I'd want to be absolutely sure.
Mail a .doc resume to a recruiter.
That bit about how easy it is to install wireless cards? Bullshit, linux-compatible or not, if you've got the wrong distribution. And even when you do, it might break: I've just managed to apt-get-upgrade my way out of a working wireless setup, and it's going to take a more lot of my precious time to wallow through bash scripts and config files to find out what's wrong than an XP driver reinstall would. Windows users have problems with software installing itself when you don't ask for it? Hey, look, RedHat will install SendMail, Cups and a stack of other stuff even when you specifically tell it not to.
If you're willing to download some software to make your XPerience a bit better, get TweakUI, turn off the popups and leave it be. It'll take five minutes, and you're done, forever. Star Office runs well on windows? Woo. Whoopee - try using MS Office for a bit. It's only about a billion times better. Windows doesn't come with that product because it is good enough to sell: in comparsion, Star Office is clearly only good enough to give away. I run Linux exclusively, and you know what? It sucks. I don't know if you've been informed, but it really does. Just a few weeks, ago, Keith Packard made it possible to change the resolution and color depth of X-windows without actually restarting the server. I've been able to do that in every other UI I've used since approximately tbe bronze age. Christ, it's only recently that I've been able to eject a CD by pressing the button, and wasn't that a breath of fresh air.
Mod this whatever you like, I could not possibly care less. Here's the news: this kind of blind, patronising zealotry exists so that the zealots can feel superior, and maybe chortle amongst themselves. It's for losers, in other words.
The thing that's sold me on Knoppix is the ease of getting rid of stuff I don't want. As much as I like being able to apt-get stuff (and check out Rick Moen's apt sources list, all you new knoppix users) the cleanliness of apt-get remove and deborphan are the best, especially on older systems.
Not Lucas' fault, mind you. The person responsible is my buddy Sean, who part way through The Phantom Menace turns to me and says "I've figured it out. When they say 'midichlorians', the mean 'semen'."
Gak.
I had a pet neutrino, but it ran away.
Please go stand by the stairs, so I can protect you from the terrible secret of space.
That can be answered by a simple question: does the money that the RIAA wins in these verdicts find its way into the artist's hands?
I'm willing to bet money that the answer that is no.
You forgot to include the cost of the lawyers.
That beats my "locked or unlocked" joke.
You need some kind of technology to be able to tell one of the drones from another.
They're actually making money selling hardware mishaps? Christ, those things come to me for free, and way too often.
Only because you're more likely to get it right after four pints than any of the others.
...that as much as you might joke that spammers should be lined up and shot, that gets a lot less funny when you're dealing with the Chinese government.
I know - the rebuttal is typically "have you looked at a shrinkwrap license, do you realize that you can't sue them either" and so forth, but that "nobody to sue" perception carries a lot of weight in manager-land.
One of the most important questions that I hope will be resolved soon is exactly that: whether or not a shrinkwrap license is legally binding, either in the client's inability to own the product or the manufacturer's exemption from liability, or any of the other restrictions.
Either way, it'll be important. Either you can't sue anybody, so everybody's on a level playing field where quality, one hopes, wins out. Or, other way, you can sue the fuck out of everybody - if those exemption clauses suddenly aren't applicable, then all the major distros are going to be on the hook for the quality of their product just as quickly as MS will - no small thing, either way the stakes for secure and reliable software suddenly get very much higher than they are. (Assuming, of course, that these actual costs are real costs, not just fictional ones - saying it costs half a gazillion dollars in sysadmin salaries to do what they'd be doing anyway, patching and updating systems and so on, if Nimda had never been written is a bit disingenuous.)
Welcome to multiprocessor debugging hell.
...that can kick your ass when you're about to make "Imagine a beowulf cluster" posts.
I'm going to have to remember to update my humans.txt file.
Consider: Arable land, zero. Pastures, crops, zero. Changes in sea level, a major issue. If you could put saltwater in a car, the world would have beaten a path to their doorstep, but it's not and they haven't. This little purchase is a little over four times their listed GDP, for crying out loud. Me, I'm happy to see countries with very little else going for them in the high tech world be able to make a buck off of things like this.
Yes, for you "this is old news" jokers, the old Wired Magazine article is here.
That may be, but it's worth remembering that the gold standard that both the government and military use for file deletion is the physical destruction of the media. While this is something I've only been told about, with respect to the U.S at least, I've seen no shortage of government auctions here in Ottawa listing X number of computers available, no hard drives included.
What, you mean a forty-car pileup?
Christ, drivers with cellphones are bad enough.