An Early Taste of OpenSUSE 233
Anonymous Coward writes "Finally the site OpenSUSE.org is up and includes some beta downloads. The stable version can be expected around September 2005. Looks like there are some differences between Novell's SUSE and Redhat's Fedora mentioned in the FAQ."
OpenSuSE at Linux World San Fran (Score:5, Interesting)
Yast is considered a feature of SuSE (Score:4, Interesting)
They also pretend that their freely downladable versions of things are the same as their commercially published ones. Roughly half the packages are different: if you use the commercial installations, you cannot use the free mirror sites for package installations due to the YaST stupidities I mentioned and their inconsistent release numbers. This is why even if you buy SuSE licenses, you should always install from the free download sites, to keep good access to updates and consistent OS numbering with them.
Re:how does it compare? (Score:5, Interesting)
It's sexy, it's stable, and has an emphasis on the desktop. I've used SuSE in one way, shape, or form since about 8.0. It's always been a reliable, well-put-together (although somewhat too 'commercialy' for me at times) system. Early provider of AMD64 support didn't hurt either. It's one linux distro that I never had an issue paying for, as they didn't go the "screw the users on pricing" or the "we're focusing on the server" attitudes that Red Hat did.
I use it in some instances as a lamp server, used to on the desktop(with great results), and have never been underwhelmed by it's stability and completeness.
If it weren't for OS X, I'd probably still be using it as my primary desktop. Bottom line is, use the right tool for the right job. Each system, OpenBSD, FreeBSD, GNU/Debian, NetBSD, Solaris, IRIX(gah!) each have their own place in the mix.
I just switched to Suse from Fedora (Score:5, Interesting)
Over all, I give high mark for SuSe for the engineering.
Of course there are still some problems with SuSe but so far I like it more than the current version of Fedora.
Re:Yast is considered a feature of SuSE (Score:5, Interesting)
The FAQ is a bit weird, though - calling YaST a "standard" is a total exaggeration.
ISOs? (Score:3, Interesting)
4 CDs? (Score:3, Interesting)
Biophysics (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Yast is considered a feature of SuSE (Score:3, Interesting)
Max
Re:how does it compare? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:I just switched to Suse from Fedora (Score:2, Interesting)
Still,
1. I couldn't find an easy way to run both 32bit and 64bit kernels via YaST.
2. I use apt/synaptic and the gwdg.de repository to install all the missing pieces - dvdcss, transcode, mjpegtools, etc. and particularly in SuSE 9.3, this approach feels like a bandaid solution. For example, I've lost the ability to burn CDs to mp3 in the KDE filemanager and have to use KAudioCreator or the command line to accomplish this task.
3. Ever since I updated firefox to 1.0.6, crashes have increased - probably due to a misconfigured flash plugin and I don't know how to fix this problem. Reinstalling and updating via YaST didn't help.
4. Back in SuSE 9.2, the CDROM would open at random and there was no way of fixing this. The fix came out a month later.
5. The artsd sound daemon (version 1.4.1-3) mysteriously dies every once in a while and reports a CPU overload error. Weird.
6. Fonts are just not as good as they were in redhat. Some webpages have font bugs.
Despite all this, I like SuSE and will stick with it. However, when compared to a Mac OS X Tiger G5 box, it does have too many problems.
21st century linux? (Score:4, Interesting)
Maybe Linux will evolve into the 21st century with Novell and SUSE.
My ideal Linux distro:
My next computer will be a Mactel.
Marketing rubbish. (Score:2, Interesting)
There are also many other significant open source projects, such as Debian and Ubuntu, that serve active user and development communities. Generally speaking, these open source projects focus on engineering-centric issues that serve their technical community of Linux developers and users.
The openSUSE project explicitly looks beyond the technical community to the broader non-technical community of computer users interested in Linux.
Only the openSUSE project refines its Linux distribution to the point where non-technical users can have a successful Linux experience.
As a rebuttle.. I am an incredibly happy user of Ubuntu, and I have seen non-technical users also enjoy using it, whether this is via TheOpenCD (now a Ubuntu LiveCD), or on a Ubuntu desktop.
Ubuntu's user community is also actively refining the distribution for the Education market (edubuntu) and additional usability through KDE (keduntu), and well as on different hardware architectures (eg. the Mac Mini).
While there is always room of another specifically customised and targeted distribution, broad sweeping statements like the above just don't hold.
Novell's SUSE and openSUSE are aimed at providing an easy to use and maintain, site-wide contant installation base. These goals are good for corporate environments (business and non-business alike), but there are other ways. It will be interesting to see how Novell seeks to control the outcomes of openSUSE, as it attempts to let go of control at the same time.
Re:diffs? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:diffs? (Score:3, Interesting)
Umm... Is Ubuntu supported? I'm not trolling, I seriously don't know. I'm thinking that Novell may be considering themselves "only" because it's a distro with support behind it, sort of deprecating every distro put together by... um... non-professionals. Not that I support the differentiation, I'm just guessing at what they mean.
Of course, that leaves one open to wonder about Xandros [xandros.com]. I've never used it, but it's reputed to be a very easy to use and approachable desktop OS and it's supported.
What really gripes me is that just this morning I ordered a SUSE 9.3 DVD from budgetlinuxcds.com. If I'd waited a month or so, I could have had the first openSUSE distro instead. $10 down the tubes, I guess.
Suse Linux (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:diffs? (Score:3, Interesting)
I was talking more about being user-friendly for non-technical people. If you're talking about paid support, Canonical provides that for Ubuntu. Ubuntu is backed by a non-profit foundation with millions in funding from Shuttleworth. Although it's Free, it also has a polished commercial feel to it (as opposed to a hobbyist feel).
Yast, RH (Score:3, Interesting)
Uh...yes. But the kernel is just public grounds for vetting Linux technology which will be the basis for all distributions and so forth.
It's not like RH doesn't have a pretty rich legacy of contributing back -- if you fixed something that really was Fedora-specific, like, oh, a package dependency, White Box Linux and the other folks would pick it up. Compared to SuSE, RH's pretty decent (Caldera and SuSE are the two distributions are I find to have an uncomfortably non-free feel to them -- though Caldera really isn't an issue any more). I'm glad to see that SuSE appears to have picked up on the fact.
I don't understand the deal with YaST. Okay, I understand that people want GUI config tools. Fine, nothing wrong with that -- the ease of writing GUI frontends is a great thing about Linux. But in very recent times, I've noticed a disturbing number of moves towards making the console a second-class citizen, which *does* bother me. Red Hat seems to have come out with Network Manager in FC4, which has only a GUI configuration utility (and no documentation on how to configure it in the console), which is my latest beef. The system-config* tools no longer all work in the console -- some require a display (take system-config-services, for instance). The people who get irritable when console users are snubbed are very often the people that actually *work* on the software.
So, while GUI utils are important (they help bring in the bread-and-butter folks), console utils/ease of functioning in the CLI is at least as important, as it encourages developers to use/test on your distribution -- the entire point for your company in producing an Open Source product in the first place.
Apple's Human Interface Guidelines, back in the day, contained a number of constraints on design, like never having a modal dialog that led to another modal dialog, or always making actions available in a submenu or through a keystroke available through a regular menu as well. The Linux distros need a similar mindset, but WRT providing an equally good quality approach to CLI use as GUI use.
Now, I'm not going to demand that someone run out and write more code to pander to me (I think it's a good idea long-term for a distro, but I'm not going to whine about it.) It *does* irritate me, however, when a system that *used* to be configurable via the console (like the network) suddenly starts relying on GUI-only config tools. That sucks.
And GNOME and KDE are both quite complicit in this. Both have members who are apparently enthralled with the idea of tying apps to their respective DEs, and absolutely *stupid* architectural decisions have been made on this basis. Microsoft tying IE to the OS really was more reasonable. Take, for instance, the VFS layers. It makes absolutely no bloody sense for GNOME to have a VFS or KDE to have kioslaves. These functions have *nothing* to do with a desktop environment -- they are generic functionality that would be useful anywhere. They *should* be available in a separate library. You wouldn't make kxml and gnome-xml -- you'd use libxml So why all the tying into DEs?
Re:Yast, RH (Score:2, Interesting)
Will they accept patches now? (Score:3, Interesting)
I didn't want technical support. I was giving them support, for fscks sake. I was sending them a patch. Yet they refused to accept it.
I've used Debian since then. They are even happy to receive fault reports without a patch.
If you're going to slag off Fedora, get it right.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Nothing like a big lie in there? Oh sorry, it's actually two lies in one sentence! Firstly, the minor lie is that Fedora's releases have actually had 7 or 8 months between them (FC5 will be out 8 months after FC4...and possibly even longer than that if it gets pushed back).
The bigger lie though is the claim that there's no updates for any of the previous releases as soon as the latest Fedora is released. In fact, the previous release remains under the Fedora Project banner - complete with updates - until about the Test 2 of the FC release two versions on - which typically would be about 12 months. And even then, updates are moved to the Fedora Project and would continue to receive updates for probably about another 12 months (Fedora Core 1 is still getting updates for example). So that's two years of updates, not 6 months like this poster claimed - not bad for a free distro if you ask me.
You have to do a fresh install every six months!
Yep, he compounds the earlier fibs with another one. Firstly, even if you insist on doing a fresh install when the updates stop, we're still talking 2 years, not 6 months. And, if you're willing to put a bit of effort into it, you can extend older Fedora Core releases yourself beyond the 2 year mark e.g. by building your own kernel from kernel.org's newer releases or trying out a later Fedora Core's RPM (source or binary) on the FC you're maintaining (for example, I've managed to get FC3's Firefox/Thunderbird RPMs working on FC2, although it does require you to upgrade several dependencies with FC3 versions). Now if you really want to slag Fedora off, complain about how Anaconda's Disk Druid is quite tricky to use and amazingly isn't available as a standalone app (yep, it's only part of the install process). Or about how Fedora starts way too many services by default, especially for a desktop configuration. But attacking updates when I think the Fedora Project/Legacy teams do a good job is just poor.
Re:diffs? (Score:3, Interesting)
The FAQ is certainly laced with a bit of marketing. That said, I have been really impressed by the progress Novell has made in the last year, and with their commitment to two aspects critical to long term success: following standards (trying to create genuinely open standards where no good ones exist) and a big investment in improving the experience of end users.
IMHO, Red Hat would like to "differentiate" itself and be the dominant Linux vendor. SUSE is aiming to be the best among cooperating organisations.
amendments (Score:3, Interesting)
I suspect that Disk Druid isn't a stand-alone application because of the dangers of allowing people to alter the partitions of disks in use. The source is in the srpms (here [redhat.com], particularly anaconda-10.2.1.5-2.src.rpm [redhat.com]), and it shouldn't be too hard to hack it out of there and disallow access to either drives mounted or disallow access to the drives supplying important mount-points -- Fedora uses LVM2, so any drive can be mapped into
Re:If you're going to slag off Fedora, get it righ (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Welcome (Score:3, Interesting)
They call it the Super Lab, and it's nothing but rows and rows of computers so that they can stress test apps before they are released. They even have different companies come and rent it out for their own apps.
Re:diffs? (Score:3, Interesting)
This is so laughable. Novell's been pushing to get lock everyone into Netware and Groupwise. I can see you've never actually been to one of their real-life presentations before.
Red Hat, OTOH, came off totally differently in real-life. Very dedicated, willing to take on all comers while still staying true to the GNU dream.
-Erwos
Re:ISOs? (Score:2, Interesting)
I prefer an FTP install because
(1) it's faster if you don't use all the packages
(2) you don't waste time checking md5sums and burning CDs
(3) you don't waste media, except for the boot CD
Once you're done downloading, your install is almost complete.
Re:diffs? (Score:3, Interesting)
But I like Suse too. And for my personal machines, Ubuntu.