Mandriva Linux 2007 Spring Released

AdamWill writes "Mandriva is proud to announce the release of Mandriva Linux 2007 Spring. Download the hybrid live / install One or the purely free / open source software Free. Mandriva Linux 2007 Spring includes the latest software (KDE 3.5.6, GNOME 2.18, Firefox and Thunderbird 2.0) and several major new features: Metisse, the most innovative accelerated 3D desktop technology; open source telephony with WengoPhone; Google desktop applications including Picasa and Earth; updates and improvements to many of the Mandriva configuration tools, and the brand new drakvirt for configuring virtualization; significantly improved hardware support, including greatly improved graphics card detection and support for several common laptop memory card readers; and a brand new desktop theme. Mandriva Linux 2007 Spring is available in the full range of editions, including the freely downloadable One and Free, as well as the commercial Discovery, Powerpack and Powerpack+. For more information see the Spring product page and the Wiki page, where you can find download and installation instructions, the Release Tour, the Release Notes and the Errata."

Re:Why?

[AvitarX]

If they are funding projects like Metisse I think we need more.

Re:Metisse seems like a novelty.

[Coryoth]

Unlike Beryl and Compiz, Metisse actually seems to be based around the idea of increasing productivity.

That's nice to know, because that's not the impression I got from their demonstration videos [mandriva.com] which feature "folding windows", tilting windows at weird angles in 3D, and a weird sort of mirror reflection effect. That's nice to show off what the engine can do, but in principle all the other fancy 3D managers can do those too -- what really interests me is, as you discuss, actually using all that power to add productivity. I agree that the pager [dailymotion.com] looks nice (although the other effects in that video are a little underwhelming in the productivity stakes). The shading effects shown here [insitu.lri.fr] could be used nicely to gray out unfocussed windows which, I agree, might be nice (as long as it isn't carried too far). Still, I'm waiting for people to get bored with the gee whiz effects and the more useful things to start to shake themselves out.

Re:my dream...

[Coryoth]

I'm not talking about merging all the open source projects, I'm just talking about all the redundant putting together of all the projects (aka distributions).

This will inevitably happen as "Linux" slowly gets more mainstream and greater desktop market share. What do I mean? Well it isn't going to be "Linux" as the amorphous mass of distirbutions that mainstream users will come to know, but rather a very small handful of distributions. As market share expands it will be that very small handful that will be gaining in audience, while all the other distributions will continue to be the small niche items that they are. Right now, because everything is relatively niche, the difference between "mainstream" and "niche" distributions is not that apparent. Once Linux becomes less of niche desktop OS (and that will happen, just very slowly) the difference will become more clear.

Re:Here's why:

[Chandon Seldon]

Simple desktop distros: Ubuntu and Mandriva.
Enterprise-priced server support: Red Hat and SuSE.
Community supported for techies: Debian and Gentoo.
Localized in Chinese: Red Flag.

I wouldn't really consider any of the other distros to be "major" (ignoring non general-purpose PC platforms).

I'm sick of Linux

[tsa]

I've been using Linux for ten years now and I get more and more disappointed by it. Ten years ago there weren't many user-friendly distros out and I started with Slackware. I'm still very happy my friend dragged me into using that because I am now a savvy *nix amateur. But! During the last ten years I kept hearing that, yes, Linux is now really almost ready for the desktop, and world domination is just around the corner. I tried some other distros over the years (Suse, Redhat), but I kept coming back to Slackware. About a year ago I changed to Ubuntu because I didn't like all the configuration I had to do after every Slackware upgrade anymore. 'Ubuntu works out of the box!' the website assured me. After install I spent hours getting X to work right. It only wanted to run in 1024x768 @ 60 Hz. Thanks to my experience with Slackware and my backups I could edit xorg.conf to fix that. Now I have a working install, but Ubuntu is so slow that it's a pain to use. And I haven't been able to watch a movie on it yet. Configuring Gnome was a pain, and there isn't much documentation on how to start on the Ubuntu website either. I find the whole Ubuntu experience very disappointing. The only thing that keeps me from changing to a Mac completely (I have a MacBook Pro which I love) is the lack of choice in hardware. Changing to Windows is of course no option; I never understood why that OS is used so much. So I keep using Linux, but I almost never use my main machine as anything other than a file server anymore. Linux is very good at that, no matter which distro you use.

Re:adverts

[AdamWill]

Well I don't know what you mean by free, then. If you're suggesting Slashdot is taking money to run stories, or something, then no: I submitted this story to Slashdot via the normal submission channels this afternoon. A few hours later, it went up. Nothing else took place whatsoever.

I've met exactly one person in five years using apt on Mandriva. A few more using smart, but still not many.

Otherwise, well - basically, we beg to differ. As you say, time will tell who's right.