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Mandriva Businesses

Mandrake 8.1 Beta1 (Raklet) Released 245

Posted by timothy from the sitting-around-the-table-with-skewers dept.
keegnotrub writes: "Mandrake just dumped 8.1 Beta on their servers. Along with updated software (KDE 2.2, kernel 2.4.8, etc) they have reworked their control center to include many new features." Word to the wise: there are some reactions to this beta -- as well as a list of known bugs and fixes -- at mandrakeforum.com. What I'd like to know is if a Wacom Intuos USB tablet will work out-of-the-box on 8.1, since I just bought a refurbed one ;)
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Mandrake 8.1 Beta1 (Raklet) Released More

Mandrake 8.1 Beta1 (Raklet) Released

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  • Big problem: DevFS (Score:1, Flamebait)

    by bconway ( 63464 )
    Why are they using devfs? I'm not sure who was smoking crack on that one, but it's junk. It's never really worked, and it doesn't work with half of the drivers currently out there, so forget about it if you want to use things like ReiserFS or nVidia cards. Furthermore, you can't decide to not use it in the install, and switching back to dev afterwards is a major PITA.
    • I'm running a devfs-enabled kernel, with ReiserFS compiled in, and most of my partitions running on ReiserFS. Also, I am running an nVidia GeForce2 card. Tell me, what is the problem with devfs again? :P
    • i use devfs, it works great, im using it with reiserfs root. In my opinoin, it is a lot easier to setup a machine with devfs than without. Wondering if linux sees your serial port, look in /dev/tts, did it see that new harddrive, /dev/discs. I have yet to encounter a single non-devfs compatable driver. The only problem i have ever had with devfs is sound apps not working correctly, and all that took was a few symlinks, which would have been made automatically if i used devfsd, but i dont, i think it works fine without it. And i dont think that there is any hassel in switching back, unless you dont know much about linux. But why would you want to switch back? its a non-issue.
    • not sure why you think those won't work

      I'm using reiserfs

      /dev/ide/host0/bus0/target0/lun0/part1
      reiserfs 4096380 2937028 1159352 72% /

      and nvidia hardware

      [mdw@umi: mdw]$ lspci | grep nVidia
      01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV11 (rev a1)

      no problems with devfs here.

    • Re:Big problem: DevFS (Score:3, Informative)

      by Nailer ( 69468 )
      It's never really worked, and it doesn't work with half of the drivers currently out there

      Then that's the fault of the drivers. What is broken is not being able to consistently address hot pluggable hardware, and almost every other Unix has a DevFS-like system (at least Solaris, OSX, and FreebSD IIRC) they seem to have a fairly proven track record or working in a real world environment.

  • windows xp (Score:3, Insightful)

    by ToWnSaVeR2 ( 471641 ) on Saturday August 18, 2001 @08:18PM (#2173819)
    ARGH!!!...if you check out the Mandrake site they have a link of their homepage showing how 8.1 is alot like windows XP. Is it a good thing that a Microsoft OS and a Linux OS have so much in common?

    • Re:windows xp (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Johnny Starrock ( 227040 )
      Maybe that's not directed at Linux users, but instead at corperate types with purchasing power...
    • while you might not like it mandrake is really good for those unfortunate souls who want to move from windows over to linux. dont worry though. there are always other alternatives for those of us who dont particularly like the microsoft look.

      see most people coming from windows are not ready for 'linux from scratch'. not everyone can be as elite as you and i :). the point: there are alot of alternatives. if you dont like this one, dont use it.
    • It probably is a good thing to point out the similarities between Windows and Mandrake, as the market that Mandrake seems to aim at is the people that are new to linux and are looking for an easy migration to linux. Having a nice and friendly desktop, that is similar to Windows will make that migration a lot easier.
    • Superficially, having so much in common is probably a good thing.

      The current useability ideal, is roughly 'do what the users expect'. Right now the users expect to shut down the system using the start button. So what do we have to give them?
    • I liked the Mandrake 8.0 distro and install setup, although there were a few things that needed to be worked on.

      I don't thing that the comparison to XP is going to win many friends in the unix/linux community. Although I can see it as a Marketing Ploy for truly new users.

      I think that it would be better to stay true to the origin of the system. Maybe even say that it is "better"

      Tough call

      - - -
      Radio Free Nation [radiofreenation.com]
      is a news site based on Slash Code
      "If You have a Story, We have a Soap Box"
      - - -

    • um....i personaly would rather if lots of people went out and bought (or downloaded) mandrake instead of xp.I know alot of poeple that cant install win98, how the hell you expect them to install debian? or slackware? or any of the bsds?
      Recently when i get requests to reinstall windows on a friend or friend of a friend computer i make letting me install mandrake and dual booting a requirementout of ~10 installs like that 1 of those people got ahold of me and told me he installed suse and likes it better...this coming from a person that asked for my help installing win 98 for gods sake. i dont use mandrake, but it was the first disto i used and i think its the "gateway drug" of unix
      • eh, sonny?

        back in the day, Slackware 4.0 was a gateway drug.

        We all saw the brand-spankin' new shiny color install. We all used the spankin'-convenient "menu system".

        Yet somehow, it still trashed every "Gateway 2000" machine that we put it on...

        that's why it's called a gateway drug now.

        Of course them young whippersnappers like Mandrake think they can pull in new users with them shiny Gooeys and what they've them got now...

        [trails off mumbling to self...]
    • Well, when you're trying to run a profitable company and please your brand new shareholders you can't just rely on a bunch of Slashdot regulars to keep you afloat, because a lot of them are just going to go d/l the ISO's.

      So who do you go after? The Big Money - PHBs. But in general PHBs are considerably less willing to ditch what they know in favour of some upstart OS like Linux, so you need to appeal directly to them.

      Now, believe it or not, M$ have actually spent a large amount of money in the past figuring out how to make stuff user friendly - even basic things like buttons illuminated from the top and _left_ rather than top and right were decided on by focus groups. But since M$ can't really claim to have been first out of the blocks with the WIMP GUI (I imagine Apple, and Xerox would have a lot to say if they did), it's difficult for them to lay claim to a lot of the desktop elements that they developed. Which means that companies like Mandrake can rip them off.

      All of which makes their OS more familiar to those PHBs with fat wallets. But while the PHBs may have fat wallets, they usually have a big padlock on them too. And if, for example, their current OS vendors decided that they were only going to rent the new version of the OS to them, the PHBs might finally start looking around for a cheaper option.

      Enter Mandrake, stage right, saying "Look, we look like XP, only we're all stable and won't cost you nearly as much". It's just business. And hopefully it'll improve the market penetration in the lucrative corporate desktop sector. If you want to stay 1337 then you can always use a different window manager (IIRC, Mandrake comes with quite a few in the default install, and nothing's stopping you adding more).

  • Keeps getting better... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Grim Grepper ( 452375 ) <Andrew275@gmail.com> on Saturday August 18, 2001 @08:26PM (#2173840) Homepage
    Some people may not like Mandrake, for a variety of reasons, but I'm liking it more and more with every release. Many people may not like this, but I like having frequent beta releases to play around with.

    Best of all, Mandrake truly does have a great setup procedure. For example, name one other distro in which you can easily setup ReiserFS, JFS, ext3, and ext2 filesystems during the installation. And afterwards, you have such tools as the Software Update utility, which is a decent way to keep up with security updates. And don't forget the custom user, printer, and other management utilities.

    I know many people call Mandrake a newbie distro, but who said that having an easy to use distro is a bad thing? Plus, even though it's "easy to use", I can still setup and configure it however I want. Mandrake seems to be getting better and better, and I wouldn't be suprised to see it take over as the Desktop distro for both newbies and experts alike.

    • Re:Keeps getting better... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by gengee ( 124713 ) <gengis@hawaii.rr.com> on Saturday August 18, 2001 @08:52PM (#2173905)
      I second that. Mandrake pushes the bar with every new release. Things like LDAP Authentication support right in the install, journaling filesystems as you mentioned, devfs (Something we all /need/ to start using) etc. It certainly does have a 'newbieish' feel to it, but it is also quite capable as a server.

      Mandrake has it's fair share of problems. Poor (IMO) packages, testing cycles that are far too short, etc. But they certainly aren't afraid of adding new features.

      I'm not certain I like the 'Configure everthing in the instal' approach they take, but I am sure it's helpful for all new Linux users.
      • Since version 7.1 I had problems with app stability and core dumps and starting with mandrake 7.2 it became unbearable on my system. With 7.2 I had no modem, sound card, nic, and even cd-rom support on my system. I use standard parts like USR hardware based modem, creative labs awe32 sound card, netgrear nic, and a teac cd-rw. It was awefull. I even downloaded a later iso image of 7.2 hoping the bugs were fixed and still no luck.

        I think your nuts to put that thing on a server! Hell even NT 4.0 sp1 would probably be more stable then any mandrake release after 7.1 and I am sadly serious too. Sure the linux kernel is stable but mandrake uses very alpha and bleeding edge apps and daemons.

        An example is kde 2.0. It had alot of problems with the first release. If I recall mandrake finished their release of 7.1 or 7.2(don't remember which) just 3 days later with kde 2.0 included!

        THen kde 2.1 came out and all the other distro's thought it was finally stable enough. Better but still buggy. Then kde 2.1.1 and then it was good. My point is that a distro with bleeding edge software and lots of bugs gives linux a bad name. Especially for those sick of windows and seeking alternatives.

        Joe consumer: If kde crashes more then w2k, then why should I switch? Remember that ordinary users think if x crashes then linux crashes because they are use to thinking that the gui is the os. My cousin tried mandrake and switched to w2k sadly. Why? kde 2.0 and a few other apps kept crashing or were buggy and core dumped were generated left and right. Core dumps are everywhere and even NT can be fine for a week or two before it goes down or a bug here and there shows up. But thats not the case with mandrake.

        I use to love mandrake alot. When I was a newbie I wanted the gui componets because I did not know the command line that well. After learning it I do not want to go back. I think most newbies would not trade stability for extra eye candies and nifty cool bleeding edge features and apps. I personally prefer debian or slackware because they are the most stable and use the most mature apps but I can't get good corporate support. Redhat has good support but a few of their apps are alpha like gvim. I might give mandrake a try just to "goof" with it. But I will not bet my job on using it in a server or any critical workstation.

        Bleeding edge is not necessarily a good thing in a server/workstation oriented OS like linux/unix. Especially to corporate america curious about linux and checking its reliability and stability.

      • Re:Keeps getting better... (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Listen Up ( 107011 ) on Sunday August 19, 2001 @02:08AM (#2174492)

        I love Linux. I have been using it since the RedHat Mother's Day release...Way back in the day. But, everytime I read something like:

        >>>I'm not certain I like the 'Configure everthing in the instal' approach they take, but I am sure it's helpful for all new Linux users.

        I don't understand the back asswards mentality that all of the people have here. Just because you have the ability to configure just about everything in the install, why is this for "new" users only? I, along with the rest of the world, prefers to install something and get started using it RIGHT AWAY. The reason Linux isn't as popular as people like to lie to themselves about is because Linux/Unix is not easy to setup and use to someone who has little time to fuck around with it. Installing, setting up, logging in, and running productive software is exactly what serious computer users (home and corporate) are specifically wanting and aiming to achieve. Mandrake does this and that is why Mandrake is so damned popular. One of my friends spent an eternity trying to setup his network card the other week. Then when that got setup he spend tooooo many hours fucking with this file and that file to setup the rest of the networking and X-Windows and eventually blah, blah, blah...He finally contacted me about his problems and I told him to download Mandrake 8.0, burn it, and install it. He did exactly that and Mandrake found all of his hardware and he was able to set it up all in the install (including networking). He rebooted and was productive in under 30 minutes.
        I am not a newbie by any means and I find Mandrake an absolute pleasure to use. It is not a newbie distro. It is a smart distro aimed at people who want to use their computers...and people who would prefer to not have to fuck with anything to set it up and get any work done. People like me at my friend are the 90% of the market Linux currently is failing to please...Thank You Mandrake for seeing past all of this "must be a bitch to setup and use to be powerful, omnipotent, and /. geek worthy" crap and giving the world a decent distro that is both easy to setup and easy to use.
        • I think you misunderstood my point:) I wasn't flat out saying they shouldn't configure everything in the install. I was just saying I'm not sure it's the best approach. Personally, I prefer the simpler approach simply because it's faster. I may not /want/ to install X-windows on a router. With Mandrake, however, I don't have a choice. I may not /want/ to configure a printer on a nameserver, but again I have to w/ Mandrake.

          The list goes on.

          We use Mandrake on all of our desktops at work. It's worked well there. At home, however, I prefer Debian. I don't find that I'm constantly fucking with it. In fact, I find I have fewer problems with Debian than I do with Mandrake.

          Debian is by no means a bitch to install. It has an extremely simple menu-based install that I can go through in about 5 minutes. It takes half an hour to do a Mandrake install though.

          To each his own though. Mandrake has it's place. As do all the other distributions (Except Caldera. They're evil.)
          • Okay. Let's get one thing straight.



            If you can't figure out how to keep from installing X when you're installing Mandrake, you have no business running Debian.



            Seriously.

            • Well, I haven't installed 8.0/8.1 at all. But in 7.2 you had no choice. In the expert install. You could deselect the packages in the expert install, but at the end of the installation, it configures X. It gives you three options. XFree86 3.3.6, XFree86 4, or XFree86 4 w/ Hardware 3d Acceleration. You have to choose one. When you choose one, it installs the packages anyway. Even if you already deselected them all in the initial package selection.

              If you could explain to me how to get around that, I'm all ears:P
    • SuSE does that just fine.

      I deployed this week SuSE 7.2 on several machines all running ReiserFS happily (and that's a good thing as one of the new guys decided that to "move" a box he just "unplugs" it while it was still humming away.

      Nevertheless: SuSE is pretty nice sind 6.4 and since 7.0 the ReiserFS is standard and works just like a charm.

      Michael
  • From an 'open source' perspective. Debian is the only GNU/Linux distro that adheres to RMS's definition of 'open source'. While Mandrake, and Redhat (based on Mandrake) are not open source, but are the more restrictive 'free software' as defined by Eric Raymond and Bruse Perens 'Open Software Definition'.

    If you believe in freedom, you are better off going the debian route, since that way you are ensured that your distro is 100% Open Source, whereas with mandrake, it is all 'free software', but some of it may be released under the highly restrictive BSD license which RMS has criticised in the past, since it allows huge corporations such as Microsoft to profit at the expense of open source developers.

    • but some of it may be released under the highly restrictive BSD license

      Please explain to me how a license that allows you to do more things with the code can be "highly restrictive" in comparison with the GPL. Thanks.

      • Well, the BSD licence forces you to release your code to the likes of microsoft who can take it, and use it for whatever they like, without merging the changes back. Which means that Microsoft could 'co-opt' code written under BSD license without giving anything back to the community. Suppose they took an implementation of protocol that was popular say the bsd tcp/ip stack and added MS extentions. Hey presto they have used your BSD code to screw you over and you have no more control!!!


        Can you see now how the BSD license is restrictive ?

        • Well, the BSD licence forces you to release your code to the likes of microsoft who can take it, and use it for whatever they like, without merging the changes back.
          >>>>>>>>>
          Umm, if you license something under the BSD license, you implicitly OK that usage. Some people don't care if their code gets used in a closed commercial system, if it makes that system better for users. Are you saying that that's bad?
        • That's the developers decision. The vast majority of people who use Mandrake aren't developers. They have no intention of making any code modifications. Probably never will look at source.

          Freedom is about letting developers decide how they want to license their works in a way in which everyone can use them. And if developers don't care if someone like Microsoft uses their work without compensation, then let them.

          Keeping their work from the world is merely because you as a developer wouldn't want to give up that right is silly. I can understand you not wanting to work on that code. But nobody is forcing you to make any changes.

          So frankly this whole BSD license is bad has nothing to do with freedom but everything with RMS not liking anything he didn't invent.

        • Re:Mandrake is cool, but surely Debian is better. (Score:4, Insightful)

          by cobar ( 57479 ) <maxwell@101freeway.com> on Saturday August 18, 2001 @11:18PM (#2174231) Homepage
          I can't believe this got modded-up, it's an out and out troll, but I feel the obligation to respond.

          >Well, the BSD licence forces you to release your
          >code to the likes of microsoft who can take it,
          >and use it for whatever they like, without
          >merging the changes back.

          Umm, no. The BSD license doesn't force you to do much of anything. You take the code, do whatever the hell you like with it - modify, sell, relicense to your heart's content, etc. and release whatever you please. If that means making changes, forking, and re-releasing under the GPL, so be it. Or taking and releasing in binary format. Whatever, so long as you maintain the copyright notice.

          It gets me off to see GPL bigots talk about the GPL being more free than than the BSD license. Nope, it ain't - and I release my code under the GPL. Things start out in a state of freedom - one that allows total freedom of action or motion and by applying restrictions, suprise suprise, you move into a state of less freedom.

          Whether that freedom is viewed in a positive or negative context, is irrelevant. By your argument, by making drugs illegal, we end up with a society that has "freedom from drugs" (ignore your stand on the War on Drugs here) or some such tripe. It may be a more desirable societal condition, but when you apply rules, you don't have 'more' freedom. It's just a moniker used by politicians to remove opposition by it look like rights are being expanded when in reality absolute freedom is being impinged on.

          FWIW, most people who release code under the BSD license are quite aware what the freedom of the license implies. It may suprise a bigot like you, but sometimes people want to allow others to take and modify code without restriction. Some of them are even pleased if their code is useful to a corporation like Microsoft. The BSD license tends to maximize code use, the GPL code return.

          For some reason FSF people seem to feel a need to make everything free and force it on everyone, willing or not. I don't agree with this, code is the property of the author, and it's up to him/her to decide what sorts of use and license should be allowed - BSD, GPL, or proprietary. Personally, I hate proprietary software and use vary little of it. I don't support proprietary software (outside of games) with my dollars, but I sure as hell don't campaign to put commercial software houses out of business. The right to my discretion as to how I license my code is a far more important right than how I choose to exercise it. Now respect the damn software authors choice.
      • You could tell us how Red Hat is based on Mandrake, as well.
    • Wrong.

      The reason Red Hat and Mandrake aren't 100% open source or free software is because they include non-free, non-open-source code. The Netscape 4 web browser is an example.
      • Netscape is in the process of being removed from Mandrake. For example Mandrake PPC no longer has Netscape. Besides rpm -e if you don't like it.
        • I'm not saying I don't like it, I'm just correcting the original thread started by someone else.

          I do use only free software but that doesn't mean I use Debian. The only difference is that Debian makes it easier for you not to install any non-free package, but I can handle that myself.

          As for Netscape 4 and Mandrake, I'm sure it's not going to be removed in this release (8.1). I do hope it will be removed by 9.0, with Mozilla 1.0 and all. The reason it's not on Mandrake PPC is because that arch is not very well supported by Netscape.

          Personally, I don't care. I quit using Netscape months ago.
          • You are correct that it will still be in 8.1 of the x86 version. However, netscape's support of PPC is fine. Linux/PPC had to ask them for source and work with them to get it compiled. Since Mandrake knew they were going to be removing Netscape further down the line they just didn't bother.
    • Hey, I thought Mandrake was based on Red Hat.
    • Great post, too bad so many people didn't get the joke.
    • It looks to me like you've got things backwards.


      um. First, if RMS (Richard Stallman) heard you saying Debian "adheres to his definition of open source", you'd be in for the argument of your life. RMS has nothing to do with open source, he will tell you so if you ask him about open source, instead letting you know that he crafted the definition of "free software" and it applies to all GNU software. Debian, which could be called the "FSF-sponsored Linux distribution", uses exclusively free software. A program could qualify as "open source", but not as "free software", in which case it won't be in Debian (well, it might be found under the non-free section).


      Second, who told you Red Hat is based on Mandrake? its completely the other way around, and actually, Mandrake has been the target of many comments stating how they are just a Red Hat ripoff adding nothing except a lot of cutting-edge but unproven software.


      Finally, the BSD license might not be of RMS's liking, but it's a free software license (at least the version without the advertising clause), and altough it's not recommended by free software advocates, because it gives up some of the GPL's protection against appropriation of your work, it's certainly more free (freer?) than a lot of licenses that are OSI-approved, but which won't qualify as free under the FSF's definition.


      Perhaps you were thinking ESR (Eric Raymond) when you wrote RMS (Richard Stallman)??

      • Mandrake has not been based on Redhat for a while now. They try to maintain compatability but are not fanatical about it. If Redhat does too far from where they want to be Mandrake will sacrifice compatabilty. A lot of Redhat RPMs will work with Mandrake but there are probably as many or more that don't.
    • 1. RMS talks about Free Software, not Open Source

      2. ESR talks about Open Source.

      3. 98% of the packages included with Red Hat are Open Source. Netscape 4 (the main non Open Source one) won't be included in the next release. Pine is still there, IIRC.

      4. Mandrake was derives from Red Hat (2 words). Not Red Hat from Mandrake. Tho it harly matters, Mandrake's now quite distinct from Red Hat.

      5. Free Software has a specific meaning. Freedom is an english world which also a well defined meaning and which is not exclusively to do with Free Softare. People use the BSD license precisely because is allows large corporattions (and small corporations, and small proprietary limited companies) the freedom to use the software as they see fit.

      And no, I don't use BSD or particularly like the BSD license. But they're my own personal opinions and I present them as such, not as `facts'.
      • 98% of the packages included with Red Hat are Open Source

        Let's check numbers:

        zembla /home/lord> rpm -qia | grep License | grep GPL | wc -l
        516
        zembla /home/lord> rpm -qa | wc -l
        888

        It's true, but it is also true another way around: 98% of packages are Free Software, not just Open Source.
        This shows 64% of packages are under GPL, if you add to this other free licenses you will get more.

    • Instead of arguing about which dist is better, why not spend time showing people why NOT to user windows on servers. I've seen hours of research done over just this topis... image what we (/.) could do IF we focused on Gates of Borg instead?

      Does it matter that much if one dist was based on another? And if you are going to complain about that, atleast spend the time to get the facts straight.

    • "Take my code and do what the fuck you like with it."

      "No way, that's far too restrictive for me!"
  • While I like Mandrake as a newbie distro, I was not terribly pleased w/ 8.0. No hot swap USB is a major deal breaker for me, as I use a USB KVM (gotta get the iMac in there). I was intrigued to see Mandrake PPC listed on their site, however, and will be giving that a try Real Soon Now.


    They note all the improvements of 8.1beta1 over 8.0, but none of it seems particularly compelling. The latest versions of X, Y, and Z are de riguer at this point, and can be added to your existing install painlessly anyway. The improvements to their management tools are incremental (yes, I know it's a . release). I'll probably grab it when it's final just to see the new mgmt tools but my system (running Krud) has the latest Gnome/Evolution/Gimp/Gphoto/etc etc etc already so it's going to go on the guinea pig box basically to see if I should install it on my wife's computer. [tummy.com]

    • I tried installing Mandrake 8.0 on my machine, and the results were spectacular. The installer did NOT like my machine one bit. Never a dull moment when the installer decided to tell me to go to hell by segfaulting and hanging about a third of a way through the installation.

      The installer crashed because I had not provided any keyboard input at the "Networking" section". I tried text-only, lores, etc. etc. No dice. Removing memory helped somewhat but it wasn't enough to get me through the installer.

      When I finally did get it installed, it turned out that the RPM database had been magically corrupted. Fsck also decided to run for no reason at all.

      One wacky system, indeed.

      • I installed Mandrake 8.0, and I was amazed. Everything worked, and the install was easier than any version of Windows.

        Sometimes bad hardware, or bad connections, can cause a difficult or impossible install. An adapter card that is not making good contact, for example, can confuse the install system. Bad contacts are cured by pulling the card or cable connector out a tiny amount, and pushing it back.

        A spike in the power, if you are not using a battery backup, can put junk in memory. In this case, re-booting the machine and starting the install over fixes the problem.

        • In the end, PC hardware is just FUNKY. I have used and owned many systems, and they all have personalities, like chimps at the zoo. When something just doesn't work on a PC, I shrug and try it on another PC.

          If you only have one PC, that attitude doesn't help, I know.

          I don't want to call the previous-precious poster cheap or ill-informed, but I have learned over the years that quality components make ALL the difference in the Wintel hardware world. There is no such thing as a bargain motherboard: you pay more in the end, even if the sticker price was cheap. I bet the Mandrake install trouble was caused by 1 or 2 "bargain" parts. No flames please, just stating my experience -- learned the hard way, I assure you.

          Recently I helped a Mac-using friend build an Athlon system for games. It's reliable enough that Mr. PC Hating Mac Man is able to use it and not hate it, or himself.

          (BTW, I am a self-loathing PC user. I have a Mac too, but I am on the PC when I am not doing layout. And I feel guilty about it.)

          • I have learned over the years that quality components make ALL the difference in the Wintel hardware world.

            This is EXACTLY correct, and very important. Often cheaper components are being sold cheaply because they are somehow incompatible.

            Save yourself grief. Buy the best hardware. Buy Intel motherboards with Intel processors, for example. The easy install with Mandrake 8.0 (two comments above) was with an Iwill motherboard and a Pentium 200 processor. At the time the system was bought, these were conservative choices for hardware.

            I own a small computer dealership, and could have chosen any hardware on which to test Mandrake, but I wanted to see if the reports were correct. Is Linux fast on less powerful machines? It is.

            The big hardware manufacturers want new software to be slow, because that causes customers to buy more expensive machines. Linux doesn't have this conflict of interest. It runs fast everywhere.

            Good-quality hardware helps you avoid problems caused by a BIOS or OS programmer not coding for your particular hardware.

            Once a friend bought a sound card for $12 from Fry's, back when sound cards were expensive. After several hours, we decided we would never be able to get it to work. That was the most expensive sound card I've ever touched.
  • anyone know how i could get hold of the supermount patch they use? the official supermount [geocities.com] patch broke with 2.4.4 and hasnt worked since - im using 2.4.9.
  • it seems like mandrake would like the reputation of being the most up to date distro. The release coincides with the release of KDE 2.2 very nicely. Some may not care for mandrake, but people on the linux for the desktop front should see this as good support for windows users looking to jump ship.

  • Mmmm Fresh Release... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by lifebouy ( 115193 ) on Saturday August 18, 2001 @08:52PM (#2173907) Journal
    New Mandrake releases are like nose-candy for newbies. I've been hooked for a while now. I love Slack, and Debian is where its at. But I still love to get my hands on the latest ML releases just to see what new things they put in the distro. But it makes ya lazy, everything(generally) works right out of the box.(Some might consider that a feature;) Mandrake Forum seems to be turning into a little community. Kudos particularly to Deno for that site. There's lots of nuggets to ferret out of that site if you have problems.

  • I like Mandrake but (Score:2, Informative)

    by CptnKirk ( 109622 )
    their migration path has been less than perfect for me in the past. In short when I upgraded to 8.0 there were many problems with KDE related to a previous KDE 2.1 install. There were strange glibc problems which caused crashes in bitkeeper and other programs. Their installer had problems figuring out which programs to "upgrade" as well.

    My solution to these problems was to wipe and reinstall. Most settings were stored in my home dir which I did not wipe and the rest of the programs were upgraded as a side effect. My RiserFS partitions were uneffected and when I was finished the strage problems I had went away.

    I enjoy my Mandrake dist. but I'd caution those who are looking to "upgrade" via their installer.

  • from the article... now it is your turn to make it become Good and Wonderful Release(TM), namely Mandrake Linux 8.1(Raklet).
    spelling taco :P

    first real post ??

  • Problem? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by tankrshr77 ( 170422 )
    Mandrake is into making polished linux distro's for Newbie users.
    Mandrake releases buggy beta versions on their website.
    Newbie uses download beta version and have major problems, and get mad at mandrake.
    Bad descision guys.
    • Ah, the final release versions are buggy as well. I've been running the 'drake since 6.0, and have found every release to have its own quirks and broken features.

      For example, 7.2 would shut down, but never report that it was done shutting down, so I had to guess when it was done before powering off. 8.0's Software Manager doesn't retrieve and install dependencies the way it says it's supposed to, and even though my USB wheel trackball was configured successfully during the install, it didn't work once I rebooted. Had to do some investigative work to fix that one.

      I really wish they would put the final releases through more rigorous testing. Mandrake is definitely a very cool distro, but it's not yet as polished and reliable as Windows. I still recommend it though.
  • I'm glad to see a new version of MDK so soon. I've a lot of problems since going to 8.0 from 7.2

    I lost full video card support, couldn't update the kernel without killing the machine, and worse than all... my favorite xscreensavers wouldn't work.

    I'm looking forward to this huge download, mostly because I would like to see the new 'Control Center'. Every other distro I've used never had a tool that worked so well.

    I hope the software update is 100% working though...

  • They seem to always include the latest releases in there releases I seem to have more problems with mandrake then other disros but it's fun being on the bleeding edge

  • Good thing I got it before the mirrors where /.'d. With the 'few' problems with the Beta, you might be better off with Cooker [linux-mandrake.com]....

  • Why hasn't Mandrake yet provided KDE versions of the Drake tools? Am I the only one who strongly feels the need for this? As a paying customer I feel it frustrating that I am not being heard. Mandrake, are you listening? Please port those tools to KDE and give your users a choice!
    • Why hasn't Mandrake yet provided KDE versions of the Drake tools? Am I the only one who strongly feels the need for this? As a paying customer I feel it frustrating that I am not being heard. Mandrake, are you listening? Please port those tools to KDE and give your users a choice!
      You do have a choice! Just download the source and port it yourself. They're GPLed software, so you can make any changes you want & distribute them.

      If you don't have the skills to do it yourself, pay someone that does. Whining doesn't accomplish anything.
      • You do have a choice! Just download the source and port it yourself...

        If you don't have the skills to do it yourself, pay someone that does. Whining doesn't accomplish anything.

        Get off the guy's case. He does say that he's a paying customer, which means that he is paying somebody with the skills necessary to make a port of the Drake tools to KDE. He's paying Mandrake, who ought to have the skills if anyone does. And by standing up and saying that he wants the KDE port he's providing customer feedback about something that they might do to improve their product. Many companies would be very grateful for free advice about what their customers really want in the next generation of their product. Mandrake is clearly one of those companies, since they've gone to the trouble of setting up a web site where customers can make exactly those kinds of comments. Admittedly the suggestion might be more likely to be acted on if it were sent to Mandrake Forum instead of Slashdot, but I doubt that you've actually checked to see whether the above poster has sent the suggestion to Mandrake or not.

        • Something I left out of my previous post is the fact that porting to KDE would be completely useless. These tools can already be used by someone using KDE.

          HardDrake [linux-mandrake.com], their hardware detection tool, is already a KDE program. The gnome version isn't even released yet, but available in cvs.

          DrakX [linux-mandrake.com], their graphical installer, doesn't use any desktop. It's only used in the installation or upgrade of your system. Which is really only useful to someone putting together their own distro.

          DiskDrake [linux-mandrake.com], their graphical partition tool, uses only the Perl/Gtk library for its interface, not gnome or any other desktop. Most distros (even the ones using KDE as their desktop) include Perl/Gtk by default.

          Admittedly the suggestion might be more likely to be acted on if it were sent to Mandrake Forum instead of Slashdot, but I doubt that you've actually checked to see whether the above poster has sent the suggestion to Mandrake or not.
          I didn't have to check. If the poster had checked MandrakeSoft's website, they wouldn't have whined on /. in the first place.
          • I *am* a Mandrake user. You are obviously not, otherwise you would not make patently false statements that HardDrake is a KDE program. NONE of these Mandrake tools integrate with my desktop. Your message is full of lies, and I don't understand the point of these of lies.

            As for Mandrake Forum, I did post my opinion there but the Moderator chose to moderate me down.
            • NONE of these Mandrake tools integrate with my desktop.
              Integrate with your desktop? What is this buzzword bingo now? If you're using Mandrake Linux, you should be able to use HardDrake & DiskDrake just fine. DrakX can't be used with any desktop, it's only used for initial installation & upgrade.

              It's no wonder you got modded down on the Mandrake Forum, with an attitude like that.
    • Umm this is a odd comment to make about a generally KDE distribution (the reason for it's existance is because RedHat didn't use to ship KDE).

      The Drake tools work just fine under KDE. Never had a problem with them. So I don't see what you're complaigning about.
    • Why do they need to be written in KDE?

      I love KDE and all, but limiting your setup tools to a huge desktop environment is insane. How many floppies will you need for the initial setup if you're not booting from a CD? What if you like GNOME and prefer not to have the KDE libs around?

      Personally, I like what SuSE did: make a scriptable setup framework (YaST2) with multiple frontends (Qt and ncurses, they look similar). It didn't need to be entirely KDE-based to be integrated into the KDE control-center, and it works under GNOME just fine without KDE dependencies. It still works fine if you don't even have X.

      Let me reiterate: forcing a million dependencies just to run setup tools is a terrible thing.

  • A Windows Desktop Replacement! (Really) (Score:3, Funny)

    by zulux ( 112259 ) on Saturday August 18, 2001 @09:21PM (#2173973) Homepage Journal

    Once the few bugs get worked out - The whole Mandrake 8.1 sytem is really a Windows desktop replacement. I'm really excited to wipe out a secratary's Windows computer, replace it with Mandrake and watch what happens. My hunch is, after explaining to her that the Start button is now a "K" - and MS.Word is now called KWord, then she will turn to me and say "OK." And proceed to work as if nothing has happened. After a few hours , I bet she'll say :


    "Wow, this new version of Windows sure has a lot of cool card games, Thanks!"

  • Too Many Connections (Poorly made packages) (Score:3, Interesting)

    by gengee ( 124713 ) <gengis@hawaii.rr.com> on Saturday August 18, 2001 @09:25PM (#2173981)
    I suspect MandrakeForum is using the Mandrake PostgreSQL RPMs. They're built with a (default) 32 connection limit.

    Warning: Too many connections in /home/www/mandrakeforum.com/html/mainfile.php on line 24
    Unable to select database
  • Never seen so many -1s, especially now that I haven't seen TollTroll around for awhile.

  • They're still using the evil gcc 2.96, and not only that, the users in MandrakeForums want it that way. I am just not their market anymore, I guess. I see gcc 3.0 out with 3.01 coming, and my first thought is: "great, they can break free of Red Hat's crappy decision!" But the Mandrake users appear to want Red Hat compatibility even to the point of following Red Hat's bad ideas. Oh well. I was holding out for 8.1. I guess it's time to find alternatives.

    • This was modded down?

      Clearly the moderator has never used GCC 2.96... ;)

      You guys forced to use RedHat know what i'm talking about.

      Especially if you've tried to compile large MMX-optimised projects.
  • In a recent discussion about another distro, someone posted a link to a great chart which showed the release numbers of all the major apps included in each distro. Can someone please post that link?
  • http://planetmirror.com/pub/mandrake/iso/i586/8.1/

    btw, it's "Raklet" not "Rakel", from the filename.

    cheers,

    -jason

  • I'm really a newbie. I'm not newest of the new, I can compile and have my own kernels/etc, but I still feel I have alot to learn before I can pull myself out of the newbie catagory, maybe low middle user or whatever...

    I have used mandrake since 7.0, bought the power pack and upgraded since all the way to 8.0 every increment. Mandrake allways gave me a feeling of bloat and being unfinished. The install was nice, but all the setup and configure tools afterward seemed half done. They would work some of the time but not allways and not ever flawlessly. I allways ended up going and configuring everything manually. It also filled up my HD with programs that weren't documented or linked to anywhere. Just wasting space, not letting me know they were there or what they could do for me.

    Also has anyone tried compiling a new kernel on a mandrake machine? It's a pain. They include all these extras in the kernel that if you give the system a new one it craps it's pants. I applaud their efforts in making a newbie distro, but I love my Slackware. The install is slightly less user friendly, but it is easy, quick and best of all it works. The system runs perfectly and it has just the software that I want and use, no crap . I have recompiled many kernels on it, mostly recompiles because I have forgotten something or another, and never have had any problems. It's also the little things, like having fortune run in the login script. It's just a slick and wonderful distro.

    As soon as anyone gets their feet wet with Mandrake I highly recomend using Slackware. The best distro.

  • I noticed in this release they're still bundling the slower, buggier PHPNuke [phpnuke.org]. Does anyone know if they'll ever to to a more stable, faster CMS like their mortal enemy, PostNuke [postnuke.com] ? Or perhaps add to this a PERL solution like the new and improved Slash [slashcode.com] ?

    If you're not sure what the heck I'm talking about, here's a recent article in Linux.com [slashdot.org] that goes into some gory detail.

  • RANT (Score:2, Interesting)

    by socialist fish ( 23418 )
    I would like to copy the comment I've just posted to Mandrake Forum:

    ---
    I didn't test this release, and I think I wouldn't even try mdk 8.1. I'm too tired from problems with Mandrake. Specially with upgrades, I've trashed my computer twice: upgrading 7.1 to 7.2, and later upgrading 7.2 to 8.0. Both times I ended with MANY problems, for example, with the upgrade to 8.0 you folks decided to change packages names, and didn't have any precaution with that. So, before the libs for some package came included in the "main" rpm and the development stuff came in the "devel" rpm. Now, the libs came in the "lib" package, so yada.rpm won't install because it required yada-lib.rpm and my computer didn't have that package before. So the system kept yada-old.rpm which won't run with new glibc and that.. So I had to install/upgrade about 200 rpms by hand.

    Also, I had infinite problems with ReiserFS because you included it when it was WAY too beta in 7.1, and then never checked if the filesystems created under 7.1 would run with a kernel upgrade. Well, it would not. I had to spend many days in the reiserfs developers list to find out how to fix the problem. And I did the big mistake of installing mdk 7.1 with reiserfs on many of my servers at work.

    For ending this long rant, I would comment that in 7.1 pam had a structure which didn't used the "pam_stack.so service=system-auth" trick. And when you upgraded SSH for a security problem, you sent the 7.1 upgrade with a /etc/pam.d/sshd file which required the system-auth file. The result: I can no longer ssh to any of the upgraded boxes. At the same time there wasn't any upgrade for PAM available at the time, and the 7.2 rpm used a diffrent version of RPM so them were incompatibles, so I had to create /etc/pam.d/system-auth by copying it from newer boxes.

    Mandrake folks: you made a beautiful and easy to use distribution, but you aren't paying any attention to reliability, nor upgradability.

    I suspect many people now will have problems with XFS and ext3 as I had with ReiserFS.

    PD: AND PLEASE: document in the package itself when it has non standard patches. I mean, specially, kernel. But also on others, for example CVS: nowhere it says that it has a shell script wrapper to pserver!!!!!!!!!!!!

    • Use Red Hat Linux, you won't have all of these instability problems.
      • Nah, I've jumped from RedHat more than one year ago. I didn't liked it too much, but I don't remember why :-)

        Now I'm switching to debian, and I'm loving it!

    • Re:RANT (Score:2, Informative)

      by msobkow ( 48369 )
      Personally I never upgrade -- I reformat the drive and do a clean install. Even RPM upgrades (much less the whole OS) can break changes I've made to my system configs, particularly as most of the software I use isn't part of the core distro.

      Another important issue is to either use one of the canned package sets, or start with the bare minimum and pick the specific packages you'll be using. Some of them seem to conflict with each other, particularly those from the extra CDs. Unfortunately you can only find out which ones conflict by running into problems.

      As to stability and reliability, I have to tip my hat to Mandrake. Ever since RedHat started their 7.x series, Mandrake has not only been more current but more reliable. Common stock hardware (e.g. CUSL2, EEPro10/100, CD, 60GB IBM HDD, and SBLive OEM) would not run RedHat 7.x reliably, regardless of which release I tried. Mandrake 8.0 was solid except for an issue with kdelibs that caused the occasional crash (fixed within 2 weeks of initial release.)

      Having tried to "roll my own" from the Mandrake cooker using LFS as a guideline, I know how much work these people do to get it working. They do a terrific job.

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