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Debian

Libranet GNU/Linux 2.0 Coming Soon 189

Posted by michael from the last-man-standing dept.
tal256 writes: "As a proud employee of Libranet, I'm pleased to announce that Libranet has started taking pre-orders for Libranet GNU/Linux 2.0. I feel I should note, of all the vaunted Debian based commercial distributions (Stormix, Corel, Progeny) Libranet is the only one left. We got started before they did and here we still are. Libranet has proven that to stay in the race what you need is a good product rather than millions of dollars behind you; but that's what the world of Free/Open software is all about, isn't it? - Tal" I love Debian, but have never tried Libranet. (The machine I'm typing on was installed with a Stormix CD; my laptop started as a Progeny machine...) Since we seem to be running out of other Debian-based distros, looks like Libranet is my next choice. :)
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Libranet GNU/Linux 2.0 Coming Soon More

Libranet GNU/Linux 2.0 Coming Soon

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  • Jeez, michael.... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Peter Harris ( 98662 ) on Thursday January 31, 2002 @06:52AM (#2929965) Homepage
    ...is the standard Debian installer that bad? Hmm -- well, yeah.
    • I usually use Red Hat or SuSE Distros with their nice graphical installers, but for some old HP PA-RISC machines I have to rely on the Debian distribution, because Debian is the only one to include the PA-RISC architecture. While the installer is far from good-looking, it does the job. It's like YaST1 from SuSE or the FreeBSD installer. Do we really need a penguin looking at us while installing Linux?
    • And of course, it's the installer that matters most.

      After having Debian on my PC for more than 2 years, I sure wish the installer was better.

      I guess having a nice installer in Red Hat is a good thing, since after all the dependency hell, broken compilers, etc, people often "upgrade" via a reinstall from a RH CD.

      I'll take apt for upgrades anyday. Debian installer? I barely remember it.
      • Oh, the ritualistic hazing I got when I went to college? I hardly remember it.



        The initial install, and the pain it invokes, matters to some because some people never get past the install. Duh.



        Personally, my only peeve with Debian (Sid) is that nobody can seem to maintain KDE properly, but the harder-to-maintain GNOME base seems to work peachy. The excuse I've been given is that GNOME is easier to maintain. Hrm.



        And that's a constant problem.

        • The initial install, and the pain it invokes, matters to some because some people never get past the install. Duh.

          What are those people doing playing with linux then? At some stage, no matter how cute Red Hat or Mandrakes installer is or the in-GUI user friendliness, you'll have to do something in linux that'll be a whole lot hairier than the Debian installer.

          Personally, my only peeve with Debian (Sid) is that nobody can seem to maintain KDE properly,

          Not a problem for me, I prefer Gnome. Seems to be more stable than KDE, though I have'nt bothered to use it in a long while.
          • Not a problem for me, I prefer Gnome. Seems to be more stable than KDE, though I have'nt bothered to use it in a long while.



            Duh, that was my point. Of course GNOME is more stable; more attention is paid to GNOME than to KDE, hence my peeve. In other distributions, it's Gnome, not KDE, that gives such fits, because GNOME is harder to maintain. Of course, nothing is impossible when you've got a grudge to keep.



            Erm, no, actually, the probem is more likely due to the inability of Debian's maintenance tools to do recursive rebuilds i.e. if libpng gets rebuilt, rebuild everything that is dependent upon libpng. If something like that existed, it'd be far simpler for package maintainers, IMHO. Oh wait, FreeBSD already has that. Hrm.

            • Duh, that was my point. Of course GNOME is more stable; more attention is paid to GNOME than to KDE, hence my peeve.

              I was under the impression that much of the KDE instability was due to most of KDE being done in C++, something that the gcc folks themselves state, is not yet anywhere near as stable in their compiler as C is.

              Why does Red Hat and Sun prefer Gnome? And what's with all the erm and duh? Another /. 12 year old? Maybe they came to the same conclusion many do, KDE is less configurable and less stable and if KDE were'nt so braindead in some of their licence decisions in the past, more would have embraced it to the point where it is on top. KDE can die for all I care.

              I like cheese I'm lactose intolerant.
              • I was under the impression that much of the KDE instability was due to most of KDE being done in C++, something that the gcc folks themselves state, is not yet anywhere near as stable in their compiler as C is.



                Well, whatever; I just know I have great luck with KDE, and terrible luck with GNOME, in other distributions. FYI, GNOME isn't just C based. It's also based on C++, Objective C, and whatever language is popular this year.



                Why does Red Hat and Sun prefer Gnome?



                They're afraid that, if they write something non-Free, they'll have to pay for a Qt license.



                And what's with all the erm and duh? Another /. 12 year old?



                You, perhaps. I was being what is known as condescending. I'm actually quite young (28) but doggone it, I feel like saying "I'm right, you're wrong." ;-)



                Maybe they came to the same conclusion many do, KDE is less configurable and less stable



                Nope, it's not less stable, and I'm not sure what you mean by "less configurable." I find KDE to be quite configurable.



                and if KDE were'nt so braindead in some of their licence decisions in the past,



                Yes, and you've said the important phrase: in the past. As in, it's over, dead, gone.



                more would have embraced it to the point where it is on top. KDE can die for all I care.



                That's you're decision, if you want to be so immature as to hold a grudge. Which pretty much gives me more grist for my "GNUbies holding an anti-KDE grudge."



                BTW, how does it work for one to be a GNUbie AND a GNOME enthusiast when people like Miguel (and dammit, I don't care what people say; it used to be his baby exclusively) whore the project around to proprietary vendors?

  • Marketing speak :) (Score:4, Funny)

    by minus23 ( 250338 ) on Thursday January 31, 2002 @06:53AM (#2929968)
    I dunno... I'm betting most of the Slashdot'ers can recognize marketing speak. It's strange hearing that language spoken now since the dot bomb. Almost like speaking the language of Mordor. A language I will not utter here. :)
    • Have you even tried Libranet? I've been using it for years and it's great! You might want to try something first then open your mouth!
    • Almost like speaking the language of Mordor. A language I will not utter here. :)

      Was'nt it Elvish on the ring that should not be uttered?

  • Running out? (Score:2, Informative)

    by Isle ( 95215 )
    I am waiting for Xandros :)

    And then there's Lindows, but I dont really consider that a linux distro.

    Just for your infomation.

  • The thing I don't get. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by jchawk ( 127686 ) on Thursday January 31, 2002 @06:55AM (#2929973) Homepage Journal
    What is the point of a debian based commercial linux os? Debian is by far my favorite choice. Getting it setup takes a little bit of time, but once it's running it is really super easy to update and install new software.

    apt-get update
    apt-get install foo_software

    How hard is that? I don't mind paying to support linux, but why am I going to pay for a distribution based on debian, when debian already kicks butt?

    And with the work being done on the debian install process it is getting easier all the time.

    - I'll bash you in the forhead.

    • Re:The thing I don't get. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by bfree ( 113420 ) on Thursday January 31, 2002 @07:28AM (#2930027)
      Ok for the sake of full disclosure I run Debian everywhere and have done for about 2-3 years and I used to work in Corel Linux International Technical Support (check THAT acronym hehe). There is a serious justification for debian based meta-distributions because while Debian will always be a horse for nearly all courses it's flexibility means that it is not targetted to most users. Corel Linux was/is a desktop OS and by making that choice Corel could configure a Debian box for an intended use. For 90% of computer users Corel Linux kicked Debian's ass simply because they would never have been able to work on a Debian system (what do you mean "edit /etc/samba/smb.conf to suit my windows network", "what do you mean man 5 smb.conf"?). Similarly we now have demudi [demudi.org] which is another targetted Debian distro, but this time for an entirely different market (multimedia production). Debian could never really try to catch niches, all it does is produce a stably packaged distribution which can be configured and adapted easily. Corel and demudi could never really try to produce a quality OS from scratch nor keep it up to date. Instead of both sides giving up, the work, aims and ideas of Free software which Debian embodies so well (they want meta-distros) leads to a two tiered system where Debian brings the pieces together and the distros tweak it. Both sides push their knowledge at each other (though either side can ignore the other) and the base system which all are using is strengthened. The alternative is just Debian, and while I would continue to use it, I think it's "market share" would be much lower that way. Never forget that everyone using a non-Debian Debian-based distro is that much closer to just changing their apt sources and leaving the commercial (or redistributor) behind and becoming a member of the Debian community.
      • Corel Linux International Technical Support (check THAT acronym hehe)

        How did such a thing get past the damn executives in charge?!

        I would have loved to work there, if only for the name tag/badge with my name, right above the acronym.
        • How did such a thing get past the damn executives in charge?!

          One suggestion for the Network Services group at one of my old jobs was Centralized Ubiquitous Network and Telephony Services.

          --saint
      • I still use Corel 1.0 and 1.2 on both machines at home. It was the first Linux OS I tried, and I don't feel much like changing. The only time I wan't running Corel was when I made my own Linux from Scratch [linuxfromscratch.org] distro. Also, where can I get the download for all the Corel Office suites? Every since Xandros [xandros.net] took over, I cannot get any of the cool stuff that came with the Corel Updater.

        • There is no download of the Corel Office suites and never was. There was a download version of Wordperfect 8 (don't know if you can still find it) and a download version of PhotoPaint (was it 9). As for Corel Updater, you can just point your boxes to Debian and grab stuff from there BUT BE WARNED you may blast out some of the Corel customisation, particularly the samba integration. You can just dist-upgrade a Corel Linux box to Debian or you can pick your packages but I wouldn't (I have no knowledge, just guesses) expect Corel Updater to do you too many favours again in the near future (if ever) if you use the Corel sites.

          The far more interesting question is can you still order the Linux WordPerfect Office 2000 or Draw 9 from Corel? If not I suspect that MS squeezed the out of it with their non-voting stock deal (do a grep of microsoft on the dll's supplied for a clue as to how Corel shot themselves in the foot and probably blew this).

      • A different view (Score:3, Insightful)

        by clump ( 60191 )
        Corel Linux was/is a desktop OS and by making that choice Corel could configure a Debian box for an intended use.
        I have no qualms there. Debian is *ultra* flexible, to the point where some people think it is... gasp... difficult to install! But then most users don't feel it necessary to install via CD then be asked later where to get the packages to install. That is good, in my opinion, because you can mix all kinds of installs and media types during installation. Normal users, however, may think it is a redundant step.

        For 90% of computer users Corel Linux kicked Debian's ass simply because they would never have been able to work on a Debian system (what do you mean "edit /etc/samba/smb.conf to suit my windows network", "what do you mean man 5 smb.conf"?)

        This is where I disagree. Yes, Corel made certain things like installation easier but Corel gave up quickly after the distro was released. Users wanting security upgrades were up the creek. So even if users knew about security it was by no means easy to get updates from Corel.

        For the parent, I will have to agree. I think that Debian-based distros have an uphill battle to fight when competing against normal Debian, but in all fairness, thats not who they compete against. The Debian developers just make a solid distro regardless of deadlines and marketing. Thats great for us knowledgeable folk, but newer users need a little more help.
        • ...but Corel gave up quickly after the distro was released...

          More like Microsoft told them to get out of the Linux market or they wouldnt invest in them (or hire their services).

          Corel isnt in the Linux business because MS didnt want Corel Office / Corel Draw etc to start targetting Linux because their was no room for them on Windows. It would have helped prove that MS stiffles the PC software world && help GNU/Linux bust onto the desktop.

          Should I mention that MS owns (still?) a big chunk of Apple stock...

          MS controls Apple and MS put the screws to Corel.

          I enjoy a good conspiracy as much as the next guy, but please, think about what Ive said here and
          *

          Via Office && Explorer: Imagine Wall Street's panick over AAPL if MS announced a discontinuation of these apps. Moderate Apple users would also flee.

          Via their 'Non-voting shares': Wouldnt dumping the shares also cause a decrease in AAPLE, and a further decrease due to Wall Street jitters about Apple becoming a target for MS.

          Apple && MS are quite cozy. Without Apple, who would MS prop up as their competition. And Corel, well they were sinking anyway -- MS made them an offer ($$$) they were in no position to refuse.

          • Re:A different view (Score:2, Insightful)

            by Adversary ( 7517 )
            I'm not sure MS' investment was the reason Corel dumped Linux. As I see it, it's more likely that both were caused by the same factor: Corel was in bad shape.

            Dumping Linux was all about Corel "focusing on key areas", meaning as a business, they couldn't justify continuing development on it. I doubt Microsoft gave two shits about Corel doing development on Linux. I mean, they wanted them to do .NET for Linux! Check the old press releases [com.com]!

            And if anyone is curious about the (former) Corel distribution, check out Xandros [xandros.com]

        • Re:A different view (Score:3, Interesting)

          by bfree ( 113420 )

          Hmm, Corel Updater pointing to Corel and Debian Security is a good big step along the way (you might have to decide whether to break Corel's work and take a debian security update or to risk ploughing on without it). You suggest that all Corel did was make an easier installer, but that's just ignorant! Did you ever install and use Corel Linux? It had samba filemanager integration, a "control panel" which actually did more than tweak your window manager (like control aspects of X or setup printers), Corel Updater which is a KDE apt frontend and the most ridiculously easy installer IF your hardware was supported (each version expanded the installers supported hardware significantly).

          Why do you think a Debian based distro has a fight versus Debian? I would forsee/hope that in 5 years only 5% of "Debian" users would actually be using debian.org's version and the rest would be using a repackaged version that does what you need, how you need and is supported the way you want. A company could even sell debian.orgs version but with their own ftp servers for packages and their own support system (i.e. phone and email support for debian). Why should people break their back tweaking and configuring Debian to their task when there are 5% of Debian users (or would be debian users) who need the same! Why should Debian set their base configuration to suit any section of the users instead of providing a sane default setup for everyone to work from? The question is will commercial or non-commercial distros win? My money is on demudi to show the world just how good debian is and for more to follow.

      • Another nice thing about this particular distro (like the other failed Debian derivatives ;-) is that it's actually Potato-based, yet comes with a number of packages that're more recent than Potato, and in the case of KKDE, nonexistent.



        That's the nice thing about such a system: it gets the benefits of a well-tested core, so they don't have to concentrate on that (just on making an easier install, and I just installed it, and it's hella sweet) and more recent packages . . . all on this well-tested core. It doesn't get much better than this. ;-)

    • Yeah, and I wonder how much it costs to get an advert like this on Slashdot? I've got a product I'd like to advertise - it's not a Linux distro, but it does add to open source software. Does that meet the criteria?

      No, thought not.
    • What is the point of a debian based commercial linux os? Debian is by far my favorite choice.
      Others have answere this point, I just wanted to add that whilst I think it's great that other distributions are basing themse lves off of Debian, users should not forget that Debian itself is a community project, dependent upon voluntary effort.
      If anyone would like to give something back and get involved - by maintaining a package, fixing bugs, translating something into a nother language or whatever, please do.
      Get on the appropriate mailing list [debian.org] and join in :-)

      - Derwen

    • Re:The thing I don't get. (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      How hard is that? I don't mind paying to support linux, but why am I going to pay for a distribution based on debian, when debian already kicks butt?

      There are exactly two different reasons:

      • Ease of use, installation and configuration. Installing, editing /etc/sources, configuring manually the machine (ppp, ...), is already too much for the use. For instance my TV ISA card was automatically recognized by Suse install ; I tried, but I stopped loosing time trying to get it running under Debian. Worse was trying to get XFree 4.0 running just was it was out. And now getting OpenGL on my NVidia, is still a significant work, no average user would do.
      • The opposite reason for super-sysadmin : automatic management of say 100+ machines. Debian is just a big problem. Last time, I upgraded one machine it took about 1 day (yeah re-installing is faster). Not to mention there is nothing for the NFS server: storage redundancy, heart-beat, automated backup. As a result, since there is no hard-availability features other than special hardware or patches available elsewhere in "experimentation" or 0.02 versions and the like, I don't use a Debian file server - each user kind of auto-administrate his Debian (with apt-get), and has backups.

      It would be VERY nice is Debian was able to run 2 Debian versions at the same time (or at least, as a boot choice) with basic Debian, and to automate that also "apt-get co-install new-unstable"). Dist-upgrade is not really practical for now (I now, I've been using all version since 1.3, man, those broken dependancies drove me crazy).

    • I like APT but there's a couple of reasons why I stick with Red Hat - I like their current yet well tested AC kernels, kudzu, setup, installer and a couple of other tools. Its always nice to just buy a network card and install it by sticking it in my damned machine and turning back on - no hunting for which driver module matches the hardware. A lot of software (Open Source apps like FreeSWAN, closed source apps like Kylix) seem to be tested on RH before other Linux distributions.

      Anyway, APT has been available for Red Hat for some time now and its how I update most o my boxes. There's a few good publically avaliable repositories and more on the way - namely all the Red Hat CDs, all the updates as they come out, FreshRPMs, and Gnomehide. I have around 2.8GB of (binary) software from 9 different sources on an APT repository I maintain at my workplace, all of which are tested against 7.2. Sure, 2.8 is less than 6GB (the amount on Debian repositories), but its got everythign we need - acroread, postfix, enhydra, kylix open edition, just about everything else.

      There's also the fact that the ability to install RPM packages is part of the LSB, and alien doesn't seem to handle this reliably.

      If you're interested, download apt packages from Freshrpms [freshrpms.net]

  • Nice Additude.. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by joonasl ( 527630 ) <joonas DOT lyytinen AT iki DOT fi> on Thursday January 31, 2002 @06:55AM (#2929974) Homepage
    I love this Q&A they had in their FAQ..

    Is Linux really as good as I have heard?
    It's better.

  • Maybe this is why we need the new Debian.

    So that anyone can try and Install Debian with little fuss...
    AND get a stable system.

    Maybe is my local lan ftp / Web server + Domain Controller is on it's way...

    Would it run on a P133/24Mo ?
    • "Maybe this is why we need the new Debian. So that anyone can try and Install Debian with little fuss...

      Last time I check, "trying and installing" -the "new version," nonetheless - of Debian GNU/Linux was as easy as this [debian.org]:

      If you are using APT, you can use the following lines in your /etc/apt/sources.list file to be able to access packages in testing:

      deb http://http.us.debian.org/debian testing main contrib non-free
      deb http://non-us.debian.org/debian-non-US testing/non-US main contrib non-free

      Read the apt-get(8) and the sources.list(5) manual pages for more information.

      #apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade

      • Remember installing from 0 ?

        editing the network config to manually remove the 47 NICs it installed ?

        Moving a small (1k) file to the proper directory to make it work ?

        ...

        I speak about all those "small" problems that always made a Debian install a 3 days - 5 kilos printed paper affair...

        At least for me 8)
        • I needed a router quickly a few days ago and it took 20 minutes from sticking the woody cd in the drive to having a working system..

          Admittedly, it's not patched or anything as it's only routing between 2 hubs sat on my desk unconnected from any real network but pointing it at the local mirror and typing "apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade" wouldn't have taken much longer..

          But then I don't run X or anything like that ;-)
          • My last Debian install was "some" time ago.

            For the routing job i was quite used to FreesSco (www.freesco.org)

            VERY nice one floppy router / DSL / Cable acces.
            And some sort of NAT.

            I just love this one, one floppy, 5', and running 8)

            I'll try Woody next week. I was trying to get my 98 box to connect to a 2kPro server without a PDC and the only way I found yet is to open the server to Anybody...

            Maybe this Samba-PDC thing will be worth it 8)

            BTW, FTP is still slugging it's way to answering. I download a Woopping 9 bytes /s 8|
      • "Maybe this is why we need the new Debian. So that anyone can try and Install Debian with little fuss...

        Last time I check, "trying and installing" -the "new version," nonetheless - of Debian GNU/Linux was as easy as this [debian.org]:

        Uh, the emphasis there was on the "anyone," methinks. As opposed to, "people who already have Debian installed."

      • That would work if the Potato installer would boot a 2.4 kernel, which I need. I have a ATA/100 drive as my main hard drive and I do believe that 2.2 does not handle it. I can't even play the install on one disk and move to another deal either. When Libranet 2.0 comes out I will check it out because I do love Debian based distros and I don't even have any bitches about Debian's installer either. I need these updates to have a usable system. Plain and simple. Plus, at least with Debian, I can count on them using a kernel that will be usable on most systems. Mandrake and Redhat both have that damn vesafb console crap and neither one of them works on my Nvidia. All I see during a reboot is a blank screen. Debian, I bet, would still use a text console. Sure, the penguin is cool, but why setup a vesafb if you don't need a vesafb (say because you have an unsupported by X video card)? I surely would not set up a vesafb just for the stinking penguin on a text console!
    • It will run easily on a P90 or P75. People use 486 machines to do what you want. A P133 will do this easily (unlses you get slashdotted).

      The issue is ram. I don't know about 24 megs, but I know that on 16 megs of ram, dselect is slooooow (I left it for an hour and it still didn't even show me the package list), and don't even bother with X (which is probably what Libra's admin tools run under).

      I would say try and scrounge up some more ram to at least get yourself to 32, to give yourself a nice margin. Apache takes up a fair chunk of mem even idling, and you don't want to spend hours just adding packages. Unpacking/installing from the command-line was almost as bad as dselect, because it was so heavy into swap, and my drive doesn't get on well with that kind of use.

      You could use aptitude or console-apt, but I don't know how well those would've ran because I gave up and threw another 32 megs of ram in the box.

      Anyway, if you learn the apt command-line tools, I can't forsee you having -too- much trouble, but pick up some extra ram if you can. You'll be glad you did.

      --Dan
  • We got started before they did and here we still are. Libranet has proven that to stay in the race what you need is a good product rather than millions of dollars behind you; but that's what the world of Free/Open software is all about, isn't it? I wonder what makes the difference. With so many distributors down the drain, what did Libranet different from the others (apart from VA and Redhat), and whether new startups like OpenOSX have a chance.

    Dirk

  • Libranet ... yeah! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31, 2002 @07:20AM (#2930013)
    I really like Debian. All my desktops, laptop and servers (I'm a sysadmin) run Debian.
    I tried Libranet and went 'wow'. It's userfriendly enough (not like Mandrake, but hey, you get Debian!) to introduce new users to Debian and stable enough to not make those newbies regret it.

    It's not bleeding edge (it's mostly the stable debian release with updated packages like recent kernel, X, KDE, Gnome), but more desktop minded than the regular Debian Stable release. I enjoyed when I used it (I wanted more bleeding edge, so I'm running Testing and Sid on my desktops. Yep. Add some lines into the sources.list and apt-get dist-upgrade into it!).

    I really want Libranet to succeed (now that progeny is gone).

    C.
    • So...let me get this straight. You can use a more user friendly installer and then apt-get your way to Debian testing or unstable? That sounds really great to me.

      I love running Debian, I've got it on my desktop and two laptops, but it is sometimes hard to install.
      Good Luck Libranet, I would like a little easier install.

  • pretty good (Score:2, Interesting)

    by SonofRage ( 89772 )

    I recently installed the last verion of Libranet (1.91 or something) on my laptop and it's pretty good. It is more up to date than standard Debian and came with Ximian GNOME already set up. It also has this weird control panel thing that has a few config tools and even a button that will run "make menuconfig" for you so you can recompile your kernel which was kinda neat (but also kinda stupid since its not exactly difficult to type make menuconfig anyway.)

  • Seems there is a free distrib available.

    Anyone got the ftp ?

    I could do with some FREE download...

  • xandros (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    >I feel I should note, of all the vaunted Debian based commercial distributions (Stormix, Corel, Progeny) Libranet is the only one left.

    Not quite, Xandros - formel Corel Linux, is coming with a new version within a few weeks, and a beta within a few days.
  • the company who bought corel linux from corel is still working on it.

    and the lindows distubution is being based on that distro.
  • First: I really like the idea of open source and think thats it a big step towards better software.

    Second: Big distributions like Red Hat, Suse and others have really great people working there. That is why I buy both Red Hat and Suse, not because I run them, but because they make GPL licensed software. Which means in the end that I can run them on my debian system.

    Third: I know that my money put in distributions is well spent because the software is open source. Opposed to buying propietary software, where it feels like they are only after the money. They can also charge unreasanable high prices because they _own_ the right for the software.
    • I hope you donate to Debian too, or the Open Source Initiative at any rate. They do what you -actually- use, but no one gets paid for using it.

      I just hope Libranet donates part of their profits to the OSI - it would only be fair. Debian makes the packages, the software, the formats, gets the servers, the maintainers, the bugfixes, the scripts and so on, and Libranet sells them. This is, of course, legal, but I think Libranet has a moral obligation to give some of their profits (even just a few bucks per copy sold) to make sure that this free ride stays free for everyone.

      --Dan

  • Why would I install it? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Lothar ( 9453 )
    Anyone care to tell me what is so special about this distribution apart from its name (Libranet GNU/Linux)?

    Choice of distro's is great but I can't honestly see what good this will do. No offence to the Libranet employees.

    Why can't people start creating new (even commercial) applications on top of Linux istead of just releasing distro's?
    • Because Debian is 'the distro your mother would use, if it were ten times easier'.

      Libranet makes it ten times easier. Finally the best, most advanced, most convenient, best thought-out, most 'Free', and more widely accepted distro out there is usable by end users.

      Sure, this post is incredibly subjective, but there are a LOT of people out there who agree - Debian is the epitome of what Linux should be. It's free, it's a community effort, making no money and giving everything they do away for Free.

      Libranet is a chance to support that very effort, and indeed, an attempt (and, apparantly, success) at improving upon it.

      This is why I think you should. There are likely other, more technical reasons, but I'm very emotionally invested in Debian's philosophy. Maybe someone else will tell you why it's objectively better, but not I, not today anyway.

      --Dan

  • Why Libranet? (Score:5, Informative)

    by benmhall ( 9092 ) on Thursday January 31, 2002 @08:11AM (#2930083) Homepage Journal
    I've read a post here asking why bother with a commercial Debian distro, let me explain:

    I have been a Linux user for about 4 and a half years now. In this time I've run the gamut, bouncing from distribution to distribution. For the last year and a half I've stuck with Debian. Why? It's stable, fast, light, well integrated and, if you use Testing, Sid or Ximian with Potato, very up to date. After getting used to Debian's quirks there's no going back for me. I played with RH7.2 lately, but I miss being able to decide that I need a new compiler and then being able to apt-get it.

    Great, so that's why to bother with Debian. If you want more reasons please see the links below.

    Okay, so why a commercial Debian? For convenience. Libranet adds a really nice adminmenu that consolidates pretty much every aspect of system management, from kernel compilation to X setup, to adding new users, changing your clock or setting up a DSL connection. It's all there in one spot. In addition, the setup is a little simpler than Debian's. Personally, I don't have a huge problem With the Debian installer. What it lacks in looks and polish it more than makes up for in flexibility. It's a great base installer. What Libranet has done is slightly massage it, rather than completely replacing it. This makes the parts that normally trip up new users go away, but still retains much of the underlying flexibility.

    Another reason for Libranet is the initial package selection. If you're new to Linux, Debian can be a little... stark. Libranet bundles packages into sections and asks you easy questions like: Do you need a web server? Or, Should I install Office Suites. It's a little thing, but it's nice.

    Then there's their support. The small knowledge base succinctly answers 90% of all new questions. Things like "How do I set up ADSL?" or "How do I share my internet connection?" are there, with very simple step-by-step guides on how to accomplish each task. If you need to ask them a question they will get back to you pretty much within a day. It's a small operation (about 6 people, I think.) and they have a nice personal touch.

    Finally, at least with 1.9.1, they have kept a solid base (Potato) and added to it. They added reiserfs support, Kernel 2.4, XFree86 4.x, KDE 2.1, and Ximian Gnome. All of this can be done with pure Debian Potato, but it means understanding apt, searching out unofficial apt lines, manually configuring or even compiling packages. Libranet took this all away.

    In short, Libranet is important because it takes away the annoying details.

    Pure Debian most definitely has it's place. I use it on a laptop with an old video card and no CD-ROM, and have used it for an Alpha and NetWinder that I own. However, for end users who either don't want to learn what each package does or who want to save a bunch of time by letting someone else make some pretty safe assumptions, a commercial Debian distro such as Libranet is the way to go.

    Okay, here are some links:

    A bunch of testimonials from Libranet customers:
    http://www.libranet.com/testimonials.html

    Here's a review of 1.9.0:
    http://www.thedukeofurl.org/reviews/misc/librane t1 90/index.shtml

    Debian for BeOS users:
    http://tinyplanet.ca/pubs/debian/html/book1.html

    Reasons I like Debian: (Shameless self-promotion)
    http://www.moses.cx/reviews/debian/debian.php

    • I played with RH7.2 lately, but I miss being able to decide that I need a new compiler and then being able to apt-get it.

      Excuse my ignorance, but I see messages like this all the times, and I really don't understand. Can't you just rpm -Uvh gcc-*.rpm ?

      Best,
      GFK's

      • Re:Why Libranet? (Score:3, Informative)

        by Howie ( 4244 )
        Or you can install apt-rpm [tuxfamily.org], and then you can apt-get things.

      • Re:Why Libranet? (Score:2, Informative)

        by Brandon T. ( 167891 )
        The difference is with RPM you actually have to find and download the RPM before you run the aforementioned command. With apt-get all you have to do is type in "apt-get install gcc" and it automatically fetches the package and any dependencies off of debian's ftp (or whatever other ftp you set up in your source list) and installs it automatically. Anyone who has used Redhat has a story about 'dependency hell', where one missing rpm caused another to fail, and then when the missing rpm was replaced, it had another dependency as well. apt-get and debian (for the most part) avoids this problem and makes upgrading a sinch. As someone noted below, apt-get has been ported to rpm by connectiva, so it is now possible to have a similar system with Redhat (though I have not tried it personally).
        • I run Mandrake 8.1 and there is an apt rpm for it. You just have to add your favorite mirrors to the sources list. You can add the cooker trees to the list if you want even more bleeding edge stuff. Cooker is Mandrake's development tree. Some things are a pain to update over a modem, but not too bad if you stay current.
        • This is a double edged sword, though. I tried to apt-get one package (using dselect) and it ended up download something like 80 MB worth of packages, after which the system didn't work properly (X server wouldn't start, when I finally got it to work, KDE was giving all kinds of error messages, gnome wouldn't run). I had to reinstall from scratch. Probably my fault for not learning apt properly... And I should mention I've had similar problems with Red Hat Network, so it's not only a Debian problem.

          However, overall Debian has a lot of good points and I enjoyed using it, and I will probably give it another try sometime in the future, or even Libranet, it sounds interesting.

    • I've bounced around distributions myself (RedHat at first, then Caldera and now Mandrake). My goal is to not necessarily have the latest software, but to have a smooth installation that doesn't destoy everything else on my computer in the process (like Windows XP). Mandrake 8.1 has been the first distro I used that properly identified the NT partitions on my drive, configured a boot loader to load my OS's, and run all of my laptop hardware out of the box (including my wireless network).

      Is Debian, commercial or otherwise, at an installation stage when it can do that? I played with an installation on a server one time and was impressed by its content (if not graphical) installation polish (kind of reminded me of FreeBSD). But on a dual-boot machine will it kill my other OS? (Also, do they have the latest PCMCIA and other hardware drivers?)

      • But on a dual-boot machine will it kill my other OS?

        I've always installed Debian dual-boot and never had a problem. Even on the install, Debian is not a automatically-screw-everything-up system. It drops you right into cfdisk and you can even edit the lilo.conf before lilo runs, IIRC.

  • Took a quick look at the website, but I couldn't find any information about what software the new version includes?

    Does it include the latest Xfree - what version of KDE? Gnome? Whatever?

    Is it KDE or GNOME centric?

  • Other commercial Debian distributions (Score:3, Informative)

    by kyrre ( 197103 ) on Thursday January 31, 2002 @08:27AM (#2930103)
    feel I should note, of all the vaunted Debian based commercial distributions (Stormix, Corel, Progeny) Libranet is the only one left.
    I do believe trustix [trustix.net] is based on Debian. And it is a commercial distribution.

    • Re:Other commercial Debian distributions (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      No. Trustix is based on Redhat. Although the main developer uses Debian. I wish Trustix was based on Debian. A server only based distro would rock.

  • Butt-ugly interfaces (Score:2, Interesting)

    by selderrr ( 523988 )
    God knows I love linux, but each time I see one of these distro screenshots, I turn my head 90 degrees towards my powerbookG4 with my external cinema display and say to myself "jezus, those apple interface design guys are good !"

    I wonder why there aren't any good graphic designers addicted to linux, so that eventually, we'll get some kick ass graphics too..
    • Check out a real screenshot.

      My Desktop [mindspring.com]
      • This is actually quite nice: the Icons have a nice plasticity and the background looks gorgeous. nevertheless the control fields on the terminal windows frame again are pretty ugly. Nevertheless, I am impressed.

        Dirk

    • I think TigerT is a great graphics designer, and doing great work with the new gnome icons. Take a look at his stock icons page [ximian.com] to see the icons. The linux desktop is just like any other desktop, it can be made to look really great, or you can put an ugly background and use an ugly window manager and make it look like shite. It basically comes down to each user's preference. I did notice that the screenshot's on Libranet's site were quite ugly, but don't let that make you think that all linux desktop's look that way.

  • "Libranet" ? (Score:1, Offtopic)

    by lpontiac ( 173839 )
    Does that come with wings to prevent memory leakage?

  • "...here we still are?" (Score:3, Funny)

    by omarius ( 52253 ) <omar AT allwrong DOT com> on Thursday January 31, 2002 @08:53AM (#2930157) Homepage Journal
    "Good is our Linux distribution! Powerful it is!"
    Thanks for the update, Yoda.
  • I am using Slackware at the moment which seems to be fine for me, but i always love to try new stuff..
    But i seem to have to buy it, i dont see why I would buy a Linux distribution when i can download others, i can see why others would buy it. Maybe i will buy it when its good, but i want to test it first.. Anyone got a nice idea ?

    Quazion.
  • What is the difference between a Debian based Linux distro and say Red Hat or Mandrake? Is the Debian based easier to administer (more powerful)? I've noticed RH and Man. doing some funny setup of directory structure and applications, do the Debian based distros go with some predefined standard?
    • I'm probably going to be off a bit with my reply, but I can give you the gist. The first difference is non-commercial versus commercial, and the second is package management.

      Debian is not for profit, and denotes all non-free or non-open source software that comes with the distribution as such. It is volunteer-run and also not particularly newbie friendly. Red Hat, Mandrake, Suse, etc... are run by for profit companies. Because they're out to make profit, it's in their vested interest to be newbie friendly. I've installed Debian potato and Suse 7.2, and the Suse install was much easier. Other than ease of install, commercial vs. non-commercial makes no difference to me, but it is important to some people.

      The real distinction is in the packaging system. Red Hat started the R(edhat)P(ackage)M(anagement) system, and a big chunk of the commercial distributions use it. So if you want to install a new package, you obtain the .rpm file and then install it using the rpm program.

      Debian uses A(nother)P(ackaging)T(ool). You can configure apt to read from hard drive, CD-ROM, and/or the internet. Apt takes rpm two steps further, by fetching the package for you and also grabbing and also installing all necessary dependent packages. You can easily automate massive installs this way, including updating every package on your machine to the latest release (as far as I know).

      That WOULD give a tremendous advantage to Debian, except for the nature of open source... some creative programmers wrote an apt for rpm files. So now you can do everything a Debian user can do with an rpm-based distribution.
    • Well, the first thing people notice is the package format. Debian, way back in the olden days of yore, when men were real men, and so forth, decided to invent a format for binary packages on Linux. Wtihout getting into technical detail, they were doing very well and their ideas were very well thought out.

      RedHat wanted to use said package format, but the Debian folks did not want to go with a half-baked product. (This paragraph is heresay)

      RedHat invented its own package format, RPM, which was apparantly designed to suck. It does this very well. It is buggy, often incompatible, and goes through version changes quite often, which makes each distro incompatible with the last, and each new package incompatible with the previous distros.

      (One time, I was attempting to install OpenSSH on a RH box I was adminning. to put on OpenSSH, I needed OpenSSL. To install OpenSSL, I needed to get RPM v.5 (4 was installed). To install RPM V.5, I needed to replace half my packages. Another time, I tried to install a package on a RH box, and it said that it required '/usr/bin/perl'. I did an 'ls /usr/bin/perl' and there it was. From that moment on, I have never touched an RPM.)

      Debian's package format, combined with the apt suite of tools, allows it to download new (to you) or updated software from a server on the internet, from a LAN, from a CD-ROM, or from a local drive, over HTTP, FTP, or mounted filesystems (the CD-ROM voodoo is pretty neat). If you try to install a package (for example, the xchat IRC client) and you do not have the libraries needed to run it (libgdk, libgtk+1.2, etc.) it will automatically add these to the list of packages to be installed, and will then prompt you to continue.

      All software packaged for Debian and included on the official Debian mirrors follows rather stricy guidelines about where things go - important binaries in /bin, /lib, etc., everything else in /usr/bin, /usr/lib, etc. Various files in /var, logs in /var/log, and so on. Everything has a place, and it all makes sense.

      Also, it feels very modular, thanks to brilliantly executed install scripts and lots of testing time. For example, if you do not have logrotate installed, your logs are in /var/log and get rather large. As soon as you install logrotate, however, all your /var/log logs are automatically rotated, and after two rotations the logfiles are gzipped. It's all automatic. You don't have to compile logrotate and install it, you don't have to edit example scripts and put them in, and you don't have to edit cron scripts to make it work, and then wonder why your logs get deleted every 5 hours because you missed a semicolon. Debian is the distro for people who install Linux to use it, instead of admin it.

      My last comment for the day, Debian is Free in every sense of the word. They do not charge you. They do not hold anything back from you. In fact, it was, until recently, rather impossible to buy anything from Debian, as Debian is not even an official organization. Lately, there have been boxed versions of Debian (of which I have everything but the CD), which included a cool-ass bumper sticker and a 360+ page special-edition book on learning Debian from O'Reilly Press. I don't know if they still sell these. I hope so.

      If you wish to give money, you can give to the Open Source Initiative (OSI), if you wish to buy a CD you can buy them from someone online. If you wish to sell a CD, just make sure you're using the official ISOs (there is more information about this at Debian's cd image [debian.org] website) and go nuts.

      Oh, one more thing - software. Last time I ran Debian, I had a pretty tricked-out list of software sources from around the internet, totalling something like 9600 packages. Yes, nine thousand, six hundred individual pieces of software. You want choice, you got it.

      There are hundreds more reasons to choose Debian, and there are dozens of reasons not to use RedHat. I'm going to avoid RedHat bashing though, because I think Debian's merits speak well enough without hilighting RedHat's faults.

      Visit their webpage, read the social contract, and the free software guidelines. It's very interesting, even from a philosophical point of view.

      --Dan
      • One time, I was attempting to install OpenSSH on a RH box I was adminning. to put on OpenSSH, I needed OpenSSL.

        Funny, "./configure && make && make install" works fine for me on a RH box. Go figure.

        To install RPM V.5, I needed to replace half my packages.

        See above. If upgrading via RPM is too dependency-ridden, compile from source. You're an admin. Be an admin, not somebody who insists on having everything prepackaged in a format a deaf-blind rhesus monkey with a drinking problem could use.

        To install OpenSSL, I needed to get RPM v.5 (4 was installed)

        You know, I'd take this anecdote of yours more seriously if RPM 5.x even existed (which it doesn't).

        [rjhansen@numbers rjhansen]$ rpm --version
        RPM version 4.0.3

        That's on a RH 7.2 box. If you've got RPM 5.x, I'd love to know where you picked it up.
        • See above. If upgrading via RPM is too dependency-ridden, compile from
          source. You're an admin. Be an admin, not somebody who insists on
          having everything prepackaged in a format a deaf-blind rhesus monkey
          with a drinking problem could use.

          In fact, I did this, but considering that the last sysadmin had the box so fucked over (there was various crap - files, dirs, installation, sourcecode, etc. in /), I wasn't looking forward to assuming where everything was.

          Turns out I had to anyway. *shrug*

          As for the RPM version thing, as you can tell from the anecode, I didn't pay too much attention to the state of affairs of RPM, and I am wel aware that I don't know what version were out. Bump everything down by enough version numbers to make things make sense, and there you go.

          --Dan
  • What's behind Libranet that is going to prevent it from going the way of so many other Debian based distros?

  • Not free? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Seems that 2.0 is only going to be available on CD, and not for free?

    http://www.libranet.com/download.html

    "Version 2.0 is available on CD only"

    No try before you buy?
  • Since the submitter works there and all...

    Any chance of this getting ported to other architectures? I'd love to try it out, but my only Linux box (currently running Debian) is a m68k machine.

    (Come to think of it, Debian is the _only_ native English m68k Linux distro. Possible market?)

    --saint
  • My first Debian system started life as a Coral Linux install - I edited /etc/apt/sources.list to point at debian/unstable, did an apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade, and 80MB or so later I had a real Debian system.

    I dare say you can do similar things with this.
  • Since we seem to be running out of other Debian-based distros, looks like Libranet is my next choice. :)

    See subject :)

  • Only available on CD? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Nermal ( 7573 )
    The 'download' link only lets you get ISOs for the previous version and says that version 2 is available on CD only. Doesn't the GPL say that they have to make it available for download?
    • All it says is that if you distribute the binary, you must provide the source - it says nothing about how that source is to be provided (if it was cost effective, they could provide it as one long printout, or a huge deck of punch cards, or on paper tape), as long as it is made available.

      You can charge for that source code, but only a fee that would cover the cost of distribution, etc (so, in theory, they could print it all out and give it to you that way, then charge you for paper, ink, electricity, management fees, and shipping and handling - and be legit according to the license - I think the wording is there to prevent "gouging").

      Typically, the GPL wants the code to be "with" the binary - ie, distributed at the same time, preferable on the same media as the binary - and that is what we typically see.

      But if a company only releases a CD of the binary, they have to give the end user a 3 year term, minimum, to request the source code if they so want it. What is interesting about this clause is that you could distribute a binary only system, and given the proper docs (ie, including copies of the GPL, etc), leave it up to the users, those who care, to ask for the source - instead of just handing it to them whether they want it or not. I am not sure, but I think there is a grain of a valid business method in that...
  • So about the modifications to the standard Debian installer and the graphical configuration bits.. are they released under GPL? Then somebody in the Debian project needs to integrate them into the standard distribution, even if optional. Debian is great for newbies if you can just get them over the first hurdle.
  • My favorite Debian based distro in GNU/Linux.

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