Greg Kroah-Hartman Reveals His New Favorite Linux Distro (www.tfir.io) 97
Top Linux kernel developer Greg Kroah-Hartman gave a new 30-minute interview with TFIR during the Open Source Summit, 2019. He discusses security in the post-Spectre world, remembers when Microsoft joined the Linux distros mailing list, and acknowledges good-naturedly that he and Richard Stallman "approach things from a different standpoint".
An anonymous reader writes: In the interview Kroah-Hartman talks about downsides of living in the Hague. "My son's school actually mandates that they all have MacBooks. So he has a MacBook, my wife has a MacBook, and that's about it." But of course, Kroah-Hartman himself is always using Linux.
So what distro does he use? "I don't use openSUSE any more, I use Arch. And my build system I think is actually running Fedora. I have a number of virtual machines still running Gentoo, Dubya, and Fedora to do some testing on some userspace tools. But yeah, all my laptops and everything is switched over to Arch these days... I have a Chromebook that I play around with, and you can run Linux applications, and you can of course SSH into anything..."
Why Arch? "At the moment it had something that I needed. I don't remember what it was, the latest development version, what not -- and I've known a number of the Arch developers over the years. Their idea of a constantly rolling, forward-moving system is the way to go... It's neutral, it's community-based, it has everything I need. It works really really well. I've actually converted my cloud instances that I have all to Arch... It's nice." And in addition, "Their Wiki is amazing. The documentation -- it's like one of the best resources out there these days... If you look up any userspace program and how to configure it and use it. Actually, the systemd Arch Wiki pages are one of the most amazing resources out there...
"One of the main policies of Arch, or philosophies, is you stay as close to the upstream as possible. And as a developer, I want that... They're really good in feedback to the community. Because I want that testing -- I want to make sure that things are fixed. And if it is broken, I learn about it quickly and I fix it and push the stuff out. So that's actually a really good feedback loop. And that's some of the reasons I need it."
An anonymous reader writes: In the interview Kroah-Hartman talks about downsides of living in the Hague. "My son's school actually mandates that they all have MacBooks. So he has a MacBook, my wife has a MacBook, and that's about it." But of course, Kroah-Hartman himself is always using Linux.
So what distro does he use? "I don't use openSUSE any more, I use Arch. And my build system I think is actually running Fedora. I have a number of virtual machines still running Gentoo, Dubya, and Fedora to do some testing on some userspace tools. But yeah, all my laptops and everything is switched over to Arch these days... I have a Chromebook that I play around with, and you can run Linux applications, and you can of course SSH into anything..."
Why Arch? "At the moment it had something that I needed. I don't remember what it was, the latest development version, what not -- and I've known a number of the Arch developers over the years. Their idea of a constantly rolling, forward-moving system is the way to go... It's neutral, it's community-based, it has everything I need. It works really really well. I've actually converted my cloud instances that I have all to Arch... It's nice." And in addition, "Their Wiki is amazing. The documentation -- it's like one of the best resources out there these days... If you look up any userspace program and how to configure it and use it. Actually, the systemd Arch Wiki pages are one of the most amazing resources out there...
"One of the main policies of Arch, or philosophies, is you stay as close to the upstream as possible. And as a developer, I want that... They're really good in feedback to the community. Because I want that testing -- I want to make sure that things are fixed. And if it is broken, I learn about it quickly and I fix it and push the stuff out. So that's actually a really good feedback loop. And that's some of the reasons I need it."
Why was banner on this story red? (Score:1)
I notice some articles are headed with a rad banner, but then after a bit it changed to the normal green.
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Then maybe it can afford to hire someone to fix the Unicode support).
Slashdot does not lack Unicode support because no one ever bothered to implement it.
Unicode is unsupported because it causes more problems than it solves.
For one thing, it would likely lead to Slashdot being banned in China, since it would allow uncontrolled communication directly in Hanzi. Reddit and Quora are discussion sites that allow Unicode and are both banned in China.
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It's ironic that we are permitted in China due to disallowing Chinese. But yes, it makes sense.
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Take unicode input, and discard any character outside of ISO-8869 1-15. Make sure preview shows this clearly.
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Cowboy Neal is still working on the Unicode support. Its not like he quit or anything.
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Keep it a secret! (Score:4, Insightful)
.. It's neutral, it's community-based, it has everything I need. It works really really well.
If it becomes popular, it will become ruined.
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it will become ruined.
systemd...
say no more, say no more...
Re:Keep it a secret! (Score:5, Interesting)
it will become ruined.
systemd...
say no more, say no more...
If you look at my post history, I had (and still do to some degree) hate systemd.
However, I have been running distros (Gentoo, Artix, Void) that use elogind and eudev -- which just takes systemd-logind and systemd-udevd and makes them stand-alone (thank you Gentoo!).
So I figured I would see how much of systemd is actually needed. Turns out, you can disable almost all of it, and what you are left with is:
systemd (init)
sytemd-logind (session management)
systemd-udevd (device enumeration)
The systemd init system is actually quite nice. My beef with systemd as a WHOLE was the fact that they were (are) trying to suck in so many other systems that have very little (if anything) to do with init.
So, right now I am running Arch. With that said, if at some point in the future I am forced to start using things like systemd-resolvd or systemd-journald, I will find an alternative. I am aware that Artix is a fork of Arch that uses runit, or OpenRC .. and that is actually what I was running.
Re:Keep it a secret! (Score:4, Insightful)
For me it's somewhere between troubling and sad that more and more distros are falling into the systemd hole. I wish I understood the thinking.
I admire your efforts to remove it, but why not just go with a systemd-less distro? I'll run CentOS 6.X until it's EOL, and I'm mostly looking at Alpine for the next server OS. I've run it on a home system for at least a couple of years and it's been rock solid. Xen is and option and is integrated well, if you need that sort of thing. Might be a bit of work to make it be a great desktop, but that's a lesser priority for me now.
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For me it's somewhere between troubling and sad that more and more distros are falling into the systemd hole. I wish I understood the thinking.
I admire your efforts to remove it, but why not just go with a systemd-less distro? I'll run CentOS 6.X until it's EOL, and I'm mostly looking at Alpine for the next server OS. I've run it on a home system for at least a couple of years and it's been rock solid. Xen is and option and is integrated well, if you need that sort of thing. Might be a bit of work to make it be a great desktop, but that's a lesser priority for me now.
I guess I should have specified that I run Arch on my laptop. For servers, I only run Devuan because there is ZERO reason to have parallel daemons starting. It is a server after all -- I give crap nothing about boot time, and *I WANT* to be in control of what starts when.
However, on my laptop, I want to "just work" with as little effort as possible. Now some people would say: "Use Ubuntu", well, at the same time I also want at least a smidgin of control.
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Great answer, thanks. I've never run systemd, and largely due to dumb luck. I don't like what I read about it- it's just too far from *nix philosophy.
In some of my Linux installs, I add an & to the end of init script commands. If there are sequential execution dependencies, I don't do it, or I make sure it's done in a seamless way. If it was much of an issue, it would be easy to check for completion of one process before starting another.
I don't find boot time to be a problem in general.
I'm a big fa
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Great answer, thanks. I've never run systemd, and largely due to dumb luck. I don't like what I read about it- it's just too far from *nix philosophy.
In some of my Linux installs, I add an & to the end of init script commands. If there are sequential execution dependencies, I don't do it, or I make sure it's done in a seamless way. If it was much of an issue, it would be easy to check for completion of one process before starting another.
I don't find boot time to be a problem in general.
I'm a big fan of booting from a hibernate image.
I'm a Slackware guy from SLS days, but recently got into Alpine and will likely deploy it for some servers. Love the OpenRC init system.
If systemd works for you, that's a win for you.
Please don't think that I think systemd is any better than OpenRC, runit, S6 (or any other alternative) -- it is a matter of not wanting to port init scripts, but even moreso, not wanting to port software that relies on libsystemd. Yes, libelogind makes it much easier, but I just don't have time anymore to fight it when it comes to my workstation. Yes, there are some very good distros out there that have done a lot of work on this front. As I stated, I use Devuan for any servers that I build (or CentOS 6 so
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I wish I understood the thinking.
I can explain this for you if you'd like. Or at least I can link [youtube.com] to an explanation.
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Arch Documentation is 10/10 (Score:4, Interesting)
Arch is the best (for my use-case), but I do hope all the "n00bs" stay on *buntu.
The last thing I want to see is the dumbification of the system to make it "easy" for new users.
>Their Wiki is amazing. The documentation -- it's like one of the best resources out there these days
Could not agree more! If you are a new user, RTFW before asking.
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I do hope all the "n00bs" stay on *buntu.
In case of invasion, move to Gentoo (with real init). Nothing is too easy there!
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ahh, the old init system. Used to love it. Just like C. Just like Perl. Just like points ignition. ... etc.
Moved on to better things.
Don't keep up and the world will leave you behind.
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Don't keep up and the world will leave you behind.
They are going to nose into the ground like a cheap airliner. I'm betting on the tortoise...
And "better" has yet to be proven. If it actually were better, adaption would be universal. As it is, it's more like a business decision than a technical one.
I'm on Slackware, they're still doing their best to keep it real.
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If it actually were better, adaption would be universal. As it is, it's more like a business decision than a technical one.
What I can tell you is I work with the industry across all kinds of lines. Nobody wants to use init any more. It's all systemd. Faster boots, it just has a lot more advantages. It's powerful if you get into it.
I'll also admit - it sucks as far as having to learn their new convoluted way to do things. Definitely not KISS. Thanks the Solaris folks for that abomination. That was their bright idea.
The only resistance I still see are people that don't want to learn the new way... and I'm one of them. Honeymoon p
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Well, since they want to make it into an operating system, it won't be complete until it has a window manager... /s
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Indeed, I have work to do. I’ll use any Linux flavour and UI environment put in front of me, as long as it’s quick to get going I really don’t care. I started with HP UX with TWM or FVWM, so I can work with almost anything but I have no time for tinkering!
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If you want Linux desktops to stick around, it needs new people,
Linux will stick around alright. With the attitude, although possibly unintentional, of the author whining about "dumbification", Linux will stick around as that weird uncle people will tolerate only because he shows up for Thanksgiving dinner.
The attitude that somehow making it easier for the average person to pick up a Linux distro and be able to use it with minimal, if any, configuration is tantamount to neutering is exactly why Linux, asi
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Indeed, I’m a dumb Ubuntu user, have been using Linux since Slackware came out on 3.5” disks and I still need documentation some times, Arch Wiki is my go to.
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Do you use the stock ubuntu desktop or something else? I keep trying ubuntu from time to time, just isn't for me the way it is.
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Arch is the best (for my use-case), but I do hope all the "n00bs" stay on *buntu.
The last thing I want to see is the dumbification of the system to make it "easy" for new users
I agree 'dumbification for new users' is never a good thing, but I disagree with the notion that not dumbed down necessarily has to mean unfriendly to new users. The latter is a notion which unfortunately is still somewhat symptomatic for a large part of the Linux community which isn't content with just using Linux and getting the best from it, but somehow needs Linux as a means of social distinction, an elitist mark.
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The last thing I want to see is the dumbification of the system to make it "easy" for new users.
I too want my system to be as complicated as possible. If I don't need to hex edit a binary to get around a spelling mistake in a config file then it's too damn easy.
Seriously though this attitude is one of the problems with the open source world. "easy" and "dumb" are not antonyms. A system can most definitely be easy and n00b friendly, while at the same time offer all the complex configuration options demanded of a power user and even those of the masochist if need be.
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Arch Installer is 10/10 too ! (Score:2)
Though a long term Debian user I was very pleased when I tried the Arch Installer disk. It is so a complete and working shell environment and it is so handy in case of rescue. Even if I mainly run Debian I keep an Arch Installer disk as a rescue disk. I think the Debian Installer is too dumbed down. Even in expert mode the shell is a lousy busybox sub-shell. And it is useless in case of troubles. Want to restore your /boot partition? Not possible. Want to access a md0 RAID disk ? Nope. Troubleshoot network
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Why Arch? (Score:2)
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Pick your target (Score:5, Informative)
>"One of the main policies of Arch, or philosophies, is you stay as close to the upstream as possible. And as a developer, I want that.."
Indeed. For that type of user, Arch is probably great. Rolling release can be useful for many home users, too. For business users- no way, absolutely not, horrible idea. Stability matters far, far more for those users. Production can come to a grinding halt with one "latest is greatest" update. And endless training and retesting is not something many have time for. I tend to use something like Centos/RHEL for machines that need to be stable (like at work), and a traditional release model (like most distros) at home as a balance between too slow of change (long term release) and too rapid of change (rolling).
it is nice to have choice!
Stability (Score:2)
Stability matters far, far more for those users.
That depends on the definition of stability. My experience is that if something is broken in a Long Term Support version, the only guarantee you have is that it stays broken for the whole support period. It is nice that working things keep working, but it comes with a downside.
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That depends. As someone who runs LTS myself I have found intolerable bugs which have resulted in getting individual packages from a different repo.
On the flipside Arch was one of the early adopters of systemd back when it still had very large problems and it often resulted in unbootable systems after an update.
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>"That depends on the definition of stability. My experience is that if something is broken in a Long Term Support version, the only guarantee you have is that it stays broken for the whole support period. It is nice that working things keep working, but it comes with a downside."
That hasn't been my experience at all. In RHEL/CentOS, for example, they are very careful in accepting any change that might break something, and if they do, it is fixed quickly. Now, there are cases where something newer you
Stupid School (Score:5, Insightful)
"My son's school actually mandates that they all have MacBooks. So he has a MacBook...
Yeah, well my son's school mandated they all a hve iPads, and about 50% of the parents told the school to get fucked.
Including, on one memorable occasion literally, and to the principal's face too.
Schools don't get to mandate anything, unless the parents let them.
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"My son's school actually mandates that they all have MacBooks. So he has a MacBook...
Yeah, well my son's school mandated they all a hve iPads, and about 50% of the parents told the school to get fucked. Including, on one memorable occasion literally, and to the principal's face too. Schools don't get to mandate anything, unless the parents let them.
Or the school pays for them. Or they were a corporate donation. Or the school charges tuition and bundles the computer/device costs into that tuition. Or you applied to the school and if you don't comply with their policies they will cut you loose and give your "seat" to someone else.
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Money making (Score:2)
Matter of fact the Apple //e paid the bills at Apple. The Mac lost money for a long long time, but the //e kept the company afloat.
LOL, What ?! [folklore.org]
Nope. Apple has *always* sold hardware with high profit margins (The whole 1000$ monitor stand thing, nowadays).
From day 1, Apple Mac were sold over-priced. The only reason "Apple //e" paid the bills, is not that the Mac were losing money. Mac *were profitable*, they just didn't push large numbers due to their (constant) high price and the lack of software (at the beginning, like with any other new platfrom back at the time. Until Macs found their niche in publishing, just like Amigas needed to
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Re: Money making (Score:2)
Yes. And Steve Jobs stood on a stage and none other than Bill Gates appeared on the big screen to announce a massive investment. Thatâ(TM)s right. Apple was saved by Microsoft
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Matter of fact the Apple //e paid the bills at Apple. The Mac lost money for a long long time, but the //e kept the company afloat.
LOL, What ?! Nope.
Your own words contradicts this, your own words proves me correct. Apple lost money on the Mac not due to unit price but due to sales numbers. There are two parts to the cost of a commercial product. Variable costs (for example parts, manufacturing and shipping) and fixed costs (for example R&D and design, sales and marketing, administrative overhead, etc). The Mac was never profitable under Steve Job's first tenure at Apple, The Apple II subsidized it. It was Sculley who eventually got the Mac to profi
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Schools don't get to mandate anything
Indeed they don't. However it's also not the school's fault if little Timmy can't pass the exam for not being able to read the textbook he didn't have, or use the calculator he didn't buy.
Sorry precious, but schools mandate a shitload of things regardless of what parents say.
Ubuntu running under Windows Subsystem for Linux (Score:2)
Mac Unix based, runs same software as Linux (Score:5, Interesting)
In the interview Kroah-Hartman talks about downsides of living in the Hague. "My son's school actually mandates that they all have MacBooks. So he has a MacBook, my wife has a MacBook, and that's about it." But of course, Kroah-Hartman himself is always using Linux.
There is very little FOSS software that require Linux, most can run on an *nix including Macs.
Unless you are working on the Linux kernel or Linux drivers you don't "need" Linux. Mac users also have a Unix based system, a BSD console and the ability to run pretty much any FOSS application or utility that is used under Linux. His wife and kids can run the same office suite of productivity apps, same email clients, same web browsers, same graphics and modeling software, same scientific apps, same engineering apps, same console based user land tools (OK, AT&T vs BSD syntax quirks), etc. In other words Mac users can be in the same ecosystem as the Linux user IFF they want to, they too have a Unix based computer.
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well yeah, Mac OSX has userspace and C libraries derived from FreeBSD.
but try to make your Mac run MATE or Cinnamon or other desktop under OSX. In the past people might say "but the Mac's desktop is more polished".... well I have mac at work, and it isn't more polished. The thing is always opening the wrong folder to save files to, some apps I use never stay in the doc but get pushed aside at times for OSX's own crap, OSX is too fucking stupid to use "file" command to identify text files and some other co
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... but try to make your Mac run MATE or Cinnamon or other desktop under OSX ...
That's mostly pointless, most people find the macOS UI superior to any of the Linux desktops. Including many "Linux devs".
In the past people might say "but the Mac's desktop is more polished".... well I have mac at work, and it isn't more polished.
Your opinion is a minority one, even among Linux users.
The thing is always opening the wrong folder to save files to, ...
Might be app specific. I've seen it start with the Documents folder and with the last folder saved to. Try the same FOSS app, say Libre Office.
Part of the doc is static and user defined, the rest of the doc is most recently used. I've never seen what you describe in the static part. And removing Apple stuff is not a problem.
... OSX is too fucking stupid to use "file" command to identify text files and some other common files...
Huh?
$
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I also share his opinion. Just saying. And I work with a Debian MATE system and a MacBook Pro running 10.4.16 simultaneously (using synergy, all day long, every day). The MATE side is more robust. I spend far more time working solving issues on the OS X side.<anecdote>
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I did the lysdexic thing and transposed digits. OS X version is 10.14.6. (For reference, the Debian system is running on a Dell Precision 7730, and handily outperforming the MBP is basically every department except weight and lack of a luxury markup.)
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... but try to make your Mac run MATE or Cinnamon or other desktop under OSX ...
That's mostly pointless, most people find the macOS UI superior to any of the Linux desktops. Including many "Linux devs".
Well, most people are wrong then. The Mac UI has sucked for twenty years and more now. It's hateful.
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I'm talking about the writers of the GUI being too stupid to use "file" when text files with alternate extensions are opened there. For that matter, even images with standard extensions aren't properly opened, because the GUi is stupid.
Not a question of "being accustomed", my employer has been providing Macbook for 8 years, on my 3rd one.
Not a minority opinion, everyone I know who works on both says MacOSX GUI is circling the drain and just added bad design on worse
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I'm talking about the writers of the GUI being too stupid to use "file" when text files with alternate extensions are opened there. For that matter, even images with standard extensions aren't properly opened, because the GUi is stupid. Not a question of "being accustomed", my employer has been providing Macbook for 8 years, on my 3rd one.
With 8 years of experience you seem surprisingly ill-informed. Lets create a text file with an alternate extension.
$ vi foo.bar
$ cat foo.bar
This is a test
$ open foo.bar
No application knows how to open foo.bar.
Now I open the folder and click on the icon in the GUI. I am presented with a dialog box saying "There is no application set to open the document "foo.bar"". One of my options is a button labeled "Choose Application". I click on this button in the GUI. I select the "TextEdit" application. Tex
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You are the one with the problem.
A text file might have no extension. Or it might have extension that usually is assoicated another application. The GUi should use "file" to see the file type, not open dialogs that might be pointless wastes fo time.
I see you are qualified to be a MacOSX GUI developer. Which is to say, dumber than a sack of wet shit. You shill and have mindless fan-boi-ism
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You are the one with the problem. A text file might have no extension.
You are proving my hypotheses (1) You are Ill-informed despite eight years of experience and (2) You are merely complaining about what you are used to (well in theory, below we see you actually don't know how Linux works either). First (1), you are ill informed regarding files without extensions. Lets create a text file:
$ vi foo.txt
$ cat foo.txt
Some text
$ file foo.txt
foo.txt: ASCII text
Now lets remove the extension:
$ mv foo.txt foo
$ file foo
foo: ASCII text
$ open foo
TextEdit opens the file
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Okay, If everything is the same, why pay premium then?!
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Re: Mac Unix based, runs same software as Linux (Score:2)
Because Linux canâ(TM)t even render a single character properly
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Okay, If everything is the same, why pay premium then?!
Basically all the FOSS software is just a lowest common denominator but for Linux that is all you get. With a Mac you get FOSS plus a lot more.
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FOSS software is just a lowest common denominator but for Linux that is all you get.
Can we stop spouting this lie? You can run plenty of commercial paidware on a Linux system just fine.
Re: Mac Unix based, runs same software as Linux (Score:2)
But only specific vertical stuff
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Not everyone can tolerate macOS GUI. I find it totally unusable from the ergonomical point of view.
Many of such complaint are merely it works differently than the last thing I had. Not wrong, just different, so people complain. Put a windows person on a Mac and for the first week they will say the Mac did something the wrong way and Windows did it the correct way. Put a Mac person on a PC and you will have the opposite, the Mac was correct and Windows did it the wrong way. Same for Win Linux and Mac Linux. People are falsely equating different with wrong. They are just annoyed their muscle memory will
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Irrelevant except that it's the one affixed to the machine and not swappable for one that works decently?
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Irrelevant except that it's the one affixed to the machine and not swappable for one that works decently?
That is a laptop problem and not Apple specific. Not all Macs are laptops, Apple makes desktops too and the keyboard options are the same as the PC desktop side. Plus when at a desk (home/your office) it is common to find someone using an external keyboard on a laptop because they are almost always superior to internal laptop keyboards, again, this is also not specific to Apple.
Re: Mac Unix based, runs same software as Linux (Score:2)
And yet, the OP was clearly talking about laptops, as they specified no user serviceable parts.
So why pay a huge premium for a builtin (terrible) keyboard that can't be swapped--when you can buy from another manufacturer who builds in a decent keyboard?
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And yet, the OP was clearly talking about laptops, as they specified no user serviceable parts.
Wrong. User serviceability was just one complaint in a list of complaints, a list that was not laptop specific.
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So why pay a huge premium for a builtin (terrible) keyboard that can't be swapped--when you can buy from another manufacturer who builds in a decent keyboard?
Most built-in laptops keyboards are subpar, PC or Mac, that is why in laptop as desktop replacement scenarios often included external monitors, keyboard and mice. Most built-in laptop keyboard are not replaceable by a different and superior keyboard. User serviceable usually means you can replace the defective part with a replacement part of the exact same make and model, not upgrade to something better.
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"You're holding it wrong!"
Sigh. Fanbois.
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Because "No user-replaceable parts." should've given you the hint that the poster was talking about Mac laptops, not desktop systems.
The keyboard in a laptop is an integral part of it. I'd be surprised if most laptop users were using external keyboards primarily.
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Because "No user-replaceable parts." should've given you the hint that the poster was talking about Mac laptops, not desktop systems.
There was a list of complaints, that was merely one of many. The complaints/conversation was not limited to laptops.
The keyboard in a laptop is an integral part of it. I'd be surprised if most laptop users were using external keyboards primarily.
Laptops, PC and Mac, are increasingly used as desktop replacements. They spend much time on the desk and external monitors, keyboards and mice make them convenient substitutes for a desktop. Adding the option to go mobile, even if its just to take it to a meeting in the building. Pretty much any laptop, PC or Mac, is subpar to use for extended periods of time when limited to the internal monit
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Holy shifting goalposts Batman!
We were talking about hardware. And people do complain about the shitty keyboards that come with PCs. It's just that with the unholy margins Apple gets on their hardware, people are rightly complaining that a luxury item with shitty hardware is a bit of a weird combination.
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"You're holding it wrong!" Sigh. Fanbois.
Nope, its you are holding the wrong thing. And its equally true for both PC and Mac vendor supplied hardware. Vendor supplied keyboards and mice tend to suck.
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> Irrelevant. Any USB keyboard or mouse will work with the Mac. Exactly, I have to carry a separate keyboard, mouse, non-glossy screen so I can actually see something in the sunlight and a bunch of dongles together with my new shiny Mac.
Same for you new shiny PC laptop. Those are all problems on the other side of the OS fence too. Laptop keyboards tend to suck regardless of the vendor. That is why when people are at their desktops there is a tendency to have a full sized monitor, an external keyboard and a mouse. In other words the laptop being used as a desktop replacement, and the built in keyboard only used when mobile. Again, PC or Mac, same story.
Re: Mac Unix based, runs same software as Linux (Score:2)
My MacBook Pro is 9?years old without a scratch. And i schlep it around every day.
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I had macbook pro which was scratched to shit by sleeve buttons, watch band, USB keys and other small items left in the bag.
Surprisingly my Dell and HP laptops had similar flaws. :-)
And magsafe. That was great
Especially at school, trip wire hell.
hahaha systemd (Score:2, Insightful)
so the top kernel develops needs good docs because the init system is absurdly complicated and in general has bad docs
meanwhile, I don't need docs for my BSD servers init system at all, nice and sane and self-documenting
Nothing against Greg Kroah-Hartman (Score:2)
But I have no idea who he is. In any case, is there a reason I should care which distro is preferred by a “top Linux kernel developer”?
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is there a reason I should care which distro is preferred by a “top Linux kernel developer”?
Because he uses a lot of them.
Does anyone else find user friendly features hard? (Score:2)
Does anyone else find that in Arch, non-critical features such as graphical wifi menus and bluetooth are impossible to configure, even on a linux-friendly laptop? It's been my experience that most things work well and are easy to set up, but some of the more mobile features are a pain.
To give a fair comparison, my ethernet totally stopped working on Windows and reinstallation seems like the only guaranteed fix. I have also not compared Arch to Ubuntu on that computer.
Re:Does anyone else find user friendly features ha (Score:4, Informative)
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I would probably not use Arch at work. As the summary implies, Arch is for being able to install the newest version of any application, not for having the most stable working base.
Watching my former colleague (and a huge Arch lover) struggling to make second monitor work for a tech presentation in front of 20 people waiting for it was pathetic.
I'm not sure we always make fair comparisons. Windows problems may not be salient because it's the default system setup, but I've lost days of work time due to Windows bugs or quirks. I've had my share of trouble with Linux but certainly did not lose the same amount of time due to "X isn't working and I need to try 10 things to fi
Linux for security??? (Score:1)
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Run Linux you silly twat. BSD doesn't have mandatory access controls (selinux) and is way behind Linux. I remember years ago we had this discussion about how "secure" bsd is and then someone ported over all the old Linux security hacks to BSD. Yea, it's not more secure. You need to admit your error. If BSD hadn't been ported to the mac for FREE it wouldn't even be an OS any more.
What is "Dubya"? (Score:2)
I've never heard of Dubya Linux and a cursory Google Search did not enlighten me...
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Ditto. I was intrigued, and while my interest is waning, I too, want to know what the article meant by "Dubya." Maybe it's "WLinux [thomasmaurer.ch]," because in English "Dubya" can be slang for the letter W ("double-U").
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Just "Debian", is my guess. It's large, popular, has been around for long so it's logical he would use it.
Also, just try and imagine any Eastern-European person pronouncing "Debian"..