[clue-talk] Hello CLUE

[Collins Richey]

On 7/31/06, T. Joseph Carter <tjcarter at bluecherry.net> wrote:

>
> Personally, I am holding off on AMD64 for another six months at least.  No
> problem with the hardware, but tons with Linux distributions' support of
> it.  Very immature at present, and I am shocked by how much stuff just
> doesn't work.  Too much code that assumes all processors are ia32,
> especially if you want to start talking video stuff.

Actually I've encountered very few (or none, in fact) 64 vs. 32
problems as yet, but then I don't do much video stuff.

>
> Debian just needs to give up on having a stable, period.  Gentoo needs to
> dial back a little and have things actually work more often than not.
> Ubuntu needs to care about something other than GNOME, with KDE and XFCE
> and school people working on their own little projects on the side.
>
> There isn't a perfect distribution.  What we've got are a lot of imperfect
> ones that can almost sort of get the job done with additional stuff the
> makers of those distributions can't or won't provide.  (he says noting the
> recent example that Ubuntu has MythTV 0.18 packages that break on install
> attempt and has outright rejected working 0.19+fixes packages which are
> provided in an external repository..)
>

I have to agree that there is not a perfect Desktop distro. You can
pick almost any server distro (RedHat, Gentoo, Debian, Ubuntu, Novell)
and get good, reliable results with actual bugs and vulnerabilities
fixed before you can say Jack Spratt, but the whole concept of an
Enterprise distribution for desktops is just wrong. The available
functionality is too primitive (in some cases) and too much in flux to
fix at one level to be maintained for years. What makes more sense to
me is a stable base (glibc, gcc, and the "toolchain") with continual
testing and release of kernel,  desktop, and application components on
that base as new functionality arrives. Unfortunately the kernel
developers subscribe to the "API is a moving target to be changed at
our whim" mentality, so that's tough to pull off. Who needs an
enterprise release that won't run on current off the shelf hardware?

>
> Regarding that, I did my best.  In the end, after enough spin to reverse
> the flow of time, even I don't know what part I played if any in the
> licensing of Qt under both QPL and GPL which effectively ended the license
> war.  The whole exercise left me rather pragmatic and skeptical of the
> fearless leaders of our movement, regardless of which faction of said
> movement we're talking about.
>
> At the time I got involved, I could only use X at 320x200 256 color, so
> I frankly could use neither KDE nor GNOME.  Nowadays I'd call them two
> opposing extremes of how to reimagine the Windows XP interface.  Right
> down to those annoying as %*@&! taskbar pop-up balloons!
>

Actually I have no problem with the WinXP lookalike interface and the
balloons, I just want stuff to work. OTOH, I'm not too fond of the
current GNOME interface with no activate button (the infamous start
button) and the working tabsatthe top of the screen. And any desktop
that doesn't havea RUN function on the right click menu is just plain
broken. And I loathe the fact that neither KDE nor GNOME has a
consolefunction on the initial desktop, old dinosaur that I am.

>
> > Welcome to CLUEful Denver.
>
> Thanks--they tell me I have another six weeks of what they tell me is
> really weird hot + wet weather.  Guh.  At least it beats what Oregon has
> had the past month.  Global warming in action, or something.
>

The wet weather in July is weird, but blistering hot weather from mid
June onward is pretty much par for the course.


-- 
Collins Richey
     If you fill your heart with regrets of yesterday and the worries
     of tomorrow, you have no today to be thankful for.