Joel Konkle-Parker pointed us to ballsome.com where they are investigating Red Hat 8 as a possible replacement for Windows XP on the desktop. Our Take: It’s a decent article that outlines a lot of known issues, but serves as a nice reminder we’re close, but not there yet.
Red Hat 8 as a Windows XP Replacement
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Adam Scheinberg
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I wish RH would focus on the limitations more so they can get there…..people use to say taht Linux will never be as good as windows……the fact is that it is so close it is scary. if RH concentrates hard on the issues in the article and in other aticles they could have the problems solved in a year.
I am a dedicated Linux user and I have to say that this is a very balanced article. There _are_ problems with Linux that have to be fixed and the author has highlighted some of the major ones. I hope that perhaps in a year’s time I will be able to look at this article again and see some of the points addressed.
Currently I recommend Linux only to my computer savvy friends or for those people who use a very small subset of applications and for whom I am able to setup the computer in advance. My experience has taught me that although Linux has improved significantly in the time I’ve used it, for ease of use its ‘not quite there yet’. Especially in terms of program installation etc.
compare the price of a boxed set for Redhat8 personal to the price of M$FT Windoze EXPEE and you decide which has the better deal…
i think bill gates & Micky$oft has enough money, besides Linux coders have to eat too…
Yes there’re are limitations:
1 RPM packaging system … it sux… THE DEPENDENSEIS, CONFLICTS, etc….
2 If Hardware manuficators [Excuse my english] would provide DRIVERS for their hardware on linux[like nvidia does] there wouldn’t be hardware problems… a day ago i had problems configuring my soud card on SuSE 8.1 [A REALLLLLLY GR8 DISTRO]
3 Yes… RH8 doesn’t have those “control panels” for configuring the system [like Mandrake(best) has or Suse( can’t configure automount and samba throu YAST)]
But really nothing new. He has an excellent point on his frustrations with while browsing a directory, having to go to a console and su root to see/copy files. Though the simple solution, as far as KDE is concerned is to browse in super user mode.
I don’t really see Linux as a quality replacement quite yet, and not because of the seemingly(at first) root privilege config and RPM problems. The software side of things as far as DCC apps goes, lags far far far far behind.
Though for an internet browser,cd burner,mp3 player, and word processor, Linux is king.
RedHat is NOT a desktop distro! It’s a professional-oriented server/desktop distro. If you want a WinXP replacement, please do choose SuSE or Xandros.
RedHat 8 is the biggest load of impotent crap that has so far come from RedHat. I wish people would stop writing destop reviews about RH8 and then complaining how “Linux is not ready for the desktop”.
how old are you Oaklahomakid? that sounds like the argument I spouted when I was in highschool…..trust me….people do not respond to it…infact…people do not respond to in your face advocacy.
I guess you did not hear about RH makeing the inroads to office desktops huh. so yes compairing the two is importent.
It is very common to claim that rpm is less usable because in windows you just have to do “donwload, uninstall, run setup.exe, answer some questions and you are done”.
Yes it does work fine when you want to install one package.
But let’s say you want to rebuild one (or worse several) machine(s) and reinstall the 100 softwares that were on it. You have to click 1000 times, answer 1000 questions, reboot 50 times…. In that case, rpm -Uvh *.rpm looks MUCH more productive!
rpm is maybe a pain with dependancy. But at least you will not break your machine by installing an old package. If it is not compatible, you know it. With Windows, maybe it will work, maybe your machine will be left unusable (or you will get some application no longer working) after installing an outdated package.
The bottom line: if you have rpm packages already build for your distribution of Linux, installing software is quite easy on Linux, as easy (if not more) as Windows.
Elver: Suse and Xandros are just about as close as redhat 8 is to being xp replacements (IMHO). As for the redhat being a professional-oriented server/desktop distro, i’m assuming you’ve inquired with redhat and asked them about this?
You are the same guy who wasted our time with an intelligent posting to Eugenia’s article about the space shuttle by berating her for posting it.. and here we are again.. listening to you ramble on about stuff you know nothing about. Redhat 8 is “impotent crap?”.
How old are you? Did you get your education from Sally Struthers “Home Learning” program?
If you don’t have anything nice to say, find another site to post on. Spare us the indignity.
Eugenia: My apologies for the rant.. but this guys getting tiresome.
> RedHat is NOT a desktop distro! It’s a professional-oriented server/desktop distro. If you want a WinXP replacement, please do choose SuSE or Xandros.
I do not agree with this assecement. WinXP is also a corporate desktop OS, as it is a home desktop OS. Red Hat is also a corporate desktop OS, so the two products do have a common market. That’s the corporate market. And the fact that the reviewer found problems with its usability, doesn’t make the problem smaller, just because “it is for the corporate desktop”. The problems are still there.
Also, the fact that Red Hat is today the best supported Linux, plus the most adopted/popular one, does have an impact on the user’s decision to choose it, instead of choosing “SuSE of Xandros”. Especially when it is free to obtain and the other two are not.
ummm….sure, but whenyou consider how most software is distributed in a windows network, that is not even the case. so RPM just plain sucks for normal use.
Nothing we didn’t know yet, but a nice and simple article making it’s point.
It made me think about some issues I wanted to share with OSNews visitors.
People use to compare dependency hell (whether source compiles of RPM-hell) with the supposed very well known ‘DLL-hell’ in Windows. Although I understand DLL-hell very well, I actually can’t recall having bumped into a dll-issue, nor lately, nor since a couple of years.
On another side-note. When might we expect articles evaluating Linux on a more corporate level? Meaning not the usual install-and-evaluate-desktop-experience, but I’d like to hear about evaluting Linux compared to what are the strong point of Microsoft SW: integration. This IMHO really starts with the domain model in NT/W2K: e.g. single-sign-on, groupware and other servers integrated in and using this user-model,…
Why isn’t any company asking: how can we provide a working alternative for e.g. the Active Directory Domain model _and_ delivering at least the same functionalities. Which Samba IMO does not. Samba is a good alternative for NT4 domains, but migrating W2K boxes to *nix/Samba boxes would be a step backwards, for several reasons, granularity of file permissions being just an example.
I of course didn’t take security/bugs/stability issues into accounting when making this statement because
– for a lot of small companies W2K is good enough
– W2K has advantages that outweigh the pure technical reasons (the usual VHS/Betamax story)
I also know that there are alternatives for things as Active Directory. But when I look for implementing such alternatives, I always have the feeling I should re-invent the wheel and hack it all together myself, which is time-consuming. For my customers those extra hours/days I should work means MORE cost, which outweighs license costs…
I have a dream of a server product delivering the same functionalities as Novell, but being Open Source and running on Unix… (This means including a Windows client!)
I think such software might be a killer app for Linux on (workgroup) server level.
I think the header of the article is the most important: “always the same over and over again”. Indeed, people aer complaining about the same things over and over. The big question is: Why Red Hat hasn’t dealt with those issues so far? Red Hat became “big”, in 1999, and 4 years later, while a lot of evolution has happened, the same very deep issues are still there.
Most Windows installers now use one of the popular wrappers around Windows Installer (InstallShield, or Wise), as has been required by the Designed for Windows guidelines for some years now. This supports management of DLL versioning, side-by-side and auto-repair. Another designed-for-windows guideline that most software now abides by is not to require unnecessary reboots – most installers do not require a reboot at all.
And, as an added bonus, if you abide by all of that correctly, you can use a response file to manage your multi-machine distribution, including *the right* answers to any questions that needed to be asked (such as security, file location, modules to install etc.)
And that’s even before we get into smart zero-touch (or, more accurately, one-touch) deployment with .NET. Incompatible installers grew to a universal position in Windows software distribution in the mid-Nineties. Things have moved on dramatically in the past 3 years, with system-integrated, standardized installation management; and I expect that in another 3 years, one-touch deployment will dominate.
The earliest examples of system integrated deployment and configuration management tools I cam across was in the AIX and OS/2 environments with product offerings from IBM. But Linux still has a long, long way to go in this area.
UGH. guys, have any of you even USED windows in the last few years? dll hell? what in gods name? i haven’t run into a dll problem since windows 95, and that was just with visual basic runtimes, and to fix it, all i had to do was copy the files into the windows directory. you;re going to need to come up with some new counter arguements when people bash dependency hell. and guys, maybe instead of just spouting off some unfounded shit about dll-hell, you could get off the defensive and FIX the dependency hell business.
Because as much as we’d like to change the world in a single moment, often other things take prioirity
I think RH made the correct decision – they focused on the server side first and made inroads there. Now they are a _known_ presence and a respected one in that market, so businesses are more likely to entertain thoughts of a desktop linux for limited use cases.
Personally, I think that the package management issue can only be solved by a major and _wholehearted_ effort by the major distros (Debian, Red Hat, Mandrake, Suse) on a common file system setup and a common package format. This affects all distros and the longer its left the more problems will be faced in the long run. Although I am a Debian user, and I have access to all the major packages, I see many advantages in being able to go to a website and being able to download a piece of software withut worrying about which distribution it caters to.
>> RedHat is NOT a desktop distro!
>> It’s a professional-oriented server/desktop distro.
If I’m not mistaken, RedHat comes with games.
Why do servers (or “professional” desktops) need games?
I truly hope Linux takes over Windows soon so we can finally stop hearing this comment, “…but serves as a nice reminder we’re close, but not there yet.” For the past ten yeras I’ve been hearing this from one Linux person or another and you know what? Linux is still as far away from desktop adoption as it has always been because Windows is a moving target and if Linux is only going to emulate the Windows GUI they will always be playing catch-up.
Wow, thank you for saying what I was dying to say! I don’t know when the last time I encountered a DLL problem on Windows was, and hell, I’m running WINDOWS ME! And please, people, spell out “Windows” and “Microsoft.” It’s just a nice thing to do. Say it with me: Windows, Bill Gates, Microsoft, XP. Thank you, that is all.
>>>
I think that the package management issue can only be solved by a major and _wholehearted_ effort by the major distros (Debian, Red Hat, Mandrake, Suse) on a common file system setup and a common package format. This
>>>
Why on earth they wouldn’t sit down and agree on a thing as simple as a file system layout beats the hell out of me. The biggest problem with linux is that different people spend hours working on different variations of the same thing. This not only wastes massive efforts and re-invents the wheel, its make the work of app developers that much difficult. Hopefully, things will continue improving.
I think the header of the article is the most important: “always the same over and over again”.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but does this mean certain people or OSNews isn’t interested in those comments I made?
I find it remarkable that nobody’s racts on this. Am I wrong about this? Maybe my knowledge of existing software is not good enough?
I’m not wanting to react negatively here. Just wondering why I seem to be the only one interested in those issues?
linux_baby: The current attitute seems to be that if everyone works on x different alternatives, then sooner or later, somewhere down the road – the ‘best one’ will win. This approach is often seen as better than the creation of a cohesive standard.
However, I think that it some cases a standard is required – even _necessary_. Standard locations, a well thought out struture that takes into account the fact that Linux is moving to the desktop as well is required.
Perhaps we need to email Linux companies about this and state that we (as users) are extremely interested in this. Currently I think we’re resigned to the situation…
For example, the DPL elections are coming around – this would be a good question to ask.
As soon as games ship with a standard Windows AND Linux port is when Linux will be ready to replace Windows on my desktop. I am currently running Linux as my laptop’s primary OS, and it’s great for productivity.
Ha! Ha!
As if!
Like, no.
Forget it.
No way.
Oh, please.
Come on!
That’s ridiculous.
No productivity.
No chance.
The dependancy problem has nothing to do with RPM. It’s a packaging problem. On Windows an app is bundled with all libraries on linux it isn’t. If you don’t like then tell the packagers to bundle everything together.
If you want a graphical interface just associate some graphical package manager with rpm files.
On Debian and Mandrake there are no dependancy problems because their package tools have automatic dependancy resolution. If Red Hat doesn’t have such a tool then it’s Red Hat’s problem NOT a Linux one.
Don’t use inferior distributions and then complain about Linux in general. Just makes you look clueless.
We also must read between the lines… the guy is not a computing expert (though he _is_ a smart scientist guy).
This kind of guys will determine whether Linux can win or not on the desktop.
And to be nice: Microsoft, Windows, _ William Gates, III _ etc.
(Though, frankly, we should distinguish person from corporation. A lot of people influences Microsoft behaviour — we shouldn’t take Mr. Gates as fully responsible for everything. All in all, he may just be a reasonable guy like everyone else.)
PS: KDE 3.1 ROCKS!
Though for an internet browser,cd burner,mp3 player, and word processor, Linux is king.
Come again? Do you mean ‘king’ because it’s cheaper? I mean, take Nero fully loaded (with all plugins) and put it up against the best of whatever Linux has to offer. As for browsers and word processors, last I checked, StarOffice/Mozilla were available on Win32. MP3 player? XMMS vs Winamp .. is there really much difference?
UGH. guys, have any of you even USED windows in the last few years? dll hell? what in gods name? i haven’t run into a dll problem since windows 95
They’re basically the same loons who keep crying ‘Windows crashes all the time’ because they’re either dillusional, grossly uninformed, or (taking a cue from the Linux crowd) they’re too stupid to figure out how to properly configure a Windows box.
And please, people, spell out “Windows” and “Microsoft.” It’s just a nice thing to do. Say it with me: Windows, Bill Gates, Microsoft, XP. Thank you, that is all.
Of course, we could go all out on the Lin-SUX thing every other sentence, but most of us are more mature than that.
On Debian and Mandrake there are no dependancy problems because their package tools have automatic dependancy resolution.
Yeah, nevermind that Debian can be (and usually is) a royal pain in the ass to get up and running and that most of the packages that come with the stable version pre-date the stone page, and that Mandrake has more bugs than a roach motel.
If Red Hat doesn’t have such a tool then it’s Red Hat’s problem NOT a Linux one.
If you want to take that approach, then I can also say that spyware is not a Windows problem either.
Don’t use inferior distributions and then complain about Linux in general
I’d actually go a bit further and tell them to stop using an inferior OS 😉
Can anyone correct me, WinXP is supposed to solve the DLL hell? I don’t have any of problem with DLL since Win2k Pro and WinXP Home/Pro. I never like RPM, it’s one of worst tool that I ever have touch in the *nix world. RedHat do really need to improvement the RPM.
Seriously… if you want to review a distro for the “average home user”, use SuSE.
RedHat is aimed at the corporate desktop. 9 times out of 10, you’re going to have one of the “PC Tech drones” installing and setting up your system. Glitches of the “HD into the promise controller doesn’t work” type aren’t just limited to Linux either.
And people need to leave RPM alone. It’s not perfect. But it only tends to break when you force it to break. Don’t use –force, don’t use –nodeps, and don’t compile/build/make install your own stuff, and RPM works better than windows.
None of the packaging systems available for Linux are perfect.
Debian apt-get may work very well, to be honest I haven’t used it enough to judge. But the packages available for Debian are often out of date and some software is only available as RPM. When there’s a new version of an app with bugs fixed and great new features added, it’s very frustrating waiting months for a Debian package to be available.
Personally I had some problems with the Mandrake package manager, it failed a few times when I used it. also you need to find RPMs for the specific version of Mandrake you’re using. Again this resticts choice and the Mandrake RPMs are sometimes out of date. Trying to install generic RPMs on a Mandrake system is a gamble IME.
There’s also the issue of having to download large applications from the internet. I suppose it’s less of a problem now with faster connections, but personally I would still much rather have software on CD than wait for it to download. Maybe I’m unusual, but I tend to keep up to date by buying computer magazines with cover CDs and I get shareware/demo compilations to try out new software. With Linux, cover CDs and compilations tend to only have source, or generic RPMs if your lucky.
JC: You want people to use SuSE? Give me a break.. Suse is a piece of shit.
Okay, I’ve been lurking here for months and only offered a few postings. One of my prime observations is that many people here offer to the Linux distrubutions several gripes and problems in the “Joe User” department. I agree, most flavors of Linux are not yet suitable for someone without some form of technical support or the desire to learn for themselves. This article addresses so many of these issues, and I find it extremely balanced, especially when the reviewer realizes his setup is in the vast minority for one hardware detection bug, very mature. However, one thing I think that is very prevelant here, and on other boards, is that most people really expect more from a Linux flavor than from Windows and its ilk. Really. We expect Linux to work flawlessly in the fashion we deem most appropriate, in every corner case, and right now. I think this is great as we all expect Linux to be great, to innovate and solve the hard problems. However, these expectations will never be fully realized because what we deem flawed is a moving target. Also, many people here think they have the technical solution to the issue. My opinion is that more people on this (and similar boards) should provide clear ideas for what functionality they desire, leaving more of the implimentation design to others who can do so. That is, tell the coders what features we truly, really, desire in exasperatingly clear language. They cannot code what they do not understand. One thing I really appreciate in the Linux communities is how the end user is part of the process. Coders *DO* listen to users who are have problems, but can describe these problems and present what they desire in clear language. If you don’t like something in Linux, generally you can fix it, or you can explain your problem to someone else and let them fix it. Check out freedesktop.org and linuxbase.org. These are two organizations that are listening to you and your friends. Many of the issues discussed on this thread are being discussed and implimented at these sites. Ring in with your desires, explain them clearly, and often. That is how these things get fixed.
The RPM package manager is awful.Please understand I’m not saying it is impossible to make it work, only that it’s often harder work than I’m interested in.It obviously runs better on Red Hat than Suse, as there are more rpm versions available, but it still isn’t wonderful. Red Hat should be beaten around the head with complaints everytime it doesn’t work, until maybe it does work, or until they come up with a better idea.I must admit I had decided the reason this rpm/package manager problem persisted was because it wasn’t actually possible to fix it. I’m sure it’s not a lack of interest.
As an alternative, Suse’s yast2 installs applications off it’s own disks in a snap, but what if they are not there or on the net? (as was the case with the last two things I wanted install). If Debian does work better than Suse I really would be interested to know, but it is hard to tell. Everyone is very partisan about these things…
First of all, how experienced is this person with Linux ?
If you put me on a Mac, I wouldn’t be able to figure some things out either. How can a user say whether or not a package is ready for the desktop *for everyone* when he is a novice ?
Second of all, KDE MENUS ARE EDITABLE IN RH ! Right click on the KDE gear, select “Menu Editor”. Am I missing something ???? How hard did this reviewer try to find an answer for that problem ? Did he post to a newsgroup ? I would have “shown” him how to edit a menu.
Third of all, if you want to be able to easily install packages, install Synaptic. This makes package management much, much easier than anything I’ve seen in Windows.
Lastly, lets recognize that it takes a while to get as comfy with a new OS as you were with the one you used for the last 5 years. Truthfully, I didn’t see any desktop showstoppers in this article. Does the author really want to move from Windows to something else ? Did he jump in the pool or just dip his toe and decide it looked cold and deep ?
I like reading about people’s experiences with Linux. However, some have to be taken with a grain of salt.
I’ve run RedHat since 6.2. And I must say, 6.2 and 7.1 were the best ones so far. 7.2 wouldnt even boot on my Athlon XP – I always got kernel panic. It was said to be some mess with the Athlon XP support in their kernel. Even tried burning the ISOs twice. No workie.
And yes, I’ve used RedHat 8 enough to criticize it. And it’s crap. I wouldnt mind running it on a server though. The installation and setup is quite nice and comfortable.
The RPM system has got to go. The dependancy issues are just unbelievable. Plus the desktop has lots of shortcomings. Now comparing RedHat/RPM to SuSE/YAST, I must say that SuSE beats RedHat hands-down.
Looking from the dumbuser side, RedHat 8 didnt even ship with any mp3 players. This is a very serious shortcoming. This and all other frustrations are enough to make someone run away scared.
I gave my RH8 CDs to a 40-year-old woman who gives Word and Excel courses and has only used Windows. She couldnt handle it. She hated it. She managed to mess things up quite good. The other day, I gave her a Knoppix CD. She liked that.
If RedHat is truly desktop-oriented, then it’s for masochistic bastards who love using an impotent androgynic distro.
Now, about the WinXP issue. WinXP IS a desktop OS. While people might claim it’s good for the server, it’s not. It’s slow enough to stay out of the low-end server market and if you do have money to spend, you’ll be going for a full dedicated UNIX server. People who do serve off Windows uses either NT 4 or 2000.
My bone to pick with RedHat is that they are after all the number one Linux distro out. That means, they’ll end up in the hands of newbies. And newbies will probably try it out. But if you cant even play mp3s with it, what kind of impression will this leave? A bad one. Just the other day as I was checking the integrity of a public internet surfing station that I’ve set up at the local library a guy, about 15 or 16 years of age, came up to me and said “why are you messing with that? Linux sucks”. I asked him, what he based that opinion on. “It’s fucking slow”, he replied. “What distro did you try?” I queried. “RedHat Linux 8”.
Second of all, KDE MENUS ARE EDITABLE IN RH ! Right click on the KDE gear, select “Menu Editor”. Am I missing something ???? How hard did this reviewer try to find an answer for that problem ? Did he post to a newsgroup ? I would have “shown” him how to edit a menu.
That’s in KDE. But Gnome is the default manager in Redhat and it doesn’t have a Menu Editor.
Third of all, if you want to be able to easily install packages, install Synaptic. This makes package management much, much easier than anything I’ve seen in Windows.
Synaptic is good. But to have the program, the newbie must search for synaptic and Apt-Get and he must know how to install it.
Right, so we pretty much cleared that RPM sucks because of dependency hell. Synaptic helps here and i agree (please REDHAT TAKE NOTE) that it should be included in the distro. Now, for all you people that have issues (or make issues where there arent many) with the MP3 support in RH8, i think they made the right “legal” move not to include the mp3 support. However if you have synaptic and scroll down in the list of packages, 3 clicks later and ~100KB download you have mp3 support in XMMS. About these things, Windows Media Player doesnt support all codecs either, it contacts codecs.microsoft.com and downloads it if it needs it. However RH8 comes with excellent OGG support (spare me, MP3’s is the standard blah blah). I use RH 8 daily and i like it. Given i am an experienced Linux user. But my wife uses it daily as well for all her school work and sch definately isnt a Linux Expert, but you know what, she took time and learned it by herself (i had VERY little to do in this). So I guess it all comes down to the definition of “newbie”. Chances are a standard dumb User that just bought his PC with Windows XP Home edition will NOT walk into a store and buy a boxed version of RH or Suse for that matter. Chances are, a Computer Savy person (friend) will tell him about it and he will try it with the help of the friend who can answer and istall the things needed.
Now to the person who gave RH8 CDs to a 40 year old woman, well if she installed knoppix on her Hd, more power to her but then i REALLY dont get how she can screw up in the RH8 install process. If she ran it from CD then she didnt install it and RH doesnt run from CD so its 2 different things. And how could she make a mess out of the RH8 installation? How much simpler do the default icons on the Kicker (or Gnome Panel) get? Web Browser, Email and Calendaring…???
I do agree with the article about almost everything but that also means that if you consider the FEW shortcomings of Distros generally nowadays (Suse, Mandrake and RH) we are DAMN close for use on the normal desktop. Heck, with the mplayer plugin working (most of the time ) in mozilla there wont be much missing in a while.
Instead of these childish “my distro is better then yours” we should be happy AND GLAD that the distros ARE already at this stage and only getting further!
jsut my 2 cents
For those who *still* have a hard time accepting Debian’s superiority in package management…
But the packages available for Debian are often out of date …
…When there’s a new version of an app with bugs fixed and great new features added, it’s very frustrating waiting months for a Debian package to be available.
http://apt-get.org/
>> and some software is only available as RPM.
apt-get install alien
alien <package.rpm>
dpkg -i <package.deb>
I got a friend of mine to try out linux, he started off with Libranet 2.0 (Debian base)… and got sick of the terminal… switched to RedHat 8.0 and next day wanted Libranet back. Now he’s happy apt-getting to his heart’s content.
I’m just speculating, but I think that Redhat doesn’t include apt and synaptic because they want people to get their updates through Redhat Network (paid subscription). If I’m not mistaken, the freshrpms website maintains this, not Redhat. I like RH8, but if it didn’t have apt I wouldn’t be using it. Apt makes life so much easier, especially when they ship RH8 without certain apps and functionality such as mp3 and DVD playback.
The problem remains though, how the hell are new users supposed to know about this stuff…
In the 10 years ive been using Windows ive had dll problems twice. In the 2 years ive been trying to get Linux to do anything usefull ive had dependancy problems with almost every RPM ive tried to install. And many of these have been unfixable (for example RPM complains that a library is missing when it is actually installed and being used by other programs)
The 2 times ive had DLL problems were with win95 over 6 years ago.
So i think the Linux zealots should shut the f…k up about DLL hell and get off thier ass and fix the problems with RPM or agree on a better package management system.
Those claiming there is no DLL hell don’t use their computers for any real tasks. Try installing powercenter client, and sql server personal edition on the same system. Now make them work. HAHA All you big babys out there bitching and moaning about rpm hell, read a manual and install apt. You do know how to read still right? Would any of you put air in your tires without looking inside the door of your car first? How did you know that little sticker was there? Did any of you magically learn how to cook? No. Get off your lazy asses and learn how to use your computers, no matter what damned OS you decide to use!
Those claiming there is no DLL hell don’t use their computers for any real tasks. Try installing powercenter client, and sql server personal edition on the same system.
Remember, if you do happen to run into DLL hell, it’s just the way the apps were packaged .. just like RPM, it’s NOT a Windows problem
All you big babys out there bitching and moaning about rpm hell, read a manual and install apt. You do know how to read still right?
Actually, I have a better idea. Why don’t you convince the Gods to make one package manager that works and comes standard with every single distro, so that end users don’t have to deal with this shit? And in the mean time, go build an altar for your Linux box and worship it.
I know this is a bit off topic, but I just want to know does nForce2 audio work properly on RH8? like the rear speaker, S/PIDF, etc
thx a lot guys
Why don’t give you guys a try to libranet ?
As far as I can tell it is debian based distro with kde 3.01 and gnome 2.0 and it does configure everything automatically plus it does have an administration utility similar to Mandrake . It is 100% compatible with debian packages so go and try it !
http://www.libranet.com
Why don’t you write one, or shut the hell up. Oh look Bill’s bent over, RUN!
I have Win98 installed and had a longing to try Linux rather than upgrade to WinXP. I installed a second hard drive and thought that I would dual boot both Win98 and Linux at least till I was comfortable with Linux. I have tried RH7.3, RH8, Mandrake9 and Lycorris – all installed really easy. But all have major problems with hardware. None use the capabilities of my Hercules graphics card and none work reliably with a Hayes Accura 56k external modem (let alone my internat 56k modem). Desktop apps are at best acceptable; none are as pollished as general Win shareware – Bluefish HTML editor compared with TextPad (or many similar HTML Kit, NotPad, etc.) is very sub-standard. Zip equivalents are a joke. I could not find CSS editors or good outliners (there is nothing like MyInfo).
Given that I could not get reliable Internet connection or software similar to the tools I use every day I cut my losses.
I will probably try RH9 (and 10) but Linux has a very long way to go to match the universality of Windows (as unpleasant as that might be).
pja
the usual gripes/problems, move along, nothing to see
he’s also paid for win xp, why downgrade, if it was win 98 then there may be a story here
The reason why people usually don’t have DLL problems in Windows is because every app copies in his own DLL’s instead of sharing with other apps.
The Linux/*IX equivalent would be to compile all programs static which would use a lot more RAM/diskspace. Hardly anything to wish for…
However, the new Side-By-Side stuff in Windows is designed to get around precisely this problem. You can specify precisely which versions of the DLL you require in an appication manifest, and the DLLs can live together.
It is taking some getting your head round, though, and the .NET stuff in this area really wasn’t working in 1.0 (its much better in 1.1).
Again, this is not perfect, and there is a way to go yet, but we’re already seeing benefits. And it certainly isn’t the equivalent of static linking – it is much more sophisticated than that.
Peter Anderson, I believe that you need to try a little harder. As for everyone else, once again Linux makes a FINE desktop for those that don’t mind putting a little bit of effort into the small learning curve. Here is a screenshot including several running windows applications. (I installed WinZip just for the screenshot.)
http://www.fewt.com/desktop
Note my uptime of 112d.
Applications:
Lotus Notes – Corporate Email application for Windows.
TextPad – Best editor on the market.
WinZip – File extraction utility.
Rdesktop (x2) – Connections to Windows servers.
Mozilla – Web browser.
GEdit – Text Editor.
GAIM – ICQ AIM Yahoo and MSN all in one.
Netbackup Administrator – Netbackup management interface.
GKRELLM – System monitor.
System Info:
RedHat 8.0 using GNOME 2.0
Wine Version: wine-20030115-1rh8winehq
Memory: 256584
CPU: 598.691
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