Installation

[degarb]

This is my first impression. The following will be mimicked by millions and should only be used as one person's articulations of the stumbling blocks that need to be cleared.

God, I am dissappointed by my first successful tries of linux (one unsuccessfull install in 2000 and 2003, each). I would say the feel of the technology is about 1994 but with remenants of 1988.

First, I am agast still after 9 years knowing they use such a suky filing system that only aliens and geeks could navigate. Then, I am shocked that there is no easy way to install programs other than a limited repository. I am shocked that installed programs go into the root partition, and that root must be wiped at each OS reinstall! kNOPPIX MENUS are a disaster and 50 percent incomprehensible. I am shocked at how slow the tiny distros run compared with win 98. I am shocked at disk space required for even vector linux light. I am frustrated that the xkill isn't real time when called, causing me to reach for hard reset button on computer every hour. And this is probably tip of berg.

This said, it is FREE! and I am impressed with vector linux follow up to my questions. . I liked the look of puppy-though couldn't get network card to see network- way better than KNoppix, which also couldn't see belkin, and nsblahblahwrapper wouldn't work after 5 hours googling. Furthermore Knoppix wouldn't see either kingston or lynsys card after turning off dma as required for boot from faster cd rom.

Any one know about installing apps on vector linux? Though in truth, my attention to this machine has expired, for the near future at least.

This said the OS, once setup should meet basic office and internet needs with some music capacity. But a distro that is serious about competing with MS needs the only two things users require: compatibility with current software and hardware; and, ease of use so everyone can use.
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[curious john]

Actually Puppy has available a dotpet (or older dotpup) pkg for just about any linux software out there and if it hasnt been done, post on their forum and somebody will probably make up a pet pkg for whatever program you want.

Now if you want to complain about your favorite commercial windows software not running on a non=windows operating system, then guess what, you need to complain to the people producing and selling that software, not to the people producing the operating system. Same with hardware drivers. Microsoft doesnt write the drivers for most of the hardware, the people that manufacture the hardware write the drivers and choose whether or not to invest time and money to make drivers for other than the current windows system. Historically few hardware manufacturers would even release the necessary info so linux gurus could write good drivers, drivers had to be reverse engineered from observing the hardware and lot trial and error. Even support for formerly popular windows systems ends. Dont believe me go try and find win98 drivers for newer hardware. And actually linux has pretty good driver support anymore. But you still have to make sure when you buy hardware that it will work in linux BEFORE you buy it. Bitching about it afterwards doesnt do much of anything. Linux isnt, as far as the home desktop user is concerned, a for-profit entity. It is an alternative, an open source alternative, but isnt in economic competition with windows. Nobody connected with linux is making a dime off the average home desktop user. So why should they worry about making it super compatible with every last piece of software and hardware out there? Whats in it for them?

The only current linux distributions comparable to win98 are the mini distributions like Puppy and DamnSmall. They are as fast or faster on simular hardware running simular size software. In other words compare Puppy running Firefox 3.5 to Win98 running Firefox 3.5. Not win98 running Netscape 4.0 And if you want to compare speed how about comparing to XP or Vista. Oh thats right they wont run on win98 hardware and win98 doesnt have the necessary drivers to run on current hardware. However Puppy can run on earliest pentium up to the latest and greatest. Some have even put it on old 486 computer and got it to work but thats about as pointless as putting win98 on a 486. It might run but going to be so slow and frustrating especially with modern software as to be pointless.

[blsJason]

curious john wrote:

In other words compare Puppy running Firefox 3.5 to Win98 running Firefox 3.5. Not win98 running Netscape 4.0

Firefox 3.5 won't run under Windows 98:

http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/system-requirements.html  wrote:

Windows Operating Systems * Windows 2000 * Windows XP * Windows Server 2003 * Windows Vista

It was said in the "good old" days, later on in the days of free ISPs, and it's true now: "if it's free, you get what you pay for."

I can say that I've tried Knoppix, as well as several other Linux distros. I've even had a used notebook that came with Ubuntu on it. The truth of the matter with Linux is if the developer(s) want to include something, they will; if they don't, they won't. In this case, IMO, that's the price of "free" software.

I'm not taking a side on this issue. I can understand degarb's frustration and curious john's viewpoint. Again, IMO, this is another price of "free" software: not everyone agrees on the best model.

On a related topic, just a few minutes ago, I posted in a distro forum a "groveling plea" for a feature that's supposed to work in the distro and found in many others. It wouldn't surprise me at all if someone replies back with something like: "in the time it took you to post, you could've started writing your own scripts to make it work." On the other hand, the reply could be that they have something that they think will work and will be in the next beta release.

IMO, Linux distros are an excellent idea. On one side, it's free, many programs are available, and it offers the greatest level of customization freedom of probably any operating system. On the other, not every program is available for Linux, nearly every distribution assumes the user is more competent than the typical Windows user, and while mentioning that probably the most important thing is Linux is not Windows–if someone is looking for an OS that runs anything (hardware, software, etc.) they can find at Best Buy or Target, there's one option out there which is about to release it's 7th version. We probably all know what that is.
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[msp]

degarb wrote:

But a distro that is serious about competing with MS needs the only two things users require: compatibility with current software and hardware; and, ease of use so everyone can use.

I don't think the Linux community considers itself in competition with Windows. I know this is a broad statement and I certainly don't consider myself a spokesman for the "Linux community". I will say this, though. Linux is an alternative to Windows. If Linux works for you and you like it, fine. If Linux doesn't work for you and you don't like it, don't use it. Remember, Linux is just an operating system, like Windows, like Mac OS, like Solaris, etc. Find an operating system that works for you and that you like and is easy to use.

By the way, I'm writing this on my Linux box (Mepis/Puppy Linux, dual-boot) but I've got Macs and Windows boxen, too.
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[curious john]

blsJason wrote:

Firefox 3.5 won't run under Windows 98

Exactly my point. Original poster was saying how fast win98 is. Well it cant even run firefox 3.5 and whats the last IE that supported win98? So its not faster if it cant even run the software is it? And if its not running same software, then its an apples and oranges comparison.

I dont really care enough to go look it up, but might be interesting if Puppy could run a newer version of IE via WINE that what win98 could run natively.....

And on newer hardware it doesnt matter much but on older hardware how Puppy is set up and whether you use give it access to a linux swap partition makes a huge amount of difference. For the record on old computer the best way to set it up is a full expanded traditional install with a swap partition. Trying to run Puppy in ram memory on some machine with very limited ram memory just doesnt work very well. You really need a machine with 256mb ram to really be effective running Puppy compressed in ram memory. Though minimum is like 128mb. And the bigger the applications or the more programs running at same time, then the more ram needed.


Thing I've noticed is that even though Puppy will run on older hardware, many times the newer applications require more resources than the old hardware can provide. You can still run Opera 9.XX with as little as say 32mb ram, which if anybody is honest with themselves, is pretty much absolute bottom amount win98 or Puppy are going to be useful with. And then probably wont be able to run very many modern applications. For example no Mozilla/Firefox/Seamonkey will even load on less than 64mb and are very slow at 64mb.