On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 8:47 PM, Digimer linux@alteeve.com wrote:
The kernel is, if I recall correctly, 2.6.18 that has only been patched
to fix bugs and security features. The modern kernel is 2.6.37, and a *lot* of hardware has come along in the years in between. For example, it's unlikely that things like bluetooth, most wireless interfaces, modern video cards, etc, will work.
Another option, if you are concerned about the short life cycle of Fedora, would be to look at Ubuntu 10.04 LTS. The 'LTS' means "Long Term Support" and will be supported for a fairly long time. 10.04 was released last April, so it will be quite up to date.
Okay, as seem Ubuntu is supposed to have a longer life.
On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 8:49 PM, Cameron Kerr cameron@humbledown.orgwrote:
Doesn't have stability!? News to me (at least for Ubuntu). Seriously though,
you would probably find that a Fedora or Ubuntu would support your desktop hardware (particularly things like Wireless and Graphics card) much better than a distribution aimed at servers. It's also a lot more newbie friendly.
Okay, but my meaning to say was that it has an end of life every six months.
On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 8:54 PM, Les Mikesell lesmikesell@gmail.com wrote:
Note that ubuntu has an 'LTS" (long term support) version that splits the
difference between the really fast moving releases and ones that go unchanged for a decade. I was pleasantly surprised a short time ago when I fired up my dual-boot laptop into an old install of ubuntu 8.04LTS and it asked if I wanted to upgrade to the newer 10.4LTS release, then proceeded to do it, automatically and successfully.
There are, however, big differences in administration commands between Ubuntu and Centos - but if you are just starting out that probably doesn't matter.
Yes, and one main difference could be that Cent OS might serve purpose better for servers.
On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 9:09 PM, Robert Heller heller@deepsoft.com wrote:
RedHat does back port drivers, at least 'essential' ones. But yes, much
'bleeding edge' hardware might not be supported.
My PC is for home purpose only and I have only a small hardward - just speakers, a printer (Samsung printer), one net connection, one flatron screen with an assemble CPU having Inter Core 2 duo processor, 2 GB ram and 250 GB hard-disk. Speakers are frequently used and nothing else. In this scenario, I hope that all the drivers red hat might be supporting as it is the minimal of a computer sys., now in this bleeding edge technology era!
On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 9:09 PM, Robert Heller heller@deepsoft.com wrote:
In theory yes. The thing is the 'minimal install' would be very
minimal indeed. Probably no GUI or any of the other 'goodies' you might expect to have. This would be fine for a fairly experienced IT person, but might be somewhat 'hard' for a novice user.
If can only manage to download *one* *CD* (either can't deal with a DVD or don't want to download 7 CDs), then you should download the netinstall CD. This is actually a very *small* iso image. Assuming you have a decent Internet connection, the netinstall CD can install packages directly from the Internet.
Ok I try one way.
On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 9:09 PM, Robert Heller heller@deepsoft.com wrote:
It is good for:
- Taking a 'test drive' to see if linux is something you want to
pursue. Or to demostrate Linux to people who might not have seen or used Linux -- it is easier to lug a CD than a whole computer.
To use as a multifunction rescue system.
To use Linux on a machine that Linux cannot be installed on (eg not
your machine).
- To see if Linux will work on the machine in question before
committing to installing on it. Can be used to test Linux compatibity with store display models, for example.
On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 9:10 PM, Michael Klinosky mpk2@enter.net wrote:
It's meant to be used to test if the distro likes your system, or test
if you like the distro.
Do you know what a 'Live CD' is? Boot your computer from it; it'll run the OS - but only in RAM or from the CD. It won't change anything on your hard drive.
Oh I see, this is really good option Linux has provided!
On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 9:21 PM, Les Mikesell lesmikesell@gmail.com wrote:
CentOS will work for desktop use but it is not ideal, especially as it gets
older. With only a few exceptions, the support updates have only bug and security fixes to the package versions shipped in the original release of the major distribution version number without adding new features. This is a good thing if you run servers with a lot of your own programming that depends on the exact behavior of the libraries from that version, but it is a lot less important for an individual user that wants the newest features from all of the available packages.
If you still want CentOS and aren't in a big hurry, you might wait for the CentOS6 release which should be coming soon. CentOS 5.x has packages from around the Fedora 6 era. CentOS 6 should jump that up to be similar to Fedora 14.
Nice, Cent OS 6 would be releasing by the Jan end or Feb, I think....? Another important thing I have is that like you are suggesting for Fedora or Ubuntu but that the newest cutting edge technology could be installed in the older hardware assuming that the hardware has minimal composition, like, only 2 gb ram, hard disk and speaker, with keyboard and a non-usb mouse. In this hardware too we can install any cutting edge OS like fedora or it really depends on the hardware that if it would accept a particular distro or not!
-- Regards, Parshwa Murdia
On 1/16/2011 3:45 PM, Parshwa Murdia wrote:
On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 9:21 PM, Les Mikesell <lesmikesell@gmail.com mailto:lesmikesell@gmail.com> wrote:
If you still want CentOS and aren't in a big hurry, you might wait for the CentOS6 release which should be coming soon. CentOS 5.x has packages from around the Fedora 6 era. CentOS 6 should jump that up to be similar to Fedora 14.Nice, Cent OS 6 would be releasing by the Jan end or Feb, I think....? Another important thing I have is that like you are suggesting for Fedora or Ubuntu but that the newest cutting edge technology could be installed in the older hardware assuming that the hardware has minimal composition, like, only 2 gb ram, hard disk and speaker, with keyboard and a non-usb mouse. In this hardware too we can install any cutting edge OS like fedora or it really depends on the hardware that if it would accept a particular distro or not!
Not by the end of January. Probably not by the end of February. CentOS is a volunteer project, so CentOS 6 will be ready when it's ready. If you want to wait for CentOS 6, then keep an eye on either this list or the centos.org website. It will be announced as soon as it is available.
On Mon, Jan 17, 2011 at 5:45 PM, Bowie Bailey Bowie_Bailey@buc.com wrote:
Not by the end of January. Probably not by the end of February. CentOS is a volunteer project, so CentOS 6 will be ready when it's ready. If you want to wait for CentOS 6, then keep an eye on either this list or the centos.org website. It will be announced as soon as it is available.
Okk, might be because many persons dedicated for this project and in simultaneous effort and when it is completed, they release it with all the details.
Parshwa,
On 16 January 2011 20:45, Parshwa Murdia b330bkn@gmail.com wrote:
Another option, if you are concerned about the short life cycle of Fedora, would be to look at Ubuntu 10.04 LTS. The 'LTS' means "Long Term Support" and will be supported for a fairly long time. 10.04 was released last April, so it will be quite up to date.
Okay, as seem Ubuntu is supposed to have a longer life.
Ubuntu LTS has a 3 year life cycle overall for desktops, 5 year for servers.
Okay, but my meaning to say was that it has an end of life every six months.
Ubuntu and Fedora have a new release approx every 6 months but their end of life is 18 months. (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/LTS and http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/LifeCycle#End_of_Life_.28EOL.29)
I personally would recommend Ubuntu LTS for family members. CentOS is geared for technical people.
On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 11:47 AM, Hakan Koseoglu hakan@koseoglu.org wrote:
Ubuntu LTS has a 3 year life cycle overall for desktops, 5 year for servers.
Ubuntu and Fedora have a new release approx every 6 months but their end of life is 18 months. (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/LTS and http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/LifeCycle#End_of_Life_.28EOL.29)
I personally would recommend Ubuntu LTS for family members. CentOS is geared for technical people.
Oh I see. But at least work could be done in Fedora too like without going into the technical details at least multimedia could be used, secured bank transactions could be done, prints can be taken and all this I guess without going into the core details we could do but only the knowledge of installation (GUI only) is required.
On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 5:36 AM, Parshwa Murdia b330bkn@gmail.com wrote:
I personally would recommend Ubuntu LTS for family members. CentOS is geared for technical people.
Oh I see. But at least work could be done in Fedora too like without going into the technical details at least multimedia could be used, secured bank transactions could be done, prints can be taken and all this I guess without going into the core details we could do but only the knowledge of installation (GUI only) is required.
Ubuntu's focus is usability - that is, making the distribution easy to install and use. Fedora may not admit it, but its real purpose is to be a testbed for Red Hat development with usability coming in a distant second. CentOS would likely only be used as a desktop OS by people who also run servers and like everything to be the same. They all assemble approximately the same set of upstream packages, though, so it is possible to make them all do the same things with varying amounts of work in finding current packages that might be missing in the base distribution.
Whatever you choose, be sure to set up some way to back up at least your locally created files onto different media. This serves 2 purposes: hard drives have short, random-length lives and regardless of the distribution you start with, you will eventually want to replace it or do a major version update that will wipe out your disks.
Les Mikesell wrote:
On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 5:36 AM, Parshwa Murdia b330bkn@gmail.com wrote:
I personally would recommend Ubuntu LTS for family members. CentOS is geared for technical people.
<snip>
Ubuntu's focus is usability - that is, making the distribution easy to install and use. Fedora may not admit it, but its real purpose is to be a testbed for Red Hat development with usability coming in a distant second. CentOS would likely only be used as a desktop OS by people who also run servers and like everything to be the same. They
I agree with Mike. I run CentOS at home... and at work, overwhelmingly. I have Ubuntu on a netbook, because there's an Ubuntu remix specifically for netbooks. I have issues with Ubuntu (I dislike the frequency of updates, esp. of kernels), but I think if I ever get my fiancee on Linux, I'll give her Ubuntu, as well. <snip>
Whatever you choose, be sure to set up some way to back up at least your locally created files onto different media. This serves 2 purposes: hard drives have short, random-length lives and regardless of the distribution you start with, you will eventually want to replace it or do a major version update that will wipe out your disks.
Which is why I *ALWAYS* have /home on at least a seperate partition.
mark
On Wed, 19 Jan 2011, Les Mikesell wrote:
CentOS would likely only be used as a desktop OS by people who also run servers and like everything to be the same. They all assemble approximately the same set of upstream packages, though, so it is possible to make them all do the same things with varying amounts of work in finding current packages that might be missing in the base distribution.
I do think CentOS gets unreasonably knocked as a desktop OS. I definitely don't use it on desktops *because* I run it on servers.
All the advantages of long release cycles apply to desktops. Despite often thinking otherwise, many users require relatively few packages to be the latest shiniest, so running a bleeding edge distro isn't really needed. Even then, a reasonably amount of software can end up being commercial, where EL5 is currently better supported than any other linux release. Where users do have requirements that diverge from the base OS, it's probably a good idea for that to be satisfied out of the main OS tree anyway, as that lets you satisfy local requirements while keeping the core identical across the board.
jh
I find that in places where I don¹t have latest and greatest hardware, CEntOS makes a much better Desktop OS than Ubuntu. If all I am doing is running a web browser for the most part, I use CEntOS.
-- cwebber
On 1/19/11 7:13 AM, "John Hodrien" J.H.Hodrien@leeds.ac.uk wrote:
On Wed, 19 Jan 2011, Les Mikesell wrote:
CentOS would likely only be used as a desktop OS by people who also run servers and like everything to be the same. They all assemble approximately the same set of upstream packages, though, so it is possible to make them all do the same things with varying amounts of work in finding current packages that might be missing in the base distribution.
I do think CentOS gets unreasonably knocked as a desktop OS. I definitely don't use it on desktops *because* I run it on servers.
All the advantages of long release cycles apply to desktops. Despite often thinking otherwise, many users require relatively few packages to be the latest shiniest, so running a bleeding edge distro isn't really needed. Even then, a reasonably amount of software can end up being commercial, where EL5 is currently better supported than any other linux release. Where users do have requirements that diverge from the base OS, it's probably a good idea for that to be satisfied out of the main OS tree anyway, as that lets you satisfy local requirements while keeping the core identical across the board.
jh _______________________________________________ CentOS mailing list CentOS@centos.org http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos
On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 4:25 PM, Christopher R Webber christopher.webber@ucr.edu wrote:
I find that in places where I don¹t have latest and greatest hardware, CEntOS makes a much better Desktop OS than Ubuntu. If all I am doing is running a web browser for the most part, I use CEntOS.
Means in your opinion, for a stable OS, cent OS is better. I no doubt agree with the fact its really a personal choice and like me (from not IT or computers), I at first would see the ease of use (yes, probably because I have come from Windows, totally GUI). I like (as what I have found reading and comments I got) Cent OS is secured, stable and an excellent OS, but if you talk of easiness, I guess Ubuntu is above in ranking, where I only talk of ease of use and again its totally the wish of the individual one who is going with what distro. But as for a person, who is really not from IT or uses computers more frequently but want to use one Linux distro, I can say that anyone be it, Cent OS or Ubuntu or even Fedora, at least it is Linux!!
At Wed, 19 Jan 2011 15:13:41 +0000 (GMT) CentOS mailing list centos@centos.org wrote:
On Wed, 19 Jan 2011, Les Mikesell wrote:
CentOS would likely only be used as a desktop OS by people who also run servers and like everything to be the same. They all assemble approximately the same set of upstream packages, though, so it is possible to make them all do the same things with varying amounts of work in finding current packages that might be missing in the base distribution.
I do think CentOS gets unreasonably knocked as a desktop OS. I definitely don't use it on desktops *because* I run it on servers.
All the advantages of long release cycles apply to desktops. Despite often thinking otherwise, many users require relatively few packages to be the latest shiniest, so running a bleeding edge distro isn't really needed. Even then, a reasonably amount of software can end up being commercial, where EL5 is currently better supported than any other linux release. Where users do have requirements that diverge from the base OS, it's probably a good idea for that to be satisfied out of the main OS tree anyway, as that lets you satisfy local requirements while keeping the core identical across the board.
+1
The local library was originally setup with Ubuntu, but the tech geek who set it up was NOT very good at maintaining things (applying updates, doing basic admin stuff). When I took over administrating things and set up the new incarnation of 'thin clients', I installed CentOS and with proper maintaince things run much more smoothly. The 'desktop' systems are used by patrons and library staff people alike (not techy geeks!). Things are stable and reliable. The fact that stuff is not bleeding edge is not something that really has much effect for most people.
*I* use CentOS on *my* desktop AND on *my* laptop.
jh _______________________________________________ CentOS mailing list CentOS@centos.org http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos
On 1/19/2011 9:13 AM, John Hodrien wrote:
On Wed, 19 Jan 2011, Les Mikesell wrote:
CentOS would likely only be used as a desktop OS by people who also run servers and like everything to be the same. They all assemble approximately the same set of upstream packages, though, so it is possible to make them all do the same things with varying amounts of work in finding current packages that might be missing in the base distribution.
I do think CentOS gets unreasonably knocked as a desktop OS. I definitely don't use it on desktops *because* I run it on servers.
The difference is that open source server software has been 'feature complete' for ages and the standards processes that change client/server interactions are very, very slow - so outdated versions of server software is not a problem as long as bug/security fixes are made. That's not true for desktop applications and environments. If you don't have something current you are missing the improvements that many thousands of man-hours of work have made. Personally, I use Windows at work and a Mac at home as desktops and use their applications for 'typical' desktop work so I avoid the issue completely (along with the ubiquitous Nvidia driver problems and lack of media codecs) and run NX/freenx to access CentOS hosts for development and server management. This gives me a full Centos desktop with good performance when/where I want it, with the ability to disconnect and reconnect with everything running, but without being limited to old, free software versions. If I didn't have the commercial apps available, I'd almost certainly need to run some current distribution for desktop use.
On Wed, 19 Jan 2011, Les Mikesell wrote:
That's not true for desktop applications and environments. If you don't have something current you are missing the improvements that many thousands of man-hours of work have made.
But I guess that's the bit I don't /always/ buy into. In the pre-Fedora days, upgrading every 12 months made sense because seemingly everything was just plain better. Things that didn't used to work now did, or font rendering was suddenly miles ahead, or lots of significant libraries were bundled. Then at some point that stopped seeming to be true. There's a whole lot of polishing going on, but I'm not sure much of it really matters to a user of a managed desktop.
And for every bit of juiciness you think you're getting with an upgrade, you're getting the disruption of a reinstall or an upgrade, and seemingly for everything that's improved there's a bug or a quirk to match. I think the negatives of an annually changing environment seemed to outweigh the positives of an improved environment even when there weren't significant new bugs/issues.
Will I move to CentOS 6 when it gets released? Sure, and I'm sure in some years time I'll be mighty glad I did. Will I force all my users to move from CentOS 5? No way.
jh
On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 5:27 PM, John Hodrien J.H.Hodrien@leeds.ac.uk wrote:
And for every bit of juiciness you think you're getting with an upgrade, you're getting the disruption of a reinstall or an upgrade, and seemingly for everything that's improved there's a bug or a quirk to match. I think the negatives of an annually changing environment seemed to outweigh the positives of an improved environment even when there weren't significant new bugs/issues.
Even when new bugs are not there, the release go on, that I consider a little negative impact!
Les Mikesell wrote:
On 1/19/2011 9:13 AM, John Hodrien wrote:
On Wed, 19 Jan 2011, Les Mikesell wrote:
CentOS would likely only be used as a desktop OS by people who also run servers and like everything to be the same. They all assemble approximately the same set of upstream packages, though, so it is
possible to make
them all do the same things with varying amounts of work in finding
current
packages that might be missing in the base distribution.
I do think CentOS gets unreasonably knocked as a desktop OS. I definitely don't use it on desktops *because* I run it on servers.
The difference is that open source server software has been 'feature complete' for ages and the standards processes that change client/server interactions are very, very slow - so outdated versions of server software is not a problem as long as bug/security fixes are made. That's not true for desktop applications and environments. If you don't have something current you are missing the improvements that many thousands of man-hours of work have made. Personally, I use Windows at
<snip> I'll disagree here: I've seen hardly any "improvements" in any of the (admittedly not a lot) of software I run. As a definition of this, let me note that in '95, PC Mag ran a review of word processors, and noted that 90% of the users (then) used only 10% of the features, and the other 10% of users who *did* use those features only used them about 10% of the time.
The last "oh, I like this" feature I can remember was when firefox introduced tabs. On the other hand, a *lot* of "improvements" I find more and more objectionable, such as thunderbird trying *very* hard to look and act more and more like Lookout, er, Outlook, and I *LOATHE* the latest versions of Outlook.
mark
On 1/19/2011 10:43 AM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
The difference is that open source server software has been 'feature complete' for ages and the standards processes that change client/server interactions are very, very slow - so outdated versions of server software is not a problem as long as bug/security fixes are made. That's not true for desktop applications and environments. If you don't have something current you are missing the improvements that many thousands of man-hours of work have made. Personally, I use Windows at
<snip> I'll disagree here: I've seen hardly any "improvements" in any of the (admittedly not a lot) of software I run. As a definition of this, let me note that in '95, PC Mag ran a review of word processors, and noted that 90% of the users (then) used only 10% of the features, and the other 10% of users who *did* use those features only used them about 10% of the time.
You are biased by having learned to live with the restrictions of old cruft. At the very least you have to be able to exchange data files and view all common media files on a desktop. What do you do when someone gives you a docx or xlsx file?
The last "oh, I like this" feature I can remember was when firefox introduced tabs. On the other hand, a *lot* of "improvements" I find more and more objectionable, such as thunderbird trying *very* hard to look and act more and more like Lookout, er, Outlook, and I *LOATHE* the latest versions of Outlook.
Sorry, but Outlook 2003 and 2007 are huge improvements over earlier versions - and lacking tight integration between messaging and calendar/scheduling has been one of the places where free software really missed the boat.
And remember that firefox/openoffice are rare exceptions in RHEL/Centos in that they have had major-version updates since the distro release, even though they still are far behind 'current' now. The rest of the distro is much older and doesn't do much of what people do with desktops today (subscribing to podcasts, media playing, serving media to other devices, etc.).
2011/1/19 Les Mikesell lesmikesell@gmail.com
On 1/19/2011 10:43 AM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
The difference is that open source server software has been 'feature complete' for ages and the standards processes that change client/server interactions are very, very slow - so outdated versions of server software is not a problem as long as bug/security fixes are made. That's not true for desktop applications and environments. If you don't have something current you are missing the improvements that many thousands of man-hours of work have made. Personally, I use Windows at
<snip> I'll disagree here: I've seen hardly any "improvements" in any of the (admittedly not a lot) of software I run. As a definition of this, let me note that in '95, PC Mag ran a review of word processors, and noted that 90% of the users (then) used only 10% of the features, and the other 10% of users who *did* use those features only used them about 10% of the time.
You are biased by having learned to live with the restrictions of old cruft. At the very least you have to be able to exchange data files and view all common media files on a desktop. What do you do when someone gives you a docx or xlsx file?
The last "oh, I like this" feature I can remember was when firefox introduced tabs. On the other hand, a *lot* of "improvements" I find more and more objectionable, such as thunderbird trying *very* hard to look
and
act more and more like Lookout, er, Outlook, and I *LOATHE* the latest versions of Outlook.
Sorry, but Outlook 2003 and 2007 are huge improvements over earlier versions - and lacking tight integration between messaging and calendar/scheduling has been one of the places where free software really missed the boat.
And remember that firefox/openoffice are rare exceptions in RHEL/Centos in that they have had major-version updates since the distro release, even though they still are far behind 'current' now. The rest of the distro is much older and doesn't do much of what people do with desktops today (subscribing to podcasts, media playing, serving media to other devices, etc.).
so, in the end, i believe we all agree that the distro choice depends on the user needs .
Les Mikesell wrote:
On 1/19/2011 10:43 AM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
The difference is that open source server software has been 'feature complete' for ages and the standards processes that change client/server interactions are very, very slow - so outdated versions
of server
software is not a problem as long as bug/security fixes are made. That's not true for desktop applications and environments. If you don't have something current you are missing the improvements that many thousands of man-hours of work have made. Personally, I use Windows at
<snip> I'll disagree here: I've seen hardly any "improvements" in any of the (admittedly not a lot) of software I run. As a definition of this, let me note that in '95, PC Mag ran a review of word processors, and noted
that
90% of the users (then) used only 10% of the features, and the other 10% of users who *did* use those features only used them about 10% of the time.
You are biased by having learned to live with the restrictions of old
So, what I like how something works is all "old cruft", and I should get with the program, and not have opinions on what I want and how I want it to work? That *is* what you're saying to me, to which I respond with "take your opinion and shove it".
cruft. At the very least you have to be able to exchange data files and view all common media files on a desktop. What do you do when someone gives you a docx or xlsx file?
openoffice opens both. And I have no idea what "features" M$ added, or whether, as usual, it was just a change to the file format solely and exclusively to force people to buy the latest versions of their crap.
And upgrades to open them I'd file under "bugfix", after M# introduced bugs.
The last "oh, I like this" feature I can remember was when firefox introduced tabs. On the other hand, a *lot* of "improvements" I find more and more objectionable, such as thunderbird trying *very* hard to
look
and act more and more like Lookout, er, Outlook, and I *LOATHE* the latest versions of Outlook.
Sorry, but Outlook 2003 and 2007 are huge improvements over earlier versions - and lacking tight integration between messaging and calendar/scheduling has been one of the places where free software really missed the boat.
No, they are *NOT* "huge improvements", they are absolute *shit*, that make any of the minor things I occasionally want/need to do *far* harder. And I thought I hated 2003, but 2007 I despise with a passion.
And remember that firefox/openoffice are rare exceptions in RHEL/Centos in that they have had major-version updates since the distro release, even though they still are far behind 'current' now. The rest of the distro is much older and doesn't do much of what people do with desktops today (subscribing to podcasts, media playing, serving media to other devices, etc.).
Huh? I have no problem with streaming media, or playing pretty much any media that I care to. What media is difficult to serve?
Sorry, but in *my* opinion, you've swallowed the Kool-Aid to the dregs.
mark
On 1/19/2011 12:03 PM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
You are biased by having learned to live with the restrictions of old
So, what I like how something works is all "old cruft", and I should get with the program, and not have opinions on what I want and how I want it to work?
That's not the point. You've had years to learn how to make a computer work like a slightly smarter typewriter, and for a long time that was about all they could do and everyone was happy with it. But that's not what someone starting today should expect.
That *is* what you're saying to me, to which I respond with "take your opinion and shove it".
OK, now it's my turn to misinterpret your position: you are saying that all of the work that the upstream developers are doing has no value and the field of computer science was complete when CentOS 5 was released (or was it awk...). And I disagree.
Sorry, but Outlook 2003 and 2007 are huge improvements over earlier versions - and lacking tight integration between messaging and calendar/scheduling has been one of the places where free software really missed the boat.
No, they are *NOT* "huge improvements", they are absolute *shit*, that make any of the minor things I occasionally want/need to do *far* harder. And I thought I hated 2003, but 2007 I despise with a passion.
My company is fairly distributed and lives on conference calls - and I absolutely need the calendar integration/reminders to track the scheduling. As far as the email component goes, I usually have a thunderbird imap view of the same messages - and have used evolution without any real difference in capabilities except in what happens when I open (e.g) a visio file on a non-windows platform. I can't think of anything you'd want a mailer to do that would be 'hard' in any of those environments.
And remember that firefox/openoffice are rare exceptions in RHEL/Centos in that they have had major-version updates since the distro release, even though they still are far behind 'current' now. The rest of the distro is much older and doesn't do much of what people do with desktops today (subscribing to podcasts, media playing, serving media to other devices, etc.).
Huh? I have no problem with streaming media, or playing pretty much any media that I care to. What media is difficult to serve?
What apps are you using for (say) podcast subscription management, playing audio/video files, or serving them to upnp/DLNA devices? If you are using 3rd party sources you are making my point about CentOS not making a great desktop, and if you enable more than one 3rd party yum repository you are setting the system up for future conflicts.
Sorry, but in *my* opinion, you've swallowed the Kool-Aid to the dregs.
That good software is still being developed and updates are worthwhile??? Yes, I believe that.
Les Mikesell wrote:
On 1/19/2011 12:03 PM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
You are biased by having learned to live with the restrictions of old
So, what I like how something works is all "old cruft", and I should get with the program, and not have opinions on what I want and how I want it to work?
That's not the point. You've had years to learn how to make a computer work like a slightly smarter typewriter, and for a long time that was about all they could do and everyone was happy with it. But that's not what someone starting today should expect.
How much more do you do with it? I've pasted pictures and spreadsheets into it; what else do you do? Certainly, bulleting isn't as bulletproof as it was in my (legal) copy of WordPerfect 6.0.c for DOS, that I keep thinking of running under wine.
That *is* what you're saying to me, to which I respond with "take your opinion and shove it".
OK, now it's my turn to misinterpret your position: you are saying that all of the work that the upstream developers are doing has no value and the field of computer science was complete when CentOS 5 was released (or was it awk...). And I disagree.
That's absurd. What I'm saying is that much of what's added is nothing more than eye candy, and features that almost no one actually uses. And just *what* do you have against awk?! <g> (says the guy who learned it and wrote 100-200 line scripts, lo, these many years ago).
I also think that to some extent, CS has gotten onto a wrong tack (and my article on the failure of OO in general, and java in particular, will be written as soon as my life in the RW slows down some).
Sorry, but Outlook 2003 and 2007 are huge improvements over earlier versions - and lacking tight integration between messaging and calendar/scheduling has been one of the places where free software really missed the boat.
No, they are *NOT* "huge improvements", they are absolute *shit*, that make any of the minor things I occasionally want/need to do *far* harder. And I thought I hated 2003, but 2007 I despise with a passion.
My company is fairly distributed and lives on conference calls - and I absolutely need the calendar integration/reminders to track the scheduling. As far as the email component goes, I usually have a thunderbird imap view of the same messages - and have used evolution without any real difference in capabilities except in what happens when I open (e.g) a visio file on a non-windows platform. I can't think of anything you'd want a mailer to do that would be 'hard' in any of those environments.
Setting up encryption, certificates, digital sigs, how my email is displayed....
And remember that firefox/openoffice are rare exceptions in RHEL/Centos in that they have had major-version updates since the distro release, even though they still are far behind 'current' now. The rest of the distro is much older and doesn't do much of what people do with desktops today (subscribing to podcasts, media playing, serving media to other devices, etc.).
Huh? I have no problem with streaming media, or playing pretty much any media that I care to. What media is difficult to serve?
What apps are you using for (say) podcast subscription management,
Don't do podcasts.
playing audio/video files, or serving them to upnp/DLNA devices? If you
Playing them? Realplayer or mplayer, mostly. Ubuntu wants to use some media player, and I haven't gotten around to doing a ps to find out what it is. Haven't been asked to serve video/audio.
are using 3rd party sources you are making my point about CentOS not making a great desktop, and if you enable more than one 3rd party yum repository you are setting the system up for future conflicts.
What 3rd party software? So far, everything's in the distro.
Sorry, but in *my* opinion, you've swallowed the Kool-Aid to the dregs.
That good software is still being developed and updates are worthwhile??? Yes, I believe that.
Yes, I agree that some updates are worthwhile, and good software is still being developed - don't try to suggest I was saying *nothing* new is good; all I was saying is that the majority of New! Features! aren't worth it.
mark
On 1/19/2011 1:51 PM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
That's not the point. You've had years to learn how to make a computer work like a slightly smarter typewriter, and for a long time that was about all they could do and everyone was happy with it. But that's not what someone starting today should expect.
How much more do you do with it? I've pasted pictures and spreadsheets into it; what else do you do? Certainly, bulleting isn't as bulletproof as it was in my (legal) copy of WordPerfect 6.0.c for DOS, that I keep thinking of running under wine.
At work, more and more I am building reports with the Pentaho report writer to be viewed through their web service (which can generate html, pdf, xls, etc.) or auto-emailed. I'm not particularly fond of it, but it does what they call pixel-perfect layouts and at least as of the last (3.7) release, has a wizard that does most of the grunge work of the sizing and positioning of elements.
At home, the Mac automatically downloads podcasts which automatically update an ipod when I plug it in to recharge - and I listen to them in the car during my commute. I can also rip dvds there, and can play these, or music, or view photos over the network on tv's in other rooms through the media player in a blu-ray player and the kid's PS3.
OK, now it's my turn to misinterpret your position: you are saying that all of the work that the upstream developers are doing has no value and the field of computer science was complete when CentOS 5 was released (or was it awk...). And I disagree.
That's absurd. What I'm saying is that much of what's added is nothing more than eye candy, and features that almost no one actually uses. And just *what* do you have against awk?!<g> (says the guy who learned it and wrote 100-200 line scripts, lo, these many years ago).
The point is that better things have come along that don't have the same restrictions (and for the same price). It's one thing to keep using something that works yourself, but something else to recommend that someone else start out with the less capable version.
I also think that to some extent, CS has gotten onto a wrong tack (and my article on the failure of OO in general, and java in particular, will be written as soon as my life in the RW slows down some).
Ummm, I don't claim to be a java programmer, but more and more of the things I use all the time are written in java: OpenNMS, Hudson, the Pentaho tools, the web servers I support, and it's pretty hard to find fault with them, especially in a very cross-platform environment. And google's Dalek variation for android seems to be taking over the world.
My company is fairly distributed and lives on conference calls - and I absolutely need the calendar integration/reminders to track the scheduling. As far as the email component goes, I usually have a thunderbird imap view of the same messages - and have used evolution without any real difference in capabilities except in what happens when I open (e.g) a visio file on a non-windows platform. I can't think of anything you'd want a mailer to do that would be 'hard' in any of those environments.
Setting up encryption, certificates, digital sigs, how my email is displayed....
I haven't set up a certificate but I thought it was a fill-in-the form sort of setup. And you can change the display arrangement.
Huh? I have no problem with streaming media, or playing pretty much any media that I care to. What media is difficult to serve?
What apps are you using for (say) podcast subscription management,
Don't do podcasts.
I recommend it if there is ever an occasion where you'd listen to talk radio but can't match the scheduling. There are some for every interest, updated regularly, and software that will grab the new items in subscribed feeds.
playing audio/video files, or serving them to upnp/DLNA devices? If you
Playing them? Realplayer or mplayer, mostly. Ubuntu wants to use some media player, and I haven't gotten around to doing a ps to find out what it is. Haven't been asked to serve video/audio.
are using 3rd party sources you are making my point about CentOS not making a great desktop, and if you enable more than one 3rd party yum repository you are setting the system up for future conflicts.
What 3rd party software? So far, everything's in the distro.
Last time I tried, mp3 support wasn't even there. You must have added 3rd party repositories which are not at all coordinated for RHEL/Centos additions. Ubuntu seems much better about keeping the state of the extra repositories in sync with each other and including the repository info in the distribution even for the ones that are disabled by default.
That good software is still being developed and updates are worthwhile??? Yes, I believe that.
Yes, I agree that some updates are worthwhile, and good software is still being developed - don't try to suggest I was saying *nothing* new is good; all I was saying is that the majority of New! Features! aren't worth it.
And I'm saying that someone who hadn't already learned to live with the old limitations is very likely to have a different opinion about the value of new vs. old features.
On Wednesday, January 19, 2011 12:55:19 pm Les Mikesell wrote:
And remember that firefox/openoffice are rare exceptions in RHEL/Centos in that they have had major-version updates since the distro release, even though they still are far behind 'current' now.
How is Firefox 3.6.13 not current (that's what's on my CentOS 5 boxen, straight from the updates)? OOo isn't too terribly old, at 3.1.1 instead of the 3.3 on my F14 box.
Yes, these are pretty rare exceptions, but even the other packages will get backports of security fixes where that is possible. FF and OOo are two of the most visible cases where it just wasn't possible.
On Wed, 19 Jan 2011, Les Mikesell wrote:
Sorry, but Outlook 2003 and 2007 are huge improvements over earlier versions - and lacking tight integration between messaging and calendar/scheduling has been one of the places where free software really missed the boat.
But then that's partly Microsoft's doing. Integrated calendaring/email used to mean Exchange, which has a deliberately broken IMAP server, and a deliberately broken web interface, making interfacing with Exchange from non-MS clients a pain. Evolution tried to cover those bases and was partly successful, but I don't think there's been anything Free that's really done enough to replace Exchange. Google Mail can offer a mighty good alternative to Exchange in many ways.
And remember that firefox/openoffice are rare exceptions in RHEL/Centos in that they have had major-version updates since the distro release, even though they still are far behind 'current' now. The rest of the distro is much older and doesn't do much of what people do with desktops today (subscribing to podcasts, media playing, serving media to other devices, etc.).
I think there's an element of mixing what I mean by desktop and what you mean by desktop. A work desktop is a very different beast from a home desktop, and I don't see the same number of failings for a work desktop. Even as a home desktop I think it's not as clear as you make out. Adding a few apps for the sort of tasks you describe from repos like rpmforge/epel often gets you to where you need to be with the minimum of fuss.
And with your two examples, firefox isn't far behind current, and so what if they are? OpenOffice produce RPMS that install just nicely on CentOS 5, and provide the latest version. So why be too bothered about whether it sits on the OS DVD? Media playing and podcasts? Is that supposed to be hard? I install amarok and am perfectly merry. Yes it's not the shiniest version, but so what? mplayer plays everything I need.
Things like Fedora lay the ground so that what I want to do in a couple of years on CentOS, I can do in a couple of years on CentOS... That doesn't overly affect me today. Cutting edge is lovely, and I'll happily install Fedora on my home laptop, but I'm having fun, not being productive.
jh
On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 11:13 AM, Les Mikesell lesmikesell@gmail.com wrote:
On 1/19/2011 9:13 AM, John Hodrien wrote:
I do think CentOS gets unreasonably knocked as a desktop OS. I definitely don't use it on desktops *because* I run it on servers.
The difference is that open source server software has been 'feature complete' for ages and the standards processes that change client/server interactions are very, very slow - so outdated versions of server software is not a problem as long as bug/security fixes are made.
Oh, my. Les, I'm going to beg to differ. Bind for DNSsec changes, Subversion for lots of performance and some security updates, OpenSSH for GSSAPI support, Perl for module dependencies for Bugzilla and Musicbrainz, and Emacs for git-emacs macro compatibility, all have lagged well behind in CentOS/RHEL 5 for years. Bug/security fixes do not address these, because they are typically for non-supported features.
Iv'e had to deal with backporting or upgrading all of these, on servers, and it gets pretty painful if you want recent versions of these components.
Maybe ask what sort of cellphones your family use. If they use and are happy with old b&w text ones (like me), then by all means pursue the Linux quest. But if they are up-to-the-minute snappy ones, or if they hang out for the latest, you are probably buying into headaches. Remember, Linux is always playing catch-up on toys produced for commercial OSes. Sean
Parshwa Murdia wrote:
But at least work could be done in Fedora too like without going into the technical details at least multimedia could be used, secured bank transactions could be done, prints can be taken and all this I guess without going into the core details we could do but only the knowledge of installation (GUI only) is required.
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Bowie Bailey -
Christopher R Webber -
cornel panceac -
Hakan Koseoglu -
John Hodrien -
Lamar Owen -
Les Mikesell -
m.roth＠5-cent.us -
Nico Kadel-Garcia -
Parshwa Murdia -
Robert Heller -
Sean