LinuxSA Mailing list archives

  From: Richard Russell <richard@yellowgoanna.com>
  To  : <branko@senet.com.au>
  Date: Mon, 13 May 2002 04:31:29 +0930

RE: Debian 3.0

Thanks....

sounds good, but I'll probably try the karun option -- want to get RH
7.3 and a couple of others as well...

Hmm... looking forward to trying it, by the sounds of your review... :)

rr

-- 
Richard Russell
Yellow Goanna Pty Ltd
e: richard@yellowgoanna.com
m: +61 412 827 805
f: +61 8 8462 2362
 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Branko Bratkovic [mailto:branko@senet.com.au] 
> Sent: Friday, 10 May 2002 9:21 PM
> To: Richard Russell; linuxsa@linuxsa.org.au
> Subject: Re: Debian 3.0
> 
> 
> On Fri, 10 May 2002 16:27, Richard Russell wrote:
> > gidday,
> > OK, it's so close to release that it's funny... Anyone have 
> CDs of the 
> > current images? I'm ready to try it, even if it's not quite 
> released 
> > yet...
> 
> Richard,
> 
> I've got the April02 snapshot of Woody.  It comes on 8 CDs 
> (yes eight!) but 
> comparing this set with the 3 that came with Debian 2.2, this set has 
> contrib, non-free and non-US so that would explain the 
> apparent bloat factor.
> 
> I had been looking at the bug graph on the Debian WWW site and had 
> extrapolated the slope to intersect with zero sometime 
> between April and 
> mid-year.  Then one day it jumped from 59 to 65 which threw 
> my assumptions 
> out the window.  Got sick of waiting and ordered the current 
> snapshot from 
> LSL (about $50).
> 
> In case you're thinking about borrowing my CDs, I'm way up 
> north (just beyond 
> Elizabeth).
> 
> Well now that I've admitted to a recent install of Woody, I 
> suppose you want 
> to know what I think of it....
> 
> _Highlights_
> Ooooh I just luv KDE!  Normally I wouldn't be impressed by 
> eye candy, but KDE 
> can be user-configured in so many ways that one must be able 
> to find a 
> pleasing front end.  I've only had time to get to know the 
> mail and news 
> readers and the amount of settings available are a pleasure 
> for someone 
> accustomed to otherwise fiddling with control files.  A quick 
> look at the KDE 
> Office suite reveals all the features associated with that 
> other Office 
> package that I'm forced to use at work (I work for the 
> Government, LOL ;-)
> 
> Xfree86 version 4 is great for three reasons.  1. It finally 
> enabled me to 
> take advantage of my S3 video card (Trio3D chipset). 2. It 
> hasn't locked up 
> and forced me to reboot like the v3 Xfree would do.  3. My 
> wheel mouse works 
> perfectly under v4 whereas it wouldn't do the repeat thing 
> with gpm under v3. 
> As a consequence of "1." my monitor is now running at 
> 1024x768@85Hz (slightly 
> overclocked), so I can have lotsa detail but without eye 
> strain. I'm not sure 
> which fonts are anti-aliased but they all seem nicer than v3.
> 
> Having contrib and non-free on the CD set is a big plus 
> because I don't have 
> to PPP in order to collect bits and pieces like MySQL.  (this 
> may be good 
> reason to get the latest snapshot from LSL rather than wait 
> for the release 
> which MAY strictly follow the GNU policy like 2.2 did).
> 
> Nice new LILO front end.  Uses the cursor keys to select 
> which disk to boot!
> 
> Many packages respect the command "dpkg-reconfigure 
> package_name" which 
> enables the sysadmin to reconfigure instantly rather than 
> poke around looking 
> for the right script to call.
> 
> _Lowlights_
> The install is still not ready to put into the hands of 
> newbies.  It has a 
> new feature called "Task Select" which enables the operator 
> to grab a bunch 
> of packages based on options like "games machine", "web server", 
> "development" etc.  This is great.  But it has a very nasty 
> interface: I 
> accidently hit return when the cursor had jumped from the 
> selection region to 
> the finish field and ended up installing just a few trivial 
> packages, not 
> once but twice!  I was able to restart it and get back on 
> track, but as I 
> said, this is not for newbies.
> 
> When LILO was run from the install sequence, it failed to 
> understand that my 
> Linux was on hdb and that I wanted to boot from hda.  Fixed 
> manually.  I may 
> submit a bug report about this and delay 3.0 even further.
> 
> There are at least 3 ways to configure XFree86 but only one 
> actually worked 
> (dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xfree86).
> 
> wvdial failed to live up to its promise of a quick 
> configuration (the install 
> actually recommends it). I ended going back to my chatscript.  
> 
> After following the install instructions, some very important 
> loose ends 
> remain to be tied up.  For instance: my CD burner is not 
> ready because I 
> still need to activate the SCSI emulation, my SB Live sound 
> card is still 
> quite silent for want of activating the ALSA drivers, XFree needed 
> persistence to get working, my HP DeskJet 930c still doesn't 
> have its driver 
> (other than plain text) and a kernel compile will be 
> necessary to get APM 
> working (one of my reasons for the upgrade - still haven't 
> got that power off 
> problem sorted)
> 
> _Rant_
> One of Debian's big selling points is stability.  That is 
> only right if one 
> is prepared to live in the past.  If you get seduced by this 
> eye candy thing, 
> KDE, then you have to go to the unstable release.  If you are 
> a real sucker, 
> install Sid and live on the bleeding edge; but then Debian is 
> no better wrt 
> stability than most other distros.
> 
> LOL, I've just run the Kmail spell checker for the first time 
> and it didn't 
> recognise the word Debian!
> 
> Regards,
> -- 
> Branko at SEnet.com.au
> 
> 

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