Thank you for the e-mail, Guillaume.
> You really think that we don't listen to people on Cooker? This is
> disappointing.
Saying that Mandrake developers not listening might be true, since my
impression is that the developers here hear/read the e-mail, but they
won't give a thought.
> (1) We assume that when you want a server installed, that most probably
> means that you want it activated because you will use it ;
Not necessarily. The assumption was not 100% valid because the logic is:
when I install something it doesn't mean that I want it to run right
away. For example:
(a) I install apache server, but I only use it for testing before I
upload it to a Cobalt Linux server - the place where I put my website
cyest.org in a shared webhosting in a company not owned by me.
(b) I install Zope, because I want to learn it, and may occasionaly turn
it on. It turns out that Zope has already had more than 6 security
problems since Mandrake 7.2 came, and that really makes me think twice
about it.
(c) When I install NFS and Samba servers, I don't want to run it right
away because I want to _configure_ it first rather than it runs with an
empty share.
(d) FTP servers are either insecure (wu-ftpd) or not configured properly
(proftpd). At least this is the case with proftpd. With proftpd, I can
still browse to other directories to instead being limited to
/home/piranha as my root directory. This still needs to be configured
properly.
(e) Remember the review from Activewin.com saying Linux Mandrake is a
resource hog because of this.
(f) Not everybody needs X-Window to open port 6000. Suggestion: at least
put a comment in /etc/inittab, /etc/X11/gdm/gdm.conf, and others that
X-Window can be run without port 6000. Also not everybody needs X Font
server because you can just put the fontpath in /etc/X11/XF86config.
This is an overkill for a desktop workstation. Why do I need to run an X
font server? I only have one computer here. About the X-Window, you
might want to add a comment line in the /etc/inittab and
/etc/X11/gdm/gdm.conf. Just a comment, doesn't need to be enabled by
default.
[servers]
#0=/usr/bin/X11/X -nolisten tcp
(g) A server should never be run by default either by a newbie or an
expert. Please tell me which server in Windows NT or 2K that runs by
default. Yet it is still user friendly. If somebody is a Linux expert,
at least he can know how to run a server. At least you put a notice
right after the install: "To configure your server please click DrakConf
and select the 'Startup Services' button"
You might be annoyed if I say this one: the icon design still needs big
improvement. This is a small thing, but small things become a huge stack
that burdens some people. If you want to know,
The installer also needs improvement. It crashes a lot. See the
frustrated people in newsgroup alt.os.linux.mandrake. People there need
help too, and some of them are getting frustrated because the installer
crashes. I hope the next 8.0 won't crash at all. Using perl for install
is already a bad choice, in my humblest opinion (this part is only my
opinion from my experience). At least we can work together to make a
very stable installed that doesn't crash at all. Or, if you have an
errata about the installer, at least make a new boot disk image and give
an errata announcement so that people won't be frustrated. In my own 7.2
install experience, it crashes because I left the installation for more
than 30 minutes when it prompts for the 2nd CD, and when I insert the
2nd CD it just crashes because the hard disk was in the sleep mode and
trying to wake up but the installer is kinda late.
Rather than releasing a new version often, which I don't mind by the
way, why not stabilize it first?
About the _usability_, can we have the menu names like "Gpa" to GNU
Privacy Assistant, "Gmc" to "GNOME Midnight Commander", X-CD-Roast to "X
CD Roast for CD Burning", "RXVT" to "RXVT Terminal", "Dia" to "Diagram
Editor", "Xmms" to "XMMS Multimedia Player", etc etc etc - to a more
human understandable language? Remember that 90% of users are bloody
stupid, and most of them are just poor Windows convert trying to
understand Linux. ***That's why Microsoft still wins in the desktop
arena, because Microsoft makes the 90% feels good/smart/easy even though
they're stupid.*** This is if you listen to my suggestion, since I've
had many comments from people who have tried installing Linux - the
naming is bloody confusing. I understand that it's quite a lot of work
renaming it one by one, at least it works though. I hope I have the
access to the CVS to modify the naming so that it's more user friendly,
too bad I don't have a write access. Giving a .gz diff will get me
flamed for sending an attachment in the mailing list too. So, I'm going
to just work on my program Mandrake Update Robot rather than getting
flamed.
Also, what about adding some usable text tools to the menu - e.g: mc to
"Midnight Commander"?
> > that I have turned off again. It is super annoying. Ask everybody. Once
> Yeah this is a bug.
Will it be fixed for 7.2 or you'd rather people to just upgrade to 8.0?
Thanks,
Prana
--
Prana <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
http://www.cyest.org
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