On Saturday 07 April 2001 07:18, Alexander Skwar wrote:
| So sprach Vadim Plessky am Fri, Apr 06, 2001 at 06:11:30PM +0000:
| > Cooker / SRPM availability?+
|
| Uhm, although *I* find that quite useful and nice - how can I turn this
| into an argument?
|
| Thanks,
| Alexander Skwar
Well, what I know from SuSE users (and SuSE Linux funs):
-- they are very happy with YaST install
-- they like configurability, number of options, etc. in SuSE
-- latest version, 7.1, available on DVD, so you don't have to swap 6 CDs in
order to find some RPM. Also, install process works very smoothly from one
DVD disk.
what they do not like:
-- latest version of SuSE Linux is not available for *free* download during
about 1 - 1.5 months after release.
This means, for example - if SuSE 7.1 released Feb.16th, most likely you
can't download it from ftp (binaries) till March 16th or even later.
-- *I* could not find SRPMs even for released long time ago versions (6.4,
6.3) Thanks Arnd Bergmann for the link - but it's rather difficult to find
such link yourslef. Haven't tested this link, though.
// disclosure: I could not compile SCWM (window manager) from latest tar.gz
available on scwm.sourceforge.net. I found that SuSE includes this WM in
their distribution, and was looking for SRPM from it. And, I could not find
it... Finally, one SuSE user has sent SRPM to me by mail. That SRPM was
patched in sopme way, comparing to original tar.gz, and compiled OK for me.
-- IMHO it is much more easy to download SRPM from Cooker or latest stable
version of LM. *openability* is great argument, IMHO.
Now let me propose some *manager-compatible* arguments:
-- One great things in Open Source is possibility to fix bugs fast.
Frankly speaking, I don't understand *how* SuSE fixes its bugs.
They have a lot of packages (3CD's of binaries), and even with 100 people
doing testing it's rather hard to catch all bugs. (if not all - than just
*many*)
When you select Mandrake - you have better *bug fix rate*
-- if there is no place like Cooker - how you can report bug you found in
Release, and how long it will take to fix?
There is no warranty that bug reported to Cooker will be fixed, but there are
good chances it *can* be fixed...
-- Mandrake decided to wait several *Kernel cycles*.
And that's very good IMHO.
Mandrake haven't released 2.4.0 or 2.4.1 kernels, because (I guess, correct
me Chmouel if I am wrong) they were just too buggy for mainstream.
AFAIK SuSE 7.1 was released with very early (like 2.4.1-1) 2.4. kernel.
It's ok for experiments/testing, but not for production systems.
-- Mandrake has the best KDE packaging
(yes I know that you prefer Gnome to KDE, but for some people, incl. manager,
it can be good argument)
If you look at different KDE lists (-general, -user) - a lot of people
complain on missing RPM packages for RH 7.0, many people have problems with
upgrading to KDE 2.1/2.1.1 on SuSE and Caldera, but for Mandrake process is
(almost) seamless.
But, in any case, it looks like SuSE is second best (after Mandrake) for KDE
users.
Well, answering your initial request for SAMBA usage - I guess any Linux
distro (or LinuxFromScratch) will be ok.
--
Vadim Plessky
http://kde2.newmail.ru (English)
http://kde2.newmail.ru/index_rus.html (Russian)
Do you have Arial font installed? Just test it!
http://kde2.newmail.ru/font_test_arial.html
