Hello,
I decided to try out one of the free software only distros listed at FSF, so
I navigated over here and chose to give Trisquel Mini a test drive. To be
honest, and ashamedly, I was not sure what to expect. While I have been
weeding out non-free software for awhile now, I was still holding on to some
codecs and the occasional application. Actually, I am multi-booting Trisquel
with four other Linux distros, one being Debian 6 Squeeze (stable). As I
understand, Debian has removed all non-free blobs from their kernel, and I
only use the base repositories. So, my Debian partition may be free, I’m
not sure.
I installed Trisquel Mini on an Asus Essentio CM1730 Desktop:
AMD Anthlon II X2, 4 GB ram, 1 TB hard drive, AMD Radeon HD 3000, HANNspree
24“ monitor
The installation went quick and easy. Everything was setup automatically and
I was at the LXDE desktop (Openbox) in just minutes. There was no problems
with the installation at all. Well, I can’t speak on the partitioner as
used GParted to set up the partition before installing. The software
selection was quite sparse of course, but appropriate. I do like to have a
non bloated install and add what I want, so this is good.
Now, after using Trisquel Mini for a couple of days I have some things to
mention that I experienced. First, and this is a personal problem, the
default font size was really small. I believe it was size 8 and my waining
and bespectacled eyes could barely read the menu or window texts. A 24“
screen at 1920x1080 didn’t help either. Anyway, I fixed that as quick as my
eyes would allow.
Next, I have been unable to get the desktop wallpaper setting to stay, it
keeps resetting to the default. Every time I shutdown or logout I have to
change the wallpaper back again. I have used LXDE with Openbox on other
distros and have never had that problem. I have checked and tried different
settings to no affect, I don’t know how to correct this.
Lastly, the default install only included the Midori browser, which is fine
as I like it. But, I wanted a more established browser for sites that Midori
just doesn’t work with. I was not familiar with the Abrowser, so I chose to
download GNU IceCat. However, what I got was both GNU IceCat “and”
Abrowser, even though I only selected GNU IceCat. Is that normal? Now I have
three web browsers, two of them being essentially the same. Not a big deal,
but I was confused after adding a couple extensions to IceCat, and later they
seem to have disappeared along with my bookmarks before I realized I was in a
different web browser...Abrowser. I suppose I should have been paying more
attention, hmmm.
All in all, I have to say I am mightily impressed with Trisquel. I may have
to switch to Trisquel as my main distribution, as I have not had a better
experience with any other I have used. And I have used many.
Thank you for this wonderful distribution, you have done well. I will spread
the word.
