On 09/16/2010 10:22 AM, Peter Alcibiades wrote:
I have finally fired up Rev Media 4.0 on two minimalist Linux distributions
as a start on the effort to discover whether the problems are really due to
not having all the necessary files installed, and whether they are due to
the mulifarious nature of Linux.
I began with Slitaz and Tiny Core, the latter of which gives new meaning to
the expression 'minimalist'. It is gui userland Linux system in 11 Mb. If
we still had floppies, it would just about be deliverable on a handful. It
uses almost none of the standard components. All applications have to be
installed from repository. Both of these distros run in memory, so they
are super fast.
If you do this at home with Tiny Core, you should probably go with 3.1,
just out. I used 3.0. It has 2.6 kernel, BusyBox, Tiny X, FLTK graphical
user interface and flwm window manager. Without getting too far into the
recherche details, this is not your standard distro. This is as minimalist
as X windows can get. Get it here:
tinycore_3.1.iso
The other distribution is Slitaz, less minimalist, this has a whole 30 Mb
and runs OpenBox, so a standard GUI, though not one most folks here may be
familiar with. It comes with XOrg and LXDE bits and pieces. Midori as web
browser, leafpad editor. It is a usable desktop out of the box, unlike
Tiny Core. Get it here:
slitaz-3.0.iso
I did not use these in VMs, but on a spare bare metal machine we now have
available. There is not going to be any difference if you run from CD in
live mode, or if you install on hard drive, since in either case they both
load directly to memory. I don't use VMs for this stuff in the interests
of eliminating as many variables as possible.
I made no modification whatever to Slitaz, but on Tiny Core, using the
terminal, was unable to cd to the USB drive on which I had placed Media. I
therefore installed PCManFM from the repository, which brought down a
modest bunch of dependencies, including Gtk2, all of which went by in a
flash. I didn't make a note of the others but can find out what they were
if anyone is interested.
It would be nice to know what people think should be tested for to make
this rigorous. What I did was two things. First, some minimal exercise of
the IDE. Created a new mainstack, dragged objects onto it, resized them.
This worked fine. The font (yes, singular is intended) could be resized
fine. The dictionary displayed and worked fine. You can alternate between
IDE and browse mode. Buttons work. Second thing was, when I had a stack,
I then moved it to another virtual desktop, popped over to the virtual
desktop and clicked it. It instantly went back to the first one, where
Media was open. So virtual desktops do not work here.
I was unable to reproduce that; started RunRev Enterprise 4.5 on Desktop 1;
opened a new Mainstack and moved it to Desktop 2 (have 4 Virtual
Desktops here);
clicked on the stack, and it stayed put on Desktop 2.
Ubuntu 10.10 Beta.
It does not look like the problems could be missing dependencies.
In an ideal world ( Ha, ha! ) RunRev for Linux would come, from RunRev,
bundled with
the necessary dependencies; or from a RunRev repository via aptitude or
somesuch
with its dependencies so all the "cooking" would be done with a minimum
of fuss and
user-intervention.
Rev
seems to work exactly the same if its in one of these totally minimalist
environments, including with Tiny Core which has out of the box almost
nothing the big ones have except what you absolutely have to have to run
the kernel and a command line, or if it is full fledged and bloated like
Gnome or KDE.
The environment I have found where Rev doesn't work at all is Ion2 window
manager. This is actually a very nice working environment, its becoming my
favorite.
I really wonder if it is reasonable to expect RunRev to ensure their
product can function
on every single Window manager out there?
Its a tiling and tabbing WM. You have tiles open, and your apps
take up the entire tile, in a tab. The tiles sit side by side on the
desktop. It handles pop-up windows in an unusual way, they all appear at
the bottom of the tile you are in. Rev does not like this, and it crashes.
When you get used to Ion and know the keyboard shortcuts, its simply
superb, fast, intuitive and very easy. You start apps from the keyboard
with auto fill to help. Everything else seems to work with Ion, so this
may be an indication that Rev is not standards compliant on the desktop
issue.
So, tell me what else people want to see exercised, and I will do it, this
is just a start. And next week I will hopefully have time to do a full
scale slackware install and bash around with that. I am not all that
lively lately, and the latest is, have a proper phone system to install....
in addition to a server. But we will get to it, we really will.
Peter
_______________________________________________
Well; as a teacher trainer told me in the States; "Make sure you find
something to
be nice about before you start criticising them" . . . :)
1. I do admire your attempt to reduce things down "to the bone";
although "bones"
can still differ (personally I rather like Damn Small Linux - which
seems quiescent just now).
2. HOWEVER; if you are testing RunRev on Linux for product deployment
(rather than
development) I would question how many end-users are running
barebones systems on their PCs.
2.1 I would ask the same question about Window managers/desktops, as
most end-users will be
using GNOME, KDE or XFCE, and a few people will be using
Enlightenment because they favour
eye-candy over usability.
3. I don't know if you have access to 4.5 dp-4 (I do); it has, from a
cursory glance at least, put a lot
of things right.
I suspect my point above are what they are because Thee and Me have
rather different outlooks
on the whole thing:
Yours is as a "computer-programmer centred" person, and mine as an
"end-user centred" person.
I am sure that both outlooks have to be taken into consideration.
Sorry; phone just rang - probably will write more on this later.
Love, Richmond.
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