Holy crap! Have you been reading comp.os.linux.misc, lately? Judging
by the subjects, Linux is lousy with really suck distros. Topping the
list seems to be Ubuntu, the darling of Linux newbies and
proselytizers alike. Seems it lacks such basic essentials as gcc,
make, diff, etc, the ability to log in as root, and my favorite, a
utility needed to connect laptops to the net. Guess how you get said
utility. Red Hat is breathing down Fedora's neck to include
ad/spy-ware and other nefarious schemes to bring its share of
sheckels. Naturally, Redhat is still the bullseye on the Linux hate
target with Gnome being the 9 ring. Even debian takes a hit now and
then. The only distro I see absolutely zero negative feedback on is
Slackware. One could argue this is because Slack has such a small
following. I don't believe this to be the case and prefer to think
it's because Slack is so good there's little to bitch about.

nb

On Tue, 17 Oct 2006 13:08:12 -0500, notbob wrote:

snip...
> The only distro I see absolutely zero negative feedback on is
> Slackware. One could argue this is because Slack has such a small
> following. I don't believe this to be the case and prefer to think
> it's because Slack is so good there's little to bitch about.
>
> nb

Well, I don't know about the small following. It's very hard, and not at
all scientific, to glean anything from anonymous postings on newsgroups;
Pro or Con.

I think Slackware has a very loyal and steady following, with people
staying with it instead of flipping from distro to distro. IMO people who
use Slack actually work in Linux. Others are still playing.

--
Peter

notbob a écrit :
> Holy crap! Have you been reading comp.os.linux.misc, lately? Judging
> by the subjects, Linux is lousy with really suck distros. Topping the
> list seems to be Ubuntu, the darling of Linux newbies and
> proselytizers alike. Seems it lacks such basic essentials as gcc,
> make, diff, etc, the ability to log in as root, and my favorite, a
> utility needed to connect laptops to the net.

Hi notbob,

Just happen to read your message on a laptop running Xubuntu 6.06 ( =
Ubuntu with XFCE desktop). Let's get things straight:

[kikinovak@fujitsu:~] $ which gcc
/usr/bin/gcc
[kikinovak@fujitsu:~] $ which make
/usr/bin/make
[kikinovak@fujitsu:~] $ which diff
/usr/bin/diff
[kikinovak@fujitsu:~] $ su -
Password:
[root@fujitsu:~] # whoami
root
[root@fujitsu:~] #

Earlier versions of Ubuntu (and derivatives) were indeed nothing short
of catastrophic. But recently there has been some serious improvement
going. Well, there are still some edges to sand down, and yeah, a few
things I truly dislike - like the horrible things they did to CUPS. But
all in all, it makes life easy for me, because I have to handle mass
installs (and configs) in my daily job.

But then, that doesn't prevent me from currently enjoying Slackware 11.0
(kernel compilation currently chugging away on other screen).

Cheers,

Niki

PS: my postulate may sound heretic, but very often a shitty distro can
run quite nice if configured correctly. On the other hand, some of them
are hopeless, and you may be right.

On 2006-10-17, Niki Kovacs <mickey@mouse.com> wrote:

> Just happen to read your message on a laptop running Xubuntu 6.06 ( =

I recall making no statement about "Xubuntu", or "6.06".

> /usr/bin/gcc
> /usr/bin/make
> /usr/bin/diff

I am happy for you. Evidently all that bitching payed off.

> [kikinovak@fujitsu:~] $ su -
> Password:

Did you workaround or is root now available from initial install?

> Earlier versions of Ubuntu (and derivatives) were indeed nothing short
> of catastrophic.

Obviously what I was reading about.

> But recently there has been some serious improvement

That's good to hear. I did read a couple articles speculating the new
Ubu 6.06 may correct these shortcomings, but nothing confirming it.

> run quite nice if configured correctly. On the other hand, some of them
> are hopeless, and you may be right.

Everything is open to interpretation. It just gave me a warm fuzzy
feeling about my fave distro not being the target of legions of irate
Linux users.

nb

notbob wrote:
> Did you workaround or is root now available from initial install?

monkey@mother:~$ sudo su
Password:
root@mother:/home/monkey#

Its there from the install. Its just beyond the grasp of most
newcomers. Ubuntu is "Linux for Human Beings" not "Linux for
Subgeniuses" ;-)

On Tue, 17 Oct 2006 14:14:19 -0500, notbob wrote:

> On 2006-10-17, Niki Kovacs <mickey@mouse.com> wrote:
>
>> Just happen to read your message on a laptop running Xubuntu 6.06 ( =
>
> I recall making no statement about "Xubuntu", or "6.06".

I think Niki meant that he read your post while he was using a laptop
running Xubuntu, notbob.

--
Chick Tower

For e-mail: aols . sent . towerboy AT xoxy . net

On 2006-10-18, Chick Tower <c.tower@deadspam.com> wrote:

> I think Niki meant that he read your post while he was using a laptop
> running Xubuntu, notbob.

Hey, what do I know. I still keep thinking Niki is a girl.

nb