[nzlug] Dell are sooo pwn3d

[Simon]

On Fri, 2007-06-29 at 20:18 +1200, Denise Bates wrote:
> Dirk Pilat wrote:
> > 
> > On 29/06/2007, at 6:03 PM, Denise Bates wrote:
> > 
> >>  Ubuntu isn't my kettle of fish: I can think of at least three
major 
> >> shortcomings which make it quite unacceptable to me.
> > 
> > Mmmh. This is very interesting and I would love to hear them, as I 
> > harbour a little grudge against Ubuntu as well (mainly due to it's 
> > security probs), that nevertheless doesn't keep me from using it on
2 of 
> > my machines at home.
> 
Any such list just has to be subjective... but "unacceptable" is such a
strong word:

> At the risk of being accused of indulging in a "distro-war", I 
> regard the following shortcomings of Ubuntu as sufficient reason 
> to reject it for my own use:
... it is only a "distro war" if you are insisting that some distro is
the One and Only Greatest Of All Time. We can accept this as a personal
perspective and not generally applicable...

> * Inflexible installation procedure: I want to be able to install 
> _only_ the packages that I need, and/or to tailor the installation 
> to suit the limitations of a particular machine (HD space, memory, 
> etc). I have found that Ubuntu simply refuses to install on 
> low-specced machines.

This is good enough by itself, provided you would habitually need to
install to such low-spec'ed machines. Naturally an OS that dosn't work
on your hardware is one you are ill advised to use. However, you have
not specified what you consider to be "low spec".

> * The lack of a regular "root" account: Having to muck about with 
> Sudo is clumsy and too damn slow.

As I once believed. However... "sudo su" will get you a root prompt. The
root account is not absent, just deactivated. You want it, you activate
it.

It takes me about one second to type "sudo su -" ... slow? It is only
clumsy on all that "sudo aptitude install ..." on the initial
configuration. But that is what the up arrow is for.

> * Difficult, inconsistent configuration: I concede that e-lists 
> such as this one provide commendable support for configuration 
> problems, but I would prefer to avoid mucking around in the first 
> place.

"inconsistent"? in what way?
"difficult"? Or just slow and clumsy like sudo?
However, you may be talking about Gnome here rather than ubuntu...

> * The default kernel configuration is too demanding of resources.

Ah well... I think the same is said of mainstream distro kernels
everywhere. The price of being generic. The alternative is even more
configuration headaches.

But I think this goes with the first one... this only matters on
low-spec boxes. So what resources are we talking about and how much is
too much?

> * Lack of KDE: OK, there is Kubuntu, but I find Gnome doesn't come 
> anywhere near to KDE in functionality (e.g. Gnome dial-up support 
> is clumsy). And, as several people who have acquired, and 
> experimented with a Ubuntu CD remind me, Gnome is so ugly!
> 
Working backwards:
1. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
2. Gnome dialup support is more properly described as nonexistent. I
agree this is annoying - but for me this is more because, in Ubuntu, it
pretends to be present. (Fedora/Gnome dialup support has always been
kind to me.) However, editing wvdial.conf and using wvdial is simple
enough.
3. Gnome and KDE are designed with very different ends in mind, yes.
4. You complain about Gnome, but concede about Kubuntu. So this entire
section isn't really about ubuntu at all.

> I don't have a desire to knock the work of Ubuntu developers per 
> se, but the evangelistic promotion of this one distro as the 
> generic version of Linux is irritating.
> 
I don't think it is promoted as "generic". More as "special".

Ubuntu is mostly suggested to newbies as an introduction. I am using it
as I really need an easily managed distro... with more time I'd probably
be moving more towards something like Slackware by now.


> > The only machine in my network where security plays an important
part 
> > due to various reasons, runs OpenBSD (me being a Theo fanboy)
> 
> I also like the approach of FreeBSD (and NetBSD for odd-ball 
> hardware). If I didn't have a head-start in learning Linux, I 
> would be quite content with BSD. I currently use BSD 
> intermittently, partly as a learning experience, but my serious 
> academic work is entrusted to Linux.

Your emphasis on low overhead and low-spec boxes suggests something like
Puppy or Feather ... but the insistence on KDE is curious, as KDE is
somewhat resource hungry also.

"64MB of memory and 500MB of free disk space for a basic installation"
compare with gnome "at least 16MB of RAM, although I expect you'll be
happier with 32MB or more. If you are just installing binaries, you need
about 30MB of disk space, count on needing at least 200MB of disk space
if you are compiling from source". (Source: the associated project FAQ
for recent versions of each.) ... in both cases, this is after X.

It actually turned out to be quite difficult to find hardware specs for
gnome so I am prepared to be corrected.