P2 Slackware as default?

[EssoAir]

Can we have a more official support for alternate OSes? Like, have official versions if Ubuntu, Arch, etc for ths P2 so as to give the less tech savy a piece of mind when installing the "unknown"

Official versions means you need to ask Ubuntu to officially support the Pandora successor, my friend. You are asking in the wrong place. Mail Mark instead. 

I mean like how SuperZaxxon is official for the OP. And how Debian will be official for the P2

 

[sebt3]

I mean like how SuperZaxxon is official for the OP. And how Debian will be official for the P2

The problem is that it's already painfull to maintain a single official OS/distrib, let alone supporting more than one. While the idea is nice ED will need way more hands to be able to do what you want.

 

[WizardStan]

You cannot have a "debian stable" stability and the lastest hottest newest code

I don't want the latest hottest newest code, but when I encounter a bug for which there was a fix made 2 years ago I'm going to stop and question the price of "stability".If a package is two years old and there have been many enhancements to it in that time you may technically be "stable", but you are skirting dangerous by not including at least the major bug fixes.

 

[slaeshjag]

Debian will always backport security fixes.

 

[Grench]

I think that there may be only one answer to cure this.

Is Mint DE available for ARM? If not, we clearly need to use the Intel z3770... oh, wrong thread.

Seriously though, Ubuntu has sucked and will suck as long as they keep pushing that POS Unity interface. That thing is a continuous train wreck. People have left that distro in droves and are fleeing to Mint.

There are two main Mint streams. One derives from Ubuntu - which derives in turn from Debian. The other Mint derives directly from Debian.

Unfortunately, the Mint DE doesn't get a lot of love. It's a rolling distribution off of Debian Testing. Mint is great, but Mint DE isn't really a prime-time distribution yet. http://www.linuxmint.com/download_lmde.php

The other Mint stream (Ubuntu based) has multiple versions that vary based on UI. http://www.linuxmint.com/release.php?id=21

Cinnamon: http://cinnamon.linuxmint.com/

KDE: http://blog.linuxmint.com/?p=2508

Mate: http://mate-desktop.org/gallery/1.6/

Xfce: http://linuxmint.com/rel_olivia_xfce_whatsnew.php

Compare http://www.debian.org/ to http://www.linuxmint.com/ .

One drawback to Debian is that, well, it's hostile to new users to even figure out which version they should download and how to install it. http://www.debian.org/ isn't the most intuitive site around.

Debian supports the same desktop UI selections as Mint: https://wiki.debian.org/DesktopEnvironment

However, if you're a novice trying to figure out how to get from 0 to a working system with UI, it's frankly a bit frustrating to get there.

For the Pandora successor, though, that doesn't matter so much as it would come pre-loaded and our community could help write up some device specific instructions on installs & upgrades.

I have tried all 4 primary desktop UI options that are officially supported on Debian (GNOME, KDE, Xfce, LXDE). GNOME is very pretty and has the largest software base focused on it, but is VERY resource intensive. KDE is very Win95 feeling and has kind of fallen out of favor the last few years. Xfce is very good for a light system, but needs packages from GNOME and KDE to fill out. LXDE is highly efficient and 'light', but feels a bit stripped down.

For the Pandora successor, I'd suggest focusing on Debian Stable with Xfce or LXDE for the UI.

Something else to keep in mind... Although there is an ARM repository for Debian, I don't think it gets quite the love & updates that the X86 repositories get. Packages could very well show up on X86 stable before they go into ARM testing.

 

[WizardStan]

Debian will always backport security fixes

I can't remember what it was now, I encountered it months ago and had to rebuild from source, but it probably wasn't considered a security fix, it simply didn't work as intended in this specific case, and where there is one bug introducing unintended behavior fixed over two years ago how can we say that there aren't more concerning bugs fixed over two years ago that are similarly ignored in the name of "stability"?

 

[Grench]

Debian will always backport security fixes

I can't remember what it was now, I encountered it months ago and had to rebuild from source, but it probably wasn't considered a security fix, it simply didn't work as intended in this specific case, and where there is one bug introducing unintended behavior fixed over two years ago how can we say that there aren't more concerning bugs fixed over two years ago that are similarly ignored in the name of "stability"?

I seriously doubt that we'll all be directly downloading the Debian ARM release to install right onto a Pandora successor. Someone or several someones is going to have to download the binaries, add in the right code for the specific machine's peripherals, compile and build it, package it as a file, compress it, publish it to the DragonBox repository, create instructions that noice and non-linux users can follow... Pretty much what Notaz has done for releases on the Pandora. (Thanks again Notaz!)

The end users should be able to apt-get additional software form the Debian repository, but the actual OS build from ARM binaries and distribution as a DragonBox (insert name here) OS will likely still have to take place within the community.

So - I imagine that at some point this will be Debian ARM stable + packages needed to make it all work on the DragonBox (insert name here).

 

[slaeshjag]

^ That sounds plausable. Possibly with the addition of packages from debian-backports in case we depend on low-priority packages with bugs in stable.

I also see it as likely that adding of debian-packports repo will be quitecommon for software as well..

 

[Binky]

KDE is very Win95 feeling

It is?

How so?

I don't think much of its default setup in Debian, but there's a lot of good stuff there if you can be bothered to find it.

 

[slaeshjag]

He probably haven't used KDE4

 

[bzar]

KDE is very Win95 feeling and has kind of fallen out of favor the last few years.

[quotation needed]

 

[Binky]

He probably haven't used KDE4

KDE3 was wonderfully configurable, but rather messy.

KDE4 was, until recently playing catch-up (features, stability) - but then the everything-is-a-plugin nature of plasma is rather satisfying.

As B-Zar says, I'm not sure where the "out of favour" bit came from....

 

[TrashyMG]

KDE is very Win95 feeling and has kind of fallen out of favor the last few years.

[quotation needed]

KDE during the early 2000's maybe.. not so much now..


People complaining that XFCE4 or KDE or well any full desktop environment on Linux should know that they can be easily customized to look like anything you want them to.. If you don't like the Windows start menu style tool bar don't use it.. The best thing about these desktop environments are they can be easily customized.


IMO there hasn't been too many advances since Windows 95 in the desktop environment world that hasn't already happened in the Linux environment.. People praise Apple for having advancements in this area with MacOS, but in reality many of their "new" stuff have been seen in the Unix/Linux scene way before they put it out.

 

[Grench]

KDE is very Win95 feeling

 It is?

How so?

I don't think much of its default setup in Debian, but there's a lot of good stuff there if you can be bothered to find it.

I was using the defaults under Linux Mint 14 KDE at the time. 'if you can be bothered to find it' implies it is the end user's fault that it is lame out of the box.

He probably haven't used KDE4

It was with Linux Mint 14 KDE. I looked it up, that would have been KDE 4.9.

KDE is very Win95 feeling and has kind of fallen out of favor the last few years.

[quotation needed]

You want me to quote someone else to validate my own experience of having installed and tried to use it for a few days? My experience was that it was clunky, hard to find settings and kept trying to default back to settings I didn't want. Just like Win95 used to. I recall that I had to go through something like 4 different areas of configuration and multiple sub-configurations just to un-map OS functions from the F1-F12 keys so they would return to functionality in other programs.

 

[Grench]

KDE is very Win95 feeling and has kind of fallen out of favor the last few years.

[quotation needed]

KDE during the early 2000's maybe.. not so much now..
People complaining that XFCE4 or KDE or well any full desktop environment on Linux should know that they can be easily customized to look like anything you want them to.. If you don't like the Windows start menu style tool bar don't use it.. The best thing about these desktop environments are they can be easily customized.

IMO there hasn't been too many advances since Windows 95 in the desktop environment world that hasn't already happened in the Linux environment.. People praise Apple for having advancements in this area with MacOS, but in reality many of their "new" stuff have been seen in the Unix/Linux scene way before they put it out.

You're right - KDE is now climbing back into favor as Unity and Gnome 3 ignored their user bases.

http://www.linuxjournal.com/rc2013?page=8

Now if they could only make KDE's customization settings sensible. Since someone will ask what I mean by this: Give me ONE settings icon and menu that can control ALL of the keyboard shortcut mappings. De-mapping the OS from F1-F12, shift F1-F12, alt F1-F12, ctrl F1-F12, alt+cltrl F1-F12, alt+shift F1-F12, (etc...) took for freeking ever to find them all. They're spread all over the place - and each different place to find them had a different interface for changing them. Changing them in one place would re-set the un-settings from another. It was royally annoying.

 

[TrashyMG]

^ Personally I gave up on the big named DE's.. I don't like where the KDE and Gnome are going.. What little of Unity I've tried I didn't like it either..  I'm using XFCE4 primarily on every Linux machine I use. I need to revisit some of the other alternatives at some point. 

 

[quadcricket]

If it were up to me I would choose Slackware.

Debian is not a bad choice but I have started to hate working with it since Ubuntu has become so popular. The REAL support is for Ubuntu and not Debian.

This leads to a lot of problems in deployment in my experience.

Slackware (by default) has no active package management. This leads to a very stable distribution for stand alone devices.

When I get ahold of an underpowered laptop Slackware goes on it. No question in my mind. It just works. (I also favor the Fluxbox UI).

Ubuntu, Centos, Gentoo, Arch, etc are just not designed for lightweight devices. They are Desktop/Server OSs and extremely powerful, but also needy and large.

(I would also remove the initrd, something I find easier to do in Slackware.)

As for the Pandora UI a custom made simple UI by default combined with optional Fluxbox(+conky) would be amazing.

 

[kingoddball]

For compatibility and repos - Debian??

 

[bzar]

KDE is very Win95 feeling and has kind of fallen out of favor the last few years.

[quotation needed]

You want me to quote someone else to validate my own experience of having installed and tried to use it for a few days? My experience was that it was clunky, hard to find settings and kept trying to default back to settings I didn't want. Just like Win95 used to. I recall that I had to go through something like 4 different areas of configuration and multiple sub-configurations just to un-map OS functions from the F1-F12 keys so they would return to functionality in other programs.

No, I wanted you to quote some source for the "fallen out of favor the last few years" part. KDE is doing very well.
The general keyboard shortcuts are ALL in System Settings > Shortcuts and Gestures. There you'll find a nice categorization to custom, global and application level shortcuts. Given that SOME default bindings are needed and they will not please everyone, some- like yourself -will always end up rebinding everything. Could you outline how you think it should be done? If you want to nuke a lot of settings at once, you can always edit ~/.kde/share/config/kglobalshortcutsrc. The base use case is changing a few settings.

 

[Antartica]

I seriously doubt that we'll all be directly downloading the Debian ARM release to install right onto a Pandora successor. Someone or several someones is going to have to download the binaries, add in the right code for the specific machine's peripherals, compile and build it, package it as a file, compress it, publish it to the DragonBox repository, create instructions that noice and non-linux users can follow... Pretty much what Notaz has done for releases on the Pandora. (Thanks again Notaz!)

The end users should be able to apt-get additional software form the Debian repository, but the actual OS build from ARM binaries and distribution as a DragonBox (insert name here) OS will likely still have to take place within the community.


So - I imagine that at some point this will be Debian ARM stable + packages needed to make it all work on the DragonBox (insert name here).

I agree with this. For example I have Debian installed in my Dockstar (armv5 embedded device; I use it as wireless AP and VDR backend, using nfs for the vdr recordings directory). The instructions for installing in the internal 256MB NAND were

http://forum.doozan.com/read.php?2,72

If you read through it, the general gist is to install a preconfigured image. When the installation is finished you just add (apt-get install ...) the missing bits for your use case.

About the topic of "debian stable is too old": Having Debian stable with some backports is not bad at all. For some time I've run happily my desktop with "stable"+"backports" (backports.debian.org; they are integrated in debian proper infrastructure). Normally you really want new versions of the applications you use daily (web browser, office suite, drawing/painting programs, ...), and most of the time "backports" have you covered there.

The two main reasons I see for using "unstable" are: (1) your platform is not well supported in "stable", and (2) there are libraries in "stable" that block backporting newer versions of a "must have" application for you.

That said, I've been using unstable now for some time uneventfully (the motherboard/processor was too new for stable).

Another thing: AFAIK, when Ubuntu wants to do a new release, it forks "sid", not "unstable". That means that stabilizations done in Ubuntu may help "unstable". That also explains why Ubuntu releases seem more unstable that debian "unstable" (sorry for the pun).

Anyway, any full distro would do for me; Arch, Slackware or Debian...