best linux distro (Page 2 of 2)

^ Yes, because they removed the old threads to the archive.

The 'best' Linux distro must either be the one that makes either Bill Gates or Linus Torvalds cry, so that Richard Stallman can drink their tears.

RMS - Recurring Menstrual Syndrome

My thoughts on the notion of a 'best desktop Linux distro', this morning, after my second cup of coffee.

It would need:
Consistency#1: applications that don't suddenly stop working after an update.
There are too many examples to list.
Some applications don't seem to work at all.

Consistency#2: applications that work 'across' the board.
Example#1: Thunar: in #!/Debian-Stable, read/write/execute/delete works fine with removeable media.
In Ubuntu-base, write/delete has to be done as root-user.
Example#2: mtools/fdutils work in Ubuntu-base; in #!/Debian-Stable, they do not seem to.

Fewer ego-trips/political hangups/etc.:
I don't believe that most people are really bothered about the proprietary/non-proprietary nature of applications, or whether or not they are open/closed-source.
As it said in the FAQ section of the old DexOS website: 'If you're not a system developer, why do you need the source-code?'
I like mp3 music files, they're convenient & compact enough for my personal media player: I don't need to read the code to enjoy the music.

Less dependency-hell:
Example#1: If I want to use XFCE, I have to have Thunar. If I remove Thunar, then it's bye-bye XFCE.
Example#2: If I want to use k3b, I have to install most of the KDE-base.

Better documentation:
Most applications are poorly documented, often with little more than an 'about' statement in the 'help' menu.
For example, I have been unable to find any solution to the file-permissions problem in Thunar.
Open-source becomes a bit useless without open documentation.

It would have to be at least as user-friendly as Windows XP
Being as fast as XP would also be good. In my experience, 'Linux' tends to become progressively slower.

I don't believe there is such a distro as one that fulfills these requirements. Even the best I've tried and tested have been severely lacking in one way or another (often many).

Consistency#2: This depends on the file system type and the corresponding consolekit/udev/dbus rule, I don't remember which one. Chose a sane default FS. So much about the example. What does a distro to be consistent with, if not with other distros? If it's the best, it is reference and does not neet consistency (which is undesirable in the linux environment by the way).

Ego-political-point: If you do not contribute (code, server, artwork, documentation), what use has the linux ecosystem for you? All you do in that case is adding to the popularity of Linux, which is by way arguably desirable. See it from a developers POV: It's no fun at all spending hours after hours in writing software, just to see people spend millions in closed systems, mix it with free software and then complain, that the open platform does not play well with their closed stuff. My best example for this are those people on different Ubuntu bbq's, complaining that their (established) Ubuntu desktop does not play well or (not at all) with their new iPhone. Yes... the new iPhone. Instead of having a look at what you have and what you buy, you just buy out of the blue and then complain to those who work for the fun and a better ecosystem, instead of writing a letter to the closed company, asking them to support more platforms (or actually getting a refund and let the company know why). It's like owning a poodle. One day you hear that great danes and mastifs are excellent choices for breeding. So you buy a mastif. The biggest one you can find of course. Then, after the poodle reports INTERFACE ERROR - PORT BROKEN, you complain to the one who sold you the poodle. There is more to this, but you should start by processing this first.

Windows XP comparison:

I don't find windows user friendly. Just because you're used to a specific behavior doesn't mean it's good, efficient or anyway near friendly. Most Linux users actually find Windows unfriendly, because it makes them hunt a cursor through a funny maze of icons. See consistency.

Dependency-hell: Well, that goes on the account of your consistency and windows points. You can't introduce a unified desktop or a unified packaging system, because half of the users finds RPM disgusting, the other half gets swollen dingleberries from .dep packages (and the imaginary third half dislikes both). Instead of something unified, which won't work, we have different adversarial frameworks, built upon other, less abstract adversarial frameworks. That might be because a lot of libraries do not give a crap about the UNIX philosophy anymore. Arch recently pulls in Gnome stuff when installing emacs (which is funny in itself), because of whatever functions the users wanted it to have depend on dconf. It's no problem as long as it depends only on libraries, but as soon as a rivaling executable is involved, it get's crappy. You can thank all lazy toolkit fetishists for that.

Documentation: Your statement is false, almost on a polemicy or lie niveau. Almost all the applications I use are well documented. The only black sheeps are some gnome/xfce thingies that ship with an insult instead of a manpage.

Your requirements do not have much to do with distributions, but with open source software design itself. The distros are not responsible for most of those problems, because all they do is package upstream software and add a patch or two. The only distro really trying to create inconsistency is Ubuntu, but that's also another discussion.

I have tried a couple of BSDs, and if there was one that came with OpenBox and plug-in-and-play support for usb-mobile-broadband dongles (I guess it'd be called something like '#!BSD'), I'd certainly be interested, and I keep looking for dongle support for BSD. A few apps don't matter to me; but the strength and security of BSD certainly appeals. Alas both PC-BSD and Desktop-BSD seem to prefer KDE, although PC-BSD certainly looks pretty good.

@Awebb:
Ego-political-point: Fair comment. I'm not bothered whether my ('old') cellphone's computer suite is compatible with Linux, although I've never tried installing in WINE.
I did try iTunes in WINE, and got a 'black screen of death'. Asunder and MPlayer work fine.
iF i could afford an iPhone (or even wanted one), i could probably afford an iToaster, and would probably shun Linux and its 'hippy philosophy', lest i got shunned by the iVangelists!
If I wrote an app for Linux, then I'd release it, code and all, under a 'do what thou wilt' licence (oh, no, not another licence). I'd tend to think that developers either aren't, or shouldn't be too bothered, especially if they're writing for Linux or BSD.

Windows-point: I found XP worked fine, once I'd switched off a lot of annoying defaults, and hacked out the extra hooks with RegEdit. Vista was horrible, but I've heard some good reports about W7.
My better half prefers Ubuntu Lucid, but found #!XFCE too difficult, and didn't like the idea of #!OB - funny, that: I reckon #!OB is probably the easiest Linux of all: all the lovely keyboard shortcuts, etc.: almost 'mouseless'.

Documentation-point: I was thinking of GNOME & XFCE. Some apps are almost 'too well documented', if there can be such a thing.

@duderocks:
Me too![EDIT]: 'kfloppy' is 83.9KB, yet demands to download 69.1MB of dependencies!!!!!
In my experience, Apt-on-CD demands loads of dependencies, including 'half' of KDE.
I just copy my /var/apt/cache/archives to my external hard-drive, add the folder in Synaptic, close then reopen Synaptic, and it seems to work fine.

[EDIT/CORRECTION]: By deselecting 'consider recommended as dependencies' in Synaptic, Apt-on-CD only demands Genisoimage as a dependency, but when it's run, it's necessary to close it manually (after checking that the ISO has been made), otherwise it doesn't finish, presumably because it's looking for either Brasero or K3B.

I did a fresh install of #!OB today, and I had to download hardly any updates. I was a bit peturbed when the dialogue almost immediately stated 'downloading file 42 of 42', but all went well. Running 'cb-welcome' was almost unnecessary.

Last edited by _user123 (2011-12-02 02:37:28)

^ I think there is also no need for a real Debian Wiki as #! is fully compatible with Debian, there is the great Debian Wiki.

Ok.  I found it, however it's not called Index as I imagined but TitleIndex.  There's also WordIndex and FindPage.

If you want "proper unix", you'll have to travel back in time, about 15-20 years to be precise.