Linux

Tsukasa Buddha said:
Well, perhaps I should differentiate between Mark, Canonical, and Ubuntu devs. Mark has made a habit of calling out people (sometimes the wrong people) in his blogs who oppose the Canonical way. For Canonical/Ubuntu itself, Mir and Unity are the big offenders. Ubuntu has been increasingly becoming an island. They are doing their own things for their own projects. Which doesn't sound so terrible, but in the open source ecosystem it burns bridges left and right. Ubuntu went from wanting to free the desktop with human friendly Linux for everyone, to wanting to be profitable from cloud and mobile licensing. Mark also has announced many of these changes at a drop of a hat, and in contradiction of previous commitments to external devs and the community. The CLA I mentioned before, which gives Canonical re-licensing rights, has kept everyone but Canonical from working on their technologies. This is all in addition to smaller ways that Ubuntu has been closing up shop. Management tells the devs what to do, and the community needs to be grateful for it. Mir and Unity have been going nowhere fast.

Histories here.
Click to expand...
Again, thank you! I didn't realize it was that contentious in Ubuntu-land.
 
Tsukasa Buddha said:
I don't think XFCE, though much more popular, has decided for certain what they are doing about the future. Which is odd, given that Debian is looking at making it default.
Click to expand...

I'm using Xfce on Debian, and I've preferred Xfce for the past few years. Looking at my past experience (almost 20 years on Linux), I've noticed two ways that open source projects tend to disappoint me: the first is when they change in a way that I find annoying, and the second is when they don't change and the project becomes obsolete.

So I never know what to hope for.

I didn't know that Debian was thinking about making Xfce the default. That just means that I won't have to use a submenu to install, but it's interesting nonetheless.
 
eerok said:
I'm using Xfce on Debian, and I've preferred Xfce for the past few years. Looking at my past experience (almost 20 years on Linux), I've noticed two ways that open source projects tend to disappoint me: the first is when they change in a way that I find annoying, and the second is when they don't change and the project becomes obsolete.

So I never know what to hope for.

I didn't know that Debian was thinking about making Xfce the default. That just means that I won't have to use a submenu to install, but it's interesting nonetheless.
Click to expand...

What is it about Xfce that you really like? What do you dislike about it? I understand it's resource light(er) than Gnome or KDE, but how much?
 
The Norseman said:
What is it about Xfce that you really like? What do you dislike about it? I understand it's resource light(er) than Gnome or KDE, but how much?
Click to expand...

I'm coming at things from the other direction--for years I preferred window managers like E15 and E16; Blackbox, Fluxbox, and Openbox; and tiling window managers like DWM, Xmonad, and Awesome. I did have flings with both Gnome and KDE at various times, but they both always seemed far too bulky and monolithic.

So I like Xfce because it's a compromise for an old man like me who's not as enamored with constantly tweaking .conf files as I used to be. It's integrated enough, but not too much. I can make it work well and look good through a simple, centralized settings interface, and it plays well with the Gnome/KDE apps I like to use. It's a little slower than I'm used to, but it's still good. It's lighter on resources as you say, but that's not really an issue, since my desktop is a beast. However, I've been using Xfce to good effect on my gutless old netbook.

I also like the Openbox setup on CrunchBang, though for some reason I don't like LXDE, which also uses Openbox. They each have their own feeling, I guess.

Since you're interested in these comparisons, I recommend that you create a few partitions on your main (or a spare) machine, and install a few different Linux distros with a variety of DEs and WMs. One of the beauties of Linux is the range of choices it gives you. It can be a lot of fun exploring what you can do with 20GB and an installation disk, and it's not risky because you can always wipe out these partitions and try something else. You can also install several different DEs and WMs on a single Linux partition, and switch between them.

I used to run eight or so different distros on my main machine, but like I said, I'm getting old, and I only have a few these days.

When it comes to deciding what to use, there's no substitute for trying things out for yourself, because it's all very subjective.
 
Whereas I had to drop LXDE from consideration, at least for now, because of its switch to Qt. Qt's not used by any apps I regularly use, and I'm not going to install a toolkit that large just for the sake of a glorified window manager.

(Also, while vanilla GTK+ has its awkward side—to put it mildly—the C++ wrapper, gtkmm, takes much better advantage of modern C++ than Qt does. Which is ironic, given that Qt is written in C++.)

Edit: Debian actually makes it very easy to install different WMs/DEs, and relatively easy to switch between them. Although it used to be even easier. Their generic menu system had support for switching on-the-fly using the native menus of whatever system you were currently using. Unfortunately, not all WMs/DEs were able to support this, so the feature eventually got lost. But the login screen (at least, the one I have installed—there's more than one option there too) allows me to choose, which is better than nothing, even if it doesn't keep all my open apps when I switch, which the old system did.
 
Last edited:
eerok said:
I'm coming at things from the other direction--for years I preferred window managers like E15 and E16; Blackbox, Fluxbox, and Openbox; and tiling window managers like DWM, Xmonad, and Awesome. I did have flings with both Gnome and KDE at various times, but they both always seemed far too bulky and monolithic.

So I like Xfce because it's a compromise for an old man like me who's not as enamored with constantly tweaking .conf files as I used to be. It's integrated enough, but not too much. I can make it work well and look good through a simple, centralized settings interface, and it plays well with the Gnome/KDE apps I like to use. It's a little slower than I'm used to, but it's still good. It's lighter on resources as you say, but that's not really an issue, since my desktop is a beast. However, I've been using Xfce to good effect on my gutless old netbook.

I also like the Openbox setup on CrunchBang, though for some reason I don't like LXDE, which also uses Openbox. They each have their own feeling, I guess.

Since you're interested in these comparisons, I recommend that you create a few partitions on your main (or a spare) machine, and install a few different Linux distros with a variety of DEs and WMs. One of the beauties of Linux is the range of choices it gives you. It can be a lot of fun exploring what you can do with 20GB and an installation disk, and it's not risky because you can always wipe out these partitions and try something else. You can also install several different DEs and WMs on a single Linux partition, and switch between them.

I used to run eight or so different distros on my main machine, but like I said, I'm getting old, and I only have a few these days.

When it comes to deciding what to use, there's no substitute for trying things out for yourself, because it's all very subjective.
Click to expand...
Good idea! Actually, I think I might just install multiple VMs as it saves me the time to boot up.

I keep having boot errors which delay my boot time by literally five minutes or so. I'm thinking it's something corrupt in my BIOS; the five minute wait is just to get to GRUB.

Anywhoo, I think I'll install Xfce again while I'm in LMDE and try it out.
 
xtifr said:
Whereas I had to drop LXDE from consideration, at least for now, because of its switch to Qt. Qt's not used by any apps I regularly use, and I'm not going to install a toolkit that large just for the sake of a glorified window manager.

(Also, while vanilla GTK+ has its awkward side—to put it mildly—the C++ wrapper, gtkmm, takes much better advantage of modern C++ than Qt does. Which is ironic, given that Qt is written in C++.)

Edit: Debian actually makes it very easy to install different WMs/DEs, and relatively easy to switch between them. Although it used to be even easier. Their generic menu system had support for switching on-the-fly using the native menus of whatever system you were currently using. Unfortunately, not all WMs/DEs were able to support this, so the feature eventually got lost. But the login screen (at least, the one I have installed—there's more than one option there too) allows me to choose, which is better than nothing, even if it doesn't keep all my open apps when I switch, which the old system did.
Click to expand...

My opinion isn't necessarily based on Qt's benefits. Many devs have actively chosen to develop in something that has a future, unlike GTK2. XFCE, like many other devs, are in limbo because GTK3... is terribad.
 
*grumble*

I thought I'd give Debian a try. Apparently you can't direct-download the Debian ISO files, you have to use something called Jigdo (Jigsaw Downloader).

*sigh*

Jigdo has no GUI, and I've had it running in a terminal window downloading the Debian installation DVD for well over an hour now, and I have no idea how much progress has been made (it seems to be downloading each individual file from the DVD separately), or how long it's going to take until it's done. I'm not entirely confident that I'm going to end up with a working ISO file at the end of it all.

(It also seems to be dumping everything into a folder in my home directory instead of in my Downloads subdirectory, but that's not really important.)
 
Brian-M said:
*grumble*

I thought I'd give Debian a try. Apparently you can't direct-download the Debian ISO files, you have to use something called Jigdo (Jigsaw Downloader).

*sigh*

Jigdo has no GUI, and I've had it running in a terminal window downloading the Debian installation DVD for well over an hour now, and I have no idea how much progress has been made (it seems to be downloading each individual file from the DVD separately), or how long it's going to take until it's done. I'm not entirely confident that I'm going to end up with a working ISO file at the end of it all.

(It also seems to be dumping everything into a folder in my home directory instead of in my Downloads subdirectory, but that's not really important.)
Click to expand...
Um... not to discount your experience, but when I google "debian iso download" I'm presented with http, ftp, and bittorrent avenues of obtaining either x32 or x64 CDs, DVDs or netinstalls.

I can give you a link, if you'd like. Which one y'all need? :D
 
Ah! Looking at http://www.debian.org/CD I see that the direct download link was a little further down the page. I didn't notice it there. But It does ask people to use Jigdo instead, and the Jigdo download eventually produced a working ISO file.

I've installed Debian on an old 40Gb IDE drive I had lying around to try it out. It's very sleek looking, but doesn't seem convenient to use. I suppose there are settings I can play with when I get around to fiddling with it.

I notice that the Install Software Packages program doesn't have nearly as many ready-to-go packages as the Ubuntu Software Center has.

(That seems strange to me, because Ubuntu uses Debian packages, so I'd have thought that any package which can install on one should be able to install on the other. Maybe I'm wrong about that.)
 
Last edited:
Brian-M said:
Ah! Looking at http://www.debian.org/CD I see that the direct download link was a little further down the page. I didn't notice it there. But It does ask people to use Jigdo instead, and the Jigdo download eventually produced a working ISO file.

I've installed Debian on an old 40Gb IDE drive I had lying around to try it out. It's very sleek looking, but doesn't seem convenient to use. I suppose there are settings I can play with when I get around to fiddling with it.

I notice that the Install Software Packages program doesn't have nearly as many ready-to-go packages as the Ubuntu Software Center has.

(That seems strange to me, because Ubuntu uses Debian packages, so I'd have thought that any package which can install on one should be able to install on the other. Maybe I'm wrong about that.)
Click to expand...

While they both use .deb's, they are not 100% compatible and often use slightly different packages.

Debian is super conservative so as to be stable. Ubuntu is based off their Unstable repo, and will pull in newer packages. Further, many more third parties will develop for Ubuntu.
 
Tsukasa Buddha said:
While they both use .deb's, they are not 100% compatible and often use slightly different packages.

Debian is super conservative so as to be stable. Ubuntu is based off their Unstable repo, and will pull in newer packages. Further, many more third parties will develop for Ubuntu.
Click to expand...
Do you mean that there could be dependency issues between the .deb packages or is it just stable versus unstable repos? I suppose that an answer could be "both".
 
The Norseman said:
Do you mean that there could be dependency issues between the .deb packages or is it just stable versus unstable repos? I suppose that an answer could be "both".
Click to expand...

There's Debian Stable, Debian Testing, Debian Sid (unstable), and Ubuntu, which are all potentially different. Generally when I install a .deb that I download separately (ie, not from the specific repo of what I'm using), it will work with Debian Stable, which is the rock in this scenario--but not always.

Here's a real life example: FadeIn is a commercial screenwriting app with Linux support. The latest version works with Debian Testing, but not with Debian Stable. In this case, the new feature I want is .fountain export (it's a screenplay markup language). I can use the penultimate version of FadeIn on Debian Stable until I want to export to .fountain, and then I can boot up a partition with Testing. Or if it's important, I can just use Debian Testing to write my screenplay. Of course, I can find other ways to filter to .fountain as well, since Linux is rich in text filters and scripting languages.

The beauty of Linux is that you have the flexibility to work around many of the limitations you might encounter in this way, because you're free to create redundancies that cover all essential requirements you might have. As a ridiculous example, on a 1TB drive you could comfortably fit 500 separate Linux installs. You'd never want to do that, of course, but it's nice to step outside the mindset of having one instance of an operating system with which you must accomplish everything.
 
Tsukasa Buddha said:
Many devs have actively chosen to develop in something that has a future, unlike GTK2. XFCE, like many other devs, are in limbo because GTK3... is terribad.
Click to expand...

I don't know if you've seen this, but it's pretty scary.

I think I'm just one among many who hope that GTK2 will be forked so that it lives on. The situation where a project dramatically loses mindshare is exactly when this tends to happen. I think that the time for this is ripe, and it's probably even an idea in motion as we speak.
 
eerok said:
I don't know if you've seen this, but it's pretty scary.
Click to expand...

Whilst I can see the point of having a consistent UI at installation, removing the ability to then choose a different theme just seems overkill.

GTK/GNOME used to encourage theming; I dabbled in adapting GTK themes as far back as 2000. I mourn the loss of themes.freshmeat.net.

I'm currently working on one for Enlightenment as I want to use that as my main DE and use it for developing apps.
 
Last edited:
Tsukasa Buddha said:
My opinion isn't necessarily based on Qt's benefits. Many devs have actively chosen to develop in something that has a future, unlike GTK2. XFCE, like many other devs, are in limbo because GTK3... is terribad.
Click to expand...

GTK3 is working fine here. I don't know where you're getting your information, but I assure you that Slashdot is not a reliable source for...much of anything! ;)

Don't confuse things like Gnome-shell or Unity with the underlying toolkit. I could understand calling those "terribad" (though I'm not sure I agree). But I don't see any problems with GTK3. (Although Debian is supporting both 2 & 3 during the transition period, which is good.)
 
Hmmm. I think I'll stick with Xubuntu for now. The convenience of having a vast range of ready-to-go software packages available to install at a moment's notice is very handy.
 
Brian-M said:
Hmmm. I think I'll stick with Xubuntu for now. The convenience of having a vast range of ready-to-go software packages available to install at a moment's notice is very handy.
Click to expand...

Perhaps you haven't enabled "contrib" and "non-free" in your Debian sources, because there are in fact a huge ton of Debian packages available. There are other things about Debian such as http://www.deb-multimedia.org that you should know about. Debian is awesome, but it's political...

I'm fond of Xubuntu, so I don't want to discourage you from installing it if you want to try it, but I think you've got the wrong idea about Debian.
 
I think the number of packages is 40k for Debian compared to 50k for Ubuntu? Somewhere around there.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom