openSUSE Forums - Soapbox

Why is moonlight development so frigging slow!?

Axeia — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 11:12:14 GMT

So Microsoft is working on the Silverlight 4 beta. While Moonlight is stuck at 1.0! Yes there is a preview of 2.0, but come on.. they should be at 4.0 as well.

So who do we blame, Novell or Microsoft?

My turn to rant

Jonathan_R — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 10:07:13 GMT

I don't often get up on my soap box, but sometimes I just have to vent.

Ya know, it sucks being diabetic. Everything changes. Gotta count carbs. Gotta learn about glycemic index and glycemic load. WTF.Then you have to learn about bolusing. Getting the right bolus is tricky. That's how much quick acting insulin ya take. If you take to much, you can crash and have hypoglycemia and end up having a seizure or worse. The risks of living with high blood sugar for long periods of time are bad as well. You can end up with ketoacidosis, neuropathy, glaucoma, renal failure, and the list goes on.

I went on a scavenger hunt to see if there were any Linux apps, other than my spreadsheet, that may assist in my diabetes. While I did find a few, they are all old. Ridiculously old. Here is what I found Open-Source Diabetes tools at sourceforge.net (fwd: msg#00006 linux.debian.devel.medical

Now I do know a little python, but I don't think it's at the level to be able to code an entire app. But they say, necessity is the mother of all inventions. So who knows.

Look Like the bloods in the water for 11.2

J100 — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 07:45:28 GMT

It seems that the open source news is beginning to call time of death for the 11.2 release. Its clear that we have a massive driver failure issues combined with installer issues mainly centered around the auto configuration features. Such as the grub installing itself to extended drives which are just containers for logical drives. You can also choose to install the grub to two different partitions at the same time. Think this won't happen an old linux pro that I know did a quick edit to the grub and missed that he had double selected. Fresh install for him after he finished a hour long setup. There seems to be a common pattern emerging, what with the black screens of death that Ati users are experiencing, add failures to even finish half the install and the just plain buggy hardware support. It looks like this is just going to be another ubuntu 7.10 full of promise and great new features put crippled by massive bugs.

distrowatch.com reviewed 11.2 and here are there thoughts. Remember even with the harsh reviews people are loving what they find. I hope we can find fixes before they move on to other distributions.

Quote:

Conclusions

While SUSE has never been my favorite I have always found it to be a solid distribution in the past. Sadly, at least on my hardware, that simply isn't true of openSUSE 11.2. Installation on my netbook, which is extremely well supported by a half a dozen other distributions I've tried, was exceptionally challenging with openSUSE. While installation on the old Toshiba was less problematic it still didn't "just work." Once installed the KDE desktop environment was pretty enough and performance was very good. Stability, however, was a major concern. Within an hour or two I would run into an application crash or even a hard system lockup (no, not just X) which is simply unacceptable in a modern operating system. GNOME and Xfce are considerably better so a user who has little interest in KDE or KDE applications would likely be able to use openSUSE 11.2 without many problems once installation and configuration were complete.

Some of SUSE's traditional strengths, including a fantastic suite of graphical administration tools and rather good internationalization and localization support, are still present and do offer some compelling reasons to consider openSUSE. The front ends to RPM package management (zypper at the command line and the YaST2 GUI package manager) are the best I've seen. The forums show clearly that openSUSE has a very large user community and I found answers to all my issues without having to ask any questions. Some documentation (i.e.: for the network installer) proved to be somewhat dated but was still adequate for me to figure things out.

I must say I found openSUSE 11.2 to be a major disappointment. I've come to expect better, much better, from Novell. If it weren't for the stability issues with KDE and relatively poor netbook support this distribution would have been a keeper for me. There really is a lot to like. Perhaps the results will be different for people with different hardware. For me, though, openSUSE 11.2 just doesn't compare favorably to the other major distributions and I can't recommend it at this time.

Wow you guys rock

dolittlejerry — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 23:07:17 GMT

Just installed 11.2 64 like it a lot. I come here often for help tho just lurking.
I see many new post everyone trying to help with this new SuSE build.
I just wanted to say thanks to the helpers here. You guys rock.

Rant: Sound "just works" so out of a support job !!

oldcpu — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 08:40:21 GMT

openSUSE-11.2 with the 1.0.21 version of alsa embedded with the 2.6.31 kernel is too good, when it comes to handling basic sound, and it appears now I am out of a volunteer support job! :( ... ohhh no … alas ... what to do ?

Until now, I've managed to lever 11 years of Linux head bashing experience of my own tribulations, into helping beleaguered new openSUSE users, as they struggled with BASIC sound problems. I emphasis BASIC, as BASIC is indeed the limit of my capability to help such users.

But the alsa developers (funded in part by Novell/SuSE-GmbH) have been hard at work, and have fixed many of the auto probe detection hiccups when Linux is started (in 1.0.21 of alsa) and with that 1.0.21 version of alsa now being included with the 11.2 version of openSUSE, I predict far fewer sound problems associated with an inappropriate auto probe. ... < sigh > which means what can I do ?

Maybe I could discourage all from updating to 11.2 ? … Perhaps I could push a convincing hard line to prospective openSUSE users to ONLY use version 10.3 of openSUSE or bust !! … but then, I recall I no longer have any PCs running openSUSE-10.3 …. OK, so scrap that idea.

I suppose I could learn a bit about pulse audio, as it appears to still have a chance to be the nemesis of Linux sound problems, but even in pulse there is progress being made, either in the Pulse audio development side or in the Linux distribution side. For example on my sandbox PC (an ancient athlon-1100) I noted Pulse Audio was disabled by default upon 11.2 install.

I recall there was a time when users would write horrific rants about the evil state of a stone age SuSE, that did not support their 5.1 surround sound. So after years of many efforts and conversations, trying to convince the wife I needed 5.1 surround sound (which given our small apartment I do not really need) I finally had her blessing and I went out and purchased my self a 5.1 surround sound system thinking I could help them, only to discover: (a) very few users actually use 5.1 surround sound and (b) 90% of the surround sound problems were due to users NOT using their mixer properly. So that was wasted money on my part, as I really don't need a surround sound system (when I turn up my computer’s sound, the neighbours bang on the wall in appreciation, let air out of my car tires so I don’t run away and turn off the sound, and put soap on my windows for some other reason I can not figure out !! ) … .

Now I note some users have problems with multiple sound devices, that they can not get multiple devices working simultaneous, and I suppose I could buy an extra sound card and an extra set of speakers to plug in and see if I can create a problem with multiple sound devices, and hence able to help such users with the problem. But given my surround sound experience, I anticipate either (1) it will be way too complex for me, or (2) it will “just work” and hence be a relatively simple mixer solution not making it worth my effort, or (4) buying the new sound card and speakers will bankrupt me, or (5) go back to school and learn how to count, in any case causing the wife to divorce me and force me to sell my PCs :) ...

I suppose I could try to offer support on graphics setup, as I have PC's with nVidia cards (FX5200, 8400GS, and GTX260) and one ATI (Radeon HD3450) but those tend to "just work" for me, and hence with my having no problems means I have not learned how to solve the problems of others. ... Plus I like installing the “hardway” (which is not hard) and in today’s point and click repository world, users like me are considered cave men, who belong in museums and in the trenches digging ditches …. I don’t like ditches, so I think I’ll stay away from graphic card support.

I've given up the idea of trying to help with wireless. Too many different types of hardware, and I can't even solve my own problems (without help). Fortunately we have experts on this forum who do understand wireless and who can provide support.

So where does that leave me ? ...

I guess I could buy an organ grinder and a monkey, and try and selling versions of Windoze Vista on the street, distributing an OS that will cause more problems, and then hopefully create a large enough group that even ignorant Windoze users such as myself (with my having not having used Windoze as my main OS at home for 11+ years) can give bad advice. ... But then comes the problem, how do I feed the monkey and maintain the organ grinder ??

... ahh ... the trials and tribulations of a new 11.2 user

OMG what has happened to Suse

robertlafler — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 03:49:18 GMT

I was a fan of Suse in the 9.X days. I love YAST. It is the best system config tool around. Zypper sucks. I tried to install 11.2 rc2 and went to nvidia site to get driver since unlike ubuntu I have to install manually. I get a prompt that says install missing plugin (like ubuntu):-) Great I select the flash plugin and next thing I know the system is doing a complete 700 freaking meg update. You great Novell developers don't see this as a problem? Try to install Ubunku/Kubuntu and see how easy things are. You should be able pull your collective brain power to make Suse what it used to be. I think you got something stuck in the Zypper...lol

Java update not a priority?

j_xavier — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 04:42:42 GMT

being completely paranoid about some things makes me prone to discuss topics that some may not find important or even interesting. my apologies.

a week ago some highly critical security flaws were reported in sun-java 5 and 6 and updates were issued.

my purpose here is not to rant, i would like to be educated.

why is this something that trickles down so slow?

Going back to XP

quilaia — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 20:07:28 GMT

I've been trying linux for about 5 years now, and using openSuse in preference to XP for 3 of those years. 10.3 was a good OS. I had a good 6 months use, without a single problem. 11.0 was faster, looked better, and reasonably stable.

11.1 is a headache. A standard install from the live system was fine. After installing updates and various packages I need for photo editing, the problems began. Programs failed to start. Menus and panels rearranged themselves. In XFCE, the panel disappeared altogether. I tried a clean re-install, choosing my preferred KDE 3.5 desktop. I rebooted the pc and..... found Gnome. I tried another fresh install, thinking I had made a mistake. No. Same result. I checked the forums here, to find other people reporting the same problem. That's a monumental bug in the installer. How did that get through?
Anyway, I gave up on 11.1 and used XP until 11.2 RC1 was available. The install went with no problems, and KDE looks very impressive. I found 11.2 RC1 to be more stable than 11.1 Final! I installed the extra packages I need (rawstudio, hugin etc) and had several days of bliss - until I put my machine in standby mode. That broke it. My desktop starts, but the mouse and keyboard fail to work, thus the ctrl-alt-backspace combo does not work, nor do any of the command keys. There is plenty of hard drive activity, but no response from user inputs. It's fubared.

So, I'm in a quandry. I like suse - it's not too easy, not too hard, and when it works, I am far more productive than when using Micro$oft offerings. But, it doesn't work anymore. 11.1 was appalling, and I'm not convinced that 11.2 will be any better. Having given up hope that suse will improve, and not having found another distro I like (or that works reliably), I am going back to XP, not because I like it, but because it just works. I install new software, and it does not break. I suspend and resume and it does not break. I move icons, or change taskbar properties, and it does not break.

Having said that, if I can find a linux based system that is as solid as 10.3, but faster, I will be a very happy man.

Each system has it's strengths weaknesses and followings

techwiz03 — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 09:20:09 GMT

People are very reluctant to change ... people as a rule want the easiest path to an end result
and this in itself is usually the path they know something about or have had their first
experience with.
"Murphy's law states : If you try to please everybody, somebody isn't going to like it!"

If we take apart the various system concepts maybe I can help demonstrate why the systems are different.
Windows:

A paid for base product
Consists of the kernel, integrated closed structure Window manager & Desktop with an open frame filesystem
While many basic system device drivers for a wide variety devices are included in the install, they often
require motherboard drivers provided by the MBO mfg to complete the integration.
Apart from a few applications like notepad, wordpad, minesweep, solitaire, Internet Explorer, and Webmail
the user is on his/her own to select and install what he/she needs.
While this system has a CLI (command line interface) it is virutally baren of many of the more useful tools
that one would expect from an OS.
device drivers and a master registry are loaded during start-up and kept until shutdown.
The operating system has no knowledge of what applications are available or from whom.
Very loose security, many infection risks, poor memory management, etc...

Quote:

Complaints:
*Progressivly runs slower as registry bloats and malware/spyware/adware accumulates
*Runs quite poorly with all kinds of crashes, freeze-ups, etc..
*Defragmenting of hardisk, scanning for infections, patching, and clean-ups take a huge amount of time.
*Lack of CLI tools
*Poor memory management prone to leaks and lockouts
*No secure point of reference on downloaded apps. Yes we can find all sorts of free downloads but there
really isn't anyone responcible for test them to be virus free or properly functional.
*Lack of security
*Everything wanted or of real value costs money which doesn't fit with many people's economics

Praises:
*Installs fairly easy on a new system
*Very little to do once the MBO disc is installed and hardware supplied install disc's done.
*Just works until it doesn't

Mac:

A paid for base product
Consists of the kernel, integrated closed structure Window manager & Desktop with a Closed Frame filesystem
Each system has a dedicated hardware and is supplied with the necessary device drivers.
Applications supplied are few and alternate applications must be provided by the mfg of the Mac.
No CLI to my knowledge (I haven't found one in my brief experience with Mac's)
Not too much info about this very closed system is available. But it does seem to work with it's limited
functionality.
The OS has no knowledge of what applications are available or from whom but, the whom is Mac since they are
the only ones who can write apps for the system.
Tighter security, fewer infection risks, reasonable memory management (does crash but does slow down)

Quote:

Complaints:
*Very proprietary, Mac supplies hardware, OS, and Apps either from them or special venders with agreements
*Too stale and closed system
*Lack of cutting edge Applications with real power

Praises:
*Just works

Linux as a CLI

A free OS base product
Consists of the kernel, command line interpreter, and a secure frame filesystem
Hardware support for various motherboard configurations is built into various versions of the kernel as
software programmers manage to create the appropriate drivers to support them.
Applications CLI based abound coming from all over the community. Anyone with the knowhow can develope
applications for the benefit of all. The degree of usefulness of such apps varies by purpose and skill.
In most cases, the apps can be .deb based or .rpm based.
The CLI is the most powerful one in the industry. It encompases, multiple forms of help, device control,
user control, group control, services control, and set-up of: networking, services, devices, etc...
The system is highly stable, manages memory well by only loading drivers, libraries, and setting files for
running apps.
If the system is rpm based, there is a real application management system because as you encounter more rpm's
the system broadens the application base of what is installed vs what is available. If the system is .deb based,
you usually need a separate program for managing repositories and package availability.
Very tight security, on both the desktop and server systems. Infections are to date unheard of with the claveat
that if you use VMware, or wine to run an insecure Windows based product you could damage your system.

Quote:

Complaints:
*Don't want to use a CLI
*Too hard to configure, have to read lots and think
*High learning curve, takes too long to become productive

Praises:
*Highly configurable
*Highly Stable
*Can function as a workstation, a server, or both

Linux as a GUI

The x-86free or simular xwindow controller adds the basic structure for allowing for a GUI
Various Desktops like KDE, Gnome, Xfce, CDE, iceworm, etc are made available. They each have their
good and bad points, and each are being independantly developed by their own groups.
GUI applications are likewise developed by independant groups and made available to the Linux community
on the whole as free software under the GPL.

Quote:

Complaints:
*Why so many desktops, why can't Linux have one desktop that just works like windows
*Why can't all GUI applications be from one central place for anyone using Linux

Praises:
*A choice of desktops allows me to choose what works for me no-one is forcing me
*Applications are available and can be managed through software management for easy add/remove

Linux as a distribution

Each Distribution sets their own method of packaging through the use of repositories which are
designed to simplify things for their users.
Each Distribution sets their own propietary method of handling system wide set-up and control.
Each Distribution has there own means of determining what to include or exclude based upon core values of
stability, testing, conformity with community wishes, and legal issues.

Quote:

Complaints:
*Distro such and such doesn't do things like this one does
*I can get/use program xyz with distro x so why does distro y not include it
*I had Problems with distro x with my hardware but distro y worked just fine

Praises:
*Distro x is working so fantastic for me