Is Updating and Installing Softwares (packages) Easy in OpenSuse for newbies?
Yes - without a doubt.
I started with Linux in November, played with loads and settled with Opensuse Gnome, even again trying opensuse KDE this weekend I went straight back to the Gnome version as my preferred and daily OS.
As a beginner myself I find the addition and editting of the main repositories very easy. I have it set to install recommended and security updates automatically and then every now and then have a scan of the update list in the Yast-Install software package and add a few that I want to and I think are needed. I do also have to trust some of the pop-up boxes that come up when installing regarding problems with dependancies and changing repo’s to install newer versions. Not sure whether this is right or wrong. As long as I don’t have an rogue repo’s added the messages seem to be correct and keep me in line.
It’s also excellent to search for software and technical bits for codecs and plug-ins.
Of course. I’m playing with Ubuntu at the moment… and the package management is a way better in openSUSE.
yup, it is 
Easy as pie.
Easy - Yes.
But once users go delving in to Build Service. One Clicking everything they come across - They (newbies) might reason differently to the answer I gave.
I beg to differ…
you have to type “zypper in package” and omg dude, that’s sooo difficult, ya know. I was like, wtf man? that’s too much to type, imma pay Chrysantine with her fat fingers to do it for me 
oops, I just contradicted my own post above
As someone that still has a lot of newbism how hard is Yast>Software>Software Management> then look for blue stuff?
OMG! that’s SOOOOOOOOO hard! I’ll have to leave this linux stuff!
rotfl!rotfl!
I would say ‘yes’ but I’ve been using suse for many years now - so perhaps my answer is not fair. I did try ubuntu on an old spare p/c and was completely lost with apt.
when i came to linux, I tried a number of distro’s, the main reason i settled in the begining with Opensuse was our easy it was to install, update, etc. I got lost with the other distro’s so for me opensuse was a great place to start and learn.
my only annoyance is the size of updates. For example, a package needs updating with KDE, you need to update the full KDE package rather than just the one application, which is annoying when you are on limited bandwidth and only want to update to fix a bug. lol.
Sorry I had to vote no. The real question is… easier that what?
Me? The only OS’s I’ve messed with are the flavors of Window$ and Suse.
I know the question is about installing and upgrading software packages, but I’d spent maybe 20-30 hours over 2-3 weeks a couple years ago with v10.2 to get my Linksys wireless working. I gave up and went back to Window$.
About a year ago wireless wasn’t that important so I gave another shot at 10.2.
I was designing and rendering 3D graphics in Win and wanted to try Blender.
I got the RPM from the repository and used YaST but it said I need another package installed first. I found that package which needed another package before that one could be installed.
I gave up at that point until recently.
I downloaded 11.1 and installed without a hitch.
Too bad the popular Linksys PCMCIA still doesn’t work out of the box with 11.1.
Should I spend more time troubleshooting that one? Possibly another countless hours? I haven’t decided yet.
I still need some Win apps not available in Linux flavors so I installed VirtualBox without a hitch.
So regarding the question “yes” I do think installation has improved.
So … Why the no vote?
Because now VB does not see my USB drives, they are unavailable. Looks like I’ll need to experiment with command line. It’s not something I look forward doing.
So I vote a rounding “YES” if it has improved but “No” for us noobs who hate messing with command line after the software is installed.
Please don’t misunderstand me.
With VB working I have no more use for a dual boot machine to “try” Suse. I plan on making Suse my primary OS and weene myself off the Win programs in the areas I can.
I wouldn’t keep Suse as an OS if I didn’t think it was just wonderful.
I just wish things would install and then (Most important) work better than what I’ve experienced.
yes for the most part, on par with Ubuntu in my experience.
1 click install is a big feather in Opensuse’s cap though, good tool for beginners.
But add/remove in ubuntu can be just as easy.
Hi. I vote yes, cause I think it is easy for newbies to intall software in openSUSE. But it’s different from Windows (and Mac). Therefore new users have to get familiar with the way it works. My experience is that many have no idea what package management is. But once you teach them how to search for packages and add repositories they consider that package management is much more convenient than the windows way of installing. On windows, when you click the “AntiVir” download button on Avira’s homepage you will have to select a download mirror and then navigate through a cascade of websites. With Yast it’s just a few clicks and it’s installed; just as an example.
Furthermore you can also install in a windows manner. I’ll take Skype as an example or Zattoo: Choose to download the opensuse rpm from their website and you’ll be asked to save the file or to install it via Yast. That’s easy. Not to forget 1-click-install.
We’re on par in comparison with Debian based distributions when it comes to ease of use, I think. But what about Mac? I am not a Mac user and had to find out how to install software on that platform but in the end it was… easy. You just have to drop a file into the programs folder.
install software on SUSE?.. piece of cake 
Installing suse provided software is extremely easy, I agree there.
But making a system actually useful by an end user is extremely difficult, confusing, and downright bloody annoying.
The design of openSUSE is this - Install all the officially provided corporate America friendly software you like, but we will make life hell for the user that actually wants to use the ****ed thing!
Does anyone actually* use* openSUSE without any useful features?
Things like proprietary video driver, movie playback capability, DVD playback, mp3 capability, wireless drivers etc’. Do you actually use openSUSE without adding any other repo?
Sure, if you only check email and write a letter to your great grandmother you are on a winner, but the normal computer user needs more than that!
Even the opensource HP (endorsed and provided by HP!) printer software is purposely left to be an extremely outdated and useless version for anyone who has a modern printer, and the normal up-to-date version is purposely hidden away in packman! Why?
Updates are NOT updates! To actually get your system upto date, you have to mess around with repos and other nonsense and do cryptic black magic things in Yast!
Hardware not supported? Your problem was fixed 2 kernel versions ago but we won’t tell you that or even offer you the option to update.
It’s policy! …oh, well that’s OK then, I’ll just wait another 8 months for a slightly newer kernel and hope that my hardware is not too old to run the rest of the distro!
I challenge all the people who voted yes (and also those who are going to try to rip me a new one for my outspoken views!) to try a clean install of openSUSE 11.1 without adding any other repos and doing all the provided updates. Use that for a week then report back here.
That includes not installing naughty forbidden wireless drivers!
My biggest gripe is the update system, this ridiculous idea of downloading 1 package then immediately installing it is so stupid that I can’t find words enough that I won’t get banned for!
If you haven’t been bitten by this ridiculous system yet, then good luck, but it will happen. And when it does I challenge you to post here on the forum and tell us how fabulous you think the update system is then!
All packages for an update should be downloaded to the client machine first and then installed.
There is no excuse for this not being done, and the ridiculous “well it saves disk space” argument is a a big steaming pile of excuse! Computers have the ability to check the client system first to make sure it has enough space, that’s what computers do!
If one sad person in a Novell back office somewhere has a really small hard disk and is scared that he won’t have enough space to do his updates, why make us all suffer? Why not simply make it a choice? I’m dead sure that more people who use openSUSE have enough hard drive space to spare than don’t, so make it the default, and then put a little button somewhre that you can check that enables the old style update.
Don’t get me wrong, I really like openSUSE, it is extremely well put together and functions very well, I just want it to be the best Linux distro avaialble and these things knock it off the top place.
I’ve used that setup on a few hundred servers for years now - what’s the problem?
And what are these servers used for? Serving? Exactly my point, a server is not an end user machine. An end user (read as desktop user) needs significantly more than a simple web browser and email client.
Is openSUSE supposed to be a server distro or a desktop distro?
As a server distro it would work fine, well, apart from if you wanted to attach a newer than 1 year old HP printer of course, then you would have to learn what packman is and how to manually tell yast or zypper that you would like to switch to the packman version, or download the source and compiler (oh yes, and also make, as that is not added automatically when selecting gcc anymore, at least in 11.2 milestone1!) and compile it yourself.
But I can already hear the reply to that one ringing loud in my ears "well, if you are running a server you should know how to blah blah blah etc’.
My point is if openSUSE really wants to be a “Desktop” distro, then make these “human” end-user features easier to setup. Don’t hide them away and pretend that they don’t exist.
And I also understand perfectly why they are hidden away, openSUSE is a testbed for the commercial SLED product, nothing more, nothing less.
It is designed to conform to US legal “standards” and appease copyright holders, lawyers, and other certain oversised corporations with which it has legal ties.
And for that purpose it is nicely inane.
Really @growbag, you should take your grievances to WWW rather than specifically openSUSE. Novel are just being careful in most part not to infringe on copyright. And FYI, everything on my laptop works from default install (except of course the likes of flash-player, mp3 etc…)
I can’t really see what you are griping about, though I agree that the updater (which I always disable) is not very useful once you add repo’s beyond the default. And I don’t get this point you make:
My biggest gripe is the update system, this ridiculous idea of downloading 1 package then immediately installing it is so stupid that I can’t find words enough that I won’t get banned for!
Servers mostly don’t use a GUI and Heidi whilst correct, is not really addressing your Desktop/Multi-media requirements. It’s really all a never ending load of wind blowing - this arguing about it.
Just let’s get on an use it, and enjoy it. Which you seam to be doing despite your hangups.
Actually my mother and father use pretty much 4 things on their machines; A web browser, an email client, an office suite and picture viewer.
For those purposes even the “out of the box” 11.1 would work pretty well, don’t you think? After all Flash works, MP3 does work with gstreamer+fluendo and Open Office does what little office things they need.
Both and it works well for both purposes - we use it at work for desktop purposes and server as well.
And that’s why we have PS and network printing - you can always use IPP like we do. The machines don’t really need to know what printer is at the other end, all they have to agree is on what form to send the information over.
If you want to change this - run for the office. Unfortunately as long as Novell is a US based company, they’re tied with the legislation of that particular country, whether we like it or not - as a group of people not working for them we can always skid the laws a bit where there’s dark and shady.
Do you think I find it amusing or wonderful that you have to use out of the distribution tools and websites to install somewhat dubious packages of uncertain legality? Of course not but that’s where were standing currently as the legislation has not yet caught up with realities.
Actually my mother and father use pretty much 4 things on their machines; A web browser, an email client, an office suite and picture viewer.
Maybe, but what do YOU use it for? Do YOU have packman stuff installed, or proprietary drivers? That was my challenge.
Maybe we should have another poll asking how many users here on the forum use a “pure” openSUSE, and how many don’t. If people answer honestly, it would be interesting don’t you think?