I’m thinking to go from xubuntu 14.04 to opensuse rolling release (I’m building my own spin, LXQT + Openbox), I’m going to ask few questions about that, I’ve been using Linux for years, my main experience is in Debian, Ubuntu and Centos.
The first question, how active is this community? I tried many distros, I dumped Crunchbang because its community is very small, I dumped Mint because their forum is dead technically. I hate ubuntu, I’m a debian fan, but I use xubuntu because I’m an established user on Askubuntu.com, if I ever have a problem, it will usually be solved in less than 24h. So how active is this forum? How long does it usually take for someone to reply to my questions?
The second question, how does the rolling release work? Like Arch or Manjaro? Arch sends you updates as soon as they are available, Manjaro however waits for 2 weeks (or less) to make sure that the package is stable before it updates your system.
Third question, this maybe hard to answer, how stable is the rolling release, compared to arch or Manjaro. The only reason I am going to try opensuse is because it released a rolling release, so I need to see how it compares to other rolling release distros.
Last question, does it have by default Broadcom 802.11 STA wireless drivers or do I have to go look for them and waste my time compiling them from source like I did in Manjaro?
Although I’m not using it at the moment, Tumbleweed isn’t what I would call unstable. The only thing to bear in mind is that you will need to, for instance, reinstall nvidia drivers each time there is a new kernel update. If you have years of experience this will not be a deal breaker though and I personally found everything worked well. On most technical issues there are some very competent, knowledgeable users of this forum who are more than happy to help and turn around is quick.
I have tried other distros but I always come back to openSUSE. Everyone is friendly and YAST is such a brilliant admin tool. Plus the stability is so much better than the others.
Welcome to the forum and I hope you soon find your feet here!
This depends.
Only certain packages are updated to the latest versions, like the kernel, KDE and GNOME.
They are put into Tumbleweed when the maintainers think they are stable enough. But you might not necessarily get updates directly after the release.
If you want a “real” rolling release, you might have a look at Factory as well. But that’s not as stable as Tumbleweed, although they are working on improving the testing there at the moment, so it might even replace Tumbleweed as the rolling distribution in the not too distant future.
Last question, does it have by default Broadcom 802.11 STA wireless drivers or do I have to go look for them and waste my time compiling them from source like I did in Manjaro?
While the Broadcom STA driver is not part of the distribution because of the license, a package is available in the Packman repo (which you need anyway for full Multimedia support). If you install it from there, you won’t have to compile it from source.
You need to install “broadcom-wl” and one of the “broadcom-kmp-xxx” packages corresponding to the kernel. http://packman.links2linux.de/package/broadcom-wl/all
Depending on what particular wireless device you have it might even work with the in-kernel drivers, you might have to install additional firmware though.
Tumbleweed is the current rolling updates release with a cycle that roughly corresponds to the standard release. When a new standard openSUSE release appears, the Tumbleweed repo is emptied and a new cycle begins with a mixed upgrade/downgrade of packages to that new release. Weeks later, the Tumbleweed repo begins a new cycle of rolling updates, by which time your system has had a chance to re-base onto a new stable openSUSE release.
Of course you also receive all security updates and patches available to the current openSUSE release.
As already mentioned, the main rolling upgrades are for Kernel, KDE, and Gnome, and some other packages. However you can make a request for new packages to be added to Tumbleweed, providing they are already available in Factory. In addition to that, you can often find new packages or newer releases of packages, also built for Tumbleweed, in openSUSE’s Build Service.
@Penguinclaw it’s alright I don’t have nvidia anyway
@wolfi323 I have BCM4313, and I have concerns about the wireless drivers being updated without being tested, last year I spent almost a week trying to configure my wireless drivers, the next day, they updated something, there was some bug and I was left without internet I love having updates for my DE, now I’m stuck with xfce 4.10 although it has few bugs, and 4.12 has been released long ago!
In general, I don’t really like forums and IRC, I prefer Q&A sites, but this forum is friendly, unlike arch forum I’ll go for opensuse, looking forward to be active member here
That on is indeed only supported by the STA (broadcom-wl) driver. So you should add the Packman repo as mentioned and install it from there.
Otherwise (when installing it manually) you would have to reinstall it after every kernel update, which there are many on Tumbleweed.
But you don’t have to worry. That driver is closed-source/proprietary, there likely won’t be an updates there anyway. Only a new package to match a new kernel.
If you do have problems with your wireless driver after a kernel update, you can always boot a previous kernel in “Advanced Options” in the boot menu, where wireless should still work.
I love having updates for my DE, now I’m stuck with xfce 4.10 although it has few bugs, and 4.12 has been released long ago!
XFCE has been added to Tumbleweed recently, but only 4.10 AFAICS. But even according to the official XFCE homepage, 4.10 is the latest version. Where did you see a 4.12? http://www.xfce.org/download
However for some reason, the command xfce4-about will output xfce 4.10
By the way guys, I use gmail, when you replied to my topic, the messages go to spam, Just so you know, maybe some configuration needed to the mail server.
Ok are you doing this in openSUSE? If so we don’t generally use app-get (I do believe it is available) the installer is zypper (command line) or Yast (Graphical)
