I really wanted to use suse..but this is just getting stupid

English Soapbox
#1

Heres the deal…

I was pretty much over the slow clunky crash prone…piece of crap that xp is… though… I have been a long time xp user…and I know it pretty well… as anyone does that has used it for a while…since its screwed them and it has had to be reinstalled so many frickin times!!!

Its crashed more time than i can say…its screwed me out if hundreds of hours of wasted time…and let me add this before I go any further…

Im a computer USER… my goal is not to spend my time working on or tweaking my computer…I want to set it up…and have it WORK period… like most things its occasionally going to glitch…ok…fine enough…but bringing my work to a screeching halt for a week every 3 months because its decided to go insane and make me spend vast amounts of time reinstalling the entire fricking thing from scratch… IM DONE XP… but…bummer…

Im a web designer… I want to get up…walk to the computer and function…period…

I also think there is a difference between folks like myself…“end users”… and “geeks”… geeks being those that enjoy endless tinkering with their computers…trying to get that last bit of performance out of them, while putting in the time and energy to truly understand how and why it all works…just as a master mechanic might with his car… Im not that… Its simply a tool for me and i want to get from point a to point b with the least amount of BS possible…

btw…not slammin on the geeks…much love to the geeks…

I have no issue taking the time to learn a new bit of tech…but my learning it is not because I want to learn it…its because I need to in order to actually function…
to get from point a to point b…my computer use is task/goal oriented

So I thought I would vent a bit on here… since …well I cant do much else… apparently i dont have permission…and…oh yes… I cant listen to any music… well …not unless i want to uninstall and then reinstall the sound card every time I boot the puter… I would listen to a cd…but well…seems I cant do that either…because… well…apparently suse has decided that…though it sees my cd drive…well its simply not in the mood to mount it… unlike the last time I booted the puter…and it mounted just fine…apparently it depends on its mood… Im assuming that last bit.

Now I really really wanted to dump xp …but so far… this has not been a fun transition, and frankly im about to say screw it…and delete suse… not much has been easy or str8forward about this…

Im not going to go into a litany of everything I have had to put up with… but just to give you a bit of how i got here…

my main working pc had a hardware failure…an intermittent one at that …and after exhaustive trying to figure it out… again…i want to function not tinker… but Im talking weeks of it being a giant pain in my ass… I decided… ok…this puter is 5 years old…its stood me well…but its going to nickel and dime me to death as i try to figure it out…bottom line…time to build a new one…because i need to FUNCTION not tinker

so i jump onto new egg order all the bits… 750 gig sata hd quad core amd processor…8 gigs of ram… fairly uber nvidia dual head video card…blah blah blah… like I said…not a geek…“user”…but i know my hardware and im building a pc that should last me another 5 years…

let me also mention… i dont game…i use my pc to work period
and the 750 gig hard drive is overkill for me… since… i learned the hard way (FUXP)… not to store my working files inside my computer… I work off of 2 usb 1tb external drives…one of the drives is my “working drive”… the other is there simply as a backup drive for the first…and depending on suses mood any given day thay are mounted of not…or fu, you cant move that today you dont have permission

So I get all the bits in the mail…and build this new puter…I put a 125gb ntfs partition on it and slam a copy of xp on it…(just in case)

the rest of the hard drive. I leave it to suse to set it up as it pleases… I also know im planning on running a copy of xp inside suse as a virtual machine…there are a couple of programs i still need to use…so im willing to live with that… though at this time i havent installed it yet…

well I cant really…no cd drive.at least not this boot…who knows maybe itll be in the mood next time… one can only hope… on an amusing note…i just realized i could hit my favorite radio station… kexp…and stream some music to listen to…but apparently…between the last time i did it and now…suse seems to have forgotten how its done…maybe its been hanging out with the dvd drive… hmmmmmm

now… I realistically did not expect to make this transition trouble free…and it has not been…but I expected a REASONABLE amount of learning curve…and issues…its been anything but that

One thing I was very excited about was finally having a fairly stable os… thats a spine tingling thought for an old xp guy like me…

the install went fine… got xp in place…then suse went right in… and now…hmmm… transitioning… actually using my computer… and thats where the problems seem to come in…

you see… I really do know how to use my puter… i truly know what I want to do with it… and you know… i do not want it to tell me i do not have permission…basically as far as this computer is concerned Im FRICKIN GOD…

this has been a weeks long nightmare of permission issues…cant do this… issues…cant mount this or that…cant unmount this or that… BECAUSE YOU DONT HAVE PERMISSION… i get there is security in place… and i have way more options with suse… than I have with windows… but the one option i do not have…that for me as a USER is one of the most important…

is the ability to FUNCTION with out the OS being in my way…
if I do a fresh install of xp… itll drive me nuts out of the box…with all its interference… but 20 min of turning off this and that… and its tame and been shut up…and it “obeys” period…

But this has been a never ending litany of what I CANT and what Im not ALLOWED to do… this os is so in my way its unbelievable…and there is no simple or str8forward way of making it simply shut the fu** up and move the fuc**** files where i want them…

OMG… what a pain in the ass… and let me stop here… please dont bother responding with… a laundry list of why its that way… as an end user… like most “USERS” …I dont care…I dont give crap one why it wont let me move something or copy something or delete something…

if i want to do it…you are the computer…obey…and dont make jump through a million fu***** hoops to delete copy or move a file…

Im not a rookie computer user…i do not need to be protected from myself… and yes i do get that suse isnt just for single person one user pc’s…and it can do so much more…problem…it seems pretty much impossible to make it do less…

As a xp user making the transition to linux and suse …I have to say actually functioning is a giant pain in the ass…and you know…I wouldnt mind that if it meant taking a couple of days to do a little research and find out what has to be turned off or beaten into submission in order for me to be god on my pc… on xp it takes about 20 min…and Im god … and as I mentioned… i dont need you telling me why i dont need to be or why I shouldnt be…

because if thats your urge…your obviously not listening…its simply the way I choose it to be… I see a ton of posts about how linux lets you control so much more…
but what seems imposable to find is a simple str8forward way to beat it into submission… so xp…20 min done… it does as its told… suse…2 weeks in…and im still not in charge…so a task that should take a second or 2 now takes an entire afternoon of trying to figure out why it refuses AGAIN…

now… again. i get how Superior… suse is to windows…on alot of areas…but when it comes to doing the simplest of tasks…that pertain to simply WORKING…its a frickin nightmare… so as much as i hate to say it…what good is all that superiority if its so **** annoying to use its driving me back to xp!

#2

Wrong section and you really should consider paragraphing things better, makes for easier reading.

Also cut down on the dots a bit, no one is going to read it through - the only thing I could concentrate on was the amount of dots.

#3

your the one i was mentioning…obviously not listening…
…

#4

Let me ask you this - how long have you been using Windows and how long have you been using Linux?

Indeed - I used Windows ever since 3.x came out and have learned the ins-and-outs of the system in the past 18 years, making it “somewhat easier” to tune things to the way I liked.

How would you fare if you had used Linux for say, 4-5 years? Indeed.

#5

Moved to Soapbox

Heh, that was a fun reading, despite the dots :wink:

Seeing this is your first post with a new OS I don’t see you actually asked here for help. It would probably have been a way less painful transition if you had done so.

You don’t give any specs of the software you’ve installed so I can just imagine that the problems you describe are due to:

a.- Newcomer that doesn’t know what to do/how to solve problems in the new OS, no matter how proficient he/she is with the ‘old’ OS
b.- Installation of beta or not updated software
c.- Hardware incompatibility (less likely, fmpov)

I, and most of us here, can have Suse up and running in 20 minutes (or less) :slight_smile:

#6

If you don’t care to learn why other people did things a particular way, then you deserve all the trouble you get.

Linux has permissions for a reason. Life has permissions for a reason. That’s why machinery has finger guards, why pill bottles have child-proof lids, why cars have seatbelts.

You may not want to believe me, but experienced Linux users are the ones who have all the permissions set, because they know why it’s a good idea.

So, you’ve got two choices. Rewrite the rule book as you wish and suffer, or stop telling the world it’s wrong and start listening to other people. We want to help you, but we aren’t here to indulge you.

#7

Even the most season’d and experienced Linux users find it important to maintain the permissions security philosophy that is in place in Linux. They have probably forgotten more about Linux than I will ever know, and quite possibly forgotten more about Linux than you will ever know.

The security policy is in place for good reason. It not ONLY protects one against one self (as you pointed out) but it also protects the rest of us where the computer is connected to the internet. PCs that run Linux with root permissions most of the time (or with far less control over permissions) are much more vulnerable to exterior hacking (and yes, Linux CAN be hacked) and hacked Linux computers area a menace to the Internet.

Congratulations on your Linux efforts, but if Linux is not for you, its not really a big thing. Go with the OS that you prefer the most, whether it be winXP with which you are familiar with, or with MacIntosh (which is built on a Unix backbone and provides a lot of superb functionality), or with Linux, if you can get over your aversion to running the Linux OS prudently, as determined by users who know more than you and I will ever know about Linux.

#8

Reference permissions, the longer one uses Linux, the more second nature this becomes. Expert users typically do not think twice about permissions, and modify them and change back/forth between administrator with no pain nor difficulty.

Initially as a new Linux user, one will find something does not work, and will almost immediately try again (from a konsole or terminal) with root permissions. The need to continually do that is the “bane” of a new users “newbie” experience, and is incredibly frustrating for new Linux users. We have all been thru that learning curve. As one obtains more experience, one begins to under stand the philosophy as to what requires root permissions, and what does not, and suddenly it all slips into place, … suddenly things “just work” that did not before as easily, and it is significantly better from a “user friendliness” perspective. (Of course from a functionality/security/safety perspective it always was better.)

Possibly the one area that still comes to bite even the more experienced users (although it bites the experienced users less) is when permissions are setup wrong by the distribution packager. A case in point is openSUSE-11.1 where there were problems in permissions for CD and DVD burning (where until HAL was fixed, there was a work around to add regular users to group “cdrom” and group “disk”, in essence increasing their permissions (at a somewhat increased security risk)). That fix was easy for experienced users to find, but a pain for new and average users.

Another example of frustrating permissions was for some scanners, where in order for some scanning applications to use the scanner, required adding the regular user to group “lp”. That is not intuitively obvious, and once again, that sort of fix was easy for experienced users to find, but a pain for new and average users.

Fortunately for both cases I gave above, a 5 or 10 minute google search finds the answer.

In summary, permission familiarity comes with time of use (of Linux). If one does not have the patience for that, then one can migrate to a Linux distribution which puts less emphasis on security (and there are such distributions), or one can migrate to a Mac or back to a Microsoft Windows products. The vast majority of PC users still use Microsoft Windows, and if one can rise above the frustrations you adequately described in your first post (and most PC users in the world who use MS-Windows appear to rise above those frustrations) then MS-Windows is an OS that one can use instead of Linux. …

Good luck in what ever direction you go for your PC OS.

#9

And I’d have got something in value range and “certified” for SLED, but capable for all but the L33t games, and have absolutely no trouble… the savings, they generally buy a whole new faster box in 3 yrs.

Obviously it’d not be worth my time, doing any research, definitely not worth reading about “users” option for mount, where the auto-mounting on hotplug isn’t enough. Nor should I appreciate, how the system protects me from the consequences of my cluelessness. Nor should I think twice about using a newly released OS version, when there’s one 6 months older, that’s been tried and tested.

#10

This is how I see the OP…

“I’m a troll… I troll because that’s what trolls do… As I troll harder, I become a bigger troll… If you feed me, I’ll troll your @ss away… Other trolls don’t like me trolling… so they troll me while I troll ya all… as they troll me, they get trolled by other trolls for trolling… those other trolls in return get trolled by me even harder… so we all have a nice trollfest going on while getting trolled by trolls for trolling as we troll…”

/troll

#11

You know, I should feel sorry for you. However I just can’t find it in me to do so. You say you just expect things to work. Why would anyone own a car, and not know anything about how they work? Likewise why have a computer, if you are not willing to understand how they do things?
I get frustrated too. I looked at this forum this morning to get some information about installing suse myself.I am having some problems getting it installed properly on my older PC. I have it running on my new laptop, and everything is working just fine. Not that I didn’t have some problems at the start. It took me exactly two days of “tinkering” to get up and functioning like I wanted it.

Like you I am a “user” not a geek. I use my computer for certain tasks that suit my personal interests. I came here not once, but probably five or six times and read what others had posted, and asked questions. Only then, did I figure out what I was doing wrong, and fixed the problems. You claim you are a “web designer”. Well if in fact you are, then you had to LEARN how to do that. Likewise if you are going to use an OS you have to learn how to use it as well.
I vent myself, when I get frustrated. I also realize that my frustration comes from my own inability to understand why something doesn’t work. So if you don’t like it, try something else. But by all means don’t blame the OS for your own ignorance of how it works!>>:(

#12

Search the forums for your troubles, the answers might be in here someplace. That’s what I do, ask and search for stuff.

#13

Kenny1948 wrote:
> You know, I should feel sorry for you. However I just can’t find it in
> me to do so. You say you just expect things to work. Why would anyone
> own a car, and not know anything about how they work? Likewise why have
> a computer, if you are not willing to understand how they do things?
Ummm…the majority of the car owning world must bother you since most
people only know how to pump gas and drive (and that one they don’t do
that well). Most people can’t even change a flat, trust me as an ex-tow
truck driver.

#14

Wow. This was an interesting couple of pages. I expected the learning curve when I made the decision to jump into Linux. I used the LiveCD of Ubuntu and OpenSuse, and decided upon the OpenSuse. I installed the Gnome, and now have asked how to uninstall it, so I can reinstall with KDE. (Maybe that will be able to find my sound card!)

As for the security issues, I have not had any troubles. Maybe I don’t have the settings set properly. Hummm… When I enter YaST I have to use my password. That is a good thing. Are there other security issues? Ah yes, that learning curve.

David

#15

Wow. Such hostility and arrogance in this thread.

Look guys, the OP just wanted his installation to “Just Work”. Why shouldn’t he be able to expect exactly that without having people label him a troll or “feeling sorry for him”? Going with that guy’s car analogy, does he feel sorry for the vast majority of the car-driving people of the world who have no clue how a car works other than pumping gas and maybe a little oil into it? Why should they bother to learn something if they don’t want to? They presumably learned to do something else, obtain a medium of exchange for doing it (money, mostly), and then use that to obtain goods they can’t build themselves, like cars, or the services of people who know other stuff, like a mechanic.

Look, as a certified geek (CS major, 10-yr linux user, overall nerd) I understand the point of view of the tinkerer: we are usually flabbergasted to see that people just don’t share our healthy curiosity for how the world works, machines, physics, all of it. And often we are also resentful of those who don’t because they are usually the majority and some bad apples like to have fun at our expense. So we lash out, and label them as inferior, make fun of them in return, make ourselves as superior in our minds.

But here’s the thing: They are not inherently inferior because they don’t care to learn. I know, that’s a hard reality to have to come to grips with, mostly because we have come to define ourselves mainly by our curiosity and desire to learn and ability to fix and understand and tinker. They’re just regular folks like us with problems and passions and the difficulty of having to decide what to do with the little time we have left when we’re not trying to keep ourselves fed and clothed. Some decide to geek out and learn, others dance, while others chase members of the opposite sex. And who is to say who is more right than the other? As long as no harm is being done to anyone, every person has the right to do as they wish, without being criticized for it.

OK sorry for this longish rant, but some of the comments here rubbed me the wrong way; because attitudes like these are the reason most regular folks are turned off from the fascinating and embracing world of free software. Don’t you realize that’s the whole point? Inclusion! Freedom! Sharing of knowledge! Sharing. Giving people the ability to do what they want with the computer, even if they have no clue how to program or how to use a CLI. I detect a basic lack of humanity toward others in these attitudes, and that is just a messed-up worldview.

I only hope the OP isn’t turned off from Linux by these posts, and that he finds a community that is welcoming of him even with his ignorance and cluelessness. Because we were all newbs once.

#16

Presumeably not all comments rubbed you the wrong way. Is it fair for you to generalize against all who posted? . …

Reference the unkind comments, sometimes users will deliberately reply in kind (with the same tone) to a post they consider unreasonable. Some might say yours is a case in point.

As long as there are no insults (and this thread is starting to follow a very fine line) then we let the thread run. That is especially true in the “soapbox” area.

But I ask everyone to please, in our soapbox area, be mindful of the rules.

#17

Fair enough. Like I said, some of the comments were irritating, and I don’t think I generalized “against” all posters but I hope I didn’t offend anyone because that was so not the point.

I’ve already mentioned the commenter who said he “should feel sorry” for the OP, also someone even labeled him a troll. For venting. Maybe even I’ll be labeled a troll too, but if you read my words you’ll see I’m not trying to provoke, at least not angry emotions but rather insight.

I spoke about not being mindful of others, and I may have committed that same mistake in attempting to point it out. If anyone took offense I apologize. But realize that the OP came here with a legitimate concern, and with a long rant which was just venting, and IMO he’s actually in the right: why should he be forced to learn a bunch of stuff he’s not interested in atm? Linux should Just Work, and if it doesn’t it’s not the user’s fault but the developers’. And as the support community, we have the moral obligation of listening respectfully to users’ concerns, however poorly specified they may be.

#18

Oh no, did we irritate you? I’m so sorry. Oh wait, I’m not.

Why should we idly watch his crying? Because he’s a new user who has contributed absolutely nothing to anything yet he feels he’s entitled to cry about every single detail.

Did he pay for Linux? Unlikely. Did he contribute something? Definitely not.

A very narrow view. If you’re not interested in knowing or understand anything about the operating system or software you’re using, you have no right to complain about them either.

I don’t have the moral obligation to do jack. I help people because I wish to give something back that they’ve given to me for free, this does not include people who come and go as the wind.

If a persons first post on forum is one where he does nothing but cry I will treat him in much the same manner as he has seen fit to treat us.

#19

The OP knows how things should work! Just how he thinks is “right”, shown when he writes “I can beat XP into submission in 20 minutes”. No suggestion that he had any open mind, appreciating basic computer security.

Someone who tries something new, with the mindset that it must do exactly what he thinks is right, has a problem, and it’s not the new OS flaws (which they all have, yes even MacOSX and Windows 7++ Pundit special version).

Linux cannot work for someone who stubbornly, tries to go against the best working practices of the system. Folk have to accept that it’s impossible to please everyone. Also suggesting someone is ‘trolling’ is hardly hugely offensive, after they’ve written a huge FLAME.

#20

You make some good points.

Reference “Linux should just work” , thats a true comment for all OS. Some are closer to that than others, but there are some things working against that wrt to Linux.

  • typically when something is created that purportedly “just works” it had to make compromises along the way, and force users down a specific path. That forced approach can infuriate some people. I had a friend spend over an hour trying to show me the mac and how things “just worked”. He gave up with disgust with me, because I was pointing out things just “DID NOT” work. They only worked if one followed a VERY SPECIFIC drag and drop sequence. If one could not guess that sequence, nothing happened. Often no feed back. Nothing. Well I hate that, and I much prefer Linux, with all its quirks.

My point? Linux (contrary to the "just works MacIntosh " ) appeals to a different type of user. The “just work” users are often more comfortable with a Mac. And thats fair game. But the “lets hack” users often prefer Linux. And many of us like it that way, and don’t agree with the “just work” philosophy. We are not interested in seeing Linux world domination, as opposed to the “just work” users who often seem to use that as their prevailing argument (ie if Linux wants wider acceptance, it need to “just work”). Eliteness? No. Definitely NO. But likely the ability to dive in the innards and hack? Yes. Most definitely YES.

  • Reference the moral obligation to listening respectfully to users’ concerns, however poorly specified? Yes, in general. But listen to insults? How far? … I think many of those responding on this thread were insulted by the first post, and they responded in kind.

The users on this forum (including the moderators and admins) in the most part are not paid. They are volunteers. They have frustrations at work during the day. They go home at night and can have frustrations at home. So in a perfect world they will put up with all kinds of forum insults. In a perfect world they will reply nicely to the most insulting user. BUT, in practice, that does not happen. Often people are people, and responses are given in kind.

So while I agree with you, I think I have a more philosophical view that these things happen, and to simply agree to freely take insults by frustrated users, to freely let users insult the dev’s (when in fact the poster is technically wrong), is not an acceptable approach any more than insulting back in turn. Being quiet to incorrect views that are given in an insulting manner is not a correct approach. Neither insulting approach is good. So what do we do? Lock and delete the first insulting post ? No. Delete or Lock all of the reply posts in kind? … No. Not all. … its a fine line to draw, … and a difficult line at that. Each responding side has their points. Each user expressing frustration via insults has their view. How far do we let it go ?

But really, the bottom line is we definitely appreciate everyone’s input. And as you note, in different words, its VERY IMPORTANT that we try to get along.