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OpenSuSE 11.0 Installer Looks Gorgeous

Alessandro17

By Alessandro17,
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Alessandro17
Alessandro17
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There are things like Debian GNU/kFreeBSD, that's why "Linux Distribution" is simply wrong...

 

If you had studied Linguistics for many years as I did, you'd know that you can't teach people what is right or wrong when they talk or write. Right or wrong is what people perceive as such.

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Alessandro17
Alessandro17
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Why exactly are you guys fighting? Who says Linux has to be either better or worse than OSX?

Kumbaya my lord....

Kumbaya

 

I thought this topic had nothing to do with Linux vs. OS X :angel:

 

got to love semantics

 

You must really love it a lot if you posted the same sentence twice :(

 

 

Nice excuse... it doesn't make you more right though.

 

Linguistics is not "an excuse", Linguistics is a science.

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Embio
Embio
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Distributions have always done that (removing or, rather, not using proprietary software)

I can't see how that is a problem.

Debian does that more than any other distro.

Solution: add one or two extra repositories.

 

Oh yes, Debian keeps it as free as possible which I applaud. My point was that according to Novell's new doctrine it would be illegal to add repositories with that code without giving royalties to Microsoft. I find the idea that code can be cut from a distribution on Microsoft's whims quite disgusting. You may say that they own the patents and can do what they like, but they have yet to show the community the offending code, which I'm sure could be re-written to avoid conflict.

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Alessandro17
Alessandro17
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Oh yes, Debian keeps it as free as possible which I applaud. My point was that according to Novell's new doctrine it would be illegal to add repositories with that code without giving royalties to Microsoft. I find the idea that code can be cut from a distribution on Microsoft's whims quite disgusting. You may say that they own the patents and can do what they like, but they have yet to show the community the offending code, which I'm sure could be re-written to avoid conflict.

 

Embio, I don't know how you came to that conclusion.

Have you seen openSUSE 10.3?

YaST has a new module called "Community Repositories"

You can, for instance, enable Packman with one click. From Packman you can get stuff like w32codec-all, libdvdcss (not Microsoft property, I know)...

Opensuse comes also with ntfs-3g in the DVD, if I remember correctly.

You'd be amazed how much "suspicious" stuff (likely to infringe Microsoft intellectual property) you'll find with a "smart search", after configuring Smart properly.

So I don't have a clue where your theory came from.

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Embio
Embio
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It isn't a theory, Novell removed code from OpenSuse 10.3 on Microsoft's orders. If memory serves it was fonts, among other things. This isn't a bit like Debian removing packages because of licensing conflicts, as in the case of Firefox. This was Novell legitimising Microsoft's claims to ownership of code used in many Linux distributions.

 

No, i haven't used OpenSuse 10.3 yet. I did have a play with it back in the 10.1 days and really liked it. I downloaded the liveCD over the Easter holidays, along with Fedora, Gentoo, FreeBSD and Debian in order to find a replacement to Ubuntu (didn't feel I was learning much!) for my Macbook. After trying Fedora, Gentoo and FreeBSD (Gentoo refused to install because my partitioning is a little... shall we say...... funky? :() I settled on Debian for various reasons and didn't 'get round' to OpenSuse. As long as Novell are doing what they are doing with MS, I can't see myself using it on a point of open source principle.

 

You are now free to call me naive :P

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Alessandro17
Alessandro17
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It isn't a theory, Novell removed code from OpenSuse 10.3 on Microsoft's orders.

Links please?

 

If memory serves it was fonts, among other things. This isn't a bit like Debian removing packages because of licensing conflicts, as in the case of Firefox. This was Novell legitimising Microsoft's claims to ownership of code used in many Linux distributions.

There is much to say about that. Microsoft Fonts were always a special download. It is still very easy to find them, just google.

In any case there is no doubt whatsoever that Microsoft fonts are Microsoft intellectual property.

I don't see how this is a problem. Nowadays most Linux distributions use free fonts that are much more beautiful than the Microsoft ones.

 

As long as Novell are doing what they are doing with MS, I can't see myself using it on a point of open source principle.

 

You are now free to call me naive ;)

 

I won't call you naive, I'll ask you to document yourself before making claims which have no basis whatsoever.

Even more important: OpenSUSE and Novell are not the same thing:

 

http://en.opensuse.org/Guiding_Principles#...hort_version.29

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Embio
Embio
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Ok so I was half right, it was font related. Cleartype to be exact!

 

http://linux.slashdot.org/linux/07/04/10/0252229.shtml

 

As I understand it, other distributions still include this stuff. I read most of your link (I'm in a bit of a rush) and one thing stuck out like a sore thumb:

 

"The board of maintainers consists of five community members including two people who are not employed by Novell"

 

This would mean that Novell have a majority say in the maintenance, no?

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Alessandro17
Alessandro17
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Ok so I was half right, it was font related. Cleartype to be exact!

 

http://linux.slashdot.org/linux/07/04/10/0252229.shtml

 

As I understand it, other distributions still include this stuff.

 

Ok, but what is it so difficult in understanding that Microsoft fonts are (obviously) Microsoft intellectual property?

Surely you don't blame any software company for not using other people's patented stuff.

But even more important, since openSUSE stopped enabling ClearType, their fonts have improved a lot, as anybody who has been using SUSE for years and now has tried 10.3 knows. The two facts might not be related, but who cares?

 

I read most of your link (I'm in a bit of a rush) and one thing stuck out like a sore thumb:

 

"The board of maintainers consists of five community members including two people who are not employed by Novell"

 

This would mean that Novell have a majority say in the maintenance, no?

 

No it doesn't. It simply means that 2 people don't get salaries from Novell.

Look, openSUSE is a community project. It has been welcomed as such from the beginning.

Novell merely "sponsors" it.

It is very similar to the relation between Fedora and Red Hat. Except that Fedora is little more than a testbed for Red Hat, not really with the desktop or unexperienced users in mind. OpenSUSE is on purpose created for "the Linux enthusiasts", as opposed to the enterprise offerings by Novell.

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Embio
Embio
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Nevertheless, one would be forced to concede that projects like Fedora and openSUSE can never be as free as Debian. My point with the cleartype debacle was that no one has yet proved it was MS code being used, ie. lifted wholesale from Windows and plonked into openSUSE or any distribution that uses it. Just because something does something in a similar way and achieves a similar result does not mean it violates patent laws. I think that was the entire basis of Microsoft's defence in many cases brought against it by Apple.

 

I haven't tried openSUSE 10.3 as I said, so I wouldn't know if the fonts have improved...

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Guest cavallo
Guest cavallo
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Maybe because it is free in both meanings of the word? And maybe because it can be installed legally on virtually any hardware without waiting for somebody to graciously hack it for us? (And even that doesn't always work, far from it).

And maybe because (most of us) are geeks and don't want to limit ourselves to just one OS?

 

just having more than one os, sincerely osx is better than any one else with ppc cpu (olders motorola)

i have older g4 qs 933mhz 1536 mb 133 ram and it's fewer slowly than this one 64x2 athlon 3800 mhz 2gb ram 333 64 bit ddr2 single channel, you know what i mean apple is better anywhere in hard and software.

to use linux you need to be a developper or so,ething like that, i am not.

It is free ok but no application instable graphic drivers and if you are not develloper you just loose your time.

If you are it is very interesting you can compile and develop your applications your kernels....;

Remember one important thing g4 is slozer also because i have a leopard modified graphic geforce agp8x 6200 adapter originally produced for windows.

I never tried an intel apple but the great difference is bios that's why win oss turns better on apple machines.

The problem i think for non ppc machines (intel/amd apple included) is that os is developped originally for ppc and then for both using rosetta code.

bye

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Alessandro17
Alessandro17
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Novell have a agreement with Microsoft anyway so they are safe from patents.

 

That is exactly the point.

As to Fedora and openSUSE being less free than Debian, I use and love both Debian and openSUSE and I can't see any meaningful difference. Except maybe that Debian doesn't have any corporate sponsors.

However Debian does go over the top sometimes, like in the case of Firefox, Thunderbird and SeaMonkey, with the result that my bank sees Iceweasel as an "unsupported browser".

 

to use linux you need to be a developper or so,ething like that, i am not.

It is free ok but no application instable graphic drivers and if you are not develloper you just loose your time.

If you are it is very interesting you can compile and develop your applications your kernels....;

 

What are you talking about? I have installed Linux for 8 years old kids and they absolutely love it.

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Embio
Embio
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Novell have a agreement with Microsoft anyway so they are safe from patents.

 

Yes, because Microsoft aren't some massive company out to maintain a monopoly and would of course ensure a deal of that sort would be completely two way. They wouldn't try to exploit a smaller company and try to bend a deal, would they?

 

Course not! Behind the scenes, Microsoft is run by two little old ladies....

 

Alessandro, it isn't about there being a discernable difference between free and non-free distros, its about the principle of the thing.

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Alessandro17
Alessandro17
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Alessandro, it isn't about there being a discernable difference between free and non-free distros, its about the principle of the thing.

 

I don't see anything wrong with principles either.

In any case I belong to the pragmatist users of open source, like Linus Torvalds, not to the extremists like Richard Stallman.

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sxjthefirst
sxjthefirst
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I have OpenSuse 10.5 running as a VMWare VM on my Dell. I had to click on the install icon, answer a few dialogs, and sit back and watch. Now I have Linux on my work laptop without breaking anything or damaging my wallet. It doesn't get any user friendlier than that.

 

A VM of Solaris however has quite a few problems for me to fix. OS X well if it had been that easy to install I wouldn't be on this forum in the first place.

 

Back in the early 90s I had worked on SCO Unix since then *nix has come a long way. Nowadays I really don't see a user friendliness issue with using linux. You can run it a low cost environment or in high end server env. You definitely don't have to be a developer to use it.

 

BTW: The new OpenSuse installer looks great!

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fatshitcat
fatshitcat
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I have OpenSuse 10.5 running as a VMWare VM on my Dell.

 

Check your version again

 

Having said that, Linux's user-friendliness is a bit more than a working gui. It really, really depends on the desktop environment.

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