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Farewell to the creator


Reiver_Fluffi
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So, what was your contribution the last years to the Mandriva distribution, besides bashing?

Where are your bug reports? Testing? Did you submit patches? Did you help the developers?

 

I can't help but think that your post was more relevant back in '98. Mandriva (the company) is constantly chipping away at the community spirit, they are the ones who would rather sell the product to you, rather than share it with you (it is a business after all). They have created a three-tier system Free - Club - Corporate, although to be fair, Corporate on its own, outweighs Free and Club put together and more! So the next time you decided to bring this point up, remember who destroyed that community spirit my making the free community, and possible the largest pool of bug reporters second class citizens compared to the club, the ame relationship holds true between the Club and corporate!

 

Mandriva is trying to had to be red hat, but they are going at it in the wrong way, they are trying to sell linux in the form of the distribution as a product with support (although somewhat meagre if the club is an example) as an extra. The way I see it, Red Hat's core source of income somes from supporting REL, and apparently doing a good job of it, all this whild the Mandriva execs are running bout concerned over which new feature to implement, rather than looking to better support the product they already have.

 

Sorry if this makes no sense, I do tend to get a bit jumbled when I ramble!

Edited by Reiver_Fluffi
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I first used mandrake at 8.2

 

I'll concur with what Gowator said. Mandrake hasnt gone anywhere since 9 imo. It's mostly the same. The MCC tools are identical + two or three more. MCC itself has only been re-arranged. I would have expected some big changes when they merged with Connectiva. Nothing. The Mandrake 2006 I installed, was practically identical to the Mandrake 10.1 I last installed. There has been little development, change or innovation. Various bugs pop up in various tools. Yet these bugs often remain until the next release, with no update in between, despite the fact mandrake have an update source there to use.

 

You can't say that it's a difficult thing to develop a distro, and that they do a lot. If it takes all their manpower to update all their packages, then whatever system they are using internally is fundamentally broken.

 

Mandrake may be up there as one of the more popular newbie distros now, but I can assure you, it's on its way down unless they turn their act around, do something, and maybe even listen to the community. Marketing isnt what they need, it's to listen to their users, and to start doing things. If mandrake implement X new feature or just drastically improve and start doing things, the reviews will show it, the reviews will shine, that's better marketing than anything they can pay for.

 

As for the departure of Gael. It's a pity I guess, seeing the founder leave, but that's what happens in business. Mandrake do not need him to continue.

 

iphitus

 

s/Mandrake/Mandriva/g

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Remember when Gael did this it was much more work making a distro than today.

What Gael and the original team did is incredible ... and they elevated it all by themselves to a world class distro. That is really something I admire.

What have the marketers done?

IMVHO they have taken a world class distro and tried to turn it into a cash cow. That wouldn't be so bad but they have turned the whole thing inside out.

As Reiver_Fluffi just said they have created a tiered system but worse than that they have tried insstead of developing the distro to be commerically succesful they have dipped into one scheme after another all because of their vision of how a distro should be run .... and they have a vision lioke the old IBM where the company supports a large management structure that overrides the developers and support a large marketing department above the users.

 

In other words and its hard to explain as Reiver_Fluffi found out....

They seem to have tried to change what was a very sucessful and at the time advanced distro into something purely to market as a source of income... along with the club etc. everything was seen as a potential source of income instead of as RH targetting the income sources for support etc. In the process everything they have tried milking has turned sour....

 

Getting rid of gael is a last straw... they already lost the community, the developers etc. and now they have no use for someone with vision? Gael leaving is a final straw but they do need im just like Tom Berger and the others! They will just realise it too late.

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Mandriva is a company and a company needs to make money. With Linux/OSS it´s not yet clear how to make money. It´s a bit like Google/search engines before they figured out you could make money selling adverts. Mandriva right now is searching for ways to make money. They try selling adverts during installation process, they have the subscription/club model, they try selling services, boxed editions etcetc. Till now they haven´t figured out how to hit the jackpot so they keep trying new ways to make money. In the meantime they keep creating a great product. :)

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I just wanted to say that all I ever did was pay my money at a retail store to buy a boxed set. All I ever did was use their services as instructed in the boxed set. (I should say attempt to use their services since I still have received no communication from them.) All I ever did was promote their product to my friends. All they ever did was.... well, let's see.... oh, yeah, take my money! B)

 

I am not going to stop anyone from making observations about their business practices, and I have no concern whatsoever if said complainer has done anything for Mandriva. You see, they are the ones who need us, even if they don't know it! ;)

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So... anyone wanna take a guess at this Ulteo thing?

 

My guess is they're going to try to offer software over the network, like Linspire is trying to do also... and like lots of Ajax-like applications already try to do. Personally, I'm not too enamoured with the idea. But who knows, it just might work out.

Edited by Darkelve
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Folks at ulteo forums are speculating that it will be an easy to use LIVEcd distro with the ability to store personal information on Ulteo servers, so it stays the same on whatever computer you launch it.

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Those are just speculations, nothing more,

but I think that saving your program settings, firefox bookmarks, etc., would be nice and it's not any top secret information.

About personal documents - your choice.

Edited by solarian
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If it will be Ubuntu based, then I am really disappointed. Ubuntu is imho far from being the wholy grail and the cure for everything. But mostly, I cannot stand most members at the ubuntuforums and their snobbish attitude. But that is, of course, my very personal problem. :P

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