arctic Posted June 22, 2006 Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 It's pretty broken in Cooker though atm....That's why it is still in cooker. ;) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gowator Posted June 22, 2006 Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 Firstly I have yet to install FC so ... Secondly I agree with most of what Solarian says except one point and a few questions... The standart menu is too confusing for my taste, I mean there is "Administration" "Settings" "System" "Utilities" and "Control center", imo they should all be below one menu "System" or two, but no more. It sometimes gets hard to remember where is what - it's not intuitive. Presumably you can just move them in kmenuedit? Unlike Mandriva that coes up with its own menu system? It lacks the beautiful MCC of Mandriva, but "System control centre" can be installed which basically is an application with links to system configuration utilities, which have to be installed seperately. Also there is no default partition manager, so I installed QTParted and it is very good, but the problem is that there is no really functional system administration tool from the start, it has to be put together from many thigs. Not really a problem, but I think Fedora should make something that looks and is similar to MCC, minus the bugginess of Mandriva GUI tools :P (they can trash config files). This is the part I really disagree on... for me the worst thing in mandriva is the MCC and its tools. Its just a fact of life that the underlying applications keep evolving be it CUPS or SAMBA or an xorg.conf ... and that all of these tools also have corresponding config tools. While these keep evolving MCC or whatever other distro-specific tool has to keep changing or get out of synch. If they don't then you end up with things you can't use or configure and no idea how MCC configured something to start off. I think the classic example for MCC is the Internet connection sharing where it installs (or installed) a very weird shorewall. Sure it kinda did the job but it left the user with some weird relics and no easy way of getting rid of them .... even the old internet connection wizard etc. caused probs if bad choices were made .. on pppoe etc. Fixing and keeping up with this basically seems beyond Mandriva's resources ... and it is of course a growing problem because each change adds extra layers. ... In the example of internet connection sharing the user ask to share the connection but what happens is a firewall is installed and activated with weird settings. Said user doesn't realise they have a weird firewall because they just wanted to share the internet connection ... Who knows what happens next ... and this is the point, I don't know nor you nor mandriva because the user decides. Perhaps nothing bad happens? Perhaps they have problems file sharing? Perhaps they decide to install another firewall, not realising they have one. Who knows ... but when they try and configure this firewall they find that the standard tools don't work or there is a pre-existing iptables etc. The thing is the potential problems are .... well not known and Mandriva doesn't seem to have the resources to follow/fix... an example was the guy with the resolv.conf being over written ... If you try and follow the problem then you look at dhclient.conf you can find tools to edit it but it takes a lot of time/apin to work out Mandriva isn't using it, perhaps because of zeroconf. In the end the problems just keep mutliplying because each fix mandriva makes is a patch on something that has its own life and each layer just adds complexity. Its like a vicous circle. Perhaps the only distro doing it pretty bug free are Suse but then this leads to the second question which is how to try a new distro without familiar tools. I guess suse have more resources to do this but in the end its not healthy ... largely because it prevents the user working out what is going on... The problem is you have to wade through the distro tool documentation before getting to the root of the problem. In the case of Suse this is pretty well documented (even if I don't like it) but in the case of Mandriva it seems pretty much non-existant. IMHO it erects an artificial barrier for the user to progress and the ponly way to progress is by doing lots of reading up on the distro specific tools as opposed to the underlying software. All in all I very like Fedora Core, it is not a distro for a total newbie, but it is good. I know that some here have been having problems with Fedora, but I guess I just don't use the buggy places, so it's been a generally pleasant experience and what I've noticed is that with Fedora my pleas for help in this forum (the only Linux forum I use) are down to minimum. It seems that with Fedora Core I have 90% less problems than with Mandriva which seems a bit unrealistic, but that is the picture when I see my posting history. I think this is a symptom of what I just described above.... you are obviously able to solve your own problems when the need arises if you know what the problem is.... my experience with mandriva is the hard part is working out what exactly the problem is....then how it was configured until you finally get to the root cause of the problem. About installing software: yum takes longer to install something than urpmi (and there is a valid reason for that) and the standart GUI package manager Pirut is very limited. I generally use konsole and yum command, but sometimes, especially when searching software, I use the gui program YUMEX (Yum Extender) and it is everything Pirut should be. You piqued my interest ... please .... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
solarian Posted June 22, 2006 Author Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 Every time yum syncs itself with all the repos and checks if there are new software versions (not only for the 'updates' repo). urpmi doesn't do that, it needs to be updated seperately. And I agree about the MCC problem and I did post about it, my wish would be a MCC like application which keeps up to date and doesn't screw up config files. So what, I'm an idealist. :P Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gowator Posted June 22, 2006 Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 (edited) Every time yum syncs itself with all the repos and checks if there are new software versions (not only for the 'updates' repo). urpmi doesn't do that, it needs to be updated seperately. Ahh thanks ... and I think that this is really one of the probs with urpmi and apt ... people try and skip a quick update and then install half and half and things get borked... certainly it should be a default at least on the GUI side. and would prevent lots of probs. And I agree about the MCC problem and I did post about it, my wish would be a MCC like application which keeps up to date and doesn't screw up config files. So what, I'm an idealist. :P LOL I think its just a bad use of resources by a distro and so not something to be encouraged. :D Indeed your informative post above illustrates this ... What is the best thing about mandriva? IMHO its URPMI ... its the absolute core of Mandriva and yet ... easyurpmi needed to be developed by 3rd parties and the documentation on it is sketchy at best and its missing many functions such as a noclean option from the GUI not to mention at least a prompt when the last update is older than a day ... or better customisable in a GUI. All of the basics are there, the tools all exist but Mandriva hasn't done them in the GUI ... (and perhaps another subject but hardly even makes users aware of them). Nothing is changing in the underlying CLI tools that mandriva doesn't control so it won't get into catch-22 like on Network wizards ... etc. but yet these options are missing and people are still confused over them. If mandriva used just the time keeping up with the SAMBA wizard or CUPS or any one of them on GURPMI instead then it would have been done a long time ago, given the will. edits: I mean documentation on URMPI not easyurpmi btw... Edited June 22, 2006 by Gowator Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jlc Posted June 22, 2006 Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 (edited) By the way, you can run yum -C to skip checking repodata if you just want to install something and not look for updates. speeds yum up a lot. Oh, this is nothing like MCC/YAST, but it also doesn't break files ;) # yum install system-config-control Then just run "system-config-control" Edited June 22, 2006 by jlc Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arctic Posted June 22, 2006 Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 I agree that the MCC is far from ideal, but anyways, for (guess) 75% of the users, it works flawlessly. I agree that thinks can and should be improved in the MCC and I think that it is possible to make it much better. E.g. if you simply make the MCC only a graphical frontend to the already existing configuration tools, then you do not have to recode the MCC over and over again. Let's take a look at e.g. the network-wizard. In Gnome and KDE, there exist several tools for configuring your Network card (eth), your dial-up modem etc. If the MCC would simply start - let's say - network-config for Gnome in the centralized window, then all upgrades/improvements of network-config would automatically make it into the MCC as it only "stores" the config-tool in its frame. This would make things easier for users if they switch from one distro to another and it would make the MCC less buggy as it does not use its own apps for configuring things. A spointed out, things might be configured by another tool possibly in a different way that Mandriva every imagined and this - surely can cause trouble. (Although the MCC has been very stable for me) I hope you get the idea. Attached is a simple, rough sketch of what I have been talking about. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gowator Posted June 22, 2006 Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 I hope you get the idea. Attached is a simple, rough sketch of what I have been talking about. Yes .... ! This is basically the idea I like though its not actually mine ... I very much like the simplicity and it gets the job done just as well. (Im actually posting from FC btw .... ) It is already driving me mad (but then Im in Gnome and it feels unfamiliar) but it feels like Redhat with the artwork etc and IMHO cluncky items but what is driving me round the bend is applications being renamed.... i have mysery apps like IP telephony .. that don't actually say what the app is ... and spreadsheet instead of OO calc etc. Im not against these per-se but these are the beginners distro things IMHO....what happens if i instal something else will it just say spreadsheet? or email etc.? cdplayer or music plpater etc. I have no idea what these are for ... until I click... I don't really see FC as a beginner distro so I don't get why put the idiot controls on... it reminds me of the idiot settings in Windows explorer where it hides system files etc. However I do like the generic nature of the tools. Only gripe is it didn't recognise the virtual SCSI disk on install and I had to change it to IDE emulation ... weird in a 'pro' distro as well? Especially since Xandros and Novel Linux desktop and even centros had no probs? In summary a weird mix of pro and ultra noobie? Only playing will tell me more i guess... so here goes.. how do i install KDE? How do i get rid of the 'clunky' redhat feel? time to play I guess! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jlc Posted June 22, 2006 Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 $ sudo yum grouplist | grep -i kde Password: KDE Software Development KDE (K Desktop Environment) To install: # yum groupinstall "KDE (K Desktop Environment)" "KDE Software Development" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gowator Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 Thx .. will try later :D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dexter11 Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 I agree that the MCC is far from ideal, but anyways, for (guess) 75% of the users, it works flawlessly. I agree that thinks can and should be improved in the MCC and I think that it is possible to make it much better. E.g. if you simply make the MCC only a graphical frontend to the already existing configuration tools, then you do not have to recode the MCC over and over again. Let's take a look at e.g. the network-wizard. In Gnome and KDE, there exist several tools for configuring your Network card (eth), your dial-up modem etc. If the MCC would simply start - let's say - network-config for Gnome in the centralized window, then all upgrades/improvements of network-config would automatically make it into the MCC as it only "stores" the config-tool in its frame. This would make things easier for users if they switch from one distro to another and it would make the MCC less buggy as it does not use its own apps for configuring things. A spointed out, things might be configured by another tool possibly in a different way that Mandriva every imagined and this - surely can cause trouble. (Although the MCC has been very stable for me) I hope you get the idea. Attached is a simple, rough sketch of what I have been talking about. What about those who don't use GNOME or KDE? They have to install kdebase and half of GNOME just for dependencies? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reiver_Fluffi Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 What about those who don't use GNOME or KDE? They have to install kdebase and half of GNOME just for dependencies? Shoot me down for stereotyping, but I reckon that most that don't use KDE or GNOME, won't be using Mandriva! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arctic Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 Oh, that is a valid point that I haven't really thought about, dexter11. But I guess that most users have the gtk libraries installed anyway (even if it is only gtk1), as IceWM uses gtk, same as fluxbox and most basic apps. So ... it might not be so much of a problem. But I leave it to others to figure out if it would cause a problem with the MCC or not. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Artificial Intelligence Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 Couldn't it be done by a non-GTK/QT instead? Well then I guess peiople would complain that it's wayoff with their theme they are using then....just a thought. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arctic Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 Then you have again at the old problem that Mandriva has its own config-tools that are not necessarily compatible with KDE or Gnome native config-tools. :D I feel like in a chicken-egg conversation. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Artificial Intelligence Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 Actually they (sientist) found out that the chicken came first! B) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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