Re: tech proposal to make manoj somewhat happy.
Hi,
Unfortunately, you were unduly optimistic when you chose the
subject.
>>"Petra" == Petra, Kevin J Poorman <ewigin@SoftHome.net> writes:
Petra> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Petra> Debian should commit to do any or all of the following.
Petra> 1: a totaly redone install procedure, with a optional newbie
Petra> install with help screens detailing exactly what is hapening
Petra> and what informaion is needed so that complete newbies can
Petra> install debian.
Firstly, where are the current boot floppies falling short? I
just installed on a laptop (my current install test machine), and I
was pleasantly surprised. Why is a complete rewrite required? Where
is information not sufficinet? Which boot floppy version have you
looked at?
Secondly, I think complete newbies should be pointed to
documentation before they install any version/flavour of UNIX; since
maintenance of a UNIX workstation is not a task for absolute
newbies. A certain modicum of expertise is still required.
Petra> a: the gui system for install should probably be based on w96 (a
Petra> small 2 color windowing system)
Why? What is wrong with the current approach used by APT? Have
you compiled a kernel, and looked at what make menuconfig does? what
is w96? Do you have a URL? how does it compare with dialog, slag, and
ncurses? What are the advantages? Why should we switch to a totally
new windowing system?
Petra> b: a port of apt to w96 or whatever gui chosen should be looked
Petra> into.
What is wrong with the current approach used by APT? I think
Jason has researched the GUI part of APT quite well. What does your
approach have which is so much better that we are prepared to throw
all the code that has been written away?
Petra> c: the console install should be completly rewriten to
Petra> include better error handleing and faster base install
Petra> suport... mabye move from a tar archive to a cpio, or ar, or
Petra> even zip archive...
Umm, where do we use a pure tar archive? Do you know what the
.deb format uses? What tar archive are you talking about? Why should
we move to zip, which is an encumbered format, when we have gzip ang
bzip2? Have you compared the compression ratios achieved? Do you know
that zip is not the most efficient?
Petra> Of the above, on the part about useing zip could even remotly
Petra> be considered a compromise to techincal quality. (and even
Petra> then only becuase I don't know that zips licens is.
Oh, Jeeze.
Petra> debian should also have a firm and well known and loved logo. a contest
Petra> should be held for this ... possibly debian should do as gimp does and
Petra> offer a reward. ...
We already have a logo. Captain Blue-eyes. (Not that I am
averse to a contest -- but we had a contest). Do you know there was
an effort ongoing for an year before the current logo was chosen?
Petra> this also does not comprimise technical quality.
No, but it shows you have not done your homework.
Petra> debian should also work to switch from the archaic man page
Petra> format, by provideing as standard packages, the packages that
Petra> will allow man pages to be served as html pages. useing lynx
Petra> or kfm, netscape... ect.
I find the man program to be faster than lynx, and less likely
to cause problems. I find it easier to search, create bookmarks, than
with lynx (I use less as a pager). For short looks, to refresh my
memory, nothing beats the man program. HTML has too many options to
be as useful; the complexity of hyperlinks is undesirable for quick
peeks at documentation.
For longer tutorials, the HTML format is not as good as the
info format; I can do greps across multiple info pages, which is hard
to do with HTML without investing time and effort in external
indexing programs.
Petra> I fail to see how this could be a compromise either...
It is. HTML is a really poor choice, though I know it is our
preffered doc format.
Petra> as for error loging and handle ing all errors should be writen
Petra> to a file and then tailed on a empty vt for console isntalls
Petra> and to the root window for the gui/newbie install.
Hmm. This actually has merit. Congratulations. How stable is rt?
Petra> hows that for a tech proposal?
You asked. Pretty poor, if you ask me. You haev not done your
homework, and there is really little technical content in there.
manoj
--
"Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most times he will
pick himself up and carry on..." Winston Churchill
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@acm.org> <http://www.datasync.com/%7Esrivasta/>
Key C7261095 fingerprint = CB D9 F4 12 68 07 E4 05 CC 2D 27 12 1D F5 E8 6E
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