Re: FWD: RMS and Debian on his Toshiba
I have installed the pcmcia services on a Compaq LTE 5100 a while back.
To get the modem and Ethernet cards working I had to get the updated
drivers from (at the time) unstable (now frozen). No, it was not
pleasant but it was done. Was it a task for a novice - no, but pcmcia
services on most machines I've used are not for the novice.
The hardware updates being added directly to stable would not solve this
problem since the CD manufacturers would have to press new disks
every time new drivers were available. It has been difficult convincing
some CD manufacturers to make disks for fear of getting stuck with
old disks when updates are made. Given this situation, your proposal
does not solve the problem since people installing hardware that is not
supported in stable still would need net access to get the updates.
It is the classic chicken and egg problem.
I've installed a fair number of machines that came with Windows 3.1, 9x,
and NT pre installed. Most of the desktops ran out of the box, but
if the drive crashed and had to be rebuilt it was usually not a task
for a novice to get everything working.
Laptops I've installed with M$ software were worse. Most of the pcmcia
drivers pre-installed were out of date and did not support the cards
shipped with the machines without installing drivers. I have never
had a pcmcia system work "out of the box" well enough that I would
call it a novice machine for support.
(on the "long" lifetime of the Toshiba laptop model)
This illustrates my point - the next model will be out in a month
or so, and will use different video, pcmcia, and sound drivers.
(most likely some if not all the hardware will be updated)
(sarcasm on)
Boy, a three month product lifetime. I'll start working on drivers
now so I can get one of the machines to work. Wait, no - I won't
be able to buy a new machine before the drivers a stable. Next.
(sarcasm off)
> > I'm willing to bet that M$ doesn't support most of the new
> > features that you claim prevent installing Debian Linux on those
> > machines, but the manufacturer of the hardware has written the driver
> > (with appropriate guidance and consideration from M$).
>
> That's irrelevant, "Linux" does support all these features, it's
> just that Debian does not.
Debian *does* support them, but is not willing to place the drivers
in stable until Debian has a system the works with the drivers.
I have never seen someone refused support from the Debian lists
because they installed package z from an ftp site. The problem
with getting the newest drivers is also related to the fact that
Debian is a volunteer organization and people contribute when they
can.
Updating the pcmcia drivers may break other software that then has
to be updated, and so it snowballs. I've seen it happen. You pointed
out the possibility of glibc moving to 2.1 (granted that is a
special case since most software in Linux depends on glibc in some
form). You will have the same problems updating any low level support
library or driver.
If a "newby" Linux user came to me with a Toshiba (or any) laptop
I would present them with the situation:
Linux is a mostly volunteer with distributed development operating
system. Some commercial distributions exist. Commercial versions
have these bonuses (insert list of perceived good things from
commercial sources) and these downsides (insert list of perceived
bad things). There are also free distributions with the following
pros and cons (insert lists of pros and cons).
I cannot guarantee ANY distribution of Linux will support all of the
neat things your hardware manufacturer claims your machine will do.
Your best course of action is to:
1. Ask the distribution manufacturers if they have support for your machine
(Be sure to ask about support for anything you consider a show stopper)
2. Ask if there are any people in the organization who actually USE the
same computer hardware so you can get first hand help.
3. Double check that any applications you NEED are available from the same
distribution. This includes things like X (I'm an old fashioned command
prompt person. Windowing environments are nice, however).
Given those disclaimers, I would then tell them to have a go at it. If
nothing else they will learn a lot about their computer in the process
(more than they want to know I bet).
If the user is installing Debian on his Toshiba and is "turned off
Linux for the forseable future" they would probably be better off
starting with a different distribution, which the would have problems
with and be turned off Linux for the forseable future.
Pat
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