So I downloaded 5.0.1 and...
Well, as usual, graphics are great, even better than usual. All my
congratulations to the graphics team! Otherwise, for me, it's going
to be YaLC (Yet another Linux Coaster).
Previously, there have been a few Knoppix releases where the canadian
(ca) keyboard didn't work in OOo. This problem has been solved, but I
wanted to test my keyboard in OOo first, just to make sure it didn't
pop up again. Well, there was a problem, but I soon discovered I had
it everywhere. Here's how it goes.
In french Canada, which pretty much means the province of Quebec,
nowadays, there are two keyboards in use: the cf, which was designed
by IBM a long time ago, and the ca, which was designed recently by an
illustrious unknow at le Conseil du Trésor du Québec and a bunch of
jerks throughout the world to be a universal keyboard for many
countries. Despite all sorts of incitatives from the governement, the
latter was never widely adopted. Manufacturers weren't enthousiasts.
The problem is it's really the work of a committee: the camel looks
like a dromedary. For instance, the following characters: { } [ ],
which are often used in programming are produced by pressing the
right lower row key and numbers 7, 8, 9, 0. You can imagine how
programmers feel about this keyboard: the keyboard file to work at
the shell has never been produced!
But, as for me, IANAP, and it's got an advantage: letters with a grave
accent, namely è à ù are produced with only one key. So it's the
keyboard I bought.
After I realised my keyboard didn't work properly, I went back to the
KDE config tool and found out that the cf keyboard had disappered
altogether! So, I took a closer look at the ca keboard and... it does
seem it's the cf keyboard!
Confusing? You bet! How do things like this happen? Here's my
experience in a non-profit ISP. Somebody comes along with a lot of
experience on a given matter that nobody cares too much about. And --
how nice it is! -- he's got a lot of time at hand. (Of course, though
Ballmer says he now knows how Linux works, the said expert is not
paid by Microsoft. This never happens in Linux land.)
So, after he's proven he kowns someting on the subject -- you know, he
fixed a few errors here and there -- he offers his help to clean that
keyboard mess. And, indeed, things look much better: at least one
keyboard has disappered!
If I'm the first one to write to KDE developpers, I'll be the only one
complaining and a, of course, a troll. Besides, many people, not
knowing that they are in fact using a cf keyboard, will say their ca
keyboard works very well. After, thousands of hours/man of discussion
in newsgroups and forums, KDE will, in a year or two, decide that
there is indeed a problem and try to get hold of that guy who knew so
much about keyboards.
Well, it will seem that this gustilof.olaf.berilowski@mermaid.ca, has
seemingly diasappered. His address is no longer valid. So, who's
interested to fix that keyboard problem that nobody gives a shit
about? Maybe in another year or two, the problem will be fixed... for
some time.
Meanwhile, the said keyboards work perfectly, and are correctly
identified in Windows. That's what you call the OpenSource advantage,
the way things are set to work now. Linux is going to conquer the
Desktop! Hurray, hurray! We're all together, we're going to make it!
So, don't tell me I'm a troll. I know I'm a troll. Everything
pertaining to Linux is absolutely perfect! Well, 7 out of 8
executives from SuSE have now left Novell and the ISP I was a member
of, which could have been a formidable platform to give a little
Linux training to beginners -- there were lots of geeks there! It was
Montreal's first ISP, beside universities -- is now dead and gone.
So much for this N th &&?%#@#% keyboard problem. I tried to see if I
could now get my printer, an HP 1012, to work. Knoppix's interface
identified it correctly. When times comes to load the printer
drivers, I receive a message saying that either the drivers are not
available or I do not have permission to install them. Until now, I
never had to be root to install drivers for my printer and i couldn't
see how I could get root priviledges from the interface.
In mode 1280x1024, the URL fonts of Firefox are still so small that
they're almost unreadable. Well, you cares? If you make a typo on
that 77 characters URL, you just retype it! You don't have this
"little" problem in IE, but don't we all know that it's really
rotten, don't we? Of course, it's obvious that replacing the search
button with a search window of about equal lenght is a tremendous
asset for Firefox, mainly that now, Google allows searches of more
than 10 words. (I just tried one with 19 words!) It's Linux, man! Say
it's great, or you're a troll!
That's as far as my testing went this time. Maybe material detection
is now better, but mine was already all detected. In Knoppix 3.7, my
printer worked, my keyboard worked... I believe Mozilla didn't have
this stupid search window.
I understand almost all of those problems are not Klaus' concern, but
there is no way I'm going to lose my time writing to geeks about
problems that anybody with eyes can see. I've got more than enough
being told that the code is open and anything that is not right can
be fixed.
I'm getting tired. For almost ten years, inclusing 5 using it, I've
been hoping that Linux would get better. But it doesn't seem that
anarchy is the best way to do things. Too much nonsense is creeping
in and nobody seems to care.
Gilles
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