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Re: The Real Problem With Debian



On Tue, 1 Oct 2002, Rick wrote:

> Debian is supposedly a great OS, it is configurable, custimizable, and
> powerful, but Debian is ultimately misleading for many people.  Debian is an
> OS that may be used on a server, or a developer's computer, so he can really
> feel the balls in his system, but it should not have been used on my
> computer, or a couple of my friend's computers.
>

Sure.  You can't be all things to everyone.

> The Real Problem With Debian is that it is MANUAL.  Everything must be done
> manually, now although there may be a script or two to ease things along,
> these often DON'T WORK.  I have spent two weeks fighting slackware, trying to
> get it to work with my printer, and sound card.  Then I spent two weeks
> fighting Debian, trying to get it to work with my mouse, printer, network
> card, and sound card.  After installing Mandrake, everything worked
> instantaneously, sound, card, network, printer, EVERYTHING.  It ran faster
> too, I don't know why, but it did, and it had newer programs, like KDE3.xx.
> Which distro do you think I stuck with?
>

That's great.  Use whatever works for you.  That's the power of Linux.
although I obviously like Debian the best, I run Mandrake, Red Hat, and
Slackware too.  (Mostly under VMware nowadays.)

> This is not an attempt to convert any Debian users on this list, but it is a
> statement.  I spent a month fighting Slackware and Debian, and 45 minutes
> fighting Mandrake.  Full balls is nice, but how about having a system that is
> full balls, but ALSO is as easy to configure as mandrake?
>

It's funny you should say that because my recent upgrade from Mandrake 8.2
to 9.0 is the first one that *didn't* go horribly wrong or need a
reinstall.  In contrast I've been regularly updating my home debian box
for about five years now without a reinstall.  Different strokes for
different folks I guess.

Well there was one thing.  In 9.0 they forgot a symlink to cpp which
prevented me from logging in to KDE.  (which is a pretty huge blunder I
think.)  All the GUI tools in the world can't help with this.  I had to
get in there and fix it myself, manually just as I would have with Debian.
(Assuming debian ever did anything that silly :)  At least thanks to
Debian I knew what to do.  Someone who relied exclusively on pointy clicky
stuff would have been lost.

> People on IRC tell me that my hardware is flaky, yet it works perfectly with
> Mandrake.  People on IRC were rude, and even elitist, and made fun of me more
> often then helping me.  A stark contrast to the helpfullness of the folks on
> the mailing list, odd.
>
> The ironic thing is that my computer was so stock, it was Lynksis NC100 card
> (tulip module) with a ESS1969 Solo card, a s3ViRGE 4mb video card, and a
> Logitech USB wheel mouse.  This should not have taken me two weeks to
> configure on ANY distro.  The point is that Debian is flaky, it is too stark,
> some call configuration tools "bloat", and call guis "evil", but
> configuration tools are the way of the future, and guis have been around for
> 20 years.  The problem is that these are the same people that work on Debian,

Well I work on Debian and I maintain webmin which is a bloated GUI
configuration tool. :)  So don't tar everyone with the same brush.

> it is too bad some of the corporate "customer comes first" mentality didn't
> get into Debian.  I donated $4 to Debian, more then many can claim, I guess I
> got EXACTLY what I paid for.  Good luck to all of you, and thanks again.
>

I like to say Debian is your second Linux distribution.  So go and enjoy
Mandrake and get used to the system.  I have a feeling you'll be back
sooner or later.

-- 
Jaldhar H. Vyas <jaldhar@debian.org>
It's a girl! See the pictures - http://www.braincells.com/shailaja/




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