Re: debian

[Paul Johnson <baloo@ursine.ca>]

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On Fri, Jun 20, 2003 at 09:10:13AM -0400, alex wrote:
> I've lost track of hows many times I've "installed' Debian because
> of making wrong decisions during the installation.

Having the installation manual handy helps.

> My observation is that the installation tries to do too much.  It
> tries to consider all possible choices that could be made, many of
> which some users don't need or even understand but don't know what 
> to do about them. At least, that's in my case.

Unix tends to overwhelm newbies by not giving them training wheels
when they're used to a toddler tricycle (at least when coming from
Windows).  You'll get less wobbly with time.

> If there was a separate alternate installation process where only 
> the essentials are taken care of, leaving the 'special' applications
> to be added after the basic Debian is running, I'm sure you'd find
> fewer complaints about Debian.

Actually, that's what currently happens.  The essentials happen,
without fancy GUI bullcrap or the potential for autodetection to crash
your system during install.  After all, you only have to run it once
if you know what you're doing or can follow along in a manual.

> Debian is an excellent system once you have it running. It's too bad 
> that it gets a bad name simply because the trouble people have with 
> its installation.

Eh.  Their problem, not mine.  In fact, playing devil's advocate, it's
to our benefit: Do you *really* want the list to be flooded with the
deluge of obviously RTFM-answerable "questions" like other distro's
lists?  That *is* a problem when there's nothing weeding out
illiterate morons.  8:o)

- -- 
 .''`.     Baloo Ursidae <baloo@ursine.ca>
: :'  :    proud Debian admin and user
`. `'`
  `-  Debian - when you have better things to do than fix a system
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