Re: "I do consider Ubuntu to be Debian" , Ian Murdock

["Michael M." <mcubed@slashmail.org>]

On Thu, 2007-03-22 at 20:59 -0400, Roberto C. Sánchez wrote:
> On Thu, Mar 22, 2007 at 05:37:00PM -0700, Michael M. wrote:
> > Personally, I'm getting a little
> > frustrated being stuck on Gnome 2.14 when 2.18 has been released.  Etch
> > is two Gnome releases behind already, and Etch itself hasn't even been
> > released.
> 
> Out of curiousity, what features are in 2.18 that are not in 2.14 that
> you absolutely cannot live without?  What about that you just consider
> nice to have?


Absolutely none!  :-)  At least, none that I'm aware of.  Actually I
think 2.16 was a somewhat more significant release for Gnome in that
more features were incorporated, many of which can be added manually
anyway.  I use Tomboy and Baobab with 2.14 -- the latter, at least, is I
think an "official" part of Gnome 2.16 but not 2.14.  I haven't bothered
trying alacarte (the menu editor) because I don't have any pressing need
for it.  That, I believe, is also newly included with 2.16.  I remember
thinking, when I read about it, "that might be nice, but no need to
bother with it now."

For me, it's not really an issue of "Oh I must have this NOW ... damn
you Debian <shakes fist at the heavens> for making me wait!"  It's more
like I read about little improvements and modifications that sound good,
and I think, "cool, something to look forward to."  Stuff for Epiphany,
stuff for Nautilus, Evolution, etc., etc.  Rarely anything
earthshattering, so mostly I'm content to wait, and let other more
intrepid and knowledgable types work out lingering bugs.  In fact I'm
quite happy to be a whole release behind something big and complex like
Gnome, not to mention various other apps.  It's just that over time,
these things build up, and that's when I start to get ancy.  If Etch had
been released in December, per the original plan, I'd probably be using
Lenny by now, and Lenny would probably have moved up to 2.16 by now, and
I'd be a happy camper.  Even if the Etch delay had been a month or two,
that's not really a big deal for me.  It's just that here we are
approaching April, and still no Etch release.  Ok, so maybe it will be
released in April -- there was something on the developer list to that
effect -- so maybe I can be patient for a while longer.  But maybe it
will be delayed again.  Ugh.  So gradually, I start thinking maybe I
should look at other OSes again ... maybe give Arch Linux or Ubuntu
another shot, or try one I haven't tried yet.  It's really more the
"when it's ready / schedules don't matter" attitude of Debian that
bothers me.

The thing is, I'm comfortable with how Debian functions (as an OS, if
not as a project, entirely), so that's a lot of inertia to overcome.  (I
tend to think that's why a lot of users never leave Windows despite all
the problems -- they are just comfortable with it, and something pretty
irritating has to come along to force them away, or their irritation
level has to build up quite a bit to overcome the inertia of sticking
with what they know.)  If I had started using Ubuntu before I ever used
Debian, maybe I'd be more comfortable with it.  As it is, I find the
little differences in how Ubuntu does things more annoying than anything
else, because it's not what I'm used to.  So it comes down to, at what
point does my increasing annoyance with Debian's habitual delays
overcome my discomfort about switching to a different OS, and any
attendant annoyances of that OS?  (That's a rhetorical question!)

(FYI, Arch Linux is a really interesting OS, IMO.  It tends to attract
more Slackware and Gentoo converts, but there are quite a few former
Debianistas in its community.  I learned a fair amount of basics about
Linux from using it, in part because its structure is so simple compared
to Debian -- BSD-style init vs SysV init, for one thing.  The package
manage, Pacman, is not yet as sophisticated or developed as apt, but it
functions similarly and is quite usable, also somewhat easier for
relatively unsophisticated users like me to grok creating their own
packages.  It has some things I find attractive in common with Debian --
versatility; multi-purpose focus, rather than a "desktop" or "server"
focus; no "favored" DE or WM like so many distros.  I would heartily
recommend it to anyone looking for something else to play around with,
simply for the sake of getting more general experience with Linux under
his belt.)


-- 
Michael M. ++ Portland, OR ++ USA
"No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions
of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to
dream." --S. Jackson