On 05/06/2008, thveillon.debian <thveillon.debian@googlemail.com> wrote:
Testing
[snip]
has always been at least as reliable as Ubuntu.
That's not saying much. ;-)
But seriously, people, testing is not stable. If you like bugs and can
live with bugs, then use testing. If you don't like bugs, then run
stable. I believe that the problem is that many Debian users have
grown used to bugs and know how to fix them or work around them when
they come up, *but* that doesn't mean testing should be Debian's
business card. Stable is Debian's final product, testing is always a
work in progress. As for desktop use, depends on the user. If you're
used to things breaking (and for better or for worse, all the Windows
users in the world seem to be used to this), then go ahead and use
testing. If you don't like it, then don't use it. I use testing and
can mostly get by with the breakage, but my mom who recently has
mastered how to use a mouse to point-and-click; she gets stable, because I
don't want her computer breaking and having her conclude that "this
thing you installed on my computer sucks, nothing works."
etch installed mostly ok on my mom's machine, but I do admit that I
had to jump through many hoops to install it. That's ok. I am an admin
for her, and the beauty of etch is that so far, I've only had to admin
that machine *once*. She doesn't know her own password, and I don't
think she has a need to. With etch she can browse the internet, read
those blasted .doc and .ppt files her friends email her, and she can
use her iPod with Rhythmbox (which she prefers to iTunes' horrid setup
and intrusive marketing). More than this, this particular desktop user
does not need.
And I run testing, and in recent memory, I have ran across the
following bugs:
- Battery monitor cannot read my battery, fixed with workaround
(#42305)
- Gnome keyboard switcher no longer honours my alt-capslock key
for switching keyboard layouts (can't find a bug and aren't sure
how to report it).
- Octaviz segfaults in 64 bit arch (#480431)
- OpenGL got broken on many games, fixed within a month or so (#470084)
- Packaging glitch with compiz where conflicting versions of
packages can be installed in testing (#483819)
just to name a few, or the ones that I noticed the most. I am pretty
sure I'm not the only one running across this many bugs. testing
breaks. That's what it is. Breaking may be good enough for most Debian
users, but it shouldn't be the standard, and it is not the way
software is supposed to be. The biggest harm MSFT products have done
for us is to foster the perception that the natural state of software
is breakage. Debian stable aims to fix that perception.
My bottom line: if you recommend testing to others, do not deceive
them, and tell them to expect breakage. If they don't like that, tell
them to use etch. If etch doesn't recognise their newer hardware, then
help them out with backporting and such. But don't unilaterally
recommend testing to all users.
- Jordi G. H.