[Nottingham] Nice Things About Suse Linux

[Michael Leuty]

On 27/06/06, Hazel Windle <hazel at hazeldle.wanadoo.co.uk> wrote:
> I like Suse Linux the best because...

For some time I have been trying to decide which of SUSE, Ubuntu and
Fedora is the best for me, and the handful of people for whom I have
installed Linux desktops. I want a distro that is reliable,
good-looking, easy to update, with recent versions of standard
software and easy access to non-standard applications.

SUSE is very polished, and I don't doubt James's opinion that it is
impeccably engineered. Minus points for me are that my USB key doesn't
appear on the desktop when plugged in, and there seems no way to
umount it. (Perhaps one is supposed just to pull it out after the
light stops flashing?) I find adding repositories through YAST a bit
confusing, there seem so many of them and no clear guidance on which
ones should be used. And some software (I'm thinking of Gramps and
Grisbi) isn't in the main repositories and the RPMs have to be
searched for. And the recent buggy YAST update fiasco has slightly
dented their reputation for Teutonic reliability. But the community is
extremely friendly and helpful, and have provided unofficial but
reliable RPMs for the latest versions of OOo and Firefox (if you can
find them).

Ubuntu works well, the latest version (Dapper) is very polished, CDs
and USB keys appear on cue as icons on the desktop, and the Universe
repository contains almost everything you could possibly need.
Automatix or Easy Ubuntu make it easy to add all the extras,
Java/Flash/RealPlayer (which OpenSUSE provides automatically) and also
the naughty plugins (which you have to search for with SUSE). On the
downside, I felt that not enough attention was paid to keeping the
previous version (Breezy) updated with new versions of OOo and Firefox
while Dapper was being developed. Neither appeared in the Backports
repository. Just before Dapper was released, OOo was up to 2.0.1 while
Breezy only provided 1.9.121 (an unofficial version of 2.0.0 was
available, if you could find it). Community friendly.

Fedora is also polished with a really beautiful desktop, anti-aliased
to death. With main, extras and RPMforge repositories you have access
to as much software as Ubuntu's main multiverse & universe, i.e.
almost everything you could possible need. Stanton Finley's hints page
makes adding all the extras a doddle. And all software packages are
constantly being updated to the latest version, including the kernel.
The disadvantage is that things occasionally break, and you may have
to use a workround (e.g. boot with an earlier kernel) or suffer the
inconvenience until a repaired package is made available, usually
about a week later. But some breakages take longer to repair. When
Fedora Core 4 came out there was a major bug with the xorg packages
that affected some video cards (including mine), which required a
tricky workround to substitute the xorg packages from Core 3, and it
took many months before the problem was solved. Similarly,
synchronising Palms was completely broken in Fedora Core 4 due to them
using a duff -pre version of pilot-link, and the problem was never
repaired (to my knowledge) throughout the nine months until Core 5 was
released. The community are not actively hostile, but seem so far
above my head as to be out of reach.

The two main failings of distros, from my point of view, are:
(1) not providing clear and easily found instructions on setting up
software repositories and adding the necessary extras (Java, etc.).
(2) not making it easy to report problems (such as the Palm sych) or
giving feedback on when such problems are likely to be solved.

Failing (1) is getting better. I expect lots of criticism for
mentioning failing (2), "don't you know about bugzilla?", "don't
complain because it's free", etc. I believe it is customary to don
flame-retardant clothing at this point.  ;-)

Mike

-- 
Michael Leuty
Nottingham, UK