[Nottingham] Expert support in installers (Oh how I laughed)

[Martin]

On 02/12/2012, Joshua Lock wrote:
> On 2 December 2012 09:35, Jason Irwin wrote:
>> On 2 December 2012 16:59, Joshua Lock wrote:
>>>
>>> I almost thought you were serious until this point. Then I realised
>>> you must be trolling because, of course, the alternate CD *was* just
>>> happy button clicking too, or at least happy key pressing.
>>
>> I was being a bit OTT, but I quite liked the alternate CDs and used it in
>> preference to the normal one.
>
> As I understand it the netinstall/mini ISO will enable you to do the
> same things the alternate installer did, so long as you have an
> internet connection.
>
> In seriousness, if the lack of an alternate installer is a genuine
> regression for you then you should file a bug. My first response to
> any rant aimed at me is "did you file a bug report".

Why must there be an 'alternate' installer that then suggests
'alternate' support and development and maintenance. Why not include
multi-layered filesystem stacks as an abstracted layer as part of the
*normal* installer?

Old Mandriva went a long way towards supporting that. Worked well for
RAID and LVM and RAID + LVM. But then, I had a setup where I wished to
use drbd and I'm sure I replicated work that EVERYONE else must have
to go through to include drbd...

Why can we not have a 'plug-in' or abstraction for that to be a normal
option in the installers?

If not already considered and included for mdadm RAID, LVM, others,
... : What happens when people wish to use the raid and snapshot
features of btrfs?...

Also provision now for GPT for example?...


Or do we all follow the proscribed install and have to rework the
wheel for anything 'different'?

Or do we promote easy polished choice?


>>> Why? Why not just install Mint? Which (so far as a cursory glance
>>> shows) is an Ubuntu re-spin with CInnamon on top.
>>
>> Same issue as Ubuntu.  No RAID support in the installer.  I have read
>> around
>> a fair bit today on resolving that (installing mdadm etc), but using the
>> 12.04 alternate is in fact a much simpler solution.

"Reading around a fair bit" is not 'polished'.

Is this where FLOSS falls down in that the clever geekie
'under-the-hood' stuff is done well but then is left only occasionally
utilised because noone cared to do the boring user-friendly
interface?...


Cheers,
Martin