Thursday, January 29, 2009

Linux , XP , OS X , BSD or OpenSolaris

Well, my Win XP have been aging and so is my machine. I am looking for a suitable and stable OS to finally take over my XP box. I have tried variants of Linux distros (OpenSUSE , Fedora , Ubuntu) and now going to try LinuxMint. I am deciding whether to stay with XP or use one of the Linux distors out there.

The Linux distros I tried were amazing. But the one weak point that doomed all Linux distros are package manage / installation. Imagine where you enter a world where you have to use a command line to do installation by runing 'make' , 'make install' , './configure' commands while OS X and Windows just require you to double click and relax. Yes , there are GUI installers and you have the RPMs where you double click and scratch your head because I have seen many RPMs not showing you the process or telling you that it's being activated and is installing whatever things it is doing. Some RPMs would at least announce to you that it have installed this and that but mostly you wouldn't know what is going on... way to go RPMS... with the lousy usability for noobs.

Now , you have apt-get and yum where 'they' said that you just do some command like 'apt-get install wine' or 'yum -i wine' or something like that. Yes , it's simple because you just state whatever you want and somehow it 'magically' gives you but you have no control of exactly whatever you want. For installers , they would allow you to choose what you want to install ..etc... like asking if you want the source code given as well... no , yum and apt-get doesn't do that. No options... just install.

The worse thing about Linux is that there is so many variations of packages or installers... it literally confuses you. Another weak point is that the huge variation of Linux just sucks because you may have a software compiled for Gentoo and Ubuntu distros of Linux but you have none for a Fedora user and what if the Fedora user is also a noob like me who doesn't exactly know much about the technical stuff of Linux ? Linux really need a 'all-fit-one' installer or it would may loose potential users like ME :P .

So of all the ranting , now lets proceed to rant about XP. Yes, I am not using Vista because Vista is a notorious bloated troublemaker for any machine and I have heard enough to keep my distance with Vista. For now , XP is the most stable available and Win 7 is coming out but that would be sometime the end of this year and the huge variation of 'distros' of Win 7 Microsoft is planning for Win 7 is making me abit doubtful to getting myself to use Win 7 because.... it's one freaking Windows 7 so why make so shitty 'Home edition' , 'Basic' ...etc... Just give us a Win 7 and whatever software you want to give us , just put it together in the CD/DVD or on the MS website so we can do it ourselves and download or load it up for installation rather than having some preinstalled stuff pre-empting that we would want to use it. Xp is pretty bloated too to be absolutely honest. I can literally switch on my XP box and go to the fridge and walk one round the entire house and get back and it's still loading.

Now, let's get to OS X and hopefully no angry mac lovers would decide to DDOS my blogspot until it's brought to it's knees...

Mac ... it's definitely a work of tech-art mixture. Nice GUI , nice effects , very simple... but the simplicity is too simple , it just doesn't give you much to choose. I want a micture of simplicity with a fair amount of my control over what the system is ! Anyway, Mac is simply giving me the vibes of 'exclusive only'. It's up to you to interpret my words as good or bad but I have no idea if it's good or bad too... so don't ask me. I always have the feeling that Mac is 'cold'... I am not sure why but I would stay from Mac since I always get a 'cold' feeling from it. Ubuntu Linux is the opposite , it gives that warm fuzzy but not too overwhelming feeling. I like that. So Mac have to reach and listen more to others... this is what I thought.

BSD .... I am alien to it and it's alien to me. There's not much installers or software for BSD and it's very sure for the geeks only. I guess you would have to scratch your head and type on keyboards into command lines so often that your mouse would be really useless most of the time ? I maybe wrong because I AM alien to BSD and so is it to me.

Finally, Solaris/OpenSolaris. I did install and test out OpenSolaris and it's pretty good. I like the power of the ZFS where you can scroll some scroller and it brings you 'back in time' to view old copies of your file/folders of how they look like.... but OpenSolaris is too new...too new to be fully stable for my use.

Of all... here's what I would choose and most of them are based on how stable , how usable and how well accessible installation is.

Fedora - well... it's because there's that Yum and RPM combination and many RPMs out there have the word 'distro - fedora'. So I would be sure to know that there's lots of RPMs made for fedora. Yes , there's lots of Ubuntu installers like '.deb' files and what you know but look around you, RPMs are pretty much 'alive' out there. It's pretty usable all thanks to Gnome desktop or else Fedora would simply exist as a command line thing without GUI or at most basic rough looking GUI. Stability of Fedora is pretty doutbful because I have Fedora crash on me a few times and have difficutly installing it's installers. What a waste of potential for Fedora. If Fedora doesn't make the basics right like the installer CDs ... it just would be good.

Ubuntu - Nice work of trying to improve. Nice GUI customized with the warm colours. Very easy to navigate around and work with but...why do I need to use apt-get and aptitude most of the time in command lines ? Yes , the package manager is nice thing to have. Anyway, it inherits the problem of all Linux systems , a centralized package installer.

OpenSUSE - Makes lots of improvement in terms of GUI and effect. Inherits the 'great installation problem' of all Linux systems. Configuring yum repos are a pain in the ass... same goes for the repos for YAST. Make it easier can you , Novell ?

LinuxMint - Trying out now... no comment ...maybe the same 'great installation problem' too ? Hey, the download speed for the ISO file is so artificial and controlled... can you guys be a bit more generous rather than allowing arond 30KBps ...which means I need around 6 hours ? You need to attract users...you know ?

XP - Bloated ... bloated...bloated...and bogged down by unnecessary apps. Windows... always a system with a huge targetting cross on it because...most viruses and whatever so malicious are made just for YOU ! Windows just naturally attract the worse of viruses and malicious stuff because ... even the military of many countries are using it , I guess ?

OS X - No money for your whatever iBook it might be ! I am not so rich to afford one... and I want to reuse my box/machine.

OpenSolaris - Good potential...but you have gotta to be more mature and stable first... so grow up .. little boy :P .

Hmmmm... none of them actually fits what I want... since there's always a believe that there's no such thing as 'perfection'. Well...it's true but I gotta choose one .... maybe I would finally decide after looking into LinuxMint and I may like it from the interesting looks of the screenshots....or maybe another huge 'Linux Disappointment' ?

2 comments:

Prostate Cancer from a survivors opinion said...

I have been like this article says looking for a windows xp alternative.
I have spent hours downloadong different linux distros some excellent some poor.
So i have been trying for 24/7 to find a free linux-xp download, but the sites refere you to a sign in page, which i dont like.
So maybee some one out there has a direct link that the average newbee can use please let me know as im interested in the linux-xp os
danielwillis@wideband.net.au

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