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- arbulus, on 05/28/2009, -13/+98This is absolutely spot-on what we need.
Though I would take it a few steps further with the app store. Make the app store replace "Add/Remove Programs", "Synaptic" and "Update Manager." Make the app store *the place* the install/uninstall software, whether free or paid, and the place to update software, manage installed software - everything.
I would use Thunderbird instead of Evolution. But that's just me.
Regarding fonts: hell yes, the Linux desktop NEEDS more default fonts - good, professional fonts.
And I completely agree that by focusing on a major app in each category, you build momentum and energy around that project which can help propel its development.
And no one uses Ekiga. Skype is where it's at.
Flash and Air? Hell yes. Flash is an ABSOLUTE MUST on the web and Air is a god-send to the Linux desktop. Forcing people to have to have to install this later is an inconvenience.
I also would say that finding a way to include mp3 codecs by default is almost a necessity. DVD playback would be a major plus, as would quicktime and wma/wmv playback. But AT LEAST mp3 playback should be enabled by default. The zealots can complain all they like but 99% of people listen to mp3s, not ogg. Beside the fact that almost no portable music device on the market supports the ogg format, and almost no audio player (except those that are Linux native) supports ogg. People coming from Windows or Mac are not going to have a 40 GB music collection in ogg format.
We have to get over this "only FLOSS apps can be considered for the Linux desktop" mentality. That is why it is faltering and failing. And if you have an app store that can easily handle the purchases of applications and take care of the commerce part of it for the developer, the dev can get paid and have a great deal more time to focus on developing. I think the iTunes App Store has proved that this model can and does succeed. And then when devs realize that they can write an app, submit it to the app store and potentially get paid for it without having to put up an ecommerce web site and deal with all the headaches of trying to manage it, you'll start to see an explosion of devs who will charge for their apps and it will prove that there IS commercial software viability on the Linux destop. - zenerdiode, on 05/29/2009, -0/+60Did the Sham-Wow guy write this?
"Why? Because Gnome-Do is awesome. That’s why."
"Boom. Done."
"Scream it from the mountain tops: GStreamer is king."
"KDE4 is rad. Very, very rad."
"Will they? Man. I sure hope so.
Because it would be awesome." - virtualmode, on 05/28/2009, -1/+42fonts can be taken from Google Android, they are free and are already in Ubuntu's repositories (ttf-droid package)
- lemur, on 05/29/2009, -3/+33This article is quite bad because the only thing that it's advocating is a particular package configuration. Give me a break. I could install 50 different distros and make them "the perfect linux distro" simply by installing the software mentioned in the article. They're not talking about making a distro, but just a spin of Ubuntu, of which there are 100's and for the love of God we don't need another one because you can't just preconfigure some packages to install and call it a new "distro." If I want Ubuntu I'll download Ubuntu and these so-called "distro author" script kiddies can stuff themselves.
Why does this article not mention anything that actually matters to distro makers? File system support? Audio system? SELinux? LVM? All the guy says is "Base? Install Ubuntu. Pakcage manager? dpkg." This article should have been written by a 12 year old who just installed Ubuntu over the weekend and titled "My Favorite Linux Porgrams." - tonytroz, on 05/29/2009, -0/+23The issue with mp3 isn't that everyone wants an open audio codec, it's the fact that it would cost money to ship the OS with mp3 capability.
http://www.cyberciti.biz/tips/why-linux-dont-suppo ...
They could include it, but then it wouldn't be free. That kind of defeats the purpose. - maz2331, on 05/29/2009, -16/+36If I want Windows, I'll use Windows.
- opencoder, on 05/28/2009, -3/+22I dugg it for the free cheesecake. First story i've dugg in a while.
- fatsobob, on 05/29/2009, -2/+21There is no perfect linux distro. The best thing about linux is the fact that there is a distro for everyone. Some prefer a more lean distribution, like Arch or Gentoo and some prefer a desktop distribution like Ubuntu or Fedora.
- RoboDonut, on 05/29/2009, -3/+21The ONLY reason GNU/Linux has gotten this far is because it is uncompromising on the FOSS ideals.
It's a simple fact that commercial software encourages developers to add irritating *****. Think about every time Quicktime/iTunes/Safari has popped up and pestered you about updating or some *****. Why does it happen? Product placement. And why do they try to shove the whole package on you when you only want one part? Market share. Think about every time you've updated Unreal Tournament 3 (or some other game) at a LAN party and found out you couldn't play because it ***** over your config files and needs you to input the CD-KEY again. Why does it happen? Incompetent developers and copy-protection. Think about all the times you've installed printer drivers and ended up startled by some stupid-ass voice ***** exclaiming your current print status at a bazillion decibels (Lexmark printers, by the way). All the arbitrary restrictions put in place on software to make sure that their product becomes obsolete by the time the next version is released. Why? Because they couldn't sell you the same product twice if they made it right the first time.
All of these little annoyances are the product of closed-source software.
That ***** just doesn't fly in FOSS. The software is written with the goal of making the best possible product, not to make money. If someone intentionally decided to pester the user, the project would be forked, the offending code removed, and the original (annoying) project would fall into obscurity.
I don't use entirely free software. I probably never will. But I see the importance of choosing FOSS over closed-source software in situations where both are available. - XFi6, on 05/29/2009, -4/+21I smell nonfree software in this article.
- sigmaman2, on 05/29/2009, -0/+16Cool! Where can I download it for free?
- daengbo, on 05/29/2009, -0/+15Yes, you can.
- orbish, on 05/29/2009, -0/+14thank you. i didn't feel like typing out all of that.
- hoodedrobin, on 05/29/2009, -0/+14The pirate bay.
- muniak, on 05/29/2009, -1/+14I wouldn't use half of these apps and even then... you don't need a new distro just to use empathy, skype, your favorite icons, etc. You can add them to quite a few distros already made, distros with extensive support communities.
Ground up? A fully functioning OS is not the ground, I realize that you're a "professional" software developer using all might amazingly pro MonoDevelop but I think you should have paid attention in school. This article is exactly what you alluded it wouldn't be: boring. - MasterGrief, on 05/29/2009, -5/+18Dugg for being realistic.
- RamezaniK, on 05/29/2009, -2/+14Maybe I'm understanding the article wrong, but he seems to be saying the perfect Linux distro ~= Mac OS X.
- DigitalPioneer, on 05/29/2009, -1/+13No, no, never do you put in CD keys more than once... You just have to reinstall the entire OS ever 6 months and call MS to get permission. Then you get to reinstall all your software, and you don't even notice that you had to put in the keys again.
Meanwhile, Linux may have 5-10 updates popping up ever day, but did you ever bother to ask why windows has viruses and Linux doesn't? And don't give me crap about Linux having viruses too. I know they exist, but seriously, who has ever gotten one? A big part of that is having software that's always up-to-date. - badcab, on 05/28/2009, -1/+12The cake is a lie
- RoboDonut, on 05/29/2009, -0/+11You've never used GNU/Linux, have you?
- americanoboy, on 05/29/2009, -4/+14ati sucks. get nvidia. their linux drivers are the *****.
THE ***** - gnatinator, on 05/29/2009, -0/+10They need to be installed by default.
- infectaphibian, on 05/29/2009, -0/+9You know it's made by geeks - they make great stuff.
- tuxchick, on 05/29/2009, -2/+11Yeah, we really need to turn Linux into a Mac or Windows clone, with EULAs, Big Brother, corporate spyware, and no rights at all.
- gnatinator, on 05/29/2009, -1/+101000X yes on the fonts. As a web designer, I feel the default Ubuntu installation really falls short here!
- contradictator, on 05/29/2009, -1/+10I know this is a common gripe, but some better driver support from the big players would be great too. I dual-booted Mint and Vista on my laptop for a while, and while I loved Mint, the lack of stable, up-to-date drivers (especially from ATI) lead me to eventually remove Mint altogether.
That and I had trouble using my iPod with Linux, but that's ATI's and Apple's fault really, cuz' otherwise, Mint was pretty awesome. - BarmyNick, on 05/29/2009, -0/+8I don't know but this guy wants us to "get over it! "
- Hellahulla, on 05/29/2009, -2/+9What an irritating writing style.
Also what the hell is wrong with pidgin? - zwaldowski, on 05/29/2009, -1/+8Hell yeah, I'm installing that the next time I boot into Ubuntu.
- 3242130193, on 05/29/2009, -0/+51. Linux is a kernel, it does not have an interface. Talk to the Gnome and KDE devs. And KDE4 is miles ahead of Win7 and Compiz puts OS X to shame. And no, there will never be one DE/"WM" so nobody bother going there. That would suck.
2. Yeah right, good luck convincing Novell, Red Hat, Canonical, etc. to abandon their projects and adopt someone else's. Again - multiplicity is a good thing, if for anything, because it allows for serving different purposes. No single distro can serve every purpose that is ever needed (and neither could Windows or OS X) - so there must be more than one.
3. Sigh. I've installed Linux on tons of systems and have never had to deal with driver issues (unless I was using something weird like Arch). And if you have driver problems, then get better hardware.
4. If you say so. I actually like knowing what I'm doing and having it placed logically in a menu. I don't need cartoons to tell me how to create superscripts or insert an image.
5. Again, if you say so. But there are tons of games for Linux and there will only be more in the future. Google around.
In summary, the world does not revolve around tek2e5. And it's a good thing that he's not the czar of the world cause he thinks he knows a lot more than he really does. - lars5, on 05/29/2009, -1/+7... so the perfect linux distro is the one i'm running right now? kind of a list of basics isnt it?
- gizram84, on 05/30/2009, -2/+8I've been a linux-only user since 2003. Debian is better; hands down.
- amirman, on 05/29/2009, -0/+6i think the best distro ever would be built on arch because pacman is the *****
- ATL, on 06/20/2009, -4/+10get over yourself
- sirjoebob, on 05/29/2009, -0/+5Gnome-do docky needs system tray support before I would advise that for everyone. System tray is still useful for some things.
- inactive, on 05/28/2009, -13/+18Really great post.
- sirjoebob, on 05/29/2009, -1/+6I have run Ubuntu for 3 years now and this is pretty much exactly what I am running.
- jamesmcm, on 05/29/2009, -0/+5OS X isn't Free Software! The whole point of GNU/Linux is guaranteeing the users' their 4 basic rights with software.
Read: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/fsfs/rms-essays.pdf - bbhill, on 06/16/2009, -0/+5I think thats what the digg button is for. . . ;)
- gizram84, on 05/30/2009, -0/+5not free and NO office suite at all. plus safari sucks and apple hardware is expensive.
- chaos386, on 05/29/2009, -0/+5Audacious or XMMS
- stormgren, on 05/29/2009, -1/+5This is out-of-the-box Fedora: ttps://fedoraproject.org/wiki/File:Tours_Fedora10_020_Apps_1.png (and https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Tours/Fedora10/Scre ... )
Far from Ugly, it's cleaner and less ugly than Windows. Or, in my opinion (apple people, digg me down) OS X.
Having multiple distros is the Linux way. It perfectly matches the Open Source philosophy: pick and choose what we like. If lots of people like it that way, you've got a distribution. It's all built on the Linux kernel anyways.
Driver Issues: 1997 called, they want their complaint back. Ubuntu and Fedora both have better out-of-box hardware support than Windows. Drivers are available in public repositories just like other software. It's not a pain anymore.
Open Office: Go make it better then or file an idea report at least. That's the Open Source way.
Lack of gaming: true (try it in Wine?), Video: NO! Use VLC, supports basically everything out there.
In summary: No. Your post is out-dated and uninformed. - stormgren, on 05/29/2009, -1/+5Not a Linux Kernel. BSD kernel, which is *nix, but not Linux.
- bobbknight, on 05/29/2009, -0/+4Lundke build it see if they come.
- OtengiM, on 05/29/2009, -0/+4And another thing you dont need to insult here, Maybe the sore fag is you *****. First look or know who you talking to.
- jsffive, on 05/29/2009, -0/+4Instructions please.
- DigitalPioneer, on 05/29/2009, -0/+4I agree with many that commercial software for Linux should happen. However, I believe that if/when it does, FOSS will keep pace just like it always has.
- jamesmcm, on 05/29/2009, -3/+7And that's why we use Free and Open alternatives!
So that stuff like that doesn't happen, so that users will always have the greatest choice. If we move away from FOSS then we destroy the entire point of GNU/Linux in the first place. You might as well just stick to Windows,
Read: www.gnu.org/philosophy/fsfs/rms-essays.pd - Joh739, on 05/29/2009, -0/+4Thanks mate! These are really nice fonts.
- Phate8263, on 05/29/2009, -0/+4Umm Ubuntu is set to default check updates DAILY. So if yours is doing it 5-10 times daily, you made it that way...
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