Vic,
 I have tried most of the distro's out there, and by far Knoppix and 
SuSE were the best (IMO)! I liked Knoppix as it detected more than most 
others with little effort of my own, I just hated using apt-get and the 
naming conventions in it's interface. I then tried SuSE 8.2, and am now 
using 9.1 on all of my boxes. I have it on my server, desktop, laptop 
(with wifi) and my son's desktop (which dual boot's to winxp for his 
learning games). I Have found that I like KDE best for GUI and 
configuring the OS thru YaST is a breeze. I would recommending trying as 
many live cd distro's as possible just to get a feel for all of them. 
Obviously everyone has different tastes and prefrences, and that is what 
makes Linux so great you can make it what you want, you are not limited 
by several choices pre-determined by some programmer who does not know 
you or the other 100+ million users.   ;)
Just my opinion!!

Mike

Victor Odhner wrote:

> In the "fixing Firefox" thread, Eric Bixby wrote:
> > Sorry.  Somehow, I got it in my head that the
> > problem was the executable, itself...  If it's
> > your profile, I'll have to defer to someone
> > who's spent more time horsing around with
> > such things.  :)
>
> On a similar thread, Craig White wrote:
> > It is how we deal with that lack of knowledge that
> > differentiates us.
> >
> > I would suggest reading the book 'Zen and the Art
> > of Motorcycle Maintenance' as it covers this subject
> > rather thoroughly.
> >
> > Basically, you have to make a decision on what type
> > of user you wish to be...
>
> This is a wake-up call for me.
>
> I'm an experienced Unix developer.  By day, and
> sometimes into the evening, I am mired down in
> something over two million lines of complex C code,
> performing diagnosis and remediation, and
> participating in all sorts of talk on system
> architecture.  Building a release of this software
> is a black art.  Starting it up, shutting it down
> and controlling the debug tools is a whole specialty
> in itself.
>
> At work, I also use a Windows XP desktop where I can
> just install new apps and have them right there at
> my fingertips without diverting my attention from
> my main task.  This is just a tool.  I use it.
>
> By night, I would like to use Linux.  But my "parts
> is parts" view of the *nix world leads me to want to
> just plug things in and configure them.  It also
> makes me want to install distribution "A" here, and
> "B" there, and be able to experiment with each
> without effectively reverting to my day job.
>
> Frankly, until Craig's comment, I was going on the
> very naive assumption that there was some level of
> commonality and cooperation among the user interface
> efforts in the Linux world.  Thinking back, I remember
> all these discussions about the various distros and
> window managers, but failed to get deeply enough into
> them to realize that each of them is *exactly* like
> my day job:  you have to pick your distro and then
> become a wizard at it.  The Windows world is what it
> is because of standardization:  Even if an app is
> Free Software, its Windows version is likely to just
> plug and play, because it is installed into a known
> environment.
>
> My son is a Unix administrator and security guru.
> At home, he loves his highest-end Mac with OS X
> because he never has to lift the hood -- it just
> works.  He doesn't have to *work* at home, he can
> just play with his pictures and music and gaming
> systems, and focus his technical attention on those
> areas.
>
> So, I'm beginning to get it.  If I just want to be
> a Linux *user*, not a Linux *hacker*, then I must
> choose a distro and make it my home.
>
> What is the closest thing, in the Linux world, to a
> distro that just works, where new releases of apps
> are available promptly and just fall into place?
> I'm enough of a hacker to get the results I want
> in specific cases, and to build special tools to
> do non-standard things; but I don't want every
> install, and every update, to become that kind of
> exercise.
>
> I'm sure that Linspire would *not* suit me.  Maybe
> Gentoo, which I've been thinking about, is more on
> target.  I'm not in a hurry, I can wait for things
> to compile while I'm off at work ...
>
> ... speaking of which, it's time to make the donuts.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Vic
>
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