On Wed, 2005-03-02 at 02:35 -0700, Joshua Bryan wrote:
> Hello there... I am new to your LUG and am going to be switching to
> linux really soon... I have always been a fan of linux just had not had
> enough of the crap from M$ to switch... I have a couple of questions I
> was hoping that you could help with...
>
> First I am really leaning twords using SuSE 9.2 for my distro... There
> are the pro's and Con's for it, but it comes as close to meeting my
> needs as possible I think... I am really looking for a distro that works
> really well with multimedia as that is like a staple for me. I know that
> SuSE does not support DVD playback from the box but it seems easier to
> add that then try and get my wireless card to work with Fedora Core 3.
> Anyway back to my first question has anyone here used SuSE 9.2 w/
> wireless and had any major issue's besides the general fuss?
----
I will respond to this generally since I have had only 1 experience with
SuSE and would not suggest that I know much about the distribution but I
do know Red Hat and Fedora fairly well.
GPL license restricts the things that a distribution can include, thus
software with licensing incompatible with GPL is a problem for the
typical Linux distribution. I would presume that SuSE has external
packagers that offer things like mplayer, xine and of course you can
install realplayer's client after your original install of a
distribution. I know that the methods to install these packages on Red
Hat EL and Fedora are fairly simple now and expect that this should be
the case with other distributions such as SuSE.
Wireless cards are another issue - many chip sets do not operate with
the code that is in GPL. Typically the orinoco and Prism chipsets will
work. Intel has made a lot of code available for their Centrino wireless
chipsets and recent kernels have made using the above wireless 'cards'
pretty much a plug and play operation. All non-GPL code supported
wireless chipsets require ugly hacks such as ndiswrapper and I wouldn't
recommend them.
----
>
> Second I was looking at the DVD for SuSE 9.2 and the fact that it only
> installs the min software package! Can you add other things like the c
> compiler and all the other several gigs worth of stuff directly from the
> CD? A second part to my second question would be that SuSE calls the 9.2
> an Evaluation copy... Is that the same as MicroSuck's Evaluation
> Definition? Meaning does it only work for a curtain amount of time
> before requiring registration... Do they limit the update with "YOU" to
> only people who buy the software stuff like that?? Those are the kind of
> things that turned me away from mandrake... was how commercial it was...
----
Fedora is entirely free - can't comment on SuSE
----
>
> Third and Final question (For now)... I have never quite understood the
> need for different desktop managers such as KDE and gnome... Do you have
> to pick one and then can only use apps that are for that desktop
> manager? What I mean is if I use KDE as my desktop manager and then want
> to use gaim will it work? If so is all you are choosing the manager for
> is the look and feel of the system?
----
The look and feel is probably one of the more significant aspects of a
desktop manager
But to answer your question, as long as the necessary libraries for the
other desktop manager are installed, you can use the applications that
are implemented specifically for them. For example, if gnome libraries
are installed, you can use Evolution on KDE and if KDE libraries are
installed, you can use Kmail, etc.
I would generally recommend installing both and using switchdesk or
other means to switch back and forth to get a feel for both of them.
There are also more 'lightweight' managers. I found that my initial
interest was KDE - seemed more Windows like and friendlier, I have since
switched back to Gnome. I love having choices.
Craig
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