On Wed, 03 Dec 2003 14:45:51 +1100, Zenaan Harkness wrote: > As per the recommendations from Bruce Perens' User Linux paper > http://userlinux.com/white_paper.html, this thread is to discuss the > applications within the bounded set of Debian Enterprise/ User Linux.
I think discussing the favorite applications, at this point, is a bit premature. Debian Enterprise (DE) should be concentrating on the framework that will make flavors possible. There is much that remains to be done on the technical level (kernels, a distribution that is up-to-date enough that companies will _want_ to use it, an installer, etc). Deciding what applications to supply isn't of much use right now (especially given the rate of development of some; mozilla-firebird may be a good choice now, but what about when epiphany or another alternative becomes the better browser?). Remember the original goals that DE is attempting to solve. Current Debian-using companies must maintain their own package backports, kernels, and so on. Deciding what browser we will default to, while possibly helping in standardization, is a long ways off. In order for DE to become useful, we must cater to companies (not the other way around). Thus, we should build out the infrastructure enough so that DE, by itself, is installable and useable. At that point, we can start worrying about what flavors will contain what software. > > The bounded set will depend on the flavour. So first comes proposed > flavours (and sub-flavours/ tasks/ yadda) - see previous email/ thread. > > Here are some initial (obviously debatable and incomplete) selections to > start out the bounded-apps conversation: > > * Web Browser > - Mozilla-Firebird > I've used Mozilla, Galeon in its day, more recently Epiphany, and the > last few months Moz-Firebird. It is simply the simplest (and in my > opinion best) of the crop. > > * Web Server - Apache 2.0 (let's get with the times) > > * Open SSH Implementation - OpenSSH (much more active that gnu version) > > * Office Suite - OpenOffice (there's no other near as feature complete) > > * Scripting Language - Python (no one will debate this one :) > - I have never used, only read (plenty) about Python, and I'm not > personally too sure about this white space thing, but from what I hear > about it (quite consistently) eventually feeling more "natural" than > anything else, I am inclined to believe this really is the case. My > experience with Java (after C/C++) was sort of like that, and if Python > is more so, then I think it could be closest to the next VB replacement
