[Top posting cos it's getting too messy] You're missing the point of debian ( and RedHat and maybe amazon linux too these days ) completely.
They are designed primarily for servers. As a server sysadmin I am really happy to stay well away from the bleeding edge of development, and reside in a more comfortable space where features are locked down and I benefit from the huge pool of testers provided by the number of sites who update through their package management systems. Sure, I'm missing out on the last n% of performance, and I can't connect to X, and my whizzbang graphics card doesn't function? Well, me ( server admin ) and Craig's granny are in the same boat here... reliability and security are far more important. TBH this thread was started about an Ubuntu LTS - ie a primarily server oriented release. My moan was that it's not fit for a lappie, and am probably going to vote with my feet. Your requirements for a desktop OS and others are not necessarily the same... I would expect that an user of ( primarily ) web based email will not need much specific hardware. They might even prefer KDE or lizards (lol) Steve On Thu, 2014-05-08 at 11:09 +1200, Volker Kuhlmann wrote: > On Thu 08 May 2014 09:34:34 NZST +1200, C. Falconer wrote: > > > Perhaps its time to drop all the frippery and return to the core values > > of Debian where "it works" is more important than eye candy, and there > > Define "it works". Spending half a day studying the 'net, then half an > hour editing a text file just to make X work which should "just work" is > a form of "works". As is a something that pops up on the desktop after a > plug in event and says "cool, I created the config, works now" with a > button "OK". > When it comes to suggesting it to other-OS user, or simply for getting > some real work done, I know which one I pick to avoid embarrassing > myself too much. > > > is no concept of Long Term Support because that's the default. > > Oh really? My own real-life experiences with that are: > 1) We all know the stale/beta/broken. It's too true. Stale simply > doesn't have the required drivers for the not-so-young hardware, > beta/broken just doesn't seem like a good idea for anything supposed to > be stable for some time. > 2) No free-time developer cares about stuff 3 years old that they last > used themselves 2.9 years ago. Consequently, the promised > long-term-support updates simply don't happen. It's a hollow promise. > > Both these points make Debian a bad choice for a desktop OS. > > > In other linux-related issues, my Nana still runs XP. Her sole use of > > the computer is email via a web browser. > > Tick tick tick tick tick.... > > > Has anyone got a suggestion for essentially a web-kiosk distro ? > > I'd build a plain debian install, but are there any other suggestions ? > > In your case, the factors are: > Someone needs to show the user initially the new stuff. > It needs to run on existing old hardware. > Someone needs to install updates frequently (i.e. you). > Those updates are ideally either provided for some time, or a complete > upgrade can be performed painlessly and quickly for both user and you. > > The combination of plain debian and you might be a best fit for the > case. > > Volker > -- Steve Holdoway BSc(Hons) MIITP http://www.greengecko.co.nz Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/steveholdoway Skype: sholdowa _______________________________________________ Linux-users mailing list [email protected] http://lists.canterbury.ac.nz/mailman/listinfo/linux-users
