Re: [LUAU] Fedora Core 3 Test 1
Warren Togami wrote: FC3T1 is indeed FC2 + tons and tons of fixes . . . Yesterday I had a need to re-install FC2 (for a test system to be demoed in Houston). It has no problem with my nForce2 based motherboard (I hope this also serves as a clarification of my previous statement). For all OSS systems, we should realize that the motto the devil is in the details couldn't be more true. After installation, I ran yum update (this actually moves FC2 past the FC3T1 for patches), followed by yum install to install mplayer, mplayerplug-in, flash-plugin, and xmms-mp3. Finally, I went to Fedora rawhide to install OpenOffice.org 1.1.2 (there are major differences b/t 1.1.2 and 1.1.1, and the benefits outweigh the risks of installing from rawhide). After making sure everything is working, I went to Mozilla to load CJK language modules, as well as installed RealPlayer-10 rpm. I won't go into details, but as far as internationalization goes, this is the best system in the history of computing, and is still improving. wayne
Re: [LUAU] Fedora Core 3 Test 1
Great report Wayne, I have a question, before I install FC 1,2, or 3, are these releases an indication of things to come, where there seems to be 2 revisions in a 6 month period of time? And where do you see the distribution stabilizing? FC 5 or 7? Also are the differences between the three that profound for a desktop install? Thanks. Today's Slashdot has a thread on Linux notebooks from HP. When I said that FC3T1 installs and works perfectly on my HP ze5000 laptop, I was not making an overstatement. And I thought that the odyssey that I had gone though tells an excellent story of how advanced Linux has evolved with regard to hardware compatibility. This example also illustrates the importance of choosing the right Linux distro. When I purchased this HP laptop a few months ago, I was betting that it will eventually work with Linux (or more particularly RedHat/Fedora). As I mentioned earlier, FC1 initially wouldn't install at all. The Honorable Alan Cox (does anyone still remember Alan?) offered several suggestions. None worked. However, his suggestions gave me a hint to try almost every possible startup option, including NOSUB. This finally did the trick. But there were several other problems, including the inability to go into power-saving mode (i.e., no ACPI), that I had to turn off PCMCIA, and the CPU fan never stopped running. Then FC2 came along and I had no problem installing it. ACPI also seemed to work OK. However, when I put the laptop into battery mode, it began crawling. Apparently, there are bugs with the PowerNow driver. With FC3T1, everything now works like magic. When I unplug the AC power, PowerNow immediately kicks in, but this laptop still runs better than some of my desktops. With PowerNow working as designed, under certain conditions, I was able to squeeze out more than 3 hours of battery life. This is truly amazing, considering that I was using one of the cheapest batteries. If I use a more expensive 12-cell battery I think I might be able to squeeze out 5 hours. After the success of FC3T1, I went back to FC2. Everything now works like charm with my fully patched FC2. There are two other very exciting developments. First, RealPlayer 10 for Linux came out today. I had no problem installing it in Fedora Core 1/2/3. So far, it works great. The second development, which may not interest a lot of people here but is of CRITICAL interest to me is the publication of the first comprehensive macro book for OpenOffice.org: http://www.hentzenwerke.com/catalog/oome.htm Or you can wait until it becomes available at Amazon.com (cheaper and free shipping): http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1930919514/qid=1091605589/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl14/104-6319084-8639941?v=glances=booksn=507846 While it appears that SUN is bashed by everyone in the Linux community, by opensourcing OpenOffice and taking the lead in its development, SUN is, IMNSHO, making one of the most significant contributions to the Linux/OSS movement. wayne ___ LUAU@lists.hosef.org mailing list http://lists.hosef.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/luau
Re: [LUAU] Fedora Core 3 Test 1
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Great report Wayne, I have a question, before I install FC 1,2, or 3, are these releases an indication of things to come, where there seems to be 2 revisions in a 6 month period of time? And where do you see the distribution stabilizing? FC 5 or 7? Also are the differences between the three that profound for a desktop install? Thanks. For desktops, I don't notice any difference in installs. In fact, I am still using FC1 as my primary desktop (b/c I need compatibility with Win4Lin). One of the main inconveniences of using FC1 is that there is no idiot-proof way of upgrading certain software (e.g., to OpenOffice 1.1 or Mozilla beyond 1.4). Of course, you can always use rawhide to do the upgrade. However, unless you know what you're doing, this is not encouraged. If you don't have the kind of particular need that I have, FC2 with a post-installation update--or FC3T1 if you don't want to be bothered with running yum--should be the preferred option. (As I have learned now, FC2 Test 1 is the final version of FC1, and FC3 Test 1 is the final version of FC2; so far the test versions actually started with Test 2.) wayne
Re: [LUAU] Fedora Core 3 Test 1
Sorry I was not paying attention when I post the reply (shame on me). If you have a nForce2 based MB, FC1 does not have the driver (which means that your built-in NIC and USB peripherals won't work, a big pain in the anal). I forgot about FC2 (though I believe I ran into the same problem). FC3T1 would be your best bet. Plus, the nv driver in FC3T1 is a substantially improved version. Don't be fooled by the name designation. FC3T1 is not a beta software. As Warren mentioned, Test 2 will be a beta software. wayne
Re: [LUAU] Fedora Core 3 Test 1
Today's Slashdot has a thread on Linux notebooks from HP. When I said that FC3T1 installs and works perfectly on my HP ze5000 laptop, I was not making an overstatement. And I thought that the odyssey that I had gone though tells an excellent story of how advanced Linux has evolved with regard to hardware compatibility. This example also illustrates the importance of choosing the right Linux distro. When I purchased this HP laptop a few months ago, I was betting that it will eventually work with Linux (or more particularly RedHat/Fedora). As I mentioned earlier, FC1 initially wouldn't install at all. The Honorable Alan Cox (does anyone still remember Alan?) offered several suggestions. None worked. However, his suggestions gave me a hint to try almost every possible startup option, including NOSUB. This finally did the trick. But there were several other problems, including the inability to go into power-saving mode (i.e., no ACPI), that I had to turn off PCMCIA, and the CPU fan never stopped running. Then FC2 came along and I had no problem installing it. ACPI also seemed to work OK. However, when I put the laptop into battery mode, it began crawling. Apparently, there are bugs with the PowerNow driver. With FC3T1, everything now works like magic. When I unplug the AC power, PowerNow immediately kicks in, but this laptop still runs better than some of my desktops. With PowerNow working as designed, under certain conditions, I was able to squeeze out more than 3 hours of battery life. This is truly amazing, considering that I was using one of the cheapest batteries. If I use a more expensive 12-cell battery I think I might be able to squeeze out 5 hours. After the success of FC3T1, I went back to FC2. Everything now works like charm with my fully patched FC2. There are two other very exciting developments. First, RealPlayer 10 for Linux came out today. I had no problem installing it in Fedora Core 1/2/3. So far, it works great. The second development, which may not interest a lot of people here but is of CRITICAL interest to me is the publication of the first comprehensive macro book for OpenOffice.org: http://www.hentzenwerke.com/catalog/oome.htm Or you can wait until it becomes available at Amazon.com (cheaper and free shipping): http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1930919514/qid=1091605589/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl14/104-6319084-8639941?v=glances=booksn=507846 While it appears that SUN is bashed by everyone in the Linux community, by opensourcing OpenOffice and taking the lead in its development, SUN is, IMNSHO, making one of the most significant contributions to the Linux/OSS movement. wayne
Re: [LUAU] Fedora Core 3 Test 1
Hawaii Linux Institute wrote: FC3T1 probably should be more appropriately named FC2-SP1. But as long as there are improvements, names don't really matter. (As we all know, FC2 made so many major changes from FC1, and did not go through a commensurately long testing period, resulting in a half-baked system. FC3T1 couldn't have come soon enough.) FC3T1 is indeed FC2 + tons and tons of fixes, except for two things... * gcc-3.4.1 is now used instead of gcc-3.3.x. This may complicate things if you use 3rd party drivers, although old gcc-3.3.x compiled software works easily with the compat-* libraries. * https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=128154 This problem happens... just close all terminals and open it again to recover, and don't rely on ssh into your local workstation. We're working on figuring out what causes this. http://fedora.redhat.com/participate/schedule/ While FC3T1 is pretty stable aside from the one problem mentioned above, T2 and T3 may be less stable from a desktop perspective because of the upheaval coming with GNOME 2.7.x betas. Warren Togami [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [LUAU] Fedora Core 3 Test 1
Warren Togami wrote: FC3T1 is indeed FC2 + tons and tons of fixes, except for two things... * gcc-3.4.1 is now used instead of gcc-3.3.x. This may complicate things if you use 3rd party drivers, although old gcc-3.3.x compiled software works easily with the compat-* libraries. * https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=128154 This problem happens... just close all terminals and open it again to recover, and don't rely on ssh into your local workstation. We're working on figuring out what causes this. http://fedora.redhat.com/participate/schedule/ While FC3T1 is pretty stable aside from the one problem mentioned above, T2 and T3 may be less stable from a desktop perspective because of the upheaval coming with GNOME 2.7.x betas. Warren Togami [EMAIL PROTECTED] Hi Warren- Haven't seen you for a while, I thought you moved to the NeverNeverLand (mainland). (OK, take that back, I now remember seeing you at Brian Chee's lab only about 1.5 months ago.) For ordinary desktop use, a fully updated and augmented FC1 is probably the best distro. Period. It's snappy and does everything I want (including compatibility with Win4Lin, etc). However, for laptops, FC3T1 is a better choice. I have a blue-collar run-of-the-mill laptop, HP Pavilion ze4500 (Athlon XP-M 2500, 15 LCD, 512 MB DDR with 64 MB dedicated VRAM, and I think I paid $899 for it). With FC1, after several painful experimentations, I was finally able to install it--but had to use a NOUSB option. After installation, I have to turn PCMCIA off. FC3T1, OTHO, installs and works perfectly on this machine. If anyone is interested in buying a laptop, this is the one that I strongly recommend. Everything works except my Netgear WA111A USB wireless card (no driver yet, but I think a lot of people are working on it). I am thinking about getting the same Belkin USB wireless card that is being used in Makiki library. As I mentioned in a separate thread, I will be very interested in Bugzilla-ing Fedora. But I believe it will be much more productive if we could have a local situs that can provide more than cybernetic interactions. wayne
Re: [LUAU] Fedora Core 3 Test 1
Vince Hoang wrote: Fedora Core Testing ftp://hosef.ics.hawaii.edu/fedora/linux/core/test/2.90/i386/os/images/ Fedora Core Rawhide ftp://hosef.ics.hawaii.edu/fedora/linux/core/development/i386/images/ ... and if you tire of Fedora, try these other fine development boot CDs ... If you want to install Mandrake's Cooker: ftp://hosef.ics.hawaii.edu/Mandrakelinux/devel/cooker/i586/images/ Debian's Sarge or Sid: ftp://hosef.ics.hawaii.edu/debian-cd/netinst/i386/daily/ -Vince Hi Vince- You now made me feel awefully guilty. As a highly demanded Linux/Unix consultant, your time, I know, is stretched like tin foil. By lots of mahalo, wayne
Re: [LUAU] Fedora Core 3 Test 1
FC3T1 probably should be more appropriately named FC2-SP1. But as long as there are improvements, names don't really matter. (As we all know, FC2 made so many major changes from FC1, and did not go through a commensurately long testing period, resulting in a half-baked system. FC3T1 couldn't have come soon enough.) I know it is very cumbersome to have to d/l the three images then burn them into CDs before installation. But if Vince gets time to supplement our local mirror, all you need to do is copy two moderately sized files, vmlinuz and initrd.img, into your boot directory, then modify your grub.conf so you can do ftp install (or harddisk install if you d/l the iso's). The whole process should take no more than one hour. (Since this is a test OS, you probably won't want to overwrite your MBR; thus, you should specify so during installation and, after installation, you also need to go to console mode, Crl/Alt/F3, to edit your grub.conf so you can reboot from this new installation.) The water is warm, and we need warm bodies. wayne
Re: [LUAU] Fedora Core 3 Test 1
I've done about 4 different kickstarts on about 3 different rawhide builds on 6 laptops that are considered not linux-ready without no problems yet. They are HP nx9110 built on, I believe, some asus or ati system board. The video and sound are both ati. Except for audio; it doesn't work and gives me an error on xorg startup if you use KDE with some sound package loaded. But I didn't need audio to teach a Linux class. Tom Hawaii Linux Institute [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent by: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 07/13/2004 11:49 PM Please respond to Linux/Unix Advocates/Users Hawaiian community discussion list To: Linux/Unix Advocates/Users Hawaiian community discussion list luau@lists.hosef.org cc: Subject:Re: [LUAU] Fedora Core 3 Test 1 Tom Gordon wrote: just follow rawhide. i have, since ~rh8 You're exactly right. Heard about it, but never knew how well it would work. wayne ___ LUAU@lists.hosef.org mailing list http://lists.hosef.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/luau
Re: [LUAU] Fedora Core 3 Test 1
On Tue, 2004-07-13 at 08:06, Hawaii Linux Institute wrote: https://listman.redhat.com/archives/fedora-announce-list/2004-July/msg00012.html I think I am getting a little bit dizzy now. Your thoughts? wayne just follow rawhide. i have, since ~rh8 -- Tom Gordon [EMAIL PROTECTED] 3 the United States of America
Re: [LUAU] Fedora Core 3 Test 1
Tom Gordon wrote: just follow rawhide. i have, since ~rh8 You're exactly right. Heard about it, but never knew how well it would work. wayne
