No more a newbie (just stupid sometimes)

Just read a blog by tronic (Linux is fragmented, and will never be BIG as MS because of the chaos it creates with all its live-cd's and distro's).

Guess he's wrong.

Linux is BIG now and strong just because of that diversity. Linux will be weak when one BIG Linux-corporation will "kill" all the other distro's and replace it with one flavour of pizza. I don't understand all the hate that linux/MS -users have for each other. I use MS and DSL (red hat/suse/mandrake/lycoris.... etc,. etc..) on my pc's and for now i do my banking/administration with MS. (because Linux will not do this for me, OR i am not clever enough to figure it out OR i am a busy parent who hasn't got the time to figure it out OR my family doesn't want to see a strange GUI on the desktop OR ........)

But i know this: When the time comes that DSL (or some other distro) can replace my MS (banking/administration) I will change the GUI/DESKTOP/THEME of linux into something that will look/feel/work very simular to MS. Because, let's face it. My wife and daughter want something familier on the desktop. I want something familier on the desktop.

REALLY , the only thing i want in MS that i find unique in linux is the fact that i can copy/paste with the scroll-wheel! I find myself very often trying to copy/paste in MS with the scroll-wheel... :-)

REALY, the only thing i want in MS is that i can take it with me on my usb-stick and boot ANY kind/type of PC with it.

REALLY, the only thing i want is the low-cpu useage and the wm-applications that i have runnning in DSL right now (i like stats/numbers :-) ) I know that there are lots of windows/sidebar applications for MS but the all eat a lot of cpu... :-(

REALLY, i like xplanet as my root-desktop (including again the low-cpu useage), i know that i can do this also in MS but i dare not )

REALLY, the only thing i like about linux is firefox V1.0 PRE
and it's tab-browsing/extra extensions/reload function/etc.. etc... (i know that FF is also available in MS but i have a java problem with it)

REALLY, the only thing i like about linux is it stable-ness/fast booting-ness, custumisable-ness

REALLY....

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Feather linux

Just tried feather linux on a usb-stick. Looks like DSL with lots of extra tools. Very nicely done anyway... But what i want to say: i sortha crambed my usb-stick (with DSL) also full with extra's and it is hard to keep it all 1) organised 2) manageble 3) easy to access. The last one is what i want to talk about. featherlinux (fluxbox) is so crambed full with stuff that it is hard to find the right tool/app when you need it. I sortha tried to change all that by filling fluxbox up with icons, but in the end, it is not getting much better. Wish that fluxbox could change color/font for every entry in the fluxmenu... Haven't found any better WM to do the trick.

Strange, every distro i try (on my usb-stick) seems to be debian/knoppix/DSL related. (INSERT/feather/....)

what are you talking about? :)

What're you talking about? I never in my article said "(Linux is fragmented, and will never be BIG as MS because of the chaos it creates with all its live-cd's and distro's)."

I said its fragmented, which it is. But I never said its big like MS or whatever. Come on man...In 1996, when I first started Linux, there were 3 distros...Slackware, Redhat, and Debian. Now how many are there? I'm not complaining...but the point is it is confusing. At least there are places like DistroWatch who take the time to compare all four trillion distributions.

The problem is now everyone has their own (sub)distribution. Feather is/was based on DSL, which is based on Knoppix, which is based on Debian...or all 30,000 other livecds based on debian...haha...I dunno. Its actually kind of amusing.

The reason I made that post with no replies allowed was so stuff like this wouldn't happen...But I don't want someone to take me out of context...or make a blatant miscommunication. I'm not ANTI-MS...And I'm only ANTI-Linux when it comes to BSD, as thats where I've been for the past decade. Go figure. But I like linux...and I never said its too big or that it will get as BIG as MS is or whatever.

-william
tronik @ #damnsmalllinux irc.freenode.net

Sorry for taking you out of c

Sorry for taking you out of context or for the blatant miscommunication... :-)

ps: I never said YOU where anti-linux or something

moving from one version of DSL to another

Right now i use DSL (0.8.4) on a usb-stick (frugal) and i've got it on a PC at home DSL installed (frugal) (side by side with Win XP). I use grub to boot to DSL / XP / DOS. (on the HD, not on the stick, the stick boots with DOS and loadlin.exe gets me to DSL)

I am thinking of moving from 0.8.4 to 0.9.3, but i wonder how much work/time it will take to get all the added settings/applications back into the "new" DSL.

Things i added to 0.8.4:

settings in .xinitrc/bootlocalrc/fixfstab.sh/
lots of dsl-extensions in the root
fluxbox 0.9.11 + added menu-icons/keybindings
firefox V1 PRE + lots of added extensions and bookmark-groups *
xplanet + settings/scripts/maps/markers
wm-applications
xawtv + settings/tv-channels (deb dpkg -i) *
bdc (anti-virus) (deb dpkg -i) *
scripts (diskcopy/xfree/outide ip-adres/torsmo/etc)
pictures (png/jpg)
sounds (wav)
realplayer (don't remember how i did that) *

All this work (*) sort off keeps me from making the change from one DSL to another. The rest is just a matter of copying from the unpacked backup.tar.gz to the right map in the new DSL. Maybe i am just lazy or scared that i will run into problems. I hear that there are dsl-users who are continuesly clooping (?) remastering the DSL-knoppix-file to add/delete app's and settings. Not my cup of tea i am afraid.

I often think that the KNOPPIX file has its pro's and con's. I don't know if a true HD-install of DSL will unpack the KNOPPIX-file to the HD and thereby make redundant the need to make backup's to save system-settings. Such a installation will use a lot more hd-space of course and will therefor not be a good idea for my usb-stick.

So far my thoughts about this matter...

donating to DSL

I just made paypal-account and am ready to donate some bucks to DSL. Hope all the other DSl-users will do that to. I am very happy with my usb-stick/HD-installation. It's so easy now to make changes/improvements to DSL on the stick (at work) and then just copy the whole stick (at home) to HD. (HD boots a lot quicker, that's why i don't boot with the usb-stick at home). (right now i am running out of diskspace AGAIN on the stick = 512 Mb).

Next "project" getting my scanner at home to work in DSL. (Hp scanner). I know (thanks to usb-view) that DSL has detected it. Now i need a scanner application.dsl or maybe i need to apt-get me something... (like sane/Xsane)

PS: it seems that dsl 0.9.3 supports usb V2.0 (which is suppost to be 40 time faster then usb V1). Wonder if DSl will boot 40 times faster from my usb sticj if i upgrade from 0.8.4 to 0.9.3???

Wow, donations are cool and a

Wow, donations are cool and all. But I guess I'm still of the mind that open source (freeware as it was in the day) was just that. Hey if you want some of my money to get more diskspacage for the web or more bandwitdth to share it with the discerning masses, I'm all for that. I've got about 600 bucks from my windows refund to share :D

Higara

And it is...

It is what it was in the day...but that doesn't mean people don't want to voluntarily support it ;) Like in the old days, when freeware was freeware(or postcard-ware) and authors asked for a letter or postcard...Nobodys begging for money here...Its just nice to get some support from your userbase when you work hard on something without a big corporate entity backing you ;) ...that way the freeware keeps rolling and keeps being free, rather than the person getting snatched up by some big company =) (some of that rhymed...weird.)

-william
tronik @ #damnsmalllinux irc.freenode.net