[Techtalk] What distro?

[L J L]

Little Girl wrote:
> Hey there,
> 
> L J L wrote:
>> Little Girl wrote:
>  
>>> What desktop settings are not available, and which controls are
>>> hidden?
>  
>> I think the general control panel was just plain gone, and various
>> other desktop controls required root access to change.
> 
> Ah, okay, thanks for the information.
>  
>>> I've been using the Run command from the menu for *decades*, and
>>> I don't want to give that up. Older releases of Ubuntu had it in
>>> the menu. Someone must have actually made the executive decision
>>> to remove it!
>  
>> That was on of the other things that some fool decided that the
>> user had no need of.
> 
> As it turns out, it wasn't an Ubuntu fool who did it. Debian is
> missing it as well - at least it's not to be found anywhere in the
> menu in debian-506-i386-netinst.iso. It can only be accessed via an
> applet in the panel just like Ubuntu.

That's odd.  I'm running Lenny, with KDE.  I bring up K Menu, and there 
it is, just above the "switch User" and below the "System Menu".

>>> But if there's a compelling reason or reasons to switch to Debian
>>> instead, maybe I should do that. (:
>  
>> Compelling?  Not sure - if you like Kubuntu.  But I found it 
>> frustrating, and I'm a long time Debian and Linux user.  It was 
>> supposedly more user friendly, but it felt more like a Windows
>> wannabe.
> 
> Lots of people feel that way. (:

Heh. I'm glad to know I'm *not* the only one.  I've had Ubuntu advocates 
tell me I was delusional, and didn't know what I was talking about. :(

>> The things against Debian proper are the slower release cycle and
>> the silly tiff they have with Mozilla about the FireFox name and
>> branding. The upside is the slower release cycle means less
>> frequent radical upgrades, and they don't try to "fix" the UI to
>> elimiate the knobs.
> 
> I would actually enjoy a slower release cycle (as seen by the fact
> that I still use Hardy Heron even though it's quite outdated). What's
> the tiff about the Firefox name and branding?

They won't bundle actual FireFox and Thunderbird, but genericized 
versions called IceWeasel and IceDove.  They work fine, except when it 
comes to installing 3rd party extensions that want "FireFox" - like 
anything Adobe or Flash.

>> YMMV, of course.  There may be a Debian Live CD available, other
>> than Knoppix, I don't know off the top of my head.
> 
> I didn't find one, but I installed the .iso file I mentioned above
> into VirtualBox and had some fun. I also tried out Kubuntu 10.04 in
> VirtualBox and decided that they've restored enough of the Desktop
> functionality that I'm willing to go ahead and upgrade to that. (:

OK, I'm glad they fixed the problems,  Maybe they will figure out that 
the reason that people are migrating away from Windows is because they 
don't *want* a dumbed down interface...

ljl