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Open Letter to Debian and Ubuntu Developers

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Re: Open Letter to Debian and Ubuntu Developers

#31

Post by sampo »

> There's also the nuttiness known as gnome-shell and unity.

I wish more people knew about Xfce (Xubuntu). It offers a better Gnome 2 -like experience than Gnome 2 ever did.

Although, the ouf-of-the-box theme, and look and feel, of Xfce/Xubuntu looks very dated. Changing the theme, desktop background picture, adding some transparency, is easy for a geek, and gives you a nice modern-looking desktop. But the default theme with gray and blue colors gives a somewhat Windows XP -like feeling.

Re: Open Letter to Debian and Ubuntu Developers

#32

Post by epoch1970 »

cwyers wrote: post #9

I mean, most people don't have that many problems with Ubuntu and Debian boxes, right? My first thought is, what is the author doing that most people aren't? Maybe stop doing that?

I don't think the author is alone in having problems with Ubuntu and Debian. There are numerous forums, mailing lists, bug trackers, and so forth which are full of reports of people encountering problems like the author describes.

Many of those users, especially if they're new to Linux, probably just end up abandoning Linux instead of talking about their problems in more detail like the author did.

Even experienced Linux users are moving on. I used Ubuntu and Debian, among other Linux distros, daily for many years. But I too started noticing quality problems. So I've moved to OS X. It isn't perfect, but it generally gives a much better experience than I was getting with Linux, while still letting me use much of the software I was accustomed to using.

Re: Open Letter to Debian and Ubuntu Developers

#33

Post by pan69 »

sampo wrote: post #31

> There's also the nuttiness known as gnome-shell and unity. I wish more people knew about Xfce (Xubuntu). It offers a better Gnome 2 -like experience than Gnome 2 ever did. Although, the ouf-of-the-box theme, and look and feel, of Xfce/Xubuntu looks very dated. Changing the theme, desktop background picture, adding some transparency, is easy for a geek, and gives you a nice modern-looking desktop. But the default th…

I have become a big fan of XUbuntu as well. When Ubuntu phased out Gnome 2 I looked for alternatives and I found XUbuntu. Like you said, it's a better Gnome 2 than Gnome 2 ever was.

This is what my XUbuntu desktop looked like a few years ago: http://imgur.com/BK2leWF

Re: Open Letter to Debian and Ubuntu Developers

#34

Post by pythia__ »

gboudrias wrote: post #6

> I mean, I have a really rather high IQ (just look at the web page below), and I have patience that is perhaps unmatched. I'm guessing you didn't write this, but don't write this. One, your IQ is irrelevant, it's an outdated way to measure anything practical. Two, patience is relative (and vague). Three, it makes you sound like a conceited jerk. > We need to figure out what is going wrong, not just at the technical…

>your IQ is irrelevant, it's an outdated way to measure anything practical

This is a common misconception. IQ predicts a lot about a person's life outcomes; see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_quotient#Social_c... for a basic overview.

It is usually a faux pas to bring up your IQ online but that is not because IQ lacks predictive power.

Re: Open Letter to Debian and Ubuntu Developers

#35

Post by V-2 »

some-guy wrote: post #4
neoCrimeLabs wrote: post #3

Was that page deliberately designed to be unreadable? I am honestly trying not to troll. Tried to read and had to give up.

I copy and pasted the text to a text editor.

This struck me as well, and yet this very article complains about lack of good "design and usability" : )

Re: Open Letter to Debian and Ubuntu Developers

#36

Post by alexandrerond »

tl;dr A rant from a guy who manages servers like it was 1995 complaining how he can't reboot and how things were much better back then.

I reboot, upgrade and recreate machines on a daily basis. The Linux Servers and Desktops work pretty well these days, despite Systemd, Gnome 3 or Unity.

If you need days to boot a server, it might not be the server's fault... just saying...

Re: Open Letter to Debian and Ubuntu Developers

#37

Post by hyperpape »

pythia__ wrote: post #34
gboudrias wrote: post #6

> I mean, I have a really rather high IQ (just look at the web page below), and I have patience that is perhaps unmatched. I'm guessing you didn't write this, but don't write this. One, your IQ is irrelevant, it's an outdated way to measure anything practical. Two, patience is relative (and vague). Three, it makes you sound like a conceited jerk. > We need to figure out what is going wrong, not just at the technical…

>your IQ is irrelevant, it's an outdated way to measure anything practical This is a common misconception. IQ predicts a lot about a person's life outcomes; see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_quotient#Social_c... for a basic overview. It is usually a faux pas to bring up your IQ online but that is not because IQ lacks predictive power.

Any of those studies address the predictive power of IQ with regard to online discussions of the state of Linux?

Re: Open Letter to Debian and Ubuntu Developers

#38

Post by hyperpape »

zanny wrote: post #15
vessenes wrote: post #11

Ad hominem attacks on this page notwithstanding, he's not wrong. The reliability and simplicity of 'getting to a shell prompt' out-of-the box for ubuntu also seems to me to be on the decline over the last ten years. And going much farther back, I would say that inscrutability of boot problems might be at its all time worst. I have ubuntu systems that will hang for 60 seconds on network failures, or sometimes just ref…

I think a lot of it boils down to the Linux ecosystem worship of C99. Almost everything underneath your GUI (and often times, it even is your GUI, cough Gnome...) is written in C. C is good for micro-systems where you do not want to implement all the abstractions higher level languages require. It is good for implementing low level functionality in other languages (like Python) or for writing a first-try compiler in…

1) I'm not sure I get what your theory about C is. I could get it if his machine was segfaulting, but how does C cause these problems? 2) C trivially can't explain any decline that's happened, because old Linux was also written in C.

Re: Open Letter to Debian and Ubuntu Developers

#39

Post by thaumasiotes »

hyperpape wrote: post #37
pythia__ wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>your IQ is irrelevant, it's an outdated way to measure anything practical This is a common misconception. IQ predicts a lot about a person's life outcomes; see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_quotient#Social_c... for a basic overview. It is usually a faux pas to bring up your IQ online but that is not because IQ lacks predictive power.

Any of those studies address the predictive power of IQ with regard to online discussions of the state of Linux?

Yes, the result known as the positive manifold says that high performers in one area will be high performers in other areas.

Re: Open Letter to Debian and Ubuntu Developers

#40

Post by zanny »

hyperpape wrote: post #38
zanny wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a lot of it boils down to the Linux ecosystem worship of C99. Almost everything underneath your GUI (and often times, it even is your GUI, cough Gnome...) is written in C. C is good for micro-systems where you do not want to implement all the abstractions higher level languages require. It is good for implementing low level functionality in other languages (like Python) or for writing a first-try compiler in…

1) I'm not sure I get what your theory about C is. I could get it if his machine was segfaulting, but how does C cause these problems? 2) C trivially can't explain any decline that's happened, because old Linux was also written in C.

1. The complexity breakages caused by software interactions over the years only gets worse with increased complexity. This is where the overarching theme in the piece of "Linux is getting worse" comes from. More moving parts, more interactions between parts, and more errant behavior and millions of LOCs getting chugged through a CPU give you a larger surface area for problems.

2. This is just a reiteration of the main point, but old Linux was... a PITA to work with. Xorg configurations, manually activating peripherals, no common bus interface like dbus, etc.

The problem is, again, when your foundation is built on C and you used it throughout the entire construction, you get leaks and problems come through the cracks especially at the joints and especially at points of interaction (especially between multiple versions / upgrades, which is a major point of the OP). Linux has gotten bigger to do more and be more, but as long as we keep piling on unsafe, unabstracted code as the fundamental our technical debt becomes so incredibly huge that you get to the point where you pull a Debian Stable rather than an Arch because upgrades are so terrifying.

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