Weekly Edition
Return to the Press page
| |||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format)
Linux Format interviews Mark Shuttleworth. "We will definitely see a multimedia version of Ubuntu kick in, and we'll probably see an embedded version. At that point we'll pretty much span the gamut from the server, through the very lightweight client through Xubuntu, and to the embedded client, with Ubuntu and Kubuntu in the middle. Beyond that, I think we'll start to see more fragmentation around vertical markets. Edubuntu is a leading indicator of that -- an aggregation of stuff from both Ubuntu and Kubuntu, but optimised for education."
(Log in to post comments)
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 2, 2006 15:31 UTC (Mon) by rsidd (subscriber, #2582) [Link] I'm surprised by his first paragraph, that GNOME focuses on the underlying technology and usability while KDE focuses on looks and bling. To me, it has always seemed that KDE feels more solid and "just works" but looks a tad ugly, especially in kubuntu, while GNOME looks nicer but is not so user-friendly (and makes stupid user interface decisions in the name of "usability guidelines").
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 2, 2006 17:52 UTC (Mon) by job (subscriber, #670) [Link] Agreed. I don't think he's used it.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 2, 2006 21:42 UTC (Mon) by pointwood (guest, #2814) [Link] Mark uses both Ubuntu and Kubuntu. He has stated that on more than one occation.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 2, 2006 18:50 UTC (Mon) by ajross (subscriber, #4563) [Link] I think what he's talking about is the Gnome folks' emphasis on infrastructure things like accessibility, standard font handling (Fontconfig landed on Gtk+ when Qt was still pushing a proprietary Freetype implementation), internationalized text (Pango plugins for odd scripts), standard system configuration interfaces (hal/D-Bus came from Gnome), media APIs (ditto for gstreamer), etc...It seems from my perspective that much of the driving force behind KDE development is user-visible features at the application level. The Gnome folks tend to write the backends first, which (again, from my perspective) makes them more attractive as a platform target. I'd be curious what your examples are of KDE features that "just work" where the equivalent Gnome ones don't, or the specific UI decisions are that you find "stupid" (pre-flame warning: if you're thinking about the spacial Nautilus thing, note that Ubuntu ships with it off and that the browser is trivially re-enabled by anyone advanced enough to use it). From the perspective of a user, I find both desktops more than acceptable. But I'll be honest, I think Gnome has a cleaner and clearer path to the future.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 2, 2006 20:39 UTC (Mon) by khim (guest, #9252) [Link] From the user perspective GNOME works (even if it does not work like I want it to work), KDE does not. The last thing I rememeber from trying to use KDE is that it's keyboard layout switch applet just does not work. It's very configurable, it shows pretty pictures, it sings and dances - but you can not make it show current XKB layout no matter what. In short: it's useless. GNOME countepart - it's simple, it's not very configurable, it's almost ugly but it works and does what it should. Yes, sometimes I do not like decisions GNOME developers did - but I often feel that any decision is better then indecision (like KDE does).
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 2, 2006 21:50 UTC (Mon) by pointwood (guest, #2814) [Link] "From the user perspective GNOME works (even if it does not work like I want it to work), KDE does not."
That's wierd - I'm a KDE user and I haven't noticed that it didn't work. When did it stop working?
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 9:02 UTC (Tue) by muwlgr (guest, #35359) [Link] I don't think you have ever used Cyrillic keyboard layout among Latin ones. KDE offers its own layout switching shortcut Ctrl-Alt-K, but the problem is that some key has to generate Latin K. In Cyrillic layout, no key generates Latin K (the usual key generates Cyrillic L instead), so you are unable to switch from Cyrillic to Latin by keys, and you have to reach for your mouse which is very inconvenient and annoying.
I think this problem has too deep roots somewhere in Qt, so it is inherent to KDE and unlikely to be fixed any time soon.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 9:25 UTC (Tue) by pointwood (guest, #2814) [Link] No, I've never used Cyrillic keyboard layout so I'm not aware of thatspecific problem. I can see how that would be a problem for people needing that. Have you searched bugs.kde.org or reported the issue?
If it is a problem in Qt, then it might be fixed in Qt4 which is the basis
This specific bug might mean that KDE isn't usable for you, but you are
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 12:38 UTC (Tue) by boudewijn (subscriber, #14185) [Link] I like facts, so I created an default user and logged in under gnome, totest how Gnome handles keyboards... Let's see...
* the keyboard configuration dialog has four tabs and more geek options
* no indication of a shortcut to change keyboard layouts: googling doesn't
* Googling tells me that "separate group for each window" means having a
* When Russian is active, the keyboard shortcuts don't work, at least not
Just for context: I do use a lot of different keyboard layouts since I
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 12:43 UTC (Tue) by boudewijn (subscriber, #14185) [Link] Oh, and one more thing: if you check the option "Include latin layout" inthe first tab of the KDE keyboard layout config page, then ctrl-alt-k _does_ switch from Russian to Greek to US to Devanagari. You need to enable it for every non-latin keyboard layout, though.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 14:11 UTC (Tue) by tjc (guest, #137) [Link] The last thing I rememeber from trying to use KDE is that it's keyboard layout switch applet just does not work. It's very configurable, it shows pretty pictures, it sings and dances [snip]As someone has already pointed out, it does in fact work. And it is definitely more configuarable than Gnome. KDE takes longer to set up, but the result is a shaper tool. So you pay up front, but you enjoy a more expressive user interface as a result. This appeals to me, since I spend a lot more time using computers than I do setting them up. With Gnome, you get a butter knife whether you want one of not.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 17:27 UTC (Tue) by tzafrir (subscriber, #11501) [Link] Right. Use kkbdswitch instead of the broken KDE keyboard applet.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 17:52 UTC (Tue) by boudewijn (subscriber, #14185) [Link] Don't you mean kkbswitch? (http://kkbswitch.sourceforge.net/) In what wayis it better -- I mean, a quick scan of the manual doesn't reveal any really important improvements.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 2, 2006 22:08 UTC (Mon) by pointwood (guest, #2814) [Link] "But I'll be honest, I think Gnome has a cleaner and clearer path to the future."
I like the fact that Gnome makes a new release every 6 months. KDE doesn't have a schedule like that currently, but they are in the middle of switching to Qt4 and that is a huge amount of work. At the same time they are really trying to rethink the desktop - they are working together with usability people and I think a lot of interesting work will come from that.
A lot of the freedesktop.org stuff will be added (like D-Bus). The reason this hasn't been added before is that KDE created its own solutions long before things like D-Bus existed. Now they are making a new stable foundation for the next many years and that makes them able to sync up with freedesktop.org. That is a good thing for both desktop environments.
The latest I read was that KDE4 is certainly not going to be released this year, but they are shooting for sometime 1. half of 2007. I have no doubt the KDE developers will be able to pull off something quite amazing.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 8:11 UTC (Tue) by Janne (guest, #40891) [Link] "I like the fact that Gnome makes a new release every 6 months."
Yes, it's nice in a way. But it can lead to quite pointless releases. Take the latest release for example. It doesn't really have any compelling new features to me, as an user. An app that displays where disk-space is going? Note-taking app that was already available separately? It kinda seems like that they thought "well, we have to release SOMETHING".
Of course it's nice to get new releases in a steady manner. But what's more important: Steady releases or steady progress? Steady releases does not mean that the system progresses steadily. 2.16 was quite boring as far as "progress" is considered.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 8:37 UTC (Tue) by micampe (guest, #4384) [Link]
It's true, functionally wise 2.16 is boring, but personally appreciate the fact that it feels more and more mature and stable. You feel that even the smallest details are getting looked at and everything is steadily polished. This is obviously not to say that Gnome is perfect or that it doesn't miss features, but I like this "solid" feeling it gives to me.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 14:15 UTC (Tue) by tjc (guest, #137) [Link] Take the latest release for example. It doesn't really have any compelling new features to me, as an user.Well, I think the menu editor -- which has been on holiday for about five years -- is back.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 18:50 UTC (Tue) by Janne (guest, #40891) [Link] Well, I'm an Ubuntu-user, and the menueditor has been available in Ubuntu for quite some timealready. So for Ubuntu-users, there wasn't that much of a change
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 16:05 UTC (Tue) by madscientist (subscriber, #16861) [Link] I dunno--they fixed a bunch of bugs. To me that's worth a release!
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 18:51 UTC (Tue) by Janne (guest, #40891) [Link] Bugfixes are worthy of a point-release, not a major release. Well, here's to hoping that next versionwill see some more tangible changes.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 7:28 UTC (Tue) by rsidd (subscriber, #2582) [Link] I'd be curious what your examples are of KDE features that "just work" where the equivalent Gnome ones don'tWell, support for indic fonts for one. You claim pango is a great thing, but getting GNOME on a vanilla ubuntu system to display unicode Hindi or Tamil text properly is a pain (Abiword seems incapable of it, and in firefox it's disabled by default on ubuntu.) In fact till about GNOME 2.8 you were basically out of luck. See here for a discussion. KDE has had full support for it for years, no tweaking or environment variables needed. PPP: maybe dialup is obsolete now, but GNOME lacked a dialup program for years (maybe it still does) while KDE had kPPP which "just worked". Bluetooth: I tried it for the first time yesterday, with a USB dongle and my mobile phone. It just worked on KDE, which showed me a vast list of services, most of which I never knew existed. I transferred files back and forth with ease. On gnome, gnome-bluetooth isn't even installed by default on Ubuntu, and when I installed it, I couldn't figure it out. Konqueror: It is the most versatile file manager I've seen, bar none, and it's a pretty darn good web browser too. You can browse your desktop or the web or use various other services, it can open pretty much any other media type. Nautilus doesn't come close (and I'm not talking about the spatial view.) As for stupid UI decisions: there's the GNOME decision to reverse the position of the "ok" and "cancel" buttons. Maybe it makes sense in some language where you are used to saying "do you want to do this, no or yes?" but that's not the case in the four languages I know. Then the GNOME habit of hiding 75% of the interesting configuration options. You need to open gconf-editor and fiddle with some obscure value to, for example, disable the "battery is fully charged" notice on your laptop (or do any number of other things). I used GNOME for a few months because I was tempted by compiz, and installed it on my wife's laptop because it's Ubuntu's first-choice desktop. Now I'm back to KDE (on my laptop) and my wife wants it too.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 18:35 UTC (Tue) by oak (guest, #2786) [Link] I myself like using both, KDE for the Desktop:- Konqueror is nicer & slimmer than Nautilus + Firefox - I also prefer KMail above that awful Evolution But Gnome stuff for the other applications: - Abiword over KWord (my main word processing app is lyx-qt though) - Gnumeric over Kspread - Dia over Kuml/K* etc.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 19:22 UTC (Tue) by ajross (subscriber, #4563) [Link] Wow, it seems this has sparked quite the flame war.Without going line by line, it seems to me that most of your information is either stale (fonts), wrong (PPP, OK-button), or just a reasonable difference in opinion (Konqueror, or all the UI complaints)*. Please try a modern Gnome desktop and be more open minded. You may not like it, but what I take from your list of complaints hardly rises to the level of "doesn't work" or "stupid". Flaming about this stuff really has to stop. Neither desktop is going away, and you are more than welcome to use the one you prefer. But be rational about it: flipping out because some folks (me, for instance) prefer one over another for architectural reasons isn't going to win KDE any converts at this point. * The Bluetooth point is valid though. I'm not aware of any good Gtk-based OBEX clients. The OBEX server applet works acceptably, though. If Bluetooth weren't such a disaster, I might care more. As it is, I use my phone over USB exclusively.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 4, 2006 5:28 UTC (Wed) by Janne (guest, #40891) [Link] "Flaming about this stuff really has to stop. Neither desktop is going away, and you are more thanwelcome to use the one you prefer. But be rational about it: flipping out because some folks (me, for instance) prefer one over another for architectural reasons isn't going to win KDE any converts at this point."
Well, you did post quite debatable comments about KDE and GNOME, and when someone decided
I might as well say that disparaging and untrue comments about KDE isn't going to win any converts
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 4, 2006 7:30 UTC (Wed) by rsidd (subscriber, #2582) [Link] most of your information is either stale (fonts),No it's not stale. Read the wikipedia page I linked to. That page is there for a reason. wrong (PPP, OK-button), The ppp thing may be stale (not wrong), and I explicitly said so. As for the button, are you claiming that the order is "ok/cancel"? Every GNOME installation I've seen has "cancel/ok" by default. It is possible that there is an obscure gconf variable to change that. Pointing out shortcomings of your pet desktop isn't flaming.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 4, 2006 8:01 UTC (Wed) by micampe (guest, #4384) [Link]
No, the fact is that there are no dialogs with "cancel/ok" buttons, and if there are, it's a bug. The buttons should read "don't save/cancel/save", for example.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 4, 2006 14:21 UTC (Wed) by ajross (subscriber, #4563) [Link] rsidd: No it's not stale. Read the wikipedia page I linked to. That page is there for a reason.I did. It says, in no uncertain terms: You do not need to do anything to enable viewing of Indic text in Gnome 2.8 or later. rsidd: Every GNOME installation I've seen has "cancel/ok" by default.Sorry, but Gnome applications don't have OK buttons. They have an affirmative action, always explained in the label (e.g. "Save"), and it is always in the bottom right corner for consistency (because there may be more than one way to "cancel" or "negate" a dialog choice). This is sane, well considered, and consistent. You may not like it, and there may even be some good reasons why you do not like it. But calling it "stupid" as you did (especially since you clearly don't understand the issue) seems like mindless flaming to me and not reasoned argument. Just stop. You like KDE better, and your are more than welcome to tell us why. But you are going beyond merely stating a preference, and making arguments about Gnome (the desktop you don't use) that are misleading at best and in some cases simply not true. This is called "flaming" or "spin", and only makes you look like an immature fan boy.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 5, 2006 11:49 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link] To be fair, the changed button order in GNOME 2 *was* contentious and the source of considerable flamage on the gnome lists at the time: what's more, the flamage was halted by a blatant argument from authority ('that's the way Apple does it'). Small surprise that some people consider this somewhat weak...
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 8:02 UTC (Tue) by Janne (guest, #40891) [Link] Is it just me, or is your definition of "standard" "something that is used in GNOME"? If something is used in KDE, it's not standard.
"Gnome folks' emphasis on infrastructure"
KDE has quite solid infrastructure. Has had them since KDE2 really. KIO-slaves, Kparts, DCOP, Arts and the like existed in KDE long before GNOME got anything comparable.
"internationalized text"
KDe has handled that just fine.
"standard system configuration interfaces"
Such as? You mentioned HAL and D-bus. Well, IIRC HAL is from Freedesktop, and not GNOME. And D-bus is an IPC-mechanism. KDE had DCOP long before D-bus was in existence.
"media APIs (ditto for gstreamer)"
KDE had Arts long before Gstreamer was around.
"The Gnome folks tend to write the backends first"
If that is the case, why did KDE get working and functional backends (KIO-slaves, Arts, DCOP, Kparts etc. etc.) before GNOME got theirs?
Note: I'm a GNOME-user. I have used both KDE and GNOME, and I see value in both. I love KDE dearly, but currently GNOME's clean UI has won me over. But that doesn't mean that I couldn't acknowledge things where KDE excels at.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 9:14 UTC (Tue) by micampe (guest, #4384) [Link]
Probably. But in my opinion (from the Gnome side of the fence), it looks that Gnome pushed (more actively, I know there are KDE developers that share these ideas) much more for its "standards" to be accepted outside of it (and it has often been harshly criticized for doing so) and for the creation of freedesktop.org, making them now standards without quotes.
Well, they're not really comparable...
I think the best example here is transparency and shadows: KDE had them for ages, Gnome refused to implement them as "hacks" insisting that that's not the job of the GUI tool kit and a true solution would involve changes to the X server. Some years later we have a composited desktop. This is the main clear difference in perspective I see.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 9:44 UTC (Tue) by rsidd (subscriber, #2582) [Link] it looks that Gnome pushed (more actively, I know there are KDE developers that share these ideas) much more for its "standards" to be accepted outside of it (and it has often been harshly criticized for doing so) and for the creation of freedesktop.org, making them now standards without quotes.On the contrary, fd.o was explicitly a forum to develop standards for BOTH GNOME and KDE. At the time it started, KDE was far ahead, but some people on both sides recognised the advantage of having compatible implementations for desktop icons, system tray icons, etc. Transparency and shadows: KDE had them for ages, Gnome refused to implement them as "hacks" insisting that that's not the job of the GUI tool kit and a true solution would involve changes to the X server. KDE's solution involves changes to the X server (specifically, the composite extension, which is needed and has been available for some years). Gnome even today doesn't implement it, as far as I can tell (unless you use the recent XGL/AIGLX stuff). KDE was the first to implement:
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 10:00 UTC (Tue) by Janne (guest, #40891) [Link] "But in my opinion (from the Gnome side of the fence), it looks that Gnome pushed (more actively"
Maybe it just seemed like that? I know that there were plenty of KDE-folks involved in formation of freedesktop, maybe they just wrote less press-releases about it? Or maybe GNOME-folks were pushing for things like that because they did not have them, whereas KDE did?
"Well, they're not really comparable..."
They are both sound-servers. And point stands: KDE had sound-server long before GNOME had one.
"I think the best example here is transparency and shadows: KDE had them for ages, Gnome refused to implement them as "hacks" insisting that that's not the job of the GUI tool kit and a true solution would involve changes to the X server. Some years later we have a composited desktop."
So the GNOME-way is automatically the better one, and we now have composited desktop, thanks to GNOME? And like it was said, the KDE-way also involved changes to X.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 10:49 UTC (Tue) by micampe (guest, #4384) [Link]
I think it was this one, and I see it as a good thing: "We need this thing, let's do it together with somebody that already knows how to do it, in a way that everybody can use the new, interoperable, version."
I never denied the point (I don't even know - nor care - if it's true or not), but surely enough Gstreamer is not a sound server at all, in the same way that Phonon isn't.
I never said nor implied anything like that. I am merely describing the differences as I perceive them (as I said before, from the GNOME side of the fence, as that's what I know). I think we have a composited desktop thanks to the people that wrote the code. Another thing worth noting, in my humble opinion, is that KDE supporters posting around (I know there are a lot more who just don't post at all) seem often quite defensive and inflammatory in their comments. I was amazed by how this thread was polite and insightful until a couple of the more recent entries.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 11:31 UTC (Tue) by Janne (guest, #40891) [Link] "think it was this one, and I see it as a good thing"
But, like I said, there were (and are) plenty of KDE-folks involved in freedesktop.org, so you can't credit GNOME alone for it.
"never denied the point (I don't even know - nor care - if it's true or not), but surely enough Gstreamer is not a sound server at all, in the same way that Phonon isn't."
Well, you claimed that Gnome was the forerunner in this area. They weren't, KDE was there first. Unless by "forerunner" you mean "first to use Gstreamer", then you would be right. But that's not what you are saying, now is it? Because if you did, then you could make just about anything in to a "forerunner".
"I never said nor implied anything like that. I am merely describing the differences as I perceive them (as I said before, from the GNOME side of the fence, as that's what I know)."
Never considered that your perception might be wrong? I have noticed that GNOME is better at PR and that they make bigger announcements about their involvement in various projects. But that does not mean that they are the only ones doing something, whereas KDE just sits there and does nothing.
"Another thing worth noting, in my humble opinion, is that KDE supporters posting around (I know there are a lot more who just don't post at all) seem often quite defensive and inflammatory in their comments."
Another thing worth noting: The GNOME-users quite often post messages like "Well, I think KDE sucks because...." and/or "I think KDE is a steaming pile of crap, but I digress". And if we then have someone defending KDE against such comments, we get comments like "Why are you so defensive and inflammatory about this?"
"I was amazed by how this thread was polite and insightful until a couple of the more recent entries."
So it's "polite" and "insightful" to say things like "GNOME pushes standards, whereas KDE does not" or "GNOME emphasises infrastructure, whereas KDE does not"? And if someone dares to defend KDE against such accusations, it's "unpolite" and "uninsightful"?
I actually went back to re-read the discussion. And there aren't any bad comments as such. True, there are comments that defend KDE (from me, for example). But they are not rude or anything like that. So am I to assume that defending KDE in itself is considered "unpolite"?
And like I already said: I actually use GNOME every day. I could use KDE if I wanted to, but I choose to use GNOME instead.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 12:51 UTC (Tue) by micampe (guest, #4384) [Link]
I didn't credit GNOME alone, in my original comment I said precisely: "I know there are KDE developers that share these ideas"
I didn't. I precisely said that I don't know - nor care - who was the forerunner. All I said was that Arts and Gstreamer aren't comparable.
Sure, this is why I'm not saying anywhere that what I say is the truth, this is just what I see.
I'm pretty sure I didn't say any of this. As I know there are KDE developers working on fdo and many other transversal projects, that would be quite dumb on my part. Well, I have my idea on the respective philosophies and approaches, it doesn't involve arguments like A is better than B or B did this before A but I obviously failed to explain it as the argument keeps drifting on useless comparisons like those.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 3, 2006 12:58 UTC (Tue) by Janne (guest, #40891) [Link] My apologies, it was ajross who made those comments, and not you. I didn't notice that the person I was replying to changed midway through the discussion :)
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 4, 2006 0:51 UTC (Wed) by Los__D (subscriber, #15263) [Link] GStreamer has nothing to do with a sound server.
ESD is GNOME's sound server (and it is, AFAIK, quite a bit older than Arts).
GStreamer is a framework for decoding mediafiles, and pushing the encoded soundstreams to a soundserver or directly to the HW, and the videostreams to video output. It can also send streams somewhere else, i.e. soundstreams to a visualization program. KDE has nothing like it.
The Amarok devs are (or maybe was, I didn't follow the discussion lately) pushing for GStreamer inclusion in KDE, but ofcourse KDE did the NIH, and want to make their own thing, can't remember it's name...
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 4, 2006 5:26 UTC (Wed) by Janne (guest, #40891) [Link] "The Amarok devs are (or maybe was, I didn't follow the discussion lately) pushing for GStreamerinclusion in KDE, but ofcourse KDE did the NIH, and want to make their own thing, can't remember it's name..."
Phonon? Phonon is an abstraction-layer that lets KDE use any media-framework that comes along,
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 4, 2006 10:52 UTC (Wed) by pointwood (guest, #2814) [Link] You claim that KDE did the NIH thing, but at the same time you say that you didn't follow the discussion. In other words, what you're saying is pure FUD, sorry.
If you had actually checked out why the KDE developers are creating Phonon, you would also know that there are quite good reasons for creating it.
Here is a comment from a KDE developer:
As he writes, he posted more about it in a post on his blog which he links to. I suggest reading that as well.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 5, 2006 7:39 UTC (Thu) by Los__D (subscriber, #15263) [Link] I certainly read that before, and it boils down to, "because we screwed up our own junk, we wont use other people's stuff"
This still is NIH, just a scared version of it.
There's no reason to collaborate with KDE devs, they screw it up every single time. In 20 years it STILL will be impossible to make a simple skin change to support different desktops because of these morons.
"OH NO, there's a G in it, let's wrap it in tons of junk to make it seem like we don't use it"
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 5, 2006 8:18 UTC (Thu) by boudewijn (subscriber, #14185) [Link] Ah, this must be the famous civility that KDE users so infamously lack.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 5, 2006 8:30 UTC (Thu) by pointwood (guest, #2814) [Link] The same NIH that is responsible for implementing freedesktop.orgstandards like D-Bus in KDE4?
Phonon doesn't mean that KDE4 isn't going to use Gstreamer. In fact,
AFAIK, the KDE devs are very much supporting the freedesktop.org
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 5, 2006 11:56 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link] Yes, and ESD and arts have one thing in common: they're awful. They're simultaneously implementing lots of things nobody uses (especially arts), and barely capable of playing a simple sound stream without stuttering the hell out of it and eating vast amounts of CPU (especially esd).
polypaudio recently restarted development and got a name change (to pulseaudio) and even more nifty (yet actually *useful*) features like a system-daemon mode and modules to do things like HAL lookup of sound sinks. Plus it's got esd library compatibility (though not arts yet). Also its CPU usage is much lower now (unless you do something like ask for high-quality interpolation).
Strongly recommended. How the hell Lennart finds the time to work on so many things at once is quite beyond me: he must have a time machine. (Plus they're all so well-written...)
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 5, 2006 12:39 UTC (Thu) by lysse (guest, #3190) [Link] > KDE has quite solid infrastructure.
Maybe so. However, every release of Slackware sees me starting up KDE, enjoying it for a while, and then starting to notice all the little things that don't work (it's been a while, I can't come up with examples) or that stop working - for example, in every Slack KDE so far, on whichever of my machines I've tried it on, after any length of use of Konqueror, something will happen that kills its ability to spawn KIOslaves (or the ability of KIOslaves to open) at which point it ceases to be any use as a web browser; and the fact that if I print a page in KWord the spacing of letters is, to say the least, bizarre. So since I seem to spend most of my time in Firefox and Abiword with or without KDE, I end up ditching it and going back to boring old Fluxbox, and vowing to try it again next time.
I'll see whether it's fixed in Slackware 11. I really hope it is - there are many reasons I'd love to use KDE (kate, Konqueror, solitaire, KOffice, the level of integration and just-works, lyx-qt, and all the other reasons) - but if there are alternatives I can use now that work now (and don't mysteriously forget how to do anything with a hyperlink) I might as well stick with what works, bloated and inefficient though it may be.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 2, 2006 22:14 UTC (Mon) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] Personally I've always found Gnome much easier to use the KDE. Kcontrol is confusing and it is difficult to find configuration stuff, for instance, and when I tried theme-ing and changing things around most of the time I'd end up with a fairly unusable system.
I was of the opinion for a long time that both Gnome and KDE were fundamentally worthless. I prefered to use the slick 'minimalist' window managers.
It wasn't until Gnome 2.6 or 2.8 before it starting appealing to me. Now I use it almost exclusively. (but I will always have a soft spot for things like Ratpoison :P ) I am hoping that KDE version 4 will be a big leap ahead in terms of usability for the KDE desktop.
I am also hoping that desktop standards keep progressing well also. There are a number of KDE applications that I like using and I like how Koffice is turing out. The great thing about standards and such is that even though there will always be people that hate KDE and love Gnome or visa versa there is no reason why choosing one or the other should hurt application support and integration.
And on a side note.. Completely unrelated...
If you have checked out yet take a look at the 'fish' shell. It's a effort at creating a easy to use Unix shell. They are doing some neat stuff to help integrate the command line into the desktop.
For instance the 'open' command checks the mimetypes of files then uses that to find out the default applications for different file types through the freedesktop.org *.desktop specifications. For instance if you choose to use Evince as the default PDF user through nautilus then you can go 'open somedocument.pdf' in fish and it will open the program in Evince.
Also you know how the 'help' command being non-existant in Unix shells was a old joke on basic lack of usability? Well Fish has 'help' that works. Just type 'help' and your browser opens up to the fish help page. Do 'help commandname' and it will open the man file for that command. It's kinda fun.
They simplify and rationalize stuff also. For instance doing loops and stuff is a easier to learn syntax:
And it keeps track of stuff better so it's easier to go
It's still pretty buggy, but it's fun to use.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 5, 2006 11:59 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link] I can see how that would be so very different from the POSIXcat file|while read i; echo $i;end cat file | while read i; do echo $i; done(which of course is also a Useless Use Of Cat, but we're going for clarity here)
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 2, 2006 16:11 UTC (Mon) by pointwood (guest, #2814) [Link] Kubuntu is not as polished as Ubuntu is, but that is not really that surprising since it all started with Ubuntu and that's where the main development effort is focused on.
That said, I'm running Kubuntu Dapper on my laptop and I'm pretty satisfied with it.
Mark Shuttleworth interview (Linux Format) Posted Oct 2, 2006 18:54 UTC (Mon) by josh_stern (guest, #4868) [Link]
Yep, I've installed betas of kubuntu dapper and edgy on three different machines (one of the dappers was a laptop) and they've been the smoothest Linux installs I've done with good functionality out of the box.
It seemed like Shuttleworth was really improvising his answer to that question...started talking about appearance of gnome and kde and ended up with a discussion about how he doesn't know MS-Windows install tech.
Ubuntu and firewall Posted Oct 3, 2006 18:45 UTC (Tue) by oak (guest, #2786) [Link] I think one of the most disappointing things in Ubuntu is that it doesn'thave firewall by default. Even Windows nowadays has a firewall! Assuming that whoever happens to install server software (e.g. because he saw an article in Linux Format about having your own www-server...) knows that he should install also firewall is a bit too much. Also, how user would know what software (games) he installs will also listen to network connections?
Ubuntu and firewall Posted Oct 4, 2006 2:13 UTC (Wed) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] Well Ubuntu does come with a firewall. It's just disabled. All Linux distros have one and they've had it for a long long time.
It's called 'iptables'. Of course the configuration is a bitch. So I suppose you can say that it's not a firewall unless configured to do so.
HOWEVER.. A (enabled) firewall can actually lower your security if you don't need it. A bit counter intuative, but let me explain. The proof goes like this:
Part A: A peice of security of not insignificant size contains bugs, this can't be avoided. Of these bugs a certain percentage of them will be security flaws.
Part B: Firewalls are built using fairly complex code from both kernelland and userland.
Conclusion: Firewalls almost certaintly contain a unknown amount of security flaws.
So in other words.. a Ssh server running by itself will be more secure then a ssh server running with a firewall. For the most part. It's logical.
In MS-Windows land a firewall is almost nessicary for decent security of course. This is because XP and friends have services that listen on the network and if you try to disable them they may break stuff and it's a PITA. Also it's nice to have outgoing filtering because you can't trust the programs you run in Windows not to try to betray you. Spyware, viruses, adware, programs attempting to access internet stuff for no descernable reason, etc etc.
This isn't a problem with Linux (yet), but I suppose outgoing firewalls would be nice to protect yourself against he odd script that may try to get executed due to some random browser vunerability or something. However if they do comprimise your account in Ubuntu all they have to do is issue a 'sudo' and then they can get root. Once root is gone then all the firewall installed on your machine isn't going to help you.
So it's not realy _that_ usefull.
Of course firewalls can be used to harden services. Like using a firewall to do packet filtering to protect your Apache service from a DOS'ing. But that is advanced stuff and may not be that appropriate for a regular Desktop OS.
A more typical use would be like something on a mobile network, or untrusted network, were you can run services, but deny access to them easily via your firewall. Then setup a VPN to allow trusted users to access your services. Like running a SAMBA server on a public wifi connection.
Or maybe turn on the firewall while your out and about and turn it off when your back at home.
For servers having a seperation machine for a firewall would be much better...
But if you want a good desktop firewall for Linux that would be easy enough to install (apt-get I beleive) and use for most users.
Pretty snazzy.
Ubuntu and firewall Posted Oct 5, 2006 9:41 UTC (Thu) by ayeomans (subscriber, #1848) [Link] Not sure if this is still true. It ceertainly used to be the case that you could turn off all listening services. But they are coming back into fashion. My stock Ubuntu system is listening on four ip ports by default, three to do with printing, even though I don't have a printer connected:
4351/tcp python /usr/sbin/hpssd
If it wasn't for the fact that I'm behind a hardware firewall, I'd feel a bit uneasy about advertising these on the Internet. So a firewall that restricts access to local subnet would seem a good idea.
Ubuntu and firewall Posted Oct 6, 2006 3:19 UTC (Fri) by nlucas (subscriber, #33793) [Link] You forgot to include the addresses they are binding to.
Except for dhclient3 (which obviously is using an external connection to your dhcp server) they are all bound to localhost (unless you configured them differently).
|
|
||||||||||||