Is Linux Desktop Better Than Windows? (LinuxPlanet) [LWN.net]

Is Linux Desktop Better Than Windows? (LinuxPlanet)

Posted Jul 16, 2004 13:13 UTC (Fri) by wweber (guest, #11678)
Parent article: Is Linux Desktop Better Than Windows? (LinuxPlanet)

As a desktop platform Linux has been a disappointment. Recently I installed klogic on an older machine running SuSE 6.4, and it worked. I had gotten the program from the distribution CD's. But when I downloaded the latest klogic from the home site to use on my Mandrake 10 system, well, it configured, it made, it make-installed, but it would still never come up. Using the command line brought a dozen complaints from it, none of which could be found in the klogic install documentation.

This is fine for those who are so well-versed they know exactly what the trouble is. But the downloads I've put on my MS operating systems have always worked, or at least told me clearly what was omitted. The installation that succeeds is always going to look better to me. Great as the gEDA programs, for example, might be, they are altogether useless if I can't find the right way to set up my LD_LIBRARY_PATH.

Despite the three Linux boxes kicking around here, I don't think Linux is ready to take over on the general public's desktops, except maybe in the form of one of those hated "sellouts" like Linspire.

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Is Linux Desktop Better Than Windows? (LinuxPlanet)

Posted Jul 16, 2004 18:45 UTC (Fri) by Richard_J_Neill (subscriber, #23093) [Link]

There's a golden rule under Mandrake: if at all possible, use a package that has *already* been built and tested for your version. That means setting up an urpmi source (see www.urpmi.org) and running "urpmi klogic". Almost all the packages you could want are already built and in "contrib". This way, things usually work perfectly. If you want the absolute latest version, compiled from source, then use "checkinstall" rather than "make install" - that way, your install doesn't bypass your RPM database, and you can uninstall it easily.

Regards

Richard