Life on the bleeding edge

[Evan Leibovitch]

Chris F.A. Johnson wrote:
> Why would you toss an entire distro because you don't like the window
> manager? Use whategver window manager suits you; the distro has
> nothing to do with it. My desktop look the same whether I'm  using
> Mandriva, Ubuntu or any other distro.
I try not to make my posts too lengthy these days, so I left lots out of
the original post -- the window manager is far from the only reason I'm
looking to switch.

Mandriva's package management system is getting worse, not better. Their
shot at a live/install system, Mandriva One, fails to impress. Besides
the technical issues, recent management changes (ie, a nasty parting of
ways with founder Gael Duval) have led to an attitude more like Red Hat
and Novell than what Mandriva/Mandrake has traditionally offered. As a
result they're putting more distance between the for-pay versions and
the free ones. By contrast, the commitment that there will only ever be
one "level" of Ubuntu, identical for commercial or free use, offers
significant appeal. And the one feature that I liked best about Mandriva
at the time that Colin and I wrote the for the TuxMag shootout a few
months ago -- the PLF repository -- is now available for Ubuntu.

I may yet stay with Mandriva -- kubuntu may turn out to have
"idiosyncrasies" of its own -- but I'd like to evaluate some
alternatives before settling in for another few years. Re-install time
is the best time to do a look around and re-survey the landscape. Heck,
I might even be ready for Gentoo, if it can handle laptop issues such as
wireless networking, battery power and hibernation...

- Evan


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