Intrepid Frustration

[dibl]

Re: Intrepid Frustration

Yes, well said guys.

*buntu is, by design, based on Debian Sid, in order to incorporate the latest, aka "bleeding edge" GNU and Linux kernel packages. In other words, it is inherently untested by a lot of users when versions are released, just because of where the software comes from.

Folks whose karma is easily disturbed by "unplanned events" would be better served by using Mepis or one of the other less drama-prone distributions.

That's my two cents worth on the subject.

[Qqmike]

Re: Intrepid Frustration

This reminds me of a joke I heard as a graduate student.

Professor Bob, a famous decision analysis theorist, announced to his colleagues in the faculty lounge that he was really upset with a personal problem he was struggling with. Jim, a fellow professor said, “Bob, this looks like a straightforward application of pre-posterior Bayesian analysis -- why don't you just apply a decision tree and go that way to help find an answer for yourself?”
To which Professor Bob replied, “Come on Jim, quit messing around, THIS is serious!”

[kjjjjshab]

Re: Intrepid Frustration

Yes, well said guys.

*buntu is, by design, based on Debian Sid, in order to incorporate the latest, aka "bleeding edge" GNU and Linux kernel packages. In other words, it is inherently untested by a lot of users when versions are released, just because of where the software comes from.

Folks whose karma is easily disturbed by "unplanned events" would be better served by using Mepis or one of the other less drama-prone distributions.

That's my two cents worth on the subject.

I have nothing but respect and admiration for everyone here... my poking this issue with a stick isn't meant to irritate anyone... I apologize if anyone takes offense... I enjoy debating the issue and learning different points of view. A "frustration" thread seemed like a good place to bring up my feelings of a broken bluetooth release, from a philosophical point of view (I personally don't care about the functionality).

People do order those "free" cds... our local LUG hands out cds (not of kubuntu, but I'm sure others do)... it is wrong to release a broken OS, when a fix is days away, IMO. Again I ask, if it were USB that was broken, would everyone here feel the same?

Again, I really do feel this is a "kick back and have a few beers discussion" on the perceived and expected business plan, values, etc. of kubuntu and it's place in the pile of distros and not an argument as to who is right or wrong...

[Snowhog]

Re: Intrepid Frustration

Again, I really do feel this is a "kick back and have a few beers discussion" on the perceived and expected business plan, values, etc. of kubuntu and it's place in the pile of distros and not an argument as to who is right or wrong...

I'll drink to that.

[toad]

Re: Intrepid Frustration

I agree and think it is rather daft to release an inherently broken system but the folks over at kubuntu have enslaved themselves to this six monthly release cycle. Once that kind of ground work is laid you have to stick with it...

The choice thus was: KDE3 with bluetooth or KDE4 without bluetooth.

Anyway, bluetooth functions perfectly well if you install libnet-bluetooth-perl

[andreasj64]

Re: Intrepid Frustration

"Again, I really do feel this is a "kick back and have a few beers discussion" on the perceived and expected business plan, values, etc. of kubuntu and it's place in the pile of distros and not an argument as to who is right or wrong..."

I'll drink to that!

Maybe they should simply add a big flashing screen before the install process saying, "These things don't work yet; install at you're own level of tollerability. (probably a lot of other stuff too)"

[quarkslot]

Re: Intrepid Frustration

I agree and think it is rather daft to release an inherently broken system but the folks over at kubuntu have enslaved themselves to this six monthly release cycle. Once that kind of ground work is laid you have to stick with it...

Yes, and I think we all know that Ubuntu came first and a short while later along came Kubuntu, and I believe they are still playing catch-up to a certain extent. I get the impression (I lurk around the Kubuntu zone quite a lot) that with every release the team push really hard to get the feature set on a level with Ubuntu. It can't be easy but overall they are doing a really good job and perhaps when they reach parity these niggling issues will go away.

Timing is everything, maybe they were caught on the hop with the release date of Intrepid.

For my new PC I took the decision 'no more Windows' so Intrepid came along at just the right time, ok some things don't quite work but that's part of the challenge along with the fun of being involved with the forums.

Like most people here I don't mind rolling up my sleeves and fixing problems however I will soon rely on this PC to do my job by which time everything on it should work and be reliable, which I don't think is unreasonable. And if everything is working as intended I wouldn't expect things to be broken with the release of an update so I fully understand gletscher's frustration. (But let's not forget that Microsoft has been know to break things with its updates).

It comes back to who is the intended audience, 95% of the people I know would never think to download and install an OS, they'd just go out and buy a new computer, some are probably even unaware that software updates occur on their machine. If I bought a Dell PC with Ubuntu pre-installed I would expect everything to work out of the box - plug it in and go. My expectations as someone who has the ability to download and install an OS are somewhat different.

Maybe they should simply add a big flashing screen before the install process saying, "These things don't work yet; install at you're own level of tollerability. (probably a lot of other stuff too)"

Perhaps this is all that is needed!

[Qqmike]

Re: Intrepid Frustration

Re quarkslot's post ...

“Timing is everything...”
That's a sound bite my first girlfriend left me with, but boy, ain't that true! Reality as we stop it and then perceive it is a function of t. The cosmic perspective kicks in as t → infinity, but for us here, t = 8 months would be nice.


“It comes back to who is the intended audience, 95% of the people I know ...”

Exactly, well said. However ...
It would be nice to have a straight-&-easy Kubuntu to put new folks into. Thinking back to when I started Linux, 2006, I had just built my first PC Nov 2005, had used computers/programmed throughout life, but wasn't really all that expert at anything PC. On XP and dial-up, a friend sent a Kubuntu 6.06 CD in the mail, I loaded it up, and off it went, perfectly. The transition from XP to Kubuntu was almost seamless, and that motivated me to get DSL, and the rest is history. I don't know how you guys feel, but right now, at t = 6 months and a few weeks, I dare not turn anyone on to Kubuntu 8.10 just yet. In fact, I fear the new non-Desktop KDE 4.x will also be a stumbling block for some new transitioners.

Thus, the issue: Is it (really) true that it's never meant to be for Aunt Minnie (=> mainstream), and we admit it's (really) intended for, shall we say, a geeky audience? It's just a question. I have no clue, and since I seem to find myself acting geeky these days, it's not so much an issue for me. (In ref to “acting geeky,” I'm sure you've heard the (existential) joke about doing and being: I'm not what I do. If I were what I do, every time I took a p***, I'd be a beautiful fountain.)

I feel like I need to go rake leaves or something this morning ....

[quarkslot]

Re: Intrepid Frustration

Following up on Qqmike's post.

I was going to mention some of the stuff you added but thought I'd gone on long enough (I have to admit the 'cosmic perspective' bit wasn't on my list - interesting stuff ).

However I was going to ask the question 'will Kubuntu ever be mainstream?' and I'd like to think the answer is 'yes'.

Kubuntu seems to be at transitional stage, the shift to 8.10/KDE 4 is significant and as such is not suitable for the average man in the street (or woman). When MS does it's geeky development stuff and pre-release testing it is mainly behind closed doors whereas Kubuntu does not have that luxury.

Therefore:

It would be nice to have a straight-&-easy Kubuntu to put new folks into.

Agreed, would it work if we had andreasj64's big flashing sign on the Kubuntu homepage saying 'non-computer geeks use this one' linking them to the straight-&-easy version? Or perhaps it would be better just to have a small sign saying 'computer geeks use this one'?

We've gone off-post here but this is a this is a "kick back and have a few beers discussion" after all.

[andreasj64]

Re: Intrepid Frustration

It depends a lot on the level of computer savvy. The less savvy, the more functional it would be for someone, because the less they need to do. If someone set up the computer for a simple user, Kubuntu would work well. I have it on three computers now, and I am loving it. It is my work computer, with windows in VBox for a piece of estimating software (Intel MB). It's on my laptop as a second boot off a USB (Dell Inspiron 9300). I just finished reviving an old computer I built about 8 years ago now, with an Asus P3C MB, RDRAM, and a 1ghz PIII with an ultra320 SCSI. Every computer is running flawlessly actually, but the display control is very weak. I'm giving the rebuild to my g-friends kids to butcher.

In short though, the more you want it to do, the harder it is to make it work. If you just want to check email, upload a few photo's from a camera, or surf the web, it is 100% fine (that accounts for 95% of the users out there really). Now if you want to tweak it, and ad cards and such, it's not straight forward.

I think it was fine to release it now, because we are the Beta testers.

[kevinc]

Re: Intrepid Frustration

I was very happy with Kubuntu Hardy and tried Intrepid when the beta first came out. I'm using Intrepid now and have no problems with it - (no bluetooth devices though).

It seems like yesterday when I bought another 512kB memory for my Amiga 500 computer making the total memory 1MB. It worked reasonably well with its Motorola 68000 processor, real 16 bit in comparison to the 8088 which IBM and others were using. Hardware and software today is not all that much different - nothing is yet 'perfect'. I know several Vista users who have slow systems, run out of memory, lost count of how many times their machines crash and I'm happily using Intrepid - no crashes, no problem with memory, small things that are easily fixed because of great help on the Kubuntu forums.

For those who know less about computers, point them towards Ubuntu or Kubuntu Hardy or another distro.
For those who don't mind helping development, Intrepid is the way to go for a good number.
Linux has so many choices that everyone should be able to find a distro to suit their needs.