Ben Kevan’s Blog

Enjoyed reading this article. However regarding the forums, forums.suselinuxsupport.de was amongst the Best Linux forums out there. this has been merger with the new forums at forums.opensuse.org

[...] Son muchos usuarios los que llegan ahora al mundo de GNU/Linux, y gracias al buen marketing de Ubuntu lo hacen de la mano de dicha distribución, por lo que a continuación quiero redactar detalles importantes de openSUSE 11.0 que creo que puede ser de interes a estos usuarios antes de decidirse en elegir una. Para hacer esta comparativa, me he basado en una entrada del Blog de Ben Kevan’s. [...]

Just a note. AppArmor came from Immunix. It was designed entirely separately from SE Linux as far as I know and is not based on it.

AppArmor is installed and loaded by default in Hardy (https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AppArmor).

tried 11 live cd on my dell 3000 (nvidiafx5200). after third screen all went black. would not do vesa. mandrek 08 does the same. using greenie buntu. even dsl will boot into vesa on this machine. look like suse needs work before prime time.

Excellent read. As a former Ubuntu user, I feel that openSUSE offers the perfect balance of customization and speed. Ubuntu leaves you wanting more after a few days.

[...] openSUSE 11 the perfect Ubuntu replacement (openSUSE vs Ubuntu) [...]

I agree strongly with two points you noticed. One that openSUSE is by long shot more secure than Ubuntu, or Fedora, or any other community driven distros, and that with latest release there is now small gap left for the openSUSE’s package management to be best. Yast is the super feature and with improved package management, it will be killer combo.

The only thing that openSuSE team shold develop in better package manager. Everything else is perferct. I started linux with 9.3 and contunued with 10, and then tried Ubuntu. But after a while (short while) a uninstalled the ubuntu and continued wiht openSuSE although the 10.3 release had some bugs.

“Ubuntu has nothing on top of the Linux OS for further security.”
Wrong. Ubuntu has AppArmor since version 7.10.
No advantage for Suse.
What’s more, Ubuntu has additional memory protection by default since 8.04 and has an option to easily install SELinux.
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HardyHeron/RC#head-7cab045da9504612484f2fb3b17699678db13249
I don’t know is Suse has these.

Also if you sum up your own points, then Ubuntu wins 4:2.
(Ubuntu: speed, restricted formats, package management, community; Suse: looks, yast - I’m not counting AppArmor since both distros have it)

well, if the first ones are questionable then the latest about community is a clear no-go.
Last two years, when I need to find some information about all-linux/GNU related stuff, I always add -ubuntu in google. ubuntuforums is the worst thing ever that could happen with a linux distribution.

Oh, and you lack another point, upgrades/updates.
I’ve upgraded from 10.3 using new zypper rpm and going zypper dup. All works as before but better.
If you don’t know what nightmares ubuntu brings with just a minor deb install … then check their community ( see above).

[...] things about openSUSE, but how does it stack up against other distributions mainly Ubuntu/KUbuntu?http://www.benkevan.com/blog/opensuse-11-the-perfect-ubuntu-replacement-opensuse-vs-ubuntu/Linux.com :: openSUSE&39s Brockmeier sees distro coming into its ownJun 17, 2008 … Of all the [...]

I was exited to try out OpenSUSE 11 on my main computer. Initial install went fine. after install, to my surprise my touchpad on my loptop did not want to work properly. I have Dell Latitude D 820 loptop (Business grade). Then I was installing flash player. After reboot the xorg refuse to load.

Now I am back on Ubuntu. My touchpad works properly and xorg is fine too. Till OpenSUSE fixes xorg I will stick with Ubuntu

ec_lug, very strange you have those issues. I am also running a Dell D820 w/ Nvidia M110 driver and have no issues with my touchpad or laptop. How did you do the installation? Did you try running sax2 and setting up your video resolution? (I am guessing you are running the intel chip).

Flash Player should have been installed with the default installation (if done via dvd)

and you give no specifcs of what DE you were trying to install.

Ben,

So you are saying I should try it again. I have Dell Latitude D820 with nVidia 250 MB. I was installing openSUSE 11 Live CD Gnome addition. I do not have too much experience with Suse and I run Ubuntu for 2 years starting with 6.06.

OpenSUSE looks like very nice distro but I could never maintain it. The reason I wanted to give it a good try was Open Movie Editor package (from Packman) is up to date and it works pretty good.

My touchpad is “AlpsPS/2 ALPS GlidePoint”
and I have found some workarounds in xorg.cong http://thedaneshproject.com/posts/improve-alps-touchpad-response-speed/ No I was not editing it when my x.org crashed.

X.org crashed with no reason. After fresh install I got notice from package manager that there are some updates to be done. One of them was x.org. I said yes. after that I installed flash and rebooted my computer. and that is the end of the story. I had three official suse repos and nVidia repo enabled ad that time.

I run local Eau Claire LUG web site. If you would like to contact me I provided the web site as well as email address.

Thank you
EC_LUG

I have the same problem with my touchpad on a Dell Vostro 1400. Problem occurs on 32 and 64 bit OpenSUSE 11 installs. Wireless didn’t work as well until I installed b43-fwcutter (but many installs have that problem). I will compare the xorg.conf between Ubuntu and SuSE to see what differs. My mouse works fine with SuSE. I have tried gsynaptics and SaX2 — that did not fix the problem.

If you are using dell crap do not be surprised! Use IBM / Lenovo or ASUS with AMD chips!

Haha Gallagher,

It’s standard for my work. I was lucky to get an 820 and not a 620.

Mark, can you send me your xorg.conf (both) I’d also like to check it out.

Ubuntu was my first Linux distribution and it worked fine for the most part, but GNOME was a disappointment to me. I could not understand why the desktop felt so “flat.” I also could not get desktop effects to work whatsoever. It wasn’t until I installed PCLinuxOS on another machine that I got to play with KDE, which I prefer. Problem is, when I went to add the KDE desktop to my Ubuntu distro, it installed KDE4, which is darn buggy. The GNOME legacy settings don’t help. Well, had I started with openSUSE I could have had more of a choice to begin with and not this sloppy method of trying desktops out. I have downloaded the openSUSE DVD and I’m considering whether to dual boot it on my desktop (with XP).

I am running Ubuntu 8.04 and openSUSE 11 on the same machine and here are my observations:

- Try to run a program from the CLI that hasn’t been installed yet. Ubuntu tells you what package contains that program and how to install it. OpenSUSE just tells you it doesn’t have that program installed.

- Similar thing with video. I tried to view some FLV videos, Ubuntu offers me to install the necessary plugin(s). openSUSE just says “sorry” and closes the application (totem in this case).

- Ubuntu fonts look much better

- Many packages on openSUSE have to be searched through web instead of package manager. Ubuntu wins there, to.

- One thing has improved in openSUSE with respect to previous version. For example, if you want to install gvim, there is one metapackage, something Ubuntu had for a long time. In the past, I had to chase several packages untill I got gvim working. Gvim is not the only example, I just can’t remember the other ones right now.

Ivo,

That capability is there in opensuse, but did not make the cut off for opensuse 11.0. It can be installed from buildservice. I expect it to be installed on opensuse 11.1.

I disagree with the fonts. I think they are cleaner on openSUSE 11.0. But again, everyones eyes are different. why do you think they are better? I feel the openSUSE ones are softer and show better on LCD’s.

Not sure what you mean by “Many packages on openSUSE have to be searched through web instead of package manager” care to elaborate? there is a option for “Provides” which will give you what you want.

Ben,
These are just my first impressions. I will try to explain, but I do not want to fight a war over which distro is better. I like both, and that’s why I have them.

1. Fonts: it could be that it is my eyes, even though my wife noticed the same thing independently. I am talking about web pages. Could be that it is because I installed msttcorefonts on Ubuntu. I added some tt fonts from some German page to SUSE, but it did not help. Maybe you can give me an advice here?

2. Missing packages: This is not a big deal, and using webpin might be a better approach anyway. But to answer your question, I tried to install scipy, numpy, matplotlib, etc (scientific python packages). With Ubuntu I can easily get them either with aptitude install python-scipy or through synaptic. On openSUSE, they are on science repository, so I had to go through webpin. Not a big deal, really.

A couple more differences:

Kernel updates: I don’t know if that is the case with 11.0, but I know that in 10.3 I had to prepare sources for the updated kernel modules if I wanted to use GPIB drivers or VMware -everytime there is a kernel update (make cloneconfig, make modules_prepare). I heard that at least with VMware that will not be the case any more. I will try this later.

Autocompletion: it is not the same, even though it is the same shell. I tried javac prog_name.java and java prog_name in the directory where there are several files with the same ‘prog_name’ name but different extension (e.g., prog_name.c, prog_name.f95, prog_name.java). On Ubuntu, once I type few first few characters it knows exactly which file to select, and when to stop (in case of java command, it doesn’t include ‘.’). On openSUSE it doesn’t do any of this.

On the other hand, if there is a directory and filename that start with the same string, openSUSE knows how to auto-complete the name if you started with ‘cd’, while Ubuntu doesn’t. So, it’s 1:1 there.

I just saw your page:
http://www.benkevan.com/blog/things-to-do-after-installing-opensuse-110/
Maybe that will help with the fonts.

[...] Son muchos usuarios los que llegan ahora al mundo de GNU/Linux, y gracias al buen marketing de Ubuntu, lo hacen de la mano de dicha distribución, por lo que a continuación quiero redactar detalles importantes de openSUSE 11.0 que creo que puede ser de interes a estos usuarios antes de decidirse en elegir una. Para hacer esta comparativa, me he basado en una entrada del Blog de Ben Kevan’s. [...]

nice blog you have there, i’ve been interested in linux since then but never had the chance in using one of the distributions because “NO Internet”. Now that I had one just a share actually, I tried Ubuntu 8.04 and it was a fun distro for a newbie like me heck I’ve even stayed up till morning just to get around on this “Linux World” as a Windows user here on Philippines. Well, Linux here in our country is not that famous. As with the blog, I liked the Gnome desktop. Simple, yet customizable also..Didn’t like KDE because it’s just like I’m with Windows again..hehe..I had downloaded OpenSuse today and I’m going to try it after school..And if for some, OpenSuse will win today still a new Ubuntu version will be arriving this October..There the tides will be rising again with this two.. ;}

Just a few comments:

- I agree that Suse 11 is better looking.
- It’s obviously and measurably NOT easier to install than Mac OS X.
- It is easier than other distros.
- The fact that most things work out of the box is very cool.
- There are warts, namely the updates which have this sort of popup dimensia - why not just a simple list of downloads like every other updater on every other OS?
- My mouse needed recharging so to by surprise my space mouse was not recognized when I plugged it in.
- Same goes for CDs.

As for Ubuntu:
- Hardy Heron is not very stable. Using Eclipse 3 with the BEA plugin to deploy to WLS crashes every time.
- The Java time is off by an hour.
- My ruby has stopped working after some update.
- Flash has stopped working.
- All in all I have 4 Ubuntu boxes and several friends who have the same issues.
- There have been something like 10 kernels since Hardy was released and it seems like 300 packages.
- There is -nothing- stable about Ubuntu.

[...] openSUSE 11 the perfect Ubuntu replacement (openSUSE vs Ubuntu) [...]

After trying Zenwalk, Ubuntu, Mandriva, Mint in their latest releases in my laptop, I stay on OpenSuse11. Surprisingly EVERYTHING works out of the box, even the suspend action when lid is closed. And gnome runs faster than Hardy. I can believe it!

Experience with zoloft and tramadol…

Experience with zoloft and tramadol…

Unfortunately linux is like flavours of icecream. Everyone has opinions. This article is entirely based on opinion and you may have picked Suse as your favourite distro.

Personally I used Suse 11 at work as we have a Novell infrastructure and at home I use ubuntu, Mint and PCLinuxOS. Try everything - you will learn a lot more in the process about package managers, graphic/CLI and linux in general.

My biggest fear about linux is setting up dual monitors. At work I have Ati and it is retardedly hard to do, yet my nvidia with ENVY at home works a treat.

I tried OpenSuse this weekend. Every single application in Yast crashed. Doing simple things like updating the system took forever as the packages kept on not being able to load (so I had to download the package again). It was a nightmare. Yes, it looks better than Ubuntu, but it’s unstable and slow.

Hi there Ive tried Open Suse 11 3 times, but yesterday for the list time. Maybe looking better then Ubuntu - I have Kubuntu - but thats all. Terrible package manager, hard to update and configure. Fedora 9 is a bit better, but NOTHING can compare to Ubuntu. See the last KDE 4 based Kubuntu 8.10 alpha. This is looking for the future. Sorry but - for me - Opensuse is on the loose.

I couldn’t agree more!!!

OpenSuse Package Manager is Terrible… They do need to get that right!!!

That and an improvement to the 1-click install tech.

I’ve set an wesite at http://opensuse.awardspace.com talking about this… but i guess no-one listen… also there is a bug open for vote at:
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=425890

lets wait and see…

I’ve tried Ubuntu Ultimate 1.9 bases on Ubuntu 8.04. I like the look and feel and the comfort, but something is wrong. firefox doesn’t allow pressing buttons in a webpage. if i run with sudo, it works. the system also crashes periodically and my wireless lan doesnt work correctly (tries linux driver and via ndis). now i’m downloading openSuse 11. if nobody stop me, i must install openSuse

OpenSuse11 is better. That’s for my personal opinion. And it’s because I never used any other distros but OpenSuse11. And I’m a newbie with Linux. I’m in Philippines also, and I want to be unique, because most of users here uses Windows (crap). Now, all I need is to know how to play my DVDs, AVIs, MP4s or any movie as I have no problem with MP3s or such. Anyway, OpenSuse rocks.

lanzce,

add the packman repository and install libxine1 and MPlyaer.

You should set