Ben Kevan’s Blog

5 Days on openSUSE 11.1 was an early X-Mas present

I have been quite busy with a major project with work and that’s kept me from being able to write as much about openSUSE 11.1 as I have about previous versions. The lack of content from me in no way be taken as a dissapointment because my 5 day report on openSUSE 11.1 is pretty good.

So here’s a quick configuration:
Main Usage: Everyday enterprise use
Computer: Dell Latitude D820
Operating System: openSUSE 11.1
Desktop Environment: KDE 3.5.10
Display Driver: NVIDIA Beta 180.16

Here’s my screenshot:

First, I must point out that openSUSE 11.1 can be downloaded from the following locations:
DVD-32bit - openSUSE Linux 11.1 DVD - 32bit
DVD-64bit - openSUSE Linux 11.1 DVD - 64bit
openSUSE Gnome Live CD - 32 bit
openSUSE Gnome Live CD - 64 bit
openSUSE KDE 4 Live CD - 32 bit
openSUSE KDE 4 Live CD - 64 bit

Here are some major package version changes from openSUSE 11.0:
- Kernel 2.6.27.7
- KDE 4.1.3 & 3.5.10
- GNOME 2.24
- Mono 2.0

Now to my 5 days of openSUSE 11.1. First, after I installed I had to convert to the Compiz packages without the NOMAD patch (which was pretty much a known issue) and I was fully up and running without a hitch. First things I notice is the speed increase in boot (I’ll provide a bootchart diagram later to find out where that increase actually came from) and the speed improvements seen in zypper.

Again, I use this machine every day in an enterprise environment. Applications I run daily are:

Lotus Notes 8.5 Beta 2
VMware Workstation 6.5.x
Kontact
Opera
Yakuke
Amarok
Pidgin

All applications ran seemlessly. This was by far the simpliest upgrade I’ve had with any linux distribution and expect openSUSE 11.2 to be even easier.

On another note I played around with openSUSE 11.1 in a VM running KDE 4.1.3 and was astonished on how much further it was compared to the build of KDE that shipped with openSUSE 11.0. Now my only hope is that openSUSE 11.2 is on a 9 month release cycle and is released with KDE 4.3 which is due out at the end of June.

I’m hoping to have some time to write more about openSUSE 11.1, but only time will tell. Maybe just a nice screenshot walkthrough of the installation of KDE 4 Live CD, Gnome Live CD and DVD based installation with KDE 3.5.10.

On another note I would like to know if anyone would be willing to help me write some content on my site. Any inquiries can be sent to ben.kevan/at/gmail[dot]com.

I ask for help because Novell in the past has been known to have marketing issues, and I’d like to make sure that openSUSE doesn’t have this issue since to me, it is the best Linux distribution out there.

Tags: 11.1, gnome, kde, opensuse, review

11.1 Build Service Repositories being Built

Just thought I’d give a heads up to the people that care. The openSUSE 11.1 Build Service repositories are starting to come online.

With openSUSE 11.1 nipping at our heels.. I’d like to thank the openSUSE Developers for their great efforts in bringing out 11.1 ON schedule even with the delays due to the power outtage in the earlier builds.

Although I have beliefs that this release will not be as great as some of the others, I have overall faith in openSUSE. I just hope that some of the issues that i’ve seen with Compiz (mostly) and openOffice (cannot open documents over SMB) are fixed via updates that are released in the next few days PRIOR to the 13th GM release date.

I’ll keep my eye open for the ATI / NVIDIA repositories (actually I haven’t even checked if they were avaliable yet).

Hope everyone is having a grand holiday.

Tags: 11.1, opensuse, repositories

openSUSE ditches the EULA

Several weeks ago when upgrading to a Beta version of openSUSE 11.1 I complained about the EULA that I had to agree to after doing a zypper dup.

However, recently (in time for openSUSE 11.1 RC1) the openSUSE project has dropped what is considered a EULA and switched to a more conventional License Notice. You’ll still get the pop-up, but there is no longer a reason to have to agree to a EULA.

If you’re really bored you can read the full License Notice here.

As I pointed out earlier the previous EULA (although for a pre-release version) kept you from legally sharing your DVD or downloaded source, since it reported that you were not free to distribute. However this has been changed in the most recent License Notice here:

This agreement permits you to distribute unmodified copies of openSUSE 11.1 using the “openSUSE” trademark on the condition that you follow The openSUSE Project’s trademark guidelines located at http://www.opensuse.org/Legal.

Another thing this will likely change is what actually ships on the installation DVD’s. Since it’s now free to be distributed all packages included on it MUST be marked as freely distributable. Which very well may be the biggest reason why realplayer was dropped which I blogged about a few weeks ago.

I will give credit to the Fedora team who were the original creators of the License Agreement that was modified for the use on openSUSE, and much credit to openSUSE for recommending other project leaders looking to ditch the EULA to look at current project licenses instead of wasting the time to “re-invent the wheel”.

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Tags: 11.1, licensing, opensuse

My beta 5 woes - :(

Boy Oh Boy.. have I been having some issues after updating to the second sync of Beta 5 this morning.

#1 OpenOffice will not open anything over smb protocol.. Bugzilla 443467
#2 With Compiz when I close krdc (on KDE 3.5.10) it kills my whole X session (this is with xrdp and dmx packages installed) Bugzilla 444249
#3 KSnapshot kills my X session much like krdc (on KDE 3.5.10) Bugzilla 443819
#4 xrdp isn’t working with KDM due to pam issues, also when I have gdm I am still getting other errors Bugzilla 441750
#5 After installed the newest sync of beta 5 (as of this morning) the Kernel 2.6.27.5-2.2 seems to have killed my NVIDIA driver, and NVIDIA driver will not work as previous (I suspect kernel upgrade did it, as the other packages installed don’t seem to have anything to do with it) Note: This actually seems to be a compiz issue, where GLX will not stay loaded
#6 Ok.. not really a bug.. but some direction would be nice: removal of emerald or fix for emerald to work with NOMAD patch for X to get xrdp working Bugzilla 431846

All in all, this build of Beta 5 .. has given me quite the headaches..

How are other fairing with Beta 5?

Tags: 11.1, beta, broken, compiz, opensuse

The sad state of emerald for compiz & its possible demise

As some of you may know, emerald is a very nice themer for compiz. However, recently a major patch was applied known as the “nomad” patch. The patch was applied on Tuesday Sept 16th and has ripped havoc for people who use Emerald.

So you’d imagine someone just needs to fix emerald. However, emerald is no longer maintained which means, unless someone really steps up it’ll just be a memory.

So what are the choices for openSUSE 11.1?

Remove compiz-emerald to keep the number of bug reports down
Find someone to maintain emerald (alot harder then just removing it)
Applying a home built hack patch to keep in 11.1 and gracefully remove from 11.2 with correct notification to the community.
Revert back to compiz pre-nomad patch (not sure about the regressoins of this).

I personally have reverted back to the “pre-nomad” version of 0.7.8 (you can modify the spec file, and just remove the patch2) .. and am keeping emerald (as I like having control of the size of my taskbar etc.. since I think all the KDE Decorations waste tons of desktop space.

Edit: Does anyone know the version of Compiz / Compiz Emerald on Ubuntu 8.10 and if it works? If it does, why can’t the patch there be used for openSUSE emerald? If they opted “not” to use the NOMAD patch, why do we “have” to? < Dunno why I just thought of that.

Tags: 11.1, compiz, emerald, opensuse

openSUSE 11.1 Beta 3 My first shot (KDE 4.1.2)

As you may have read, openSUSE 11.1 was realeased and was shipped with KDE 4.1.2. I’ll go into my initial experience with 4.1.2, after I touch on a few changes since some of the older betas:

What’s changed since beta 1?
Major changes in this release include:
» Live CDs for x86 and GNOME and KDE
» OpenOffice.org 3.0
» Mono 2.0 Final
» Linux 2.6.27.1 (fixes e1000e issue)
» CUPS 1.3.9
» Parts of 11.1 branding are now in place
» Amarok 2.0 beta 2
» Banshee 1.3.2
» GNOME 2.24

» KDE and GNOME integration is ignored (bnc#433076)
» GNOME quickstarter does not work (bnc#434778)
» localized strings are not updated from extra sources
» optional packages are not really optional because the registry files are not spread correctly
» the user configuration includes symlinks to /usr/share/ooo3 instead of that real files; it might be a feature but it might also cause problems in the future.
» pyuno components are still not registered
» Suse-puzzler.xls works only partly; e.h. “Sneaky Peak” or “About” works but the “Shuffle” does nohing. Also, pieces can’t be moved by mouse.
» some missing hacks from ooo-build/bin/package-ooo and older OOo.spec
» missing OOo-sdk compat stuff (to build voiko…, bnc#428403)

List gathered from openSUSE 11.1 Beta 3 announcement

So now onto my experience.

My installation was simple, I actually did a

sudo zypper dup

From openSUSE 11.0. I ran it a few times, and after a while all was updated. (Note: I skipped the whole portion of me removing all my 11.0 repositories including the OSS and NON-OSS)

I originally only had KDE 3.5.10 on the machine, which behaved as it should, (with the exception of a problem with compiz. A bug report has been filed, and shouldn’t effect everyone. Please check out http://bugzilla.novell.com if you wanna poke around). Since this was such an easy upgrade, and nothing changed on the KDE 3 side, I decided to install the highly touted, and highly talked about (in both good and bad ways) KDE 4 (note: I tried KDE 4.0.0 - 4.0.4, and made the conclusion that it was not ready for my daily production work use).

I open up YaST and install the 2 KDE4 Patterns. I add kde4-konsole, and NetworkManager-kde4 to the mix, and log into KDE4. My first impression was “Damn, this is pretty nice looking.”. I was logged in, I had a panel that I could actaully modify (height etc), and I had been logged in for over 10 minutes without a crash (I’ve now gone 100% longer in KDE4 this time, then I have in previous attempts). KNetworkManager(3) launched instead of KDE4’s KNetworkManager (I assume this is because I had another session open, so I don’t consider this a fault).

I then pushed my luck. I added a second panel. Went to resize it, but no juice. The panel I added was able to be resized bigger, but not smaller ( I found this out after I made it 450 pixels for fun). Ok, removed the silly thing. Now the honeymoon period feels over, since KDE4 and I are starting to have our little bickering contest. I pout off like a little kid to change my theme, maybe a new look will make me feel better. Switch to the first theme, and apply.. Cool, but not cool enough, so I try the next. Dropped down the box, chose one, and clicked apply… BLINK.. plasma crashes, and everything comes back (hey, at least it came back, in 4.0.0 you were left with nothing).

Opened up dolphin, man I think to myself, this thing is snappppppy. I am quite impressed with the performance. I do a few other things that would put you guys to sleep, and log back into my KDE3 session to write this up.

So how would I rate my overall experience? a 7 / 10. A much higher 2 / 10 I would have given 4.0.4. Most my issues seem to be with the panel (I love my little panel). Here are my biggest gripes:
1.) Newly added panel couldn’t be resized
2.) When resized my panel to 24Pixel, the system tray icons were off the screen, and other icons were not scaled (maybe I needed to restart x?, whelp I don’t care to find out).
3.) I couldn’t change the translucency setting on the panel.. (booooo.. ok.. minute point).

A few other things I can’t think of right now.. since I did just get a root canal, and going back for a crown and some fillings..

All in all, I would actually install and use KDE4, if it weren’t on my machine that I use daily for work, and hell I may actually try it for work if I get too bored :o)

I know this is a pretty shotty review, but I plan on doing a much more comprehensive one with openSUSE 11.1 Final, which will include KDE 4.1.2 and GNOME 2.24 (Both installed into a Virtual Machine with all the packages they want from installation), with many more pictures, and quite possibly the installation process :o) So be sure to check back.

Note: I have had other issues with Beta 3, that I did not include in this, since they were not KDE 4.1.2 centric. They include netconfig not using /etc/sysconfig/network/config, and few other very minor “enhancements”. But .. you all the get point, it’s a beta build.

Tags: 11.1, kde4, opensuse