🚀 go-pugleaf

There will probably never be just one default GUI that loads on install and/or
first boot for Linux.  User tastes vary too widly for that.  Linux does however
make it *very* easy to load each user's default GUI.  Once configured startx
looks at certain profile files to determine which GUI to load, and what
settings to use for it.

Also, building the GUI into the kernel is not as simple as it sounds.  Compound
that with the fact that Linux runs on many hardware platforms.  Even though the
same C++ source code compiles and runs on all of them there are differences in
the compiler settings for each platform.

How do you account for the myriad levels of video capability from one machine
to the next?  Xconfigurator accounts for at least a dozen video clock chips,
hundreds of video boards, and unlimited flexibility in configuring all of the
video I/O properties.  Not all hardware can be probed successfully to determine
its optimum settings.  Microsoft accomplishes this with bloated code that takes
up much more drive space and a much larger memory footprint than would be
needed if these things were separate.

Given a known, standard hardware set an effective Linux administrator can leave
out all of the unneeded support from the start.  Even an average Linux user is
capable of removing files which are unrelated to any hardware in their system
or any software running on it.  While some of this is possible under Winxx it
is risky with all of the interdependancies built into the system.

I enjoy the fact that I have a choice of several GUIs for Linux.  Some times I
just want something different.  Nevermind the fact that I'll probably never
tweak any of the open source code.  I have the options available to chose
between several GUIs, command shells, text and graphic editors, web servers,
...  the list goes on.

PnP is nice but there's no substitute to being able to pick apart the system
(even on the most superficial level) when things go wrong.

Island Computer wrote:

> When will there be a truly GUI based version of Linux
>
> I was at a Birthday party over the weekend - a bunch of University Users
> that swear by Microsoft were arguing that maybe if Linux was as easy to use
> and install as NT, then they would perhaps try it out
>
> I can't believe that something like Motif hasn't been adapted, or adopted,
> to be integrated in Linux
>
> Comments ????
>
> PS: I want to print these out and send them to the Local Armstrong State
> here in Savannah so keep it clean
>
> David
>
> --
> Island Computer
> PO Box 86
> 406b/c First Street
> Tybee Island, GA 31328
> USA
>
> Voice  912 786 8555
> Fax     912 786 0999
> sales@islandco.com
> www.islandco.com

--
D. Keith Higgs,                     Collection Maintenance Supervisor
Kelvin Smith Library, 11055 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland Ohio  44106-7151
mailto:dkh2@po.cwru.edu      Phone:216-368-0559      FAX:216-368-3669
Official: http://www.cwru.edu/UL/pershomepages/K_Higgs.html
Personal: http://129.22.137.40/Index.htm                 ICQ#28181802

Have you rebooted Windows today?    Linux, it's where you want to go!

I understand that Linux is an OS that is non platform specific - and not
particularly hardware specific with reference to video cards etc., but I DO
think it would be a VERY good idea to develop particular shrink wrapped
products for the average user to install just as they would Win98 or NT

If the COmputer industry wants to provide a more than feable attempt at
competition to Microsoft, then there needs to be a simple "install and use"
package based around Linux that includes a GUI - something not too
dissimilar to Windows

Sadly, the majority of people that do have 99% of clout in the Computer
business have always been the 1% of users, namely the IT managers, that went
to school specifically for Unix/Linux programming

That is how Microsoft has won the lead - they provided for a huge market
that had been overlooked by the snobbery of the IT community

That is not aimed at anyone imparticular, but it a stance that is held by
the IT profession that needs to change if we are to see a fair market in the
new millenium

To finish - what kind of future do you think Microsoft would have if they
had a real competitor ???

OS/2 Warp is unknown - mainly though IBM's disinterest in marketing its' own
product
VMS - Well - it's going whether by choice or by force
Unix - Well - it's like having 500 different versions of the English
language...






Keith Higgs wrote in message <371B5CD9.E7C931CD@po.cwru.edu>...
>There will probably never be just one default GUI that loads on install
and/or
>first boot for Linux.  User tastes vary too widly for that.  Linux does
however
>make it *very* easy to load each user's default GUI.  Once configured
startx
>looks at certain profile files to determine which GUI to load, and what
>settings to use for it.
>
>Also, building the GUI into the kernel is not as simple as it sounds.
Compound
>that with the fact that Linux runs on many hardware platforms.  Even though
the
>same C++ source code compiles and runs on all of them there are differences
in
>the compiler settings for each platform.
>
>How do you account for the myriad levels of video capability from one
machine
>to the next?  Xconfigurator accounts for at least a dozen video clock
chips,
>hundreds of video boards, and unlimited flexibility in configuring all of
the
>video I/O properties.  Not all hardware can be probed successfully to
determine
>its optimum settings.  Microsoft accomplishes this with bloated code that
takes
>up much more drive space and a much larger memory footprint than would be
>needed if these things were separate.
>
>Given a known, standard hardware set an effective Linux administrator can
leave
>out all of the unneeded support from the start.  Even an average Linux user
is
>capable of removing files which are unrelated to any hardware in their
system
>or any software running on it.  While some of this is possible under Winxx
it
>is risky with all of the interdependancies built into the system.
>
>I enjoy the fact that I have a choice of several GUIs for Linux.  Some
times I
>just want something different.  Nevermind the fact that I'll probably never
>tweak any of the open source code.  I have the options available to chose
>between several GUIs, command shells, text and graphic editors, web
servers,
>...  the list goes on.
>
>PnP is nice but there's no substitute to being able to pick apart the
system
>(even on the most superficial level) when things go wrong.
>
>Island Computer wrote:
>
>> When will there be a truly GUI based version of Linux
>>
>> I was at a Birthday party over the weekend - a bunch of University Users
>> that swear by Microsoft were arguing that maybe if Linux was as easy to
use
>> and install as NT, then they would perhaps try it out
>>
>> I can't believe that something like Motif hasn't been adapted, or
adopted,
>> to be integrated in Linux
>>
>> Comments ????
>>
>> PS: I want to print these out and send them to the Local Armstrong State
>> here in Savannah so keep it clean
>>
>> David
>>
>> --
>> Island Computer
>> PO Box 86
>> 406b/c First Street
>> Tybee Island, GA 31328
>> USA
>>
>> Voice  912 786 8555
>> Fax     912 786 0999
>> sales@islandco.com
>> www.islandco.com
>
>--
>D. Keith Higgs,                     Collection Maintenance Supervisor
>Kelvin Smith Library, 11055 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland Ohio  44106-7151
>mailto:dkh2@po.cwru.edu      Phone:216-368-0559      FAX:216-368-3669
>Official: http://www.cwru.edu/UL/pershomepages/K_Higgs.html
>Personal: http://129.22.137.40/Index.htm                 ICQ#28181802
>
>Have you rebooted Windows today?    Linux, it's where you want to go!
>
>

Only one of your newsgroups cross posting was particularly appropriate...
(comp.os.linux.alpha).  Had you bothered to wander into the comp.windows.x
related newsgroups, you could have answered this yourself.
			- Jim

> From: "Island Computer" <dbturner@islandco.com>
> Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1999 10:39:13 -0400
> Newsgroups:
>
comp.os.linux.alpha,comp.os.vms,comp.sys.dec,comp.sys.dec.micro,cu.alpha.manag
> ers,vmsnet.alpha
> Subject: Question:  GUI integrated into Linux ??? - When if ever ????
> -----
> When will there be a truly GUI based version of Linux

In my opinion, it is in the process of happening.  There is not one,
but two competing desktop environments for Linux/UNIX under development.

I'm partial to gnome (www.gnome.org); there is also KDE (www.kde.org).

These are in the process of shipping as part of the next major versions
of Linux distributions (RH 6.0, SUSE 6.1, etc, Caldera, etc.).  Certainly
by the end of the summer Linux will look very different than it has in
the past.

> 
> I was at a Birthday party over the weekend - a bunch of University Users
> that swear by Microsoft were arguing that maybe if Linux was as easy to use
> and install as NT, then they would perhaps try it out

To be fair, NT isn't all that easy to install from scratch.  Linux isn't
much more difficult than that, if your hardware is supported.

> 
> I can't believe that something like Motif hasn't been adapted, or adopted,
> to be integrated in Linux

Motif / CDE is royalty bearing, and at a price that the general Linux 
market is impossible.  It is available as a layered product. I've never 
been fond if them anyway, and have never thought they were serious 
competition to the Mac or Windows.  Gnome (at least; haven't played with 
kde as much) certainly is... I get a charge out of seeing the X window 
System work the way we intended... 
				- Jim Gettys



--
Jim Gettys
Industry Standards and Consortia
Compaq Computer Corporation
Visting Scientist, World Wide Web Consortium, M.I.T.
http://www.w3.org/People/Gettys/
jg@w3.org, jg@pa.dec.com

In article <7fffg0$lbg$1@holly.prod.itd.earthlink.net>,
Island Computer <dbturner@islandco.com> wrote:
>I was at a Birthday party over the weekend - a bunch of University Users
>that swear by Microsoft were arguing that maybe if Linux was as easy to use
>and install as NT, then they would perhaps try it out

Tell them to try FreeBSD instead. It's easier to install than NT, and with
the Gnome packages it's a hell of a lot more pleasant to use.

Oh, and since it's got a lot of geneological and functional similarities to
Digital UNIX it's even on topic in comp.sys.dec.

-- 
In hoc signo hack, Peter da Silva <peter@baileynm.com>
 `-_-'   "Heb jij vandaag je wolf al geaaid?"
  'U`
         "Tell init(8) to lock-n-load, we're goin' zombie slaying!"

In article <7fffg0$lbg$1@holly.prod.itd.earthlink.net>, Island Computer  
says...
>
>When will there be a truly GUI based version of Linux
>
>I was at a Birthday party over the weekend - a bunch of University Users
>that swear by Microsoft were arguing that maybe if Linux was as easy to use
>and install as NT, then they would perhaps try it out

Corel intends to do just that, for the Intel-based workstation market.

http://www.corel.com/news/1999/march/march_2a_1999.htm

Island Computer wrote:
> 
> When will there be a truly GUI based version of Linux
> 
> I was at a Birthday party over the weekend - a bunch of University Users
> that swear by Microsoft were arguing that maybe if Linux was as easy to use
> and install as NT, then they would perhaps try it out
> 
> I can't believe that something like Motif hasn't been adapted, or adopted,
> to be integrated in Linux
> 
> Comments ????

Here's my comment.  Huh ?  I see everyone running some kind of X on 
Linux all the time.

Jeff

Is it possible to install both KDE and GNOME, and then switch easily between the
two?  Can I run KDE one minute, and then change my mind and decide to run GNOME
the next?

It seems a lot of people answering this question are MISSING the point

The point is - most people don't know how to load an OS from Scratch like
one has to do with Linux


Linux needs a GUI built in - just like NT and 98 and 95 and OS/2 - pictures
speak LOUDER THAN WORDS

Charlie - Your note wasinteresting - I wander if this will ever be ported to
the Alpha boxen





Charlie Luce wrote in message <7fi697$86e$1@ash.prod.itd.earthlink.net>...
>In article <7fffg0$lbg$1@holly.prod.itd.earthlink.net>, Island Computer
>says...
>>
>>When will there be a truly GUI based version of Linux
>>
>>I was at a Birthday party over the weekend - a bunch of University Users
>>that swear by Microsoft were arguing that maybe if Linux was as easy to
use
>>and install as NT, then they would perhaps try it out
>
>Corel intends to do just that, for the Intel-based workstation market.
>
>http://www.corel.com/news/1999/march/march_2a_1999.htm
>
>
>

Island Computer wrote:
> 
> The point is - most people don't know how to load an OS from Scratch like
> one has to do with Linux
> 
> Linux needs a GUI built in - just like NT and 98 and 95 and OS/2 - pictures
> speak LOUDER THAN WORDS

Caldera is claiming to do this now with OpenLinux 2.2.  Haven't looked
at the quality or checked Alpha availability.

In article <7fksti$r2d$1@birch.prod.itd.earthlink.net>,
Island Computer <dbturner@islandco.com> wrote:
>The point is - most people don't know how to load an OS from Scratch like
>one has to do with Linux

Have you ever installed Windows (3.1, 95, or 98) from scratch? Including
juggling the CDROM drivers so you can launch SETUP.EXE? Oy vey.

-- 
In hoc signo hack, Peter da Silva <peter@baileynm.com>
 `-_-'   Ar rug t� barr�g ar do mhact�re inniu? 
  'U`   "Twenty-two points, plus triple-word-score, plus fifty points for
         using all my letters.  Game's over.  I'm outta here."

My sentiments exactly. I here about 'linux with GUI" all the time.
Even in PCWEEK surprisingly ( but then again they failed to see the
power behind VMWARE).
I sitting here trying to decide WHICH gui I should have.  Unless there
is some confusion in the public's eyes as to what GUI stands for
(Graphical User Interface for those that don't ) . Which today means
you can click on things and things happen. Well there are a ton of
those that run under linux.  
The trouble the world is used to being tied to the ONE 'look' that
identifies a product like M$. Well the world has got to realize that
you can choose from a number of GUI's and call it your own. They
should all work anyway. and you will still be able to go to someone
else's machine and click on a button and something will happen( As all
GUI's tend to do).
Or better yet.. is there a 'Digital Equipment' GUI or for that matter
is there a 'UNIX' GUI?? Then why should there be a 'LINUX' GUI??
Enjoy
Brian Vicente
Systems Manager- Trans-Proteome Cluster Development
UCLA

"Jeffrey J. Potoff" <jpotoff@rhea.umd.edu> wrote:

>Island Computer wrote:
>> 
>> When will there be a truly GUI based version of Linux
>> 
>> I was at a Birthday party over the weekend - a bunch of University Users
>> that swear by Microsoft were arguing that maybe if Linux was as easy to use
>> and install as NT, then they would perhaps try it out
>> 
>> I can't believe that something like Motif hasn't been adapted, or adopted,
>> to be integrated in Linux
>> 
>> Comments ????

>Here's my comment.  Huh ?  I see everyone running some kind of X on 
>Linux all the time.

>Jeff

Peter da Silva wrote:
> 
> In article <7fksti$r2d$1@birch.prod.itd.earthlink.net>,
> Island Computer <dbturner@islandco.com> wrote:
> >The point is - most people don't know how to load an OS from Scratch like
> >one has to do with Linux
> 
> Have you ever installed Windows (3.1, 95, or 98) from scratch? Including
> juggling the CDROM drivers so you can launch SETUP.EXE? Oy vey.
> 
> --
> In hoc signo hack, Peter da Silva <peter@baileynm.com>
>  `-_-'   Ar rug t� barr�g ar do mhact�re inniu?
>   'U`   "Twenty-two points, plus triple-word-score, plus fifty points for
>          using all my letters.  Game's over.  I'm outta here."
What a wooosy! I built an install disk for w95 by manually adding
drivers to the config.sys and mscdex.exe to the autoexec.bat. EASY!
What's your problem? Too much unix? All you have to do is read the
instructions in any dos 5.0 or above handbook.

Chris.

In article <371F55E0.2A5E@infoave.net>,
Chris Clifton  <chclifton@infoave.net> wrote:
>What a wooosy! I built an install disk for w95 by manually adding
>drivers to the config.sys and mscdex.exe to the autoexec.bat. EASY!

The point isn't that it's that hard, the point is that Mister Island Spam
was complaining how hard it was to install Linux when he'd obviously never
installed DOS or Windows.

-- 
In hoc signo hack, Peter da Silva <peter@baileynm.com>
 `-_-'   Ar rug t� barr�g ar do mhact�re inniu? 
  'U`   "Twenty-two points, plus triple-word-score, plus fifty points for
         using all my letters.  Game's over.  I'm outta here."

Peter da Silva wrote:
> 
> In article <371F55E0.2A5E@infoave.net>,
> Chris Clifton  <chclifton@infoave.net> wrote:
> >What a wooosy! I built an install disk for w95 by manually adding
> >drivers to the config.sys and mscdex.exe to the autoexec.bat. EASY!
> 
> The point isn't that it's that hard, the point is that Mister Island Spam
> was complaining how hard it was to install Linux when he'd obviously never
> installed DOS or Windows.
> 
> --
> In hoc signo hack, Peter da Silva <peter@baileynm.com>
>  `-_-'   Ar rug t� barr�g ar do mhact�re inniu?
>   'U`   "Twenty-two points, plus triple-word-score, plus fifty points for
>          using all my letters.  Game's over.  I'm outta here."
OK, I stand corrected! I just did a fresh install of w95 on a Compaq
486dx2-66 Presario, loaded the cd drivers off a home made boot disk,
fdisked and formatted the WD 1.6 gig from my disk and loaded the cd  and
NU95 v2.0 in less than a half-hour. .............

Chris.

In article <7fksti$r2d$1@birch.prod.itd.earthlink.net>, Island Computer  
says...
>
>It seems a lot of people answering this question are MISSING the point
>
>The point is - most people don't know how to load an OS from Scratch like
>one has to do with Linux
>
>Linux needs a GUI built in - just like NT and 98 and 95 and OS/2 - pictures
>speak LOUDER THAN WORDS
>
>Charlie - Your note wasinteresting - I wander if this will ever be ported to
>the Alpha boxen

Thanks. Corel has mentioned StrongARM as a possibility for their desktop 
Linux, and they do have an agreement with Samsung (though that's for products 
under WinNT on Alpha), so I guess it's wait-and-see.

There's been a lot of excitement around the new Caldera OpenLinux 2.2 release, 
which is clearly designed to be a viable alternative to Windows, but Caldera's 
been an Intel-and-clones-only distribution from the beginning, and I don't 
really expect that to change -- it's basically a Novell company, after all.

What's going to be interesting is what Red Hat does to respond to these 
products, since as far as I know they have by far the most popular version of 
Linux for the Alpha processor.

In article <7frf3d$e7l$1@ash.prod.itd.earthlink.net>, Charlie Luce
<URL:mailto:lucejr@eisner.remove.to.reply.decus.org> wrote:

> Thanks. Corel has mentioned StrongARM as a possibility for their desktop 
> Linux, and they do have an agreement with Samsung (though that's for products 
> under WinNT on Alpha), so I guess it's wait-and-see.

The Netwinder that's on sale already contains a StrongARM and runs
ARMLinux AFAIK.

As I'm using an Acorn RiscPC  next to my Alpha I'm interested whether
the Impulse initiative will succeed. They intend to make a Risc Os GUI
and fontsystem lookalike for Linux.

 Ernst
-- 
Ernst Dinkla  Serigrafie,Zeefdruk            The point will never be metric

"Island Computer" <dbturner@islandco.com> writes:

> I understand that Linux is an OS that is non platform specific - and not
> particularly hardware specific with reference to video cards etc., but I DO
> think it would be a VERY good idea to develop particular shrink wrapped
> products for the average user to install just as they would Win98 or NT

Yeah, what we really need is software packages that automatically
replaces working libraries with broken ones, changes the text in
various system dialogs to German, crashes during install forcing you
to reinstall the whole system, and leaves a corrupted registry on
uninstall.  

If you don't have that, the system is simply not user friendly enough
to be popular.  And rpm -i is just too darn hard to type.

> If the COmputer industry wants to provide a more than feable attempt at
> competition to Microsoft, then there needs to be a simple "install and use"
> package based around Linux that includes a GUI - something not too
> dissimilar to Windows

Yep.  We really need to find a Linux installation that requires you to
reboot the computer thirty times, and which refuses to be installed
with any other Linux version.

> Sadly, the majority of people that do have 99% of clout in the Computer
> business have always been the 1% of users,

Sadly, the people that have 99% of the clues, commit 1% of the Usenet
postings. 

Really.  Get the Mandrake distribution, slap in the CD, answer a
couple of simple questions (even though they're not really GUIfied, I
know.  Major loss - not) and use KDE.

Sorry about the rant, it's the end of the day, and too much coffee.

-kzm
-- 
If I haven't seen further, it is by standing in the footprints of giants

Ketil Z Malde (ketil@ii.uib.no) wrote:
: Yeah, what we really need is software packages that automatically
: replaces working libraries with broken ones, changes the text in
: various system dialogs to German, crashes during install forcing you
: to reinstall the whole system, and leaves a corrupted registry on
: uninstall.  
[...more rants deleted...]

Amen!

I like the way Tom Christiansen put it on comp.lang.perl.misc:

Windows was created to keep stupid people away from UNIX.

:-))

cu,
  Martin
--
                        | Martin Vorlaender | VMS & WNT programmer
 VMS is today what      | work: mv@pdv-systeme.de
 Microsoft wants        |       http://www.pdv-systeme.de/users/martinv/
 Windows NT 8.0 to be!  | home: martin@radiogaga.harz.de