Debian on Death's Doorstep: Developers Resist Systemd by Resigning

Is Debian Dying?

There is no shortage of consternation brewing over on the Debian Debacle Cul-de-sac where the nattering nabobs of negativity have forced yet another vote taking for the decoupling (or not) of the current plan to migrate to a replacement for sysvinit system.

The votes are in and it would appear no change in plans will take place.

So, it's full steam ahead with standards-compliant systemd replacing the aged sysvinit middle-ware design.

What lies ahead?  Much discussion preceding the vote taking took place including the proposition of forking Debian.  Yes.  A fork.

And, despite the issue of migrating over 40,000 applications, the proposition is still being taken seriously.

From my vantage point, Debian has always been a 'speed bump' on the road to innovation.  Their software management policy is simply unacceptable in today's world where life can change in a New York Minute.

The concern should present to those Debian derivatives, of which there are many, that delays in moving forward on systemd continue to mount.

Canonical Ltd. Mark Shuttleworth has intimated in a question and answer session (video) including Mir, their Wayland alternative, won't happen any sooner 2016.  I predict that there will be further delay as other unforeseen Debian issues present during their migration to systemd support.

Developers of Debian derivatives and application software ought to be giving serious consideration to the overall 'health status' of their beloved operating system.  They have their work cut out for themselves.  Not only must their Distro middle-ware be modified, but also the applications that run on it.  That is a 'double-whammy' and I'd suspect that when the going gets tough, you'll hear more kvetching and see Developers who can't knuckle-under hitting the exit doors seeking to retire their Derivative or joining up in the RPM camp.  I hope that the latter will be their preference.

Looking at the above chart from Wikipedia showing those major Distros that have adopted systemd, both Debian and Ubuntu stand out and, as a result, all their derivatives will fall into the same status until Debian can reach a stable systemd plateau.  It is interesting to note Gentoo and Slackware have indicated no plan to change over to systemd.

Are these indications that Debian is in the midst of her final initial death throws?

If developers align to advocating for a Fork, then the demise of Debian may well soon follow as a wholesale 'plate tectonic shift' occurs.

As for Me, I am wagering Debian's days are numbered.  What say you?

-- Dietrich

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Linux Desktop Application Development Flounders

You know, I have been trying to remain objective on this topic and have debated whether or not it would be constructive to write a post for going on several months now. (Image credit: illustrationsource.com)

Each day I survey the news pan-handling for those 'nuggets' that would indicate someone out there is 'thinking' and actually innovating on the Linux Desktop.  When I sort through the chaff of daily trumpeting of the newest Distro cookie cutter 'me too!' clone, I come up with scant information on new software development for specifically the Linux Desktop market.

Okay, you are grumbling.  You see, being an Advocate doesn't mean I will feed you platitudes and say 'nice things' all the time.  Quite the opposite.  I take a critical eye to what is, or in case of this story, isn't going on with Linux.

I don't get as excited about Linux on the Desktop (LoD).  Where are the killer apps?

Close your eyes and what do you see?  Heh.  Yep.  Nothing.  This is saying something but I am not sure what it means.

Are Developers too busy doing other things in their lives?

Are the global economic conditions putting pressure on LoD software development in general?

Companies with a bankroll and capability to pay Developers to do their work allow them a decent livelihood.  So, consequently companies like Microsoft and Apple have traditionally done well.

Yet, even now, Microsoft just announced a major lay-off of 18,000 employees.

Along with the effects of a recession, which I prefer to call a depression, come the attendant 'side-effects':

Business contraction, job loss, increased unemployment are all symptoms of what is not just regional, but encompassing the global economy as it were.

Thus, if you are one of those committers who volunteers their service in writing Open Source code in your spare time, and you find yourself out of a day job, that will most undoubtedly put a crimp on your ability, willingness to volunteer services when you cannot put dinner on the table.

We see ongoing development continues with Apple, Microsoft, Red Hat Linux and their orbiting software vendors in the commercial arena, but on the community side of Linux, I see few interesting new software applications in the offing.

Does this fit with what you see?  What are your thoughts?  -- Dietrich

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Linux on the Desktop: It's Not Me. It's You.

by Dietrich Schmitz

Have you grown tired of Linux on the Desktop?

Does 'familiarity breed contempt'?

At times, I feel I have a 'relationship' and when it reaches the point of saturation, or, I don't see anything in the way of innovation going on, I feel the urge to say in parting, "Linux, It's not Me.  It's You."

Yes.  You.  I'm flipping that famous line, "It's not you, it's me intentionally to make a point.

What is my point?

I am a human from planet Earth.  I am really smart and Linux, you are doing a terrible job of keeping up with things.

So much so, I am just about to break up with you if you don't start shaping up.  I know you've been busy with Android and other embedded devices, but you really need to pay attention to me.  Over here, that's me sitting at a conventional keyboard, monitor, desktop unit (or Laptop).

And I keep hoping you'll begin paying attention to me.

But it seems like things are, well, boring, unchanging.  You've made a few attempts to sweeten things up.

Like Gnome Shell, for example.  Okay you worked hard on that, but, it's just that it is easy to use, but too simple.  Why is it so hard to innovate?

Unity?  You've really gone out of your way to be 'different' but again, the gui is not usable and limiting.

I've stuck with you this long only because of LXDE.  Now, after all of the upstream struggles to get Gnome 3.x to a point of 'usability', I have resorted to using lightweight LXDE.  Why?

Because, it doesn't reinvent the wheel.  Don't fix what isn't broken.

Panels, Desktop, Desktop folders, icons, menus, terminal windows, they all work in a classic intuitive way which is why I have always liked you Linux.

I think the problem is, you are trying to be different but no matter how hard you try, the technology just comes up short, deficient.

Maybe you should just be yourself again?  You know like when Ubuntu first came out?  Gnome 2.x worked so darned well.

Why did you change?  I don't like you as much anymore.

Please change.  I mean, innovate, in the truest sense of the word.
Let's not make new widgets that replicate existing functionality.  We already have in my estimation too much of that.

And please.  STOP cloning yourself.  You could go blind doing that.

How many of you do we really need?  I think you should just work on making one Distro better.  No, perfect.  That's right, perfect.

Make yourself sexy with a purpose, but let's stick to just the Linux Standard Base (LSB), one Filesystem Hiearchy Standard (FHS), one graphical API (like Windows GUI).  Yes?  Come to think of it, isn't that what makes Windows so successful?

Please.  Don't put on pretenses for me.  I know you.  I just want what's best for you and think you should really strive to simplify.  And, never mind what the other clones are doing.  They are just copy cats trying to emulate.  You are better than that.

Linux on the Desktop:  Be the best that you can be and I won't leave you.  Promise.

-- Dietrich

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On Good Design, Standards, and Divisiveness

by Dietrich Schmitz

I am shaking my head and letting out a chuckle.  Because today, I read how Ubuntu, or, Canonical Ltd., in their own infinite wisdom have decided to reinstate 'Menus' in select applications, including Nautilus.

Good grief.  So, throwing the baby out with the bath water wasn't a good idea after all?

I should say not.

I've been dead set against Unity from the beginning and have taken the position that it represents in its great desire to be 'different' a net software regression.

Removing menus was a mistake and flies in the face of common sense and good sound design principles.

That with a host of other changes which have essentially given Canonical Ltd firm control of their software development, including Mir, have placed them in total isolation from the community at large and distinguish Ubuntu as the only Distro that uses the novel Unity graphical user interface.

Arguably, they have made some technology advancements, but to many, they have created a rift and wholesale development shift in avoidance of Unity and its attendant technical issues entirely.

Wayland fortunately continues to progress and paves the way for Distros which plan to migrate away from the aged and complicated X.org Display driver semantics.  This is a bridge that will be crossed soon and Mir will be the singular X.org replacement going forward for Ubuntu, unless they reverese their position and current thinking.  It would really be in their best interests to support Wayland so as to be uniform with all upstream development but then Canonical Ltd., would yield control away from sole ownership of Mir and have to 'cow-tow' to the community or at least make an attempt to 'cooperate' and contribute to Wayland.

But, that is the way it is.  Live by the sword, die by the sword.  Canonical Ltd. has made their own strategic business decisions and must live with them.  It's not too late for them to come to their senses and drop Mir and support Wayland.  It would be a good move.

+Mark Shuttleworth you've done the right thing by standardizing on systemd.  Don't be divisive.  Adopt Wayland and dump the Mir project.  Do the right thing.

-- Dietrich

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Debian, Ubuntu Cave In: Standardize on Systemd

by Dietrich Schmitz

It's almost too painful to watch.  Really.  

Whenever Debian gets around to getting off their collective hands and coming to grips with reality, it's as though a new Pope were being selected and we are all waiting with great anticipation for the 'smoke signal' indicating a decision has been made.

Good grief.  This is what constitutes progress for Linux.  It's really border-line funny how Debian committees work through the pros and cons of adopting Upstart vs. systemd.

Do these Folks realize they are running the risk of becoming irrelevant in their inaction while the earth continues to turn on its axis?  Seriously, systemd is a foregone conclusion and while it took time for me to digest the technical issues during the past year, I do see its importance.

The thing is, this does represent not only a technical advancement, but also galvanizes the Distro community into a level of conformance which begets standardization.

Oh there's the standardization word again.  I said it.

Let me pose a hypothetical question for you developers out there:

What would happen if you dropped all of your current development efforts on your Distro X and enlisted to work on one mainstream Top 5 Distro, such as Fedora?

Think about that question for a moment.  What would you be giving up and what would you be gaining?

The initial knee-jerk reaction might be to say "I'd be losing my right to choice".  But would you?

Is the act of being independent and creating variation 'because I can' and "it's my right" of higher importance than say putting forth the effort to build a superior singular Distro?  Imagine if you would, hundreds, thousands of developers going to work on one Distro.  Leveraging the intellectual resources and manpower would be amazing.

But wait, all of that 'variation'?  It would fall to the wayside and we as developers could all focus on working with one software API, one file hierarchy structure.  The effect would be the same as if overnight we all chose Android and focused on application development in that ecosystem.

Honestly, I wonder where Linux will wind up and hope that if consolidation occurs as I predict, more effort will be redirected to a single Distro which can be forged, annealed, hardened to become as popular as Windows.

The success of Windows is as much about a monopoly as it is about one standard, one api, which was embraced and flourished.  Microsoft Windows legacy 8 is aged and I believe we have reached a turning point where Corporate Enterprise knows it must do something to unshackle itself from a marriage to an ever-restrictive proprietary solution.

Mark Shuttleworth acts like a defeated Man in his Losing Graciously concession to adopting systemd.  It's silly.  Look at the big picture.

One Distro, one API, with thousands of developers behind it, is a powerful thing.

-- Dietrich 

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Fedora 20 LXDE Spin Tune-Up Tips and Tricks

by Dietrich Schmitz

Regular readers will have figured out by now that I have a particular obsession affinity for Fedora.  It has things that make it just 'better' than the competition.

Still, competition exists and Fedora is not everyone's cup of tea.  And isn't that the way of the world?

It seems that it suffers from an arguably undeserved reputation for being more difficult to set up and use.  Some of that is true, still.  But, I maintain that the Fedora Team has done a brilliant job pulling together their twentieth iteration family of spins, Fedora 20 and the 'ease of use' category hasn't been overlooked.

All the spins have their merits -- you have Gnome (Fedora Desktop default), KDE, Xfce, Mate, and LXDE spins from which to choose.  Conspicuously missing from the line-up is a Cinnamon Spin, but, fortunately, as with Enlightenment 17, Fedora chose to include software groups, should you feel the need to run with those GUIs.  Only you must install one of the aforementioned spins first before installing one of the two guis.

That is all well and good.  But, some of you also know I have this thing about minimalism.  It's not just about visual elements; it's minimal in terms of resource consumption as well.

Thus, I have come to like the LXDE Desktop along the way using Lubuntu.

Let me say that Lubuntu is a very fine Distro for new users coming from a Windows perspective.

I've gone back to Lubuntu several times in the past because of one thing or another that set me off and I got annoyed by so as to induce a reflex response -- go back to that which 'just works well'.  That was, for me, Lubuntu.

It is easy to install, use, familiar, comfortable, lean, minimal and wicked fast.

When briefly using it not long ago, I thought to myself, "Self, why can't Fedora be like this?"  I was left to wonder about it until this past week and I set out to reproduce the "Lubuntu Experience" by seeing if I could tweak up the 'bland' out-of-the-box Fedora 20 LXDE Spin by making a few needed changes.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that I was able to achieve the desired result.  Fedora 20 LXDE tweaking helps more than a bit, I think.  But, you can be the judge.  

Here's a run-down on what I've done to tweak up the LXDE Spin a bit.

Btrfs Filesystem

I don't think this is easy to do on Ubuntu, but, I can't remember if I tried to make Lubuntu run with Btrfs as the root filesystem.  Somewhere, I read that it gives grub major headaches, but, I have found the out-of-the-box selection of Btrfs with auto-configuration makes a separate partition for /boot (512MB) using ext4.  There was no thinking on my part to make that happen, but given grub is running on ext4 is the 'rub'.  Nicely done Fedora Team for making this a 'seamless' process.  There's nothing worse than the feeling one gets after an install seeing on first boot a grub> prompt.  That's a sign that something has gone fubar and it usually requires going back to grub.cfg and/or booting up a pendrive and using fdisk to remedy.  So, I was quite pleased that the new Anaconda installer handles Btrfs so well.

Full Disk Encryption

Full Disk Encryption will encrypt your entire HDD/SDD and every time you boot, you will need to input your WDE password to unlock the drive before the system can bootstrap.  This is strongly recommended in today's world where theft of Laptops has become rampant.  As a matter of good security practices, I'd suggest it be used on any hardware, regardless of whether it is a Laptop or not.  In the Anaconda installer, it's a checkbox [x] selectable item.  Check it!

Linux Kernel 3.12 zswap

My good Friend +birger monsen shows in a Google Plus post how to enable a new feature found in the Linux Kernels >= 3.11 called zswap.  

Zswap essentially takes data that would otherwise head to I/O disk swap space and compresses it in a kernel ram cache using LZO compression.  Effectively, a speed performance gain can be realized by using zswap.

Interestingly, Lubuntu 13.10 has zRam, a similar technology (but not the same), enabled by default and it helps greatly with older PCs, even ones having as little as 256MB ram will benefit.  Naturally, I have zswap.enabled.  Why?  Because I am bad. :/ Seriously, if you google around, you'll find information that shows IBM is equipping their Linux mainframes with zswap for heavily I/O bound applications yielding measurable performance gains.  Enough said.

Yum Plugins

If you love yum as much as I do, then Fedora is for you.  It's just far superior to Apt-Get for so many reasons.  In Fedora 20, presto has been merged so a separate install of the plugin is not necessary.  But, I installed two delicious plugins: yum-plugin-fastestmirror and yum-plugin-fs-snapshot.  The former, determines the 'closest' mirror to your geo-location -- this actually can make a difference in terms of number of hops your tcp/ip packets must travel to reach your PC, believe it or not.  It's a must-have as far as I am concerned.

The latter, yum-plugin-fs-snapshot, is 'money in the bank' if you need to have a restore point from which to recover.  Apple OSX and Microsoft Windows users enjoy having such when things go fubar.  Now, with this plugin installed, whenever using yum to make an update/change/removal, the plugin will diligently create a 'snapshot' (a standard feature in Btrfs).  The plugin automatically backs up each time yum is called.  By virtue of copy on write (COW) technology Btrfs uses minimal disk space and the backup time is near instantaneous.  The first time I messed with Btrfs a few years ago I thought something was wrong.  The snapshot command returned to a prompt in less than a second.  I thought, "Did it just core dump?"  Nope.  

It all seemed counter-intuitive at first but with COW you only get only pointers to read-only data (data that hasn't changed) with any other disk 'writes' getting a full copy.  It's a great idea that Btrfs borrows from the SUN's Solaris ZFS filesystem. (See directly above yum in a terminal session doing an automated fs-snapshot.)

Install both plugins with:

$sudo yum install yum-plugin-fastestmirror yum-plugin-fs-snapshot

Google Droid True Type Fonts

Google Droid fonts, easily, are as good as Windows Tahoma TTF and Ubuntu TTF true type fonts and were installed with:

$sudo yum install google-droid*

After installation, be sure to go to the Preferences->Customize Look and Feel->Fonts tab and make sure hinting is using Rgb and set to 'Full'.  This is especially helpful on LCD Laptop displays.  On the 'Widget' tab, set the 'Default Font' to Droid Sans 10 point.

Adwaita Nemo Widget Theme

I chose by trial and error Adwaita-Nemo Widget theme.  Install with yum:

$sudo yum install adwaita-nemo

Select from the Customize Look and Feel->Widget tab.

Elementary Icon Theme

Just by chance, I decided to try Elementary Icon Theme and liked how it gives LXDE an overall professional feel.  Install it with yum as follows:

$sudo yum install elementary-icon-theme

FedoraUtils

FedoraUtils is a 'grab bag' of utilities with a Zenity gui wrapper for a series of shell scripts.  Used judiciously (not all scripts are applicable), one can quickly configure features which otherwise might require additional time when done manually at the terminal command line.    

Features include:

• Install codecs and additional software
• Fix various problems
• Tweak and cleanup your system
• View system information
• And much more...

OpenBox 'Flatbox' Window Decorator Theme

What really sets LXDE apart is it's OpenBox window manager.  I love OpenBox for it's blazing speed and minimalism.  I went to Box-look.org to check around for other styles of OB window decorations and ultimately chose Flatbox.  Download the obt file and import from Preferences->OpenBox Configuration Menu->'Install a new theme' button.

The decoration is clean and doesn't cause the eye to break -- it integrates as though it was meant to be.

It's a clean crisp look that when added to the Elementary Icon Theme and Adwaita-Nemo Widget style is simply superb.  In fact, I really think appearance-wise it is better than stock Lubuntu.

Pidgin Instant Messenger - pidgin-libnotify

I hate how Google Plus Hangout (formerly GTalk) works.  So, instead I set up Pidgin.  It's really better anyhow, since you'll never miss any message from a friend with Pidgin (such as when your G+  tab is closed).  And if you install pidgin-libnotify along with xfce4-notifyd you'll have notifications screen up when friends come and go.  Don't forget to go to Pidgin->Tools->Plugins->Libnotify Popups (select)->Configure Plugin button  and checkmark [x] 'Buddy signs off' and 'Buddy signs on'.  Also, in Tools->Preferences, be sure to have Pidgin minimize to your system tray 'Always'.

Install pidgin-libnotify and xfce4-notifyd with:

$sudo yum install pidgin-libnotify xfce4-notifyd

If you don't like the default location for Pidgin's popup notifications (top right), open a terminal and type xfce4-notify-config and set the location to lower right as I did.

Compton Composting

LXDE in the Fedora Spin is considered lightweight by design.  Thus, you don't get any compositing like KDE, MATE, Gnome Shell, or Cinnamon.


If you have the intestinal fortitude, clone the compton project using git and manually compile as I did.  This rpm 'should' be installable on Fedora.20 if you pass in $sudo yum localinstall --releasever=19 <package name>.  But, I haven't tested it.

RPMFusion Free and Non-Free Repositories

RPMFusion provides Free and Non-Free rpm packages which aren't found in the standard Fedora repository system.  Follow the directions to install the *.repo files and you are good to go.  Once done, I installed VLC Media Player, Mozilla Totem plugins which are accessible from both Chrome and Firefox.

Redshift-Gtk

At first, I was skeptical about this technology.  But now, I am sold.  What does Redshift-Gtk do?  Well, it when fed your latitude and longitude, goes to its own database of current weather conditions indexed by time of day, and then makes a display color 'heat' adjustment.  It automatically adjusts throughout the day to the most ideal setting for viewing and eases eye strain accordingly. I strongly recommend it and you will appreciate it most at night when an otherwise 'bright' screen can kill your vision.  Install redshift-gtk with:

$sudo yum install redshift-gtk

With LXDE, you'll need an autostart file in your ~/.config/lxsession/LXDE/ directory.  


The commands in mine include starting Pidgin, compton, and redshift as follows:

dietrich@localhost LXDE$ cat autostart

@compton -c -r 16 -l -24 -t -12 -G -b

@pidgin

@redshift-gtk -l 43.030718:-74.992302 -t 5700:3600 -g 0.8 -m vidmode -v

Conclusions

Looking at the Desktop, it is clean, easy on the eyes.  If you've never tried Fedora, I would suggest LXDE especially for older PCs.  You'll find the machine will return to life and OpenBox's windows paints and LXDE GTk refreshes will snap on screen instantly.  Short of using Lubuntu or #!CrunchBang, I cannot think of any faster Linux Distro setup.  

Fedora 20 Linux LXDE Spin running with the tweaks shown in this story.

Hopefully, the tune-up tips and tricks I gave will increase your level of enjoyment using Fedora.

Fedora Linux:  The safest operating system on the planet.

I stake my reputation on it.

--Dietrich

Related articles

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Top 5 Linux Desktops: Where Do You Want to Go Today?

by Dietrich Schmitz

Overview

No one can disagree, the level of choice one can have for coupling a graphical user interface to Linux to achieve the Linux Desktop metaphor has grown and become quite extensive. (Image right: Fedora 20 Desktop Edition)

By comparison, Apple's OSX and Microsoft's Windows legacy x86 7/8 have little choice to offer, by default.

I've been thinking about whether or not having so much choice is a good thing or not.  Certainly everyone understands that 'choice' is a tenet or, if you will, a cornerstone of Open Source and Linux and breeds variety and stimulates creativity.

But to temper one's thoughts, should it come with a level of restraint lest we find ourselves ultimately floundering with 'too much choice'?  That is an important question and distinction.

If one considers the abstraction 'Linux Desktop', one may not necessarily and reflexively fix their mind on a singular idea of what that is.  No, there are quite a few good choices one can make insofar as which GUI to use.  Might there be a 'down side' to having so much choice?

Newcomers to Apple Macs know the GUI will always be what Apple provides -- one and only one GUI.

Newcomers to Microsoft Windows will have the same expectation.

And now, upcoming Google Chromebook provides uniformity of its own.

These three commercial products are designed not to encourage decoupling the gui from the kernel.  The technophile may try to do so, but by and large, consumers in the larger mass market accept without conscious thought the packaging and presentation as found and just use a given product, because 'it works' for them, by design.

That reduces common-denominators dramatically and allows to a large degree a level of standardization to be fostered.

With Linux, the story is different.  For example, the commercial Distros Red Hat and Ubuntu Linux offer one GUI.  That makes sense as far as the aforementioned is concerned, providing consistency across varying hardware platforms, along with meeting user expectation.  If assumptions can be made on how software behaves then cost of operation will also be lowered appreciably.

On the community side of Linux, we have a garden variety of multiple GUIs, package managers, File Hiearchical Standard variations, because with 'choice' comes the ability to depart from what was previously done.

Each Distro brings with it a variation or 'spin', if you will, on what constitutes a 'better mousetrap'.  The design goals can be modest to major departures from previous attempts.  In some cases, one might not be able to distinguish the difference between Distro A and Distro B.

Distrowatch Top Five

Taking a look at the 'Top 5' Distros listed on Distrowatch today (Image left: taken 1/12/2014 by DTS) we see Mint, Debian, Ubuntu, Mageia and Fedora are in the pack.

These 'players' have moved around a bit but for the most part have been dominant insofar as a Distrowatch measurement gives.  It's not scientific by any means, but, over time one can get a feel for where the modalities are.

So, is it safe to assume these are the top 5 players in the Linux Desktop market?  There is room for debate and if you have played 'horseshoes' in your life, you know that 'close' counts.

We are seeing a 'clustering' around these data points happening for a long period of time.  I don't think we'd be out on a limb to say they represent the most popular Distros in terms of traffic detected.

Then making that assumption, what GUIs appear to be used with each of these?  Let's take each one at a time.

Linux Mint

Linux Mint Lead Developer Clem LeFebvre has much to be proud of.  He has shown that a better mousetrap can be built and the level of thought, fit and finish to his several 'spins' are worthy candidates for any newcomer to Linux.  In fact, I'd probably offer them first to a newcomer than Fedora my mainstay Desktop of choice.  Why?  They just work and nothing needs to be tweaked out of the box.  In its current incarnation, Linux Mint 16 "Petra", users have several GUIs from which to choose: KDE, Xfce, Cinnamon, and MATE.

At one revision, I believe 12, Mint offered an LXDE spin.  How I wish they'd bring that back.  But, Xfce works really well as lightweight GUIs go.

Interestingly, Mint doesn't offer a GNOME spin and no Enlightenment either.  Enlightenment just released version 18.  I feel, Enlightenment is not getting the 'respect' that it deserves and the spins which offer it are few and far between.   Bodhi Linux is a good choice if you'd like a good out of the box experience.

Debian

Debian is the staid, pragmatist-favored Distro for reasons of intentional slow development to promote a stable operating environment.  If you want cutting edge technology, it won't be there by default.  The kernel will be at least 12 months old and packages will be likely aged the same.  As for GUIs, and if you want to stay in the present, you'll likely feel like you are living in the past if you opt for Debian's choices.  The website design hasn't changed much for many years, appears spartan, and if I were a new user, I'd be intimidated by it.  It certainly doesn't coddle the user by providing what I call user-friendly 'good guidance'.

It wouldn't cost much to improve its friendliness and that's why I won't ever have a new user first try Debian.  When you are drilled down to picking the isos from a barren directory tree structure, you'll find they offer GNOME, KDE, LXDE and Xfce 'flavored' isos.  Most will fit on a CD with 'overburn' but one or two require a DVD if you opt not to use a larger USB pen drive.

Ubuntu

To be fair, Canonical Ltd. has succeeded in making Ubuntu Linux a true 'user-friendly' experience.  From the moment you arrive on their website to downloading, to installing, you will be coddled and that breeds confidence.  As it should be, Ubuntu is made for commercial use and for the general consumer.  It is designed to fit most users' needs with just one GUI, called Unity.

Unity is the bastard child in the Open Source community, promulgated by Canonical Ltd.  But it has resulted in somewhat of a 'wedge' in upstream development standards.  Namely, despite their vocal support for nurturing and being behind Wayland, the follow-on new Display server standard to replace the aging and 'problematic' X.org, they did a switch of direction by choosing to write Xmir, a variant containing some of Wayland but mostly rewritten by the Canonical developer team.  As such, much contention has arisen around its development and the long story short is that Unity isn't supported by any other Distro.  It's an island.  It's how Canonical does things.  They are in full control of it.  So be it.  The long-term prognosis for Unity is unclear as more and more Distros hop on board with Wayland-driven technologies.  I would personally offer another spin of Ubuntu such as Kubuntu or Xubuntu before I would recommend Ubuntu.  Both will support Wayland going forward.

Mageia

Mageia is a community-based fork of commercial Mandriva Linux.  I cannot give you a statistic for it, but I would tend to believe that Mageia in terms of country of origin dominates in Europe since Mandriva was historically developed by a French concern.

Mageia is in the pack for very good reason and one need only go to their website to see the level of professional work and finish is a 'cut above'.  It's the same level of polish as that of Ubuntu, only they offer a comprehensive list of GUIs that include:

• KDE4 SC 4.10.2,
• GNOME 3.6,
• XFCE 4.10,
• LXDE,
• Razor-Qt,
• E17.

Fedora

Fedora is my Distro of choice.  By default, Fedora 20 Desktop Linux Edition installs GNOME 3.10.x.  In their 'family' of spins one will find GUIs of KDE, Xfce, LXDE, and MATE.



 

Conclusion

It would appear that Fedora is the only Distro that offers their default Desktop with Gnome.  I would add that this is the first experience I have had with Gnome in a long time where I feel that it has reached a plateau of usability in version 3.10.  It's not perfect and there are issues for the more technically inclined who quickly hit limitations, but for a newcomer and 'Joe Six-pack', I feel that Fedora 20 Desktop Edition is more than 'adequate' to get the job done in Gnome 3.10.

Looking at Mint 16 Petra's other 4 Distros, Mint seems to premier KDE and Cinnamon and MATE provide good Gnome alternatives, while Xfce offers Gtk2/3 support going forward and no Gnome dependencies.

Canonical Ltd. continues to chart their own course doing many things that simply depart from common sense.  Unity being what it is, will still give new users ease of use and the work done to keep to a standard and polished commercial product stands out, nonetheless.

I expect to see continuing big things from Mageia.  While they tend to lumber along, they are dealing with a lot of moving parts so necessarily must be pragmatic and plan their changes carefully executing them in good time.  They are worth waiting for whatever they bring to the next major revision level.

Debian are probably not going to change a lot in terms of their software policy management and so while work continues on the next Debian 8, it will be slow coming.  The Distro spins and website could use a major face lift.  Get out of that '90s Yahoo look.  Is Debian a 'speed bump'?  Yep.

Mint stays firmly entrenched in the top 5 slot numero uno and for good reason.  The reputation and expectation is that one can quickly, easily install any flavor of Mint and hit the ground running.  Just use.  Mint doesn't include Gnome but makes up for it with a set of jewel-like Distros, shiney and ready to go to work for you.

That's it for now.  Let me know what you think.  -- Dietrich

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