Yesterday, I received a presentation on SLED - http://www.novell.com/products/desktop/
Essentially, SUSE Linux + OpenOffice + Novell improvements.
FWIW, I was dead impressed. OK, so underneath it all it's just another Linux distro, but it is really really nicely packaged. Yes, it's €47 pa (for support updates + support), but it's not aimed at the readers of this list - for the first time I really think there is a genuine enterprise ready alternative to Windows on the general user desktop.
Greg
On Thu, 2007-03-01 at 14:48 +0000, Greg Thomas wrote:
Yesterday, I received a presentation on SLED - http://www.novell.com/products/desktop/
Is it me or does the presentation on the "View Demo" have the most completely bizarre pronunciation of "SUSE" ever ?
FWIW, I was dead impressed. OK, so underneath it all it's just another Linux distro, but it is really really nicely packaged. Yes, it's €47 pa (for support updates + support), but it's not aimed at the readers of this list - for the first time I really think there is a genuine enterprise ready alternative to Windows on the general user desktop.
I was up until a few years ago a big advocate of Suse, I used to religiously purchase every other release as boxed copy.
Certainly everything is pretty well polished and there is little doubt that YaST simplifies basic Admin for those not so familiar with Linux.
The only things that really stop me from still running it again are (in no specific order)
RPM. Once you have lived with apt you never want to go back to anything RPM based no matter how many fancy tools they wrap around it.
YaST. I like YaST and it really helps those not so familiar with Linux get the simple things working (file and printer sharing, firewall, remote access etc) but up until I stopped running Suse at home it really _hated_ any manual twiddling of configuration files.
Novell. I still am really unsure about Novell. If only because I will never forgive them for pulling the plug on what was looking to be the most viable alternative to Microsoft Small Business Server when they bought Suse.
Wayne Stallwood wrote:
On Thu, 2007-03-01 at 14:48 +0000, Greg Thomas wrote:
Yesterday, I received a presentation on SLED - http://www.novell.com/products/desktop/
Is it me or does the presentation on the "View Demo" have the most completely bizarre pronunciation of "SUSE" ever ?
Back in the old days when it was still German, I spoke to the MD at an exhibition. He said it should be pronounced Soo-Zuh. Haven't watched the demo...
I was up until a few years ago a big advocate of Suse, I used to religiously purchase every other release as boxed copy.
Ditto. I'd still take it over RH any day.
Certainly everything is pretty well polished and there is little doubt that YaST simplifies basic Admin for those not so familiar with Linux.
The only things that really stop me from still running it again are (in no specific order)
RPM. Once you have lived with apt you never want to go back to anything RPM based no matter how many fancy tools they wrap around it.
I second, third and fourth that. If one lets the system get even a smidge behind the curve, it can be an absolute nightmare to sort it out. If one ever installs something for which there is no package, and that's not an infrequent event when one is running servers commercially, then library dependencies enter a new level of pain. No, it's Gentoo for me (and even that has its "challenges"!).
YaST. I like YaST and it really helps those not so familiar with Linux get the simple things working (file and printer sharing, firewall, remote access etc) but up until I stopped running Suse at home it really _hated_ any manual twiddling of configuration files.
Novell. I still am really unsure about Novell. If only because I will never forgive them for pulling the plug on what was looking to be the most viable alternative to Microsoft Small Business Server when they bought Suse.
Ditto on both of those.
Cheers, Laurie.
-----Original Message-----
I was up until a few years ago a big advocate of Suse, I used to religiously purchase every other release as boxed copy.
<AOL> Me Too </AOL>
Novell. I still am really unsure about Novell.
<AOL> Me Too </AOL> I just don't trust them not to do what ever M$ tells them to do :(
I've just removed SuSE 10.0 from the last of my machines, and I've gone all retro, and put Gentoo on instead ;) It's almost as much fun as Slackware used to be :)
Peter
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Greg Thomas -
Laurie Brown -
Peter Onion -
Wayne Stallwood