LINUX---Discussions in General

[Gnobuddy]

Then update some stuff and it all fooked up again.

And a very frustrating experience it is, when an update bjorks your system.

I have had that happen at least once with with every operating system I've used on a PC - Windows, OSX, Linux, and FreeBSD. Nothing is perfect, such is life!

-Gnobuddy

[big_teee]

At home, I've been Linux-only since 2001. Sixteen years now. Currently using Xubuntu, which I was driven to because both KDE and Gnome became unusable as far as I was concerned.

I've never tried Mate, will have to test it out some day. Meantime, XFCE / Xubuntu does the job for me.

I have to use Windows at work, and, most of the time, it feels like taking a couple of steps backwards. Worst of all is the constant worry - will I get a worm? A virus? Ransomware?

-Gnobuddy

Actually my flavor of linux, is Mate/XFCE.
I install U-Mate, then I install XFCE4, XFCE4-Goodies, and XFWM4-themes, from the repositories.
That gives the option of running either of two desktops, mate, or XFCE.
U-mate has a great base, but I too, prefer the XFCE desktop.
My laptops like the Mate/X, better than the Xubuntu alone.
I've been Linux only for 5 years now.
Ran it off and on since about 1999.
T

[big_teee]

I personally think that there could be a downward trend with the lighter weight legacy driver type available varieties of ubuntu or in my case linux mint XFCE. My point being that I have a computer in my work shop that has pretty dated hardware, 2003-2004, which was running Linux Mint XFCE without a hitch for about 2 years. Then there was this software update, about 3 months ago, that rendered the computer almost completely useless. So all of a sudden it cannot run software manager from GUI or command line and no internet etc... I installed it again and from the image file the installation works flawless. Then update some stuff and it all fooked up again. I installed 4 other versions of XFCE as well as others and it was as if the new updates did not like my hardware. I mean I ran a full memory test on RAM with no issues. I swapped out for 3 different hard drives with no change. I currently have Mint 17.1 XFCE installed on that computer and it works great if you just don't run the newest kernel update.

EDIT: Note that all the flavors of XFCE I tried were all tied in to Ubuntu kernels.

Hi DrGonz:
It is probably a driver issue, like you said.
Maybe try Xubuntu, or maybe mate?
T

[Steve A.]

And a very frustrating experience it is, when an update bjorks your system.

I have had that happen at least once with with every operating system I've used on a PC - Windows, OSX, Linux, and FreeBSD. Nothing is perfect, such is life!

-Gnobuddy

Knowing absolutely nothing about Linux I would venture to guess that recovering from an update that goes south is much easier with Linux than with Windows or the various Apple operating systems.
I've restored disk images on Windows machines but it is a real hassle restoring all of your data files newer than the image. Probably easier to restore the disk image to a fresh hd and copy files from the old hd as needed. As Terry recently pointed out it works better to access files on an old Windows boot drive using Linux!

Steve A.

[big_teee]

With my dual boot machines, just switch to the one that is working, and reload the other one.
Lots of times it is faster to load a new distro, than the hassle of fixing it.
Keeping all the personal data on a separate home, or storage partition.
If you want to load a ubuntu that is fully updated, you can download and install a daily build.
Run it on a SD stick, and if it works OK, load and run it. I do that off and on.
Index of /ubuntu-mate/daily-live
T

[Gnobuddy]

Knowing absolutely nothing about Linux I would venture to guess that recovering from an update that goes south is much easier with Linux than with Windows or the various Apple operating systems.

It has been, in my experience. I've never had the actual filesystem go south, so, worst case, recovering files was usually as simple as booting from a Linux live-CD, and copying the data onto another hard drive.

I usually create a separate hard-disk partition just for user data, and most of the time, you can just re-install Linux onto the borked machine, telling the installer NOT to use that user data partition. After the new install is complete, I would edit a couple of configuration files, so that the fresh new Linux install would once again use that same old data partition. Presto, all your data is back!

One of the nice things about Linux is that you get all these great networking tools, free. When I get a new computer, I set the old one up as my data backup, and use a couple of network programs called rsync and ssh to copy my data over the network regularly, so I have a backup that's never more than a few days old on the old PC. That's saved my bacon a couple of times when a hard-drive failed suddenly.

The one thing I never had (and still don't have) is an off-site backup. I would be in trouble if the Fraser river flooded and my house went under water for a few days.

As Terry recently pointed out it works better to access files on an old Windows boot drive using Linux!

It does indeed, and I've done that a number of times during the days when my wife still had a Windows computer in the house.

But the most satisfying case of that happening was when I got a phone call from a very upset woman, who turned out to be the wife of one of my neighbours co-workers. Her Windows PC had died, would not boot, taking with it *all* the photographs she'd ever taken of her daughter, from small child to young teenager. And she had no backup.

I was able to rescue all of her data with a Linux live CD, and copy it onto a few DVD-Rs (this was a few years ago, gigantic USB thumb drives didn't exist yet). She and her husband were hugely relieved. Turned out her husband played in a Beatles tribute band, and they gave me and my wife free tickets to their next show. That was fun, but the best part was being able to give that nice couple back their photos.

-Gnobuddy

[DrGonz78]

But the most satisfying case of that happening was when I got a phone call from a very upset woman, who turned out to be the wife of one of my neighbours co-workers. Her Windows PC had died, would not boot, taking with it *all* the photographs she'd ever taken of her daughter, from small child to young teenager. And she had no backup.

I was able to rescue all of her data with a Linux live CD, and copy it onto a few DVD-Rs (this was a few years ago, gigantic USB thumb drives didn't exist yet). She and her husband were hugely relieved. Turned out her husband played in a Beatles tribute band, and they gave me and my wife free tickets to their next show. That was fun, but the best part was being able to give that nice couple back their photos.

Yup that is the greatest feeling when you save files on a crashed system. I have doing just that for many people since at least 2002. Back then I would run Knoppix as a live CD and 9 out of 10 times it was a breeze.

[big_teee]

Ubuntu will drop the flagship desktop Unity, next month when Ubuntu 17.10 comes out.
Guys and Gals either loved Unity or hated it, I was in the hated it group.
The New Ubuntu 17.10 will drop Unity, and adopt a version of the Gnome Desktop.
It will have a similar look to unity, but have some key changes.
No more Dash bar at the bottom, the new Ubuntu will have a Docking bar on the left.
No more closing the windows on the upper left, now the window controls will be on the upper right like most desktops.
I have it loaded on my HP test box, and here are some preview screenshots of the new `17.10 Ubuntu modified desktop.
It seems to be pretty easy to use.
Check it out!
T

[The Dude]

I'm curious, big_teee, have you any knowledge in regards to the supplied driver package? In other words, is the OS installation able to find most drivers on it's own, or do you have to go hunting for them after the install?

[big_teee]

The drivers are preloaded into the Kernel package.
See screenshot, it shows the issue of 17.10 has a kernel of 4.12.0-13 generic.
And, my default desktop is Mate 1.18.0.
That is all the latestest Ubuntu software.
To check drivers, I always run a new Distro live.
You can either download and burn a DVR, or load it to a USB memory stick.
With laptops, I always use the USB sticks.
There are several different ways to make a bootable memory stick with windows.
If you are interested in trying a live USB, I can help you dig into it.
T
Here is a link to make a live usb drive.
https://itsfoss.com/create-live-usb-...tu-in-windows/

[Gnobuddy]

...is the OS installation able to find most drivers on it's own, or do you have to go hunting for them after the install?

It's been many years since I've had to manually install drivers for any built-in PC hardware. In my experience, Linux got really good at auto-finding and auto-installing drivers long before Windows did, and only recently has Windows caught up.

As an example, many years ago I bought an HP laptop that came with Windows Vista. I found Vista utterly unusable, so I decided to wipe it and install Windows XP. Unfortunately, XP completely failed to identify much of the essential hardware on the laptop, including the built-in Nvidia graphics card, SATA hard drives, and even such basics as USB ports and motherboard audio. It took me several days of online research to find and manually download all the requisite XP drivers (at least half a dozen), and I ended up having to create my own Windows XP install CD, slip-streaming the necessary drivers onto it, so that the install CD would actually boot on that machine and "see" the SATA drives.

After spending a week to get XP installed and working fully on that laptop (I needed Windows for one single piece of software that wasn't available on Linux), I went ahead with the plan to add Linux as well. In complete contrast to the Windows XP install, the Linux installation was as simple as popping in the install CD, booting the machine, and clicking through a few prompts. No fuss, no muss, no driver-hunting, and about half an hour after popping in the Linux CD, I had a fully functional Linux laptop.

These days Windows 7 (corporate version, still used at my workplace, and still fully supported by MS) is pretty good about finding drivers as it installs, but this is a pretty recent phenomenon in the Windows world.

-Gnobuddy

[bob p]

The reason that the linux drivers are easy to find is because linux distributions ship with bloated kernels that provide support for everything including the kitchen sink. On the one hand, having support for everything built into the kernel or kernel modules makes things easier for users, but the code bloat has the disadvantage of increasing the memory demands of the system. For decades (wow how time flies) I've been building my own lean kernels that remove support for devices that I don't have in my system.

There are still some problems though -- Nvidia is a particular headache on Linux boxes because they won't allow access to their proprietary code, which forces you to build wrappers around what they do make available. The real problem with NVDA/Linux is that there's a guy named Terrence who is in charge of linux support, and he's too lazy to keep the code updated as compilers change. The result is that as the rest of the world moves onto more modern compilers they can't build the Nvidia drivers.

[Gnobuddy]

The reason that the linux drivers are easy to find is because linux distributions ship with bloated kernels that provide support for everything including the kitchen sink.

When loadable kernel modules arrived, there was a perfectly good compromise. No need to bloat the kernel with built-in drivers, simply load modules as necessary.

Years ago, I did build my own kernels on both FreeBSD and Linux. I even used Gentoo Linux for years, which meant you built and compiled almost all the software on your PC. In those days, I found Debian and Debian-based Linux distributions slow and cumbersome, which is why I jumped through all the hoops to get things to run just a little faster.

Things change. Hardware got much faster - in a few short years bus speeds shot up, we got DDR, we got SATA, clock speeds flew through the GHz barrier and kept going. First Mepis Linux, and eventually Kubuntu - both Debian based - was now fast enough on my hardware, and I didn't need to waste precious hours of my life compiling kernels and operating systems.

Nvidia certainly brought its own headaches. I got off that train when Intels built-in GPUs became "good enough" for anything I do on my PC. Bye-bye, Nvidia!

For any experienced Linux user who wants to see just how incredibly fast and light Linux can be, even in 2017, download and try out Tiny Core Linux: Tiny Core Linux 7.1: Big Where It Counts | FOSS Force

In a classroom setting with no budget at all, I used Tiny Core to keep a dozen cast-off 200 MHz Pentium II machines with 64MB of RAM alive and kicking until 2014. Those machines were designed for Windows 95!

Tiny Core is a fun fast-and-light starting point for the experienced Linux user, but for those new to Linux, I suggest sticking with something from either the Ubuntu or Linux Mint family.

-Gnobuddy

[bob p]

Gentoo. Oh, how I remember the pain... complete system compiles on a P-class machine took and entire month of compile time. I had to build a distcc compiling farm in my basement.

http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-p-2242733.html

Jackass! was built around squeezing every drop of performance out of the x86 architecture. I still have pentium-class file servers and firewalls in service that I built with Jackass! 2005.0. We had to phase out the 486 hardware when we broke our last ISA 10-base-T card.

[big_teee]

I like a full figured linux, not totally bloated, but with all the growable options.
I like the XFCE4 desktop cause it runs pretty snappy, but lots of bells & whistles can be added if need be.
I've tried tons of different distros, and always come back to Ubuntu-Mate/XFCE.
U-Mate is real stable, and does good with laptops.
I buy $300 laptops, and replace win 8, or win 10 with multi-boot linux.
I keep 4 or 5 distros on each laptop.
I have one laptop setup to test linux live, and to test loads.
The limiting factor to a lot of linux distros, is if you run GPT, with EFI.
A lot of the distros are just now getting round to supporting efi, and secure boot.
Ubuntu has supported them for years.
Whatever you run, however newbie or advance, it IMO is better than Windoz, welcome to penguin country!
T