SUSE Linux 10.1 Review

warpengi · #1 06-04-2006, 03:25 PM

This thread discusses the Content article: SUSE Linux 10.1 Review

I've been running Suse on my laptop for a year and just installed 10.1 on my workstation. Their are of course little irritations when switching distros but not really worth mentioning.

What about software management? It's a nightmare. First the speed is god awful slow and I read many accounts of that in the forums. Adding a repository I thought the app had frozen. Eventually I walked away and 10 or 15 minutes later the repository was added successfully but due to overzealous clicking I ended up with 2 copies of one repository.

How many ways are their to install and update software? There's Yast, ZENworks, Yum, YOU, and Rug and they are not all accessed in the same window (well of course not Rug). I don't believe they all do the same thing either. I tried Rug to update the latest patches and their were still patches to be installed in YOU.

I come from Mandrake and urpmi is a great tool. My servers run Debian so I know apt-get as well. Both those systems have their issues but they generally work very well. I'm glad to see that Suse is finally getting around to including a command line software management tool. Why they don't go with apt for Suse I don't understand. Why is their command line tool not the backend for their GUI tool? That only makes sense from a compatibility and simplicity standpoint.

There are too many software management tools. Pick a system and, OK you're doing a transition, so pick one system to transition too not 2 or 3.

One final note. I chose to update software from the Software Management console and it fixed a bug I was experiencing. Why was the update not offered in YOU? Is that the way Suse works? Do I have to update each application in Software Management instead of getting bugfixes in YOU? Their also seems to be a dearth of updates. Seems to me there should be a few more bugfixes and security updates by now. Maybe the release was just so perfect they do not need more;-)

Post edited by: warpengi, at: 2006/06/04 15:29

Valour · #2 06-04-2006, 04:27 PM

The ZENworks updater is the official update framework in SUSE 10.1. It doesn't work very well, but it's official. YOU is outdated, though it has worked very well in previous SUSE releases.

As I said in the review, a release like this one had to happen sometime. I expect the next one to be just as good as 10 was, with all of the features and enhancements of 10.1.

-Jem