[Comm-en] My review of ALT Linux GNUStep OS

[David]

Thank you, Michael, for all of your feedback!  

I want to take some time and make a more detailed response, but right now I have run and do some winter farm chores.  Just quickly though, I wanted to mention that I've made a few adjustments to the review based on what you've suggested here.  Also, I have started with a quick update on the GNUStep Wiki page that I thought would be helpful to others and I'll continue to contribute what little wisdom I can learn as time goes on.  :)

Of course, please adjust/correct anything I've written there as you see fit.

David.

January 6, 2022 4:58 AM, "Michael Shigorin" <mike at altlinux.org> wrote:

> On Thu, Jan 06, 2022 at 05:23:17AM +0000, David wrote:
> 
>> I hope no-one minds, but I'd like to share a link to a recent
>> blog post I did on my experience installing and using the ALT
>> Linux GNUStep / WindowMaker build.
> 
> BTW it has its wiki page (both Russian and English):
> http://en.altlinux.org/starterkits/gnustep
> http://altlinux.org/starterkits/gnustep
> 
> Maybe we'd better update the links to p10 and review the memory
> requirements (increasing CONFIG_NR_CPUS doesn't come for free,
> unfortunately; maybe a lower-limit kernel flavour is due again
> as it was with led-tc one for thin clients).
> 
>> If you're interested, the review can be found here:
>> https://dbouley.vivaldi.net/2022/01/05/alt-linux
> 
> You're welcome, and I highly recomment your reviews to anyone --
> having enjoyed those back in 2.x days:
> http://web.archive.org/web/20030503195650/http://www.virtualsky.net/altlinuxreview.htm
> http://web.archive.org/web/20040315025638/http://www.virtualsky.net/linuxoncd/compact-review.htm
> 
> The only suggestion I have is to rather link to http://getalt.org
> as the easier "entrance" into ALT builds that should allow to
> understand them at a glance instead of having a long walk
> all over the wiki.
> 
> p10 is pretty stable but p9 is very stable indeed :-)
> Both of these platforms are our stable branches:
> http://en.altlinux.org/branches (I've updated the page
> to state that p10 is the current stable one, sorry for
> confusion).
> 
> There's one more thing to window managers: it's more realistic
> to have your settings travel with you over years and decades,
> changing hardware if required, by a simple "cp -a ... ~/GNUstep"
> or so.
> 
> And regarding WindowMaker in particular, it does save some
> screen estate, especially widescreen (or should I say lowscreen?)
> that's rather suited for content consumption than for creation:
> the "lack" of a horizontal panel and the typical vertical dock
> leave more space for the applications. Still I tend to prefer
> full-screen zero-distraction modes for my main apps, namely xterm
> (Alt-Enter) and Firefox (F11) so that even wmclock doesn't "tick".
> 
> Regarding CUPS, yes, we could easily put that into any particular
> starterkit or all of the desktop ones but it would add several
> dozen megabytes (or is it several hundreds by now?) to each image
> involved -- so those who want to have a quick look at e.g.
> Cinnamon (we don't build a "proper" distro carrying it but it's
> available and actively maintained in the repository) or IceWM
> would have to pay more bandwidth. There have been seldom
> requests or even frustrations regarding CUPS particularly
> but I do approve that starterkits are aimed at those who will
> prefer the hassle of "apt-get install cups" (and maybe spot
> the printer-drivers-base metapackage either) to having it along
> with the rest of kitchen-sink handed to them without asking.
> 
> Thanks for understanding it exactly -- if you come up with
> any words that would help others, just write these down
> on http://en.altlinux.org/starterkits yourself.
> 
> Regarding the font/locale(?) issue with Synaptic, please file it:
> http://bugzilla.altlinux.org/enter_bug.cgi?product=Sisyphus&component=synaptic
> ...stating how to reproduce (e.g. "grab this iso, install with
> English language chosen, run Synaptic, do this and that,
> see the weird glyphs on the screenshot attached").
> 
> I hope that you actually use p9 and not Sisyphus as the latter
> one is stable enough for developers and very experienced users
> but it's definitely more of a moving/breaking target than p10,
> can bring a frustration once or twice a year (like breaking
> one's X11 setup, especially with nvidia_drv).
> 
> The GTK fonts issue is most likely the DPI-related one --
> some GNOME folks with likely Windows background have insisted
> on breaking X server "so browser looks like in Windows", that
> is, to nail artificial 96dpi down by default; was especially
> "funny" since even Windows was taught the real DPI back then:
> http://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=41115
> 
> Try figuring out your display's DPI (from the docs, online screen
> DPI calculator site, or a ruler and a calculator of your choice)
> and testing if restarting those apps after "xrandr --dpi 166"
> (or whatever) helps; if it does, stick an executable script into
> ~/.xsession.d/ or add "DPI=NNN" to /etc/sysconfig/xserver,
> see also /etc/X11/xinit/xserverrc
> 
>> My compliments to the ALT Dev Team for their work on this
>> release. I'm enjoying it very much.
> 
> Glad to hear, thank you!
> 
> --
> ---- WBR, Michael Shigorin / http://altlinux.org
> ------ http://opennet.ru / http://anna-news.info
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