Linked by Paul Hankes Drielsma on Tue 15th Apr 2003 06:40 UTC
I can't take anymore comments like "Debian/Gentoo/OpenBSD/etc. are not good/user-friendly because they lack a graphical installer." Searching the web, I couldn't find a comprehensive site describing the good and the bad about graphical installers for various OSes throughout the years, so in this article I hope to debunk a few of the myths on the basis of my own personal and professional experience.
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My big problem with distros like Gentoo and Debian in terms of installation is not that they have text installers - the problem is, that's _all_ they have, and they're not very good installers to begin with. Unfriendly.
Like someone else brought up: RedHat has an excellent text installer. Doing a text-mode, network installation on my totally unsupported P166MMX laptop is a joy. However, this _does not_ obiviate the need for a good GUI installer as well. If my desktop has the power and a CD-ROM drive, why shouldn't I get the opportunity to use an eye-pleasing installer?
The other day, the hard drive on my primary machine failed. Not an uncommon occurance these days, given the bad build quality. Fortunately, my parents had a spare 120gb drive lying around. I saved what I could off the other drive, and installed the new one.
Now, it was time to bust out the shiny new RedHat 9 CDs and install. It took me about three minutes to repartition the drive and start the package installation using the GUI installer. That's just as fast as the Windows98 install ever was for me. Sure, it took an hour to get "everything" on the drive, but that's a function of the media and CPU power, not of the installer.
Last time I tried to install Debian, it took at least 3 times as long. Did I mention I _grew up_ on Debian? First distro I ever used, and I used it for years. Eventually I switched to RedHat for other reasons. This was one of them.
I am now going to make a pronouncement some of you won't like: Debian's installer sucks not because it's text-based, but because it's too damn complicated. I can't speak about Gentoo, but I've heard only similar complaints.
-Erwos