Xandros does Linux sans Tux, but the big question remains: Does being fast, easy, and astonishingly elegant buy it success on a down and dirty desktop? Asks Open Magazine.
Open Magazine: Can Xandros simplify Linux use?
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Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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However it is not good to tweak the default application set through sources that are not those provided by the distribution. Perhaps autopackage will solve this in the near future.
while Xandros is great and all, I would love to see a Gnome based distribution with as much attention to detail as Xandros has provided.
That would be interesting.
AFAIK there has never been a desktop focused Linux OS founded around GNOME.
Though many for KDE:
Mandrake, SuSE, Lindows, Lycoris, Xandros, Libranet, Corel and one more I don’t remember the name of.
Wonder why no-one has tried this with GNOME yet. Could it be that Qt also comes with a commercial license?
xandros and lindows are truly desktop linux to me.(i use suse)
xandros extends the desktop usability to the max while lindows laptop edition is impressive.
i tried Autopackage its great yet no distro yet offically support it
meanwhile sun java desktop might switch from suse base distro.
are there goin to make a true java desktop? :+
The reason realplayer didn’t work is because it’s realone player.. and there is no plugin with realone player as of yet
Red Hat uses GNOME as default… no?
Linux is not just about simplification. It is, primarily, about providing a customized solution to end users. Being easy to use does not automatically guarantee new switchers, or a new market share.
Most people use Linux because of the limitless customizability and freedom. As individuals graduate from merely end users to master users, or power users, Linux becomes gradually becomes an attractive platform.
I’m glad Linux corporations like Xandoras exist. But really, superior technology and simplicity are not the only factors that determine a larger market share, more switchers and hence more profits. You need extra ordinary public relations, ingenious marketing, a lotta hype and luck to do that.
But let’s be realistic, the market Xandoras is committed to satisfying is significantly small. Chances are that if you are a Linux user, you are technically savvy, you know an awful lot about computers, you are not intimated by “do-it-yourself” techniques and the restrictions of other operating systems frustrated you.
In fact, I’d be bold enough to ignorantly assume that above 80% of Linux users are of the type I mentioned above. Xandoras’ market will generally not understand what an operating system is, talk little of understand what Linux is. And even if they did, they probably haven’t heard of Linux. Xandoras’ market is likely to install an operating system that 90% of the world is using, or at worst a Mac. Or better have one preinstalled for them.
I respect Xandoras and similar corporations for braving new worlds and technically unsound business markets. But really, I think Xandoras needs to do more than the “just works” mantra to garner new users and markets. Xandoras is definitely not appealing to hard core Unix users, which is the majority of Linux users, and I don’t see window users or Mac users switching either, nor do I see potential computer n00bs opting to use Xandoras. I’d hate to be a decision maker working for those companies.
‘Wonder why no-one has tried this with GNOME yet. Could it be that Qt also comes with a commercial license?’
maybe because kde has more professional feel, more options in terms of a DE. sometimes gnome ui to me is too cartoonish, widget proportion abit too broad or big…
60%+ of enterprise chooses gnome as their de simply because of license no about about that.
anyway some gtk apps are still my favorites apps
“Linux is not just about simplification. It is, primarily, about providing a customized solution to end users. Being easy to use does not automatically guarantee new switchers, or a new market share.
Most people use Linux because of the limitless customizability and freedom. As individuals graduate from merely end users to master users, or power users, Linux becomes gradually becomes an attractive platform.
I’m glad Linux corporations like Xandoras exist. But really, superior technology and simplicity are not the only factors that determine a larger market share, more switchers and hence more profits. You need extra ordinary public relations, ingenious marketing, a lotta hype and luck to do that.
But let’s be realistic, the market Xandoras is committed to satisfying is significantly small. Chances are that if you are a Linux user, you are technically savvy, you know an awful lot about computers, you are not intimated by “do-it-yourself” techniques and the restrictions of other operating systems frustrated you.
In fact, I’d be bold enough to ignorantly assume that above 80% of Linux users are of the type I mentioned above. Xandoras’ market will generally not understand what an operating system is, talk little of understand what Linux is. And even if they did, they probably haven’t heard of Linux. Xandoras’ market is likely to install an operating system that 90% of the world is using, or at worst a Mac. Or better have one preinstalled for them.
I respect Xandoras and similar corporations for braving new worlds and technically unsound business markets. But really, I think Xandoras needs to do more than the “just works” mantra to garner new users and markets. Xandoras is definitely not appealing to hard core Unix users, which is the majority of Linux users, and I don’t see window users or Mac users switching either, nor do I see potential computer n00bs opting to use Xandoras. I’d hate to be a decision maker working for those companies.
”
I totally agree, though for some n00b it works well and the fact remains is that the family of teckys will be forced to try linux so odds are the tecky will give his/her family something easier. I for one though dont see anything great about the distro except its package. It has some nice proprietary stuff in it that would make it worth buying if o lets say you wanted to be able to see wmp 9 or compressed quicktime files, but then if I wanted some like that I would get Mandrake PowerPack 9.2 – its cheaper, has more stuff in it and its an OS I know. If I wanted something Debian based I would get Debian the real thing. If the installs hard well oh well I dont care, ill tackle it.
Red Hat uses GNOME as default… no?
Actually Red Hat isn’t a desktop distro anymore…it happily left that market. Fedora, though, does. But Fedora needs some work still.
It might just be what Novell might just put out. We will have to see though, and I think Novell is going for the corp market, not so much Joe Average. We will have to see though.
Xandros and Lindows are probably two of the best newbie starting distros, though it may make people feel that Linux has just as bad security as Windows due to Lindows running as root, I don’t know about Xandros though, and for someone who uses the computer for mainly internet purposes may not make a new account.
Um, care to cite that 60% number? I keep harping on it, but its important, because this is how FUD gets started: no company has come forth and said they are using GNOME because of licensing issues. Not yet, anyway.
Actually Red Hat isn’t a desktop distro anymore…it happily left that market. Fedora, though, does. But Fedora needs some work still.
Oh yes it is. Red Hat Enterprise WS. It is designed NOT for home users but instead those who wish to deploy it in an enterprise environment in which in house support can configure and deploy according to the corporate requirements.
AFAIK there has never been a desktop focused Linux OS founded around GNOME.
Though many for KDE:
Mandrake, SuSE, Lindows, Lycoris, Xandros, Libranet, Corel and one more I don’t remember the name of.
At the danger of sounding like a prick, that list is hardly realistic.
Mandrake was never based around KDE. The inclusion of KDE (which was based on a non-free toolkit back then) was one of the reasons for Mandrake to exist as a Red Hat clone and they are AFAIK still using KDE as the default, but that’s all. There config tools are even written in Gtk and their GNOME desktop usually rocks.
SuSE is as much as desktop centric as Red Hat is. The only difference being that Red Hat doesn’t sell a box targeted at private users right now (they are supposed to get it for free).
Libranet is everything but KDE based. If you visit their home page, they will tell you how great it is to choose from 20 windowmanagers.
Corel doesn’t exist anymore, Xandros is based on it.
This leaves three distributions, all of them are are based on Debian and proprietary.
A good reasons why you haven’t seen any “finished” GNOME based home user desktop product yet is certainly, that GNOME just isn’t ready yet (Project Utopia is right on track though). Still, the only major user friendly free software distribution is based on GNOME. And that doesn’t even consider Ximian.
Distroish comparisons aside, I know the main reason I personally pay more attention to KDE than Gnome…
kde-look vs art.gnome
Distro’s only provide so much to me anymore, it’s what I can do with them AFTER.
with a borked mozilla to boot.
so your target audience is users who want an elegant, and simple desktop?
sounds like the target audience will be your none-to-technical folk.
so what app will likely be used most?
mozilla.
and it’s borked.
The person impersonating ChocolateCheeseCake, knock it off. You are not adding any value to the discussion about Xandros.
If you take note, your IP is IP: 209.234.166 and the original ChocolateCheeseCake is rochester.rr.com.
Perhaps some aging is in order. Your so 311t3 language is very impressive to us non-computer savvy persons. Let me ask, how long have your really used MS products? I have been using them since 1985. As for your “Communist and Fags” statement indicates that:
1) You have not one clue of Communist ideology.
2) Your homophobic which probably indicates lack of intelligence and education as well as maturity.
My guess your between the ages of 12-16 which is quite shocking based on your ridiculous ideas. If your older than that then you have no hope as a human being. Please feel free to end your existence. I await the day your ignorance meets your maker.
>with a borked mozilla to boot.
And what exactly does that mean? Mozilla under Xandros works just fine, tis not “borked” whatsoever.
I don’t care what anyone says, or what distro we talk about.. The fact is Microsoft and Apple have both been in the “Game” for 30+ years and yet Apple is being out installed by Linux and MS with 50 Billion in the bank spends more time and money worrying about Linux then it does making better products to counter Linux.
That says a lot of the quality and innovation of Linux and Open Source!
And you can say “Windows is more stable and has more software!” Well it should it’s got a 20 year head start on Linux yet it still has no better features in it then Lindows or Xandros at this point. And once more vendors start making apps for Linux it’s all over! (By vendors I mean Adobe, Macromedia and MS it’s self!)
So tell me? Besides more apps and games what makes Windows better? More drivers? Please!
Show me on application, one idea (Besides putting Windows on cheap computers) that Microsoft came up with first??
Show me on application, one idea (Besides putting Windows on cheap computers) that Microsoft came up with first??
The thing is that Microsoft extend those ideas much further. Take Windows Explorer for example. Certainly not the first, but completely unlike anything else on the market then and even now. Then take for example Xandros FM. Other than little things like CD burning, there isn’t really much of a big deal with it, comparing with Windows Explorer.
Personally, and I think I speak for most people, is that I don’t care who came up with the idea first. I care who implement it best to suit me. If Apple created idea X, and Microsoft extend it further to be Y, and I prefer Y, I don’t see why I should use X.
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,4149,768274,00.asp
Gnome look far more unified. It is more responsive also, it compares to windows in terms of speed. KDE is sloooow. Having tried both on my P4 3.06, believe me!!!
BTW, there’s also SUN Java Desktop that uses Gnome as the base desktop, in fact, it is their only DE. Not only Fedora.
:::PROUD TO LIVE IN THE BIRTHLAND OF LINUX:::
I really don’t get it – I have been using KDE on this machine (P2 400, initially 128MB RAM now 256 MB) for over a year, and the reponsiveness is perfectly reasonable (about the same as Windows, less than BeOS). It sometimes bogs down during the setup phase of a really big apt-get upgrade, but that’s about it. I really can’t fathom how it would be an issue on the modern machine you describe.
Xandros is nice, but I’m with RedHat in their opinion that products that mix open and closed source won’t do great in the long run. Or maybe I’m just cheap.
I prefer Gnome to KDE. It’s a personal preference and I wouldn’t pay for a KDE distro.
I would love an easy to use Debian based distro, but Xandros has been altered so much that it negates the Debian advantage (installing packages easily with apt).
I think that RedHat/Fedora does a better job with its artwork (icons) than Xandros. They’re using the Navigator icon from so long ago while RH has created a really cool web icon.
I don’t want a Linux distro that runs Windows apps. I don’t really do that much with a computer (office software, im, web, email, basic games like freeciv and solitare, watch DVDs) and I can get all of that for Linux. Plus, when you make your OS run another OS’s applications it isn’t likely to do it as good never mind better and it leads to developers not making versions for your OS if you can run another OS’s programs. This is why Apple has never implemented a Win32 API so that developers could simply recompile and it’s one of the reasons that IBM’s OS/2 failed (because it could run Windows programs no one wrote OS/2 programs). Not running the majority of the market’s programs does lessen the appeal of Linux in the short-run, but I think that it makes it more likely to do well in the long-run.
My take on Linux distros: I’m not going to use SuSE or Xandros or any of those other pay-distros because I’m too cheap. Maybe if I really wanted to steam Bill Gates I would, but for me Linux can’t cost me more than Windows and Windows didn’t cost me anything since I couldn’t get my Laptop without it. I know that I did pay for it, but c’mon to the real world where it wasn’t like I had a choice.
Mandrake just doesn’t look nice enough. It’s just too, chopy looking. It works well, but it just doesn’t have the integrated feel that RedHat/Fedora does. I like that it includes the quasi-legal stuff like MP3, but I respect RH for not including it.
RedHat/Fedora is very elegant. The only problem is that RPM is a disaster. I used to use apt with Fink on Mac OS X and it was wonderfully easy. Everything got downloaded and installed automatically. I wish RedHat was as good.
Debian is too hard to set up for me to try. I’m sure this will change, but their package management remains out of my reach for the time being.
Xandros is nice, but it costs money and I don’t think that it would give me much that I don’t get with Fedora. No matter what happens distro-wise, open-source operating systems will continue to get better and more in the reach of normal people.
you can use apt with xandros. it works just fine, but you’ll want to pin your packages….meaning that you tell apt not to mess with your customized xandros packages so you won’t kill your system.
there are how to’s for this available on the xandros community site.
fir the record, my mozilla works perfect in xandros. i didn’t have any of the problems this reviewer did, and xandros works better than any other distro ever has for me.
Just in case some don’t know, there is Standard Xandros, which doesn’t have Crossover, and is much cheaper than the Delux edition.
“Gnome look far more unified.”
True.
“It is more responsive also, it compares to windows in terms of speed. KDE is sloooow. Having tried both on my P4 3.06, believe me!!!”
I don’t. Others shouldn’t neither. I tried both too. I could not make out any differences between the two expect for file browsing where Gnome is *much* slower than KDE (thats for Gnome 2.4 and KDE 3.1).
“I don’t. Others shouldn’t neither. I tried both too. I could not make out any differences between the two expect for file browsing where Gnome is *much* slower than KDE (thats for Gnome 2.4 and KDE 3.1). ”
Are you sugesting Nautilus is slower than Konqueror for file browsing??? Good joke! I have a folder with all the pictures that I made in one and a half years with my digital camera – around 3000 pics. Konqueror always crashed when I wanted them to be displayed as thumbnails, but Nautilus has always worked, maybe took just a few seconds to update the thumbnail info for new photos.
Look for my previous comments for other articles like Lindows and Xandros reviews – u’ll see I was recommending KDE-based distros, in fact I was using them. Last time I had tried Gnome was sometime in ’99, and I liked KDE better. Didn’t bother to try it again, until two days ago, when I installed Mandrake 9.2 with only Gnome, and I was impressed, really. I was a KDE fan – but once I switched I understood why Gnome fans are so fond of their DE. And I’m not lying, I DO HAVE a ECS Green 732 laptop with P4 3.06, 512 DDRAM, Hitachi 60GB 7200RPM 8MBcache and Mobility Radeon 9000 64MB DDR, and I don’t really care if you believe me or not. I don’t care what DE you use, go ahead, use KDE if you want. I was just pointing my new experience with Gnome and I prefer Gnome now. I betatested for Xandros and it took 10 second AT LEAST to start mozilla. It shouldn’t be so. BTW, Debian is messed up, just learned how to use urpmi in Mandrake – it installs the required packages, and I NEVER HAD to manually configure anything. One example, why doesn’t mplayer resize the video in KDE when you want double size or full screen??? Why did it worf flawlesslly in Gnome? Why when I installed KDE in my Mandrake, Mplayer was doing this problem again? And why when I removed KDE Mplayer started playing nice again?
I am comparing Gnome 2.4 with KDE 3.1.4 and that is my opinion based on the experience I had on my “better-than-OK” machine.
:::PROUD TO LIVE IN THE BIRTHLAND OF LINUX:::
As Konqueror crashed on you (it didn’t at mine) you can not really make a speed comparison. At my box with Mandrake 9.2 Konqueror was much faster at displaying the thumbnails of such a directory like yours with over 1000s of pics. That doesn’t mean that its not possible that at your box its the other way round!
I just wanted to point out that just because Nautilus is faster at yours it doesn’t mean its faster in general, because at mine it is not.
I also can understand why people prefer GNOME, but I doubt its mainly because of the file-browser’s performance.
To your other points:
“”I betatested for Xandros and it took 10 second AT LEAST to start mozilla”
I beta tested too. It took about the same amount to start as under Windows at mine: a few seconds. But afaik Mozilla needs some GNOME libraries so it would be understandable that it starts up faster on GNOME where such libraries are already loaded than under KDE (where KDE-apps will take longer to start and GNOME).
“One example, why doesn’t mplayer resize the video in KDE when you want double size or full screen??? Why did it worf flawlesslly in Gnome”
Why should that be KDE’s fault? Could also be problem in MPloayer which doesn’t access KDE’s APIs right. Totem beeing a GNOME app on the other hand works flawlessly in my KDE.
“Why when I installed KDE in my Mandrake, Mplayer was doing this problem again? And why when I removed KDE Mplayer started playing nice again?”
I don’t really get it. What was the exact problem? That with the video resizing? You said it did not work under KDE only, so obviously when you remove KDE the its fixed because you cannot run it under KDE anymore. Was that your point!?
When I wanted to double size the video output, the window would resize, but the video would stay at 1/1. And when my mandrake installation had both Gnome and KDE, Mplayer was showing this weird behaviour in both KDE and Gnome, but when I removed KDE, it would work again. After a loooong search in google I found it has something to do with the mplayer.config file – in KDE you have to set everything manually for that to work like “zoom=yes, fd=yes” etc. In Gnome it JUST WORKED. I didn’t have to go to the local profile /.mplayer and change anything. The overall feeling in Gnome is that everything works from the start. I had the chance to try the two most user friendly distros out there, both Xandros and Lindows – but Debian based distros seem so complicated and look like they need an enourmous amount of fine-tuning. Last time I tried Gnome was with Mandrake 6 or 7 (I think), in 98 or 99 – I don’t recall exactly. Didn’t bother since then to try Linux, I waited a bit for it to mature some more. My past experience with a RPM-based distro was not encouraging, and everyone sais Debian is easier. So I waited and tried – it worked OK, aside these problem with Mplayer and some other minor annoyances. But with Mandrake 9.2 and Gnome linux felt REEEEEAL GOOOOOOD. Better than with KDE on Debian-based distro. Only thing I had to figure out was how to add skins to xmms and mplayer – find the right directory. Do you understant now? I’m not trying to make you or anybody else switch to Gnome- just my oppinion. Maybe you will give it a try – decide for yourself. Maybe KDE 3.2 will change things, but 3.1 feels complicated, bloated and slow. Gnome is simpler and feels more compact, less trying to be like other UI out there. I hope they can add features without filling it with the bloat KDE faces. Keep it REAL and simple.
:::PROUD TO LIVE IN THE BIRTHLAND OF LINUX:::
I must admit I miss K3b in Gnome. Will have to do with X-CD-Roast for now – until it gets there.
:::PROUD TO LIVE IN THE BIRTHLAND OF LINUX:::
With all this talk about extraordinary Gnome desktops slackware and dropline comes to mind. If you ask me slackware is still one of the easiest distros to install and because of the hotplug addition in recent distros, it pretty much configures itself in terms of hardware. Dropline makes it a supreme desktop distro that’s easy to upgrade through dropline installer and easy to configure through the graphical menus…. My only issue with it recently (which isnt’ really a droplie or slack problem) is the bug in Evolution which makes you have to delete your hosts file comments and blank lines before you can send e-mail.
I want a KDE based distro.
Just opinion of course, but I find KDE to be MUCH nicer than GNOME. It seems more professional, consistent and functional to me.
When distros like Lindows, Lycoris, and Corel Linux (later Xandros) came out, they pretty much had to be KDE-based because GNOME wasn’t quite as usable. GNOME 2.0 was on the right track, but still had the poorly integrated Sawfish as the official default window manager (though many used Metacity unofficially). Vanilla GNOME 2.2 still wasn’t quite a match for KDE, though when GNOME 2.2 was patched by distros to integrate Metacity, it was streamlined, useable, and far less baroque than KDE. By that time, though, the desktop decisions had long been made, and switching Lindows, Lycoris, and Xandros to GNOME would require major surgery and plenty of QA headaches.