2007/11/1, Joey Hess <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > I think that I have a fairly good understanding of the diversity of > internet connections out there, having spanned dialup, cable, dsl, isdn, > t3 or better, the neighborhood coffee shop, third world networks, and > satellite in a non-linear progression over the past 13 years. :-P > Still you did it? Its like I have come through all this, now I have a good net connection, why bother about those third world user who does not even have a good connection, right?
> (I upgraded a Debian system behind dialup just last weekend. I > brought a DVD to do it with since 5 hour downloads are not fun.) In Bangalore, one of the most net savvy tech cities in India, people still go for CDs so you can imagine other parts. there are still many parts where broadband is not available even though you are ready to pay. Even though I (one of the elite net user in Bangalore wth upto 30KB/s) had the apt archives I had to sit entire night when I did a net install. It is just an opt in and you don't even want to allow that? > So, it's not really problimatic if the installer asks about using a > mirror before it lets you load your CD set, because you know that's not > the right choice for your situation and can quickly move on to the right > choice. > I think even now if you select a mirror and installing from CD it downloads even those packages in the CD, correct me if I am wrong here. > > I know your aversion against the full CD sets. I remember your blog about > > it. But I don't think scanning additional CDs if you already have them is > > in any way harmful. > Exactly at least CD2 should be scanned since you can't put everything into one CD. > I'm not adverse to CDs sets, I'm adverse to them being unnecessarily > produced and used. The inverse scenario to the dialup scenario above is > someone in a first world city who orders a 20 CD set because that's what > the average CD vendor sells, and its price is no worse than cab fare. > It is great to see people care about the privileged people and neglect the unprivileged -- always. It is the same in most of the cases, we complain about lack of infrastructure in the city when majority of the poor still don't have a place to live or food to eat. > This user will at some point realise he's been had. Typically this > happens now when he realises that hey, he installed a fully working > Debian system and the only CD he ever used was #1. That seems somehow > better than slowly feeding in all 20 CDs only to be informed at the end > that you can choose to use a mirror instead. That is the problem with the vendors as Frans pointed out at least it is not the same case in Dutch. Cost of internet is much more than the cost of 20CDs in most part ar at least in my part of the world. > > > I agree that downloading/buying/scanning a full set of CDs is silly in > > almost all cases. However, if you want to do something about that it should > > be done where users decide to *buy or download* the images: on the website > > and in documentation. Exactly -- not by denying users who want it -- at least more than the single CD. > > Unfortunatly, it seems that as long as Debian makes huge CD sets > available for download, they will be what vendors try to sell to users. > After all, a vendor can make a lot more money by selling more plastic. > I've mailed a few vendors and suggested they offer more useful single > CDs, but never heard back. How much does it costs to buy 20 CDs? Wouldn't the first class cities have DVD drives or god connection? > > It's quite difficult to find the more useful CDs, like multiarch discs, > single full CDs, and netinsts, while we're awash in 20 CD sets. This is > broken.. and you fixed it by removing the option to use more than one CD itself, great! Cheers Praveen -- പ്രവീണ് അരിമ്പ്രത്തൊടിയില് Join The DRM Elimination Crew Now! http://fci.wikia.com/wiki/Anti-DRM-Campaign
