Hi Purple Penny,
Many thanks for your kind response - my mail was actually a bit of a
late night drunken rant :( - you know, you regret it once you've hit the
'send' button...
Also, I felt a bit bad as it wasn't really helping your cause much so
apologies.
Yes, it's a paradigm shift going from Windoze to Linux - I just got
frustrated as I was fairly comfortable with previous versions of Debian,
but little bits and pieces have changed - the sum of the parts being
enough to make tasks I used to be able to do happily different enough
that they wouldn't work without digging around in the docs or asking on
this list (which is very good BTW). One little example is the way a
program called xconsole worked - I have problems with a cheap wireless
network card (acx100 - don't ask...) that keeps giving transmission
errors so I like to have the xconsole open as it reports me when it
starts giving those problems. There's been a small change in how it
works from the previous versions of Debian to Etch, and it caught me
out...I hope you get my drift as to why I got a little frustrated. On
the other hand, the wireless card was a little easier to set up under
Etch than Sarge. So swings and roundabouts I guess.
It's like having to relearn everything again which takes time. You know
what I mean - kind of like when going from Windows 95 to Windows XP -
trying to find all those things that have changed places between one
version and another.
Anyway, yes Linux is much more fun than Windows if you like learning
new things - and there's always another level deeper you can go if so
desire giving the potential for absolute control over the computer and
great flexibility of what you can do.
I like Debian because I know (knew...?) it enough to be able to use it -
never quite an expert though! I don't hate it at all despite my rant -
just having an argument with a good friend :)
Stick at it - it pays back the time you invest in it.
I have CCed this to debian-user but cut your reply, hope thats OK - glad
the "apt-cdrom add" suggestion worked!
Best wishes,
Martin
violet penny wrote:
...
From: "Martin Waller"
To: "debian user"
Subject: Re: Accessing software programs from disk
Date: Wed, 12 Sep 2007 23:14:03 +0100
violet penny wrote:
>
>
> If the "... apt-get blah, blah ..." command line thingmee is
> the only way to do this, then I'll just have to forget it: even
> if I didn't have M.E. (a fatigue disorder), my middle-aged brain
> simply isn't capable of dealing with SO much new and totally
> unfamiliar data at once. It's just too much.
>
I used to like Debian because it was free of such stuff - once
learnt, you could always use it. Even if at first it was a paradigm
shift. Yeah, there's that apt-get shite, but once you got it it
was constant.
But now, well, I sympathise with you - there seems to be too much
pressure to conform with people's 'windoze' expectations of things
being 'automagically' updated, things getting updated 'for you',
'for your own good'. Too many changes to too many key aspects of
the system to be able to keep up with unless your some college
student with no real-life mundanities (is that a real word?
wotevah...) to sort out every day.
Complexity was never an issue for me, just change for the sake of
change, and I can't help Debian has somehow lost it's way. Just my
upgrade from sarge to etch seems to have brought so many changes
into my system without me being able to control them. I want to be
in control - that's what I hate about windoze (lack of control or
choice).
Two examples - update available packages using dselect front end to
apt - new kernels automatically get installed! Never used to
happen. I don't want that by default - never had issues with it in
previous Debian versions.
2nd eg - X - used to be a pain to set up, but you knew what the
'bejeezuz' was going on once it was set up. Etch install - worked
it out all automatically! Great - but I want (need?) to know wtf
is going on behind the scenes so I can tweak stuff the way _I_
want. I'd rather it was hard to configure for _every_ aspect but
have control than easy to configure in some aspects and hard in
others. With that I lose two ways - I lose control in some aspects
and the other aspects they keep f***ing changing every upgrade.
Smells like s**t to me - eat windoze!
Expect flames - talk to the hand.
Once a debian advocate, now an ubuntu-maybe (hurts). I gotta deal
with 'Redhat Enterprise 64 bit' (F**k!) for my new job, so perhaps
I shouldn't complain but, well, it's the thought that counts.
I just get the feel something's changed for the less-good with
Debian. Maybe thats just the way Linux is evolving.
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