[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > Did anyone know if there will be new graphical installer in next version of > Red Hat Linux? > Anaconda must be better. > > Please comments about anaconda.
Anaconda is not that bad but it is not state of the art. It has not caught with Lizard, the revolutionary (in 1999) installer from Caldera and it is also below what Mandrake and Suse are doing. Let's see a few shortcomings: 1) Mouse selection: RedHat does not give to the user the oportunity to check if all the buttons are working. I also failed to be offered the choice of generic (ie no MS) Intellimouse. Mine is LogiTech. 2) Grub. Grub allows real support of non US keyboards and Mandrake installs the corresponding keyboard map. RedHat installer does not install another keyboard map so if you are unfortunate enough to be french and need to pass mem=128m at boot time you have to type ,e,=&é_, 3) Package selection. Two days ago I upgraded a P200 MMX I noticed a few tasty packages and proceeded to install. It stood for a looooooong time (at least 10minutes) before telling me it had not enough space. I know this is only a 200 MMX but I don't think adding the sizes of 500 packages plus size of database plus size of installer should need 10 minutes. I know, I know this is not so simple since in order to ensure all partitions have enough space the ionstaller has to check individual files but there must be a smarter and faster way. Like a precalculated database telling how much of such package will go under cmmon ùmount points like /var, /usr, /home. Also when upgrading you have the choice between upgrading and not upgrading package. You cannot remove a package from old installation. Compared to Mandrake there are other shortcomings: installer does not handle conflicts so RedHat cannot ship alternative printing systems or mail agents. This is unfortunate since for old timers Redhat has to ship sendmail and LPRng while the sensible choice when you don't have legacy are postfix and cups. Installation does not self tune to available disk space (Mandrake does), there is no hierarchy of packages (some are more important than others). There is no a "recommended" installation class where user doesn't know enough so better trust the installer for making sensible choices like what booter, mail system or printing system are the best. 4) X configuration is good but there are two things I miss: One is that sometimes you get a usable screen who is far smaller than monitor size and/or not centered. This can be fixed with xvidtune and then editing XF86Config but Suse installer invokes a TCL application who is far more palatable than xvidtune and in addition edits XF86Config. (Don't forget a new user does not know about this file). End result is that a Suse user ends installation with an optimal screen and the RedHat with a suboptimal one. I also miss Mandrake's feature allowing to change resolution and color depth on the fly (thiis is not an installer but a run time feature). Very nice when going from working activity to action games who could be too slow on 24 bpp. 5) When you end a Redhat installation you don't really have a working box. It doesn't print, you cannot connect to your ISP, you probably have unneeded daemons and other things I forget. Of course this can be done later but my experience is that it takes longer since the user will be chasing for the tools instead of being prompted. Also if config is happening at installtime it can do things like installing samba if user tells he will be using an SMB printer. Contrarily to RedHat users the Mandrake and Suse users can really start working as soon they end installation. One area where RedHat is better is sound configuration since at first boot it detected my card, prompted me for configuring it and I had sound working from my first login. Mandrake users are not so fortunate. For the reasons given above I really think the ideal combo would be Redhat with a Mandrake installer BTW Mandrake installer is GPL and Mandrake "stole" from RedHat three years ago. Time to get even isn't it? -- Jean Francois Martinez Project Independence http://independence.seul.org Because Linux should be for everyone _______________________________________________ Redhat-devel-list mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://listman.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/redhat-devel-list
