Re: SEUL: Observatons

[Johan Grape <grape@asgard.dartmouth.edu>]

> 
> Johan Grape wrote:
> 
> > The idea of SEUL is, in my opinion, to bring out a distribution
> > that *introduces* linux.  Someone gets a copy, or downloads it,
> 
> Well...it better do a lot more than that!  If this is worthwhile, it
> needs to be something that people can use and grow with.  What's the
> point in getting them hooked, then say "go buy RedHat?"

That is not what I meant.  There is no charge associated with ftp
or putting rpm packages on a CD.  Why reinvent the wheel?  There
are reasonable package systems available.  What I meant was to 
avoid all the hassles with supporting the magnitude of different
programming libs etc. etc. and let people take a look and then
show them where to get a ton of additional software.  Why make
them install 200MB of software?

> 
> >         I personally think we should assume that a FAT partition
> > exists on the PC.  We should provide a boot manager that runs from
> > this partition (the partition could be tiny) - but something more
> 
> I don't think we should assume anything.  If a FAT/DOS partition is
> there, install some kind of loader on it.  If it's not, just put our
> loader in the MBR.  No biggie.

Yes and no.  We can put our loader in the MBR, but I think we should
use/put a fat partition in and run a more sophisticated OS booter
from there.  On the alpha, this is MILO, which boots the kernel of
choice etc. etc.  Not making it fit in the MBR helps a lot on features.
But then again it appears that LILO is improving a lot.
> 
> I also mentioned that Zip drivers would be nice, and I hold to that.  I
> know, most complete newbies won't know what to do with them, but it
> could be nice for some people.  And how much space could they take?

Since a Zip drive is just another hd/sd device (unless you also want
the parallel port Zip drive) I don't see a problem.

> 
> >         I also think we should have a database of available programs
> > that the user can peruse, and tell them to go visit sunsite or redhat
> > or debian (or the CD)for that matter to get packages.  This implies
> 
> As I mentioned before (and don't think I got any replies to), I think it
> would be a good idea to have a client/server install system.  Set up a
> software.seul.org (or whatever), have a client program to connect to
> it.  This program would let people query the software available,
> determine if it would run on his/her computer, give good descriptions,
> maybe screenshots, and let them download it and automatically install
> it.  I'd actually like to work on that part of it myself!
> 

Well - rpm at least allows install with URL's.  hack a wrapper for 
rpm that also allows screenshots etc.

Johan
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