Re: gEDA-user: which linux?

[Marvin Dickens <marvindickens@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Saturday 05 November 2005 14:36, Stephen Meier wrote:
> I build geda and pcb from source code.
>
> My office workstation is running SUSE 9.3 which works fine.
> My laptop is also running SUSE 9.3 which works fine

As a long time SuSE users, we are dismayed by the recent aquisition
of SuSE by Novell. The parent holding company of Novell is The 
Canopy Group which is also the parent holding company SCO. 
In essence, the history of The Canopy Group regarding Linux
makes me and others I work with uncomfortable regarding the
future of SuSE. 

With that said, I have recently been evaluating alternative distributions.
The two distributions that I/we find attractive out of all of the available 
distributions are Debian and Slackware. Even with these two distributions,
it's not all smooth sailing. Now, Debian has a lot of packages. But, then 
again, a lot of the packages in Debian are from the stone age when measured 
in internet years. Also, this does not even touch on the issue of packages 
that are not included for what ever reason. These issues are due to many 
things but mostly to the politics of Debian.

Slackware, on the other hand, requires a great deal of customization because
of its UNIX heritage. A base slack install is just that: Very basic. 

My point is this: We have come to the conclusion that it is in our best 
interest to take either Debian or Slackware base system and customize it for
our uses - Just as we have done with IBM AIX for years. Yes, this is a lot of 
work -  But at the same time, once the system is built, the majority of the 
headaches will be gone. We know what is and is not on the system and how
how it got there and further, why its there.


Regards


Marvin