linux loses another user forever

[eightup1]

I've spent the last three years telling one of my friends how awesome and amazing Linux is so he finally agreed to give it a try after telling him that i could just put a distro on a thumb drive and he could run it from there without effecting his system ... well after watching me spend the last few hours downloading distro after distro and installing them to usb only to find out that none of them will work because of this new automatic graphics detection garbage thats in the kernel now . his laptop would boot to an almost completely blacked out desktop because the screen brightness was set so low .... after going through every setting in each distro there is not one single way to set monitor brightness ... it's just NOT there period. so long story short after seeing how frustrating and difficult it is to get linux up and running He wants absolutely nothing to do with it ever again .

I knew this was going on with the Ububtu Distros but i didn't know gentoo and others were suffering the same problems .. on the laptop im writing this from with mint 12 every time i boot i have to boot into the gnome dektop and go into setting and turn up the brightness then log out then log in to xfce otherwise there is no way to turn up the brightness . and there is NOOOOO way to make this a persistent setting , it's really annoying to the point where im probably going to go back to mint 9 the last version that worked perfectly .


I dont even understand the direction that linux is going in now ... the whole purpose of linux used to be to have choices and be free to have the OS that YOU wanted . now with gnome 3 trying to be more like apple and focus on fancy bright good looks rather than functionality and even the Kernel team moving towards taking away controls and making things automatic all i see are giant steps backwards to the days when an installation of linux took several hours of command line wizardry to get it up and running . isn't the whole idea to get MORE people to try linux and get MORE funding so the project can move forward . Why is it going backwards so quickly I seriously don't understand it

[viking777]

You and your friend must have some seriously weird laptops.
However many distros you have installed I doubt it is more than me, and in all that time (11 years now) I have never had to do anything with the brightness - ever, it has always been set properly by default.
If I want to alter it, then I can ( this hasn't always been the case, but it is now and has been for some time). To do this I adopt exactly the same procedure as a windows user would - I press the function key along with the brightness up/down key.
Not that difficult to find I would have said.

[monkeyboy]

Remember this post of yours?

eightup1 "I Agree 100% mint 12 is absolute garbage Gnome 3 sucks Mate is a terrible mess .... unity was the death blow for ubuntu , gnome 3 may be the nail in the coffin for Mint .... i had so many problems getting 11 installed then when i did it was buggy as hell and 50% of the time i started it some script or applet would fail to load and cause problems and now 12 is even worse to the point of almost not being usable on a daily basis ..... the ubuntu fork of mint is dying .... i don't know what distro to turn to , debian isn't stable and their servers are painfully slow .............. somebody suggest a good stable Gnome 2 distro"

You should have known better. Enjoy

[Daboo]

...To do this I adopt exactly the same procedure as a windows user would - I press the function key along with the brightness up/down key...

I can't answer for what the brightness settings are in the OS itself, but every laptop I've seen allows you to set the brightness level with a Function key. On Dell laptops, it is Function key+F8.

Chris

[eightup1]

You and your friend must have some seriously weird laptops.

yeah weird .... 2 brand new HP laptops and the brightness function keys Don't work on either of them . why did they take away the power controls ? ... and i've searched , im not the only one having the same problem ....... i haven't seen a definite solution yet though

[eightup1]

Remember this post of yours?

I do and my opinion hasn't changed even the slightest ... the more i use 12 the more i find wrong with it .... which is EXACTLY why i did not try putting Mint on a USB for my friend i tried 4 other distros .

i fully believe mint 13 will be better ... but in the mean time 12 is TRULY a pile of junk , at least for me on THIS laptop

[wyrdoak]

acpi_osi= without setting it to anything like this, you can adjust the brightness via keyboard keys through some hardware-only interface, which means that xbacklight and any DE utility won't be able to change the brightness and the interface in /sys/ also won't work, but on the other hand, you can directly change brightness even on a tty with the keyboard keys

acpi_osi=Linux enables some ACPI software-only interface, so you must use some program like xbacklight or a DE utility or write to the /sys/ interface. Using xbindkeys to bind XF86BacklightLower or smth (check with xev what your keyboard keys trigger) to a script to write to the /sys/ interface or xbacklight works well

Code: Select all

gksu gedit /etc/default/grub

Code: Select all

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash acpi_osi="

[monkeyboy]

Remember this post of yours?

I do and my opinion hasn't changed even the slightest ... the more i use 12 the more i find wrong with it .... which is EXACTLY why i did not try putting Mint on a USB for my friend i tried 4 other distros .

i fully believe mint 13 will be better ... but in the mean time 12 is TRULY a pile of junk , at least for me on THIS laptop

Help me out, with all the problems you have had with Mint, Ubuntu and Debian what other four distros did you try to load onto the USB? The reason I am asking is I am thinking of adding a Linux distro to the wifes HP and your help might save me lots of time and effort. Thanks

[bimsebasse]

.. on the laptop im writing this from with mint 12 every time i boot i have to boot into the gnome dektop and go into setting and turn up the brightness then log out then log in to xfce otherwise there is no way to turn up the brightness . and there is NOOOOO way to make this a persistent setting , it's really annoying to the point where im probably going to go back to mint 9 the last version that worked perfectly .

See 1m in this thread.

I dont even understand the direction that linux is going in now ... the whole purpose of linux used to be to have choices and be free to have the OS that YOU wanted . now with gnome 3 trying to be more like apple and focus on fancy bright good looks rather than functionality and even the Kernel team moving towards taking away controls and making things automatic all i see are giant steps backwards to the days when an installation of linux took several hours of command line wizardry to get it up and running . isn't the whole idea to get MORE people to try linux and get MORE funding so the project can move forward . Why is it going backwards so quickly I seriously don't understand it

Gnome 3 is still new, it will be as customizable as Gnome 2 in due time - it's already as easy to manipulate under the hood, there just aren't that many GUIs for it yet. Sometimes changes happen gradually and sometimes you have to start anew with something wholly different to push ahead in the long run. You can complain and moan about this or try to make it work. I know which of those two options is in highest favour on Linux forums

[lmintnewb]

Actually have to go ahead and dump another pointless 2 cents. Always grates when I see people with the I can't figure it out ... so it obviously doesn't work, must be something wrong with the software attitude. LM12 is the worst thing you've ever seen in your life, yet you're still using it ... think that's odd.

Tend towards believing folks who share such nonsense, have zero understanding of what gnu/Linux is, all the decades of talent, time and energy that's gone into all this awesome software and how friggin awesome it is for all the opensource fans of the world. Such people are always running around with the this is the end, the sky is falling ... LINUX is going in terrible directions mumbo jumbo. Often foaming at the mouth when describing how gnome3 is the end of the world, when there are several Mint releases here supported for quite awhile longer that use gnome2, stuff like MATE getting dev, gnome3 supposed to be making progress AND/or it takes 10mins to install and use how many other desktops and/or WM's in a couple mins instead ?

Have come to prefer windows managers myself. So am not overly concerned with gnome3, stopped using gnome2 early into migrating to gnu/nix. But if I was a full DE kinda person ... Would just install one of the so many others choices and use it until either gnome3 matured enough to like it ... or MATE or or or.

Can also see where a person could install an earlier version of the kernel and call it done, also should take all of a couple mins ... Install one of the gazillion versions that predate the dreaded changes you cannot figure out or any of a vast number of other obvious solutions, that apparently never occured to ya. etc. As with all things kernelish ... No doubt patches and fixes will be rapidly forthcoming, if there actually is any real issue.

Don't know the spec's of the massive issue you're struggling with. Mentioned several perfectly acceptable alternatives in this post alone. Actually seriously doubt there is a problem. How did you make the live media ? Apparently you don't overmuch know what you're doing me thinks. Seem to be needlessly stumbling around to me. Just chafes me when folks who really don't appreciate this ocean of great opensource software, then due to what I think is obviously their lack of good judgement, blame it all on the software. Guessing if your friend never wants to consider gnu/Linux again ... a. It's his loss ... b. Rather than the software, personally think they have you to thank for it, not faults with the software. Oh well ... 2 cents.

[Daboo]

...Can also see where a person could install an earlier version of the kernel and call it done, also should take all of a couple mins ... Install one of the gazillion versions that predate the dreaded changes ...

I was headed that way myself. I had LM10 KDE which worked fine, except for some issues with getting Skype to work correctly. That's a Skype issue, BTW, not a LM issue. I installed LM12 to see if it would fix the video issues (it didn't) and while I liked what I saw, I also got frustrated with the Gnome way of doing things. I could work my way around them, but missed what I was used to. I tried OpenSuse KDE and found it once again did not work on my hardware. So I loaded LM12 one more time and decided to try loading KDE on it. It worked and I've left it like that. However, if it didn't work, I already knew I was going back to LM10 KDE. It only takes about 15-20 minutes probably tops, to load the OS fresh.

I've read so many posts here of people who can't get the new version to work for them. Why not go back to what did work? Gee, I still have WinXP loaded dual-boot and that's been out for how long? Having the "latest and greatest" OS, is not always the best. Especially when it worked with earlier versions, just fine.

I've also noticed how many people complain at what volunteers are doing for their benefit by producing new versions of the OS. Like the volunteers owe us something. I'm getting less and less patience with that.

Chris

[lmintnewb]

Totally agrees with everything ya posted Chris ...

Although I can't claim to have directly contributed anything to any of these great software projs, I try to be grateful and appreciate what all these generous opensource devs have done. I try to share what I've learned on the forum of a distro I happen to like and had a good experience with. Like you're mentioning, I often wonder where users ... the keyword in that imo ... is USERS, get their sense of entitlement and feel justified in apparently endless expectations. Even if that means everything should be done automagically for them, foolproof and take no effort at all to do for themselves in learning to use the software.

People at LM have worked who know's how many 1,000's of hours ( over years), people before them worked decades to create all this great software, then they turn around and let anyone who wants to download and use it free, change it, pass it around ... etc. So yeah ... seeing someone post stuff like this does grate on my nerves and feel the need sometimes to post a pointless rant about it, shrugs.

lol ... Must be a full moon or national snarky post dy or summin. Am on the verge of a flamewar in another thread already today ... Oh well, been a long time since I've bothered being in a good ole flamewar.

update, lol2 ... Nah takes too much energy am too lazy to bother with it. Besides LM has an ignore user option if ya come across someone who really rubs ya the wrong way.

[Evil-K]

It's often easy to forget that this distro was made by programmers and developers who've volunteered their time and effort since it is so well put together (yes, even 12... there, I said it). However, this is the extent of my playing Devil's Advocate in this case

[podagee]

im assuming the hp's which you are trying to install are amd.in my opinion the new kernels dont play nicely with certain amd graphics cards.i had a hell of a hard time with nephews hp g6 amd vision hd,but,installed on a friends hp the,latest amd,and it came out perfect.for me,i like intel a lot better cause you dont run into graphic problems.as far as not being able to control brightness,i find that odd cause even what i had to go through with my nephews computer,with typing nomodeset i still could adjust brightness.
intel....100%

[eightup1]

In reply to the people bashing me for being extremely frustrated about the Distro that i have loved and donated over $1,200 to over the years . while I commend Clem for trying to make Ubuntu more Usable for the average person the fact remains , 12 is a great big mess ( at least for me ) it's buggy, slow and unstable. am i supposed to feel good about that ? as for the one who just hates it when people go on forums and complain ... have you lived under a rock your whole life ? when people get frustrated and upset they complain , it's human nature ... the internet was created for two things , complaining and p0rn haha

to the one that wanted to know what Distros i tried on usb ... sabayon, puppy slacko, mint 12 , and mint 9 ... 9 wouldn't even load it just booted to a screen that said something about syslinux version, and a blinking curser .. i don't know if that was due to a bad iso image or a bad install to usb from pendrive linux .


to the one who wonders why i'm still using mint12 even though im having problems with it .......... i spent the last week backing up re formatting and restoring 3 laptops ( for other people ) and i'm just exasperated with the whole process ...... in a few weeks if i get bored, i'm sure i will restore this comp back to it's previous glory

oh .... and now for some reason beyond my grasp ......... my brightness controls are working now

[podagee]

eightup1:i have recently switched back to ubuntu 11.10 with gnome shell,gnome classic,and cairo-dock as my desktop environments.ive switched over too because of the buginess.and to be a bit more formal about buginess i mean in the gnome shell.i have found that with certain gnome shell themes hovering over the icons create all kinds of colorful flashes on my screen.its easily fixed by finding a theme that doesnt have bugs.i use awn notebook theme and it works flawlessly seriously with no flashes.i erased the unity and got a faster boot up speed.i am now very pleased with ubuntu11.10.mint 12 actually seems kinda bloated also.to me anyways.find one that suites you,maybe going back to ubuntu.

[eightup1]

And again brightness controls are not working , so there must be some driver randomly loading at startup ....

[ej64]

Ever bothered if xbacklight works? eg xbacklight -set 80 for 80% brightness.

If yes, write a script, make it executable, and put it into /etc/rc2.d

[tmm2112]

I've recently experienced this same thing with a Toshiba Satellite. Puppy 4.x worked fine with this machine, but 5.x has the dark screen problem and I haven't been able to solve it. Neither Mint 11 or 12 will boot on this machine, but, oddly, it will run fine on an older Toshiba T series. Both Mint distros do seem to load a little slowly, though. I really like Mint, but these problems are kind of frustrating.

[podagee]

main reason for me switching back to ubuntu