How Odious the Deception

[pythagorean]

I just installed Debian Squeeze in a Virtualbox to try it out. I have always just used Ubuntu, Mint and Fedora because I believed all this time that Debian was somehow complicated or difficult.

1. The installation is not even in the slightest bit difficult. It works almost EXACTLY like Ubuntu, Mint or even ANACONDA in Fedora, if not easier even than any of those three.

2. I went to Software Sources and enabled the non-free sources and then added multimedia to /etc/apt/sources.list and within minutes of installing Debian Squeeze I was not only able to play mp3 files and flash videos but also I ripped a commercial dvd with mencoder (and verified that it played normally in VLC).

3 Incidentally, after using Squeeze for a few minutes that little Update Center thing popped up and told me there were updates available... EXACTLY LIKE WITH EVERY OTHER LINUX DISTRO... sheesh.

Well, I just feel like a complete idiot. Debian is not in any way harder to use the Linux Mint and it is not in any way harder to use than Ubuntu and I just feel sick to my stomach that all of the Debian developers hard work has been basically just flat out ripped off by people who want to market their own Debian versions. But. maybe they are saints and it doesn't bother them the way their work gets used or maybe they just feel like all of these other Debian based distros only add to the value of Debian in the end.

Anyway, I learned a lot about life and about Linux just now and I had to share. Maybe this should be moved to a rant.

[MALsPa]

When I finally got around to installing Debian for the first time, a few years back, I too wished that I hadn't waited so long. I thought it was gonna be a lot harder than it turned out to be.

But, I don't feel the same way as you about this:

I just feel sick to my stomach that all of the Debian developers hard work has been basically just flat out ripped off by people who want to market their own Debian versions.

I don't see it as a rip off. Some of these Debian-based distros give people some things that they couldn't get from Debian, I guess because of Debian's philosophy or whatever. One example: A live/install CD (or DVD).

[craig10x]

and Mint adds all kinds of nice stuff both in main edition and the debian edition (LMDE) which debian itself does not give you....including the nice one panel on the bottom and mint menu, neat software center with reviews of software, control center to adjust various things and other useful tools...These things ENHANCE it not DETRACT from it....

And a big one is the font rendering....When LMDE first came out, i looked at the iso and saw how (unfortunately) crappy pure debian looks for web surfing and all...when we all brought it to Clem's attention he made sure to get the proper libcairo patches in so that now LMDE has beautiful looks and font rendering (as nice as ubuntu's which is how they do it...lol) and when i saw it on the December iso, i knew i HAD to install this...

Yes..i know you can do your own patching of various types (i know many here did who started with that september iso) but heck, the distro developer should do that, not the user (and besides not everyone is proficient enough to know how to do those kind of things right)....

LMDE simply improves upon something that is already excellent and makes it even better

They are even working to add more newbie friendly features to the lMDE installer...so it is all good and certainly no "rip off"....In fact, from what i understand Debian appreciates and likes to work with other distros that use them as a base...Even THEY don't feel the way you do about it

[TBABill]

maybe they just feel like all of these other Debian based distros only add to the value of Debian in the end

This is exactly the key. But they do it in many ways. Look at the software alone. Debian doesn't have current versions of every app available in the "ripoff" distros so someone has to package them, maintain them, update them, maintain a repository, keep up with servers, network bandwidth, deal with bugs, etc. It's not as simple as "lets take Debian and just call it Mint, then distribute".

Debian isn't that difficult to setup. But it's not as easy as Ubuntu or Mint based on Ubuntu, especially when it comes to drivers. Users have to find those answers and figure out which driver they need, how it installs, etc. And that's just one single aspect. Mint Menu, Mint Update, Mint Software Center (with user ratings, which is not even in Ubuntu), inxi, codecs, and on and on. Plus the Xfce, LXDE and LMDE versions. This has got to be a mountain of work for many people.

I think you may find your claim to be at least a little offensive to those who put so much work into taking Debian and turning it into the more user friendly systems they turn it into. I personally don't want to patch libcairo2 and other files, and if I can get a beautiful desktop out of the box then I'm already a step ahead. Plus having the latest software on a great base is a win-win for the end user.

Nobody disputes the greatness of Debian, but to summarize all the hard work of Ubuntu and Mint into a ripoff is naive and contrary to even the views of the devs of Debian. Your views do echo commonly throughout the Debian forums, however.

[robert-e]

What I find somewhat deceptive is Mint's tactics insuring the continued use of Google's Search. Mint restores Firefox's google search xml on each reboot, unless one takes extraordinary steps to prevent this behavior. Check:

/usr/share/linuxmint/adjustments/firefox, and
/etc/linuxmint/adjustments

There are both good and bad in any distro, but I find this plain ugly.

Regards,
Bob

[MALsPa]

What I find somewhat deceptive is Mint's tactics insuring the continued use of Google's Search.

I don't like that, either. I bypassed the whole thing by installing Firefox from the Mozilla site and using that instead... but now I use Chromium instead of Firefox, anyway.

[DrHu]

I don't like that, either. I bypassed the whole thing by installing Firefox from the Mozilla site and using that instead... but now I use Chromium instead of Firefox, anyway.

I use Opera or Firefox, but for searching I use scroogle
http://www.scroogle.org/cgi-bin/scraper.htm

I don't mind Google or even Mint making some revenue by advertising Links: I only object to the amount of data capturing Google does of it's search engine users

• Now that they have established a monopoly, bearing out almost all the other search engines, such as yahoo or altavista etc..

[DrHu]

Well, I just feel like a complete idiot. Debian is not in any way harder to use the Linux Mint and it is not in any way harder to use than Ubuntu and I just feel sick to my stomach that all of the Debian developers hard work has been basically just flat out ripped off by people who want to market their own Debian versions.

Yes, for some years now, Debian with their netinstall or their graphical installer has been just as easy to install as Ubuntu (the desktop distribution savior ?)
http://wiki.debian.org/DebianInstaller/GUI

However, I don't feel Debian developers feel ripped off, I think, if they intended to commercialize or otherwise develop a revenue stream for their Linux product, they would have accomplished that a long time ago

• They have smart people working on their systems..

If you want to see what might be considered a more direct rip-off idea, look at the wine re-developers such as Cedega or possibly codeweavers crossover (they might be a bit better), but Cedega is quite propriety in taking from the wine project and not giving up much (giving back)
http://transgaming.com/
http://www.codeweavers.com/products/cxgames/
http://frankscorner.org/
--a resource for free data on running windows games on Linux (emulator)
http://www.winehq.org/
--the original source of knowledge

[jeffreyC]

Regarding search engines I read a few days ago that Yahoo is working 15% better than Google currently

[MALsPa]

Regarding search engines I read a few days ago that Yahoo is working 15% better than Google currently

How was "better" defined?

[sgosnell]

If you want the absolute latest available software, you can get it in Debian. Just enable the Experimental repositories. If you want a little more well-tested, but maybe a version older, enable Unstable, which is what Ubuntu uses. Testing is ~a version behind that. Stable will never have new software, but that's not everyone's first priority. You can get as new as you want, as long as you're willing to accept the possibility of instability.

[runbei]

I'm very, very leery of the "Debian is easy" claim, especially when it comes from someone who just installed it.

Because LMDE, unhappily, will not install on my desktop PC, I looked for a distro that was reputed to be very stable - a high priority for me - and that was also known to be "easy." I tried OpenSUSE 11.3 KDE 64-bit. And, what was my surprise to find that I had to spend a couple of hours looking for a solution to a problem with OpenSUSE not saving my selected desktop resolution settings between sessions. And what was my further surprise when I found...

Well, you get it. Before you claim that Debian is just as easy as Mint, do a thorough test of all your hardware and get back to me in the morning.

I've seen this again and again with various "easy" distros, from Mepis to PCLinuxOS, to Ubuntu (!), to OpenSUSE, to Mandriva... The problems appear later, once you begin using the distro.

LMDE does have its issues, as does Julia with its Buguntu roots. But, in all, Mint in all versions is the easiest distro I've found to install and configure, aside from LMDE (but then, LMDE is, for all practical purposes, still Beta software). Hm, have you tried getting Skype to work in OpenSUSE?... Put on your reading glasses.

[jeffreyC]

@ MALsPa better being defined as clicks leading to web search results rather than further search attempts.
I have noticed personally that Google seems to be more interested in revenue than relevance now, many search 'results' are Google ads often having little to nothing to do with what is being searched for.

[XidCat]

..... I just feel sick to my stomach that all of the Debian developers hard work has been basically just flat out ripped off by people who want to market their own Debian versions. But. maybe they are saints and it doesn't bother them the way their work gets used or maybe they just feel like all of these other Debian based distros only add to the value of Debian in the end.

The whole essence and spirit of Linux just went over your head and is still gaining altitude....

http://www.debian.org/intro/about

[craig10x]

..... I just feel sick to my stomach that all of the Debian developers hard work has been basically just flat out ripped off by people who want to market their own Debian versions. But. maybe they are saints and it doesn't bother them the way their work gets used or maybe they just feel like all of these other Debian based distros only add to the value of Debian in the end.

The whole essence and spirit of Linux just went over your head and is still gaining altitude....

http://www.debian.org/intro/about

I guess he does not understand what the words "open source" means...he must think debian is microsoft or apple

The irony of this is that the Debian project does NOT feel the way he does about this...they in fact appreciate and encourage other distros that use them as a base and in fact welcome them to work with them for the benefit of everyone...

[Imagus]

What I find somewhat deceptive is Mint's tactics insuring the continued use of Google's Search. Mint restores Firefox's google search xml on each reboot, unless one takes extraordinary steps to prevent this behavior. Check:

/usr/share/linuxmint/adjustments/firefox, and
/etc/linuxmint/adjustments

There are both good and bad in any distro, but I find this plain ugly.

Regards,
Bob

I totally agree with you, and this is exactly the reason why I'm thinking of leaving Mint (been using it since 3.0 Celena). Also the fact that my questions about mintupdate (see my other post "Two questions about mintupdate") remain unanswered is starting to make me somewhat paranoid. I don't like it when other people decide for me what software I should use. I hate Google, I never use it and I don't want Mint to force it upon me. Next thing you know they'll install that piece of spyware called Chrome too...

So I've started distro-hopping (again), but haven't found a good alternative yet. Perhaps I should try what the OP suggested and just install the real Debian. Anyone else have a suggestion for a good Mint alternative? (Hope this question doesn't get me banned or something. Ah well, guess I'll just have to take the risk.

[MALsPa]

Well, if you like Mint except for some of the default software, you could simply use other software. I don't like the default Mint/Google/Firefox deal, so I don't use it. I use Synaptic instead of mintUpdate. Easier than getting rid of the entire installation, I guess. Well, I suppose some folks might say that I should use the distro "the way it's supposed to be used" if I'm going to use it...

[randomizer]

Well, I just feel like a complete idiot. Debian is not in any way harder to use the Linux Mint and it is not in any way harder to use than Ubuntu and I just feel sick to my stomach that all of the Debian developers hard work has been basically just flat out ripped off by people who want to market their own Debian versions. But. maybe they are saints and it doesn't bother them the way their work gets used or maybe they just feel like all of these other Debian based distros only add to the value of Debian in the end.

Some of the steps you've described above are beyond the capacity of some people, and others are just so lazy that they want everything to work OOTB. Debian doesn't suit the latter crowd all that well, but there are worse distros for them for sure. Derivative distros don't "rip" others' work. Nobody is claiming that the work came from anywhere but debian developers. Plus the Debian developers gave express permission for others to use their work for any reason as long as modifications are made public. Such is the nature of the GNU GPL.

I totally agree with you, and this is exactly the reason why I'm thinking of leaving Mint (been using it since 3.0 Celena).

I have always wondered why trivial matters like default software configurations are enough to make people change distros. Fair enough if you are using Gentoo and get tired of configuring your system for everything, but being overly concerned about some pre-installed software that can be replaced in minutes (less if you've got a good connection) seems irrational.

I guess he does not understand what the words "open source" means...

It means exactly what the name implies, which despite the common misconception is not software freedom. There's a good reason why that Debian page doesn't use the term even once.

[craig10x]

More collaboration among Debian-based distributions: the Derivatives Front Desk

June 29th, 2010

The Debian Project has been promoting software freedom and delivering Free Software to users via its releases since 1993, when it was one of the first GNU/Linux distributions ever. It has spawned several distributions which are nowadays based on the work done in Debian, as allowed and encouraged by Free Software customs. Such distributions are colloquially referred to as derivatives; according to DistroWatch, Debian currently enjoys more than 120 derivatives, including some of the most popular GNU/Linux distributions currently available.

The Debian Project encourages other distributions to base themselves on the volunteer work of Debian Developers and believes that it is through inter-distribution collaborative activities such as bug forwarding, joint maintenance teams, patch forwarding, etc. that Free Software is best served.

To that end, the Debian Project is happy to announce the opening of its Derivatives Front Desk, a forum where contributors to Debian-based distributions can meet and discuss the best ways to push their changes back to Debian or otherwise ask for help on how to interact with Debian development.

Developers of Debian-based distributions are hereby invited to join the debian-derivatives@lists.debian.org mailing list as the main discussion forum for derivatives. Additionally, the Debian Project encourages contributors of Debian-based distributions to mail inquiries about how to contribute back their changes to derivatives@debian.org.

About Debian

The Debian Project was founded in 1993 by Ian Murdock to be a truly free, community project. Since then the project has grown to be one of the largest and most influential open source projects. Over three thousand volunteers from all over the world work together to create and maintain Debian software. Translated into over 30 languages, and supporting a huge range of computer types, Debian calls itself the universal operating system.

Contact Information

For further information, please visit the Debian web pages at http://www.debian.org or send mail to <press@debian.org>.

Note: This is a paste in from the actual Debian Project website and i think it says it all...so those, such as the comments by the original poster as well as a few others who agree with him, here is debian's official policy on this which is totally OPPOSITE of your beliefs and feeling about it..get it now?
In their own words they ENCOURAGE other derivatives (like linux mint) to base themselves on the work of the debian developers...

[ukbrian]

@ randomizer +10 respect never read a bad post from you, I wish I had a little of your skills