[lug] Initial impressions of Kubuntu

[Nate Duehr]

Daniel Webb wrote:

> The only problem I had with the Etch RC1 installer was that a mirror
> (ftp.us.debian.org) hung on me!  Arghgh!  What is it with Debian and package
> mirrors!?  Other than that I'd say it was better than the Ubuntu installer,
> just not as pretty.  

ftp.us.debian.org ... or ftp.xx.debian.org for any other country... or 
ftp.debian.org... isn't a single server.

ftp.us.debian.org.      3600    IN      A       35.9.37.225
ftp.us.debian.org.      3600    IN      A       128.101.240.212
ftp.us.debian.org.      3600    IN      A       204.152.191.7

Thus, if one is having a known problem, it can be removed from the pool.

The downside is that the route to the one your DNS resolver decided to 
use, might be quite a bit crappier than the next one in the list.

Once you get up and running, you may want to look into digging around 
for a non-generic mirror to point at, the problems Sean mentioned aside.

The netselect-apt package can help find the "fastest/best" mirror from 
your location... if you agree with the package's definition of 
"fastest/best".  Check the docs.

I found a mirror that was filling almost an entire DS-3 pipe the other 
day.  I got the IP from netselect-apt, and then put it in sources.list.

After I figured out that it was SMOKIN' fast, I did a reverse-DNS lookup 
on it and wasn't too surprised to see...

mirrors2.kernel.org

Sucks that one of the main boxes decided to hang on you, though.

I used to subscribe to the public mailing list for the server admin 
stuff, but can't even remember which public list that is at 
lists.debian.org, now... hmmmm.

> For example, when I forgot to plug in my network card, the Ubuntu installer
> just commented out all the apt sources lines and went on!  Then once it was
> started the "Install programs" program didn't work right because of that
> (duh).  What would a normal user have done there?  

Ouch.  Bug.

> The etch installer caught that the network wasn't working and walked me
> through it (my AP has a WEP key).  It was very easy.  I now have a system that
> does everything I want (X11, ratpoison, Firefox, vnc viewer) on 1.2G space.
> I'm happy, and I won't be looking at distros again for 2 years.  :)

Watch out down the road... Debian is on their high horse (not for me to 
decide if rightly so or not, just saying...) about Firefox and 
Thunderbird trademark issues.  They ended up changing the names of the 
packages that contain them in the next version.  I forget the new 
names... but they're headed downhill sometime from "unstable" at some point.


Ice-something...?  Bah, memory is the first thing to go.  :-)

Nate