I find it a bit funny and perplexing that people have such a high opinion of ubuntu as frankly I find it to be one of the worst distro avaialble. This from an attempt to install a 64 bit AMD version about a year and a half ago. So much of ubuntu didn't work, worked poorly or was poorly concieved that I reformatted the disk within a two weeks. I have not seen indications that these problems have been addressed in later versions either.
Now this may reflect my back gorund a bit and the fact that I've experimented with just aobut every Linux distro available. Once had a PC set up just for doing installs of new distros, so when I rank ubuntu where I do it is not without a basis to work from.
Went back to Fedora on my main machine and haven't had a significant issue since. For the PC I got to do CNC on, it is my intention to use BDI. That may change of course, every thing is subject to change, but I believe that BDI is the easy route to a CNC controller. A controller that is stable and compatible with a good repository.
For a computer novice, for many of the same reasons, there is no better choice than the BDI distro. It is a Debian variant which is a mixed bag, but a lot fo effort has been put into getting the configuration to work well. The install is straight forward and elminates a host of problems related to getting EMC and the realtime system up and running. Yes; I do realize that much work has been put into taking the difficulty out of bringing EMC up especially EMC2, but for somebody whos focus is not computers it is still a task.
Originally Posted by vacpress ubuntu is the default option, all the editing commands do not seem intuitive or even working.. when i go into the edit mode, it dosent have any option for 'boot order'.. it is hard to explain.. im not sure if it is grub, but i know it isnt lilo... ubuntu is default, it gives me 7 seconds to choose a partition. if i dont babysit my bootup(hard to do for some reason) it boots into ubuntum, therey wasting ~5 minutes.. |
Well I already laid out my opinion of ubuntu so I can only offer suggestions. First figure out what bootloader is being used. Then read the associated man pages. If it is grub it is not that difficult ot get a handle on things.
i hate how linux software STILL dosent have very good front-end configuration editing.. its really lame that a supposedly 'easy to use' version of linux dosent have an intuitive way to choose boot order. the VERY FIRST thing you encounter with ubuntu is counter intuitive!
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First in a sense I understand your concerns about GUI's for such configurations but then I have to say that grub isn't that difficult. Use vim/gvim for editing. Now you have me off track here agian with ubuntu, I'd strongly suggest getting rid of it, even if that means more effort to get EMc to run. You seem to be haivng issues with ubuntu that I had over a year and a half a go - not a good sign. The problem is that ubuntu causes more problems as far as a Linux distro goes than it solves. You are far better off using a text editor on another system to conifgure you installation than you are relying on ubuntu to do anything right or in a generally accepted manner. Given that other distros are coming along with better tools for GUI configuraiton I can not see a reason to continue with ubuntu.
linux is like dealing wioth the government. its suppsoed to be free, and hold great potential, but the only people who enjoy dealing with it are those who make alot of money off it, have years of experience, and are willing to put up with more than just a few hassles... |
That is not really true. When I disposed of ubuntu, on my 64 bit desktop, and went with Fedora 4 alot of my problems went away. Now that is something because Fedora is not suppose to be a stable distro as it is more of a development platform. The only thing that has been a problem on Fedora 4 since I installed it has been the Eclipse installation and I just repalced that with a download from Eclipse.
Now I know it may seem pretty bad to some but the alternatives are a lot worst. Especially if you intend to install many applications. Windows really sucks here and XP hasn't improved that enough. Do non-trivial software installations on Windows and you will have more troubles than Linux offers.
Unfortunately my interest/free time have not allowed me to do the Linux installs like ai did a couple of years ago. So I don't know where other distros lay with respect to configuration. I haven't even updated to Fedora 5 yet. What I do know is that a lot of work has gone into the major distros much of it to make for a better user experience. So don't discount Linux because of ubuntu, it is a distro that obviously has a promotional effort behind it to overcome the reality that it is crap. Just resist the marketing drones!
and for those who say 'i run linux just fine'
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I'm not sure what that means. Linux does run fine. Sure it has a different software base than does Windows but that doesn't mean anything at all. The problem is that people run linux and expect it to work like Windows, sorry but it doesn't and never will. Just like there are people that cna use Apples OS/X to great benefit over Windows so can Linux users. In either case though to realise that beneift requires a little effort to move oneself beyond the mainstream. In the case of Linux there is a little effort required and if you are not willing to wrap your head around it you will continue to not get it. Frankly the effort to run Linux is less than that required to keep a Windows installation running.
whatever.
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Best of luck with your system.
Dave