So now that I have become a little dis-illusioned with Ubuntu, I have been investigating alternative Linux distributions (aka distro's). What fun this is (not!).
Problem number one. It would seem that my brand new SATA CD/DVD drive does not burn ISO images properly. I'm able to boot sometimes, but more often than not the disk is corrupted or damaged. So I have to download the files on my Laptop (which ironically is running Ubuntu 9.10, which I'm trying to replace on the desktop) and burning the images there. Once I get my desktop installation stabilized, I can look into this drive problem in more detail, or just replace the drive ($30 for a drive is dirt cheap)
Fedora 12
After getting a functional installation CD, I tried out Fedora 12. Version 12 was just released the other day, so the timing is good. And there was even a 64bit KDE version. Running the Live CD, I encountered an error when I told the installer to re-initialize my drive. The error message showed up BEHIND the other windows, so took some time for me to notice things were taking too long and start examining why. Regardless, restarting the installer, and it installed as I would expect. The installation process is not quite as "smooth" as Ubuntu, but reasonable enough. A short while later I had Fedora 12 installed.
And this is where my fun begins. I will have to say up front that my issues with Fedora are really a lack of experience/understanding on my part and not really a reflection of anything wrong with Fedora. You see, I got used to using the APT package manager. RPM based distributions have never "clicked" for me. So while I can use Fedora easily enough, tweaking it to do what I want/need requires some learning on my part. Which means time. And really, I need to get my development environment running again right quick so that I can do billable work.
So, it was a nice visit Fedora. Perhaps next time I will be able to spend more time with you and get to know you better.
Debian
Next was a network install of Debian Lenny (5.03). Debian is the basis for Ubuntu, so I knew the environment would be familiar. But Debian is also very conservative in what they consider "stable" and do try to stick to the FREE (as in thought) paradigm where they can. So I had concerns about being able to get the environement I want.
The installation went smooth enough and I was looking at a desktop in short order (well, an hour or two - it WAS a network install which means it had to download a lot of stuff). So time to set up my environment. First, I need to ditch this Epiphany web browser. Not because there is anything wrong with it, but because none of my customers run it, and my web apps are not targeted at Epiphany. So, I try to install the latest version of Firefox. Er, first snag. And it is a show stopper.
Apparently there was some sort of political cat fight between Mozilla and Debian. Debian took a hardline approach that if the logos and icons for Firefox could not be changed (due to trademark issues), then the program was not really "Free". So they forked Firefox and created "Iceweasel". Iceweasel is supposed to be exactly the same as Firefox. But I quickly found out this is not the case. The differences become really noticable when you try to install plugins. For me it was "AdBlock Plus" - It could not install because it thought "firefox" (which was really Iceweasel) was too old. A quick look and yep, Iceweasel was version 3.0.x. The current stable version of Firefox is 3.5. So I was hit with a double whammy here - an outdated browser (3.0.x is a couple years old), and NO way to install Firefox anyways. At least not through the "official" methods.
I *could* install Firefox manually. But then I have to worry about dependencies myself, which means I also need to worry about breaking the stability of the underlying operating system that also makes use of those dependencies. In addition, I loose the automatic updating of Firefox as new versions come out - I have to manually update the software to keep it current with security fixes and enhancements. And this issue defeats the purpose of trying to find a "maintenance/hassle free" distribution.
So Debian is not suitable.
NEXT!
Next, I'm downloading PCLinuxOS (again!) to try to burn a functional CD. We'll see how that installation goes. Failing that, I may look at Xubuntu, though I think I would end up running into the same issues that prompted this adventure. Time to research what other distributions are suitable...