Mandrake vs. Red Hat

[kentborg at borg.org (Kent Borg)]

On Thu, Sep 19, 2002 at 11:20:14AM -0400, Scott Prive wrote:
> Why not ask, which is better: vi or emacs? 

Because I already know something of that topic.  Example answer:

vi is much lighter weight, more likely to be available on a minimal or
crippled system.  Though vi is a "screen" editor it has a "line"
editor history that many find more obscure.

emacs is a gigantic environment that even includes its own
implementation of the Lisp language.  emacs is more powerful,
integrates with the gdb debugger, grep, compiler output, etc.  One can
fire up emacs and live there.  It has a kitchen sink quality to it,
but it is also more approachable for a newbie.  If things are working
right the arrow keys will work and under X there will be menues to do
other obvious things.  emacs has very annoying bits to it, but it also
has an elegance to it.  Don't expect emacs to be on a Linux rescue
floppy.

> Linux or FreeBSD? Atari ST or Amiga? Heh.

I don't know the answer to those questions...

> IF you are looking for a desktop system, you might expand your
> question to incluse Xandros and Lycoris. Try them all (VMware
> helps).

I have tried Lycoris and was disappointed.  Their KDE seemed very
sluggish.  (Kind of the way Red Hat's does.  In contrast the KDE on
the Knoppix CD seemed faster--maybe because I was impressed it worked
at all.  Knoppix is a CD-bootable distribution that is very cool.
Amazing what is squeezed on a single CD and how fast it manages to
be.)

Personally I am interested in Linux both as a server and a user
system, but I am on the lookout for ways civilians can possibly use
Linux.
 
> I can say that the Red Hat "null beta" for 8.0, has a much more
> user-friendly feel to it thanks to desktop cleanup, and a GNOME2
> base.

I am looking forward to trying 8.0, but being a Red Hat bigot almost
by accident I have wondered what I am missing.


-kb