[Discussion] [Linux] Starting the move to MAC

[Jon]

On Sat, 21 Mar 2009 10:58:09 -0400 (EDT), Carl Gehr wrote:

> Of course, the 'free' package
>does not really have 'support' as such, but they do have an automatic
>update for fixes, enhancements, etc. 

Carl:

Your discussion prompted me to boot into my Suse partition and refresh my memory.  I don't use it 
often and mostly just to play with and be a bit familiar with it.  In fact, my distro is v9.1 which 
must be 4 or 5 yrs old by now.

One thing I had forgotten is what a PITA keeping things updated w/ Linux are.  It's ok if you stay 
on top of it, which means you are constantly installing new stuff.  As you pointed out, 2x annually 
w/ ubuntu.

I decided I'd install Firefox.  Well, that is easier said than done.  I'll take eCS anyday.  The FF 
RPM has a lot of dependencies that I did not comply with because my linux version is so old.  
Similiar to eCS's requirement to install the latest libc (which isn't hard), with Linux there are 
lots of packages to download.  And when you try to install you find yet another dependency that is 
missing.  I gave up when I got into it 3 levels of different RPM's to install just to get FF 
installed.

So if you don't keep on top of it with the latest & greatest you will eventually find yourself 
where I am.  The best thing for me to do is to go to openSuse 11.x and start all over.  That is not 
going to happen here in the near future.

Jon