Which Linux?
Archives Forums/Linux Discussion/Which Linux?
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| I'm going to install linux on my new computer but going to their site i saw there were loads of versions of it. I'm a bit confused and aren't sure which one i should be getting. Preferably one that isn't too complicated as i have never used it before. |
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| My First Choice : Ubuntu available http://www.Ubuntu.com/ My Second Choice : Knoppix available http://www.knoppix.net/ for blitzmax without net access under linux knoppix is the best option. kev |
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| 1. Ubuntu 2. Fedora Core 4 |
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| After using Ubuntu for a while, I'd really recommend it. If you hate Gnome, there's Kubuntu, which is just Ubuntu with KDE. SuSE 9.3 was very straightforward and includes everything you'll need to get Blitz to work on the CDs/DVDs. Fedora Core 4 is a pain. While you'll likely be able to get Blitz working on it, it uses GCC 4 so all your executables will require extra packages on other distributions. Many apps outside of Blitz haven't been cleaned up properly to work on GCC 4, so you'll have to compile a lot of stuff with command line options, etc. Also ATI has only just released video drivers that work without issue on GCC 4. FYI the next versions of Ubuntu/Kubuntu are meant to be using GCC 4 as standard. With all GCC 4 distros you can also compile under GCC 3 by setting compiler options - perhaps once Blitz Make is open we can make these available to Linux users. |
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| [quote] My First Choice : Ubuntu available www.Ubuntu.com/ My Second Choice : Knoppix available www.knoppix.net/ [quote] have to agree, after you are well versed in those, move to Fedora. |
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| Well, speaking from personal experience and the immense amount of trouble I went through to get any version of Linux up and running, I would recommend MEPIS - http://www.mepis.org It's up to date and detects modern hardware (including my ATI Radeon 9800 Pro + 3D acceleration). You can try it out first (although the 'live' version won't spot the ATI card) and if you decide to install it it includes everything you need to get BlitzMax up and running straight from the CD. Not one single package required updating from the net either. The partitioning didn't seem that intuitive, but it's easy enough when installing to an empty hard drive. Just for the record, I've tried the following other distros... SuSE 9.2 Personal - nice, but I simply could not get the thing to use the 3D capabilities of my 9800 Pro. Had to download lots of RPM's to get BM running. Ubuntu - downloaded ISO's would not work and always complained of CRC errors. ShipIt CD's would not load the installation components. SuSE 9.3 Pro - only got as far as the install menu and then didn't want to do anything else. Thought this was weird considering 9.2 was OK. Linspire - full of promise, but failed to install with a fatal CD error barely into the installation process. Apparently this is due to the version of Grub used and their suggestion was to use another PC until they got around to updating it! Anyway, MEPIS for me. |
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| I had a CD Driver on one install that killed a CDROM drive completely dead, forever... |
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| i've been a linux user for a long time. i've been using BlitzMax on and off for about 3-4 months now, but I had been using the Windows version on my dual boot computer and just hadn't gotten around to installing it on my Linux partition. i've now been using BlitzMax for a couple of weeks under Gentoo Linux. fwiw, just to add to this thread. |
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| I've been using Fedora Core 4 for the past month or so - my first foray into the world of Linux, although I had used Unix at Uni some 10 years ago. It was very easy to set up (probably helped by being on a physically separate hard disk to my Windows install), although as Craig says it does use GCC4, so you'll have to install legacy drivers - there's a sticky HOWTO thread for details if you decide to go with this. |
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| Ubuntu 5.10 is released tomorrow and includes GCC 4 - expect the GCC related problems to become more widespread as more distros start including it. It's probably fairly safe to say that one of the few distros that won't be using it in the near future is Debian, I think everyone else either has it in their next release or current release now (SuSE, Mandriva, Fedora, Ubuntu, etc.) BlitzMax actually uses GCC 4 AFAIK if you have it as the default compiler. BlitzMax apps compiled with GCC 4 will not work automatically on distros with only GCC 3 libraries installed - you'll need to install GCC 4 compatibility libraries on GCC 3 based distros. The dependency issue with BlitzMax on GCC 4 based distros is actually because BlitzMax itself (the IDE, mainly) was compiled with GCC 3, and therefore you need the compatibility libraries for that. It actually will compile quite happily with GCC 4. So GCC 4 isn't that big of a deal except for backwards compatibility, and that shouldn't be a big problem for your apps so long as you are doing packaging - something I've been trying to suggest for ages. |
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| I would recommend using Mandriva Linux ( Formerly known as Mandrake linux ). |
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