J.A.M.D.: Your Neighbor's Best Friend

[Birdie]

This space is for discussing the JAMD 0.0.6 report we just published.

Here (http://www.tuxreports.com/index.php?module=prodreviews&func=showcontent&id=31)

[wallawonder]

I don't understand what the big "wahoo" is about JAMD? From this review, it doesn't look that great. Not intending at all to flame here but instead to be practical.

"Each release has focused on the personal desktop experience...."

So what was the experience like? Aside from the install, it sounds like it was pretty negative to me. If I did this install for my neighbor and then let him be, he'd probably be pretty ticked! The screen resolution isn't what he wants, so he changes it. But nothing happens. Then he loads a movie to watch. That doesn't work either. He gives up and decides to listen to some music but no player pops up and when he eventually finds kscd, it doesn't work either. Now what's he going to do? Call me of course! :wink:

I can appreciate some positives such as xmms or Synaptic, but to my neighbor, "The dang thing is broke!"

Don't mean to be disrespectful; I really appreciate everyone who takes the time and effort to get a review out about a distro. I'm just not understanding how you can say that, "There is no sweeter rpm-based distribution for the desktop than JAMD. It is easy to install, comes ready for use....", cause from here, it doesn't sound like it's ready for use at all. Where's the sweetness?

So you know where I'm coming from, I've tried SuSE 8.0, Red Hat 8.0, MDK 9.0 & 9.1, Slackware 9.0, Lycoris (build 71), Vector SOHO 3.2, and now, Ark Linux (Alpha 7). I like automation, time management, efficiency and constantly look for stuff that works "out of the box". I guess the 40+ hours I spent in the "early days" getting RedHat 8.0 configured as a usable, well rounded desktop, took it's toll.

In Ark Linux, right after install, I put in a music CD and up popped kscd, and onto the desktop went an "Audio CD" icon. When I was done, I hit the eject button on the CD player and bingo! Out popped the CD, kscd closed, and the "Audio CD" icon disappeared off the desktop. Now that was some nice automation. That was an "out of the box" experience my neighbor could appreciate!

I gotta ask though, how come you had to change the MPlayer preferences from /dev/dvd to /dev/cdrom? To have to do that, to watch a movie, when the movie is playing in a dvd player...that just sounds nutty to me.

In all genuiness, thanks for the review. Seen a lot of stuff coming out of the woodwork about JAMD. Certainly some positive aspects - looks promising.

~wallawonder

[Birdie]

Thank you for the comment wallawonder but we tried to make it clear that we were putting together several issues from different installations. It wasn't one install -- and all of these problems happened from just one install -- but rather the "problems" occured based on the type of hardware. This is why we stated that the type of hardware is very important.

/dev/cdrom change was the only way to get the device to be read properly. This was a samsung cdrw/dvd player. So, again, it was hardware specific.

[wallawonder]

Understand. I can appreciate the effort to combine many tests into a single review.

I'd be really curious to know though what hardware JAMD performed well on. Maybe mine is the same (Athlon 1.4, 256mb, gForce2, etc.). Were you able to get nVidia drivers loaded on it? I like the direction Ark is going but it won't play nice with the nVidia drivers.

How was JAMD with CD burning via a gui interface? The JAMD web site TODO list looks great but it doesn't mention anything about CD burning fixes. If this is all good in the dev release right now, I'll give JAMD a try just for that!

Thanks again!

~wallawonder

[NinerFan]

If I did this install for my neighbor and then let him be, he'd probably be pretty ticked!

The review never stated whether they liked their neighbor ;)

Were you able to get nVidia drivers loaded on it?

There are some having troubles with the Nvidia drivers, but for the most part I believe the people that had issues were not following the directions correctly, or were making assumptions based on past experience. There are two cases that may be exceptions, one is running a PCI version of the card, and another is running one of he new laptops with a built-in Nvidia chip. But if you peruse the actual Nvidia forums, there are tons of people with stock Red Hat 9 that are having issues, so it is hard to say. I personally have a TNT, TNT2, GeForce2, and a GeForce4 that all work fine. Several others report that it works just fine provided you follow the instructions.


How was JAMD with CD burning via a gui interface?

It includes K3b. Many people say it is similar to Nero on Windows, but I've never used that program, so I can't say how accurate that information is.

[tazlinux]

"wallawonder'....

I use JAMD and love it. It works right out of the box. As far as burning Cd's I have had problems with K3b....but not just on this distro. I use XCDRoast, it can be installed using Synaptic installer. Speaking of Synaptic it makes JAMD nice for newbee's. I have been using Red Hat and switch to JAMD because it works and the users forum is a great help for any problems that may a rise. Just "fyi" I also have used many other distros in the 2 plus years I have been using Linux.....and for my home use needs this is IT....heck I have not booted my Win XP box in 3 months. :lol: .....I highly recommend JAMD.....but it is not a power user distro....so if thats what you want ....well stay with Gentoo..Slackware...or even Debian, they are all great distro's and best of all .......they are NOT Windows!!!!

taz...

[Unimpressed]

Most every comment relating to user experience is negative. How come so many stars? Desktop resolution was set at 800x600 and caused problems, desktop icon for cdrom didn't work, three out of four cdplayers didn't work, Synaptic cache update issues, & Mplayer configuration problems. Your conclusion: "there is no sweeter rpm-based desktop than JAMD." What???

If this distro is looking for newbies than they better give the developers more time to fix whatever they broke with the regular RH9 install. I have been playing with Linux since SUSE 5.3 back in 1997(?) but am still a novice due to lack of time and effort. I manage to install RH7, RH8, & RH9 with no problems (but then again, the installs detected and properly configured my hardware everytime). Why would I want a distro that obviously strips out stuff RH includes and improperly configures the system?

If newbies want all the features of JAMD without the troubles,
look to www.altlinux.org and check out Alt Linux on distrowatch. Its a very slick Mandrake based distro with Synaptic (apt-get), multimedia working right out of the box, and four desktop envirnments all setup with similar menu structure.

[TRN]

Most every comment relating to user experience is negative.

Naw

How come so many stars?

This is a nice distro. We compiled a list of issues we had with several different installations and hardware. And as we stated in the review, the user's experience will be highly dependent upon the hardware.

Desktop resolution was set at 800x600 and caused problems, desktop icon for cdrom didn't work, three out of four cdplayers didn't work, Synaptic cache update issues, & Mplayer configuration problems. Your conclusion: "there is no sweeter rpm-based desktop than JAMD." What???

Please see above. Since you don't include the hardware then it is difficult to know why you experienced these problems.

If this distro is looking for newbies than they better give the developers more time to fix whatever they broke with the regular RH9 install. I have been playing with Linux since SUSE 5.3 back in 1997(?) but am still a novice due to lack of time and effort. I manage to install RH7, RH8, & RH9 with no problems (but then again, the installs detected and properly configured my hardware everytime). Why would I want a distro that obviously strips out stuff RH includes and improperly configures the system?

Again, it is hardware dependent and not for every system.

If newbies want all the features of JAMD without the troubles,
look to www.altlinux.org and check out Alt Linux on distrowatch. Its a very slick Mandrake based distro with Synaptic (apt-get), multimedia working right out of the box, and four desktop envirnments all setup with similar menu structure.

Oops, I guess you missed our Alt Linux story.