In which I am reminded why Ubuntu exists.

[reddragdiva]

Ubuntu 11.04 presents to the world an interface of ridiculous fuckery, even if you go to "classic." So, I'm a geek, let's see how the mothership is doing!

How to get the wifi working in Debian on a Mini 9:

wget http://downloads.openwrt.org/sources/wl_apsta-3.130.20.0.o
wget http://mirror2.openwrt.org/sources/broadcom-wl-4.150.10.5.tar.bz2
wget http://http.us.debian.org/debian/pool/contrib/b/b43-fwcutter/b43-fwcutter_013-2_i386.deb
sudo dpkg -i b43-fwcutter*
tar xfvj broadcom-wl-4.150.10.5.tar.bz2
sudo b43-fwcutter -w /lib/firmware wl_apsta-3.130.20.0.o
sudo b43-fwcutter --unsupported -w /lib/firmware
broadcom-wl-4.150.10.5/driver/wl_apsta_mimo.o
sudo modprobe -r b43 ssb
sudo modprobe b43

This is starting from the 1.1 GB live-USB version, of course. Add several more installation steps if you're starting from the 140MB netinst ISO.

For evil, tainted, ugly, non-free formats — like all your mp3s — it appears Debian non-free is faintly less faff than the various Ubuntu plausible deniability shields for Canonical. Flash still looks like, ah, trouble.

I haven't actually wiped Ubuntu and installed Debian yet. The appreciation gained for the paper-cut annoyances Ubuntu fixes is valuable, however. (And I bet the non-free world is still way easier on Debian than Fedora.)

Comments

[redcountess]

Why bother when there's Macs? ;-p

[fluffymormegil]

Can't speak for Diva, but: I've never met a Mac I liked :)

[greylock]

I'm using 11.4 at work and, once I killed Unity and forced it towards classic, I can't say I have had too many issues (although I am only a week in and it's taking a while to customise, and I am sure the screen resolution is all over the place (one area where Win7 appears to be better so far) other than the fact it periodically freezes up for a few seconds.

It has more or less slotted into the Windows network okay (although MS Exchange continues to not work, but I am not sure Ubuntu is at fault there).

Of course, I am also not needing to do anything like get Wifi working. Still, Printer Set-Up was a dream.

[reddragdiva]

Printer support is provided by CUPS, which is now owned by Apple because it was the best solution to printing on Unix, which Mac OS X is. So it pretty much Just Works, if the printer is supported at all.

[greylock]

I did think it was suspiciously easy.

I was hoping I was just so goshdurn clever.

[reddragdiva]

In general: if stuff is supported at all by open source software, then it works like a dream. If not, it's entirely made of arse.

More and more stuff is supported by open source, so things work reasonably well these days. The catch is stuff like obscure wifi or video drivers, particularly in laptops.

[greylock]

I have to say the only things I have had not work are CD Burning and a program from the Synaptic Library called Transcript. It was a pile of crap, and simply would not work at all.

[rbarclay]

There's flashplugin-nonfree, which downloads from Adobe and throws into the filesystem. Mostly it even works. Also see http://wiki.debian.org/FlashPlayer
You might also want some packages from http://www.debian-multimedia.org/

[andrewhickey.info]

Yeah, add the Debian multimedia repos and all your media worries are basically over.

However, there's really no need to install flashplugin-nonfree - Gnash (which comes as part of the standard install) is now good enough even in Debian stable that I've not seen a Flash thing that didn't work in it in maybe a year.

[ciphergoth]

I'm fine with Unity. The bugs are annoying, but not fatal.

[reddragdiva]

Interfaces are a definite YMMV :-) Even in Classic, GNOME this time around (particularly gnome-panel and gvfsd) seem crashy as hell compared to 10.04 (which I use at work) or 10.10.

[rbarclay]

Gnash is actually usable now, even for Youtube videos and such stuff? I need to play with that, then.

[andrewhickey.info]

Yeah, I can view Youtube videos in it just fine. The *only* problem I've had with it is a tendency for processes to hang around using memory after the tab has been closed, but that's much better than the non-free version (which causes Firefox to crash regularly on my work machine, running Red Hat).

[reddragdiva]

I get Flash video using a horrendous percentage of CPU (way more than Totem playing the same FLV), but no Flash-induced crashes on Ubuntu 10.04 or 11.04.

[montag]

I know you're unlikely to care, but Fedora 14 just works. I recently upgraded both my laptop and my desktop - both fully functioning right from the reboot - no hacking, no issues, no gripes, no workarounds. But then I always felt that Ubuntu was the bastard child of an under developed, under supported OS for masochists, so I'm about as biased as you are. :)

[reddragdiva]

On a Mini 9 with stock hardware, you mean? That being what we're talking about.

[reddragdiva]

CD burning I'm surprised didn't work - CD/DVD burners are really generic and standard these days.

If you've added "universe" and "multiverse" to Ubuntu, Synaptic will show you basically everything in Debian. And almost everything that compiles in Linux will be in Debian. Whatever the quality is. Some is, as you have discovered, terrifyingly awful.

[reddragdiva]

Yes, but does Weebl's Stuff work in Gnash? That's the acid test. (Horrifyingly broken last time I tried it, which was a few years ago. But if Gnash does YouTube and Weebl, they need to publicise the fact!)

[vampwillow]

All my 'native' ubuntu installs are command-line (no gui) server versions. The three which aren't use KDE or xfce or standard Gnome (which you can get to from Unity with one change and is permanent).

Unity might be ok for touch screens?

ps. I'm sure that the bottoms aren't covered in the version of that pic I have. You getting coy?

[reddragdiva]

Ad rules - a modicum of decency is apparently the price of selling out. It's pretty obvious they're pastede on yay.

[sidhedmento]

LMAO!!

[sidhedmento]

Y U NO post?

[reddragdiva]

I keep forgetting to. I have three or so posts half-written in my head. (The tweet stream should give you some idea.)