Thoughts on the next release

DJiNN · posted: 2008-02-10 14:49

julian67 wrote:I find vlc and audacious a good combination which can handle everything music + video.

I'm using Audacious on several systems here & it's great. Really light & fast. The only thing that i've had a problem with so far is i can't get it to stream over the Network, but that's probably down to something i've not set up correctly. __{{emoticon}}__

For CD ripping how about replacing Grip with Asunder? Asunder is beautifully simple and can encode to multiple formats simultaneously. It's very light and starts up instantly and is completely desktop agnostic. On the command line ripit is an amazing CD ripper and of course being without a gui is tiny and efficient.

Never even heard of them, but they sound really good, so i'm going to grab them now & have a play. I've used Grip before & it's pretty good, so if Asunder is better that'll be great!

I like Gthumb but believe it would bring in a lot of Gnome dependencies. Perhaps it's best left to the user to choose this from the repos.

Does gThumb use Gnome deps? I thought it was mainly a gtk app that was used in Gnome. It doesn't seem too heavy, though if it does use Gnome deps then as you say, possibly best to let users decide.

As fuse is part of mepis/antix maybe it would be worth looking at the fusesmbtool that comes with Zenwalk which makes using fusesmb extremely simple. I believe lighttpd web server is also part of the standard install so maybe SWAT could also be included for easy samba setup & management.

Aaah, that's why the Zenwalk version works so well? Up to now i thought that the"Tool" was part of fuse? It works so well in Zenwalk, and as Networking has always been a major pain (For me anyway) in most lightweight distros, i'd love to see something like this.

I like Xfe file manager which I hadn't come across before, but find emelfm2 far more useful and customisable. It's a tiny bit more memory hungry (0.4% more RAM but distinctly less CPU use on my laptop) but far more versatile, looks nicer (imo) and is desktop agnostic.

Thunar is also a great file manager, and although it may not be as light as some of the others, it's not too heavy either. __{{emoticon}}__ PCManFM is also a great (Multi tabbing) file manager that has some really good features. But yep, emelfm2 is really good.

And of course another vote for Wicd!

LOL... I still haven't tried this yet, but i've been seeing some great reports about it. I'll have to give it a go sometime soon.

I really like some of your suggestions. There are a few there that i've never heard of, and that's always good to hear. __{{emoticon}}__

DJiNN · posted: 2008-02-10 14:58

OU812 wrote:So this is a terrific replacement for xfe, but I think you'd still want to keep rox.

Everytime i think rox isn't that good, i either find something else about it that's amazing, or it does something that other File Managers won't do (Or at least not without a lot of config file changing etc)..... __{{emoticon}}__ Rox just always works really well, and is one of those programs that i always install, whatever system i'm using.

DJiNN · posted: 2008-02-10 15:06

On the Terminal front, what about"Sakura"? It's really light, does tabs, has transparency etc.... great little Terminal. Can't get it working in Xubuntu though. It's not in the Repo's and i can't get it compiled for some reason, but it's in the Tiny Me test 7 release & it's brilliant. __{{emoticon}}__

OU812 · posted: 2008-02-10 16:11

I uninstalled emelfm2 and tried to compile it from source; I got errors. I tried to installed emelfm (gtk 1.2 - in repo) but got a dependency error. So, I decided to give pcmanfm another shot. Synaptic automatically deleted apps, installed apps, and upgraded apps for me. This time, pcmanfm works very well. (So maybe keep rox but replace xfe with either emelfm gtk 1.2 - if you can resolve the dependency problem - or pcmanfm.)

As for asunder, it's not in the repos and grip is definitely an outstanding app.

Was thinking about aqualung but it seems to have quite a few dependencies. I think vlc is good enough to stand on it's own, but if you feel the need for a second app, why not gmpc? It has one dependency and seems a good fit for ncmpc. But again, I think vlc is great on its own. (But keep a cli app, too - they're kinda fun.)

I like both gthumb and gqview. I think they have about the same amount of dependencies. So I think it's one or the other.

Maybe beautify conky a little bit - perhaps even have a contest. Maybe have two versions - the one like impuwat uses and one like tinyme uses.

But overall, I think this is a terrific distro. The app choices are already very good. It would be nice to just give it a little polish. For example, other than conky, tinyme has some great control panels - one for admin (inherited from pclos) and one for system settings. It looks fantastic. I think they used some sort of app for this (zenwalk includes an app like this - I think).

john

DJiNN · posted: 2008-02-10 18:08

OU812 wrote:I uninstalled emelfm2 and tried to compile it from source; I got errors. I tried to installed emelfm (gtk 1.2 - in repo) but got a dependency error. So, I decided to give pcmanfm another shot. Synaptic automatically deleted apps, installed apps, and upgraded apps for me. This time, pcmanfm works very well. (So maybe keep rox but replace xfe with either emelfm gtk 1.2 - if you can resolve the dependency problem - or pcmanfm.)

I've just looked in the repos & can't find several programs (Like Asunder and Emelfm2 for instance). Bit PCManFM works great here and (like you) for now, i'm keeping with that & Rox. __{{emoticon}}__

As for asunder, it's not in the repos and grip is definitely an outstanding app.

Maybe Asunder is available as source to be compiled? I'll see if i can find it somewhere. Just about to install Grip now, but it would be nice to give Asunder a try. I did manage to install ripit, although i haven't tried it yet.

I think vlc is good enough to stand on it's own, but if you feel the need for a second app, why not gmpc? It has one dependency and seems a good fit for ncmpc. But again, I think vlc is great on its own. (But keep a cli app, too - they're kinda fun.)

My vote's for vlc because i've found that it pretty much plays everything that i throw at it, which is great. As for cli apps.... I'm just getting my head around irssi. I usually use xchat2 but i thought i'd give irssi a go for a change. __{{emoticon}}__

Maybe beautify conky a little bit - perhaps even have a contest. Maybe have two versions - the one like impuwat uses and one like tinyme uses.

I've just copied the conkyrc from my TinyMe installation & it works a treat in antiX.

But overall, I think this is a terrific distro. The app choices are already very good. It would be nice to just give it a little polish. For example, other than conky, tinyme has some great control panels - one for admin (inherited from pclos) and one for system settings. It looks fantastic. I think they used some sort of app for this (zenwalk includes an app like this - I think).

They're great aren't they? Tinycc is the desktop app they use. Zenwalk has recently added the"Zenpanel" (Written by the same guy that provided the Panel in Wolvix i believe) and that's really good as well. I wonder if there's anything like that (In a generic way) for debian distros such as antiX? It would be great if there was. __{{emoticon}}__

TLeeNorris · posted: 2008-02-10 18:23

KDE __{{emoticon}}__

DJiNN · posted: 2008-02-10 21:14

xToeCutter wrote:KDE __{{emoticon}}__

LOL! The funny thing is, i often find that i install Konqueror on quite a lot of the lightweight distros that i install (Even in TinyMe) because it makes setting up Network shares/browsing etc a completely painless process. It just works every time, and Konq is such a great browser. __{{emoticon}}__

anticapitalista · posted: 2008-02-10 23:01

One thing for certain is kde will not be installed __{{emoticon}}__

This weekend I had a bit of time to experiment and this is what I found. All sizes before compression.

Adding wicd plus python dependencies added about 30MB. I have no idea as to how well wicd works, I'm going by your good reviews. main disadvantage is that it is not in the repos.

Vlc adds about 15MB. It really is a fine player, BUT it is a lot heavier to open than mplayer. For those will more than 128MB RAM, you won't notice the difference much, but with 128MB it seems too slow IMO.

Audacious is small, though surprisingly it wanted a few extra dependencies. I like it, but on my box at least, sound quality is not as good as xmms. It doesn't have the xmms-xmmplayer plugin which is included in antiX for video files. On the other hand it is actively being developed, unlike xmms.
I'm considering including gmpc as a front-end to mpd. It is small and easy to work with.

File managers. Rox is integral to antiX as much as fluxbox is, so thunar, pcmanfm, konqueror (!) will never replace it.
xfe was provided as a 2 pane alternative, is small and does the job well. It is pretty ugly though.
Emelfm2 is not in the repos and won't be included, though it does seem to be a good alternative to xfe.

I haven't tried asunder, but as it is not in the repos, Grip will stay. It is fairly light and fast, even with 128MB RAM. antiX also comes with abcde, an excellent cli audio ripper.

fusesmb will be included, unless someone can convince me of a better alternative. It does drag samba in though (for better or worse)

gthumb or gqview? I don't mind either. Whatever is the lightest and fastest to open.

Terminal: I adore aterm. Light, fast, configurable, but still doesn't work properly in Debian testing (Sid works fine). I found eterm and Sakura, though very good, a bit heavier. Also Sakura crashed a few times on me, but that might be because I didn't compile it properly.

antiX-M8 will have other changes in conky, wallpaper, fluxbox styles, gtk etc (suggestions welcome). I like the idea of some sort of competition for the beautification of previously mentioned apps such as conky.
Sakasa has produced some great wallpaper, as has OU812, impuwatt (as well as fluxbox styles, gtk ideas etc). Apologies for others I haven't mentioned.

I will get some sort of plan of action together asap, though I am still 'restricted' to some extent by how Mepis develops, particularly concerning the kernel.
Also I'm fairly busy at the moment, not due to work but helping to build for the General Strike here on Wednesday.

Keep the ideas coming and thanks for the input so far. Remember that antiX is targetting 128MB RAM boxes, not the higher end, so keep that in mind when making suggestions, and it aims to be a 'rolling' release so simple apt-get upgrades/dist-upgrades will keep it alive and no need to compile from source (unless the use wants to that is)

OU812 · posted: 2008-02-11 01:24

Well, if you don't want to go with wicd as it's not in the repos, you may want to take a cue from tinyme and go with netapplet, which is in the repos. It will pull in a few dependencies, though. Otherwise, there is wlassistant, which also pulls in a few dependencies.

Yes, you have some tough choices to make.

john

OU812 · posted: 2008-02-11 03:28

To make things easier __{{emoticon}}__ you may want to test out gnome-commander. It's a two-panel file manager. It's very light, no dependencies, in the repos, and looks good. Maybe not as powerful as xfe (for example no thumbnails - but then again xfe is very slow at generating thumbnails so that's what rox is for), but very pretty. So if you want a two-panel file manager, you may want to consider gnome-commander.

john

OU812 · 11 Feb 2008, 04:09 #26 2008-02-11 04:09

Hello. I just started playing around with icewm (I liked it in vector but it seemed buggy in absolute). I mainly got interested in it again because it had several themes similar to the amiga. Anyway, I was thinking: I know that fluxbox is the default wm, but it would be nice if ~/.icewm was set up for the user (by copying the files from /etc/X11/icwem) and some links included on the antix links page. Thanks.

john

julian67 · posted: 2008-02-11 07:39

Gthumb has lots of Gnome dependencies (libgnome-2.0, libgnomecanvas-2.0 etc). GQview has no Gnome dependencies.

I have Gthumb installed on all my PCs but wouldn't expect to see it in a very small lightweight distro's default install because of the baggage it brings with it which a lot of people will be seeking to avoid when they choose something like fluxbox.

PCManFM seems like a nice lightweight file manager but the tab feature (its claim to fame) is redundant in fluxbox as you can easily tab two instances of roxfiler (or anything else).

It's true that Asunder and emelfm2 aren't in the Debian repos, which surprises me, but source and deb packages are available for Asunder and source for emelfm2. I've never had a problem compiling emelfm2, probably any problems result from not having all the relevant (confusingly modularised in true debian style) gtk+ dev packages which are its main dependencies. Asunder is a very quick and easy compile and even easier if you use the deb
__{{emoticon}}__

donquixote2u · posted: 2008-02-12 01:29

erm, ... I think OU812 will find that gnome-commander actually DOES have a few dependencies of the gnomish persuasion __{{emoticon}}__

on the broader topic of enhancements, I think it would be too easy to make yet another camel out of a horse - I'd endorse the philosophy of only ONE suite for each job (e.g. flux OR icewm) by popular choice.

if its any help, I chose antiX for what it claims to be (and is) - a"lean mean" livecd distro - also one with a very current kernel, fluxbox, and (unlike DSL or Puppy) using std debian apt-get and distros, for recourse to a large selection of add-ons.

anticapitalista · posted: 2008-02-12 01:56

Thanks for the feedback guys and ...girls (but there isn't any from the girls. Why not? C'mon, it is just as much your distro as the boys!!)

To begin with, as I probably didn't make it clear, I almost certainly will include wicd in the next release.

Now, the rest is open for discussion.

This is what I want antiX-M8 to be.

Size: as close to 300MB as possible
A gui and a cli app for most tasks
Apps that will work reasonably well with 128 MB RAM LIVECD!!
Suggestions as to what to REMOVE from the present antiX.
Does anyone use icewm?
I like the idea of cli apps, what do you think? A waste of space eg mpd/ncmpc or keep only xmms/audacious?
I'm seriously thinking of replacing iceweasel with opera as opera seems to really work fast in antiX (though fonts are not so nice).
Sylpheed will be replaced with claws-mail.

I hope to have updated (and more enhanced) scripts for cheatcodes and (maybe) other uses such as how smxi is used in sidux.

Time for me to retreat to the land of nod.

eriefisher · posted: 2008-02-12 02:32

The only thing I would be hesitant with is Opera. Why? One, Opera isn't"free" or at least it wasn't. Two, I never really liked it(my opinion only) but as you wish.

Is UnicornRider still working on scripts? I haven't seen him pop up for a while. He may have some interesting suggestions.

My only request would be to keep the download as small as possible. Just the bare minimum would suffice for me.

eriefisher