General installation options was Re: Criterion revision proposal: KDE default applications

[Donald Buchan]

On Sat, 2013-12-14 at 09:01 -0600, Michael Catanzaro wrote:
> On Fri, 2013-12-13 at 18:06 -0800, Adam Williamson wrote:
> > Perhaps the simple thing to do going forward is bump KDE and GNOME to
> > 2GB max sizes, so they both have space to include everything they
> > actually want in a default install in their live images, and then have
> > both those groups clean up comps and spin-kickstarts so that DVD
> > installs and live images contain the same package set from comps, then
> > maintain the package set in comps in future and only make package
> > changes in the kickstarts which for some reason absolutely have to be
> > changed on a live image (of which there shouldn't be many)? 
> Yes please -- it sucks that I have to even think about whether I install
> from a live CD or a DVD.  The end result should be the same.

"Me too".  (I think ... :) )

This relates to a relatively "long" time ago, but ...

A few years ago I installed Fedora 9 (gnome) via live-CD, back when
Fedora live-CDs tried to keep within the size limits of a CD.  I was
mildly disappointed with the result, although I easily corrected the
perceived shortfalls and didn't change the image on the machine until
probably F11 (and then F12 when I tried to streamline all my machines on
the same Fedora version).  I would say that the biggest disappointment I
had -- which was actually and admittedly quite trivial in and of itself,
as well as easy to correct -- was the lack of OpenOffice.org (now
LibreOffice) on the CD.  Once the system was install on my computer, a
"yum install openoffice.org" or somesuch quickly and easily solved that
"problem".

What really disappointed me at the time was that the live-CD, in trying
to be a showcase for Fedora -- because after all, "here's a CD, it won't
touch your hard drive, but you can see how good Fedora / Linux / linux
gaming / (insert your favourite application name here) is!" -- actually
failed *for me* because it was missing what to me was a mainstream
killer-app, albeit due to space restrictions on the CD.  (By the way, as
I recall, AbiWord was included on the Live-CD.)

This was an issue at least as of F12 when the same omission (again, *for
me*) was still in place, and probably with even less free space left on
the CD.  (Yes, I am quite aware of just how humongous OO.o and
LibreOffice are, and, at least from a simple arithmetic perspective, the
technical difficulties of including such a large piece of software on a
live-CD.)  At that time, I had done a side-by-side comparison of the
Fedora live-CD and an Ubuntu live-CD.  I decided that the Ubuntu CD was
a clear hands-down winner for what I would recommend / give away to
others.  Why?  They included OO.o as well as a snazzy (although no doubt
relatively simple to assemble, for the technically able) little
directory that opened up on boot-up with a few useful files to "close
the deal" on how good the CD was, such as a simple mortgage calculator
for OO.o, a few pictures, a sound / music file, and a short step-by-step
video tour of the CD.

As such, since F9 I have favoured either the net-install CD (due to one
of my computers being a somewhat older, slim form factor machine with
only a CD drive) or the DVD if "I thought that internet connectivity
might be an issue", which going in I usually knew wouldn't be, since I
was also planning on installing all sorts of software via yum.  Either
way, a "standard" "full" install via Anaconda has been my preferred
method of installing a satisfying base of Fedora, from which to start
the rest of my installs and customizations.

My point to this long story is to agree with the general idea of looking
at how Fedora is distributed and making sure that the product -- or the
various product versions, or various media versions -- come/s out
looking good, as opposed to trying to be good to everyone while not
being good to anyone.  Do I think that the DVD should be a good showcase
for just about everything?  I suppose I dare not invoke the apocryphal
"640K is more memory than anyone will ever need" argument.  Maybe
Live-DVDs -- full to the brim that is -- will be the new live-CDs, each
being a spin unto themselves.  Maybe the Net-install CD ... well now I'm
sure I'm just diverging toward things I don't the first thing about. :)

Thanks for reading. :)