Mailinglist Archive: opensuse-factory (422 mails)

["Larry Stotler" <larrystotler@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Tue, Jan 13, 2009 at 6:49 AM, Rob OpenSuSE
<rob.opensuse.linux@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > This is the same problem that windows has.  Too many apps think they
> > are the most important thing you'll never use.
>
> Any Specifics?

That's a big list, but here's a couple of examples on WinDoZe:

Java
Quicktime
iTunes
Any Search program
CD Burning programs that override the Windows default settings when
you insert media
Instant Messengers(The average at my shop is 3 installed - MSN being
the most often seen)
Printer utilities that don't need to run
Office quickstart programs
Hardware utility programs(video, sound, etc) that no one ever tweaks.
Advanced Text Servcies and the language bar(which is really only good
for east asian users)
Firewall(for a desktop on a hardware router, it's pointless.  For a
laptop that's on different connections it's not).  Both Windows and
Linux on this one.

Also, the Prefetch and Superfetch schemes will preload things like
installer programs that you only use one time.  If you turn off
Superfetch, you can actually use Vista with 1GB RAM.

The biggest speed boost in Windows is using msconfig and turning off
all of the startup programs and services that don't need to be run.

I've even seen where I have uninstalled stuff like Norton and Macafee
and FSecure and they still have stuff loaded on startup.  That's why
Symantec and Macafee have removal tools, and then they still don't get
everything.  And, just try installing a current version of Norton or
Macafee on any machine slower than 2Ghz with 512MB and watch your
machine turn into molasses.

Fortunately, Linux is nowhere near that bad, but openSUSE still
installs a lot of what I fell are unnecessary programs like Beagle,
OpenOffice(KOffice is much better and uses less resources if you use
KDE), AppArmour, etc.  I realize that the devs want to make the
install easier and that they choose a specific set of apps to install,
but, from my experience, 90% of the people never even use a Desktop
search program, so it's just a waste.  Also, YaST can make it a pain
to uninstall stuff.  Try removing OpenOffice, AppAromour or Beagle in
11.0, and you'll get dependency complaints.  If the main module of a
program is selected for removal, all parts of it should be removed
unless they have a dependency elsewhere(which they shouldn't).  I
haven't tried it in 11.1 yet.

The idea of preloading some things for faster startup speed is
laudable, but then again, it has huge tradeoffs on slower systems.
It's a shame there's not an easy to use tweaking program for Linux.
YaST has some things, but they aren't as robust as I would like to
see.  I'd write one, but I'm not a programmer, so.....
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