Feature added by: Arnold Mesper (amesper) Feature #319627, revision 1 Title: Minimal KDE and GNOME installation option openSUSE Distribution: Unconfirmed Priority Requester: Mandatory Requested by: Arnold Mesper (amesper) Partner organization: openSUSE.org Description: The installer must provide an option to install a minimal KDE and a minimal GNOME desktop in addition to the current KDE and GNOME desktop options, which install a lot of software. A minimal GNOME desktop should, for example, only install the software necessary to boot the system, login into GNOME and the GNOME shell. In addition it should include drivers only for hardware that is available on the system and corresponding configuration software (e.g. network manager if network card is installed) and the package manager in order to install additional software as required either from DVD or via internet. It must also include and enable security software (e.g. AppArmor, Firewall), thus the system is secured from the beginning. What a minimal GNOME desktop should not have: - hardware drivers for hardware that is not available (e.g. bluetooth) or has been disabled in the BIOS (e.g. WLAN, web cam, etc.) - software that can be easily installed afterwards (e.g. office suite, web browser, e-mail client, chat client, terminals, file managers, text editors, character maps, etc.) - software which is not intended for a minimal desktop (e.g. server software, development software) - Java, Flash There is also a grey zone of software, that might be useful, but should not be mandatory part of a minimal install (e.g. Avahi). Here the user should be shown with a list of software recommendations (with description) during the installation, which he must explicitly enable to be installed. Use Case: Use Case 1: Install a clean GNOME or a clean KDE desktop as a host for virtual machines. After installing the minimal desktop, the user only needs to install VirtualBox. Use Case 2: Install a clean GNOME or a clean KDE desktop as a virtual machine guest and install the required software afterwards. E.g. easily install a web browser VM or a mail client VM or an office VM. Business case (Partner benefit): openSUSE.org: For novice users the current desktop options full with software are good choice as they do not need to think about what to install. For expert users the openSUSE has the wonderful possibility to customize the system to be installed by selecting / deselecting software. I think this is the biggest plus of openSUSE in comparison to other distributions. But what is lacking is an interim solution for advanced users, that only want to install a clean KDE or GNOME desktop and decide on what additional software to install afterwards. This is especially when working with virtual machines, it is very useful to have an option to install a clean desktop without much effort. -- openSUSE Feature: https://features.opensuse.org/319627