[Discuss] Firefox with RedHat Fedora

[Alan W. Irwin]

On 2007-01-18 19:59-0800 Murray Strome wrote:

> So I have a question for you Alan.  Let's use some simple, frequently used 
> applications like GIMP, Firefox, Thunderbird and OpenOffice.  From what I 
> have seen, most distributions do not have the latest versions. Now consider 
> Firefox.  In Windows, if you want the latest version, you just click on 
> "Help" and "Check for Updates", and it will update to the latest version...

Same (I assume) for Debian unstable.  But most people do not run that
version of Debian because it is, well, unstable.  There is a well-known
trade-off between stability and cutting edge.  On my desktops, I prefer
stability so I am content to use roughly one-year old versions of desktop
software where there is a reasonable chance most of the bugs have been
shaken out, but at the same time I am not too far from the cutting edge.
This strategy has always paid off for me; I rarely if ever have had trouble
with any Linux application that I run, and I run a lot of them.  Also, I
don't think I am missing much by running year-old desktop software.

I assume you have some legitimate reason why you are anxious to get the
absolutely latest versions of desktop software, but you should not be
surprised when you get burnt by such choices.

> I know that in Debian (and presumably Ubuntu/Kubuntu) there ARE repositories 
> that contain more up to date applications. There may be similar things for 
> Mandriva -- but unless someone tells you about them, how are you supposed to 
> know what and where they are?

Debian unstable, for example, is for expert Debian users who are willing to
accept (and report on) bugs in order to get access to the latest/greatest.

> Also, for example, if you include the"Universe" 
> for apt-get in Debian where some of the later stuff resides, there are lots 
> of warnings about dangers involved in downloading from there if I remember 
> correctly from my Koha experience.

"Universe" is a term used by Ubuntu so it sounds like you were trying to mix
Debian and Ubuntu which is a no-no (as indicated by the warning messages you
encountered and also as indicated by the general advice in my previous post
to not mix packages from two different distros).

>
> Sometimes people also ask the same question simply because they cannot 
> remember the answer they got two or three years ago (or even if they asked it 
> in the first place) and cannot find it in the archives or through the search 
> engines or where they wrote it down or recorded it on their own computer. 
> You may even find that happening to you some day as you get older.

Don't worry, it is already happening to me, but I keep forgetting when this
problem started.... :-)

Seriously, both Barbara and I try to take good notes whenever we initiate
any system change on our respective computers.  For example, we capture the
output of apt-get so we have a record of which packages were installed when.
So far, over the course of many years I have never had to use that record to
help straighten out an installation problem, but I just feel it is good to
have a dated record of when I have installed or removed certain packages.

>
> I do thank you, Alan, for your patience and for the many times you have 
> helped me in the past. That goes for all the other very helpful VLUG people.
>
> There was a time when I was quite expert with UNIX, but can no longer 
> remember most of what I once knew (I cannot even remember how to change the 
> command line prompt in a terminal to look like what I would prefer, how to 
> use SED and AWK,  and I even have to look up how to tar and gzip things then 
> extract them again from the command line as I cannot usually cannot remember 
> it from the last time I used it a few months before).

I have used the Unix/Linux command line on a daily basis since the late 80's
so it just seems easy and natural to me.  If you are a touch typist (like I
am), and you are using a bash shell with all the on-the-fly command-editing
help there is, then 10 fingers just have a hell of a lot more bandwidth than
the rodent.  That said, the mouse is definitely nice for cut and paste so
I always run the command line from many different xterm applications.

For those wanting to learn the command line, I highly recommend that you
immerse yourself in it cold turkey for a couple of weeks straight while
taking good notes to help the learning process.  That is just a much quicker
and more efficient way to learn (or relearn) the command line compared to
trying to dabble with it for a few hours every few months.

Alan
__________________________
Alan W. Irwin

Astronomical research affiliation with Department of Physics and Astronomy,
University of Victoria (astrowww.phys.uvic.ca).

Programming affiliations with the FreeEOS equation-of-state implementation
for stellar interiors (freeeos.sf.net); PLplot scientific plotting software
package (plplot.org); the Yorick front-end to PLplot (yplot.sf.net); the
Loads of Linux Links project (loll.sf.net); and the Linux Brochure Project
(lbproject.sf.net).
__________________________

Linux-powered Science
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