[NTLUG:Discuss] Ubuntu Developer Summit for version 10.04

[Hank Ivy]

On Wednesday 28 October 2009 04:23:11 am Ralph Green wrote:
> Howdy,
>
> On Wed, 2009-10-28 at 01:24 -0500, Hank Ivy wrote:
> > Mandriva runs its update notification as a small icon on the task bar. 
> > The icon changes when there are updates available.  I find it to be
> > informative without being intrusive.  Perhaps the Ubuntu update manager
> > can be configured in a similar manner.
>
>   That is the way it used to work in Ubuntu.  You can't quite change it
> back to the old behavior.  In some ways I understand, because they are
> trying to make it cleaner and more acceptable to a broad range of
> computer users.  But, the current solution is bad enough that I don't
> feel good about deploying it.  I use it myself and gripe about it
> several times a day when it intrudes upon work I am trying to do.  Yes,
> it interrupts me several times most days because I work with a number of
> machines.

I looked at my system again.  A small notice window pops up once, and 
disappears after 3-5 seconds.

>  If you are a Mandriva user, I have got a question for you.  I used to
> run Mandrake(and later Mandriva) on some machines all the time.  I
> thought their graphics were about the best of any distro and the systems
> worked nicely.  The biggest limitation was that I frequently found
> programs I could not find packaged for installation on Mandriva.  I
> would install from source for me.  But, I really test distros to see
> what to recommend and I don't recommend users install from source,
> unless they are somewhat experienced.  Anyway, the real question is
> about Mandriva Powerpack.  I installed it and the licensed DVD player it
> came with.  Or rather, I started to install the DVD player and found the
> license unacceptable.  It said something like "in return for the
> privilege of having a licensed DVD player, you hereby consent to having
> all your web browsing monitored."  No reasonable person would accept
> that, and I wiped Mandriva off the system.  I know some people will say
> I could run Mandriva without the DVD player.  That is true, but I don't
> trust a company that would put such terms into a license.  This happened
> a little before NTLUG left Nokia.  Does Mandriva still have such
> unreasonable terms?
> Have a good day,
> Ralph

The encryption/copyright rules for digital DVD player software is a long 
story.  I am still playing around at getting DVDs to play on my system.  The 
libdvdcss is all I need.  The EULA is not that bad.

Wiki said the following about the library, libdvdcss, that decrypts movie 
DVDs.

"Many Linux distributions do not contain libdvdcss (for example Debian, 
Fedora, SUSE Linux, and Ubuntu) due to fears of running afoul of DMCA-style 
laws, however they may provide the tools to let the user install it 
themselves. In other cases some distributions refrain from preloading 
libdvdcss onto their install discs but it is available in their software 
repositories.  Distributions which come pre-installed with libdvdcss include 
BackTrack 2, CrunchBang 9.04.01, LinuxMCE 710, Linux Mint 7, PCLinuxOS 2009, 
Puppy Linux 4.2.1, Recovery Is Possible, Slax 6.1.1, Super OS 9.04."

-- 
Hank Ivy

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