Top 3 Bad Linux Distros
Even before I write this post, I know I’m going to get some real nasty comments. Bring it on, tough guys.
The freedom which FOSS gives us, enables everyone with a specific goal in their mind to create their own Linux distro. Most of the time, the goals/philosophy are cool and interesting, but it often happens that the “product” of the project, the one that should take you to the creator’s goal, turns out to be less than nothing. And we have quite a few examples of this in the Linux world. Let’s take a look at our Hall of Fail.
3.) gOS
I’m starting with gOS on the bottom, because I think it wasn’t half bad in the beginning. Most of the coverage came due to the low price of the gPC, the supposedly “tight” integration with web services (if you can call a basic installation of Google Gears and shortcuts to websites “tight”), badly copying OS X (along with the stupid dock).I checked out the last version of gOS, and again it s a meaningless pile of installed packages already available for every other major Linux distro out there. It’s slow, the boot-up screen is ugly, the wbar dock is too basic (the version with AWN is too demanding for low-end PCs, their main target), the window buttons are too small and indistinguishable… and I still don’t know why all the Web 2.0 guys are so excited about a few Google Gadgets and some Facebook and other social network icons which simply open a browser window ( so instead of clicking Firefox and Facebook, you click Facebook and get a retarded browser window. I don’t see any Gears there).
I was first excited about gOS. It promised to offer a real ‘cloud’ operating system, but what they have now is a weird greenbuntu which still needs OpenOffice to do some real work. Now I think their main goal is just to copy the Mac as well as possible.
gOS devs: take another look at your goals and separate the bling from the functionality!
I reviewed this distro a while ago and I though it’s cool that someone is aiming to create a distro in the spirit of BeOS. Looks like the developers didn’t hear the last part. It said ‘philosophy’ not ‘theme’. When I booted into zevenOS I got a very ugly net-book interface (why? It didn’t say that it was for net-books), although they have IceWM. The desktop background is very bad, so is the choice of software. Yeah, the version I tried was a late beta, but betas are finished products which need to remove bugs, not stuff that pops up German menus when you choose the English language. Anyways, now I know why Mark Shuttleworth doesn’t want the name Ubuntu to be associated with low-quality products.
ZeBuntu devs: Your goal is awesome, but you will have to work very, very hard!
1.) Linux XP
“As of September 24th 2008, their web site does not have a way to obtain a serial number to register the OS, and they do not respond to emails sent to them. It is not known if the distribution is dead, or Linux XP is only being registered in Russia.”
I’m still wondering whether this distro is violating the GPL. For Pete’s sake they have a 30-day TRIAL. Linux XP is a Fedora re-spin with a Vista skin, Wine and some other front-ends. It is being sold, you can also obtain a serial number.
Check out this ‘feature list’ from the site. Are they trying to sell Fedora here?!
- The most user-friendly interface ever made for Linux
- Simple and clear installation and Windows-style setup tools
- Full set of applications for work in the Internet.
- Support of Microsoft Office document formats (WORD, EXCEL and others)
- Useful tools for working with Windows networks and VPN
- Full control of your computer, data and applications
- Stable, dependable and without any reinstallation
- Absolutely virus-free environment
- Free updates through a simple but useful interface (no RPM knowledge is required)
Linux XP devs: seriously, wtfiddlesticks
Do you know any distros whose developers sadly didn’t fulfill the promised goals? Share your thoughts in the comments.
You’ll probably get flak for gOS, but I agree with you. The ‘integration’ amazes me. All they did was 3 actions 1) take ubuntu, b) pre-install google products, c) theme it.
Point of it? Not a lot! They would’ve been far better off riding Ubuntu’s brand popularity and using the stock version.
linux xp is just huh. At least it’s not the worst that has happened.
[...] Internetling addthis_url = ‘http%3A%2F%2Fwww.proliferationoflinux.org%2F2008%2F09%2F28%2Fthree-of-the-worst-linux-distros%2F’; addthis_title = ‘Three+of+the+worst+Linux+distros’; addthis_pub = ”; [...]
You comments about gOS are interesting, my initial impresssion was also “it wasn’t half bad in the beginning.” But I must admit I haven’t used it much since then.
Gary
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Gos isnt that bad IMO.
Too bad its all opinionated.
I love these kinds of articles. The simplicity in the vocabulary and the Internet-synchronized sentence structures appeal to me so.
But seriously, even though Linux XP is a crap of bull, you gotta say, they did a great job in making a huge presentation of why you should use their product. If other distros had vivid, live screenshots with exciting titles as that, but weren’t trying to scam someone, that’d be great.
+1 to the comment by Exsecrabilus.
As for gOS: Have they actually preinstalled the apps, or is this simply an elaborate series of links to the web sites?
Mostly jut links.
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Hey, the Linux Xp don’t receive our mail, they are monopolist, don’t acept what people say, broke the GNU GPL rules, and did a sh*t fedora+wine+Vista skin, they suck!!!