Greetings all,

I keep researching more about Conectiva and I am just amazed that North America and Europe have totally ignored this distro!

Conectiva is like the Red Hat of Brazil. It is a commercial distribution that has regional training centers throughout Brazil and South America. They have their own certification programs just like Red Hat. They have the endorsement of the Brazillian government and large South American commericial businesses.

I find it hard to believe that so many people in North America, Europe and Asia are simply unaware that this distro even exists.

Here is the link to the training programs:

http://www.conectiva.com.br/cpub/pt/...ento/index.php

Why haven't more people tried/considered this distro?

Thorn

"Why haven't more people tried/considered this distro? "

No falo Portuguese.

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Steve Stites

Ok the portuguese language IS a barrier but the distro does ship with an english language version. During my install I chose english as my language and I have an OS localized in english.

I could translate the technical docs if that is the issue that is keeping more people from trying this distro.

The Brasilian users are friendly people they are willing to help if you have problem with the distro. Some of them do speak and write english.

Conectiva was one of the founding members of United Linux whose goal was standardization of the Linux Kernal for the member companies. Now they are a founding member of the LLC.

What this means is that the Kernal in Conectiva, Suse, SCO, Turbolinux and Mandrake is the same.

I had issue with Mandrake 10 official. It wasn't right for me.

I tried Conectiva 10 and it just works. I still have to do some manual tweeks to make it more to my liking but you have to do that with just about any linux distro.

I would even go so far as to say that you have to do the same thing with Windows as well.

I worked with Windows from 3.11 to XP and you still have to go through the same customization process.

From my point of view I see a lot people having problems with the popular linux distros like fedora core.

But I don't see a lot of complaining about Conectiva even in Brazil or Argentina. I read their forums too and they mostly have basic newbie questions. They hardly ever have major problems with OS related things.


So take my advice for what it is worth to you.

Maybe there should be linux install competions. Take two identical computers and install one distro on one machine and the competing distro on the opposite machine. Document the steps for each, and time the installations to see which one finishes first and which one is more stable and user friendly.

You can do the same thing as a Lan competition; where the distros act as servers instead of clients.


Well I have gone on long enough. Good Night.

Thorn

"But I don't see a lot of complaining about Conectiva even in Brazil or Argentina. I read their forums too and they mostly have basic newbie questions. They hardly ever have major problems with OS related things."

That is partly because Microsoft does not astroturf in Portugese.

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Steve Stites

"That is partly because Microsoft does not astroturf in Portugese."

I am not so sure about that. I have been to Sao Paulo twice and I have seen the Microsoft Building. It is one of the tallest in the city. Furthermore most Brazillians I know use Windows.

Conectiva is doing in Brazil what Suse did in Germany. They are making inroads into governmental computing. The Brazillian Government is adopting Conectiva because it is a Brazillian industry and the source code is open, unlike Microsoft which is closed and propriatery.

Thorn

ok since dvd decryption and recording are legal in brazil, does connectiva come with built in decss, and dvd recording support?

I will have to check that.

However, copyright infringement IS illegal in Brazil. The problem is that it is poorly enforced.

Copyright enforcement is not high on this list for the Brazillian government.

However, even if Conectiva does have decss and DVD recording capability. As an citizen of the United States it would be illegal for you to use it to duplicate copyrighted material.

BTW I noticed one your boxes runs SCO, did you pay for that software?

Thorn

Ive nearly downloaded the Conectiva iso's twice but i havent got many cd's left lol

Give it a try.

If you are really low on CD-Rs you can D/L just first disk which is all you need for the default install.

However if you do choose a custom install then you will need all 3 discs.

I do not recommend the Conectiva Live Beta since the default language is Brazillian Portuguese.

I read the Debian thread you posted on. If you do install Conectiva, let me know how it goes. Since I am interested in seeing how it compares to Fedora Core 3.

Thanks,

Thorn168

Yeah it looks really good, i don't think i'll get it but i been browsing the site (even no i dont understand it lol) Do you think they'll keep releasing it, because of the merge?

Conectiva support DVD instaling contrib packages.
http://www.ccl-br.com.br/wiki/index....onectiva_Linux

EliotK,

The Companies have announced that they do not intend to cease their respective distributions. But they will continue to develop their respective products and perhaps merge the distributions sometime in the future. Sort of like what Novell & SUSE have done.

Oh I see, yeah suse & novell merged recentley i was sort of confused when they changed their site around.