> On Fri, Sep 23, 2011 at 06:31:25PM -0000, Till Kamppeter wrote: >Roger, note that I have done a lot of fixes and improvements on the >Ubuntu package of which did not (yet) get adopted by HPLIP upstream. So >these fixes are most probably not in the Gentoo package of HPLIP. Please >report bugs in the bug tracking system of Gentoo and ask them to adopt >these fixes for the Gentoo package. I spent the whole day trying to get the Ubuntu Live CD (oneiric-desktop-i386.iso 696M Sep 21 16:04) configured and setup properly to print to file, along with printing to printer. All tests showed this issue was only hacked around (or more politely, worked-around). Of all the prints I did using the hplip/gs HP-M1522NF postscript driver, I could only get postscript 2 files even after making sure postscript level 3 was set within the PPD files. This is completely WRONG! When an admin sets-up a printer to print PS Level 3, they should get PS Level 3 files and not PS Level 2 files. The very least that could be done, run the *.ppd files through sed or gawk to install a comment, "# Even though PS Level 3 is stated here, PS Level 2 will be used (per bug# ...)." And using the PCL HP-M1522NF still shows high page margins when printing (hence, top/bottom of the page might be cut-off). I even tried to modify this PCL ppd file per the related hplip bug, without success here. On a side note, I hope you enjoy constructive criticism. ;-) 1) The desktop ran amazingly slow for my 2x750Hz P3's w/ 1GB RAM. I'm using kernel 2.6.39 and 3.0 using nouveau and mesa-7.11 with gallium and I get really good desktop performance. I can't recall your kernel in this, but performance nouveau was looking good at kernel version 2.6.39 here, then I enabled gallium (3d excell) and can now almost play HD videos here. 2) As with Linus, I do not like the new GNOME or KDE at all. Gnome2 was pretty good, now I can't do anything. It's only focus is eye candy on fast cpu's and lots of memory. Productivity means able to scale on older h/w and get things done, if needed, put a picture of a flower on the wallpaper. And, there's so much MS Windows influence, I can't get anything done. 3) Because of the above, I had lots of problems navigating the desktop, and as usual, opened a terminal but still had problems as Bash didn't recognize tab-completion on the first tab (can't remember if this was default or not). And then, I had to keep clicking in each tabbed terminal to regain focus. 4) Top menu bars of windows ended up at the top of the desktop, while the windows were placed elsewhere. Resizing windows was difficult because the mouse had too small of a movement for resizing the window. 5) Installing the printer was completely non-intuitive. I remember to use CUPS local server, but most distro's have their own configuration GUI for configuring everything (ie. Mandrake/Mandriva). I would at least put a link along with an initial libnotify event stating "To configure your printer, click me..." and then open Mozilla to the CUPS local server page. However, one first needs to configure their local network. 6) Configuring local network card, again non-intuitive. A user somehow must know to right click on what looks like a network card icon to some, and select configure. Again, I was expecting a separate tool. To fix, use libnotify or prompt on top of the toolbar network icon to say, "Click me to configure network." 7) One thing I see consistently between Gentoo's LiveCD (KDE) and this Ubuntu's LiveCD (GNOME?... which I perfer against KDE), whomever is designing it, thinks the icons they're designing are intuitive. They are, by far, not! When I click this red icon in the corner of a window, I don't expect it to try logging me out of a desktop session! A lot of icons don't have mouse-over details. Although, I do enjoy the artistic abilities of the desktops, art/looks is only <5-10% of a users requisites for using a desktop! 8) Installing additional software didn't show anything telling me it was installing or had installed the software. Long 15m+ pauses of nothing. I then used the terminal to tab-complete the program's name to find if it installed. 9) sysvinit rewrite, openrc seems way better -- especially when doing it old style: /etc/init.d/cups restart! Ubuntu complains every time an expect does something like this at the keyboard. This is too funny. If I had to profile the desktop GUI's today, I'd say they're being sabotaged by ex-Microsoft coders whom really want they're "maximize window" icons on the window widgets w/ start menus! When I build, I build from the ground and not from the top down. Tonight, I'm sure going to be cuddlying-up with my terminal & keyboard and Thanking God for them! Best design, give people a basic functioning desktop to begin with. If they want more eye-candy, give them an option letting you boast about what you want the desktop to look like. There's already prompt for language, might as well add one more to the GUI (and also to the boot prompt). This is one thing MS did well in WinXP, gave some options for eye-candy based on performance and system resources. I'm not trying to be negative, but it needs work. Mandrake (before it went to Mandriva) was a good distro. Mandrake employed the most common and best options for all the software programs; making it easy for users & developers to use, while keeping an open ear for what users & developers wanted. -- Roger http://rogerx.freeshell.org/