Mainstream Linux Desktop ?


Recommended Posts

Personally, one of the reasons I made the switch to linux properly (a couple of years ago now) was because of media capabilities. With windows, I was forever having problems with getting videos to play, getting the right codecs, getting overlays to work properly, fiddling with directshow filters, etc. etc. I found this so much easier on Gentoo - everything just worked straight off right "out of the box" (not that there is a "box" with gentoo, but you know what i mean). Mplayer simply works, and works well. It is the most powerful media player I have ever had the pleasure of using, and it can do pretty much anything you want it to. Bad index on an AVI file? no problem, it can reindex it for you. On windows, I'd have to download something like divfix to do this. Sound out of synch? no problem, you can adjust the audio/visual delay on the fly. No media player I ever used in windows was capable of that.

IE - well, I use Firebird anyway, so I think the OS is a moot point here (you can get firebird for most common OSes). HTML help? My gnome help browser has all the features of html help, and it works pretty well. And anyway, support forums are better help than static html any day of the week :)

I have never had any real codec problems in Windows. Though I have one with MPlayer in Linux - the QuickTime codec doesn't play all the files correctly (and my camera uses it). I can watch The Matrix Trailers perfectly, but Three Dead Trolls In A Baggie (http://www.deadtroll.com) "Internet Helpdesk" video is not shown correctly (sound is ok). In Windows it displays correctly.

OK, WMP and IE are probably a subject of personal preference.

I like WMP because it is easy and has quite intelligent playlist feature (it automatically creates playlists and sorts your music files in the library, so I don't have to spend time searching for a specific media file from my disks), which I have not seen anywhere else.

IE in my opinion is the only browser that displays most pages correct (there are exceptions, but not as many as Opera or Mozilla have), and the full-screen is awsome - everything you need is present and easy to hit, but still small enough not to bother you).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

IE in my opinion is the only browser that displays most pages correct

The problem is, IE doesn't display some "W3C standards compliant" pages correctly, so web page authors have gotten in the habit of coding to IE's quirks, which means that browsers that DO follow the standards don't display those pages the way the authors intended (although they ARE displaying them according to the standards).

IE is the broken one, not Mozilla, etc.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The problem is, IE doesn't display some "W3C standards compliant" pages correctly, so web page authors have gotten in the habit of coding to IE's quirks, which means that browsers that DO follow the standards don't display those pages the way the authors intended (although they ARE displaying them according to the standards).

IE is the broken one, not Mozilla, etc.

Actually, I was talking from the point of standards. I know that IE uses some additional Microsoft standards, but generally it is W3C standards compilant. Mozilla and Opera have (had) some problems with that (at least in my experience). If you can give me some examples of IE not being compilant with W3C standards, let me know.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If you can give me some examples of IE not being compilant with W3C standards, let me know.

* Handling of .png graphics.

* Interpreting a document specified as text as HTML, if it think it looks like HTML (this is bad when you want it to show it as text, so the code can be shown on the screen as an example).

That's off the top of my head, in addition to what stormtrooper posted.

If you want, please google, and I am sure you will find more.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

crashes all the time? buggy? never had a problem with amsn and I use it all the time...

perhaps you're missing a dependancy or something?

Agree with you there.

I use aMSN for my poor Microsoft-dependant friends. ;) It has performed flawlessly with me. It looks like the Microsoft version, but wiht a penguin added. Much more aesthetically pleasing than adding it into gaim. :yes:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.