Siduction "Desperado": cutting edge Debian distro

[chamaecyparis]

So-called Unstable Debian impresses me via the distro known as siduction

e.g. current kernel = [cpp]sid@sid:~$ uname -r
3.5-0.towo-siduction-686[/cpp]

It is the first time I have seen the browser Midori suit my needs, as well.

It is well worth checking out. I suggest trying either the LXDE or razor-qt versions.

Cheers!

 

[powerhouse32]

Thanks for this short intro to siduction. How does it fare in terms of ease of installation and how do you accomplish LVM installation, Xen hypervisor etc.?

The reason I'm asking is that I'm open to try new distros because the regular distros such as Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Fedora and the likes put up some challenges in getting a Xen hypervisor to work with VGA passthrough from a Windows VM (or domU in Xen talk). I know some people have managed to make it work in both Debian and Fedora, but both of them have their downsides in usability compared to Linux Mint, for example. I'm talking of multimedia codecs (Debian and Fedora ship without proprietary codecs - Linux Mint has them included), Flash player, proprietary drivers (Nvidia, for example), or the GUI. Fedora gives me fits with its selinux and the GUI, and in Debian I also have some tough time getting all the stuff in place. In comparison, Linux Mint suits my GUI needs as well as applications and codecs, but it does give me a hard time to get Xen working with VGA passthrough to run a Windows VM (domU) with direct access to the GPU.

So I'm looking for a way to combine the Linux Mint Maya GUI and applications/codecs with a Windows 7 VM that has to support VGA passthrough to have direct access to the GPU. The drives must be formatted to LVM, too.

I know this is not everybody's need but in my case there is no other way except dual-boot, which I hate like hell. I do have the hardware to support this, except the video card which may be questionable in terms of VGA passthrough support (PNY Quadro 600 Nvidia card).

So, do you have any opinion on this distro with regard to Xen hypervisor support? Having the latest Debian could help in supporting Xen.

 

[chamaecyparis]

Your question seems to be a common concern involving Xen on Debian(e.g. see http://forums.debian.net/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=80927 ), about which I know virtually nada. <LOL> This ignorance probably won't last long, though. (Suggest looking to that or another IT forum for details). Therefore, no opinion is forthcoming in this regard.

LVM is always available ( http://manual.siduction.org/en/part-lvm-en.htm ), as are graphics drivers ( http://manual.siduction.org/en/gpu-en.htm ).

Yes, one still has to get into the CLI (the script smxi -- http://smxi.org -- helps but is not a panacea) regarding proprietary packages like w32codecs and flashplugin-nonfree, but we're talking something all GNU/Linux users should become proficient in using, are we not? Updating sources.list files (smxi has a handy option to compile all files within sources.list.d folder into this one file called "restore sources.list") and upgrading within the console without a Display Manager using apt-get ONLY is highly recommended for "Unstable" siduction. But, then again, its manual is one of the best around (as is aptosid's) and having the latest packages available is a serious plus. (You are correct in the latter). Such is the nature of the beast! Enjoy!

BTW, I commend your efforts to become Pane-Free!

 

[skittle]

I'm talking of multimedia codecs (

its 2012, do you really have videos that cant be decoded without w32codec?

 

[Pyroflea]

Interesting, although an unstable Debian distro does seem to go against the entire philosophy of Debian itself

 

[chamaecyparis]

Interesting, although an unstable Debian distro does seem to go against the entire philosophy of Debian itself

If I were so inclined, I would bet siduction is more stable than ubuntu 12.04 !