Personal suggestion for fixing the Linux situation

[David C.]

> Let me explain again.  You take the most minimalist possible Linux.  As
> little gui tools as possible.  You take the distro that has the least
> possible tweaking of any applications.  Then you try to find out:  do
> virtual desktops work here?  Are all fonts visible here?  Does the editor
> crash here?
>
> If it works fine, you have learned something important.  You know that it is
> something at a higher level than this that is causing the problem.  So you
> start adding stuff, one thing at a time.  Eventually you can tie it down.
> Or it may be that in Slackware, it just works.  Then you know it is in other
> distro tweaks and customizations.
>
> This is not about what we use for goodness' sake!  I don't use Slackware any
> more (though I would for servers).  This is about systematically tying down
> what it is that is causing the problems, going through and eliminating
> possible causes one after the other.
>
> I don't mind the command line and editing text files at all, but its not
> something that I want to do in my regular working system.  But there is no
> other way of getting as close to bare metal as you can, and there is no
> other way of eliminating most of the possible sources of the problems than
> getting down to bare metal.

Oh, I understood what you are attempting completely before commenting...
I was just tossing out a few good natured jabs based on past personal
experiences and the impending "fun" you are setting up for. It's been
a long time since I've used the shell for much of anything important,
much less actually attempting to bootstrap a distro up from scratch
again...

Haven't gone down that path since around version 7 or maybe 8 of the
old Mandrake offerings and I'm happy to say so. :)

I did finally get around to wiping the drive on my laptop and
installing the latest Ubuntu last evening. Maybe I can get back in the
swing and be of some sort of help eventually.

Best regards,
David C.