Re: Sound after upgrade to 11.1

On Thu, 01 Jan 2009 21:19:36 -0700, Kevin Nathan typed this message:

On Fri, 02 Jan 2009 08:10:42 +0700
Good Soldier Schweik <decypher.signature@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Thu, 1 Jan 2009 10:30:51 -0700, Kevin Nathan <knathan@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

On Thu, 01 Jan 2009 10:32:05 +0700
Good Soldier Schweik <decypher.signature@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

Having done a bit of software design in the past I can tell you that
if I were to present the Finance Manager with version X of the new
accounting system that no longer recognizes leap years, for example,
he IS NOT going to say "Oh well, I guess things that used to work may
not work the new version". Quite the opposite in fact.


Oh come on -- let's not compare apples to oranges! Having sound not
working hardly compares to an accounting system ignoring basic
functionality! And many people have no problem with sound -- whereas
your example would affect everyone *without fail* regardless of their
hardware/software combinations.

It is not apples and oranges.

Yes, it is. The inability to handle leap years is *vastly* different
from the program no longer beeping on an error.

And, I've been developing software since 1979 on mini-/micro-computers
as well as mainframes. Something as small as an audio problem, on a
percentage of machines, for a non-audio-centric program would be looked
at but would have a *very* low priority compared to basic functionality
missing.



It is simply an example of a system that worked in one version and, with
no explanation, doesn't work in the next.

No it is not -- it is contrived and a bit of hyperbole besides.


All the complaints I have heard about sound and 11.1 say the same thing
- "it worked in 11.0 and I installed 11.1 and it doesn't work".


I've been using SUSE since 7.0 and have heard the same complaints at
*every* version change. Sound or video or network or some other
hardware. I've also heard the same complaints on the Windows side, as
well. I've already given examples of some things that can cause this; it
is completely unrealistic to expect *any* company (including Microsoft)
to strenuously test their OS on *every possible combination of hardware
available*. I don't understand how you cannot see that.

If the persons having the problem work on it long enough, they can
usually find the cause and possibly a solution. If they find the cause
but cannot find a solution, then they have to postpone the upgrade until
the new system catches up.


What you seem to be saying is that it is perfectly normal to provide an
application which worked in a previous version, and which the user has a
perfectly normal reason to think will work in the newer version, that
fails? And... to do this without any warning?


I'm talking OS here, not applications. There is a world of difference.
And yes, it *is* perfectly _normal_ for this to happen, but it is not
the _preferred_ result. I have no idea how they can warn about *every*
possible incompatibility without having every possible combination of
hardware on which to test.


Now, if the developers had provided a list of equipment that they had
tested and stated "this version was tested and known to work with the
following devices" it would be a completely different situation.. but
they didn't. They left the user to assume that as version 11.0 worked
the new, updated version would... and it didn't.

That would definitely be an ideal situation and I agree with it.
However, in the real world, that seldom happens, for various reasons.
It's still a case of not being able to test all hardware *combinations*.
I had three different computers running 7.0 or 7.2 (this was around
2000). They had three different AMD processors, different memory modules
and amounts, etc., but the same nVidia video card. Two of them installed
and ran X with no problems. The third one would not run X. Nothing I
could do would fix it, so I just made that one the server. On the next
upgrade, they all three worked fine. Then, on the following upgrade, two
of them lost X and audio. At that point, I was ready to purchase new
equipment anyway so I didn't try too hard to find the problem. But it
happens. Always will, no matter how hard they try to cover all cases.


*And* they are getting paid handsomely for that -- they are not doing
that in their spare time.

You really need to wake up and smell the roses. The days of Suse, for
example, being totally supported, if that was ever true, by masses of
volunteer programmers is long over.

No it is not. SUSE/Novell have a large, paid staff of developers but
they *do not* develop *all* the changes/updates to all the software.
There are thousands of programmers working on the kernel and all the
applications that do not get a paycheck from SUSE or RedHat or whomever.
Linux is *still* a largely volunteer environment.

What SUSE/Novell is doing is providing stable systems in SLES and SLED
*only* and depending on the *mostly* volunteer openSUSE for developing
and testing and integrating all the thousands of software (including the
kernel) that are out there. openSUSE is generally cutting-edge and not
meant for serious production work in huge IT departments -- SLES/SLED is
the proper choice for that market.


Do a little research, these are
companies that are making large profits or getting large grants from
somewhere. Novell, for example, recently got how many million dollars
from MS for Linux Licenses? Do you actually believe that MS is paying
all that money for the efforts of a bunch of volunteer programmers? Or
that Novell is basing a multi-million dollar business on a bunch of
volunteers?


See my previous comments. MS did *not* buy licenses to openSUSE, it's
SLES and SLED that are getting the corporate attentino. . .


Of course it is an exaggeration, deliberately made in fact, to point out
a difference between professional and un-professional programming.


Then it failed miserably because comparing an *application* that is
missing a vital piece of business logic, to an *OS* that no longer works
on a small percentage of audio cards (for whatever reason) is patently
absurd. As was the comparison of IBM *testing and certifying* a known,
and finite, group of hardware/software systems to a general OS release
to the general public. Neither one says anything about professional and
unprofessional programming.

Now, if every single person that installed the latest version had the
exact same audio problem, you would have a point -- but that is *not*
the case.


You are spending a lot of time defending a company that needs no
defense.

I'm not defending SUSE -- I say this applies to virtually every OS
release ever made, and probably every one to come, whether it be Linux,
BSD, Windows, Apple or whomever.

We use Gentoo at work for our servers and every version upgrade has
broken something. We've always been able to find out why and have been
able to fix it, but it still happens.


We all know that Suse is one of the better bistros. But read the
literally mass of complaints, all saying essentially the same thing - I
up graded and it won't work. I can't seem to fix it so am retro-grading
to 10.X or 11.0.


I have never had to retro-grade; I've always been able to figure out how
to make it work or found a way to work without it. And I don't expect
that to change no matter what distro it is. But, if the necessary
functionality is missing and can't be fixed, going back to the previous
version is the correct move. The following version may fix that problem
(and may introduce others).


As it seems highly unlikely that large numbers of users would be making
this complaint if there wasn't something really wrong with the new
version.

High numbers of users make similar complaints on every version in which
I've been watching. It is not *everyone*. If it was everyone, then your
point would be valid. I currently have two computers that I maintain at
home (two more available but no time to get them running) and two for
family and one at work. They are vastly different hardware and I have
had no problems with any of them from 10.0 to 10.1 to 10.3 to 11.0.

I suppose we can just let this lie here at this point. You will continue
to insist that if a percentage of people have problems with an OS
release then it is shoddy programming and I will continue to insist that
that isn't true unless *everyone* has the same problem.

It's been fun! :-)

Whoa, whoa there. If any vendor should have error free, highly efficient
code in its operating system it is Microsoft. MS has millions of users,
thousands of developers, millions of beta testers and they try to have a
new releases of their OS every 3-4yrs.

The sound problems are not just Suse its across distros. Every distro
using the latest PulseAudio will probably have users with a sound
problem. Ubuntu, SuSe and FC are just the most popular distros with the
most vocal users. If you have older sound chips using Intel8x0 or CMI
sound drivers chances are you won't have a problem, those with newer
sound drivers probably will have problems.

Beyond that somewhere between Kernel 2.6.27 and SuSe 11.1 there are
inconsistencies. I use the Gnome Desktop with some KDE4 applets, and
there's no GDM-Setup, the simple gdm --version command generates errors
and fails to display the version, running Kate works but dumps a page of
what looks like debug messages, etc., etc.

I've read and now agree that 11.1 was designed primarily for the
corporate desktop, because quite a number of configuration utilities and
applets are missing or have features crippled.
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: [SLE] opensuse 10.1, sound card is working but no sound with KsCD and other appl.
    ... When I was installing Suse 10.1 from CD's the sound did not worked. ... everybody's hardware is different. ... functionality of every mixer, including QAmix, while no other mixers are ...
    (SuSE)
  • Re: 11.1 Blown Patches
    ... Took the drive out, put it in a windows PC, and the sound there didnt work either. ... there's trouble trying to run Xandros on it also. ... And, not to exclude the hardware, but I only tried the new mthbd because I was already having so much trouble with Suse 11.1, and wonder how they didnt pick up on how KDEE 4 was buggy also. ...
    (alt.os.linux.suse)
  • Re: Dell inspiron 700m with linux
    ... Well, I was able to get sound from Mandriva 10.1, but some of my other ... hardware doesn't work. ... The distro that I liked the best was SUSE 9.3, ...
    (comp.os.linux.misc)
  • Re: !p+, and thank you Jeff
    ... traditional Forth programmers, ... It is why our hardware can be simpler and our software can ... It was fun trying to write small and fast ... ANS Forth looks the way it does is because of Pentium ...
    (comp.lang.forth)
  • Re: Sound after upgrade to 11.1
    ... I've been using SUSE since 7.0 and have heard the same complaints at ... of hardware available*. ... There are thousands of programmers working on the kernel and all the ... Linux is *still* a largely volunteer environment. ...
    (alt.os.linux.suse)