January 14, 2007 at 15:06:17

The Linux Project part III

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By Robert Raitz (about the author) Page 2 of 2 page(s)

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The downside of PHLAK 0.21 look is no screen savers. While this might be seen as nit picky, when you consider that PHLAK 0.21 will not compile any of the numerous screen saver options available from the net, it's a downright shame. The simple addition of even one screen saver would have added to the cool of PHLAK 0.21, especially if it was war themed. For whatever reason, be it economy of setup, or just lack of concern about something as mundane and "uncool" as a screen saver, the makers of PHLAK just couldn't bring themselves to put something in there for the not-so-geeky among us. Hell, don't they know even geeks like pretty designs on their screens?

So, for the fourth criterion, look and feel, I have to give PHLAK 0.21 two and a half stars. I'd have given it three and a half if installing a screen saver had even been possible. While such trivialities may be meaningless when one considers the purpose for PHLAK's existence, the fact that PHLAK 0.21 can't even live up to its supposed purpose of Internet mischief lets me know that PHLAK 0.21 was a good idea that fell way short of its goal. My hope is that if they do a new release, they will take the time to clean the bugs and include the libraries to make installing a screen saver a reality.

On the fifth criterion, overall impression of the distribution, I have to give PHLAK two stars. The fact that its installation is straight forward and easy as well as the fact that PHLAK 0.21finds all the devices installed is far overshadowed by many of its patent annoyances. Although it gets good marks in both installation and device support, the fact that the other areas are so grossly deficient just renders the good marks pretty much non-existent. The bad points were simply too bad to be outweighed by the good points, even though those good points were the highest on my scale.

For many years, UNIX was the backbone of the Internet. Many sites refuse to use anything else. The fact that a UNIX based operating system can't even get on the Internet without training wheels is not a good thing. If just invoking the "dhclient" daemon were enough to get you there, I'd have been a bit more forgiving. However, the fact that the supplied web browser ties up when that daemon is in operation shows a lack of consideration for the operation of the system. The addition of the fact that the "dhclinet" daemon also renders other parts of the O/S unstable makes me wonder who did testing for PHLAK 0.21, and what kind of drugs they were on at the time.

Since the purpose of these reviews is to give the newbie a heads up, I can say that if you are a neophyte, take the advice PHLAK offers on its version 0.3release and, "[start] with a more user friendly [distribution]."

While it installs with real ease, I can't see a first timer getting anywhere with PHLAK. 0.21. It's a real bug-fest! I can't believe they even allowed it to get out to real people. If they are putting it out specifically for hackers, maybe hackers can put up with the problems inherent in PHLAK 0.21. However, even hackers might like a nifty screen saver to come up while they are away doing something else. In my opinion, an operating system should make a computer operate. PHLAK 0.21 barely achieves that goal. In the process, it irritates folks like me who expect their computer to work in a marginally acceptable fashion upon operating system installation. If only by virtue of the irritation factor, PHLAK 0.21 should keep users away in droves.

Perhaps that's exactly what the guys who created it had in mind.

Blessed be!
Pappy

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