Java for use in Firefox and Open Office - which packages to download?

[Art Alexion]

On Friday 19 December 2008 11:03:02 am Billie Walsh wrote:
> Up front, I don't care for the Gnome desktop. I prefer KDE [ DUH! I
> guess that's why I'm on the Kubuntu list ].

Well, they each have their pluses and minuses.  I find more gnome stuff works 
as intended than kde, but I prefer the KDE apps and the greater control I 
have over how I use KDE.


>
> On the other hand there are a few aps that are gnome that I prefer over
> the KDE counterpart. One that I use frequently is "gftp".

The two I can think of right now are, synaptic over adept, and tsclient over 
krdp.  

But I only rarely use synaptic or adept for searching and always use aptitude 
for actual package management.  Once you have gotten used to a cli package 
manager and its speed, you never want to use a gui again.  I can run and 
update/upgrade on the command line in close to the time it just takes the gui 
to load.

And I have rdesktop scripts that sort of replace the nice tsclient interface.


>
> I guess I just don't understand. What is all the fuss over having a few
> gnomish bits installed?

Ah, perhaps you misunderstand.  Disk space is cheap.  I don't care about 
having the "gnomish bits installed", I just don't want to load them into 
memory if I don't need to.  If Firefox is built against gnome instead of 
merely gtk+, it loads gnome, in addition to the already running KDE, every 
time you use it.  If you get Firefox from the Mozilla site, it is built 
against GTK+ and doesn't require actually running gnome.


>
> If that's how you want to run your computer that's fine. Choices is part
> of what Linux is all about. I'm just curious is all.

Hope I answered your questions.

I think the "konqueror is the web browser" philosophy is the reason there is 
no Kubuntu Firefox, and instead the repos install the gnome-built version.

/opt and /usr/local are your friends when you want to use stuff your distro 
doesn't provide.  I also recommend that you put them on separate partitions 
if you don't want to lose them with new installs.  Unfortunately it is tough 
to guess how big or small to make those partitions.



-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 307 bytes
Desc: This is a digitally signed message part.
URL: <https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/kubuntu-users/attachments/20081219/f92a0a56/attachment.sig>