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What is the difference between a "Linux Skin" and a full blown "Linux Distro"?
So, I've been trying my hand at compiling my own distribution over the past 6 months. Originally it started as just a fun hobby but now it has a following and quite a community has rallied around it. Although it shares virtually no similarities with any other distros, those who have seen screenshots and haven't actually used the system just say its not its own OS or Distro, it's just a Linux skin. This has constantly frustrated me, as I am forced to respond "No, its not, its much more than that! It's based on the community and what the users want!". Virtually none of the packages that are in use on the system are included default in any other distro. So, what is the difference between a Linux skin and an actual distro?
I can't speak for everyone but I consider something a "distribution" when it's different enough from the big names to stand on its own. Without knowing more about your distribution I can't say what I consider it to be.
There are a lot of unfortunately underwhelming "skins" out there that take a generic Debian or Ubuntu install, change the wallpaper and call it a "distro." I generally ignore them.
lthough it shares virtually no similarities with any other distros, those who have seen screenshots and haven't actually used the system just say its not its own OS or Distro, it's just a Linux skin. This has constantly frustrated me, as I am forced to respond "No, its not, its much more than that! It's based on the community and what the users want!".
You're not going to win over naysayers with broad generalizations like that. "What the users want" depends on which users, and they're all different. I groan every time DistroWatch adds yet another *buntu-based clone that says it's "designed to be easy for first-time Linux users." It's a favorite catch phrase that so few actually live up to.
If you want people to take your distribution seriously in its own right, trumpet the unique features it has. What does it do better than, say, Ubuntu? How so? Give details.
Quote:
Virtually none of the packages that are in use on the system are included default in any other distro. So, what is the difference between a Linux skin and an actual distro?
Kevin
Founder of Manhattan OS.
So it's what, a kernel and everything else is your own stuff? There's going to be a significant amount of overlap on any distribution considering most of them have the same core applications and a slightly different graphical style or package management system. What do you have? Please elaborate.
I can't speak for everyone but I consider something a "distribution" when it's different enough from the big names to stand on its own. Without knowing more about your distribution I can't say what I consider it to be.
There are a lot of unfortunately underwhelming "skins" out there that take a generic Debian or Ubuntu install, change the wallpaper and call it a "distro." I generally ignore them.
I tried to create a system that people could easily move over to from any other OS. Without going into to much detail, it has an office suite, photo booth, photo manager, audio editor, garageband, backup system, graphic editors, WINE, a media center, skype, frostwire, firefox and thunderbird, and the likes.
A picture can be found here
EDIT: And global menus at the top like Mac has. And I improved on that by also putting window buttons at the top that can directly control windows.
You're not going to win over naysayers with broad generalizations like that. "What the users want" depends on which users, and they're all different. I groan every time DistroWatch adds yet another *buntu-based clone that says it's "designed to be easy for first-time Linux users." It's a favorite catch phrase that so few actually live up to.
If you want people to take your distribution seriously in its own right, trumpet the unique features it has. What does it do better than, say, Ubuntu? How so? Give details.
So it's what, a kernel and everything else is your own stuff? There's going to be a significant amount of overlap on any distribution considering most of them have the same core applications and a slightly different graphical style or package management system. What do you have? Please elaborate.
I'm afraid to give to much away at this point in fear that ideas may be stolen. I know, call me paranoid, but I can't help it.
I gave a broad generalization of what it has. And the screen capture should do the system some justice.
I'm afraid to give to much away at this point in fear that ideas may be stolen. I know, call me paranoid, but I can't help it.
I gave a broad generalization of what it has. And the screen capture should do the system some justice.
Hmm. Well, unless you let your OS out into the real world for people to use and critique there's very little chance of it growing to anything other than a hobby. I look forward to seeing a final version when it's out.
Well its nearly complete, I'm shooting for a January release. I've got a good deal of followers all over the web (mainly on Facebook). I'll elaborate what I meant when I said "its a distro for the users." I listen to the input people give to me. I want them to like it, so I tinker around with it, and by listening to their input, am finding the best mix that a majority of people will enjoy. If I show people a feature and they don't like it, I'm quick on my feet to adapt to something they find suitable.
I'm afraid to give to much away at this point in fear that ideas may be stolen. I know, call me paranoid, but I can't help it.
Isn't that sort of the antithesis of what the open source community is about?
It's hard to draw a clear cut line between a "skin" as you say and a real distro. For the most part, if someone respins an Ubuntu minimal CD with different packages, I would not consider it a separate distro. But then you have something like Crunchbang, which is build off the Ubuntu Minimal CD yet is clearly a real distro as well.
Perhaps because a lot of work has gone into customizing openbox for Crunchbang, they have preconfigured pipe menus for things like screenshots via scrot, window compositing with xcompmgr, window transparency with transset. And their site has a wealth of info on setting up things like conky. So there's definitely value added.
I guess I'll call something a distro if I don't think I could do it myself.
Avant Window Navigator 0.4 (MUCH IMPROVED TASKDOCK!!!)
Calculator
Character Map (for editing keyboard layout)
Conduit Syncronizer (upload pretty much everything to another computer or to the web!)
Deja Dup Backup Utility
Disk Usage Analyzer
GNOME Do (really awesome graphical searcher)
Leafpad (notepad)
Manage Printers
Passwords
Screenlets (widgets for all)
Sweeper (like the cleanup utility for Windows)
Screenshot
Terminal (for advanced user commands)
VirtualBox (run another OS from within Manhattan)
Xournal (a note-taking utility)
Firefox Web Browser
Frostwire
Gobby Collaborative Editor
Gwibber Microblogging Client
Mozilla Thunderbird
Pidgin Instant Messenger
Skype (because everyone LOVES Skype)
OFFICE:
Dictionary
OpenOffice Database
OpenOffice Drawing
OpenOffice Formula
OpenOffice Presentation
OpenOffice Spreadsheet
OpenOffice Word Processor
Osmo (calendar, contact, and information manager)
SOUND & VIDEO
Audio CD Extractor (for ripping cds)
Cheese Webcam Both (PHOTOBOOTH!!!)
Jokosher Audio Editor (allegedly like GarageBand)
Moovida Media Center (this is awesome)
Totem Movie Player
Pitivi Video Editor (like iMovie editor)
Rhythmbox Music Player (iTunes replacement)
Sound Recorder
SYSTEM TOOLS:
Scheduled Tasks
System Profiler and Benchmark
UNIVERSAL ACCESS:
Kmag (Makes portions of the screen bigger)
Kmousetool (click repeater)
WINE:
Wine is a Windows Emulator. It helps run Windows programs natively within Linux.
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