It looks like there are some really ominous things in the future of my favourite distro: Mandriva. This comes on the back of Silver Bullet biting it. But the signs are there, first:
Mandriva up for sale
and now:
KDE maintainer leaves
Things aren’t looking so good for the reliable and easy to use Mandriva. I hope that they pull through this. I’ve tried Ubuntu and a few other distros, but Mandriva is still the one I use the most.
I hope this Mandriva forum poster is correct.
Mandriva’s present situation, if we really do appreciate this distribution’s capabilities, we shouldn’t panic. We need to realize that, although opensource in nature, Mandriva itself must attain some kind of financial independence and a secure one at that. Having your community panic is just one other hurdle to deal with. While not saying that Mandriva is not the creator of its present demise, I think that we should also shoulder part of the blame for the lack of advertising of the great distribution that it is to the public at large. The Ubuntu community does not seem to have problems extolling the virtues of their distro on various message boards and comment sections of magazines. We should also be doing the same. Getting the name out in circulation lends itself well in the viability of a distro’s survival.
I have tried other distros and still find Mandriva one of the most “user experience” distros around. It just needs more publicity to create that demand. I intend to stick with it till it degrades to the point where it becomes an un-trustable distro. Which it is not at this point.
Let’s keep our cool and keep contributing as a good and helpful community that we are.