[Input Needed] Sabayon 5 Brainstorm

[Thev00d00]

Hello creatives!

Obviously we are plodding along with our 4.x releases for a while yet, but I want to hear / see what you guys are looking for in the future iterations of everyones favorite Gentoo based distro?

Personally for gnome, I would like a dock and conky as default with a funky wallpaper of some type, but this isnt about me, its about you guys!

Create mock ups, links to cool stuff, paste wallpapers you like, icon sets, cool UIs, whats good and bad with currently releases? etc etc.

Here is my Sabayon 5 Gnome mock up:

Feel free to add stuff you want, stuff you dont.

[R3MF]

i'd like a dock too.

however i'm a KDE/windows guy so i'd like the dock at the top of the screen.

other than that, it mostly comes down to applications.

i'd like Sabayon 5 to ship with OpenCL compliant drivers, at least for ATI/Nvidia.

i'd like it to be completely KDE4 with no apps or systems tools using KDE3, obviously not for the Gnome version.

[kodiakmax]

i'd like it to be completely KDE4 with no apps or systems tools using KDE3, obviously not for the Gnome version.

That's not a bad idea. By the time Sabayon5 is ready to roll; KDE4 should be pretty much ready for mainstream use and mostly bug free i'd think.

[Stupot]

I think what I would really love for Sabayon 5 would be if we had choices of pre-packaged entire themes. Some people like dark themes, some people like lighter themes, and changing everything around so it's just right takes quite a while. It would be really awesome if we had multiple designs that contained the entire themes, whether it's just the background and icons, or if it even included things like docks and their placements, conky etc. Just one simple click for you to choose which theme you want installed as your default out of the choices and going forward from there.

Clearly this would involve a lot more work, as we would need multiple great themes and to devise a way for people to select which one they want, but I think it could be a worthwhile enhancement.

[DanySK]

I think it would be great to have a updating "white list" for newbies, avoiding them to do critical updates (grub, kernels, drivers). I think just a double package.mask file selectable from equo/spritz would be already sufficient, for an experienced user who wants a bleeding-edge distro should be not a problem to change an option.

[dunsurfin]

A large "read me first" that contains instructions on updating and warns of possible pitfalls.

[WarraWarra]

Yup the readme same as pclinuxos has once you open up firefox it is there.

Beginner / advanced experience:
Could even be able to have a beginners and advanced option that can be enabled as is needed inside the gui. should someone need to fix something technical / in advanced and back to basic / beginner to keep things safe.

Multi use / function dvd / iso:
Possibly have a multi os dvd same as now and then be able to split off say only example: UMPC or run a command that makes a UMPC cd .iso of say 300mb from main 5.0 dvd for those that only need that.
Should be able to do this using funtoo / metro ie: freshen and build and user can use k3b to burn or can be automated with latest downloaded packages inserted into this .iso .

Blocks / modules of grouped software:
Would likely need to have say a block or module containing only games or only handheld devices or only media centre block that can be added or maintained independently from base or cd sized 5.0.
ie: should you want the base + games = 5.0 server + gui and basics "mc nano .... and then run "equo install games" or download games.squashfs.bz2 to distfiles and "emerge sabayonlinux-games"

Updating / rolling release:
Likely this way you can deal with either a fix in base 5.0 cd or only error in games bundle + xdelta or similar "metro freshen" to fix or even run torrent + 5.0 broken .iso and new md5 = download only needed missing 1% or 2% that has been fixed ? and only update broken parts instead of complete new version / subversion release "rolling release"

Distcc / similar entropy:
Would be nice if we can have the distcc type thing so when screensaver runs users help build SL packages or during sleep = activate distcc type thing and help build packages. User only sets up / down speeds and max cpu usage at say 30% or 50% or it is auto user has priority niceness if they choose to help = active this option / program / entropy advanced option.

Hardware support:
We will have to keep in mind just like my laptop is dual core 32 bit / 2 years old and too slow users would upgrade to at least a quad core laptop / desktops, the avg. user will upgrade to minm. 2x or 4x cpu, 4 x quad or 4x 6 core or 4x 8 core if Intel actually delivers in October this year + at least 1 or 2 nvidia / AMD sli gpu's or even this cuda nvidia thing might become more default pc by the time 5.0 is here.

3G and 4G modems and other mobility devices should become more useful and available and or integrated into new devices so might want to look into adding related modules / software or having it available soon that is not yet supported.
If the intel Atom becomes main stream we will likely have to build a SL MCE and standard SL version once this takes off but could be later.

Install:
How about we have a choice during install to do a default what is on the dvd install or do the old gentoo thing where it actually downloads & builds the system from .bz2 or bin packages so by the time it is installed all software is up-to-date as this will get rid of a lot of bugs and give the iso's a longer life span , then once the updated becomes more than say 300mb or 500mb we release a new 5.1 or 5.2 .
We will be able to get rid of a lot of user installed problem this way hopefully by just updating the installer to fix issues.
IE: get a basic working nice environment and then select slow but up-to-date or default dvd install and update later while still have server and UMPC small footprint basic version or full hard core install for those that wants to get into the new version faster.

Live cd /dvd / Live usb:
The pages saved on ftp://ftp.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/distrib ... allGuides/ "HOWTO_build_a_LiveCD_from_scratch.htm" , "HOWTO_Gentoo_LiveCD_and_LiveUSB.htm" has all the scripts to build and update the iso's , maybe we can tweak some of them to once a month "crontab" update / rolling release the iso's and date them to 4.1G-april09 or 4.1G-may09 for gnome or kde and instead of using portage use entropy.

[Thev00d00]

A minimal install CD was planned for 4.1 think a week after KDE it should be here! Lythandrel is working on that so you will have to ask her!

[chickpea]

These are all great suggestions, how about full drive encryption option? Or at least home partition encryption option as part of base install, ala debian/Ubuntu. Sure not perfect, but would make it easier for us laptop users to use best practices safety.

[Thev00d00]

Ooo I like that one. /me adds to the fabio todo list