[OpenIndiana-discuss] distribution constructor for making OI spins?

[Chris]

On 2021-01-20 04:09, Tim Mooney via openindiana-discuss wrote:
> In regard to: Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] distribution constructor for 
> making...:
> 
>> I would love to have XFCE.
>> 
>> But as I know, the OI devs will not package other DEs. They stay royal to 
>> MATE.
>> 
>> You can't found any other DE's packages on the repo.
> 
> You might want to review the mailing list archives for this mailing list
> to get a clearer understanding of why that is.  It's been discussed
> before.
> 
> If you or Chris or someone else builds an entire desktop environment
> like Cinnamon and publishes a repo that is kept up to date, I would
> definitely give it a try, at least in a VM.  If someone does this and
> keeps it up to date for a long time and continues to contribute to OI,
> I would probably use that as my main desktop environment.
> 
> Just building it once, without a commitment to keeping it updated, isn't
> good for anyone, though.
TBH The only reason OI isn't my "daily driver" is the DE available. If I
had XFCE (what I currently use), or better, Cinnamon. I'd have a hard time
not using OI. Overall I like it better. But I'm (currently) pretty well
committed to FreeBSD as maintainer of some 160 ports, and I create
installs for all my servers && clients. I've been on BSD since Bill Joy
forked 386BSD, and hacked on various NIX' before that. But if I could
cobble up an OI I could justify as a "daily driver", and something I could
recommend to my clients. I'd make the switch.
Which brings me to why I initiated this thread. Since I need commitment
to justfy *my* commitment. I thought I'd send out a "feeler" to see if
there was any interest. Appears I'm not the only one. So I'm going to
"take the plunge". I'll start gathering all the information I need to get
all the dots in a line, so I can start production. Any pointers to help
shorten the trajectory would be *greatly* appreciated. As well as keeping
the wiki working. ;-)

Thanks for the feedback!

--Chris
P.S. To be clear. I don't want to create an OI "fork". I intend to keep
this inline w/OI. IOW It *is* OI, but with a different, or more DE choice(s).

> 
> Tim
> 
>> There are packages for many window manager, though.
>> 
>> You have to do pretty much anything yourself, with your own repo publisher.
>> 
>> BTW, at least I know XFCE is possible on Illumos. Tribblix's default 
>> desktop is XFCE.
>> 
>> I don't have much hope about Cinnamon. But if you can bring it up, I would 
>> love to have it, too.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> ---- On Wed, 20 Jan 2021 13:55:13 +0700 Chris <oidev at bsdos.info> wrote ----
>> 
>> > Well I was finally able to get OI on one of my spares.
>> > I wanted to do so, so that I could start adding/upgrading
>> > some OI packages. As I began looking at the process I
>> > stumbled on distribution-constructor and thought; why
>> > not build up some additional desktop installs. I had
>> > intended to build both the Xfce4 and Cinnamon desktop
>> > packages anyway. So why not ask to see if the any
>> > OI users/developers/caretakers would be interested in
>> > providing xfce4 or cinnamon desktop ISO and USB images.
>> > Would something like this be of any interest?
>> > If so. I'll start building all the necessary bits straight
>> > away.
>> >
>> > Thanks for your feedback.
>> >
>> > --Chris
>> > --
>> >

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