Yesterday I installed Mandrake Linux 9.1 in my home computer. Mandrake is the distribution I’m using since I decided to have a dual-boot system at home to experiment with Linux so that I could make it my primary platform in the future. The first version I used was 8.0, which didn’t remain installed for a long time in my computer as 8.1 was released not much later after I started using 8.0, with lots of new and interesting features. For some time I had Red Hat installed as a third system, due to its wide usage, but after some time I opted to have just one Linux system to avoid spending extra time managing two different distributions with all their idiosyncrasies. Mandrake has proved to be more than sufficient for all my needs, both as a developer and as a common user. Something I was found interesting about Mandrake Linux is that its intermediary releases are usually as feature complete as the main releases, where the version number changes. Often, those intermediary releases contain so many significant changes that they warrant an immediate upgrade. So, version 8.1 was not a small incremental improvement to version 8.0, but it had a pretty impressive list of new features. Although, quite incidentally, it broke an important Linux functionality as shown later.
Version 9.1 follows the same philosophy, and is considerably different from the previous release, both in the upgrade of various applications to newer releases and in the addition of new features. And although those kinds of changes are not uncommon in open source packages, their quality and extent, in core parts of the distribution, would certainly have justified a new version number in most of the other Linux distributions.
The evolutions are visible right in the installation procedure that, even though it was already the most friendly of all Linux distributions I have used, became even simpler. In the previous releases, the installation could be done in two modes: expert, which was more sophisticated and had more advanced options; and recommended, which would take most decisions automatically in the user’s behalf. The new installation procedure unifies the two modes in a new and straightforward set of options that lose none of the power and flexibility of the former expert mode. In some instances, common tasks are automated in a way that doesn’t prevent a power user from tweaking the system as he wants, but accelerate the process for any user — formatting, for instance, is automatically done in a clean install; in previous versions the user would always have to approve the choices made by the installer regardless of the installation type. The advances in other parts of the installation procedure as disk partitioning and hardware recognition are also noteworthy. All in all, the final result of those changes is that the time it takes to install a Mandrake system was greatly reduced. It took me less than one hour to get my system running, and most of this time was spent choosing what packages I would install and copying and installing those files to the disk. And I had no gigantic service packs to install either.
In the big picture, the most significant changes in this new release are those that took place in some of the core system components. Apache 2.0 replaced the venerable 1.3 release common to most distributions. Also, MySQL 4.0 was chosen instead of MySQL 3.23 as the former at last achieved shipping stability. Finally, XFree86 4.3 is now the default windowing system replacing the usual XFree86 3.3.6 release in the previous versions. Those changes make Mandrake Linux one of the most complete and up to date distributions today. The inclusion of those new packages is also consistent with the current trends in open source solutions.
As Mandrake is also geared towards desktop users, the changes in the distribution’s desktop environments are also quite interesting. The upgrade of KDE and Gnome to their current versions (3.1 and 2.0 respectively; they were introduced in the previous versions and upgrade in this new release) are a good step in the direction of making Mandrake an even more viable alternative to Windows since those environments, in that versions, are much more stable and usable them their previous incarnations. Also, following Red Hat’s strategy, Madrake Linux introduces a new theme common to KDE and Gnome, called Mandrake Galaxy that provides a friendly, pleasant, and consistent interface in both environments, which is also much more useful to end-users. The use of new anti-aliased fonts is another positive step in creating an interface superior to similar offerings from other distributions.
Two other big advancements in this new release, which can further help Mandrake in the desktop arena, are supermount and dynamic desktops. Supermount makes easy to use CD and floppy disks, automatically mounting them when the media is inserted in the drive. It was available in previous versions, but it has not worked properly for most people since version 8.1, forcing many users to deal with the subtleties of Linux’s auto-mounting file systems. Dynamic desktop is the automatic recognition, with a subsequent insertion of a desktop icon, of external devices as USB hardware and web cams, making simple to use them.
Also present in Mandrake Linux are various office packages, and applications for general use, including the newest versions of OpenOffice and Mozilla. I’ve been using OpenOffice in Windows since it’s first complete release, as I don’t own Microsoft Office, and I’m very satisfied with it. Granted, I’m a very basic user since I don’t have complex needs and I use few of the program resources. Nevertheless, everything I’ve used until now has worked quite well and I can easily exchange files with Microsoft users. The distribution also features a bunch of multimedia applications ranging from image editors to MP3 players.
Another point I always appreciate in Mandrake Linux is the plentiful availability of simple, but interesting games. This version is even better. 
There are a lot of different types of games, including board, card, strategy, and 3D games. I’m not a great user of PC games, but I’m pretty much content with those that came with Linux. For the other games, I can always go back to Windows until game makers decide to target Linux.
For developers, Mandrake Linux has, besides Apache 2.0 and MySQL 4.0, recent versions of the most widespread programming languages for the system. PHP 4.3.0, Perl 5.8.0, Python 2.2.2, and a great bunch of their libraries can be found in the distribution along with GCC 3.2.2. Emacs, Vim, and KDevelop are also featured in current versions intended to please all kinds of programmers. Obviously, as it’s the case with all Linux distributions, there are hundreds of other development packages to choose from.
In the server arena, the common applications are also present in the modern versions, and the main advantage is that many of them can be directly configured from the Mandrake Control Center, the Mandrake Linux’s equivalent of Windows’ Control Panel. The Mandrake Control Center makes service management simple, providing a central location to find many of them. The distribution also features a wide selection of complementary applications to help with server installations like anti-spam software SpamAssassin.
Finally, the distribution has excellent security resources, including automatic security levels ranging from Standard to Paranoid, which configure and protect the system without the need of user intervention. There is also a firewall application that can be easily configured from the Mandrake Control Center.
All those resources make this Mandrake Linux release an attractive choice to all kinds of users. Although, as a Linux distribution, it still has a long way to go (if it survives), this new version is, in my opinion, the best Mandrake Linux version I’ve seen so far, not because it’s new, but because it’s complete and polished. It’s certainly one of the better offerings in today’s operating system market. Obviously, I’m still getting to know it, but I had almost no disappointments with Mandrake releases in the past, and I’m sure this one won’t be different.
My intention, as I previously said, is to turn Linux in my primary platform as soon as possible. Today, the only problem with this is that I lack a modem that works under Linux. Although hardware support has been getting better, as this release shows, it’s still very hard to get modems working under any distribution. I’ve tried four different modems, with drives varying from experimental to beta, and none worked in a newer kernel. Here in Brazil, most modems are controllerless, which severely limits my options. My current modem has an Intel chipset for which there is no Linux driver, although one has been promised as “coming real soon now” for a long time already.
Another problem for Linux, although it doesn’t completely hinder its use as a primary plataform, is the lack of good TrueType fonts for it. Its current fonts are very inadequate, and, in some instances, plainly unusable. The common ones, like Courier and Times New Roman, look like they are always bold in sizes above 12pt and, to make things worse, real bold and italic almost always look garbled when applied to a document. The user can disable the default anti-aliasing but that turns many fonts nearly unreadable. Sometime ago, I read that a very know font maker would be releasing some of its fonts under a open source license specially geared to Linux users, but I haven’t heard much more on the subject since. If such thing would happen, it would be another huge step towards an even better Linux desktop.
All things considered, Mandrake Linux once more proves itself to be a modern, accessible, and friendly distribution with excellent resources that make it a great alternative to companies and common users alike. I’d give this distribution nine out of ten both as a desktop and server system.