openSUSE on Netbooks at FOSDEM 2009

At this year's FOSDEM (Free and Open Source Software Developers' European Meeting) Stefan Seyfried, who works on the openSUSE Linux distribution, gave this talk titled openSUSE on Netbooks, which is divided in three parts: netbook hardware, software and tips and tricks.

Stefan has a strong focus on trouble you may get into using a netbook like slow solid state drives, not working wireless network access, short battery life time, and limited hardware support.

Stefan also highlights problems of the user interface that arise due too smaller screen resolutions on netbooks, which may for example result in not visible buttons that are hard to access when windows cannot be resized.

To address such issues Stefan recommends to make windows resizable and make better use of the available horizontal space in full screen views. Users should file bug reports, if they run into problems, otherwise they issues may not be fixed.

In the last part Stefan recommends some best practices, including:

• If you already have a Linux installation, create an image of it and backup /etc where many of the configuration files live, before installing a new operating system.
• Try a Live CD, before installing a new OS on your hard drive, to see whether it works as it should.
• Check out Unison which is a tool for synchronizing data, if you use the netbook as a complimentary machine.
• If you can, use IMAP for email.

Stefan certainly does not sound like a netbook salesperson, which is not his job anyway, as he strikes some points, people who think about buying a netbook better be aware of. In the end it should not come as a surprise that you get what you pay for.

One thing that leaves me puzzled a bit though is way this talk is called openSUSE on Netbooks. Apart from the fact that the presenter works for openSUSE, there is really not that much specific information about this Linux distribution.

Two more things: Stefan does not actually reveal which netbook he is using for the presentation, but he mentions Acer one time when talking about his device, so it is probably the Acer Aspire One. The video of his talk can be downloaded in Ogg format.