Dancing with Wolves, a Wolvix Hunter 1.1.0 Review
By Todd Robinson, Systems Devlopment Engineer
for Webpath Technologies and On-Disk.com
7 Aug, 2007
With the release of Wolvix Hunter 1.1.0 the wolves are loose, and they are a pleasure to hunt with!
Introduction
Predictable things begin to happen with Linux distributions as newer technologies become available.
- The big get even bigger because they can easily include these technologies.
- The small get even smaller because people tend to flock to the newer technologies which smaller distributions find harder to incorporate with fewer participants. Eventually they either fall out of existence after becoming obsolete, or hang on with updates but without really gaining much more of a following.
- Some smaller distribution will surprise everyone and not conform to this normal pattern. They will either go "cutting edge" and beat the big guys to the punch, or address a need that is not addressed, or not addressed well, within the larger distributions. Last year it was Sabayon and Linux Mint who heaped on extra functionality, and GoblinX with it's amazing artwork. So far this year it's Wolvix.
When Kenneth (aka Wolven) submitted Wolvix Hunter and Cub 1.1.0 to us here at On-Disk.com it was nice to see he had a new release, but I had not expected more than some updates to the existing model. Then, as I did the normal double checking that is done when we prepare to post a new release, I found that this was a serious jump from previous releases based on Slax. The new version is based on Slackware itself and the Linux-Live Scripts. I also noticed a great software management tool called "Gslapt", which makes adding, removing, and updating software extremely easy. This piqued my curiosity so I decided I needed to take a closer look.
Live
Wolvix is a Live distribution, meaning that you put the disc into the computer and turn it on and it will run from just a CD as if it were installed on your computer. It's from this LiveCD that you can install Wolvix or just use it from the CD. Live CD or DVDs run a little slower because optical drives are slower than hard drives. Although this holds true for Wolvix as well, you might find that when Wolvix is running from the LiveCD it's at least as fast, or even faster, than your currently installed operating system.
After Wolvix was booted, and I logged in with the usual username and password combination of root/toor, I took a look around. All my hardware was detected and installed correctly. I opened a few applications, and everything was rather snappy even though it was running from the LiveCD. I opened Gslapt and looked at everything that is installed. I was happy to find it was ready to play DVDs and had multimedia codecs already installed.
I opened Firefox and found something even nicer. Not only was I online, but nearly every browser plugin under the sun is already installed. Flash, Java, media (including Real Player, Quicktime, Windows Media Player, and even Scalable Vector Graphics support.
I checked in the file manager. The USB stick I had forgotten to remove was showing up, and I was able to easily access the files on it. I looked into the "media" folder and found entries for both a primary and secondary hard drive, and they were already mounted and ready to access. For a live system, having access to all my normal drives without any extra effort on my part was wonderful.
I had noticed Wolvix Hunter 1.1.0 has dosbox installed. I think this may be the first time I have ever seen this already installed on a Live desktop. Since I could access my hard drive I opened my all time favorite DOS game, Pirates! Gold. I, of course, played a sea battle or two then got back to checking out Wolvix.
One of the best aspects of Wolvix for me personally is that most of the software included is what I normally choose to use, so I personally think the software selection is excellent.
Conclusion: As a Live, Internet-Ready distribution Wolvix is very nice and gets the job done without a lot of messing around. As a multimedia-ready distribution Wolvix is one of the very best.
Thus far I had been very impressed and decided to install Wolvix on the secondary drive.
Installation
To install Wolvix,select the Wolvix Control Panel from the System menu and select HD-Install, As you can see from the image above, you have several choices. I wanted to get the full effect so selected the full install.
I was immediately greeted with the following warning message:
The warning message appears to more of a "if it kills your computer for any reason don't blame me" disclaimer so I pressed on.
There was a previous Linux installation on this disc, so I didn't need to create any partitions. The only things I had to do in the window below were to select the Swap partition, which was optional, and check the box to install GRUB, the boot loader that will let Wolvix load when the computer comes on.
I hit the Start Install button and was off to the races. From here there wasn't anything else to do. I watched as the installer gave info about what it was doing and watched the progress.
After copying files for only 7 minutes it declared it was finished and presented the following screen: (sorry, I didn't get the screen expanded to show all the text)
I thought this was nice. Normally I prefer to start with the command line, but this time I selected GUI because that is what most others select, and I noticed in the Control Panel that I can switch it any time I want.
The next option was also a nice touch. There were times when having a full screen high resolution command line to work with would have been nice. But I've finally become friends with the normal console so I kept the Standard Console selection.
Another somewhat comical screen popped up. I understand that it will allow for other options if you have multiple distributions installed in different partitions, but found the directions to check it and name it even if I don't know what I'm doing a little comical.
I checked the box, named it WolvixHunter1.1.0 (because the instructions say no white space, and usually there is a reason when such instructions exist) and hit the Ok button.
I then got a small window saying it was complete and to restart. I followed the instructions and booted to a nearly identical login prompt where I again used the username/password combination of root/toor to login.
Setup
Now that it was installed I had a few choices. I opted to just change the root password and always login as root. Many feel it is breach in security, or safety, but I'm used to being in the root environment and prefer it. Yes, a few programs refuse to run under the root user, but if I can't run them as root without risking harm to my system I prefer not to use them at all. To change the root password I simply had to open the Wolvix Control Panel under the system menu and just select the option to change the password (see below). I was prompted to enter the username, I entered root, then type the new password and then a second time to verify it.
That completes the setup. In all it took about 10 minutes to get a complete hard drive installation. It takes longer than that to type in the product key when attempting to install Microsoft Windows! (sorry, sometimes I have to rub it in a little).
Speed & Performance
I have used GoblinX and Zenwalk before, both Slackware based distributions, and loved the sheer speed of each. So when I booted up Wolvix it wasn't much of a surprise that it flat out flies. And even though I know it's going to be so fast that applications open even before I click on them, it's still amazing. You can almost hear that CPU talking to itself, "speed, I am speed!".
My personal computer is a fairly new 64 Bit system with an average amount of memory (512 MB) and a middle of the road Nvidia video card. There have been many distributions installed in both their 32 and 64 bit variations. Normally there is a definite speed and performance advantage when using the 64 bit versions. Wolvix does not offer a 64 bit version yet, but still manages to outperform all the 64 bit distributions I have used.
Another aspect of performance is stability. Thus far after testing many of the installed applications, playing a DVD, listening to Music, writing this review, etc., I have not experienced any desktop or application not working, or a crash of any kind, so I don't have much to report other than "it works", and works well.
Software Management
Adding, removing, and updating software is very easy. Just click the "Gslapt Package Manager" menu entry in the the system menu. Click on an entry to get detailed information, or on the block in front of it for the available options (see the example below).
System Administration
I really like the excellent system administration software included with Wolvix. Anything you want or need to do is easy to find. And the Wolvix Control Panel is a real gem.
Kenneth tells us credit for the Wolvix Control Panel goes to Chris Gallienne (aka Oithona) and that Wolvix would not be the same without him.
Multimedia
Wolvix is truly ready to play any type of media file you throw at it. It's a real pleasure to use an operating system that makes playing videos and music what it should be...easy. I didn't need to spend any time, beyond the ten minutes it took to install to the hard drive, to have a fully functional multimedia desktop.
Conclusion
If I were to say I was impressed with Wolvix Hunter 1.1.0, it would be an understatement.
In my opinion, if you figure in the Wolvix updates, the excellent Wolvix Control Panel, the ability to use NTFS partitions, excellent wireless support, the ability to play DVDs and nearly any multimedia content without having to add codecs or extra software, all the pre-installed browser plugins, the excellent choice of pre-installed software, and the sheer speed and performance, Wolvix is on par with some of the heavy hitters such as Ubuntu, Debian, Linux Mint, and PCLinuxOS. If, like me, performance is a key factor for you, Wolvix may very well be the Alpha Wolf.
More Information
After Review Update
First a little background:
When I was finished with the review the intention was to keep Wolvix installed on the additional hard drive so I could play with and learn from it as I often do with various distributions. I generally move on to another distribution, and so on.
My "work" desktop has been the 64 bit version of Fedora 7 since it's release, previously it had been FreeBSD. When I moved to Fedora 7 it was because some of the work I had to do here at On-Disk.com required a linux install...things such as building the distribution ISOs for one developer, and creating Repository discs, etc.
Now, if you recall, one of the biggest reasons I had decided to look closer at Wolvix was that it is based on Slackware and uses the very nice Gslapt software package manager. Using this information, I added a Slackware repository to Gslapt (under the Sources tab in the "Edit > Preferences" menu item) then used Gslapt to install a few specific applications to help with the DVD and ISO mastering I sometimes have to do.
Comparing the Wolvix Hunter experience with that of others, everything went off without a hitch. I Can't even begin to explain the problems I had getting everything (almost) working under Fedora, where I had to manually compile and install many of the dependencies. I had also tried Ubuntu, and Ubuntu Studio, and although they are quite nice in their own right, they didn't have the performance or stability I require with such applications. The Fedora 7 install was not bad as far as performance and stability goes, but I was able to get EVERYTHING I need working under Wolvix with the performance and stability I need.
When people ask if they should upgrade their computer to a new version, or try another operating system, the answer is always the same. "If your computer does everything you need it to do, there really isn't any reason to change it." ...using that logic, until now, my various installed desktop operating systems had not done everything I need to do. I decided to stick with Wolvix.
With everything I needed installed and working root access wouldn't be needed very often, so I went ahead, following conventional wisdom, and created a basic user account for my day to day work.
Kenneth, Chris, and everyone who has given such great feedback to allow the current version to be as great as it is, THANK YOU!
FYI: The Slackware repository I added was http://www.slacky.eu/repository/slackware-11.0/
You can copy and past it into Gslapt if there are some extra applications you would like but don't see listed . You will get a prompt telling you that you need to update the repository information. All you need to do is hit the one button at the prompt and it'll do that automatically for you.
    
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