Q4OS Forum

OldCodger

Member

Registered: 2017-11-11

Posts: 14

New user - a few questions ...

Firstly, very good distro. Installed flawlessly in virtual machine and performs excellently.

I would be grateful for answers to the following questions.

My hypervisor is VirtualBox 5.2 and I have the Q4OS Guest Additions installed as recommended.
However, the supplied Guest Additions are 5.1.30 not 5.2. Everything works fine but I was wondering
how often the Q4OS supplied GA's are updated ?

I have Update Manager installed but it never appears to do anything.
This week I have upgraded both the q4os-base and libpq5 packages but I have had to do them through
Synaptic rather than the Update Manager. There appears to be no options available to alter the frequency
with which Update Manager checks for updates, so I'm left assuming that the checks either didn't run or
the delay between checking is too long ?
This distro seems to be aimed at, amongst others, Windows refugees, so perhaps the Update Manager
could be enhanced to include a taskbar button to actually launch an Update Manager dialog or perhaps
the ability to right-click the taskbar button and select a "check for updates" option. 

When I insert a USB stick, a removable drive icon appears in the task bar (nice) but I get two of them even
though I've only inserted one stick. Perhaps someone could investigate ?

Thank you.

Dai_trying

Member

From: UK

Registered: 2015-12-14

Posts: 2,989

Re: New user - a few questions ...

My hypervisor is VirtualBox 5.2 and I have the Q4OS Guest Additions installed as recommended.
However, the supplied Guest Additions are 5.1.30 not 5.2. Everything works fine but I was wondering
how often the Q4OS supplied GA's are updated ?

You can manually replace the GA's with the correct version available from Oracle web site, although I haven't experienced any problems (so far) with keeping the older version.

I have Update Manager installed but it never appears to do anything.
This week I have upgraded both the q4os-base and libpq5 packages but I have had to do them through
Synaptic rather than the Update Manager. There appears to be no options available to alter the frequency
with which Update Manager checks for updates, so I'm left assuming that the checks either didn't run or
the delay between checking is too long ?
This distro seems to be aimed at, amongst others, Windows refugees, so perhaps the Update Manager
could be enhanced to include a taskbar button to actually launch an Update Manager dialog or perhaps
the ability to right-click the taskbar button and select a "check for updates" option.

I can't say how the Update Manager should work, but I have written a simple update manager that will reside in the system tray and give you a different icon according to the status of required updates, a simple click of the icon and you can install them (after checking the list that shows them and confirming) it is available from this post and (obviously )I use it on all my systems

Be sure to use the latest version (0.0.1-21), the other ones are kept for "just in case" reasons.

When I insert a USB stick, a removable drive icon appears in the task bar (nice) but I get two of them even
though I've only inserted one stick. Perhaps someone could investigate ?

I have noticed this, usually if the usb device has had an iso image written to it, I'm not sure why it happens and maybe the devs could take a look and see if there is a "simple" fix.

crosscourt

Member

Registered: 2017-05-07

Posts: 1,805

Website

Re: New user - a few questions ...

Same here and it happens when an iso image is present, curious but harmless.

I like that term Windows refugees....

Last edited by crosscourt (2017-11-11 18:37)

---

Q4OS Aquarius 5.1 KDE   Lenovo Thinkcentre M900 Tiny i5-6500T, 16gb ddr4 ram, 512gb m.2 ssd

OldCodger

Member

Registered: 2017-11-11

Posts: 14

Re: New user - a few questions ...

Thank you for the quick replies.

Guest Additions
I need the Guest Additions for mouse integration and full screen support (I run all my guests that way).
As long as those currently shipped by Q4OS work, I'll stick with them.

Update Manager
My hosts run Debian, so I'm comfortable with Synaptic and in fact always have it added to the panel so
I can launch it manually when I first logon. I'll probably stick with that for the time being but thank you
Dai_trying for the reference to your own update manager - I'll keep that in mind.

Drive icon in taskbar
Yes, the USB drive did have an ISO on it, so that's the answer - thanks.

Dai_trying

Member

From: UK

Registered: 2015-12-14

Posts: 2,989

Re: New user - a few questions ...

Just a note about my updater, it still uses synaptic to do the updates (it is very reliable) my updater is basically a front-end with a user notification for the system tray, but if your happy how things are I'm happy with that too.

And welcome to the forum

crosscourt

Member

Registered: 2017-05-07

Posts: 1,805

Website

Re: New user - a few questions ...

Your updater works great Dai, and welcome to the forum oldcodger. My nickname from another forum was technogeezer.

---

Q4OS Aquarius 5.1 KDE   Lenovo Thinkcentre M900 Tiny i5-6500T, 16gb ddr4 ram, 512gb m.2 ssd

Dai_trying

Member

From: UK

Registered: 2015-12-14

Posts: 2,989

Re: New user - a few questions ...

Thanks CC, I have it installed in all my systems and some that I provide support for (mostly Q4OS and Debian Xfce).

crosscourt

Member

Registered: 2017-05-07

Posts: 1,805

Website

Re: New user - a few questions ...

My seniors(charity system users),friends and clients are using it with no issues. Q4OS is the only Debian based distro we offer to people presently.

Last edited by crosscourt (2017-11-13 23:29)

---

Q4OS Aquarius 5.1 KDE   Lenovo Thinkcentre M900 Tiny i5-6500T, 16gb ddr4 ram, 512gb m.2 ssd

Dai_trying

Member

From: UK

Registered: 2015-12-14

Posts: 2,989

Re: New user - a few questions ...

I have a few users that I converted to Debian a long time ago and they were worried back then about changing from windows, and now they would be just as concerned with changing to another distro so I think it better to let them keep the system they have got used to as I do also use it on some of my machines anyway, so it's all familiar.

crosscourt

Member

Registered: 2017-05-07

Posts: 1,805

Website

Re: New user - a few questions ...

Its best with new users to keep them on the same distro and we allow the charity users to pick a distro from a group of about 10 that include most of the better known distros. Im typing right now on PCLinuxOS testing an install for a new user but Q4OS is by far the most popular so far being a Windows clone.

I run 4 distros myself and test about 15 distros on the side.

---

Q4OS Aquarius 5.1 KDE   Lenovo Thinkcentre M900 Tiny i5-6500T, 16gb ddr4 ram, 512gb m.2 ssd

OldCodger

Member

Registered: 2017-11-11

Posts: 14

Re: New user - a few questions ...

Veering slightly off-topic but very interesting comments from you both regarding Q4OS and its popularity,
especially as a Windows clone/replacement.

I'm still using Windows (in a virtual machine) but only offline now. I have some old applications which provide
features/functions that I can no longer get in later versions of Windows/Office, nor can I find complete replacements
within Linux - therefore the easiest thing is just to keep running Windows, albeit offline.

My Linux guests were originally Mint Debian Edition (Mate desktop) but they've announced the next version will only
have the Cinnamon desktop - hence my move away to something else.
Q4OS fits the bill superbly, with a very familiar desktop and being based on Debian which I like.

Dai_trying

Member

From: UK

Registered: 2015-12-14

Posts: 2,989

Re: New user - a few questions ...

I think a lot of Linux users use Virtualbox (or similar) to keep an old Windows version running for those hard to replace programs, I have a WinXp VM for just such occasions. Some prefer using wine but I would rather keep a greater distance between M$ software and my OS.

crosscourt

Member

Registered: 2017-05-07

Posts: 1,805

Website

Re: New user - a few questions ...

Havent had many issues running older apps on Win7 but wont go to Win10.

---

Q4OS Aquarius 5.1 KDE   Lenovo Thinkcentre M900 Tiny i5-6500T, 16gb ddr4 ram, 512gb m.2 ssd