"If my Linux system was working I wouldn't be at LinuxQuestions.org". Then again, some of these icons might reveal that we're unwittingly running a vulnerable system - say Floppix, the ultimately unsuccessful and unmaintained and fortunately probably fictional port of Knoppix to boot from floppy disks. A lot of floppy disks, this is how I first got RSI :-) But so many really old systems have a floppy drive, so they released D*mn Slow Linux :-)

My mistake, something called Floppix exists but must be much better than I was suggesting!

Can some of us save our blushes by using one of the Linux systems that runs as a Windows application more or less, or do we get an even more embarrassing icon? A Tux in Windows colours???

One use I actually intend for that sort of thing (such as andLinux): my main home Internet access is stand-alone Windows-based; having purchased F-Secure Internet Security for Windows, I also want to run F-Secure for Linux, to check PCs from certainly clean for one thing, but it needs to be installed and then allowed to download up-to-date virus identification database updates. I assume that I can't pass it the Windows edition's virus database, but I haven't asked and maybe I should. But if I run F-Secure for Linux in Windows, it can get the virus data and, I assume, keep it. On a Linux bootable USB stick, for instance. Using that to check Windows PCs for virus sounds like cheating, but I have paid for F-Secure for three PCs so they got money.

I think I said this before, but I propose to have the icon determined in the user profile, not in the browser you happen to use. Look at this post, I am embarrassed!

jlinkels

Thanks!

Y'know, there's some merit in that idea.

Just a thought:

Perhaps if that were the way it's done, the icon would/could be generated based on what the member enters as their "Distribution" in their profile. If multiple distros are listed, the first one parsed would be the icon determiner.

If nothing else, it might make more people happy in that, at least the icon wouldn't be changing back and forth all the time, for members who post from multiple machines.

Sasha

Ah, I remember vividly the day I first started to dabble with Linux. That was also the day that I got rid of Windows on my own box AND the day I registered at LinuxQuestions.org. The latter was done from a borrowed Windows machine since the most pressing issue of the time was how to get my wireless network working (by using an ethernet cable, incidently). Should your post show a Microsoft logo, know you have my sympathy.

I see someone already has mint.

That would be fine as an alternate way to express the information (potentially) already in the profile. I would never assume that either the distribution(s) listed in the profile or the distro icon on a post was an accurate reflection of the distro the OP was seeking help with. Which is why I proposed somewhat aggressively asking for this information when somebody starts a new thread.

Tux's belly: Why does it sometimes get a question mark? "Where's the Squid"?* Hoho.

* Ref: http://www.seaworld.org/animal-info/...nguin/diet.htm

Good question. I have seen that from some reason MY Tux is one of the few with a question mark. And I am a Debian user, just like you. I don't even know what the question mark means.

jlinkels

I'm gong to answer the question - which has been asked and answered many times in the past - with an instruction. Mouseover the tux - find one with and one without a question mark - read the bubble text. Do you see the difference?

Mine is?

Whoohhh... that is smart

But seriously, I have tool-tips disabled in Opera (I got very annoyed to see 3 lines of the post when hovering over a thread in a forum), and did not have the status bar enabled, that is why I didn't discover it earlier.

jlinkels

Ah, that would explain it. But how does that account for the large number of people who ask about it and have tool tips enabled? It's also obvious on those occasions when all icons don't load correctly - you just get the alt-text showing what they mean...

What if a click on the distribution icon leads to a screen that explains how the icon is chosen? Or even allows to preview the icon and report the correct one so that the code can be adjusted?

I think this should be a good feature. I like it!