You've actually hit at the heart of what really bugged me about her review. Yeah, I agree, Slackware is very different from most distros in these areas, but she made absolutely no effort to find out why it remains different in these areas. She simply dismissed Slackware out of hand as being too out of touch with modern reality (i.e. her personal expectations). If she had done a little exploration into why Slackware users tend to find these idiosyncrasies to be useful as opposed to just labeling them as inexcusable, then I wouldn't have had a beef with her review. However, instead of presenting an objective review, she substituted her own opinion for fact (a VERY common feature of bloggers) and dismissed Slackware as an old dinosaur waiting for oblivion.

Furthermore, her responses to the posters were just plain inexcusable. Several people (T3Slider in particular) tried to point out why Slackware users value what she doesn't, and instead of replying in a thoughtful manner, she was rude, dismissive and labeled anyone disagreeing with her as a zealot. To me, it looked like she was trying to pick fights instead of engage in a reasonable discussion. She had a real opportunity to explore why Slackware is different and learn from Slackware users, and instead she let her personal feeling dictate her responses. To be honest, I've lost a lot of respect for O'Reilly for not setting higher journalistic standards for their bloggers. There certainly should be a place for opinion, but they should be holding their writers to basic standards of journalism.

I'm not sure we are all reading the same review!

Perhaps because she assumes the interested readers are already aware of this? She states "My first impression: Slackware is still Slackware". That statement says plenty to anyone familiar with the evolution of free software. She obviously is familiar with Slackware over several years and versions and credits her audience with already knowing something about the Slackware way, or at least its unique position.

Actually she says It's a little hard to reconcile what she actually wrote in plain English with the Alice in Wonderland interpretations and howls of anguish offered in response.

A reviewer's or blogger's job is not to simply offer unadulterated praise, deference or love-sick enthusiasm. To criticise reviewers for expressing opinions that differ from one's own, or any opinion at all is ridiculous.

I'm pretty sure we are, but some of us are getting vastly different impressions than others.

Someone writing for a general site like O'Reilly shouldn't be assuming anything of the sort. Yes, she is obviously familiar with Slackware, which makes it all the more inexcusable for not discussing why it is different instead of dismissing those differences out of hand. She is a linux professional, she should be able to understand why some of us don't want automatic dependency resolution. Instead we get that it is "inexcusable". Similarly she should be able to understand why not having an official repository of compiled software isn't a bad thing.

Maybe you need to re-read this thread. Nobody is asking her to change her opinion or to fawn over Slackware, what we are asking is that she give Slackware a fair shake. I would be perfectly fine with the review as it is, if she had added a few sentences about why the differences exist in the first place. This is where she stumbled badly by offering her preconceived notions about what a distro should and should not do as fact.

Again, you need to go re-read those responses. Most of what got posted was pretty reasonable. She is the one who started the "How dare you question me I'm a linux professional" attitude when people pointed out that maybe her opinion wasn't all that objective. Again, by presenting the same conclusions from a more balance point of view would have helped the article immensely and probably would have earned her some kudos. Slackware users are probably the first to admit that it isn't for everyone, but a lot of the reasons behind why Slackware does thing differently are actually worth discussing and would have made for an excellent article had she actually bothered to do it.

Hi,

Not when the reviewer states they are being objective.

edit: this was directed to post http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...31#post3183531