My son, Alistair, is extremely evangelical in his fervour for open source software and for Linux in particular. He has just built his own PC and installed Linux, naturally. I am very impressed with his new PC and how little it cost him to build it.
I have only really played with Linux at the fringes. I have an EeePC and have fiddled with Linux on that. I thought this report on the BBC website was interesting, therefore. I am not a fan of Microsoft but tend to recognise that it is often very hard for people to move away from it for a variety of reasons. Corporate networks, for example, are often tied up with maintenance contracts, training requirements and a knowledge base that is not easy to change. There is also the comfort of the familiar. If it comes out of the box with Windows on it then you'll probably just use Windows.
I also use a Mac a fair amount. In fact I knew how to program a Mac long before I had ever really touched MS Windows (but then who ever wanted to use Windows v3.1?). I like the MacOS but then it's even harder to get under the lid of and more closed than Microsoft.
Perhaps it would be worth installing Linux on a separate partition of my main PC to see what I really think of it and how hard it is to move over. I do tend to be on the geekier end of the spectrum, although not in the same league as my son. I can't help feeling that I must be missing out on something. On the other hand, is life not just a little too short?
4 comments:
For me, installing Linux was the beginning of an exploration which has taught me a huge amount: how the Internet works (IP addresses, DNS etc); how dynamic, database-driven web sites work and how to create them;, how to program in PHP and Ruby; what Open Source is and why it matters, and much more besides.
A safe option is to run Linux off a pen drive - http://www.pendrivelinux.com
Throw of the shackles of M$ :-)
I agree with Mr Jones. It is a fantastic experience if you care about more than just surfing the web...which is what most people just do on their computer. As long as they can surf, IM and listen to music, they are fine.
An interesting thing the guy on the BBC said was that he cannot get his Ipod to sync. Now, as I can't find anywhere on that article to contact him to tell him he is wrong, I'll do it here.
There are plenty of programs which can sync with ipods. Mine of choice would be songbird, but it isn't stable yet. If one was using gnome, one could use banshee. If one was using KDE, one could use amarok, however, one could use any of those on either of those, it just moulds better into seperate ones. I also believe that rythmbox is trying to get syncing with ipods.
I'm also convinced my visits have gone up since you posted this. I only have the stats for the week up to this post, but its nearly double on this day..
I'd heartily recommend having a shot of linux, especially having made the admission that you find yourself on the geekier side.
I started playing with it a couple of years ago, and I found that I learned more about how computers work in that time than I have since I first got my hands on a rubber-keyed Spectrum.
That said, I don't use it for my day to day desktop computing any longer, preferring my mac instead. I think I had one too many compatibility issues, that it became a bit of a headache.
I do have a clapped out old Dell machine living in a cupboard running Ubuntu server edition now. This hosts and shares all my storage across the house, as well as all my music.
I wouldn't have been able to do this without first of all getting to grips with the OS and its command line. To this end, I'd recommend the Linux Reality series of podcasts that really holds your hand through understanding how it all works, as well as decyphering the seemingly baffling command line. Well, to an extent anyway... :D
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