Ubuntu 9.04 For the Windows Power User 727
crazipper writes "Know a Windows power user who is (honestly) good with technology, but hasn't yet warmed to Linux? Tom's Hardware just posted a guide to installing and using Ubuntu 9.04, written specifically for the MS crowd (in other words, it talks about file systems, mount points, app installation, etc). Hopefully, by the end, your 'friend' will realize just how easy Ubuntu can be to use and start down a long path of exploration with a new operating system."
Fantastic! (Score:5, Insightful)
Friends don't tell friends to install Linux (Score:4, Insightful)
I learnt this lesson the hard way when a close friend decided to ring me at 1am to bug me about a Linux problem. I don't even remember what the issue was, he was just a bit stressed cos he'd spent hours trying to figure something out and I had promised to help him whenever he had problems.
I told him what to do in about three sentences and passed out again. This taught me you don't encourage friends to switch to Linux.
Oh, and Ubuntu is a terrible start to Linux. Debian forever! (seriously: you only install Debian once, beyond that it sorts itself out)
Re:Fantastic! (Score:5, Insightful)
"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:5, Insightful)
I hardly see how this is a tutorial for "power users." The article makes out the terminal to be a big bad scary thing, but you'd think that most power users would at least be familiar with Start | Run | "cmd" | "ipconfig".
It's basically a walkthrough of the installation process that goes into more detail about partitions than is necessary. There's only a couple thousand of those floating around the Internet already...
Aren't You Lucky You Use the Correct OS? (Score:1, Insightful)
Hopefully, by the end, your "friend" will realize just how easy Ubuntu can be to use and start down a long path of exploration with a new operating system.
Right, because remember that no one can be your friend unless they use the same operating system. And all operating systems are bad unless they're the one you use. And everyone uses an operating system for everything because all operating systems are equally good at each of the several thousand tasks operating systems perform and function as for users.
Re:My experience shows a short path (Score:1, Insightful)
The reason they go back to windows is because they don't like to change what they already have and is working.
Wrong Crowd (Score:5, Insightful)
Technically inclined people who aren't programmers simply don't need linux, and programmers will already know about it.
That's my 2 cents.
market ball size (Score:4, Insightful)
It's simply a ball size competition.
MS is a playah and is willing to do dirty sneaky deals with OEMs to get their shit pushed.
Ubuntu, as FOSS, rightly stays away from such tactics, and unfortunately runs afoul of the fact that the majority of computer sheeple really couldn't give a clue about patents, open source, and whatnot.
Linux's technical strengths are also economic weaknesses.
What would help IMHO is for linux to have advocacy, a marketing department, and general user friendliness polishes.
But nothing except legal action is going to correct the fact that microsoft simply holds most of the IP cards, as proven by their ambush against TomTom which in theory could lock linux out of the flash-drive market, as well as any other device that exposes it's data with VFAT internally.
Thank you (Score:1, Insightful)
"Therefore, this article will not tell you to compile anything from source code, and no sentence begins with 'bring up the terminal' or any other UNIX techno-babble."
Thank you. There is no reason to bring up the terminal today on a modern Ubuntu installation. If there is, someone isn't doing their job right.
Re:Friends don't tell friends to install Linux (Score:5, Insightful)
And how is that different then friends running windows calling you at 2am?
A persons OS of choice doesn't negate them having issues. It does perhaps change the types of problems however.
Installing Ubuntu isn't the hard part (Score:1, Insightful)
Important question... (Score:3, Insightful)
I actually read the article and it seems to lack one important thing... Why? Why should a Windows Power User wish to install Ubuntu? I mean it is "free" but my time certainly isn't, so I guess what is in it for me? What advantages does it have over, let's say, Windows XP?
PS - "Free" "Open Source" "You can compile it yourself!" don't count. People don't buy software because it is cheap, they buy it because it enriches their lives or increases their productivity.
Re:My experience shows a short path (Score:1, Insightful)
You had me until lack of apps.
There's everything you can imagine available for linux. And as for quality... you're being a troll.
That said, I agree with the general tenet, that it's not such a simple process. It took a few years of me dabbling with it in much the manner you described before I suddenly felt that something had clicked and I preferred it.
Re:market ball size (Score:5, Insightful)
What would help IMHO is for linux to have advocacy, a marketing department, and general user friendliness polishes.
What would help Linux is to run games without WINE. Or, if you have to use WINE, make the use of it completely seamless. Somebody clicks on a game installer from a CD they put in the drive--"This is a Windows application, but Ubuntu can run this if you install a compatibility layer [don't name WINE by name, nobody cares]. Would you like to install the compatibility layer?" They click yes, you automatically apt-get WINE, launch the app. That alone would help with the grandma cases.
Thanks, But No Thanks (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not an MS fanboy... but using MS dev tools, writing software to work on MS operating systems, and with a user audience where MS software has a nearly-100% market share by choice... is my day job.
As such, I don't have the luxury of time either in or out of my regular work hours to explore other things. I'm busy enough keeping up with current trends on the .NET Framework, which is exactly what the folks who fund my living want and need me to do.
End of story.
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:5, Insightful)
I know that linux isn't windows, but for a lot of people, a computer is the tools you use for it, and people are probably less likely to give up microsoft office than windows. I wonder how much less successful OSX would be without office.
Please, I am aware of open office and gimp and all of that stuff. I'm posting from my debian partition right now.
Re:My experience shows a short path (Score:5, Insightful)
As one example, to install software, I can go on the web, find the primary site for it, make sure it passes malware tests, and install it. On Linux, there's a repository (as I understand, never figured that part out). That may be a technologically superior option, but that means I have to trust the repository buildier. And it's not as though Linux is somehow immmune to malware that lets me skip that step. Anytime I install software it can do something I didn't except, on any OS.
But generally with a repository they have already A) checked the source for malware (most malware scanners only search for patterns in the binary that indicate a virus) B) Tested the software to make sure it is at least (somewhat) working. You have to have trust somewhere unless you are really skilled in writing software purely in binary. With most Linux software you have A) The option of going through the source yourself B) Have a fully open environment C) Have a community that has no profit incentive. The reason of having no profit incentive is good is because they have to compete based on features. MS can cripple software to make a quick buck, trying to do that on Linux just leads someone to move to a better distro.
There are many more paranoid Linux users than paranoid Windows users. Security is a great concern. If Ubuntu was adding in malware in a repository, someone would know and the software would be taken down. A site with a trojan on it for Windows is considered typical. I don't know of a single modern case of malware being in "trusted" repositories (such as Ubuntu's main repository, etc).
Re:Friends don't tell friends to install Linux (Score:5, Insightful)
Because they can blame you for pushing them into an OS they otherwise wouldn't have used.
Re:My experience shows a short path (Score:5, Insightful)
There's everything you can imagine available for linux
Ok, I'm a Linux user and I even think theres a lack of good apps. Sure, the basics are covered, great browser, great file manager, great desktop environments, great e-mail client, decent word processor, decent simple games, great programming features, decent enough replacement for Photoshop, etc. But Linux lacks games. Sure, there are a few shining examples of some in almost every category, Battle for Wesnoth is an amazing strategy RPG, Doom/Quake are good FPS games, SuperTux is a decent platforming game, there are many card games, etc. But you can't really find any complete FPS games that don't use the Doom or Quake engine for Linux. Etc. There is a total lack of variety of games. Sure, you can emulate a lot of them in WINE but more often than not you get a performance hit (not always because of WINE itself but because many distros enable compositing by default and that can slow down the games).
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:2, Insightful)
Said 12y/o tends to be a bit smarter and maybe a tad more respectful than people like you.
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:5, Insightful)
I would argue that you're not a power user unless you regularly use Windows-R, have a shell in your quick launch, or have some other quick way to get to a command line of some sort. But then someone out there is probably sitting at nine computers at once calling me a schmuck, so the definition is clearly pretty hazy.
Tried it... went down in flames (Score:3, Insightful)
I'll admit I am a Windows person. I am a novice to linux based OS since college courses about four years ago. I am using a Dell Mini 9 netbook running Ubuntu 8.0.4. I setup my system just fine, wireless was connecting to my WPA-TKIP hidden network, and the world was grand. I did switch to the classic desktop instead of the 'netbook dashboard' that is default.
A few updates were available. I updated to 8.1 I believe. This caused my wireless to no longer be available and will no longer connect via NetworkManager since the updates. Yes, wireless network is still on and is able to be used by other Windows laptops.
So i updated to this newly touted 9.x version of Ubuntu using the Netbook Remix version available. Now I have this wonderful thing where apparently gnome-panel doesn't auto-start. So logging in I go directly to a blank desktop, no panels, no short-cuts, no nothing really. I can change my background and create a new folder on the desktop just to access my file system. I am a novice so I don't know how to get around this.
I have been on MyDellMini and short of 'rolling my own fix' and others pointing me to known bugs identified months ago with no fix nobody has been able to help me at all. SO from my standpoint this OS really is terrible for Windows people to come over. Sure, when they do they'll have to learn every inch of the OS because most if it doesn't work or they'll spend it troubleshooting problems that most of us Windows people have had experience doing since 95 release.
Thats just MHO though. I don't recommend it for anyone used to Windows. My recommendation for Windows users to jump over is to ignore Ubuntu like a venerial disease that is for some reason popular among some, and just go to Fedora or Mandriva. Something that mostly works as you'd expect. It will save you time having to google on your Windows machine why your Ubuntu machine doesn't function right.
Wifi friendly (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Why is "friend" in quotes? (Score:1, Insightful)
Your "friend" = You
Re:Wrong Crowd (Score:5, Insightful)
As a Windows desktop user who has considerable experience with Linux (I run a bunch of Linux servers and spent some months exclusively with Linux on the desktop), I believe this is the wrong crowd to try to get to switch to Linux. Experienced Windows users simply don't have the problems about which everyone complains about Windows. Windows just works for experienced users who don't install viruses and ad/spyware. Windows hasn't crashed on me since before XP. Ever. Never frozen... nothing. I'm currently on 7, spent a year and a half on Vista, and the rest of the decade on XP (after it was released).
Technically inclined people who aren't programmers simply don't need linux, and programmers will already know about it.
That's my 2 cents.
You're exactly right. Those of us in this situation, whether we're on Windows, OSX, Linux, or whatever, have a rock solid, lightning fast, powerful and adaptable OS experience. We don't get any malware, we don't have problems configuring our hardware, and we have all the applications we want and what we need very efficiently. In my experience, we're also not the fanboys. They seem to be the much less experienced users who primarily relate to their own and other operating systems through the lens of marketing (or anti-MS holy wars from the Linux brigade).
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:My experience shows a short path (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes. Your Windows method: you have to trust every single application vendor separately. Linux system: you trust one repository, which you can check out the reputation of if you're concerned. I fail to see why this is a problem, it sounds simpler and safer to me.
By the way, many "repositories" also host Windows code; I get a lot of Windows apps from Sourceforge.
Re:My experience shows a short path (Score:5, Insightful)
apt-get install apache perl php
Funny. I had *precisely* the opposite problem with the tv tuner.
On windows it cmae with this awful, slow, nasty proprietary software that took ages to load, lost the ability to change channel every so often and was a nasty, nasty resource hog. It also took over the entire screen for it's crappy, non-standard front end. And when I re-installed and couldn't find the cd it came with, well that was it done. No chance.
On linux I just fire up kaffeine and away it goes. It's great, responsive and usable.
Sorry you don't like OpenOffice, I prefer it to word now but I know there are rendering differences.
But firefox? I've never had to do anything to FF on linux to get java or flash going. I've never even heard of anyone having java problems with a browser on any platform since 2002...
I know it's not for everyone, but IMHO it's at least the equal of windows now. But then I'm not a gamer, and games are just not made for linux at the moment. It's a vicious circle - It's a small market so few games are made, and because there are few games it stays small...
Re:Important question... (Score:1, Insightful)
This is why Windows users don't convert. When they ask the serious, genuine, and curious question "What's in it for me?", they receive a response that boils down to "You don't have to type in a product key."
You just convinced at least one potential Ubuntu user that it's not worth it. Fantastic.
I realized something, when I installed Gentoo: (Score:4, Insightful)
You think you are a power-user when you know the depth of Windows registry, what all the files do, made your own slipstreamed installation DVD, and know all the cool tools.
But you don't know shit yet. And I didn't too.
The key difference: Bash scripts + everything is a file.
Seriously. I could never go back, because I became dependend on slowly growing my one-liners to whole applications, and integrating them into everything (cron, kde, config-files, etc).
And the other key difference is the full control of the kernel and services.
It's just another level of in-depth knowledge.
Of course the amount of stuff to learn is overwhelmingly gigantic. But this is ok, because you're a power-user.
I could not even imagine, how I would create a file system out of an encrypted compressed tunnel via http , which goes to a zfs-fuse or LVM2 disk system which is mapped trough an encryption loop. (Something I needed in a workplace with an idiotic firewall, so I could access my home server.) Or similar stuff.
The power to slap it all together out of small parts is just about the best thing that ever happened in computing, since transistors. :)
And the only sad part is, that the desktop environments completely ignore that philosophy, and fight over who imitates Windows the best. (Especially the dumbed-down "features".)
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:5, Insightful)
I was hoping that there would be more tutorials for getting wine to work with apps that users like.
I would not put this in a beginner tutorial. Wine should not be a deciding factor in your migration: if you use Windows exclusively to run Windows-only apps, you won't benefit from migrating to Linux. It works well if you have one critical app that you can't find an OSS replacement for, but for regular use it's a pain.
Re:My experience shows a short path (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe, except that in my experience, the majority of users never do go back to Windows once they have been exposed to a decent Linux implementation for a few weeks. This includes your grandma/grandpa type users. Obviously this does not take into account gamers or users with specialist or niche applications, but these do not even come close to forming part of the majority.
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:4, Insightful)
I use linux at work for linux, not for its apps. Specifically, the homogeneous file system (no c:\ d:\ e:\ monkey business), soft links and standard utilities that have been around for decades and are still useful. The default availability of powerful command line shells and utilities. Most of what I use that is linux specific shipped with the ISO I installed it from, some have no decent windows equivalents at all, and nearly none are built into windows.
Most of the major apps I use (Firefox/launchy/IntelliJ/remote desktop) are available in Windows too, so it's not those.
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:5, Insightful)
I second that p.o.v..
But even whole Linux distributions, like Suse and also Ubuntu, try to show the shell / command line / terminal as uncool and for total freaks only. But it is the most basic and essential tool, with the most power. I think users should only gain the right to use a GUI, after they know how to work the shell, the file system, and some basic tools. Same as you should only use a calculator function, after you did it by hand at least once, and understood it.
Re:Thanks, But No Thanks (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm not an MS fanboy... but using MS dev tools, writing software to work on MS operating systems, and with a user audience where MS software has a nearly-100% market share by choice... is my day job.
Right...so you don't need to know about anything else, even if there are reasonable alternatives.
As such, I don't have the luxury of time either in or out of my regular work hours to explore other things. I'm busy enough keeping up with current trends on the .NET Framework, which is exactly what the folks who fund my living want and need me to do.
A valid point, and perhaps a trap?
End of story.
Also, a dead end to your career. Trying something totally new is hard and painful, but opens a lot more doors. Adult life doesn't offer us the time we had to "tinker" like when we were kids, but missing it means you become a (Linux|MS|Java|Perl|PHP) zombie. Better to force yourself to learn something totally new, than to become older and unemployable at any interesting job, because "it was too much work" to try something new.
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:5, Insightful)
Nobody will argue with me when i say that there are tangible benefits to switching to linux and linux based apps for 80% of what a user does on a computer, but there are those applications, like microsoft office and photoshop that users have a lot invested into learning and using that they just don't want to be bothered to replace. Its often those apps that keep people anchored to windows and prevent people from switching. I have too many first hand accounts where I've installed open office on someone's system so they can open a document in the short run, but when they have the cash, they go out and buy microsoft office. That is enough to convince me that to get people to switch to linux, you have to tell them that they can bring a few of their favorite apps and show them how.
Re:My experience shows a short path (Score:2, Insightful)
Netbook + MX Revolution?
And that doesn't seem like a weird combination to you?
Ugh, shut up. Shut up and go away. People like you are exactly what is wrong with the Linux community -- you don't contribute anything helpful, you just mock somebody for having a hardware setup that isn't perfectly typical. Do you think you're actually accomplishing anything other than making yourself look like an asshole?
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:5, Insightful)
He could have gone over what it would have taken to get adobe photoshop or microsoft office to install...
If a user wants to use Adobe Photoshop and Microsoft Office why shouldn't he just stick with Windows?
When I fire up my computer, I'm not fiddling around with the command prompt or using the calculator.
Precisely. So what is the point of him installing ubuntu, only to have to fiddle around with WINE tutorials to manually install something onto an unsupported platform? He ALREADY has an OS that works, that officially supports and runs his apps.
Installing Ubuntu only makes sense if he actually wants to play with a new OS and try new applications.
Re:Important question... (Score:4, Insightful)
Let's see, some reasons I like using Ubuntu over Windows XP:
- Free updates more-or-less forever. Along with that is only one update program that needs to run, rather than 15 little icons sitting in the bottom left corner for every single piece of software that needs to check for updates periodically.
- UI effects that are often prettier than what XP in particular can offer. For instance, translucent windows.
- Easy setup for multiple users with different preferences. The same machine can look completely different for Mr and Mrs.
- Utility programs that you often need to find and download in the Windows world (from sources you may or may not trust) are already installed on most Linux setups.
Re:My experience shows a short path (Score:3, Insightful)
I fully expect this post to be downmodded to hell by the Windows fanboys, but, fortunately, I have some karma to burn!
Every time I read something like this, I think about the unmitigated arrogance of some posters. It's basically saying "I don't care what you think, and I expect to be persecuted by those opposed to my views, which means I'm better than you." Seriously, is there anything wrong with just saying your piece then shutting the fuck up, and *actually* having a high-ground against "the fanboys", rather than putting in an early insult?
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:3, Insightful)
Not to mention that for many of us who use Windows, the "apps" we use it for are games. And in answer to the question TFA's author said we should ask... no, it's not worth the hassle.
Until you can write a tutorial that makes it as easy to run every single popular app and remotely popular game as easily (and with all the same performance and features) as on Windows you're just wasting your time. Until that day comes, there's no room for Linux on my hard drive.
Re:My experience shows a short path (Score:2, Insightful)
That's a great part of it but I also need a reason to switch.
Unlike the hordes of Slashdotters who've claimed to have a system pwned on a broadband connection in less than 30 seconds, I've never had a virus. My machines do not blue screen every 15 minutes. In fact, none of my current Windows boxes have ever blue screened. I've never had a hard time finding and/or installing the right driver. I've never had a malware issue. I've never had an install run amok.
AMEN! Preach on, brother!
My laptop ran Vista for over a year before I had a BSOD. And that was because of a bad Flash update. My desktop only BSOD'd while I was using beta video card drivers, or when this one really poorly coded game *coughCryostasiscough* beat the crap out of it. Setting up a fresh install took me about an hour, including the OS install. And the only virus I ever had came from my roommate's computer on the network. He was running WinME. You figure it out.
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:1, Insightful)
Security flies out of the window any time you let an idiot loose on a computer, whether it's windows or linux. The person who opens all email attachments on windows is the same one who will pick up rootkits in linux.
Reliability: My kids turn off their windows machine by pulling the plug, at least twice a day. It comes back up every time with no fuss, and will only force a disk check once a month or so.
The same thing on all the linux filesystems I've tried will force a full disk check and quite often result in corrupt data.
Speed is no longer something to write home about. For the past few years, every distro I've tried at home is as slow or slower than windows.
Yes, you can get minimalist distros or compile everything by hand for specific optimizations, but that's not something you could sell to the average home user.
For hardware requirements, compare fedora [fedoraproject.org] with XP [microsoft.com]
Where fedora wants 400MHz, 256MB and 2.7GB HDD for a desktop system, XP wants 300MHz, 128MB and 1.5GB HDD.
For servers, I wouldn't even consider running windows, but for the home desktop linux just doesn't offer me enough to switch (no matter how much I wish it was otherwise).
Re:What you need is a compelling reason (Score:5, Insightful)
I think my core issue is this: I'm bored of computers.
I've been using them since early 80s (ZX Spectrum FTW!) and they don't hold much of an interest to me anymore. Hex editing? Done that. Assembly programming? Done that. Writing my own simple 3D engine? Done that, too. Configuring something obscure for weeks and tinkering with configuration files? Done that. In my youth I even had huge-ass ISA cards with a couple dozen relays on each and I used to build things that I'd control with my computer. I've done it all.
For me, the computer stopped being a toy some time ago. When I'm at work, it's a tool that I use to earn money; at home, it's an appliance that plays music (TV is reserved for videos) and lets me browse some sites when I'm bored, or play a game five hours a month. Had I been born a decade later, I'd be a Linux user, I'm absolutely sure of it... But I've just had too much exposure to computers already.
I used to be a power user, but I'm not even an average user anymore, though. I have no idea what drives those... And the kids these days just seem to be interested in playing games.
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:5, Insightful)
See the difference is that people who use linux are OS buffs. Most people really dont care about OS- so long as it runs all the apps we need- and you cannot argue with the fact that -As it stands- Windows has by far the widest application compatibility hands down.
Re:Fantastic! (Score:5, Insightful)
Ahh... so it wasn't that Linux wasn't ready for the desktop, but that your desktop wasn't ready for Linux.
Why do people hold hardware compatibility against the operating system? Don't people realize that Linux actually has much better hardware support than any OS out there?
Windows hardware support is terrible, but the hardware manufacturers are more than happy to provide a driver for Windows users while they ignore Linux. Do not expect this to last forever.
I have been running Linux on the desktop for almost 10 years now (wow has it been that long already), and with the 2-3 year old hardware that I run, I rarely ever experienced hardware compatibility issues that are worth being frustrated about. Sure I have to use an applet to dim my laptop display, big deal, it's better than installing a bunch of SONY software so that the keyboard buttons work. In fact, with Windows they didn't work at all until I installed Sony's crap.
Linux is more than ready for the Desktop. Hardware manufacturers are getting on board far more rapidly than you might believe, it's reputation is already stellar in the enterprise server end of things, and more and more companies are exploring alternatives to Windows/Office and understanding the need for open data formats and centralizing data in the data center with client-server based solutions. For those reasons I encourage everyone to at least take the time to learn more about Linux, and familiarize yourself with how it fits into your future. I expect that eventually almost everyone will be using *NIX a derivative for at least part of their technology needs.
Re:Thanks, But No Thanks (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm busy enough keeping up with current trends on the .NET Framework ...
You should be careful restricting yourself like that. I'm also a .NET developer (C++ as well, though), and I, too, follow the new developments in .NET in most detail, closely followed by C++0x standardization process (I read the committee monthly papers and mailings as soon as they are published). But it doesn't mean not looking elsewhere. There are plenty of interesting things going on all around, and some of them may well end up in .NET eventually (see: IronPython, IronRuby, Phalanger, F# ...). It helps to know bits and pieces of everything, even if your main focus remains in one or two areas.
Among other things, no technology lasts forever as a dominant market leader. .NET may be there for years to come, but there will come a point at which the next step won't be evolutionary. Just remember VB6 -> .NET transition. For many people getting stuck in that, it was a very unpleasant experience. But those who happened to also know Java or Delphi moved on fairly easily. More recently, same thing happened with LINQ - people with at least cursory knowledge of FP welcomed and embraced it, and hordes of programmers who never looked out of C# box (or only looked at Java at most) ended up being thoroughly confused. Same goes for F# in .NET 4.0, only to a higher degree.
Re:Fantastic! (Score:3, Insightful)
It depends. For instance, if you're a web developer who's using linux boxes (or some kind of cloud) in production, using linux/unix/BSD/OS X is a far better idea than developing on Windows. The integration between your development machine and your production environment will be completely transparent in that case.
This isn't to say that Microsoft doesn't have awesome integration within its own set of tools, SQL Server, Visual Studio, IIS, its own performance monitoring tools, etc, but it really depends on what you're working on. And no, cygwin and ssh putty are not adequate replacements for a full-blown unix development environment, those tools will do in a pinch if you get stuck, but they're quite limited and they will make you lose more time than anything else if you're developing for a Unix-like production environment.
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:4, Insightful)
Windows also has the most quality free software. Not all is FOSS, but Windows definitely has boatloads of free stuff that does what it's supposed to, without crashing, and with highly intuitive UIs.
Re:Fantastic! (Score:3, Insightful)
Exactly, it's a driver issue. If Intel created a good Linux driver, or provided the specifications to those who would happily write it for them, it would perform equally as well(if not better) than it does with Windows.
What I am saying is that NO operating system will support every piece of hardware natively out of the box. Hardware requires drivers that facilitate communication between the hardware and the OS. Considering how limited the support is by hardware developers (often none) it's amazing how good most hardware works in Linux. As hardware manufacturers grow to support Linux, it will eventually match or exceed Windows hardware support.
Actually, for older hardware,like my old Matrox Marvel G200-TV PCI video card with hardware encoding, Linux already far surpasses Windows. Matrox hasn't released a Windows driver since July of 01 (Windows 2K), while its fully supported on a 64Bit Ubuntu install.
So, again, don't blame the OS when it doesn't support your hardware... blame the hardware manufacturer for not supporting the OS. Or better yet, blame the hardware manufacturers for not releasing detailed interface specifications to allow anyone to develop their own drivers. That's the way hardware should be done.
Re:Fantastic! (Score:5, Insightful)
I can't say I agree - as a Windows 'Power User' moving over to Ubuntu had advantages and disadvantages, but the main disadvantage is that is *sucks* to move from being pretty competent to fix your own issues to not being sure if you're even googling the right words.
So, although this tutorial doesn't exactly fill an 'empty' niche (There have been quite a few every six months aimed at this skill-level), for making it clear that Ubuntu is equal (Well, lets be honest, better than) to Vista/7 in power and XP in ease of use, it is a good reminder to people that it's out there, it's improving at a rapid rate, and it's a lot easier to regain that feeling of being comfortable as a power-user in Linux than it originally was in Windows.
Finally, although I am happy to see Ubuntu pulling more basic users over, a good cadre of previous Windows power users that can answer questions in the form of "Oh, yeah, that confused me too when I first switched - here's the logic, I think it's actually an improvement now that I know why they do it that way . . ." is an asset worth pursuing.
Pug
Re:"Power Users"? I don't think so... (Score:2, Insightful)
Oh really? I have tried a number of distros on several laptops over the years, most recently the last 4 incarnations of Ubuntu. I grew heartily sick and tired of things working (yay!) then breaking on the next update (boo!).
I switched back to Vista because it was reasonably reliable, and I could run all of my apps with no trouble. Recently switched to Windows 7, and I can't see myself ever going through distro hell again.
Please be careful with broad statements like "nobody".
Re:Fantastic! (Score:5, Insightful)
Again, you had an issue caused by a lack of support from a hardware vendor. That does not mean that Linux isn't suitable for the desktop.
If I sold you a computer where all of the hardware was supported by the manufacturer to run Linux, your experience on would likely be as good if not better than on Windows (assuming your application needs could be equally met on either OS).
To say that Linux isn't ready for the desktop would suggest that the operating system was lacking something essential to desktop users. It is not, it just hasn't yet attracted the hardware manufacturers support that Windows currently has.
My mother, my children, and my wife all run Linux exclusively. Other than needing to tell my kids that the game they want work on their computer and we have to see if we can get it for one of our consoles, I haven't heard a single complaint. My mother, who lives an hour away, tells me all the time that she wishes her "computer would break down more often because I don't visit like I used to.". And my wife hates how I need to frequently stop the in-laws house to fix their windows computers all the time.
I realize that Windows is improving, and some of the old complaints are dated... but my mother runs an early P4 with 512MB of ram on dial-up... Vista or Windows 7 are not options for her. And my children have comparably old laptops.
To say it's not ready for the Desktop is flat out wrong. It is ready, and my family proves it every day. So say you don't like it, say you had a bad experience, even say that you will wait until your cheap MOBO/sata controller manufacturer releases Linux drivers before you will consider it as a viable option to you. But it is ready for the Desktop.
It's FUD like that that makes the problem worse. When hardware manufacturers hear/read comments like yours, they assume that you would rather use windows. When in actuality, you probably don't care, you just want your computer to work... if you can use a free OS, Great!
Next time, say what you really mean... "If only my mobo's lame SATA controller were better supported, Ubuntu may have been an option for me."
And by the way, you couldn't fathom the number of computer novices have lost all of their data and/or endless hours of time to Windows driver issues; and you claim that it's ready.
Re:Fantastic! (Score:4, Insightful)
When someone buys a computer that claims to be Windows Vista compatible and they find out that their old printer doesn't work with Windows Vista, do they blame Microsoft or beg their printer manufacturer to release a driver for Vista?
If I buy a computer that was certified to run Windows 95, do I blame Microsoft if Vista doesn't run on it?
If I buy a Mac keyboard and it doesn't function as expected on my PC do I blame Microsoft for that?
So is it fair to blame Linux when the PC I bought to run Windows doesn't work? Strange, it didn't work with the Mac OSX disks I had either, stupid Apple can't make a desktop ready OS.
Now if you go buy a computer preinstalled with Linux, using hardware that is well supported, and sticking with a LTS level release of Ubuntu. I believe that you would think that Linux was plenty ready for the desktop.
Even if you don't use Linux or OSX, you can help improve the situation for everyone by simply combating any FUD you hear with reason and logic. Remember, everyone benefits as Mac OS and Linux increase market share, they drive Microsoft to innovate to create more open and inter-operable products.
Not better than Windows for the Desktop (Score:4, Insightful)
Ubuntu's not really better right now. I installed Ubuntu on my main windows machine. It's got 2 monitors running through an Nvidia card. The sound didn't work until I played with it for 2 hours (I think it's because I've got a motherboard with surround sound where any of the jacks can be used for any conceivable purpose), and I still don't know what I need to do to get my Twinview settings to persist. And I had all kinds of trouble with multi-monitor support, fiddling with which one has the main menu and which doesn't, and so on.
With Windows, all that kind of stuff just works. It breaks my heart, and I want to use Ubuntu on my desktop, but not bad enough to spend a whole weekend messing around with it. For now, I'm happy with using Windows on my desktop and using samba shares to an ubuntu server. Well, I'd be happier if my config was all worked out, but it's not worth it.
But as my machine continues to bug me about Windows Genuine Advantage, it's becoming more temping to rid myself of that windows plague...
Re:My experience shows a short path (Score:3, Insightful)
It's a problem because I want to simply watch the output of my Video Card and perhaps record it. MythTV wanted to install everything and the kitchen sink just to do that. If you can't see why 124 dependencies is a bad thing, then there's no hope for you. Especially as if just 1 of those 124 breaks, you may be screwing up other applications on your system.
That's not how it works.
These aren't simply just .dlls or extra support files included in the original installation package, they are complete installations of other applications just so MythTV can sit on top of them and utilize their functionality.
I bet they were mostly DLLs though.
MySQL Server just to store program listings ?
MythTV is an entire PVR system, not just a TV player. You should have tried something else if all you wanted was
The whole of the X-Windows system just to use some graphics capabilities? Come on.
X-windows IS the graphical interface system, you don't have a windowing system without it. What, you wanted to watch TV in in 30x80 ASCII art or something?
(The above are off the top of my head, I may be mistaken about X-Windows. But the sheer fright of seeing massive applications and systems required for some simple functionality WAS scary nethertheless).
You're an idiot.
Re:Fantastic! (Score:3, Insightful)
To ensure optimal compatibility I recommend hardware that has been on the market for at least a year and is/was in very wide distribution.
I have seen few if any real problems with Dell Optiplex or Latitude models that are more than 1 year old. I personally run a Sony VAIO laptop, my wife runs a latitude, my daughter has a Gateway (very popular model from 2003-4).
My mythtv frontends are a variety of mostly Dell small form factor optiplex's. My server is a custom build on an MSI mobo with 6 sata ports... I researched the chipset before buying to ensure that there were few, if any, complaints about support.
Again, none of my equipment is cutting edge. I'm not a gamer and instead am far more interested in stable, productive computers. If cutting edge performance is key to you, then you need to research each major component a little more thoroughly, regardless of the OS. Start with selecting a chipset and build the rest of the system around that. The 790FX, even though it's a year old, seems to be a safe bet for a performance machine. Nvidia nForce chipsets have historically been strong too. And I've never had problems with Intel's chipsets, they just lack some of the features.