So what is all this linux crap I hear about?

It is freedom. It is the very nature of free on a philosophical level, which by extension also has no cost.

It is also very cool. It is intuitive. It is free of viruses. It is as complicated or simple as your needs require.

One of the hardest things to do is to get people to try it... even though it is simple enough to do... people don't understand it, don't trust it, and typically would rather get into a fistfight than change something they do not understand but have figured out how to use (Windows/Mac).

So... here is the easiest possible way to get a feel for ONE of the hundreds of desktop environments. This is the most popular linux distribution, ubuntu, with its native Unity interface. I am very very critical of this particular interface... but at least it gives people an idea of what linux CAN look like. Again, unlike Windows/Mac, you have tons and tons of desktop environments available, across several distributions. These are not "skins" or "themes"... but completely different desktop environments. Anyway... this is an online ubuntu distribution. You can just logon and use it as if it were your PC.

http://edubuntu.org/weblive

So... give it a whirl. Doesn't cost you anything... Tell me what you think.



Here are some terms. I might add to them.
Distribution: The type of linux. This has mostly to do with the package management system (how it gets/installs/manages programs). Examples are RedHat, Ubuntu, Arch, Suse etc. Each distribution is maintained by their own group. There is no real windows equivalent. It is more akin to "Windows 8" or "Mac OSX"

Destkop Environment (DE): The graphical user interface (GUI) in which you interact with the distributions methodology. In windows this is "the desktop".

Desktop Manager (DM): The control mechanism for the DE. As DE's all look and work differently, how you interact with the backend of the front end changes from DE to DE. In windows, this would be the "control panel"

Derivatives: Projects that branch off of an official distribution, primarily these differences have to do with the DE. For instance Ubuntu is the main distribution, some derivatives of Ubuntu are Kubuntu, Lubuntu, Xubuntu, Mint, Backtrack5, LinuxMCE, XBMC, Mythbuntu etc ad naus. There is no legal similarity in Windows

 

My ex used to use linux and he loved it. When I got on it though I had no idea what I was doing, but that's because I've grown up with Windows (started with Windows XP...totally hate Windows 8, yuck!)

When I asked my fiance his thoughts on linux he said it is more for people who do coding, but I suppose that was just his opinion. I tried your link but it said the site had too many users atm. lol

 

For everything except gaming, Linux is far superior.

 

I have tried for a couple of days as well... always at 100% capacity. Sorry for that. Outside of my Ctrl.

Your ex's linux does not have to be your linux experience. Again... if you were just culture shocked to the DE, it was the wrong DE.

Download a Kubuntu iso. It is the most similar to Windows. Everything will feel very familiar. Keeping in mind you can download it, burn it to a DVD or thumbdrive, and boot it live (from the medium) without installing it, and do everything you would want to do, though no changes to the system will be preserved.
http://www.kubuntu.org/getkubuntu/download

Instructions are there, and very simple. I recommend a USB drive. Much faster.

 

Let's see how goes GNU/Linux with steam.

 

Most people SHOULD use Linux. Most people do not. This is because of what I call the Linux Paradox. The paradox is this: people do not use Linux because it is free. Even though it is superior, the fact that it is free is actually what keeps it unpopular. You might think that is because people think that nothing free is good, but it's actually not that. Most people don't know about Linux. They don't know how to use it, they don't know that thousands of free programs are available if you do use it, and they are not aware that it is free. Why? Well, have you ever seen a Linux commercial? No, you have not. The very fact that it is free means that no one will profit by making you aware that it exists. A direct result of our consumeristic society. Since nobody will spend advertising dollars to tell you that they will give you something for free, you don't know. Now, really, our public school system should pick up the slack here and educate people about this public good. But most computer classes are essentially a commercial for Microsoft and Apple. They tell you how to give your hard-earned money to the corporations, so that you can deal with viruses, blue screens, and your computer spying on you. I don't have any children in school, or I would go down there and make a stink about this. Linux is exactly the kind of thing our tax dollars should be used to educate people about, because we (the public) will save more money by knowing that better options are out there.

 

I have to say, the past week has made me reconsider my love of Linux. Installing the latest updates has made my computer very buggy. It won't even detect my monitor correctly. Everything was fine, then updates, now it detects my monitor as a laptop, and will only allow me 1400x1050(4:3) resolution even though I have a 1080p monitor. Very frustrating. Good luck getting any support, by the way.

 

For some applications the virtual machine is the win. Using wine can be a PITA sometimes.

My main wrath at Ubuntu is the default Unity interface. I despise it entirely, but some really dig it. I suspect they did this because the saw the tablet revolution arriving? Anybody know for sure? Either way I use the gnome fallback session.

But installing linux just became a huge headache on new machines because of windows incestuous matrimony with the new encrypted BIOS's.

Windows is the Beezelbub of the computer world.

 

I went to Linux from Windows because I got cheesed off with having to continually verify the installatione every time I blew up my computer. I had to phone a call centre and got grilled and that's when I decided to try Linux.

I found a cd from a computer magazine that had Turbo LInux on it. Not useful. Then I was in the newsagent mooching around the computer mags and saw this Ubuntu thing. Took it home and installed it (I had formatted the hd) and it went like a charm. Okay the command line took a bit of getting used to but with some online help it wasn't insurmountable. Now I wouldn't be without the cl.

I've tried lots of distros but finally settled on Mint (no need to fiddle about looking for codecs) and Lubuntu (works well on my old P4). I have W7 and Ubuntu (Gnome classic) on my laptop which I use for business so I dons't muck around with it, but the desktop is continually exposed to various distros.

Linux is an OS, the superstructure is the distro. Mint I think is most user-friendly for migration from Windows.

I'm using Lubuntu right now. Anyone see any differences??

 

I have heard that some type of Java code poses a security threat to Apple computers (CNBC news blurbs across the bottom of the screen). Any details?

 

Ah...a fellow Gnome. Did you have the same visceral hatred of Unity or did you just prefer Gnome?

Isn't Lubuntu the lightweight version of Ubuntu? Does it still have the software centre? Or have you evolved past that? I am interested in lightweight functional OS's. One of my favorites is Puppy Linux, it loads into the ram and screams like a demon; no HD needed. Thumb drive will do the trick.

 

Tell you what... just download an image, and you can run it from the cd/dvd without even installing it... keeping in mind of course that the performance is night and day between a live cd/dvd and an installed instance. http://www.kubuntu.org/getkubuntu/download#download-block I personally recommend installing to usb... there should be instructions there on how to do that.
12.10 is the "latest", but unless I have a specific need, I ALWAYS roll with LTS (Long Term Service) releases, which run in even prefix, and an .04 suffix. So the current LTS is 12.04, which means April of 2012. LTS is the most stable version, and, currently, carries 5 years of support.

You mentioned support... while there are HEAPS of forum pages explaining how to do MOST things... if you open an IRC client, and connect to freenode.net and /join #ubuntu, pretty much any answer to any question will be addressed, with painstaking effort... for free... by experts in the community. There are typically at least 1500 users in that room. Be polite, do not swear, and be patient... and anything you could need will be addressed.

The only problem... irrevocable problem for *buntu... is that new ARM devices require OS's NOT windows to buy a license. As of yet, only redhat has. Redhat is a GREAT OS... and responsible for MOST of linux's success in the server market, monetizing "free" software. They use the yum package management system... and if you ever want to work with linux professionally, it is pretty much a prerequisite.

The reason for unity... is... sadly... an attempt to follow windows 8 tablet interface for desktop. Once people are used to 8, they believe it will make unity an easy alternative. It is a mistake in my opinion... but I am not canonical.

There is a nasty chunk of code out there pretending to be an adobe flash update... and if you opt to install it, will cause problems. Mac is based in a special flavor of *nix, and is afforded the same protection as linux. You can open a terminal in mac and run most any linux basic command under various shells. However there are bad folks out there who want to "infect" mac and linux. Linux, by virtue of repositories etc, is not susceptible to this particular java exploit... Macs only are if they select the fake update and provide credentials.

 

It should be noted that there is a gnome2 version of 1210.
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuGNOME/ReleaseNotes/12.10

It bundles gnome3 and gnome2, giving you the opportunity to decide.

 

People choose OSX for ultimate convenience with very little customization, and Linux for the opposite. Windows lies somewhere in between.

It's not "better", it's just different. People will choose whatever they feel best suits their ability. I myself prefer Windows 7.

 

It's not free, it's funded by ad revenue.

 

Linux is too hard on hardware, not surprising since it's blowware. I don't like the Windows monopoly, but my oldest computer has been running it for over 12 years now without having to replace a single piece of hardware, while every one of my boxes running Linux blew something out every two to three months, monitors and cd drives and power supplies, and finally I got bored with screwing around with the crap altogether. I did, however, make a contribution to the 'cause' once, figuring out that a defective L2 cache in the Pentium 2s caused bad installs, and disabling it solved the problem; and also solved a problem with some Slack version that didn't recognize my cd drive, and having to find and edit the device driver manually, basically just removing an asterisk before a line of code, not that I ever got any help solving that issue either, nor with any other issue I ever had with Linux, although I did get the standard, usual 'go read da manual, man' handwave from the usual blow ware fanatics, lollers. Don't have any desire to screw around with the crap again.

 

I hated Unity when I first tried to use it, damn things were bouncing all over the place. But I use it on a Netbook and find it quite okay. I prefer Gnome classic on the desktop but I think I'm using Gnome 3 (?) in my Ubuntu on the laptop. I started using Cinnamon on Mint but for some reason it started to hog the resources so I took it back to Gnome, I think it might be Mate, not sure, and it's a lot better in performance. Lubuntu uses LXDE and it's going very well on my old P4.

 

The extreme customisation in Linux is found, I think, in Gentoo. I am too stupid to run Gentoo though, tried numerous times but can't install it. I have to admit my limitations.

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Free as in free beer, as the saying goes. All the distros I've ever used, and I've used plenty, were free, as in free beer and not carrying any rubbish in there.

 

This is complete rubbish. It is completely free. There is no advertizing on your OS. Free as in freedom. The very notion of advertizing is against the fundamental philosophy behind the open source community. It is truly free.

This is also completely and patently false. Linux is not "hard on hardware". Your hardware blowing up had nothing to do with the OS. Nothing.

 

Any flavor of linux can be "extremely" customized. However, if you're used to Ubuntu with Gnome3 (Unity - blech), it may not seem that way as it tries to hide as much from the user as possible.

Just get very familiar with the command line.

 

Lubuntu and Xubuntu are lightweight versions. They still have a software center. Lubuntu is the lighter of the two.

Here is a good breakdown of some tiny linux distros.
http://www.tuxradar.com/content/whats-best-lightweight-linux-distro

 

Yeah right ... whatever ... never mind, just peddle the cult.

 

Haha good on you. I tried Linux for a few weeks but didn't find it appealing. Windows is the sweet spot for me right now.

 

What you are suggesting is profoundly uneducated superstition that you alone have determined. The only way linux could POSSIBLY damage a monitor, is if it were a CRT, and a bad modeline were formulated for it. You would have to work very hard at blowing up, only this type of monitor... and it would have been instant. Monitors have a passive interaction with the video hardware.

A CD/DVD drive is powered by the PSU. The OS has NOTHING to do with its throughput... and reading and writing sectors is done at the speeds and articulation mandated by the hardware/firmware of the device.

The power demands on a PSU are LOWER from a linux desktop than any other... they are determined by the operation of the hardware itself, the more calculations necessary, the greater the draw.

You have absolutely NO idea what you are talking about... introduce "voodoo" as the reason you don't like linux, and then call me a cultist. I don't like windows... it cannot damage your hardware either. It sounds like you had a bad PSU that was blowing up your hardware, or you did not have a PSU rated high enough to power the hardware you had in the machine.

The only way linux can "damage" hardware is by directly overwriting the firmware on the devices which is something that must be done with specificity and is not native to the OS on any level... however your ignorant theory that it "runs harder" is completely without tether to reality.

 

So I took the plunge last week. I just got a new computer, bought it barebones to maximize bang for buck, and installed Ubuntu Studio 12.10. Got the studio version so I can do recording and video editing for my band. Well, things are going OK, I guess. It's pretty cool, but I'm such a noob (1st time using Linux) that I don't know how to do much. The terminal is confusing as hell. The only real problem I've had, though, that I just cannot seem to get figured out, is how to run World of Warcraft. I've tried so many different things from forums and such...wine, winetricks, playonlinux. It's always the same. The laucher tries to download "updates", and just hangs. But other than that, I like the bundled multimedia software, but I've got alot of learning to do to run any of it right.