Anybody Linux here?

[The Quadfather]

I am going to get a new OS for my pc soon. I have been reading about Linux, and was wondering if anybody here uses it? What do you think pros/cons.
Am I understanding from my reading that it is free for download?? Or is that some sort of trial deal? All the geeks I work with are tied up at the moment.

Thanks

[relfen]

It is free. There are many many different distributions to choose from and the learning curve can be quite steep. I would suggest you check out Ubuntu (www.ubuntu.com). It is one of the more mainstream distros out there today and there has been a good amount of usability work that others haven't seen.

There is a pretty solid community behind this particular distro as well. You will find a good amount of information for just about anything you need on the web.

My suggestions would be to download the desktop edition (link on the main page of ubuntu.com) and try out the livecd. This basically allows you to burn the image to cd and run the operating system from cd so you don't have to mess with your system. Basically, you can try it out before installing it. Good stuff.

As for pros/cons, it has a lot to do with what you're going to use it for. If you're just looking to do word processing/web browsing, you can definitely get what you need from linux. If you're a gamer and want to still be able to play all the games you do in windows, that's a different story. There are ways to make it work, but its not nearly as easy in many cases.

I started using linux in the late 90's and it has come a long way. Let me know if you have any other questions I can answer. Hopefully I offered some useful info here :P

[kantill]

I would agree with relfen on one thing that if you are a gamer it may not be for you but there is alot of good games for linux just not the main stream games. As for the learning curve todays linux distros are so user friendly that I had my mom of 61 running linux for awhile now. I love linux and it is a far better choice over windows unless you need some special app that will only run on windows. Of course you can always run both by using the live cd, dual boot or in a virtual system. To check out what that means check this site out.
http://www.virtualbox.org/
You can run linux or windows inside an window right on your desktop.

[Nik]

I like to look at it like this:

Say you are walking down the street (your PC), and in an alley there is a man being mugged (a problem).

Windows: A team of dudes puts a big canvas up across the alley so you never have to see the mugging. The guy ends up getting beaten to death, but you are none the wiser. God help you if you try to peek behind the canvas though.

Linux: You see the guy, and you can go and help him if you so choose, but there's a decent chance that you're going to get mugged right along with him.

[Kfedka]

I've used Ubuntu, that a great start. If you have 64 bit cpu, go with the 64bit version. Most drivers are installed with the os installed, which is very convenient.

You can try Ubuntu with windows install here; http://wubi-installer.org/

[Bodofish]

Ubuntu is probably the most painless. Another benefit is you don't need to run it on the latest hardware. Small foot print for the OS. Linux has come along way from it's humble beginings although it still doesn't have a multi billion dollar support system in place if you have trouble. It's true you can download it for free and the help you may find may be free, just remember, you get what you pay for. Cost of ownership is rarely figured at the initial investment.

Remember...... When you install that new card and it doesn't work, buck up, quit sniveling and write a new driver that works.

When you call your isp telling them you're having trouble, the first question will be,"is that a Mac or a PC?". When you say Ubunto they'll laugh and say contact one of your user groups. Oh darn, can't get to the internet........

If you are serious about it, the best thing to do is find an old PC, study up, join a couple user groups, get a few phone numbers of experienced users close by and load it on the PC and try it for a while. Don't jump in with both feet, you will be sorry.

[swedefish4life1]

Trust me Bodofish knows user systems, computers and complainers daily!:-$

[Rich McVey]

I like to look at it like this:

Say you are walking down the street (your PC), and in an alley there is a man being mugged (a problem).

Windows: A team of dudes puts a big canvas up across the alley so you never have to see the mugging. The guy ends up getting beaten to death, but you are none the wiser. God help you if you try to peek behind the canvas though.

Linux: You see the guy, and you can go and help him if you so choose, but there's a decent chance that you're going to get mugged right along with him.

Ive had that feeling before, trying to run Win7 RC1 now, "No bootable partition in table" ran fine all weekend. Office '07 SP2 Update. Argh... I feel like Im being mugged right now...

Quad: If you want to put some time and energy into learning the Linux commands and file structure, you shouldnt have to many problems. But like everyone is agreeing, it IS a totally different animal. You wont have as many mainstream softwares available to you but the Linux world has an application out there for most enything you could possibly want if you put the time into finding it.

If this is your primary PC, make sure you have everything backed up. Linux may not install and play nice with current files left on the drive. You can also expect to spend a fair amount of time configuring the software once installed. Drivers and updates are a lil bit less forward.

I learned Linux (RedHat) by doing it. Installing and building up HTTP and FTP servers. I also kept an older machine around to practice with.

Documentation: The site to the Linux flavor you choose should have most of the documentation you'll require, I also got a book on "Shell Programing" had all of the Linux commands neatly laid out and defined as well as usage context.


~Rich

[kantill]

The point you all are missing is that most likely just like most "users" he wouldn't be doing upgrades or compiling anything at most he would install software from the add programs applet. So an distros like ubuntu or mepis would be fine and he would find them very user friendly. Everybody talks about how easy windows is to use and that's why linux isn't used much and that is why you take a simple question and start talking about compiling and so on most people think that they are going to be doing that just to get it to turn on. If windows is so easy than why do I have a job support companies with their systems.

I agree just like anything new he should some homework before he picks an distro to run and that why I suggested to run it in a virtual system like virtualbox which is pretty easy to use and he can run several different installs at once and never change the windows he is on. I feel that he has taken a huge step in even asking about it and I would like to say congrats to him looking out of the norm and trying something "different".

[Easy Limits]

I have Ubuntu on my desktop and Kubuntu on my laptop both as dual boot options. I am still learning the in's and out's of Linux but I like it so far.

[HillbillyGeek]

I been using Windows from NT 3.1 to Vista & recently began using Linux (Fedora) at work.

The shell differences are HUGE, but if you've ever used Unix, the Linux shell will look familiar.

Overall I am impressed with Linux -- but I still like Windows better. It has more bells & whistles, plus it's MUCH more manageable in an enterprise environment.

I'm also a huge fan of C# and the .NET framework. The closest thing for the Linux platform is Java...

[Rich McVey]

Hey Quad... Where are you at with this? Have you installed the OS?

[kantill]

I'm also a huge fan of C# and the .NET framework. The closest thing for the Linux platform is Java...

I am not a programmer so sorry if it is not the same but have you looked at python?

Just was wondering what did you mean on what "bells and whistles" that windows have that linux doesn't besides active directory? You can setup samba so be a domain controller.

I to have been in the "pc" world since dos to testing windows 7 and would love a different point of view of linux. As I have told other people that I can remember saying that I want a 486dx so I could install windows 95 and bulletin boards where much better than the internet.

[HillbillyGeek]

I'm also a huge fan of C# and the .NET framework. The closest thing for the Linux platform is Java...

I am not a programmer so sorry if it is not the same but have you looked at python?

Just was wondering what did you mean on what "bells and whistles" that windows have that linux doesn't besides active directory? You can setup samba so be a domain controller.

I to have been in the "pc" world since dos to testing windows 7 and would love a different point of view of linux. As I have told other people that I can remember saying that I want a 486dx so I could install windows 95 and bulletin boards where much better than the internet.

The bells & whistles include things like WMI, DCOM, an extremely robust event logging framework, powershell (VERY powerful) and wide variety of built-in tools that make life easier.
As far as Python goes, I don't know much about it -- but from what I've read, it looks promising.

[kantill]

Ok you were talking more toward the development side as the built in tools go a lot of them there just under different names. Also to be said I don't know much about the Fedora aka redhat distro I am a Debian person.