Linux is Not Windows

[Plastic Paddy]

I must say that this article was well written. I wish that I had seen this article prior to taking the plunge. It was quite refreshing though, but there was a steep learning curve. I dual booted with windows for a time and then found that I only booted to windows once a month at best.... then lately not at all. I tried a few flavors of Linux and found Mint. Great distro and I can not imagine going back.... the article does explain a lot and I will print and use it when I preach to the masses.... well done on the article and well done Linux Mint Gloria!!!

[rhY]

Nice article. I'm new to linux and want to learn how to make it dance. On the net where is the best place to learn? I have mint7 but plan to dual boot a no frills basic distro to work on to learn.

Why dual boot when you can run any distribution you desire in Virtualbox? That way if you by chance bork your virtual machine, you don't take the whole computer down with it.

Dual boot is a much better idea for most users. The main reason being Grand Theft Auto.

[Colonel Schell]

Yes, but he wasn't originally talking about dual-booting Linux and Windows, he was talking about dual-booting Mint and some more bare-bones Linux flavor on which to learn the underlying command line and architecture. (Slackware comes to mind.)

[brucekan9]

yes, absolutely

http://www.ecmzone.net

to know more about linux, i hope it will help.

[MistressNomad]

..........................

[ibm450]

*sigh* While the article is well-written, and does strike on many valid points, I have to ultimately disagree. What I hear when I read that is the same thing I've always heard from well-meaning Linux geeks who are, ultimately, missing the point.

I'm in the process of downloading Mint as we speak. I'm currently an XP user because I refuse to move to the insanity that is Vista, and Ubuntu disappointed me beyond belief.

Not because it wasn't Windsuck. The reason I tried it was because I didn't want it to be. I don't mind learning some new hotkeys. It's not that.

Not because I'm totally computer illiterate. I'm not. If I have to, I can go into the command line and get my **** done. I'd prefer not to, but I can. It's not that.

The reason I didn't like Ubuntu was because the package SAID "pre-assembled toy car" and when I opened it, not only was it not fully pre-assembled, but some of the pieces didn't even fit, and some of them were missing all together.

For example, what precisely is the point of a packaged Java install when it fails to work (all 6 versions, by the way) and you have to go into the command line anyway? Just for looks?

I have dozens such examples with my 4 months with Ubuntu. Yes. Four months. I gave it the benefit of the doubt. I gave it a chance. But ultimately, I don't want to play with a half-assembled car. Even if it's free.

That, for me anyway, was the issue. If Linux wants to be for geeks, by geeks, that's cool. But if that's how it's going to be, don't lie to me and tell me it's user friendly (user friendly being defined as logical and simple, not necessarily familiar). Either be for geeks and be honest about it, or give me something that actually IS user friendly.

However! I have heard the Mint has made serious progress on this issue, and really, Ubuntu was not that far away from being worth it. There are probably only 3 or 4 things that needed to happen for Ubuntu to be totally useable for the "average user," and from what I've read Mint hits most them.

So, I'm hoping this is going to be The One. Because as we speak, I'm on a friend's Vista machine, and it's making me want to dig my eyes out of my head with rusty spoons. And once 7 comes out, I'm not going to have much of a choice. I was done with Windows years ago. Hopefully this will be the alternative I've been looking for.

Jesus, you hit my G-Spot with this comment...lol...talk about straight to the point, and mind you, a very sharp point it is too.
ive been in the computer business for many years, from having a home based comp business (web-developer - in house database planner/developer - in house vb programming). for many years i tried linux on and off, i only had linux installed for no more then 1 week in the past, until i discovered mint.

i almost gave up linux my self especially when i stumbled across "Whinners.." thread i think in this forum or Ubuntu, where, ultimately, it was the geeks attacking the newbies when newbies were trying to understand and or try out something new from years of windows use to something that, frankly, in my personal experience, found linux/ubuntu having that half finished feel to it and was and is still at times very frustrating to make things work and get very dis-heartened by comments like "if you dont like linux, go back to windows.." just dosnt help.

i can see that more and more window users are at LEAST dual booting to linux these days and that to me means that there is going to be 1000's of opinions coming at linux developers in relation to user friendliness to new GUI designs to making it, hopefully, less command line free OS.

lol....i cant wait to see the slagging coming my way after this post also.... must say its getting better, more GUI orientated and starting to get less line command orientated when installing wanna be apps (debs)

[MistressNomad]

That was exactly it. It felt half-finished. I'm sure geeks must love that to pieces, but for someone who just wants to get her **** done, that is a nightmare.

And that article had the same snobby "You stupid Windows users just don't understand" feel as everything else I've read. It's not that I don't understand - I'm not stupid. It's that I was told Ubunutu was user friendly, and I found out that it was not. And when I said something about it, I got attacked.

I don't anticipate Mint to be entirely easy if only because I have a touch screen to grapple with. But I simply can't go on with Windows. And I am really hoping Mint will deliver on its promise where Ubuntu failed, and that the community here will be kinder than the community there.

EDIT: Here is a successful Linux convert who gets it: http://nixiepixel.com/blog/index.php/ub ... hate-linux

Don't be fooled by the title.

[rich_roast]

That was exactly it. It felt half-finished. I'm sure geeks must love that to pieces, but for someone who just wants to get her **** done, that is a nightmare.

Agreed, migrating to Linux, as opposed to trying it out, is an operation not to be underestimated, and an on-going one. I switched to Fedora 2 shortly after its released, completely, because I was forced into it (laptop's Windows got corrupted on hard drive during work trip, absolutely needed something to word process on, couldn't afford a new Windows and didn't have recovery disks, found Fedora 2 offered on front of a £5 Linux magazine, installed it, got on with work). I feel very fortunate that my experience has largely been a smooth one, and Linux rescued my Master's which Windows seemed intent on destroying. I got my "****" done through Linux, and have largely been able to find the information I needed to keep it that way for most of the time since.

I am interested to know, and hope others would be, in which ways (Ubuntu?) felt half-finished. Linux OSs, bar those that have ceased to be actively developed, are never finished nor will they ever be, any more than "Windows" will be finished - I suppose that Windows releases might "feel" more finished on account of the longer gaps between releases, but from a user interface perspective I can't help but feel that Mint (can't speak specifically for Ubuntu) has quite a mature desktop. Nobody, excepting perhaps testers, wants to feel like they're working in a construction site so it'd be interesting to know where this feeling comes from.

...It's that I was told Ubunutu was user friendly, and I found out that it was not. And when I said something about it, I got attacked.

You shouldn't have been attacked. It is sometimes difficult for a veteran, who remembers the clunky old graphical user interfaces (or not!) offered years ago, to understand or remember the difficulty of adjusting to new ways of doing things, like getting to grips with running terminal commands, modprobes, permissions, etc.. But that's no excuse, sorry to hear it.

I don't anticipate Mint to be entirely easy if only because I have a touch screen to grapple with. But I simply can't go on with Windows. And I am really hoping Mint will deliver on its promise where Ubuntu failed, and that the community here will be kinder than the community there.

There have been a few reports, both successful and not, on these forums concerning touchscreens. apparently there's an evtouch package which might help. Welcome to Mint, hopefully this'll be a better experience.

[MistressNomad]

Part of the reason I want to try Mint is because from what I've read, it has fixed a lot of the issues with Ubuntu. Like I said, still in the process of downloading it. Haven't tried Mint yet.

Ubuntu felt "half finished" in that a lot of the install packages didn't work, the compitability issues were much more crippling than it implied (as in, 4 different pairs of speakers, and none of them would work consistently), and all sorts of little niggling things that added up to such a bad user experience that I didn't want to continue with it. Basically, it said it did a lot of things that, in actuality, it doesn't. The looks were deceptive - it did look "finished," but it acted like it was still in Alpha.

Part of this is that while I am capable of getting into a computer's guts, I don't want to. I move and work quickly. I am only willing to spend so much time learning an OS and setting it up. If I still haven't got it right after 4 months, it's not worth it to me.

I'm hoping I can get the touch screen to work, but I basically just need to save my computer right now. XP ate it. Again. So it's time to try something new. Hopefully this will be the answer.

[lagagnon]

MistressNomad: Mint is based completely upon Ubuntu. There are really no significant system differences between Ubuntu and Mint - most of the differences are cosmetic with a few extras thrown in such as mintMenu. So all I'm saying is don't expect miracles.

Perhaps you could be more specific as to what "install packages didn't work" and what "compatibility issues" you in fact did have so we might be able to help you with your Mint install. You might also want to read this post about "The Myth of Working out of the Box" : viewtopic.php?f=61&t=29923&p=172482&hilit=myth#p172482

[MistressNomad]

The thing is, there was nothing significantly wrong with the *idea* of Ubuntu. It was just sloppily put together.

So, a re-worked Ubunutu actually sounds pretty good, if it really is re-worked.

I don't think that installs are instant. I, unlike most, have actually installed Windows, and I know for a fact it doesn't really "just work." But once you get through the installation part, most of it actually does just work. That's what I'm aiming for.

I'll get there once I actually get to the installation part...

[lagagnon]

I, unlike most, have actually installed Windows, and I know for a fact it doesn't really "just work." But once you get through the installation part, most of it actually does just work. That's what I'm aiming for.

Windows only works after an install once all the correct drivers for the various hardware are loaded, and even then there may be problems. Same with any operating system actually...tweaking is usually required unless you buy off the shelf.

[MistressNomad]

Yup, and in Vista's case, not even then.

Just trying to get USBMint to work on Vista is a nightmare... and for once it's not Linux causing the problems. God, my friend must be insane for dealing with this voluntarily...

[Plastic Paddy]

I see the point made here and for me, I was Ubuntu user, and still run an Ubuntu box on my home computer. Mint has done a lot and it took me some time to get Ubuntu working, but I have installed Windows more times that I can count. Nothing works out of the box unless it's OEM and then God help you if your warranty is up, need to reinstall, or have a hard drive go bad. I have resurrected two computers that I love that were mere paperweights and that is where Linux works for me.

My father tried Linux but in the end found it easier to just buy a new computer with... you guessed it... XP with the promise of a Windows & upgrade. But soon this computer will grind to a halt without some registry toolkit/scanner. In windows, the registry fix em up programs are like cocaine, you use them once and you're hooked. I went cold turkey to Mint and have not looked back. I think older computers do better with Linux because the geeks have worked out all the bugs, but for the new computer user, there are still things to figure out because Linux geeks are not consulted or told about the whiz bang stuff, they look at it, figure it out and then tell the rest of us.

For the computer companies, Microsoft and local support businesses, Windows is great. But for a half-geek want-to-be who is still using the Gateway Laptop I bought in 2002, that was sluggish at the best of times, Mint has done it for me.

[MistressNomad]

Oh, don't get me wrong, I'm certainly not arguing the case for Windows. Windows blows, if my struggles to format USBMint on Vista are any indication.

If I had tried Redhat, I certainly wouldn't complain that it's not user friendly. It's not meant to be. If I don't have the technical know-how or patience to make it work, that's my problem, not theirs. The only reason I'm complaining with Ubuntu is because the whole point of it is that it's supposed to be the layman's Linux, and it's not. That was the frustrating part.

I haven't yet gotten Mint properly up and running (just trying to salvage my stuff of my computer that XP ate... once again, I'm certainly not arguing in favor of Windows - XP has made my perfectly good computer run like a dog), but so far, it's gone much smoother than my affair with Ubuntu did. I have high hopes.

And yes, you're right about older computers. My computer is only about 3 years old, but it's one of the predessors to the webbook, so it's specs are... rather underpowered, to put it lightly. I'm hoping Mint can give me a little of the power back that XP sucked out of it. Mint in its entirety took up about 1.7GB on my USB drive... XP took over 6GB.

Ubuntu was not far off the mark. It had a couple of major failings, but if those were fixed, it would be perfect. I'm hoping that's what Mint has done. Because I am REALLY tired of dealing with Windows.

We shall see...

[DrHu]

Ubuntu was not far off the mark. It had a couple of major failings, but if those were fixed, it would be perfect. I'm hoping that's what Mint has done. Because I am REALLY tired of dealing with Windows. We shall see...

I notice that a lot of people seem to want to maintain the windows experience; I think that was even their logo/advertisement for XP (Xperience): the flying desk across the desert.

Doing that only forces Linux to ape either windows OS looks or MAC OS looks, that is, the eye candy.The fact that a command line operation is supported doesn't prevent any/most gui operations from also working

And I would offer this, the default windows OS experience is a double-click of the mouse; I prefer the single-click So I don't fall into the windows experience needed to feel comfortable. In the same way, I don't care if Ms Office 2007 or next version is different from office 2003 or OpenOffice. I use OpenOffice, don't need Ms Office, and don't miss it.

Now if I really have a problem with the Linux OS, and the hardware is supported in any way, even using a windows driver under a wrapper program, like ndiswrapper, to allow it to function; I don't mind, if it works..

If I have a device or a notebook, that is so propriety that no-one has developed a work-around (that includes Dell, which at one time claimed to support Linux, but really was just a ploy against Microsoft), I'll either live without it (that notebook) or suck it up and use windows (if I have no other choice)

I didn't like Ubuntu, because of Gnome; I must prefer Mint's Suse menu style vs the standard Places/System/Applications that Ubuntu and most Gnome based distributions use, as well as not liking the desktop look of Ubuntu..
--also I don't like the idea of changing a package manager to something that is your brand, but really is only a reworking of standard tools, like apt.

[MistressNomad]

I think the fashionable look of Mint will certain help win it converts, but personally it doesn't make a huge difference to me. Do I appreciate it? Sure. I like eye candy as much as the next person. But I didn't mind the brown-ness of Ubuntu that a lot of people don't like. I wouldn't have cared if it was no more graphically interesting than Windows 95, as long as it worked.

Let's be honest: All OS's that are usable for the Common Man look more or less the same in how they are laid out and organized. Mac, Windows, the desktop versions of Linux, doesn't matter.

The reason for that is the same reason that every street car is laid out the same way, no matter who is making it. It works well. It's intuitive. It is the most direct way from A to B.

There's no reason to make it look and work drastically differently, and doing so would actually make it less functional.

Sure, there are Formula 1 cars and dragsters and cars for people with various handicaps, but for your every day average Joe on the street, all cars work the same, because that is the best way to do it.

Mint seems to be perfectly capable of handling customizations. Sure, it's not as readily obvious as it is in other Linux OS's, but that's the sacrifce you get for usability and general appeal. The point is that you CAN if you want to without too much of a fuss. And if the point of Mint is to be user friendly, that's as it should be.

I still haven't gotten Mint on my hard drive (my computer is in a sorry state at the moment), but when I ran it from the USB, Open Office was as easy to find as the partition manager. Good luck finding the latter at all on Vista without tearing your hair out in frustration.

And I think that's a rather good balance. I'm somewhat taken with Mint so far. I think it may have finally accomplished what Ubuntu failed to.

I get that a lot of die-hard, long-time Linux fan don't like the more friendly versions of Linux that are coming out, but keep in mind, open source should be for everyone - not just geeks. Isn't that the point?

[Colonel Schell]

Right, which is why I intend to keep one foot in each camp: the more geeky, and the more n00b friendly.

It's one way to learn enough to help out, and to pay back what I've been given.

[hinto]

and the more n00b friendly

That's interesting... I was just completely baffled why, after installing Norton Endpoint on my XP box, I could no longer connect to it with RDesktop (from Mint). I'm still trying to remove it from XP.

I forgot... which OS was for the more geeky?

-H

[ibm450]

I forgot... which OS was for the more geeky?

-H

definitely linux - not MS - known fact