When did you come to Linux?

[MurphCID]

... whining about NVidia and Broadcom drivers were the least of a newbie Linux users problems ...

Huh?

If you had NVIDIA drivers installed, every kernel upgrade would break your system. Proprietary graphics drivers were by far the touchiest part of maintaining a functioning system. I remember the days before distros came with "driver managers".

Oh Lord, so do I.

[Lady Fitzgerald]

I set up my first Linux machine on an old Win 7 machine back in mid December. I took the plunge and put away the other Win 7 machine I had in mid January. I'm still a raw noob when it comes to Linux (learning doesn't come easy for me).

[Barbados99]

I set up my first Linux machine on an old Win 7 machine back in mid December. I took the plunge and put away the other Win 7 machine I had in mid January. I'm still a raw noob when it comes to Linux (learning doesn't come easy for me).

I'm curious, how has your journey been so far? Are you a happy camper

[Barbados99]

I first used Linux in the mid-1990's, I think it may have been in 1995. My first distro was Red Hat Linux. From the beginning I was drawn to Linux due to the free software. We had young children and on a tight family budget. LOL, now I'm retired and still on a tight budget... some things never change

I had a tough time learning how to use Red Hat but was very grateful for it. I was trying to volunteer for a not-for-profit agency (who didn't have much money either) and ended up cobbling together a web site for them that I maintained. I also did manage to set up a web server for them with Red Hat to host the site. It was a database driven website too, that I also found complicated. All I remember was that it was a very painful experience due to me not being an IT person. But in the end it worked for them. I did set it up as a mail server too (this was before Gmail and the other free email services came along). How, I don't know, but I did get it to work after a lot of trial and error. I remember that I about lost my mind before I got it all to work. After a few years I was able to hand it off to a new volunteer who DID have an IT background. That felt so good to let him take over. But how cool that we could do all of this with free software, right? I have also built my computers (desktops not laptops) over those many years - a friend of mine at work taught me how to build my own and I'm mighty grateful to him for taking the time to teach me. LOL, he is one of those "smart people" who actually understands all of this stuff. I'm just a "learn as I go" guy who half understands it all.

Over the years I have used a lot of different Linux distros and have liked a number of them. But Mint XFCE is my favorite for getting everyday work done, and not having to fight my operating system. On my main computer I just want stuff to work as hassle-free as possible. That said, I do enjoy tinkering with other distros just for fun and learning. But I don't have to depend on those installs for critical work that needs to be done. Anyway, I am grateful for Mint. Last week my daughter dropped off her Windows 10 laptop for me to fix. What an unpleasant experience. I had forgotten how frustrating Windows can be to work on. I find Mint a lot easier to work with. Anyway, that's my story with Linux.

[Lady Fitzgerald]

I set up my first Linux machine on an old Win 7 machine back in mid December. I took the plunge and put away the other Win 7 machine I had in mid January. I'm still a raw noob when it comes to Linux (learning doesn't come easy for me).

I'm curious, how has your journey been so far?...

Rocky with plenty of ups and downs. Of course, that can be said of going from my house to and from my snail mail box.

...Are you a happy camper

Pretty much. While I'm still struggling far more with Linux than I was with Win 7 when I first started with Linux, keep in mind I had decades of experience with Windows. It won't take as long to get in Linux where I was in Win 7 but it won't be overnight either (hopefully, I'll live long enough for that, a real concern considering how "well seasoned" I am). Overall, I'm liking Mint far better than Win 7 (I won't even discuss the abomination called Win 10) but that doesn't mean Linux doesn't have its undesirable quirks.

...I'm just a "learn as I go" guy who half understands it all...

That's pretty much how I have to learn.

...I had forgotten how frustrating Windows can be to work on. I find Mint a lot easier to work with. Anyway, that's my story with Linux.

The fact that I was so familiar with Windows is one reason I'm still struggling with Linux. Overall, Mint is definitely better and easier to use than even Win 7 (Win 10 and Microsoft itself aren't even in the race) but there are a few areas where it isn't as easy to use or understand as Win 7 was.

[jjp2145-oldtimer]

I have been using Linux for about 1 year.

Looking through my old posts, I realize that I am just weird. Like the time I deleted my swap file without even running swapoff first and started to comment out lines of my fstab in order to figure out how things work. All very analytical; like destroying or damaging a person's organs and recording how they died in order to find out what organs do.

Yeah, starting with Linux Mint in the summer of 2019 was not even remotely difficult. So far, kernel updates have not caused any problems. The software repository is like having someone do my techsupport for me. I also have never been shamed off of a forum.

[farkas]

One month after MS discontinued support for win95.

[Contra]

I came to Linux in 1991, and ran Ubuntu server on a machine in order to build a website I hosted but that was some time back, but got used to Window$ again and forgot most of what I learned. Fedora was my first distro.

[absque fenestris]

I came to Linux in 1991, and ran Ubuntu server on a machine in order to build a website I hosted but that was some time back, but got used to Window$ again and forgot most of what I learned. Fedora was my first distro.

Could it have been before September 1991? Then it would have been called "Freax", nonetheless you should be one of the very best Linux users ...

[MartyMint]

What an incredible story.

[Contra]

I came to Linux in 1991, and ran Ubuntu server on a machine in order to build a website I hosted but that was some time back, but got used to Window$ again and forgot most of what I learned. Fedora was my first distro.

Could it have been before September 1991? Then it would have been called "Freax", nonetheless you should be one of the very best Linux users ...

No sir, I am so out of practice, I am just getting back into this OS. I remember it was Red Hat, I bought it at Comp USA, I didn't know it was free back then...lol.

[Barbados99]

I came to Linux in 1991, and ran Ubuntu server on a machine in order to build a website I hosted but that was some time back, but got used to Window$ again and forgot most of what I learned. Fedora was my first distro.

Could it have been before September 1991? Then it would have been called "Freax", nonetheless you should be one of the very best Linux users ...

No sir, I am so out of practice, I am just getting back into this OS. I remember it was Red Hat, I bought it at Comp USA, I didn't know it was free back then...lol.

I remember doing something similar. It must have been around 1995 or so, and I ordered Red Hat on CD and paid for it, but if memory serves me right, it was dirt cheap. It probably was just enough to cover the cost of the CDs, packaging and mailing it to my home. I'm sure I could have downloaded it and burned my own back then, but I knew absolutely nothing about Linux and felt more comfortable paying like that. It got me started anyway. My memory is foggy on it all, other than I remember that it was hard for me to learn. It was all so new to me.

[ajgreeny]

I came to Linux in 1991, and ran Ubuntu server on a machine in order to build a website I hosted but that was some time back, but got used to Window$ again and forgot most of what I learned. Fedora was my first distro.

Are you sure about that?

Perhaps I have misunderstood what you mean about the dates but unless I'm very much mistaken, Ubuntu of any version didn't exist until 2003 or 2004, starting with the released version 4.04 named, if I remember correctly, Hoary Hedgehog.

[Bolle1961]

First Ubuntu was 4.10, released in october 2004 named Warty Warthog

[Contra]

Then possibly it wasn't Red Hat, I really don't remember what distro it was, I do remember buying one at Comp USA and thought it was great because it would have free software, but found out I couldn't play all my games on it, so have flip flopped with Windows ever since.

[Minux1]

If I didn’t need MS Windows for certain things I would have called it quits after XP which is the best O/S MS ever offered. I’ve got one working MS Windows 10 laptop left. Used DOS command line a lot in Windows and also the MAC terminal so the Linux terminal was no big deal (about the same as the MacOS terminal). Messed around with a lot of distros. Linux Mint and MX Linux are about the best. Experimenting with Parrot Linux now ... hopefully I’ll keep myself out of jail.

[tjay260476]

I came to Linux when I was asked to build a web server, before I was using a WIMP server (Windows/IIS/MySQL/PHP), but knew that a industry web-server needed a LAMP server.

This was well over a decade ago, but it did mean that I was using the terminal from the get go, and it took a lot of trial and error, well more error LOL. before I went pro in web hosting, I started with web/email hosting from home - I did recognise the risks of doing this, but I think that if you want to understand the WWW and the internet in all its unforgiving glory, the best way is to do it yourself. I have had ransomware attacks, my server being blacklisted as it turned into a spambot, as well as all the other things that can go wrong! I did however got myself whitelisted within months, so no mean feat there!

My three (two virtual) servers are Linux based, even the business file server, but its only been the past few days I have added a Linux distro on my main PC, as the only time I use Windows is for work, as I use Publisher and Photoshop a lot, as well as Outlook.

This is probably the first time I'm using Linux for leisure though

[Barbados99]

I came to Linux when I was asked to build a web server, before I was using a WIMP server (Windows/IIS/MySQL/PHP), but knew that a industry web-server needed a LAMP server.

This was well over a decade ago, but it did mean that I was using the terminal from the get go, and it took a lot of trial and error, well more error LOL. before I went pro in web hosting, I started with web/email hosting from home - I did recognise the risks of doing this, but I think that if you want to understand the WWW and the internet in all its unforgiving glory, the best way is to do it yourself. I have had ransomware attacks, my server being blacklisted as it turned into a spambot, as well as all the other things that can go wrong! I did however got myself whitelisted within months, so no mean feat there!

My three (two virtual) servers are Linux based, even the business file server, but its only been the past few days I have added a Linux distro on my main PC, as the only time I use Windows is for work, as I use Publisher and Photoshop a lot, as well as Outlook.

This is probably the first time I'm using Linux for leisure though

That is a wonderful story... and welcome to the Mint Forum.

[tjay260476]

Bit of an update..... realised I didn’t need Windows (who knew!) and now all servers, PC’s and laptops are now all running FOSS!

(Now waiting for Stallman to give me an audit!)

[MurphCID]

If it was not for photoshop, iTunes, and games, I would go 100% Linux Mint on all my machines. The kids and spouse-unit still would need MS Office.