Linux for a new user

[sinkoman]

Today, I figured i'd try out a small Linux distro, and as I was searching around for a few that boot off a cd, I asked myself "why?"

Indeed, why should I try Linux? I was going to do it just for fun, but really, is there any REAL benefit with it over Windows? Do you guys think that it's really worth it just to have fun and muck around for a little while?

If so, then what distro would you guys reccomend me? Doesn't have to boot off a cd.

If not, then try to convince me, please

 

[Zeus]

http://www.ubuntu.com/

Ubuntu is prolly the best for new users.

Honestly after using linux for a while I don't really see much use to it over windows..pretty much everything is harder to use and set up. Its fun to screw around with for a while but I just ended up back at windows after dealing with numerous problems.

 

[dys4iK]

Having to work with many linux systems day in and day out, I can only say that if it's gaming and web surfing you're after, stick to windows.

 

[furiousV]

Being able to use Linux, as well as Windows, is a good thing, and can look good on your CV.

Benefit: You can get Linux for free, Windows over here cost about £100 for XP Pro, that is if you decide to go legal.

If you leave your computer on for long periods of time, for downloading torrents, server, anything, then Linux will probably be better. Linux can go on for 100s of days without a reboot - even if you install updates, whereas Windows, I need to reboot constantly - every update, most programs, to free RAM.

More and more games these days have support for Linux. All Quakes, including 4, Doom III, all Unreal Tournaments, and Duke Nukem 3D (Great game, I started playing it again recently), which is now shareware and people have made it support Linux.

If a game does not have support for Linux, there is Wine and WineX(Cedega). Half Life 2 runs fine on Cedega.

In a typical Linux installation, you get nearly everything you will ever need. Office software, handy calculator, memtest, compilers, wireless configuration utilities, SSH/Telnet clients, Samba server for sharing files across a network that even Windows systems can get access to, Apache for hosting your own websites (you must specifically tell it to run), Firefox (woohoo!), Thunderbird, another 1 or 2 web browsers if you don't like firefox, another email client if you don't like thunderbird.
Virtual desktops, If you have alot of applications running in one desktop, switch to number 2 for a clean screen and do whatever. Switch back and forth with the click of a button. You can have many virtual desktops.

Very customisable GUI. Download themes, modify themes, add effects, change clock to suit the way you want, add transluscency to the start menu, add transluscency to particular applications - such as CLI shell, whatever you want, you got it.

A feature I find very important: True multi-user OS.
Windows XP promised it was a MU-OS, however, doign a Remote Desktop login to a computer when someone is already physically at it gets kicked off. Only one person can be working at the computer at a time (it's also in the EULA for Windows XP).
With Linux you can have lots of people logged in and notice almost no performance loss.

I could go on . . .

 

[OCybrManO]

If a game does not have support for Linux, there is Wine and WineX(Cedega). Half Life 2 runs fine on Cedega.

Also, IIRC, Battlefield 2 support was just recently added in Cedega 5.

 

[Cole]

If you have no problems running Windows, there is no real reason to switch btw.
There are certain emulators to run Windows games n applications on Linux, but they will run faster on windows.

If you have no problems with windows, there is no real reason to switch. If you are having probelms with spyware, adware(cuz you use IE to look at porn with no protection), lots of crashes, etc... then you could try switching to linux.

 

[duffers20]

The only reason I have installed and use linux some of the time is because I want to get a decent level of understanding because it is something which is being used alot more in businesses and it would be excellent to say that you are comfortable in both windows xp, 2000, server 2003.. and the following flavours of linux.

 

[furiousV]

I randomly came across this today.

It is basically a Windows compatible OS, and it is not quite Windows, and not Linux either.

And its free!
Something to look at if you don't have a legal copy of Windows . . . I do

 

[sinkoman]

I'm rereading through this thread, and am utterly interested in putting a small linux install on a flashdrive (iPod maybe) just try out for a few months.

Compilers got me interested. Furious, what languages are we talking?

 

[furiousV]

Compilers got me interested. Furious, what languages are we talking?

C, C++, Java, Python to name a few
You can get Borland's Delphi equivelant for linux, called Kylix but it looks like something you need to buy.
Theres Pascal, and Visual Basic applications have been known to run in linux.

Pretty much any language, mostly C/C++

 

[sinkoman]

C, C++, Java, Python to name a few
You can get Borland's Delphi equivelant for linux, called Kylix but it looks like something you need to buy.
Theres Pascal, and Visual Basic applications have been known to run in linux.

Pretty much any language, mostly C/C++

/me starts up an UBUNTU dl.

 

[OCybrManO]

Remember, if you like the basic underlying aspects of Ubuntu but you prefer KDE to GNOME (the one built into Ubuntu)... there's also Kubuntu. You can still install KDE on top of Ubuntu if you decide to switch later on down the road, but it's cleaner to just start with the variant built around it. Both desktop environments are good. It just depends on your personal preferences.

 

[dys4iK]

I firmly beleive it is easier to learn how to take care of your windows system than it will be to learn how to take care of your linux system. I don't mean to discourage you from learning a new OS, because as has been said it is a valuable thing. If it's just stability you want, learn to manage windows, because linux isn't going to be any easier.

 

[sinkoman]

I firmly beleive it is easier to learn how to take care of your windows system than it will be to learn how to take care of your linux system. I don't mean to discourage you from learning a new OS, because as has been said it is a valuable thing. If it's just stability you want, learn to manage windows, because linux isn't going to be any easier.

Well, i'm having no issues whatsoever with Windows atm, i'm just having some fun and trying to broaden my computing knowledge. Would be neat to tell my next employer that they could sit me down with a Linux system and i'd be fine off.

Not to mention, if I ever get my graphics design house )), then I could just pass out a Linux Distro to my few employees, and leave my windows system at home to my home computing and gaming needs. That'd save a ton of money on licenses.

I'm just getting a Live CD now. I've already got a DSL live CD, but I wasn't pleased with that. I want the whole linux experience. DSL seems like a cool little project, but I wasn't satisfied that i'd really gotten to play with linux.

 

[furiousV]

Get Knoppix
About 2GB squeezed into a single bootable CD. Boots into the KDE desktop by default, also has Gnome and another desktop selectable.

Knoppix on the CD is pretty powerful, got lots of tools, Open Office.org, port scanners (now behave yourself), ndiswrapper for using your wireless network card.

It can even read your NTFS partitions.

Some people use it for hosting servers, like Samba or apache.

Downside is, if you do alot with it, make changes and reboot, youv lost everything. Though you can save your current settings to a floppy/flash.

I am currently dual booting Windows XP and Fedora Core 4.
I also got a headless box with FC4 which I SSH into, I keep learning all the time.

 

[Adabiviak]

... had windows 98 on for, what, five months before we rebooted it? (server back in the day). We only rebooted it because we were switching power supplies. I wonder if anyone has ever said:
"I'm never buying <popular auto manufacturer> again! I keep getting traffic violations for crossing red lights and parking on freeways.":bonce"

"Curse <popular auto manufacturer>s! I got a custom made fuel pump from the flea market for free and now my car won't start. This happened with the carburetor I got at a yard sale and the brake pads my 4-year old made out of clay. Maybe I need a new car." :rolling:

"Egad! People keep putting homing devices on my <popular auto manufacturer> and they know where I've been. I don't know how to stop them, but I know how to build and customize my own car that will keep them off, so I'll do that." :bounce:

"I keep getting flat tires in my <popular auto manufacturer>. Maybe, instead of watching the road or purchasing a good set of puncture proof tires, I'll buy a whole new car."

There are (in my opinion) valid arguments for switching from Windows, but the above are usually what I hear.

 

[sinkoman]

There are (in my opinion) valid arguments for switching from Windows, but the above are usually what I hear.

Well, i've never had a problem with Windows, and I, unlike a ton of idiots parading the internet, do a whole bunch of performance checks weekly.

Just doing this for fun

Oh and, YAY! My ubuntu Live CD is done. Time to go burn it I guess.

 

[sinkoman]

I bid you all "hello" from my ubuntu Live CD!

YAY!

I are happy

EDIT: Well, this is all very nice and interesting, but I see no real reason to stick with it. I'll probably try screwing around with my DSL live cd again, cause this is allot like windows, and therefore i'm completely comfortable with it. I really love the whole workspace idea though

 

[xombine]

The real way to experience Ubuntu is to put it on the HD. The LiveCD is just for fun, it will be much better without it. Just make sure you dont erase Windows off of your drive when you do.

Its also nice if you have another computer you can screw around with, not to worry about your main rig.

I myself put Ubuntu on one, and dont see any major reasons to go to Linux. Sure its a nice change, but some things are a real pain in the ass. I had a helluva time getting a music player to play mp3 format songs, as the one that comes with Ubuntu doesn't.

Just screw around a lot, and eventually you'll figure it out.

 

[sinkoman]

Yeah, i'm thinking of maybe getting a laptop HDD, putting it in a USB enclosure, then putting a Kubuntu boot on it

 

[OCybrManO]

I myself put Ubuntu on one, and dont see any major reasons to go to Linux. Sure its a nice change, but some things are a real pain in the ass. I had a helluva time getting a music player to play mp3 format songs, as the one that comes with Ubuntu doesn't.

What? I got MP3 support in like 3 minutes... without doing anything even remotely complicated. Perhaps that's because I downloaded XMMS (looks sort of like winamp 2.X).

The only problem I encountered was getting MPlayer working. It turned out that the one in the unofficial repository I was checking was an old version that conflicted with other packages. So, I downloaded the DEB package from the a link on the MPlayer site... installed the plastik skin for it... and all was well.

Other than that, Synaptic works wonderfully and had almost all of the software I needed to get started.

 

[xombine]

Well...maybe I'm retarded. Thats what I did, got XMMS. YOu just have to go into the add/remove programs thing and add it. Just took me forever. Yup, im stupid.:monkee:

 

[sinkoman]

Well...maybe I'm retarded. Thats what I did, got XMMS. YOu just have to go into the add/remove programs thing and add it. Just took me forever. Yup, im stupid.:monkee:

Perhaps. The Live CD recognized my iPod and all the songs on it

 

[Space Farm]

I find if you have an older laptop and only want to surf and do some word processsing or something (I'm using an older laptop now) linux is simply awesome.

You don't need an anti-virus program, which noticeably slows down older PC's and theres no need for defrags or anti-spyware checks etc... I simply love it and I'm pretty new to linux. I'm using Ubuntu and while it was kind of hard to wrap your head around things after using Windows for years and years it's getting a lot easier and it's stable as hell. You get addicted to trying out new themes and customizing everything.

Howevever, my main PC will still use XP. In years to come when linux gets bigger and there are more games, native support for photoshop, dreamweaver etc... windows is getting the boot.

 

[furiousV]

I have a Pentium 4 2.4GHz 512MB RAM SiS Integrated graphics for my family main PC running SUSE 9.1 Professional. The decision was after a non-l3g4l copy of Windows XP Pro died for the 2nd time, and were not paying about £120 for XP Pro, it's just too much.

It is serving us well, OpenOffice.org does the .doc files beautifully, and I like the word-suggestion feature it has. No anti-virus on it, I don't need to worry about ad-aware for the time being, as nobody is an administrator that can damage the PC if they mess up. There are plenty of IM clients that support MSN Messenger protocol, and the printer works perfect using CUPS.
Nobody has complained about freezing up, crashing or any kind of problems at all. There is nothing that PC is used for that Linux can not do, it can only do better.
Wouldn't mind getting Suse 10.0 some time

But my own PC right now is dual boot WinXP Pro and FC4, I like my games

I am seeing more and more games coming out with linux releases, like Doom III has a Linux release, and Quake 4 and UT2004. An example that every game developer should follow.

Crisis King, you tried using the GIMP yet?

 

[Space Farm]

Yes I've tried it, I use photoshop daily for work and after trying to use Gimp it just isn't as good (this is my opinion though and that's probably because I've used PS for so long). However, having said that, I love Gimp. It's great because it's free, but I feel that it's just not as polished as photoshop is.

Also there is also another photo editing software out under linux but unfortunately it's not free - can't remember the name of it but it looks pretty cool.

 

[Cole]

I am seeing more and more games coming out with linux releases, like Doom III has a Linux release, and Quake 4 and UT2004. An example that every game developer should follow.

More and More? Id's engines run on Open Gl so thats why for them(Open up for a wider audience is simple for them...more $$). Even Q1\Q2\Q3 should run on Linux with ease. So thats something ID has always done, thus it's not "growing". I could see UT2004 Engine being Epics last engine with no support for Open Gl, ecspecially with there Upcoming engine which I havn't heard anything about it and Open GL just it and Direct X.

Personally, it's rather getting smaller as Direct X climbs.

Of course then you have emulators like Cedega etc..

 

[furiousV]

I could see UT2004 Engine being Epics last engine with no support for Open Gl, ecspecially with there Upcoming engine which I havn't heard anything about it and Open GL just it and Direct X.

NO support for OpenGL?
I have UT2004, and it has DirectX, OpenGL and even Software rendering . . .

And yes, Quake I,II and III all have Linux binaries that you can download to make the original Windows-compatible CD you bought work (you install the binary you download, and copy some files from the CD over)

And nobody is making game developers use DirectX - for now anyway, its just that it's currently a better API but OpenGL will make a triumphant return soon don't worry :naughty:

Then there is that about Vista killin OpenGL(wrappin OpenGL in its own DirectX) - can someone give an update to this?
If this is the case, game developers may start writing only in DirectX
But people may also decide the time has come to part with Windows

And if Windows Vista does provide more techniques to combat piracy, that doesn't necessarily mean more people are going to buy it, people will stick with Windows XP for as long as possible, then perhaps make the move to Linux - I for one will never purchase it.
Then with less people using Windows and more using Linux, game developers have to respond.

I am not 100% convinced what I just said is the case, but I do beleive it is a consideration, especially all that about the DRM. I know very few people that have actually paid for Windows XP, if any Windows at all.

What scares me about buying any Windows is my mate can't install his Windows XP Pro anymore, he activated it too much??? He was told to purchase a new copy if he wants to use it. . . and theres plenty of stories like that on the net.

Anyhoo I am gettin a bit off topic here - there is always Cedega/Wine

 

[Cole]

NO support for OpenGL?
I have UT2004, and it has DirectX, OpenGL and even Software rendering . . .

Misspelled there it should be:
"I could see UT2004 Engine being Epics last engine with support for Open Gl, ecspecially with there Upcoming engine which I havn't heard anything about it and Open GL just it and Direct X."
Infact without that correction it dosn't make sense.

And nobody is making game developers use DirectX - for now anyway, its just that it's currently a better API but OpenGL will make a triumphant return soon don't worry

You said you are seeing more games that are coming out supporting Linux and I was just showing you that they wern't.

Then there is that about Vista killin OpenGL(wrappin OpenGL in its own DirectX) - can someone give an update to this?

That was just for Beta 1, and if it did go in the final it would just be for Aeroglass, the 3D DESKTOP API.

And if Windows Vista does provide more techniques to combat piracy, that doesn't necessarily mean more people are going to buy it, people will stick with Windows XP for as long as possible, then perhaps make the move to Linux - I for one will never purchase it.

Why are we talking about piracy now?
Vista is a big step and will be needed.... Offering full 64 bit, hardware accelerated desktop, 3d desktop, and the focus of Vista is not Piracy it's security as in hackers and viruses.

I am not 100% convinced what I just said is the case, but I do beleive it is a consideration, especially all that about the DRM. I know very few people that have actually paid for Windows XP, if any Windows at all.

What about DRM? The only thing I know about DRM is Sony and screwed up Cd's. Onless you are talking about Videos and monitor. Well blame that on the video and music industry and the people that pirated there shit. Somebody has to put a stop to it all.

What scares me about buying any Windows is my mate can't install his Windows XP Pro anymore, he activated it too much??? He was told to purchase a new copy if he wants to use it. . . and theres plenty of stories like that on the net.

Did he even contact Microsofts tech support? They have an EXCELLENT tech support. I had the same problem and its to help combat piracy. All you have to do is call them up and activate it over the phone. Not that hard.


What is so bad about Microsoft? They arn't trying to kill Open Gl, they are trying to push in Secruity and already have an excellent free(for Xp and Vista) virus program. They are upgrading Internet Explorer to be more secure, trying to upgrade its features, etc.. Plus they don't force you to use it. If you want firefox or opera(I have all 3 to test my webpages, I use Opera the most) then go right ahead lol.

I know very few people that have actually paid for Windows XP, if any Windows at all.

Don't forget that all the Hp, Dell, Emachines, Gateway etc.. that go out that include Xp give microsoft $$.

Im not saying Linux is bad or Windows is the best. Im just saying why in the world do you hate Microsoft? Because there a big corporation? Everyone acts like Microsoft dosn't care about the customer even though they have taken up a whole new project on designing an OS completely based around Security and not about performance(not Vista) just to look for new techniques, plus they made Vista with secruity from base 1.
Infact this project wont even be released and there spending millions to billions into it to learn and take security to a new level.

If you think Windows sucks and that Linux is better than don't use it, if you pirate it you basically have just told me "You use Windows because you like it", if you tell me that you need to use it to play games....well nice support in getting developers to switch to Linux lol.

Vista will offer tons of performance including the ability to optimize each piece of your hardware with one another automatically, and alow the most experinced to tweak them manually to maximize performance.
With all the Andantech articles on Vista, I can only say that I am down right excited. Offering much more than they did before. For Performance, Secruity, Gaming, and Flexibility.

 

[OCybrManO]

Misspelled there it should be:
"I could see UT2004 Engine being Epics last engine with support for Open Gl, ecspecially with there Upcoming engine which I havn't heard anything about it and Open GL just it and Direct X."

Unreal Engine 3 was demonstrated on the PS3 at E3. Also, if the hardware can handle it, they're looking into putting it on the Revolution. Sony does not support DirectX. Nintendo does not support DirectX. So, they definately have OpenGL support. Albeit, IIRC, official Linux/Mac support may still be up in the air...

 

[diluted]

I'm interested in Linux but don't have the patience to learn it. I messed around with Mandrake for awhile but got rid of it. I still keep a copy of Knoppix around though, in case Windows screws up and I need to access something on my hard drive.

 

[furiousV]

Hey Minerel, time for a new thread
I'm just about to run out to get the bus for work, so I can not respond now sorry

And my mate did contact Microsofts support, and they were the ones that told him he activated too much.

 

[Cole]

And my mate did contact Microsofts support, and they were the ones that told him he activated too much.

I contated them after when I had reinstalled bus drivers(trying to get my damn network to work and I was reinstall something and forgot to uncheck em) and it wanted to activate again. Just told them, talked to a few people via online and phone.

I'd tell him just to call up with the phone number on the activate page. Else go directly to there tech support(Talk with a guy online etc..)

Unreal Engine 3 was demonstrated on the PS3 at E3. Also, if the hardware can handle it, they're looking into putting it on the Revolution. Sony does not support DirectX. Nintendo does not support DirectX. So, they definately have OpenGL support. Albeit, IIRC, official Linux/Mac support may still be up in the air...

Very right, forgot about them. Thanks for the correction.\

Yeah we have gone off topic lol. Once I get my 250gig I will be running Linux on my old 80gig and Windows on my 250gig. Fedora 4 will include all my Apache\PhP\Mysql work and Windows all my games. I just need them seperated else I have to much junk all over the place.