Posted on 04/09/2014 7:48:00 AM PDT by ShadowAce
OK—I can accept that point. But how many beginning users will be using the command line and not the GUI?
Wrong!
It's the absolute truth.
And it is Linux which is at fault. It is advertised as being able to run on Windows, and then idiots like the author whine that Microsoft should have foreseen DIY programmers might write stuff in the future that might not work as expected. Maybe Microsoft and the chip makers simply retired their OUIJA boards early.
What a silly comment to make! Stuff people are writing don't work in Windows.
D'OH!
Good point — they may not be beginning users
in the absolute sense, but required to use the system due to some circumstance on-the-job, too.Hey, Dave, you need to SSH in to the client's server and find out what's wrong with their configuration.
Uhhh--no.
Hardware drivers are not written by Microsoft. They are written by the hardware vendors. In the vast majority of cases, they write to the largest customer base--Windows. This is not a surprise, nor is the author complaining about it. He is just stating the fact that the driver may not be readily available for Linux.
In either case, it is NOT the OS' fault for a lack of drivers.
I’ll second ShadowAce’s recommendation for PCLinuxOS. I’ve resurrected half a dozen old Windoze desktops (several dating back to the late 1990s) and never had any hardware incompatibilities. It has simply worked out of the box on every computer I’ve installed it on, old or new.
When I began using Linux three years ago, I was just a typical Windoze user, with very little computer knowledge. So if I could do it, anyone can.
"The normal Menu button is missing!"
"The new fonts are ugly!"
"What happened to the background image?"
"I liked the old desktop layout better."
"My App/Game/Photo/Vid program no longer works!"
OK, so either stay with your current version of 'doze, add it back on yourself manually, or switch to Linux. And you think that paying over 120 dollars each time you "upgrade" to the next version of widows is actually something you absolutely HAVE to do?
On top of that, people then go out and pay more money for the newest version of MS Office, Photoshop, DVD utilities and burning software, and uncountable AntiVirus programs.
I will repeat that: they willingly PAY for all that.
However, an OS which comes in many, many flavours, is almost infinitely configurable, comes with many applications such as those previously mentioned already installed and if the default apps are not all there or to your liking, they are readily available online, but is not "Windows" but "Linux" -and totally FREE...
This is enough to make people complain that Linux is unuseable?
Words fail.
I’m running Mint on a laptop and even my wife can use it.
Plus, it is based upon Debian Stable, so a solid distro with a good support userbase.
Ubuntu was extremely easy to install - easier than Win by far
Linux has been unusable (aka “not ready for the desktop”) for at least the last twenty years I’ve been using it on my desktop.
I had to touch windows 2012 recently, and of course I had to reboot. Never had to do a web search to figure out how to reboot a linux box.
“...there are times where certain components aren’t as Linux compatible as others. What might surprise most people is that this isn’t a Linux shortcoming, rather, this is a limitation of what the individual PC was built for — Windows.”
The writer lost me here.
You do realize that some hardware has firmware written entirely to Windows, right? They do not conform to standards.
Some people just need more hand-holding than others. Not too long ago, a friend started complaining that their (Windows) machine had a problem. Seems it would no longer shut down when the Ctrl-Alt-Del sequence, also known as the three-finger-salute, was pressed. After a couple of weeks about hearing about it, I finally agreed to go over to the house and take a look at it.
Came into the house, the machine was powered on with a blank screen since no recent user activity so I hit a button to verify that it was functional and had him log in. That done, I initiated shutdown. A little menu window popped up with the options for that task displayed:
...
Logout
Shutdown
Reboot
...
Reboot in 10, 9, 8...
I quietly shut My eyes and shook My head for a moment, then interrupted the process so I could call him over to take a look at the machine. Then I showed him how the up- and down- arrow keys would change the selection from the "Reboot" setting it was then on to "Shutdown" instead. After I selected the "Shutdown" option for him, I hit the Enter key and the machine proceeded to quietly shut down.
"You're welcome." I told him briefly, then left.
Perhaps Linux is indeed too difficult for some people to use. Windows comes preinstalled with the machine. Linux pretty much never does, unless you specifically ask for it. Either way there is a bit of a learning curve needed. I guess some people prefer to deal with the preinstalled ones rather than some other ones.
I’d second shadowace’s response. All three should be good for beginners. I’ve recently been playing with Mint in a VM. The ‘live’ CDs are great to see if everything in your computer is compatible. Boot up on the CD, then try different things like playing an MP3, connecting to the internet, and other stuff like that. If everything works, you should be good to go. If your wireless card doesn’t work, (this is a lot less common than it used to be), you might want to google a bit to make sure it can be made to work fairly easily.
I am by no means an expert user - not even a talented amateur, but earlier this morning, I resized my partitions on the fly.
I am using Fedora 16 (Verne). I need to update, but this version has been my favorite and I’ve been slow to change.
Honestly, if I can do it, nearly anyone can/could. I taught myself Linux when my new laptop several years ago came with Windows Vista and it was the worst thing ever.
Mint is a decent distro, I agree. Tried it out not too long ago but it took up a bit too much space on the default drive though so decided to look at it again at some future date. PClinuxOS looks visually more appealing I think, but I tend to stay away from the RedHat/Fedora -based distros so decided against it. Others might find it more appealing, however.
I used Linux for a few years and for most people it is terrible as a desktop computer. But one distro I always liked was Puppy Linux. It's very small and efficient and extremely easy to get up and running. If you just want to surf the web and other simple stuff it's great.
The Holy Grail from a user perspective is that he/she shouldn't know or care what the underlying OS is. We have a long way to go before that is reached but it's reachable.
Plain old “info” might get somebody started, and the other tool that is useful is “apropos” also known as “whatis.” It narrows down and gives precise man page names.
That doesn’t make it Windows’ fault. That’s an artifact of market power.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.