Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms Computers - can't live with em....can't live w....

Ian: you have inspired me to have another look at Linux and I decided to try and set up Ubuntu http://www.ubuntu.com/ on my new Asus PC. It is installed so as to give a dual boot option. In other words I can fire it up in Windows or in Ubuntu. I have to say that I am most impressed. The installation was seamless and all peripherals are functioning. Standard software for browsing, Firefox, and email, Thunderbird, plus Open Office are all working well. Interest to see that cloud storage is also available for music etc. The only thing a bit odd is that I have to open a terminal window to run the Canon scanner program.

I tried to install Ubuntu (for anyone not familiar with Linux Ubuntu is one of several distributions of Linux that are available) on an old Lenova laptop (that I suspect has hardware problems - possibly some bad RAM) and could not get it to work.

In any case I can see that Linux is really becoming a valid low cost (or no cost) alternative to Windows and Apple. I have noticed that there are some manufacturers now offering PCs and Notebooks with versions of Linux already installed.

Peter,
many distributions now have a live cd, whereby you can run Linux ( all be it slowly, as it's running from cd, not a hard drive) without installing anything. That's a good way to check if your hardware is supported. Canon seems to be one of the manufacturers who are reluctant to support Linux. I mostly go for HP as they do give good support. Scanners do seem to be a bit of a problem, but I found a piece of commercial software which works very well: Vuescan http://www.hamrick.com.
Mint is based on Ubuntu ( as Ubuntu is based on Debian) & seems to be considered more user-friendly than most.

Years ago, I used to run Novell Netware on the works server, but after they tried to force me into yet another unwanted upgrade, I looked at Linux for the first time. I worked out the basics & set up a server & it worked fine ( & cost nothing!). Later, when I was more confident with it ( remember this was probably 12 years or more ago & Linux was a lot rougher than now) I switched my office machine to Linux & found I spent much less time sorting the pc than I used to spend fixing Windoze. I later changed all the computers to Linux (Debian). No one has any problems using it, I don't have to frig about with Windoze so everyone is happy. We have one copy of Windows 98 running on a virtual machine to run our banking software ( they'll catch up one day!)
Our main server is backed up automatically every 4 minutes to a standby server in the same building & a second backup server in another building. To do that with Microsoft would cost a fortune!
Ian

wowe wowe wowe, this is all going over my head but sounds interesting, what am i missing (and for free), is this anything to do with firewall (not computer literate) but have protectors constantly flashing up like Mcafee wanting me to purchase.!!!

I ended up with same problem with Netware some 12+ years ago Ian. A couple (mainly one) of directors wanted to go down the MS NT route, which I wouldn't accept. He ended up costing the company money it couldn't afford (with all its other expenditure). Never got as far as adding a linux server to trial as they went bust before I could go that far...
Ho hum!

Cheers,

Ah Novell Netware! I hated it so much I had completely wiped all memory of it. I started with PDP 11 systems then I sort of made a jump from being a power CP/M user (anyone remember CP/M?) to the edges of Unix but then moved into the world of PCs, MSDOS, and ultimately Windows. Somewhere in the middle of PC networking and software support I got thrown into a couple of Novell Netware systems. Always found it very hard to get it to behave. Luckily I had a good networking guy at "head office" I could call for assistance. I was surprised to discover that whatever was left of Novell shifted into the world of of Linux and became SUSE (if I understand correctly)

Always regretted I didn't do more with VAX systems and come to grips with Unix. Would have been very handy when Linux came along.

Never ceases to amaze me how much computing has changed since the 70's

It's not too late... VAX/VMS on RaspberryPi


~iw

VAC - a blast from the past - my first email was via VAX!!

Hardly surprising on the TM website that the tendency towards nostalgia extends even to computers....Not me mate. Just thinking about trying to program in Fortran 77 on Southampton University's old Honeywell 6080 is enough to give me sleepless nights.

Nothing to do with firewalls. Linux ( proper name Gnu/Linux) is an operating system ( as are Windows & Apple). It's the kernel ( the bit at the heart of making a computer work) together with all the other software you need to make things work.
The kernel was started by a Finnish student called Linus Torvalds ( he still controls the development) & since development has been carried out by many individuals around the world and a good number of well-known companies like IBM & HP. It's all free & you can get the source code & do anything you like with it ( provided you give back any changes to the community which developed it.
Ian

So why would you use this instead of Windows or Apple ?