GNU/Linux

I've used several, including building from scratch (_http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/) a few year ago to learn more about how distros are put together. My current favorite is Kubuntu (Ubuntu with KDE desktop) and my wife loves it, too (and she is not a techie). The package management is great, but because it's Linux I can also customize and optimize things for my wife, do upgrades etc. a lot easier and less error-prone than on Windows.

For server side stuff I prefer either Red Hat/CentOS because they tend to have the most production ready, well supported enterprise technologies there from many companies, or Debian stable because it has usually been so rock solid.
 
Well, I've never had many problems with either Debian, Ubuntu, Kubuntu, or Fedora (those are the 4 that I've used on laptops in the past five years). However, I knew before purchasing the laptops that I would be running Linux on them so I made sure to do a lot of research to make sure there weren't any compatibility problems. I run Kubuntu on my current laptop (Lenovo N100) for the past couple of years.

It is important to note though, that I'm technically inclined so if say the webcam built into my laptop didn't work with my distro of linux, I wasn't averse to downloading and compiling drivers for my machine. Non-technical users probably wouldn't want to try to deal with this which is why up front research is so important.

Here are some pointers (assuming you aren't very familiar already with Linux):

1) Many distributions now will let you download a "live CD". This CD contains the entire linux on it and you can boot your computer from it and play around with it without ever having to install to your laptop. One note though is that since it is running from CD in this mode, it will be slower to load programs and even start up because the CD is slower than your hard disk.

2) Here are a couple of sites that help to research:

http://www.linux.org/hardware/laptop.html
http://tuxmobil.org/

3) If you already have a laptop, you can google for your specific brand and model number and include the "linux" keyword to see if other users are experiencing any issues.

Kubuntu 9.10 (the latest release) has had a few flaky things about it so far, but some have been fixed already with bug updates. Not sure about the status of other distros.

HTH
 
I started with RedHat 5.1 and played with it for a year , then I moved to Debian which was nice as a server but worse for a desktop because of old software.
And then Gentoo came out :D I am still using it.

1) Gentoo: Too strange for me, so I abandoned it. This was some years ago and
I have not since revisited it.
Click to expand...

Well , it is still a rather hard to manage kind of distro , but a lot has changed for past few years. I strongly suggest it as a starting distro for anyone who wants to learn linux system internals in general.
For an average computer user I would rather suggest using Ubuntu which is easy to use and it wont cause any change-shock ;P

Also i am experimenting with OpenSolaris because of ZFS filesystem of course :)
ZFS is a brilliant fs

12 years of linux out of which 8 years linux only - Thats my story :)
 
Heya;

This is a really cool site that takes you through constructing a Linux dist from scratch. Takes time, but well worth it!

http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/

Work that LFS book!!
 
I've used different Linux distros briefly from time to time during years past, but then I moved to the BSDs as alternate OSs. I still have - and use from time to time - an old Gentoo minimal install CD, though, which has come in handy due to the extensive collection of utilities on it. (for example, I still use it whenever I have to resize NTFS partitions for a remaining Windows install)

drygol said:
Also i am experimenting with OpenSolaris because of ZFS filesystem of course :)
ZFS is a brilliant fs
Click to expand...
If we're going towards discussing other *nix systems as well, I might as well mention what I'm using: DragonFly BSD, ie. the fourth (and smallest) of the "big" BSD projects, originally based on FreeBSD 4.

For the one and a half years I've been using it, I've also been using its versioning filesystem HAMMER, where overwriting, deleting, etc. a file leaves the old version. (with by default a half-minute granularity, history is stored for file versions unless directory trees or mounts are marked nohistory. you can specifically access an old file, but also an old directory, for example to cd into it, etc. - commonly done with periodic snapshots). There's also support for volume "mirroring" (streaming changes) across network and such things, though I've yet to use it.
 
Just a mention of graphical programs which serve on that platform aswell

Blender : 3d / composite program, which to my knowledge of 10 years with 3d studio max, fully fills the allround needs of the game, effect and general 3d designer, and then some.

Gimp : a standup equivalent, allthough not entirely up to par, to Photoshop, enough for my level of use but probably not for a graphic designer.

My new found knowledge of these programs up-to-dateness and usability compared to the industries flagships has made me ready to jump ship, as soon as i find a media fit, I should be running Ubuntu, which should be the soft landing into STO computing.

Thanks for the reminder.
 
Freyr:

You probably already know this, but Linux software is GPL, open source, one can
always get involved the Linux community and support/add to it. This also means
that one can get involved with software programming. I have contributed code in
such cases, and gratis. Unless one works for a company that will pay one for the
Linux work one get to choose to work on, it is otherwise volunteer work, gratis.

It is hard to make a living, to get food on the table, if all one did was program
for free. In any case, one would need a day job that pays the bills, and yet
still allows one time for "hobbies".

With this in mind, it is amazing how far the Linux community has come under
these conditions, and also, the many contributors from the four corners of the
world who mostly work as volunteers, gratis. And at the same time, their collective
works has caused the Goliaths of the software world to tremble.

FWIW,
Dan
 
dant said:
With this in mind, it is amazing how far the Linux community has come under
these conditions, and also, the many contributors from the four corners of the
world who mostly work as volunteers, gratis. And at the same time, their collective
works has caused the Goliaths of the software world to tremble.
Click to expand...

not only that, but so far the community has managed to reasonably well deal with the 'Goliaths' various nasty and underhand attacks to try to subvert and collapse the open-source movement from the inside. A really quite impressive case of defense for freedom against the forces of ponerology, actually.
 
Nomad said:
dant said:
With this in mind, it is amazing how far the Linux community has come under
these conditions, and also, the many contributors from the four corners of the
world who mostly work as volunteers, gratis. And at the same time, their collective
works has caused the Goliaths of the software world to tremble.
Click to expand...
not only that, but so far the community has managed to reasonably well deal with the 'Goliaths' various nasty and underhand attacks to try to subvert and collapse the open-source movement from the inside. A really quite impressive case of defense for freedom against the forces of ponerology, actually.
Click to expand...
You can say that again! It serves others as an excellent example.

potamus said:
This is a really cool site that takes you through constructing a Linux dist from scratch. Takes time, but well worth it!

http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/
Click to expand...
Hi potamus, thanks for the link! Linux From Scratch is really great. If you REALLY want to understand how exactly a GNU/Linux system works from the inside, you should follow that book! In the last years, I built two LFS systems and one BLFS system and I used it for one year as my daily OS. I even built the Compiz Fusion window manager into it and enjoyed a 3D desktop! I guess I am a geek in that respect! :)
 
I even built the Compiz Fusion window manager into it and enjoyed a 3D desktop!
Click to expand...

woohoo , thats impressive :O
How long it took you to get all up an running ?

I played with LFS only for a short period of time when i got a task to reverse-engineer particular software (which was running on LFS). It is a nice system indeed , or maybe i should say shell-os :)
But on the long run , it is hardcore to keep it up to date , thats why i am runnnig gentoo as an OS which is felxible and still quite low-level oriented

I also forgot to mention that I have quite nice library of e-books (already sorted) so if anyone is interested , let me know :)
 
For all those of you who are interested in OpenSolaris - here is a log of an IRC talk about future of OSOL

http://www.c0t0d0s0.org/archives/6393-About-the-future-of-Opensolaris.html
 
drygol said:
I even built the Compiz Fusion window manager into it and enjoyed a 3D desktop!
Click to expand...

woohoo , thats impressive :O
How long it took you to get all up an running ?
Click to expand...
A long time. About 1 month for LFS, then another 2 until I could use BLFS for my daily purposes. Compiz Fusion took me intensive 3 or 4 days, because there were no instructions.

drygol said:
But on the long run , it is hardcore to keep it up to date , thats why i am runnnig gentoo as an OS which is felxible and still quite low-level oriented
Click to expand...

Yeah, I learned a lot, and this was the purpose, but after I tasted larger Linux distributions (with all their automatic and pre-built stuff), I don't want to go back.
 
A long time. About 1 month for LFS, then another 2 until I could use BLFS for my daily purposes. Compiz Fusion took me intensive 3 or 4 days, because there were no instructions.
Click to expand...

Thats what i thought ! :)
Seriously , well done Data ! Thats a really admirable achievement - hard-core setup compiz on lfs !

Yeah, I learned a lot, and this was the purpose, but after I tasted larger Linux distributions (with all their automatic and pre-built stuff), I don't want to go back.
Click to expand...

Same here :) , with one exception , I used gentoo stage 1 as my serious learning ground.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom