Why do i use Ubuntu..?

I’ve been using Ubuntu and Ubuntu based operating systems for about three months, and using it exclusively for about three weeks. I’m happier with my operating system now then I have ever been from using Windows. Why did I make the change though?

About a year ago, I frequented a video gaming board that I still frequent today. On this board was a topic about iPods and alternatives. On the board was an open source evangelist. He spoke negatively about DRM, Apple, iPods, Microsoft, and everything else closed source. I made my post asking why he was so up in arms against iPods. At the time I saw no problem in using an iPod, using iTunes, buying from the iTunes store, and using Windows. He told me that using these severely limit one’s freedom. Freedom to do whatever they want with an operating system, and not be restrained by copyright or other limits that were put in place to make money.

So this intrigued me. I had only ever used Windows before so I wasn’t too familiar with other operating systems or how they worked. I downloaded the Ubuntu distribution that was available at the time and partitioned my computer. Needless to say I was impressed but just couldn’t make the complete switch. Most of my music was DRMed and I HAD to be able to listen to my music. So, iTunes was literally a shackle on me from switching to Ubuntu and ultimately stop supporting Apple.

Over that year I went on a crusade of sorts to un DRM my music. The only legal way of doing this is to burn it onto a CD and rip it onto the computer. Alas, I lost sound quality with this. Was it worth it? Yes. By the time of 3 months ago most of my music was DRM free. The music I had left that wasn’t DRMed, which made up about 200 hundred songs, I wasn’t fond of anymore. I deleted the songs. Two hundred dollars down the drain, yes. Still completely worth it.

By this time I had my own laptop aside from a desktop. I downloaded the latest Ubuntu distro and installed it aside Windows Vista. I didn’t have much patience at the time to configure anything with school and other worries, so I used Windows for most of the time. I did try out several operating systems; Fedora, openSUSE, Mandriva, Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Xubuntu, DSL (Damn Small Linux), Puppy Linux, and a couple of others. Ubuntu was the clear winner. When summer vacation came around I took the plunge into Ubuntu. After configuring everything I had a great operating system. The tasks that were unfamiliar to me such as using the terminal (which was very intimidating at the time) are a breeze now.

So, why do I use Ubuntu? Ubuntu to me is the best Linux distribution for me. It is free as in philosophy and free as in beer. It has a large selection of free, quality software. It doesn’t limit me in any aspect. It even supported my now deceased iPod very well. No longer do I need Windows at all. Just about everything I can do in Windows I can do in Ubuntu (with the exception of many video games).But is Linux for everyone? Of course not. Some operating systems are just not some peoples’ cup of tea. That’s just how it is. Are many Linux distros viable alternatives to Windows and Mac OS? Yes, absolutely!

Why do i use Ubuntu..?

I’ve been using Ubuntu and Ubuntu based operating systems for about three months, and using it exclusively for about three weeks. I’m happier with my operating system now then I have ever been from using Windows. Why did I make the change though?

About a year ago, I frequented a video gaming board that I still frequent today. On this board was a topic about iPods and alternatives. On the board was an open source evangelist. He spoke negatively about DRM, Apple, iPods, Microsoft, and everything else closed source. I made my post asking why he was so up in arms against iPods. At the time I saw no problem in using an iPod, using iTunes, buying from the iTunes store, and using Windows. He told me that using these severely limit one’s freedom. Freedom to do whatever they want with an operating system, and not be restrained by copyright or other limits that were put in place to make money.

So this intrigued me. I had only ever used Windows before so I wasn’t too familiar with other operating systems or how they worked. I downloaded the Ubuntu distribution that was available at the time and partitioned my computer. Needless to say I was impressed but just couldn’t make the complete switch. Most of my music was DRMed and I HAD to be able to listen to my music. So, iTunes was literally a shackle on me from switching to Ubuntu and ultimately stop supporting Apple.

Over that year I went on a crusade of sorts to un DRM my music. The only legal way of doing this is to burn it onto a CD and rip it onto the computer. Alas, I lost sound quality with this. Was it worth it? Yes. By the time of 3 months ago most of my music was DRM free. The music I had left that wasn’t DRMed, which made up about 200 hundred songs, I wasn’t fond of anymore. I deleted the songs. Two hundred dollars down the drain, yes. Still completely worth it.

By this time I had my own laptop aside from a desktop. I downloaded the latest Ubuntu distro and installed it aside Windows Vista. I didn’t have much patience at the time to configure anything with school and other worries, so I used Windows for most of the time. I did try out several operating systems; Fedora, openSUSE, Mandriva, Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Xubuntu, DSL (Damn Small Linux), Puppy Linux, and a couple of others. Ubuntu was the clear winner. When summer vacation came around I took the plunge into Ubuntu. After configuring everything I had a great operating system. The tasks that were unfamiliar to me such as using the terminal (which was very intimidating at the time) are a breeze now.

So, why do I use Ubuntu? Ubuntu to me is the best Linux distribution for me. It is free as in philosophy and free as in beer. It has a large selection of free, quality software. It doesn’t limit me in any aspect. It even supported my now deceased iPod very well. No longer do I need Windows at all. Just about everything I can do in Windows I can do in Ubuntu (with the exception of many video games).But is Linux for everyone? Of course not. Some operating systems are just not some peoples’ cup of tea. That’s just how it is. Are many Linux distros viable alternatives to Windows and Mac OS? Yes, absolutely!

CHROME OS,WINDOWS AND LINUX...

Chrome OS is an upcoming operating system designed by search engine tycoon Google. Chrome OS shares the same name as the recently released web browser, Chrome. Google’s plunge into the operating system business isn’t all too surprising but the effects on the operating system world may be bad for Microsoft.

The Chrome OS is supposedly being designed for netbooks and for a world based of of the Internet. Google has stated (and I paraphrase) that operating systems of today were invented and designed before the rise of the Internet. Google wishes to try and revolutionize the operating system business. In my opinion, Google will have a better time marketing its open source, free operating system than Linux can, and may even become a viable alternative to Windows for the average computer user. Google is already familiar to thousands,nay, millions of computer users. It’s simple take on web searching and the superior search engine makes it the obvious market lead.

One of the main issues why Linux isn’t as popular as Windows or Macs is because of two reasons in my opinion:

A- Linux is seen as too hard to use by the average computer user.

B- There are so many Linux distributions competing (and also sharing at the same time) that they seal their fate when it comes to becoming as popular as Windows.

Reason A is understandable. When Linux was in its infant years, it WAS difficult to use. Times have changed now. Some Linux operating systems are as easy to install as Windows. This popularity problem hurts Linux hardware wise as well. Some hardware just doesn’t work well with Linux (although a lot does). This isn’t Linux’s fault, rather the fault of companies that code the drivers for their products. But there aren’t enough people using Linux to go to that trouble.

Problem B is also understandable, but it isn’t helping anyone. Linux distros need to get their act together and polish their operating systems in a way so that they CAN combat Windows and the new Chrome OS. Things change needlessly from release to release.

So, with Linux trying to get its act together when it comes to a larger market share, Microsoft is the behemoth in the industry that Google has to worry about. Google is going to have to convince manufacturers to put Chrome OS on computers. Even more so, manufacturers will have to market Chrome OS so that people will buy computers with it on.

The fact that Chrome OS is free, bumping down the price of the computer by a good 200 hundred dollars, will make it attractive to new users. I may even get a copy of Chrome OS and try it out myself. Will it convert me from Linux? Not likely. But it will probably have an impact on Microsoft’s market share.

Choosing frameworks

When starting a new project, it’s important to consider which framework(s) to use, if any. Frameworks can speed up development, but they may be feature-bloated or not so easy to learn. Also, it’s important to think about in which languages you will use frameworks. For the network (soon more on that topic) we first chose BluePrint for CSS, MooTools for JS and CodeIgniter for PHP. After some research, we discovered that for our needs MooTools wasn’t the correct framework, since we won’t do much more then ajax, DOM manipulation and tabs. We’re in the process of choosing a new one, but there is much chance we’ll go for jQuery. We also discovered that CodeIgniter was quite loose on MVC and OOP, and still PHP4-compatible (and thus not using PHP5 features optimally). Again, we’re in the process of choosing a new one, but there is much chance that we’ll choose Kohana.

What I want to say is that it’s very important to inform yourself about all the possibilities and think about what you need for your project.

Ubuntu

Ubuntu

For about a month now, I’m running Ubuntu on my 1GB ram desktop. I really like it, except for some useability issues. My sound is bugged as hell, I’ve googled hundreds of times, never found a working solution. Really, it’s fucked up. When I play multiple tracks in Tuxguitar it starts acting very strange, and I then get a horning sound. Sound at youtube is bad, it jumps a lot and strange sounds get mixed in.. But that might also be an issue of the other problem : flash. Installing a new Adobe flash version doesn’t work, Swfdec is bugged as hell, and you can’t fucking uninstall it without removing GNOME. Really, I like ubuntu, but sometimes I really wonder why I left Windows XP for Ubuntu. For hard-core geeks it might be good. Who needs flash after all, and sound ain’t important, is it? But for a bit more mainstream users, and for mainstream users to use Ubuntu, it is one of those important things. Without such things fixed less people will go to Ubuntu or any linux version, as not-geeks might not understand how linux-distro’s work. I think these are things that really have to be fixed.