PDA

View Full Version : How long have you been using Linux?



lao_V
February 10th, 2005, 02:16 PM
For me its been 2 months.

jwb
February 10th, 2005, 03:52 PM
I've been on it since early 2000....... January or February. I think I started with Mandrake 7.1 or 7.2.

nocturn
February 10th, 2005, 05:22 PM
I started in 1997.
In 1999, it became my exclusive OS (except for FreeBSD on my server for a year).

kassetra
February 10th, 2005, 08:54 PM
Wow. I started in 97. :shock:

Now I feel old.

I remember hating it when I first started too. I didn't really "like" it until 99/2000 ... by then it was my regular personal desktop.

Yukonjack
February 10th, 2005, 08:56 PM
I started in 1998

jdodson
February 10th, 2005, 09:26 PM
I started in 1998

that was around my time too. well exposed to it in 98 started tinkering over the next year or so.

Jad
February 10th, 2005, 10:18 PM
Well started in 1999, but linux became the only OS only when I got ubuntu.

carlc
February 10th, 2005, 11:11 PM
I have used it on and off for a few years, most of the time more off than on. Ubuntu is really the first distro that I have been truly content with and I have been using it for about a month or so.

friez
February 10th, 2005, 11:34 PM
i started in the spring of 2002 with suse 8.1 or 8.2 :?:

KiwiNZ
February 11th, 2005, 09:36 AM
I am over 4 years messing with Linux except for right now , I cant install it *sob*

Randabis
February 11th, 2005, 10:54 AM
I started using it about 3 years ago or so.

Juergen
February 11th, 2005, 12:08 PM
My first install had a kernel 0.99rc1 or something ;-) but only lasted a few days.

Then, ~1995 I think, about a week with kernel 1.2.13.

And now: almost 3 years and almost exclusively at home.

goedson
February 11th, 2005, 02:27 PM
Started in 1996. It's the only OS in my machine since 1998.

carney1979
February 11th, 2005, 02:56 PM
1996 or 1997.

It was an old Red Hat distro. I forget the version number. I still have the CD-ROM. I should look it up.

I remember it took my a week of reading to get X running with FVWM.

At a later date, I had Red Hat 6.1 on. I installed Helix Gnome (now Ximian). It was an 80 meg download on my dial-up internet. It took 8 hours to come in. But was I impressed!

I now have a cable modem with a 4 meg download speed. 80 megs would only take a few minutes now.....

Some distros that I have run since that first Red Hat install are:

Red Hat: ?.? (first distro); 6.1; 7.0; 7.2; 8.0 (I think); all Fedora Cores
Debian: Slink; Potato; Woody; Sarge
Mandrake: The last 3 or 4 versions
SuSE: The last 2 or 3 versions
Ubuntu: Warty Warthog - I'm hanging on to Ubuntu. It rocks!

Future distro:

Ubuntu: Hoary Hedgehog

David

jwb
February 11th, 2005, 05:37 PM
My first install had a kernel 0.99rc1 or something ;-) but only lasted a few days.

Then, ~1995 I think, about a week with kernel 1.2.13.

And now: almost 3 years and almost exclusively at home.

Dang- that was back in the day when all they had were wood burning kernels...... or so I've been told. ;-)

Mute
February 12th, 2005, 01:54 AM
I started in 97 (mid year sometime) with Slackware, still have the 27 floppies I downloaded ;). Been using slack/redhat off and on from then on.

-Mute

TravisNewman
February 12th, 2005, 04:08 AM
Interesing it seems most here have used it for a looong time.

I've been using it exclusively for a few months, but off and on since November or December '98. I actually started with Slackware, interestingly enough.

dejavu
February 12th, 2005, 04:56 AM
ive been trying to use Linux since past 3 yrs ... but its been like 2 months when im almost completely into linux

Lynx
February 12th, 2005, 05:26 AM
7 months almost exactly. Good stuff, I have no intentions of switching to anything else.

JayCnrs
February 12th, 2005, 06:03 AM
I started with Red Hat 7.2, when I got my first highspeed line in 2000, went through to Fedora Core 3, which didn't seem to like my PC, switched to Ubuntu just in the last month and I have never looked back.

k.ODOMA
February 12th, 2005, 06:10 AM
I think my first distro was SuSE 6.3 back in 1999. It was sometime around then.

Xappe
February 12th, 2005, 06:21 AM
started with mdk 10 last spring. ubuntu since the middle of november and Hoary since late november...

Jspired
February 12th, 2005, 06:33 AM
Wow, tough question. I think it's been about seven years for me...which sort of dates me I suppose, huh? \\:D/

cacofonix
February 12th, 2005, 08:12 AM
I started pottering about in linux about 2001 with a copy of Redhat 7.1 of a magazine. wasn't able to get my win modem working and had lots of trouble installing things and getting them to work. So I went back to windows. I tried again in 2004 with suse 9.1 and Mandrake 10. I wasnt satisfied with either so I tried Gentoo Slackware 10 Ubuntu and Debian Sarge. I'm also trying FreBSD now. Still not sure which one I want to stick with yet. But I havent booted into WIndows in about 4 months :D.

lao_V
February 14th, 2005, 01:56 PM
Wow!! There seems to be quite a lot of dedicated Linux users in here!!

piedamaro
February 14th, 2005, 05:25 PM
Wow!! There seems to be quite a lot of dedicated Linux users in here!!
Yeah but why noone answered to my very simple console question? http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=15045 (spam, eheh).
I began in 2000, I did mandrake ==> redhat ==> fedora ==> gentoo ==> suse ==> ubuntu!

EDIT: oh, it got answered....the power of spam :D

Kimm
February 14th, 2005, 07:45 PM
I think I started with linux about 1.5 years ago, my first distro was Lindows.. it laster for about.. 2-3 hours before I removed it. A while after that I tried Mandrake and Ive kinda been holding on to that untill now. I now... just like everyone else :P have no intention what so ever of going back from Ubuntu... man, I'm so happy mandrake didnt like my new computer ^^

m4ng0
February 14th, 2005, 08:13 PM
I started with Red Hat 6.0... since then I've used also SuSE, Debian, Gentoo and, obviously, Ubuntu!

piedamaro
February 15th, 2005, 03:52 AM
Yeah but why noone answered to my very simple console question? http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=15045 (spam, eheh).
I began in 2000, I did mandrake ==> redhat ==> fedora ==> gentoo ==> suse ==> ubuntu!

EDIT: oh, it got answered....the power of spam :D
Oh, and the first distro I tried was zipslack, a 80MB zipped slackware, downloaded on a 56k modem :)

rufius
February 15th, 2005, 03:55 AM
I've used it since I was 12 and I'm 17 now so 5, almost 6 years now. Started on some version of Redhat (can't remember) and moved to Mandrake, then Slack, then to Debian and kinda jumped around for a bit till I found Ubuntu :).

IgnisUmbrarum
February 15th, 2005, 07:46 AM
I just got into Linux about a year and a half ago.... maybe more, I don't really remember.

my brother got into it a college around '96. after '98 we always had a computer running linux. but now I have my own box. I started with morphix, then went to mandrake and now I am on Ubuntu. this is my favorite by far.

trash
February 15th, 2005, 08:19 AM
3 years on and off.. mostly off though and only ever on ppc.
first...
redhat rough cuts 5.1 i think(4cd box set for 10 bucks) and it installed very easily on a nubus machine!
OSX..does this count??
Yellowdog 2.3 -> 3.1
and now Ubuntu which is fulltime on :grin:

Buffalo Soldier
February 15th, 2005, 12:07 PM
First linux installation I had done was RedHat 4.x in 1997. But it was kinda hard, I had just learn how to reinstall Windows95 back then and linux wasn't as user friendly as now and no desktop applications. So after 2 days I reinstall windows back.

But after installing Ubuntu (November 2004), linux is always on my computer (but I still do dualboot WinXP-Ubuntu).

Quest-Master
February 15th, 2005, 11:45 PM
Started around in October.

welly
February 16th, 2005, 04:48 PM
Started around in October.
First used kernel version 0.95 in 1992 when I was 18. I was originally looking at Coherent Unix, which I believe was a kind of unix front end for dos software but I couldn't afford it at the time so came across Linux by accident, got involved for a brief while, and wrote a really early FAQ on how to install linux but unfortunately not a great deal of software available at the time for linux, and there wasn't a "Prodigy" client available for linux at the time (or ever?), so got caught up with the whole windows thing and apart from a trial of slackware in about 1994, I didn't really touch it again until a month ago. Gutted. Never mind, it's never too late. So realistically, a month :)

hard_i
February 16th, 2005, 05:11 PM
Little over a month ... , i have no idea why i didn't started earlier .. i already love linux ( especially Ubuntu ofcourse :p ) so much.

Wim Sturkenboom
February 17th, 2005, 12:41 PM
My first experiences in the *NIX world were back in 1988. Just did some 'driver' programming and brought down complete systems :roll: due to memory overflows during the development ](*,) Was not really appreciated by my colleagues :grin:

Kept in touch with *NIX systems ever since.

Around 1999 or so, the first Linux experience (RH6.2). Now all machines that I use are dual boots to keep my boss or family happy, and single or triple boots to keep me happy :grin:

plb
October 13th, 2006, 04:40 PM
Since 1999 here, how about you?

Rackerz
October 13th, 2006, 04:42 PM
November 2005. Started with Mepis, quickly moving onto Ubuntu Breezy Badger (5.10).

Sef
October 13th, 2006, 04:44 PM
April 2002. Started with Lycoris, then Xandros, then Ubuntu. Tried a some others, but those were the main ones.

PriceChild
October 13th, 2006, 04:44 PM
Tried a redhat early 2005, Installed ubuntu about early September 2005.

If i don't boot xp before November... Its going!

maniacmusician
October 13th, 2006, 04:45 PM
First started using it on an occasional basis on July 06. Erased my windows partition September 06. So pretty new, but adapting quickly and nicely.

Gargamella
October 13th, 2006, 04:46 PM
i began with mandriva 2005 but i can't survive unfortunally without Windows

mucha
October 13th, 2006, 04:54 PM
Well I started with linux for like 2-3 years ago, think it was Slackware, but got tired fast.
I switched to Ubuntu in the beginning of 2006, and I'll never switch back to windows again ;).

Exclamation
October 13th, 2006, 04:57 PM
About 3 years now. I cant even remember all the disros Ive used.
Right now I have Ubuntu on my laptop + Arch on desktop.

Mihkal
October 13th, 2006, 05:14 PM
I started experimenting with linux in january 2006 after playing with unix at my campus.
First, I tried out gentoo. Their guides were informative, but I ended up with a broken linux system and a lost weekend.
Then, I switched to ubuntu and have been very happy since. :cool:

bonzodog
October 13th, 2006, 05:31 PM
I came across linux in 1996 on a Cybercafe server running SLS linux (kernel 1.2.3 -pre-slackware).

I didn't have my own PC until 1999, when I GPF'd win 98 after just one hour of usage. I reformatted the HDD and installed Caldera 1.3, then moved to RH6.0, which caused me a lot of problems.

I then got involved in the Userfriendly.org community, which contains a lot of Linux/FLOSS users, and got to know Beamerboy (http://www.ubuntuforums.org/member.php?u=129304) or Paladine as I knew him then.
He invited me round to his house one day, and introduced me to Slackware. I over-wrote RH6.0 with Slackware 7.0, and haven't looked back. I did dual boot windows Xp for a short while, but got rid of it very quickly - it was too hard to use and maintain compared to Slackware.
I switched from Slackware to ubuntu in december 2006 with the release of Slackware 10.2, which did away with gnome for KDE, a decision I didn't like. I was also looking to go 64 bit, so came over to Ubuntu, but have since left again for Zenwalk, a slackware derivative.

MasonM
October 13th, 2006, 08:45 PM
Started in 1995.

beercz
October 13th, 2006, 09:22 PM
For me using linux mostly as servers for about 4 years, and on the desktop for about 2 years.

biikman
October 13th, 2006, 09:29 PM
6 days. I've setup a dual XP/Ubuntu boot. There are still a few things I need to use windows for, such as ripping and burning dvd's. I did read her ethat I could install "wine" and run dvdshrink etc but that won't happen until I get more familiar with Ubuntu. I do find that I now spend most of my time using Ubuntu which surprised me. I was very happy with me when I was able to network to our other PC which is Also running XP. I was never able to do that when I've tried other distros. Now however I am nervous that if I ever have to reinstall this, I won't be able to remember what it was I did lol.
Sorry for the essay :)

Kateikyoushi
October 13th, 2006, 09:41 PM
I used bsd before linux, switched when gentoo appeared.
Tried linux few times but the dependency hell and the different, at that time I felt untidy organisation of config files plus the lack of benefit drove me back to bsd.

ashleycrue
October 14th, 2006, 12:56 AM
I've been using it for a few months and the way it works is just coming togeather and to tell the truth I prefer it to xp which I have on my other machine which may well have a little 'accident'.

sktfeelsdapper
October 14th, 2006, 01:14 AM
For me it's been about a month, give or take a week or so.

It hasn't been an easy ride, that's for sure and I'm not honestly sure where I'll go after this. I mostly got Ubuntu because it was suggested to me, my ******* sound was borked and someone told me to try Ubuntu out to see if maybe it was just the drivers.

2 weeks later I completely screwed my Windows install, and tried to reinstall it only to have the disc not work at all (Win disc). Downloaded Ubuntu and have had sound out of the box.

Unfortunetly not without some steeeeep prices.
In the 2 or 3 weeks I've had Ubuntu/Linux I've tried Kubuntu, Xubuntu and Gentoo (Wasn't about to wait what someone said 3 days for that) and like this the best so far. Aside from having to reinstall about 5 times. ANd the alsa/sound issues.](*,)

compuguy1088
October 14th, 2006, 04:02 AM
I personally started using linux around in 2001, with Mandrake 7.1, and have fidddled with other distros (mostly off), including Red Hat, Fedora Core, SuSE, MEPIS, Gentoo (never could get it to install right :(), and K/X/Ubuntu. I think it was orignally when I came across SuSE the second time, around 2005/2006, that I got really into linux, though then I did know of Ubuntu, but shrugged it off, I guess from Initial appearances, though later, after hearing the hype, thats when I started using Ubuntu (starting with 6.01), and I haven't looked back since then :mrgreen:. I still use windows though...for gaming and other things...everything else is Ubuntu.

Dr. C
October 14th, 2006, 04:43 AM
On servers for Web hosting since 2000, mostly RedHat and now CentOS. On the desktop 6 months. Started to practice with Breezy, and then made Dapper my main desktop OS 3 months ago.

Yossarian
October 14th, 2006, 05:10 AM
Since fall 2002, on and off. First version was mandrake 7 or 8 point something.

cogsprocket
October 14th, 2006, 05:28 AM
Started using it around the time that RedHat was going to change the world. I can't recall exactly when I know it was either 95 or 96 because I was still part timing high school and spent a lot of time at the college science research center messing with the systems there.

I made kind of crazy jumps RedHat -> FreeBSD (Not Linux but, hey) -> Mandrake -> Slackware -> Gentoo (3 days maybe?) -> Fedora Core 3 -> Ubuntu

Mind you, this is NOT desktop usage for the most part. Up until I started using Fedora Core 3 most of my Linux use was for experimentation, embedded/dedicated systems, system recovery and server usage. I didn't really spend a lot of time with FC3 and Ubuntu has turned out to be the best solution for personal use Linux I've found because I can easily adapt casual users to it.

nyinge
October 14th, 2006, 05:36 AM
Started out with FreeBSD years ago, and left it after a couple of months.

Now, just a little over a year ago...

Fedora Core 4 -> SUSE (didn't like YAST, damn slow) -> bunch of other distros for a few weeks each -> finally settled with Ubuntu so far. :)

dckirba
October 14th, 2006, 02:18 PM
Starting looking into it about 6 months ago. Shipit kindly sent me live CDs of 5.10 and 6.06. Used to live on dial-up then :)

Actually installed it (Dapper) around 3 months ago at work (dual-boot, XP) and about a month ago at home after I got a new HD. (also dual boot XP)

At present trying to download the Koraraa live CD to see how the 3d effects go :) Love it and the only reason I log into windows is to watch VCDs because I can't get that to work for some reason.

Cheers,
Have a good one,
David

ButtonMasher
October 16th, 2006, 05:24 PM
My friend showed me Red Hat 5.3 (I think) around 96 or 97 and we installed it on a couple test servers. I installed Mandrake 8.1 on my desktop about five years ago. I've had dual boot machines ever since. Now that I'm using Ubuntu, I think I might be able to get rid of Windows completely.

sktfeelsdapper
November 3rd, 2006, 11:43 PM
Well we're back for round 2.

I ported back to Windows because I thought I couldn't "live" without last.fm and wanted to play RO, so I had it for about 2 weeks and then well...

RO ate up too much of my hd (only 10gb's here) and was really slow so I just ended up uninstalling it.

And last.fm well, I can deal without it for now there's always last-exit and lastfmproxy.

At any rate, I'm back from M$. The thing that brought me back? The sweet sweet CLI.

MedivhX
November 3rd, 2006, 11:45 PM
Exactly on 1st August this year. That means 3 months.

kalle314
November 3rd, 2006, 11:56 PM
Well we're back for round 2.

I ported back to Windows because I thought I couldn't "live" without last.fm and wanted to play RO, so I had it for about 2 weeks and then well...

RO ate up too much of my hd (only 10gb's here) and was really slow so I just ended up uninstalling it.

And last.fm well, I can deal without it for now there's always last-exit and lastfmproxy.

At any rate, I'm back from M$. The thing that brought me back? The sweet sweet CLI.

Is there any problem with last.fm and Ubuntu? I haven't noticed any.

ComplexNumber
November 4th, 2006, 12:00 AM
since about 1997. not solid since 1997, though. thats when i first used it at college using vi etc. in total, about 6/7 years since then.

Max_Might
November 4th, 2006, 01:21 AM
I have been playing with Gentoo but when I instaled Ubuntu for first time it became my primary OS (I sometimes use windoz for games :) )

AlphaMack
November 4th, 2006, 01:25 AM
Started in January, although I spent several weeks researching and trying out different distros before settling on Ubuntu.

slimdog360
November 4th, 2006, 01:33 AM
I think it was around mid march this year some time. Started with Mandrivia, then Ubuntu then Kubuntu then Windows then Ubuntu then I tried about another five or so distros until settling on Ubuntu.

UchihanoKonoha
November 4th, 2006, 09:56 AM
this has been my second day to ever use Ubuntu or Linux at all. I have a lot to learn. :D

nbound
November 4th, 2006, 10:36 AM
November 2005 (not long after Breezy was released)... Spent a few days with debian... but it was to backwards... tried to setup gentoo... but was too noobish at that stage (could probably do it quite easily now)... then found ubuntu... and have been using it ever since on all my PCs :D

Reshin
November 4th, 2006, 11:04 AM
Lessee, I started when Red Hat 7 or 8 was brand new :-k

EdThaSlayer
November 4th, 2006, 11:44 AM
I have been using Linux for over 8 months. I started it with Ubuntu 5.10, and Ubuntu has grown by quite a lot since then! :D

bigken
November 4th, 2006, 11:54 AM
started november 2005 so its being one year

kicked off with ubuntu 5.10

its my main os my server runs dapper on my laptop I run edgy

my daughters pc duel boots dapper and win xp

I have also dabbled with suse freespire and fedora

[h2o]
November 4th, 2006, 12:22 PM
On server 3-4 years. As desktop I started with the Dapper Beta in March/April this year.

deepwave
November 4th, 2006, 10:11 PM
Desktop (err... laptop too) for last 5-6 years
And 100% for 4.5 years.

mdsmedia
November 4th, 2006, 11:06 PM
I started trying to run RedHat 7.x in about 1999/2000. Gave RedHat another go 4 or so years ago. In October last year I installed Ubuntu (Hoary) on my laptop, just before Breezy, and it's been my main OS since. So I voted "over 1 year".

MedivhX
November 4th, 2006, 11:10 PM
I don't have only one edition of Ubuntu that's 5.04... I even have 4.10... I never installed it... Or 5.10...

jabooty
November 5th, 2006, 01:44 AM
I've been using linux off-and-on for the past 3 or 4 years. I'm still no good with it and consider myself a noob, mostly because the most I've done is set up a file server for my home network. It's been sitting there running like a champ for a couple years now.

The rest of the time I just fiddle around. Right now I'm 95% linux and if I can figure out how to get Evolution to connect to my school's Exchange server, I'll be 100%.

chaosgeisterchen
November 5th, 2006, 02:02 AM
It's very soon that I will 'celebrate' my first anniversary of solely using Linux on one machine. It's no real achievement but the knowledge I gained throughout this one year is far beyond what I imagined first. I am very fond of the fact that I am now able to help a number of beginners out of their first minor (or even major) issues.

It's great to share knowledge and experiences. This is what makes Linux that interesting and lifely. The vital community. Take and give on a human emphasis.

NiklasV
November 5th, 2006, 02:42 AM
I started using Linux in the fall of 2000, I believe it was Slackware 7.1.
I had tried Corel Linux some time before that though, not sure when, but I removed it pretty quickly.
Since then, I've used Mandrake, SuSE, RedHat, Gentoo, Debian, and Ubuntu since May.

s_h_a_d_o_w_s
November 5th, 2006, 02:49 AM
For me it started in March 2005. Would've been sooner if i had know of ubuntu!

Aranel
November 5th, 2006, 03:17 AM
It's been almost exactly 7 months, now. I had just gotten fed up with Windows, heard that Linux really wasn't all that bad despite all the stereotypes, and searched around for information on it. I'd heard that Mandriva 2006 was the most user-friendly major distro, so I tried it out. I liked it a lot better than Windows, but it was horribly unstable, and it had a bunch of unnecessary stuff... It was the perfect OS in theory, but it simply didn't work. After it committed suicide for the third (third!) time when I simply tried to upgrade KDE, I decided to move on.

My next choice was SuSE 10.1. That one seemed relatively awesome... but even after several days' worth of frustration, I couldn't get my wireless card - which uses a BCM4306 chipset - to cooperate. Mandriva had used a GUI tool that had set NdisWrapper up in seconds, and being the newbie that I was to Linux, I couldn't figure out what all of those cryptic commands and such did. Finally, I heard about the reverse-engineered BCM43xx Linux driver, that it was included in 2.6.17+ kernels, and that Ubuntu had already implemented it. So after a few more days of headaches with unsuccessful attempts to upgrade my SuSE kernel (I had bitten off more than I could chew there - after all, I was a complete newbie), I thought giving Ubuntu a try wouldn't be such a bad idea.

I went and downloaded Ubuntu, but the LiveCD installation performed infinitely slowly (whereas other LiveCDs had worked fine) and refused to move beyond step 2. The alternate CD likewise gave me a "white screen of death" about 60% through the installation process each time I attempted to install. I tried the last-resort install methods - bootstrapping from Knoppix, GrUB4DOS, etc. - but not even those worked; the best I could get was a command prompt that apparently had a broken Apt system.

It was suggested at that point that I try to "aptitude dist-upgrade" from Debian Sarge, which naturally didn't work either. I did manage to get Debian installed with some difficulty, however; so after recompiling the kernel from source (yay @ the ability to easily make a .deb package!), I was finally able to set up my wireless card in a matter of about 20 minutes, using a tutorial I'd found online. I stuck with Debian for a couple months, although in the depths of my heart I loathed it; sacrificing up-to-date software just for stability is just not acceptable in my book. And then there was that whole feud with Mozilla, which turned my dislike of Debian itself into disgust at its community.

So, with the advent of Edgy, I thought I'd give Ubuntu one more chance. I downloaded the alternate installer's ISO the day Edgy was released, burned it, and inserted it into my CD drive. It installed without a single problem, and it took me approximately a minute to set up my wireless connection with the BCM43xx driver. I've absolutely fallen in love with it since then, and I'm stickin' with it. :)

steveneddy
November 5th, 2006, 04:52 AM
UM - actually around three years. Started on Knoppix, moved to DSL, then Knoppix again, some Puppy time and the Ubuntu. Been on Ubuntu close to two and half years or so I guess.

I tried to update to Edgy and had to reinstall it borked my system so bad, I couldn't believe it, but all is well now.

Always remember to backup your important data. It saved my butt this time.

More beans please.

-SE