SunnyRabbiera
September 16th, 2007, 12:12 AM
I have been writing this for just a short time now but I will probably make revisions later.
Nothing impressive I think but a good start.
Hello and welcome to the world of Ubuntu Linux!
You are most likely someone who is either curious about Linux, looking for an alternative or replacement to windows or OSX,or someone who just wants to try something different.
Linux is indeed something different and a good alternative to look at.
Now I won't bore you with details like the long and complicated history of Linux unlike most beginner guides you might see around the net, no I am going to get to the nitty gritty of things so that you don't have to read through a mile long documentary on the history of Linux but to understand what Ubuntu is you do have to know some things about Linux.
First like windows and OSX Linux is an operating system, not a program.
One of the most common misconceptions about Linux is that its some sort of program you pop on your computer like you do on windows, it is its own system.
Second Linux is not meant to fully replace windows, a lot of people come to Linux in hopes it will do everything windows can and honestly it works for some people but it might not work for others.
Hardware and software compatibility varies between the two, meaning that ultra cool mouse you got or that fun game you bought last year might not work on Linux and later I will point out the reasons why.
But if you are willing to learn I am willing to teach, so without further delay lets get to my article.
Article 1: Ubuntu Linux, what is it exactly?
Ubuntu is one of the most promising Linux desktop distributions out there, now what is a distribution exactly you might ask, well this dive in to some of the history of Linux a bit but to make it short I will sum it up like this:
Like windows there are many versions of Linux, however unlike windows each one is sort of an operating system of its own.
Think of Windows and Linux like a car company, in the case of the windows car company that new Vista car is basically the same thing as that XP car they have however Vista has a lot more of a visual appeal to it, while the XP car mainly comes in blue, silver, green and possibly gray but vista looks better because it looks sleek with cool looking wheels and it has leather seats.
But if you look inside it's the same engine, only it might have a few more bells and whistles then the XP car.
Now lets look at the Linux cars, for now lets pick two of the top distributions on distrowatch, Ubuntu and PCLinux OS 2007.
If you go over to the Ubuntu car you see it mainly comes in a orange and brown color scheme, you look in and see that it has a radio, a navigation system and perhaps a video player in the glove compartment.
You look inside the engine and see that even though it might not have a lot of features you have heard you can get a lot of nice add on's for free, even if you don't like the way is colored you have heard it is easy to change the way it looks.
Then you go over to the PClinux car, it is shaped a bit differently then the Ubuntu and it has a few things that catch your eye right away, you see that even though it has a radio it can get more stations then the Ubuntu can, and the video player also works a bit faster then the one in the Ubuntu car.
Then you look at the engine and find out that it is identical to the Ubuntu one!
Though you see a lot of key differences here and there, as even though you saw some minor differences between the XP car and the Vista car there are quite a number of differences between the Ubuntu car and the PClinux car.
But at the very heart of both of them is the same basic engine, it is what is connected to that engine that makes the two different.
In Linux terms this is because the two have entirely different ways of thinking, the two might have the same basic goal in terms of making a great desktop Linux but they go about it in different ways.
This does not make one better then the other, in fact you might think because a version of Linux is on top of the Distrowatch rankings it is the latest and greatest version of the operating system... No it is not, this is another misconception about Linux when concerning newcomers.
Ubuntu, PClinux and the vast array of others are their own OS, but share the same common ground unless it is a BSD, now BSD that's another can of beans but I will get to that later.
Now then lets get back to the two I was discussing, there are many fundamental differences between Ubuntu and PClinuxOS.
Ubuntu practices as a free software friendly perspective, while it gives a lot of great apps to make your transition from windows to Linux easier it does not do a lot of things by default like play MP3's or various amounts of video formats, or be able to use flash.
PClinux is targeted at the beginner, who just wants their stuff to work and not worry about free software fundamentalism, in this respect I feel PClinux might be better for the beginner then Ubuntu, plus there are a few others I think the beginner might want to try such as Linux Mint, Mepis Linux and a few select others over Ubuntu.
But this doesn't mean I think Ubuntu is bad, quite the opposite as really getting things like flash to work is easy if you have the time and patience, Ubuntu has quite a few tools to make things to make things easy but if you just want everything to work right out of the box Ubuntu might not be for you.
Article 2: So how can I try Ubuntu, will it harm my computer if I do?
Ubuntu is something called a live CD, a live CD is practically an entire OS loaded onto a single disk., where you can run and experiment with the system without harming your computer.
Just make sure you have a program to burn ISO's as windows is not friendly with burning them.
The advantage of a live disk is its sort of like a "try before you buy", lets go back to the car dealerships for a minute to see how this works...
Now when you go over to the Windows dealership, you see a lot of nice looking cars and want to take them out for a spin before you buy one of them. But you find out you can only test drive your car if you put money down on it and even if you can get the option to try the car out it will only run inside the lot of the car dealership unless you pay for it and on your test drive there are at least three people who work at the dealership inside of it, one with a clipboard, one with a checkbook and one with a large shotgun who shouts at you every time you make a wrong turn that is too far from the main dealership building.
Now at the Linux dealership you find out something odd, most of the people who own the cars will let you have the car to test drive and own for free!
No money to give them, no strange people inside the car ready to blow your head off if you make a wrong turn, no you can take the car away and not pay one single cent!
But there is a bad side to the Linux car, you learn that there are quite a number of roads that only allow windows cars to come into, plus if you go out for extra parts like a new cupholder or stereo there is hardly anything that works in your Linux car.
In real life this is no real fault of Linux, there is a lot of hardware and software that simply won't work with it, this is because a lot of companies out there work with Microsoft only, sometimes there are those who make things for Apple but not many or its something that works for both Windows and Apple only.
But there are cases that even though something doesn't say it works with Linux doesn't mean it won't, there are number of things that might work with Linux if you are lucky, but Linux support honestly is low in the actual world.
3: So what does Ubuntu offer me that Windows doesnt?
This is a very good question, but it all comes down to basics.
First Ubuntu like other Linux distributions offers far more security then windows, because it is so widespread Windows is a main target for hackers, Windows biggest advantage is its biggest curse, for even though a lot of things work in Windows there are a lot of things that can easily break it.
Once again lets go back to the car dealerships.
Now say you have finally decided to buy that windows car, it cost you a pretty penny but since a lot of things with with the windows car only you just got it because it works with that cool looking radio you like that works with the windows car only.
Now say you take your car to a store somewhere where they offer a lot of cool add ons for you, but the owners of this place are not entirely trustworthy though you don't know it at this time.
You buy a cool new stereo system for your car, you get it installed but almost immediately you see major issues, your car starts running slower, the engine starts to overheat easier and soon at home your mailbox is flooded with adds that freak you out like a ***** enlargement kit and other adds that say "reply to this message and get a free ipod!"
now getting a free ipod might sound nice at first and you might have the gumption to reply to that message, but when you do your mail is even more cluttered with things like porn ads, odd beat up looking packages and you are soon annoyed with people from some pizza place you never heard of with a large stack of pizza with them with bills costing up to wazoo.
It turns out that when you gave your credit card to those people at that store you bought that cool sound system from they used its information to infest your mailbox with junk mail and make your car practically unusable.
In anger you might go back to where that store was, only to find out the store is boarded up and closed and you find out its owners have moved to Mexico and you soon find out they stole money from your bank account...
This is a scary situation but it can happen very easily in real life with your computer if you don't know what you are doing.
For all its worth Windows is a security nightmare as even though Microsoft does update it hardly any of its updates do any good as there is another vulnerability in the system soon after and it takes Microsoft to fix that as well, then even after that there is another security flaw to fix.
But Microsoft honestly does not keep a lid on itself, Microsoft thinks that just because they are on top of the hill they can get out of the way of any arrows that come at them.
However they are not safe and it is only Microsofts complacency that makes using windows so risky, now sure there are programs out there to help make windows safer such as firewalls, anti virus, anti adware, anti spyware and a vast arrangement of other things but you will wind up using a lot of space to keep you safe.
Keeping windows secure can be hell, but Ubuntu Linux is different.
Ubuntu like other linux distributions are far more secure then windows, this is because linux is not the leader on computers, windows is.
As I said before Windows biggest advantage and disadvantage is that its the most used OS.
Windows desktop share is gigantic but as a result many people out there like to hack it.
Even Vista with its promises of being more secure lags behind linux, linux is based on UNIX even though its not really a part of the main UNIX tree it is inspired by UNIX.
Unix is a very high peak in security, thus why it is a very popular basis for many operating systems out there, BSD, Apples OSX, Sun's Solaris and Linux are all based around the ideals of UNIX, but UNIX itself is really a moot point in the end as by now there are so many spin offs of it that practically UNIX as it was before now is practically a benchmark.
The thing is that you really dont need to switch to linux, if you want you can keep windows for as long as you want until you are forced buy the next Microsoft OS.
in this case is why a alternative to windows might be desirable, as really Microsoft forces its consumers to update by totally dropping support of its older systems.
now of course concerning some linux distros's like ubuntu you are also sort of forced to upgrade, but in ubuntu's defense it is one of the easiest linux variants to upgrade and normally you probably wont need new hardware all the time there is an upgrade...
Just consider this, when most people were forced to upgrade from windows 2000 to XP it was quite a big hunk as 2000's demands were far less then XP, but in retrospect for a lot of people the transition from 2000 to XP is lightyears better then the transition from XP to Vista.
Vista is a mega beast compared to XP, bogged down with more eye candy then actually real groundbreaking features Vista is basically XP with more eye candy, extra bullcrap tools, and a load of bloat.
Even XP is a lightweight to it and XP too had a lot of bulge to it.
4: If I like windows but also like Linux do I have to wipe Windows off my hard drive?
Not really, you can set up something called a dual boot.
But from a personal note it might be best to have your data backed up just in case you frag your system.
Now in the world of the car dealership this sort of thing will look very odd, if Windows looked like say a Chevrolet then Linux might be a European car such like a BMW and one can easily tell a BMW looks vastly different then a Chevvy.
It would be a very interesting to look at indeed, but despite the differences in body work and all the two halves work together quite well... actually a better way to do this is to make Windows a Motorbike and Linux a side car so that we would have a less awkward looking and practical automobile.
Dual booting can be a good thing for beginners or for people who play games as sadly there are not many good games for Linux.
5: so if I get linux what happens to all my programs I already have?
nothing if you dual boot, however i will remind you that Ubuntu does have alternatives to a good majority of windows apps.
Just remember Linux is not a windows replacement, no operating system will ever be windows unless it is in fact windows.
I personally ubuntu/ linux apps are suitable alternatives to windows ones.
XMMS/ Beep/ Audacious are all great winamp like programs
Amarok is a good alternative to itunes
Firefox of course is a well known alternative to IE
Open office is also fair if you are a MS word/office user
it really depends on what you need, if you are a net junkie ubuntu and other linux distros out there might suit your needs.
Multimedia might be an issue at first, if you listen to a lot of music then initially ubuntu will not work for you right away on things like MP3's
But this is no fault of Linux, there are a lot of legal issues concerning MP3 and many other popular windows and apple formats such as certain audio and video formats.
But this is easy to correct and it is easy to learn if you are willing to learn.
Games though, a major weakness, this is why if you are a gamer it would benefit you to dual boot windows as most games are windows only, in this respect linux is like apple.
Another issue you might find is that linux might not work for your favorite things like controllers, keyboards, mice, graphic cards and other add ons.
Again no fault of linux, as i said before a lot of things are made for windows only and it is no fault of linux if certain things might not work.
This is why a live CD is a good thing, it gives you a test run of everything before you decide if you want to install ubuntu/linux
5: What if I like windows better then Linux, or like another version of Linux better then Ubuntu?
Honestly its all about choice, and keep and open mind as Ubuntu is not the only Linux out there so if ubuntu doesnt work for you there are many other variants out there, Mepis, PClinux, Mandriva, Fedora... who knows what might work for you.
Thank you for your time and make sure to read other articles about Linux if you are generally interested in it... good day :D
Nothing impressive I think but a good start.
Hello and welcome to the world of Ubuntu Linux!
You are most likely someone who is either curious about Linux, looking for an alternative or replacement to windows or OSX,or someone who just wants to try something different.
Linux is indeed something different and a good alternative to look at.
Now I won't bore you with details like the long and complicated history of Linux unlike most beginner guides you might see around the net, no I am going to get to the nitty gritty of things so that you don't have to read through a mile long documentary on the history of Linux but to understand what Ubuntu is you do have to know some things about Linux.
First like windows and OSX Linux is an operating system, not a program.
One of the most common misconceptions about Linux is that its some sort of program you pop on your computer like you do on windows, it is its own system.
Second Linux is not meant to fully replace windows, a lot of people come to Linux in hopes it will do everything windows can and honestly it works for some people but it might not work for others.
Hardware and software compatibility varies between the two, meaning that ultra cool mouse you got or that fun game you bought last year might not work on Linux and later I will point out the reasons why.
But if you are willing to learn I am willing to teach, so without further delay lets get to my article.
Article 1: Ubuntu Linux, what is it exactly?
Ubuntu is one of the most promising Linux desktop distributions out there, now what is a distribution exactly you might ask, well this dive in to some of the history of Linux a bit but to make it short I will sum it up like this:
Like windows there are many versions of Linux, however unlike windows each one is sort of an operating system of its own.
Think of Windows and Linux like a car company, in the case of the windows car company that new Vista car is basically the same thing as that XP car they have however Vista has a lot more of a visual appeal to it, while the XP car mainly comes in blue, silver, green and possibly gray but vista looks better because it looks sleek with cool looking wheels and it has leather seats.
But if you look inside it's the same engine, only it might have a few more bells and whistles then the XP car.
Now lets look at the Linux cars, for now lets pick two of the top distributions on distrowatch, Ubuntu and PCLinux OS 2007.
If you go over to the Ubuntu car you see it mainly comes in a orange and brown color scheme, you look in and see that it has a radio, a navigation system and perhaps a video player in the glove compartment.
You look inside the engine and see that even though it might not have a lot of features you have heard you can get a lot of nice add on's for free, even if you don't like the way is colored you have heard it is easy to change the way it looks.
Then you go over to the PClinux car, it is shaped a bit differently then the Ubuntu and it has a few things that catch your eye right away, you see that even though it has a radio it can get more stations then the Ubuntu can, and the video player also works a bit faster then the one in the Ubuntu car.
Then you look at the engine and find out that it is identical to the Ubuntu one!
Though you see a lot of key differences here and there, as even though you saw some minor differences between the XP car and the Vista car there are quite a number of differences between the Ubuntu car and the PClinux car.
But at the very heart of both of them is the same basic engine, it is what is connected to that engine that makes the two different.
In Linux terms this is because the two have entirely different ways of thinking, the two might have the same basic goal in terms of making a great desktop Linux but they go about it in different ways.
This does not make one better then the other, in fact you might think because a version of Linux is on top of the Distrowatch rankings it is the latest and greatest version of the operating system... No it is not, this is another misconception about Linux when concerning newcomers.
Ubuntu, PClinux and the vast array of others are their own OS, but share the same common ground unless it is a BSD, now BSD that's another can of beans but I will get to that later.
Now then lets get back to the two I was discussing, there are many fundamental differences between Ubuntu and PClinuxOS.
Ubuntu practices as a free software friendly perspective, while it gives a lot of great apps to make your transition from windows to Linux easier it does not do a lot of things by default like play MP3's or various amounts of video formats, or be able to use flash.
PClinux is targeted at the beginner, who just wants their stuff to work and not worry about free software fundamentalism, in this respect I feel PClinux might be better for the beginner then Ubuntu, plus there are a few others I think the beginner might want to try such as Linux Mint, Mepis Linux and a few select others over Ubuntu.
But this doesn't mean I think Ubuntu is bad, quite the opposite as really getting things like flash to work is easy if you have the time and patience, Ubuntu has quite a few tools to make things to make things easy but if you just want everything to work right out of the box Ubuntu might not be for you.
Article 2: So how can I try Ubuntu, will it harm my computer if I do?
Ubuntu is something called a live CD, a live CD is practically an entire OS loaded onto a single disk., where you can run and experiment with the system without harming your computer.
Just make sure you have a program to burn ISO's as windows is not friendly with burning them.
The advantage of a live disk is its sort of like a "try before you buy", lets go back to the car dealerships for a minute to see how this works...
Now when you go over to the Windows dealership, you see a lot of nice looking cars and want to take them out for a spin before you buy one of them. But you find out you can only test drive your car if you put money down on it and even if you can get the option to try the car out it will only run inside the lot of the car dealership unless you pay for it and on your test drive there are at least three people who work at the dealership inside of it, one with a clipboard, one with a checkbook and one with a large shotgun who shouts at you every time you make a wrong turn that is too far from the main dealership building.
Now at the Linux dealership you find out something odd, most of the people who own the cars will let you have the car to test drive and own for free!
No money to give them, no strange people inside the car ready to blow your head off if you make a wrong turn, no you can take the car away and not pay one single cent!
But there is a bad side to the Linux car, you learn that there are quite a number of roads that only allow windows cars to come into, plus if you go out for extra parts like a new cupholder or stereo there is hardly anything that works in your Linux car.
In real life this is no real fault of Linux, there is a lot of hardware and software that simply won't work with it, this is because a lot of companies out there work with Microsoft only, sometimes there are those who make things for Apple but not many or its something that works for both Windows and Apple only.
But there are cases that even though something doesn't say it works with Linux doesn't mean it won't, there are number of things that might work with Linux if you are lucky, but Linux support honestly is low in the actual world.
3: So what does Ubuntu offer me that Windows doesnt?
This is a very good question, but it all comes down to basics.
First Ubuntu like other Linux distributions offers far more security then windows, because it is so widespread Windows is a main target for hackers, Windows biggest advantage is its biggest curse, for even though a lot of things work in Windows there are a lot of things that can easily break it.
Once again lets go back to the car dealerships.
Now say you have finally decided to buy that windows car, it cost you a pretty penny but since a lot of things with with the windows car only you just got it because it works with that cool looking radio you like that works with the windows car only.
Now say you take your car to a store somewhere where they offer a lot of cool add ons for you, but the owners of this place are not entirely trustworthy though you don't know it at this time.
You buy a cool new stereo system for your car, you get it installed but almost immediately you see major issues, your car starts running slower, the engine starts to overheat easier and soon at home your mailbox is flooded with adds that freak you out like a ***** enlargement kit and other adds that say "reply to this message and get a free ipod!"
now getting a free ipod might sound nice at first and you might have the gumption to reply to that message, but when you do your mail is even more cluttered with things like porn ads, odd beat up looking packages and you are soon annoyed with people from some pizza place you never heard of with a large stack of pizza with them with bills costing up to wazoo.
It turns out that when you gave your credit card to those people at that store you bought that cool sound system from they used its information to infest your mailbox with junk mail and make your car practically unusable.
In anger you might go back to where that store was, only to find out the store is boarded up and closed and you find out its owners have moved to Mexico and you soon find out they stole money from your bank account...
This is a scary situation but it can happen very easily in real life with your computer if you don't know what you are doing.
For all its worth Windows is a security nightmare as even though Microsoft does update it hardly any of its updates do any good as there is another vulnerability in the system soon after and it takes Microsoft to fix that as well, then even after that there is another security flaw to fix.
But Microsoft honestly does not keep a lid on itself, Microsoft thinks that just because they are on top of the hill they can get out of the way of any arrows that come at them.
However they are not safe and it is only Microsofts complacency that makes using windows so risky, now sure there are programs out there to help make windows safer such as firewalls, anti virus, anti adware, anti spyware and a vast arrangement of other things but you will wind up using a lot of space to keep you safe.
Keeping windows secure can be hell, but Ubuntu Linux is different.
Ubuntu like other linux distributions are far more secure then windows, this is because linux is not the leader on computers, windows is.
As I said before Windows biggest advantage and disadvantage is that its the most used OS.
Windows desktop share is gigantic but as a result many people out there like to hack it.
Even Vista with its promises of being more secure lags behind linux, linux is based on UNIX even though its not really a part of the main UNIX tree it is inspired by UNIX.
Unix is a very high peak in security, thus why it is a very popular basis for many operating systems out there, BSD, Apples OSX, Sun's Solaris and Linux are all based around the ideals of UNIX, but UNIX itself is really a moot point in the end as by now there are so many spin offs of it that practically UNIX as it was before now is practically a benchmark.
The thing is that you really dont need to switch to linux, if you want you can keep windows for as long as you want until you are forced buy the next Microsoft OS.
in this case is why a alternative to windows might be desirable, as really Microsoft forces its consumers to update by totally dropping support of its older systems.
now of course concerning some linux distros's like ubuntu you are also sort of forced to upgrade, but in ubuntu's defense it is one of the easiest linux variants to upgrade and normally you probably wont need new hardware all the time there is an upgrade...
Just consider this, when most people were forced to upgrade from windows 2000 to XP it was quite a big hunk as 2000's demands were far less then XP, but in retrospect for a lot of people the transition from 2000 to XP is lightyears better then the transition from XP to Vista.
Vista is a mega beast compared to XP, bogged down with more eye candy then actually real groundbreaking features Vista is basically XP with more eye candy, extra bullcrap tools, and a load of bloat.
Even XP is a lightweight to it and XP too had a lot of bulge to it.
4: If I like windows but also like Linux do I have to wipe Windows off my hard drive?
Not really, you can set up something called a dual boot.
But from a personal note it might be best to have your data backed up just in case you frag your system.
Now in the world of the car dealership this sort of thing will look very odd, if Windows looked like say a Chevrolet then Linux might be a European car such like a BMW and one can easily tell a BMW looks vastly different then a Chevvy.
It would be a very interesting to look at indeed, but despite the differences in body work and all the two halves work together quite well... actually a better way to do this is to make Windows a Motorbike and Linux a side car so that we would have a less awkward looking and practical automobile.
Dual booting can be a good thing for beginners or for people who play games as sadly there are not many good games for Linux.
5: so if I get linux what happens to all my programs I already have?
nothing if you dual boot, however i will remind you that Ubuntu does have alternatives to a good majority of windows apps.
Just remember Linux is not a windows replacement, no operating system will ever be windows unless it is in fact windows.
I personally ubuntu/ linux apps are suitable alternatives to windows ones.
XMMS/ Beep/ Audacious are all great winamp like programs
Amarok is a good alternative to itunes
Firefox of course is a well known alternative to IE
Open office is also fair if you are a MS word/office user
it really depends on what you need, if you are a net junkie ubuntu and other linux distros out there might suit your needs.
Multimedia might be an issue at first, if you listen to a lot of music then initially ubuntu will not work for you right away on things like MP3's
But this is no fault of Linux, there are a lot of legal issues concerning MP3 and many other popular windows and apple formats such as certain audio and video formats.
But this is easy to correct and it is easy to learn if you are willing to learn.
Games though, a major weakness, this is why if you are a gamer it would benefit you to dual boot windows as most games are windows only, in this respect linux is like apple.
Another issue you might find is that linux might not work for your favorite things like controllers, keyboards, mice, graphic cards and other add ons.
Again no fault of linux, as i said before a lot of things are made for windows only and it is no fault of linux if certain things might not work.
This is why a live CD is a good thing, it gives you a test run of everything before you decide if you want to install ubuntu/linux
5: What if I like windows better then Linux, or like another version of Linux better then Ubuntu?
Honestly its all about choice, and keep and open mind as Ubuntu is not the only Linux out there so if ubuntu doesnt work for you there are many other variants out there, Mepis, PClinux, Mandriva, Fedora... who knows what might work for you.
Thank you for your time and make sure to read other articles about Linux if you are generally interested in it... good day :D