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mrtaber
August 15th, 2005, 08:36 PM
We use VMWare (workstation and ESX) here, and my boss is just starting to play with Workstation. After several unsuccessful attempts at installing another distro, I nonchalantly suggest, "Here...try this; it's a nice Linux, and only comes on one CD. An easy install. If it installs, we know the other problem was probably software and not hardware. Try it--it's the hot new desktop. I've got it on my machines."

30-40 minutes later, he's in my office, telling me he's loving Ubuntu.

...One computer at a time. :razz:

KingBahamut
August 15th, 2005, 08:37 PM
taber, thats all it takes.....Ive converted over 20 people , its taken a long time though.

granite230
August 15th, 2005, 09:22 PM
I think I need to learn every little thing about the OS before I start recommending it to other people... because I'm probably the one who has to fix their problems as well...

and I don't have any interested friends who know less about Ubuntu than me.

rolfotto
August 15th, 2005, 09:29 PM
Cool, nice to see he's not a PHB^_^


I think I need to learn every little thing about the OS before I start recommending it to other people... because I'm probably the one who has to fix their problems as well...

While I recommended to my parents OSX for the notebooks, I'm in the process of converting their 4 computer home office to Ubuntu. Yesterday, I was surprised to see my mom playing around with Gnucash, having download it herself with the instructions from Ubuntuguide.org - I have hope for the future of computing

(If you do start converting people - I think Ubuntu has one of the best communities out there this side of *nix)

KingBahamut
August 15th, 2005, 09:35 PM
I think I need to learn every little thing about the OS before I start recommending it to other people... because I'm probably the one who has to fix their problems as well...

and I don't have any interested friends who know less about Ubuntu than me.

Thats a rather closed view Granite. You point them here, and we all will fix their problems.

=)

granite230
August 15th, 2005, 10:08 PM
No it's not a closed view because I DO point them into this direction. The problem is that they're not seriously trying it out! They're not interested.

Just like I sometimes tell people they shouldn't use IE but just use Firefox instead as the primary browser. But they just don't care! They think IE is just fine and they don't need anything else because IE will also do the job.

They simply don't care about alternatives! They really don't care about computers and if something is new, then it takes time to learn how it works... they are really not waiting to put time in something they don't care about.

Also, my experiences with Ubuntu aren't the best.
Today it turned out my Seagate harddisk was responsible for most of my Ubuntu problems but for example I'm still stuck with this (http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=57174) problem. I've been using Ubuntu for about half a year now and I still don't know how to fix this. I still can't do everything I want the easy way and I'm a "computer-student"...
Sometimes I'm wondering what a complete newbie would think about all the trouble I've been through while using (and learning how to use) Ubuntu. I don't think I can blame them for not trying it.

Brunellus
August 15th, 2005, 10:19 PM
No it's not a closed view because I DO point them into this direction. The problem is that they're not seriously trying it out! They're not interested.

Just like I sometimes tell people they shouldn't use IE but just use Firefox instead as the primary browser. But they just don't care! They think IE is just fine and they don't need anything else because IE will also do the job.

They simply don't care about alternatives! They really don't care about computers and if something is new, then it takes time to learn how it works... they are really not waiting to put time in something they don't care about.

Also, my experiences with Ubuntu aren't the best.
Today it turned out my Seagate harddisk was responsible for most of my Ubuntu problems but for example I'm still stuck with this (http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=57174) problem. I've been using Ubuntu for about half a year now and I still don't know how to fix this. I still can't do everything I want the easy way and I'm a "computer-student"...
Sometimes I'm wondering what a complete newbie would think about all the trouble I've been through while using (and learning how to use) Ubuntu. I don't think I can blame them for not trying it.

Its hit or miss, depending on what hardware they happen to have.

The main newbie problems seem to be enabling the extra repositories and thus getting multimedia codecs/flash/java.

Ubuntu is potentially very friendly to total newbies--that is, people with almost zero computer experience--but will frustrate people who already know how to work Windows. (...and who learned to use windows pcs after the advent of Win 95).

Generally, anyone who is willing to learn something new will tend to persevere with Ubuntu and GNU/Linux in general. The remainder will come here and troll with "UBUNTU ISN'T READY FOR THE DESKTOP" threads.

mrtaber
August 15th, 2005, 10:20 PM
Well, my boss is one of those wonderful rarities...a techie in management clothing. And...he loves to tinker. His main confusion with Ubuntu was how *little* he had to do to get it up and running nicely under VMWare.

He's already talking about putting it on one of his extra computers at home.

Mark

granite230
August 15th, 2005, 10:30 PM
Ubuntu is potentially very friendly to total newbies--that is, people with almost zero computer experience--but will frustrate people who already know how to work Windows. (...and who learned to use windows pcs after the advent of Win 95).

Generally, anyone who is willing to learn something new will tend to persevere with Ubuntu and GNU/Linux in general. The remainder will come here and troll with "UBUNTU ISN'T READY FOR THE DESKTOP" threads.

Agreed! (So that's why I said: I don't have any interested friends who know less about Ubuntu than me)

I have also learned Windows first, but I'm determined to keep using Ubuntu. Even when I have a few problems that are really frustrating. I was really close to stop using it, but I know I can't find anything better than this. Sometimes I'm curious about SuSE or Red Hat or whatever but then I think: hell... it can't be better than Ubuntu.

Maybe some day I'll try something else, just to explore something new.

poofyhairguy
August 15th, 2005, 11:52 PM
Well, my boss is one of those wonderful rarities...a techie in management clothing.

http://www.buchananink.com/images/orn-home-run.jpg