my dad was used to windows only. we got him HP business laptop with SUSE preinstalled. needless to say it all worked out of the box. We then replaced SUSE with Kubuntu (to avoid paying a licence to access their repo+suse repos are old). we changed the menu to classic so it looked like XP he was used to and a bit more like win 7 that he had at work. we then showed him the alternative software. most he already new as we used and still do open source software on windows. at the time we just asked him to give it a try and if he feels it is too alien for him, we would buy him windows and install that. he has no issues and every once in a while i would ask him how the PC is doing and he says his PC runs just fine.
so to sum up. transition is very easy if:
1. hardware is linux compatible --> manufacturers are responsible for that - they should either create drivers or if they give access people will create drivers for them. when drivers are opensource every user is "responsible" for their improvements and is encouraged to post bugs, queries, feature requests...
2. windows users already use opensource programs on windows - for example we already used Firefox, Inkscape, GIMP, Libre Office (before open office or old MS office 2003), Thunderbird, a bunch of KDE apps... on windows. since they are the same on linux users have no issue moving between OS.
for the few software my dad needed we found good alternatives (gramps for genealogy, k3B for nero and digiKam for photo organisation). slowly but surely all machines in that household moved to linux.
i still have some windows machines, because i need osme windows specific software. and when thinking about getting a new PC i am conflicted. on one hand i think Kubuntu will be enough, but then for specific signing software for tax reports and a few other things they want windows (software is only made for windows). while i still have win 7 on one of the PC it is only supported for about 1 more year. and then what? so i might need to load with windows.
Bookmarks