Just Uber

Well Chris has done it, in fact he has done it every where he can slip it in.
“Oh er missus” i hear you say, but no, put that thought back where it should be, i am talking about Ubuntu (or Kubuntu).

Chris has been an advocate for Linux for some while now, in fact it was while we were researching for our free wifi setup that Chris caught the Linux bug. I developed it earlier, a long time ago I went to Uni and gained (its hard to fail!) a degree in Software Engineering, this opened my eyes to many forms of operating system, with many a discussion to the pros and cons. Linux was used at Uni for a basis of many of the units (shell scripting, inter-process communication, PERL etc etc) all interesting stuff but of no use when hitting the big world

It seemed that all that was required was a understanding of how to combat the BSOD and talk nicely to users (grrrrrr). Since leaving Uni my Linux skills have slowly been lost to the dark recesses of my mind (not a nice place!), but it was after watching Chris start enjoying computing again that i realised it was time… Time to ditch Windows and move to Linux…

Chris and I have had this discussion for some time, why we have to stay with windows etc.. etc.. mostly it geared around other members of the family having to cope with what at heart is a nerds delight

But looking at the Kubuntu site and checking out Chris’s laptop where he had it installed i realised that there were no arguments left in my way. I had used many live cds (including the very good backtrack but never felt inclined to actually stick with Linux.

It was only in the last few weeks of 2006 and after much discussion with Chris and reading generally about Microsofts Vista OS that i realised computing (the Microsoft variation) has lost its way. I asked myself, why do we need a 2.4Ghz Duo with 2Gig of Ram just to run the OS!?
Most people i know do the same things day in day out with their home pcs - surf the web, listen to a few Mp3s, and word process a few documents (if its Chris we are talking about those documents will be complaints! ) so why do we need Vista? Well i for one don’t and i will predict i will not be the last person making this decision in 2007.

I don’t need the bloatware that has become Windows for my day to day working PC (unless ‘the man’ at work forces me to use it…..) and i certainly dont need it for my family. We dont have the money to purchase a new Uber PC just to surf the web and get by on a P3 800Mhz with 1/2 Gig of Ram, this currently runs Win2k and has done since it was installed in 2000! It has been extremely stable and we have been very happy with it (well done Microsoft!) but because i am in need of a donar pc to set up as a child friendly (11 year old daughter!) proxy/filtering box then i have decided to replace it with a newer 2.4ghz P4 box with silent cooling, am i the only one that hates the fan whining?

When this new box comes online do you think i should invest my hard earned cash on adding to Bills stash (actually Bill isn’t a bad boy), or should i rephrase that - should i pay my money out to a corporation that is hell bent on making software that in my opinion is making something that is not needed?

Nah - i didn’t think so, instead i will install Kubuntu and use Open Source Software and provide donations to applications that we use all the time.

Dont get me wrong, i am not Windows bashing, I have been brought up with philosophy that you use the correct tool for the job. Hence the reason behind languages like Haskell, Ada, LISP and Prolog and yes i have written programs for them all (i still rock back and forwards holding my knees when recalling Haskell), and its why i have a big server running Windows XP and a copy of GBPVR and will do so for quite some time me thinks.

Any way, i predict that 2007 will be the year that Linux starts to make headway into the desktop market. It may be fuelled by the users out there who have had a dubious copy of Windows XP but find it hard to upgrade to Vista? or more likely it will be fueled by corporations or SME looking to make savings (PCs are becoming less important in this software as a service world, all that is needed is a webrowser), either way the very fact Kubuntu have come up with a simple Linux that is based on something that is stable and easy to drive (Debian) that will appeal to the non-techies out there means the time of an alternative to Windows is now upon us. Yes i know this argument has been played to death many many times before, but that was them and this is me

Back to the project -
I have converted the wifes laptop (a Compaq Evo N1020v) without too many hitches;

1) Downloaded the Kubuntu DVD iso

2) Put DVD into drive and made sure it booted from the DVD.

3) Answered a few questions and then let it do its thing (around 40-50 mins)…

4) Set it on the network (i.e. shoved a network cable into it) and then upgraded all the things it asked me to do..

5) Waited a while and surfed using Konqueror, once the upgrades had completed, a quick sudo apt-get install firefox (along with flash, and a few others) and it was starting to make sense.

6) I followed Chris’s instructions as per his previous blog entry and then sudo apt-get install msttcorefonts (this took quite a while!) to sort out that annoying problem with missing flash fonts.

7) apt-get install planetpenguin-racer (well i have to dont i…!)

Hey presto, everything is working including the ACPI and wireless card (standard PEAK 802.11b/g).

And to test all of the above I had to do the usual for the wife, take some photos of her favorite blogging subject - hand knitted socks (well we are all nerds at heart! - Its just the subject that changes..).

This included taking the pics using my Fuji S2Pro, using CF card reader plugged into USB port of the laptop (which it recognised without a problem) and then realising that my favorite image manipulation program (Adobe Photoshop) is not installed…! Hey ho - bring out the GIMP i say (or at least install it via apt-get), and after using Photoshop i quickly got to grasps with the GIMP. I then searched the network for a SMB share on the main dowstairs PC and moved them to the wifes blog photos folder.. All in less than 20 mins, not bad for my first attempt to use OSS only.

Heres to 2007 the year of OSS…..

Adam

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This entry was posted on Monday, January 1st, 2007 at 10:51 pm and is filed under . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.