Comments on: Ubuntu Help

By: Matt Hartley

Matt Hartley — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 18:34:27 +0000

I’ve heard good things about the latest Mandriva release, and they do a nice job with the restricted stuff, making it work out of the box. But how is it these days with updates? Last few releases, it has been very “RPM-like” and left me missing a Debian based setup. How would say it differs from its cousin, PCLinuxOS, from which they are based?

By: matthartley

matthartley — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 04:32:30 +0000

Again, not sure if the comments with the show notes are showing up, post here for them if they do not show up as the links are very important.

By: Matt Hartley

Matt Hartley — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 04:28:49 +0000

Seems like the comments are only showing up half the time, so respond here if the show notes are not appearing for you via the comments section. Thanks

By: Matt Hartley

Matt Hartley — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 04:23:16 +0000

And yes, I was in error on the Prism chipset comment, you need to install linux-wlan-ng and; well, just read the comments for the show notes on the wireless post. ;)

By: Matt Hartley

Matt Hartley — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 04:18:33 +0000

Show notes for the wifi video:
http://tinyurl.com/34vdyt

Show notes for the sound card piece:
http://tinyurl.com/2p2gza

And there is a new one on tackling the DNS issues in Gutsy as well. Goto http://www.lockergnome.com/nexus/linux/ to read about it. ;)

By: ernie

ernie — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 03:48:39 +0000

Quote:
I’m all for Open Source, but do people like my parents really care?
End Quote

They may surprise you if the were helped to understand what the Open Source movement is all about because it is about freedom.

Freedom to know what software is running in your computer and why.

Freedom to see and even modify the source code if you so choose.

Freedom to customize your system as much or as little as you want.

Freedom to copy and share your OS with others – legally.

Of course, the exercise of freedom does not come easily. You must learn about the OS (to customize it), and possibly learn something about programming (if you want to examine or modify any source code). What is important is that you have these freedoms with Open Source Software, even if you do not choose to exercise them. Even more important is the fact that millions of eyes look at the source code of every Open Source Program, so security weaknesses and bugs are uncovered and corrected quickly. While the turn around time from discovery to patch for Proprietary Software is usually measured in weeks or months, with Open Source Software it is usually measured in days.

You seem to think that Linux is too geeky for the desktop, and Windows is not? I use Mandriva Linux here, and I can configure my system to look and work the way I want it to from the time it exits the BIOS screen at boot-up to the time it shuts down by using the configuration tools provided by Mandriva and KDE. To even partially accomplish anything similar in Windows would involve some serious registry hacking, and perhaps rewriting some of the software (a potentially illegal undertaking), and even then it may not be possible.

If you want to see how easy installing Linux can be, install Mandriva Linux 2008. It is available as an installation DVD image, or as a Live CD image (Mandriva One KDE or Mandriva One Gnome). In either case, you burn the image to a disk, then boot your computer with it. If the disk is the DVD installer, the installation program runs directly. If the disk is the Live CD, after Mandriva Linux boots to the desktop, you can click the installation icon on the desktop. For an even better test, have Ponzi do the installation. I’d bet she can do it.

My2cents,

By: Nikiaf

Nikiaf — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 01:52:31 +0000

hey thanks for that chris! i actually emailed you about wireless issues in gutsy recently and i’m going to give wicd a try and hopefully it’ll work :).