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Linux for Non-Geeks
The title explains exactly how Grant's book is laid out. It's for Windows users, Mac users, and new or inexperienced Linux users who are non-geeks (or wannabe-geeks) and who are itching to take the plunge into Linux without having to wade through a multitude of books aimed at power users, online HOWTOs, weblogs and IRC channels. This is one volume with enough worthy information to credit the cost of the $34.95 investment.
The content is based on Redhat's Fedora Core and includes CDs for installation. As such, the author has chosen to go with the default Fedora desktop, GNOME. Choices have to be made: Fedora Core vs. Mandrake vs. SUSE vs. Xandros etc., and GNOME vs. KDE vs. Enlightenment, etc. Grant has chosen stability and ease of use, and he has chosen well. Fedora would have been Redhat 10, had Redhat gone that route. They didn't and we can all lament the changes the company has launched toward focusing on corporate gains or we can move on. Moving on, we can see immediately that Fedora Core is excellent and if Red Hat's idea in Fedora's community focus is to go the Debian route and have lots of experienced eyes taking care of this project, then it will continue to be excellent. Once you get into this book and get your fancy tickled by Fedora and GNOME, go wild. 'Nuff said.
The first two chapters of the book cover the 'penguinista' mindset (why you're even looking at a book on Linux), hardware compatibility and the install process. Easy enough, and Grant does a great job of leading the reader through this process. It's the scary part, after all! Once the deed is done, the reader is introduced to Chapter 3, 'A New Place to Call Home'. Gnome is the desktop of choice and the author goes into detail, easing the reader through a wealth of GUI options. Lots of screenshots and photos give the reader a clear sense of what to expect when they are navigating through the choices. Lots of time is spent on customizing and some may find this trivial but there is nothing more frustrating to the beginner than being told to "click click click" when they aren't comfortable finding the correct windows, buttons and choices. After spending some time on this chapter, the reader will be able to progress through the book with confidence.
Connecting to the Internet is the next chapter, with information presented on hardware, connection options, using the browser, email and IM. The Internet is a must-have so this chapter is well placed. Get 'em going and they'll keep plugging along!
Once the reader is up and running, a side road is taken for those who want to get more familiar with the GUI and who like to tweak everything to look as individual (and tacky) and they can.
After getting on the Web, printing is probably next on the list in importance. Grant dedicates Chapter 6 to explaining how the reader can achieve good printing karma with printer support, printing to PDF, changing settings and handling queues.
Part one of external media is covered next, with an introduction in to floppies (whaaaa?), data and music CD reading/playing/burning, and ISOs (an absolutely necessary part of life for Linux users, especially since we all tend to experiment with different distros when they become available!).
With Chapter 8, we get into the core of every OS user's skill set, no matter how newbie the newbie is, one thing everyone wants to know how to do on their platform of choice: how to install applications (did I say "games"?). Grant gives the reader a very well written chapter on package management, walking the reader gently through four examples, including Skoosh and -- woo-hoo!! -- Frozen Bubble (well, we all need Frozen Bubble!). He even gives the reader a taste of "dependency hell" (don't panic! It's a controlled environment!). There will be a few folks who complain that RPM is Redhat-centric thinking and they'd be right. We are working with Fedora Core after all. Remember the "'Nuff said" above'?. Grant later presents chapters on APT and Synaptic and also on compiling a program from source so the reader has ample chance to get geeky.
A (too short) chapter on the terminal and the command line is wedged in between with practice projects on pyWings and pyChing that brings it all home. Part two of data management comes next, covering USB storage devices and the Windows partition, if there is one. Chapters 13 and 14 deal in depth with music (audio formats, mp3 support, apps like Grip, Rhythmbox and XMMS) and 'getting arty with the GIMP' (including how to scan and use your digital camera).
Then, it's back to business, with several chapters dedicated to workplace productivity and what options are available to Linux users in a 'dark side' dominated world. Grant looks at several office suites including OpenOffice.org (the clear winner) as well as KOffice and some stand-alone apps like AbiWord, Dia, Gcalctool and GPdf. There is also quite a bit of excellent coverage on fonts (a must read!) and finally, language support within Linux.
Now, if everything is working well so far and you can connect to the Internet, print, get your work done and play games. So what's left? Doing it all from your living room, bedroom, even bathroom! In short, going wireless. Grant succinctly explains what it means, what you need and how to do it.
The last few chapters of the book deal with bits and pieces of necessary information that are essential to the reader for further Linux exploration: system settings and system updates, KDE, 'odds and ends' and the requisite troubleshooting section for "uh oh, now what do I do now?" moments. Lots of help and resources round out the book.
A few things could have been expanded on or included: a bit more on firewalls and internet security (we are not entirely immune, after all), handling email attachments is missing (the author promises an update to this on his web site), something on yum and device installation; the slim description of installing a CD-RW drive in the book merely refers the reader to his web site where one can download PDF instructions ...hmmm, that seems a bit skimpy. Installing drives and cards (especially sound cards) would have been a nice chapter on its own, especially since this would most likely require re-compiling the kernel. The reference to this on Grant's web site results in a 'broken' pdf link and no obvious way to alert the author to the damaged file.
At this writing, there are only a few errata but it would be wise to take a peek at Grant's site before delving too deeply into the book.
Overall, I like how Grant chose to lay out his chapters; he's anticipated the needs and expectations of the level of reader he's targeting and placed well-constructed topics in a logical series of chapters. Nicely balanced information for a new Linux user, an on again/off again Linux user or for the switcher (is that trademarked?!). Other distros will be a short leap after reading this one volume. So yes, I lied: Linux for Non-Geeks is for your mom -- and for you, too, come to think of it. (And are those references to Vonnegut scattered about? Erudite crowd, Linux folk, yes?)
You can purchase Linux For Non-Geeks, A Hands-On, Project-Based, Take-It-Slow Guidebook from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, carefully read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
I do not think it means what you think it means.
See here.
Mom Installing Linux Fervently
It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. -Frederick Douglass
hehe, its good that we get more good books about installing/using linux, then maybe linux will get more accepted by people/comapnies (its already came a long way tho..).. cool that 70 year old moms use linux for sure ;)
I can think of one major reason. Security. Actually, given how bad windows security has been lately, I'd recommend that most users not use windows unless their geeks and know how to keep it clean, and free of Spyware. I already install mozilla whenever I come across a Spyware infected machine. There is some Spyware that infects mozilla on win32. (The user gets a warning about installing XPI, but it's not even as menacing as IE ActiveX warnings. On the other hand, many Spyware programs install themselves via security holes in IE)
Running as non-root on a Linux machine is much safer for the naiveté surfer then running windows.
We'll have to see how XP SP2 fares as far as protecting users from all the people who want to rape them.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
This IS TFM
Regexes are like cocaine. The first hit is pretty good, but afterwards you try to use them to solve all your problems.
Wouldn't it be nice if it actually got more normal people to start using Linux?
I won't buy those on principle even if they may contain pertinent information on a subject I'd like to learn about.
-S
--- What parts of "shall make no law", "shall not be infringed", and "shall not be violated" don't you understand?
I still think using that the elderly using Linux with increase their number of gray hairs and raise their blood pressure :P
Linux community definitely needs more books like that and users like that. Only increase of Linux desktop boxes can push software developers/companies to writing their for-now-Windows-only software for penguin system.
Additionaly, this is the only way to surpass the chicken-egg problem, as software companies aren't willing to (as we can see today) port their software to non-Windows.
So, kudos to author!
Ever hear of the Red Hat Society? It's a society inspired by that "When I am old I shall wear purple..." poem. I think Red Hat is missing a neat tie-in by not giving Red Hat Society members Fedora Core discs, or maybe this book. Hordes of older women using Linux would pretty well put a stake in the heart of the "Linux is too hard to use" BS.
- Oh, Hello Grandma, what'd you get me for Christmas this year? - Well, me and grandpa thought about it and decided to give you... our .bash_profiles. Hope you like them.
1.) Have sad story about good'ol Mom.
2.) Write Geekish book and get free PR on slashdot.
3.) ???
4.) Profit!!!
"Curing Cancer for Dummies" wouldn't make you whip out your wallet?
Surely the first chapters must be devoted to the great Linux jihads!
Chap 1: Gentoo is t3h 1 4 u
Chap 2: KDE was here first
Chap 3: Becoming a man of vi
Chap 4: What of Redmond? (Onward Linux Soldiers)
Hell if they're going to be linux users, the least we can do is teach them the basics, eh?
Then the appendices --
Appendix A: How Are You Gentlemen? (Blending in)
Appendix B: Attacking Your Leaders (They're blowhards, hackers, they're blowhards!)
Appendix C: Forums of Attack (Slashdot, Installfests, LUG meetings, etc.)
"This is not an intro Linux book for your mom. Well, actually it's an intro Linux book for the author's mom!
What if the author has a sibling(from the same Mom). If he/she reads the article he is going to be confused no matter how well written the book is.
I only have very limited experience with non-geeks using linux, but my experience has shown that they don't read, and don't think they should have to read to use linux. My non-geeks don't even pretend to solve or diagnose the problems, they just call for help immediately. I think the non-geeks this book would help most, are those already solving their problems using google.
The review talks about using Fedora, but doesn't mention whether it's version 1 or 2. This would be nice to know, especially since there are some major differences between the two.
Somewhat sick and tired of sorting out my mother's PC from virii, trojans, spyware ad infinitum. I wiped her box and installed RH (should have used Debian in retrospect).
Interestingly, once she knew which icons were for email, word processing and browsing, she was off. Her only problem was when her ISP changed dial-up telephone numbers, and the moron on support only had windows experience (or script). He claimed that the service she'd been using fine over the last year didn't actually work with Linux. A quick ssh and change of telephone numbers had her online again(*).
She even found out how to add a new printer on her own, something she never managed to do with windows.
(*): The telephone number changed meant that the previous low rate number became a standard cost per minute, and massively increased her cost of being online. The ISP didn't bother to notify her, and it wasn't until she got a phone bill that was 5x higher than normal that we knew something was afoot.
I am setting up a Linux (JDS) system for my grandparents, who keep saying they'll never learn. To this end I have been creating a screen-captured document of the common tasks (login, read email, reply to email, delete email, fwd email, create/open documents in OOo, play CD). This book may shortcut some of this. The easier something is to understand the more often it gets used.
I am a geek, You insensitive clod !!!
Rickford Grant's Mom
Take a look at this write-up on why GNOME is better than KDE. I am a GNOME fanboy, and I still dis-like his article. He doesn't provide any really good reasons why one is better than the other. Just lousy opinions with no backing. I really hope he put more thought into his book.
My parents can't move to Linux because they need specialized Windows apps not to be found this side of the divide. Nope, nor Gracenote nor LillyPond make for even decent musical typesetting packages in a professional environment.
Yet they keep messing up their files dragging-and-dropping to wrong places or generally fucking up with the GUI.
So I got them Cygwin and Bash, and taught them to manage their files that way. It works.
Rickford's writeup is not on why GNOME is better than KDE. He writes on Why I like Gnome better
He doesnt really make any claims just says why he likes somethings. Infact he says Just to be fair, however, I should state that KDE is no dog. In fact, the first Linux desktop environment I used was KDE, and it was sufficiently impressive to reel me into the Linux world for good. and concludes the article with Enjoy finding out which environment is best for you by playing around - that's half the fun, after all. Which to me doesnt seem like KDE bashing at all.
Finally, I have come to a conclusion. I have silently read Slashdot for several years and have seen COUNTLESS references to this on-going project of having "mom use Linux".
Today, I came to a realization. Each and every poster on Slashdot has a mom-fetish. That is the ONLY explanation. Every mention of mom is either posted or moderated up. Mom mom mom.
Christ, quit with this horrid maternal obsession, please.
That's like saying "Windows for non-Morons" or "AOL for the Technically Competent"
Grant has chosen stability and ease of use, and he has chosen well. Fedora would have been Redhat 10, had Redhat gone that route
which would have been Redhat 17 if they had gone Slackware's route... which would have been Redhat 23 if they had gone Mandrakes route... which will be SCO Linux 2004 when SCO decides they want to get into another lawsuit, by claiming Linux kernel 0.1 is a derived work of SCO Linux 2004.
Blasphemy! Burn the heretic and his unholy scribblings at the stake! Oh, ye cursed, ye fool! You'll have worse things to worry about than dependency hell. May Saint Ignucius have mercy on yer wicked soul.
Alexis de Torquemada
Chief Inquisitor
I love C++
One can only hope. When I first admitted that I was interested in C programming (remember Power C's $20 compiler and libs?) I was scrounging for books that would definitively explain C programming from the point of view of a novice, NOT a programmer!. In the early 90's, that nearly didn't exist. The technical priesthood still held sway and they did demand their tithe.
The early Linux efforts at documentation carried through with the priesthood mentality - Every person writing the documentation just assumed you already knew what he or she knew and what they wrote offered only what he or she thought you needed to know. Not all mind you, but most.
Which is the worst assumption any writer can ever make, IMHO.
Mod me troll, if you must, I can't help it.
With all due respect to the author, who I'm sure wrote a fine book, no one sits down and reads whole manuals. Some people will grab a manual to find a solution to a problem. The rest will ask someone, do a workaround, or do without. 330 pages? That's about the thickness of a John Grisham book. (Though I'm sure this one has more pictures.) IOW, huge.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
I just installed my first linux (mandrake 10) this weekend.
:-)
:D
Of course, im a geek. Not a linux geek, mind you, but still a geek.
Im having fun discovering a whole NEW slew of prolems to deal with. Of course, these are slight more managable then the ones i used to deal with
google, slashdot, and random linux gurus online have been wonderful. thanks folks!
I should pick this up.
no
... Riiiiiiight, like that will ever happen.
might as well write a book called "quantum mechanics for the blind, the stupid, and the illiterate"
She had been told many times about the standard problems windows users have to cope with, and how to minimize them. NAT router with a dial-up!? Twat. Besides, why should she have to buy hardward because the windows OS is a toy. Or maybe she should have bought win2k (then 300UKP).
You are way off the mark an all accounts. Her installation was live after 23 minutes (yeah I know that's slow, but the box is slow!). Browser: mozilla, email: evolution, word processing: open office. All easily selectable at install if not part of the defaults. There was no install part of the OS, reboot, install some more, reboot, get drivers, reboot etc etc. Install virus checker, reboot, install tacky free/spyware so-called firewall, reboot. BTW the linux kernel has a real firewall built in.
So bad luck there my boy, she has a clean, trouble free system after nothing more than a few minutes work on my part. Furthermore, she's not tied into any subscription virus check to keep her partially protected from a known, weak, trashy toy of an OS and associated virus magnets. Furthermore, my support time has been limited to the one single incident and she hasn't had to spent a single penny for a complete suite of applications for her needs.
You say security through obscurity? Ever heard of IIS? Closed source, less than a 1/3 of the install base of the open source apache, yet compromised more than anything else. Hmmm, how many trojans have I had to content with with Linux over the last seven years? Must be the same as the number of viruses that hit me. Zero.
Based on what I've read of Freudian psychology, it is quite likely slashdotters do have a thing for their mommy.
Freud claimed that people normally develop oedipal feelings, but people can normally resolve them themselves. The common way to resolve this is to transfer those feelings from the mother to another woman (girlfriend).
If you look at the situation of the common slashdotter (really, how long has it been since any of you even saw a girl?), it becomes apparent that many slashdotters are unable to resolve this issue.
...
So maybe we could get the CDC to declare slashdot a medical disaster area and send in the needed "medical" supplies to treat our horrible [mental] illness.
I sticks to the Mandrake install, covers all the usual stuff (playing music, editing files, browsing blah blah) , and then finishes off with a bit of bash scripting.
A superb intro for the newbie Linux people - i heartily reccomend it.
No , i'm not connected with the book or the publisher in any way - i was just impressed with the layout and the usage of screenshots and the step by step explanations within , in purely non-geek terminology.
"As such, the author has chosen to go with the default Fedora desktop, GNOME. [...] Grant has chosen stability and ease of use, and he has chosen well."
He would certainly been still more happy with something such as Mandrakelinux 10.0 Official, which is easier to use than Fedora, and more stable. Additionally, it's available for download for free, and benefits from official Mandrakesoft updates.
Mandrakemove would have been an excellent choice as well since it doesn't require any installation and can store user's data on a USB key.
If you want to do anything else on the other hand...
I got a new PC at work so I thought I'd install Linux on it and dual boot. I still use AutoCAD and PLC software that is Windows only. I wasted three days trying to configure 2 different distributions and eventually gave up. Everytime I try Linux I end up wasting huge amounts of time trying to get the last 5% of the install tweak the way I want.
By contrast on Windows XP it took about 2 hours to install emacs, cygwin, apache, php, mysql, myphpadmin, thunderbird, and firefox. Plus I can change screen resolution by right clicking on the desktop. Imagine that, I just described how to change screen resolution in 5 words. I spent 14 hours trying to get XFree86 to accept the screen resolution I wanted. I must have read 50 printed pages worth of mesage-board postings, documentation, etc. I suceeded only to have it break again when I typed apt-get upgrade.
I love Linux but I have found that its like being given instructions on building a gps unit when all I want is directions to the bathroom. And trying to hide the complexity behind control-centers and set-up wizards doesn't seem to help much.
Cars can be described in three ways: ..."
The dummy's point of view: "Oh look, pretty red color"
The driver's point of view: "Turn the steering wheel to the right to turn right"
The engineer's point of view: "The newton force required to make a 90 degree turn depends on the distance from the center of the steering column that the force is applied
This book will help only if it written for a car driver style point of view. Not dumbed down, not full of technical information that the computer user will never use.
Car manuals and driver's ed books do not show you how your engine works. If you need to know that, you need to get a different book or have someone else fix it for you.
Computer books for users should be the same. Just the info on how to use what you will use, very basic maintenance, and nothing else. If more info is needed to fix something, time for a more indepth book or a call to your local computer geek.
Unfortunately I have yet to find such a book for computer users. They either go too dumb or to full of information useless to the end user (great for the geek and semi-geek though).
At 337 pages, I am thinking this one may be just another failed attempt with too much info for the end user.
That's a short list. I could think of more.
Free software is more than stable and hard to break, it's excellent in every way these days. Fedora is very good too and addressing all of the reasons I moved to Debian based distributions two years ago but doing it with the same Red Hat ease of use I sometimes miss. The new interfaces are beautiful and functional.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
No. No it wouldn't
Usability shmoosability
Computers where never meant to be usable, practical, or accomplish much of anything. The fact that they do was an unfortunate side affect and now everyone and their mom is apparantly using one.
And then they complain when things go wrong.
Things are supposed to go wrong!
Afterall, if i don't have to work out why I have an error dialog popping up (windows), or why deleting a file called fstab suddenly stops me getting to things like my hard drive (linux) or if i simply don't have to reformat my computer every month or so, then i'm not having fun am i
The inevitable loss to entropy of a file system, not to mention irriversable damage done to system files by my own short sighted tinkering, are what make computers what they are: a hobby.
Unfortunatly, some people decided to tell the general world about the joys of the internet and e-mail and now, not only do we have to contend with the latest fad of cyber clutter (homepages, blogs, pictures of peoples cats) we get viruses and spyware to boot. And, while these viruses afford yet another welcome chance to reformat, suddenly you have to listen to your uncle joel complaining that his computer crashed.
It's a toy. It's supposed to crash. It's a feature.
Oh well... I'm only half joking. All I can say is at least the linux world are trying to provide easy to use, fresh out the box, systems for the productive, unknowledged members of the society, while still maintaining distros that, thankfully, make it as hard as possible to do anything in a speedious manner.
The Neo-Bohemian Techno-Socialist
even with mozilla as my browser. Must be all those pr0n sites!
Admittedly, I'd say the average week's haul is only about 10, and I'm not convinced that Seek and Destroy's definition of spyware is altogether correct, some cookies are fine.
I don't believe that vulnerability exists anymore in Firefox 0.9 / Mozilla 1.7. See http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=238684 if you're interested in the details, but basically that patch made unrequested attempts to install an XPI illegal, sort of like how the pop-up blocker works. You have to click a link or something along those lines for the request to be valid.
Rock over London, Rock on Chicago. Wheaties: Breakfast of Champions.
what have the blind to do with "stupid and illiterate"?
Yeah, it's not hard. But it seems that most people don't know anything more about their computers than how to use the start menu. A huge number of computers are infected with spyware, these days. And tons of them are left unpatched.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
speaking of insecure, why do you post then as anonymous coward?
Why does everyone keep talking like it's hard!? Wanna browse the web? click an icon. Wanna check mail? click an icon. Wanna burn a CD? click an icon. And just like Windows programs each mail reader and browser and what not are gonna have their own setup. Yes, some differences here, but Linux isn't harder, it's just different! Getting an internet connection in linux is no harder than it is on Windows if you have Cable; just turn the damn computer on!
The only way to really learn Linux is to get something into your head that you want to do, and then start taking a step by step approach to accomplishing it. For example, set yourself the goal of setting up a mail server, for example, and then start researching what steps need to be taken. Break the task down into sub-sections: Installing the operating system, securing the distribution of your choice, installing the neccessary packages, etc.
I think that learning Linux seems a huge task to you at the moment not because it's beyond you, but because you have no direction in terms of what you want to do with Linux. I believe that almost everyone has the capability of running Linux successfully, but I don't think that it's suitable for all purposes, yet.
I agree that books like this will help bring some people to Linux, but unless they actually have something in mind that they want to use Linux for, they won't get past the "installed Linux and messed around with KDE/Gnome a bit" stage.
Brandon Glass's personal site.
Quote: Erudite crowd, Linux folk, yes?
1. Hey, it's Yoda! [chuckling to himself]
2. Hey, "Erudite"? I thought this book was for geeks, not Greeks [holds his ribs as they swell with the expansion of his lungs as he laughs out loud at his clever retort]
This wasn't just plain terrible, this was fancy terrible. This was terrible with raisins in it. - Dorothy Parker
I thought the idea was to get MORE people to use Linux. Like it or not, the non-geeks will be the deciding factor for the success of the OS, in whatever flavor we like to use it.
The only thing I really care about is being a thorn in Billy boy's side. If that means getting Linux into as many Windows users' hands as possible, I'm all for it.
I might be considered a semi-geek. I like to put together and troubleshoot hardware. Windows is all I've ever really used extensively. That is, until Mandrake 10 and suSE 9.1. I haven't booted back into Winders since suSE installed on my machines. Don't miss it one bit.
Say what you will, but these are 2 sweet distros tailor-made to get Windblows users into the Linux community. They set up and run with no hassles, and they'll do everything that Windblows users are accustomed to doing, by default. And they do it faster and more stably, at that.
I appreciate the knowledge of the Linux community, and my hat's off to you, but elitism to the extreme won't spread Linux any faster, if at all.
Take a minute and help a Windows user see the light. The OS you save may be yours.
Penguin Power! Flippers Up!
Are you aware that there is a (kickass) Scheme system named Gambit and the last release is version 3? Just in case you didn't know...
You've just described the uses of a geat majority of computer owners in the US.
The major distros will surf, email, write docs, burn CDs, most of the mundane stuff, as well as, or generally better than Windblows.
That is a great start, and I've waited for a long time to see it get to that point. I love to see Microshaft get a little nervous, especially once people find out the distros are free, and they can get one of their more knowledgeable buddies to burn 'em a copy and show 'em how to install it.
Well, I wouldn't really call cookies *spyware*. If you're really getting 10 exe files installed a week, um, you're doing something really wrong.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
iTunes for music haters?
Ever notice how hard it can be to read through a "man" page? What if we also had a "dumbed down" version of a man page available for newbies? eMan (easy man) or something like that.
If only the book was published under an open licence then I could modify it to suit my Fedora Core 2/GNOME using mum, and others could modify it to suit there Mandrake 10/KDE using moms. The author would get the benefits of others keeping the content up to date, and off the shelf sales (assuming the source was released under a non-commercial licence). The rest of the community would benefit from a book that would better suit our needs.
.. then the vendor should do it as a courtesy before it leaves the store. In fact, they should be updating those machines as they sit around waiting to be sold.
Patches should be treated like a "recall", in fact, IMO, people would take them more seriously if they WERE recalls. People understand a "recall".
Of course, ignore all that, most people won't do quat until after it's hosed... what was I thinking...
I think Linux desktop support is pretty much there/em. Non-geeks can plop an ISO in, run through the graphical installer, and come out with a desktop system where everything pretty much works. Yeah, GNOME/KDE will look hugely different to XP but then the XP interface was itself quite a departure from the previous versions of Windows. It's just a case of adapting to a new desktop environment.
However, most of my non-geeky friends have laptops and things don't always just work here, AFAIK.
Is there an installer that has especially good laptop support? I would love to get them to switch away from Windows but I don't want to a) install it for them and, subsequently, b) become their tech support bitch.
At the moment all they do is natter about pop-unders when using Firefox (I suspect they're actually IE windows launched from resident spyware; yes, I tell them to run AdAware, trendmicro, etc.) or other Windows 'fun' like worms or viruses. All I can do is stare at them blankly.
If they could start using Linux on their own, without too much handholding, I'd have a lot less staring to do...
"The number of Unix installations has grown to ten, with more expected." (Unix Programmer's Manual, 2nd ed.; june 1972)
Not with Windows 2000 Pro. I know because that's what the last company I worked for gave me. I had to spell check in Open Office until I figured out how to make Mozilla mail work with their exchange server. I can't vouch for XP, but I suspect that you have to buy Office to get a spell checker there too. Don't blame me for that company, like most, thinking that XP is not what they want on their desktops. That's what I had and that's what most people get.
In any case, not having to look for a spell checker won't make up for all of the other things Outlook Express lacks, much less all of the other 8 things that make me love Linux on the desktop. Modern Linux distributions are easier to install and use than Windows and most commercial software.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
What kind of geek reads a Linux book anyway? $man man
blowjob is the best distribution of linux ever
EULAs are the debble. Here you got fabulously successful companies who by common sense observation SELL software but in legalese they uh loan it to you or something in exchange for you paying for the box it comes in or something. It's nuts. They insist on every possible legal protection and every possible penny in profit, yet NO LAWS apply to the actual product. No warranty, no recourse, no nuthin. It's nuts. I still fail to see why there hasdn't been a massive joe user backlash with a BIG class action suit. forget bundling and browser inclusions and all that jazz, a class action suit over useability for purpose, a warranty. If someone sells a product call it selling, this "license to use but not own" stuff is the ripoff scam going on.
with free software, I got no beefs, I know up front what the cost is-free-and that I might need to tweak, or get hosed with some aspect of it. I don't expect a warranty of any kind, and am pleasantly surprised that the developers keep working and fixing it. To me it's "so what" on any warranty with free software so I don't mind a EULA there. It's worth "free" to me or minimal cost on a data transfer medium. But to charge what entities like MS charge, SERIOUS folding money, get entire companies sucked in, millions of home users, then they have no warranty at all? Nuts. Software been around decades now, time to take the training wheels off and have our legal systen and society treat it like any other product if they insist on treating it like a product when it comes to money.
Oh, they are all cookies, I don't think I've had an exe /installed/ on my PC, whether virus or spyware, in two years, whether I've been using Moz or IE.
I haven't read this book, however, the concept sounds very similar to Marcel Gagne's book Move to Linux: Kiss the Blue Screen of Death Goodbye. I wonder if Mr. Grant read this book before he "decided to write up a set of instructions on his own"?
> If only the book was published under an open licence then I could modify it
There's always the Introduction to Linux - A Hands on Guide book. It's published under the GNU Free Documentation License. Have fun!
That's better than I got following most of the above advice. My box sat behind a firewall. I used Mozilla for mail and web. I never fooled with media junk, especially windows media player, so if it was not on there I lived without. I got GIMP for the few times I wanted to edit an image. I lived with the single screen and desktop. After four months or so, the damn thing had trouble staying up all day.
All of the above was tedious work I don't have to go through with any modern Linux distribution. For all of my trouble, it was not enough. I consider install time and performance issues very "sharp corners." Why go through all of that so that they might be able to keep a box up for a week when they could get all the same features and better performance in 30 minutes with a Mepis CD?
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Being able to get a spell checker by upgrading both IE and OE for free (soul sucking EULAs are free, right?) has convinced me that I need to run out and buy Windows XP for all six of my computers. I'll have to buy Microsoft Office for at least one of them and Adobe Acrobat Writer so I can send well formated pdf by spell checked email. I'll also have to learn to use Microsoft's firewall and how to make it work on a 486. I'll probably have to also buy some remote desktop software to replace ssh with X forwarding, so that I don't have to buy five new monitors or a switchbox. I'll also want a fancy video card with multiple desktop software. See, Microsoft had the solution for me all along. All I needed was another $2,000 or so and lots of time to fight viruses. Why on earth have I been sitting here relaxing with machines that just work?
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
> Linux community definitely needs more books like that
No, we don't. We need manuals that we can legally redistribute and modify (including translations and updates). So I recommend Introduction to Linux - A Hands on Guide for newbies instead.
she never tried linux but is very familiar with VMS on the Vax
I own one copy of Windoze 98. To move the rest of my computers would cost big bucks and leave me with considerably less reliability, function and value.
I don't know why you keep getting and extra point added to your post score.
I'm an old fart with excellent karma, gained by wasting many hours and submitting many stories. You could say it's earned, mostly by sharing useful information, like what follows.
Is setting up a firewall on Linux as easy as checking a single checkbox?
Guarddog. OK, you have to click more than one button, but a firewall with one button might not work so well. Smoothwall is as easy to configure as any WAP. If you don't like that, you can copy an ipchains script like Ian Hall-Beyer wrote.
These are quite valid points. The only thing I would add is that Linux distros have made significant strides in usability.