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Linux Desktops Catching On In Education
digihome writes to point us to an appreciation of the state of Indiana's project of moving students from Windows desktops to Linux. In about a year, 22,000 students have made the switch, using a variety of Linux distributions. The crn.com writer tried switching his own two children to Linux laptops. From the article: "'So Dad,' [the 10-year-old son] asked. 'What is the difference between Linux and Windows?' I tried to explain but it was a waste of breath. 'What difference do you see?' I asked back. 'Nothing, really.'"
While all the "rich" kids at school had the designer jeans and fancy cars, my father MADE me appreciate things a little more since we didn't have the money and he would buy me quality but cheap jeans "toughskins" or whatever. My first car was a "beater that I paid for out of money from my first job and my allowance savings. Not everyone has the cash nor the need for such high end things...
Yea numbnuts, you have to make sure the software is compatible with your computer.
Meanwhile the rest of us learn to read the box or in the case of us Penguin nuts we check online for supported options before buying anything.
The only thing is, the rest of us quit doing that back in, oh I dunno, in the late 80's, early 90's. Whenever I've bought software in the past decade or so, it's just worked for me. No need to upgrade every few months as you say. I'm able to just buy any old box at the local thrift store for $20, and anything (other than games) works just fine on all of them (I have about a dozen assorted computers here at work).
Welcome to 2006. Unless you're a masochist (and apparently you are), you don't have to do that any more. But I guess, if you've got nothing better to do...
If there's no difference between Linux and Windows, that is a great reason to switch --- to OS X.