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How Do You Advocate Linux in 5 Minutes?
xtracto writes "I just returned from buying certain Linux magazine. While looking at the 'Computing' stand in the library, and right after I grabbed a copy of the Linux magazine, a guy asked me if I used Linux. After that, the man told me he had tried to use Linux, but he had found it difficult. I told him the first things that came to my mind: that it depended on the distribution (he tried Kubuntu). I recommended him to look for a Linux User Group near his hometown (he told me he didn't live near a city). What would you tell these kinds of people? Not so long ago, and to my surprise, a relative who is completely computer illiterate started talking about Linux, but the general thought is that 'it is harder than Windows'. How do you advocate Linux to people who are more comfortable using Windows?"
Here's what I would tell such a person: get some help. Find a geeky friend or a co-worker who is willing to set it up for you in dual boot with your Windows system. The distribution choice, by the way, is largely irrelevant. If the system is fully set up (all the drivers are working and the Windows partition is visible) then Slackware is as easy to use as Kubuntu. I would still recommend a Debian-based system though, since its package management can handle a direct hit by a total noob.
Educating is mostly pointless, since these people are not asking to get educated. They just want to try it out, so let's just give them a fully working toy to play with. Educating comes naturally after some use. You will start getting questions like "why cannot my Windows see my Linux partition?" Well, gosh, because Windows is designed to be incompatible? Plenty, plenty of educational opportunities will be available later, for both technical and political topics. But for starters, just give the man a working OS!
LiveCD's.
Just the other day, I had a friend ask me, "Why is my computer rebooting?" (Xp BSOD with only a 64K dump. Goes by pretty fast.) Once I explained it was "just normal Windows," they asked me, "How can I get Linux?"
I explained it like this: "You can just download and burn a CD. Pop in the CD, reboot, magical linux." I didn't take the time to explain the different distros. But LiveCD's are that good.
Just boot them into Knoppix, and while it's booting explain to them that their Windows install is unaffected while you show them this "live" evaluation CD, and give them a rundown of the security benefits Linux has over Windows (spyware etc) should they choose to run with it. Then, when Knoppix has finished booting, put in a thumb drive with just the most incredible demoscene software you can find. Next, boot their own Windows install with QEMU (DISABLE NETWORK PASSTHROUGH - DISABLE NETWORK PASSTHROUGH), explaining that they can use all their old files etc from inside that Window -- without ANY of the security vulnerabilities of actually running Windows natively (tell them the Wall Street Journal says that Windows should be run from inside of Linux whenever the total value of the files and personal data on the machine is worth more than $70) -- but that they should browse the Internet off of Firefox in Linux. Finally, put QEMU into full-screen and say: "Now this is what your Windows installation can do from inside Linux" and run the most ass-kicking demoscene software you can find. Trust me, these Demoscene kids make even old 386 scream with the most ass-kicking, hard-core 3D experience you can get without resorting to drugs, and they'll fit it into like 13 bytes. All the code will run at full frame-rate from the emulated machine. (Be sure to turn the speakers up too!)
The most common response I get is "How much do you want for this Linux CD?" and, if you say something reasonable, whether they can just keep it the way you've "set it up" for them.
After that, the man told me he had tried to use Linux, but he had found it difficult. I told him the first things that came to my mind: that it depended on the distribution (he tried Kubuntu).
I reply that I have had too many problems with Windows and have moved on. I give examples.
I had a photocopyer set up using a scanner and printer. I needed to edit a photo, which launched the 30 day trial software for the photo editor bundled with the machine. Now anytime I want to photocopy something, it launches the photo editor on top of the photocopier software when the scanner is used. I ask if he could fix it for me? It's too difficult for me to fix and is still broken after 6 months.
Both operating systems have things that need to be understood in order to maintain the system. I personaly find Linux easer to fix than fixing what's wrong in the Windows Registry which killed the photocopier. Uninstalling the photo editor did not fix the problem. Now Windows offers to search for the missing exe file when I attempt to photocopy something. I now photocopy on the Linux machine instead. I did not have to install any software or drivers to make it work.
At least in Linux, the programs are operational instead of trialware.
When I have visitors and they want to check their online mail, or want to check something online, I log them into a Ubuntu machine and show them the icon for Firefox. When they are done, I ask how they liked using Linux.
If a Windows user is getting a machine fixed, I offer to lend them a replacement while their machine is being fixed. I provide a machine and give them a password for one of the generic accounts. Seldom do I spend over 5 minutes in user support.
Here, log in like this, here is the menu, here is Firefox, here is Evolution, here is Open Office, here is your home directory, here is the shutdown button for logoff or shutdown. No there is not a C:\.
A properly configured loaner is good. A live CD most times will be a problme because it takes longer than 5 minutes to explain why it doesn't play MP3's and flash sites don't work. After they have used a properly configured loaner, be prepared to help a new user learn the basics from filesystem, printer, email, and network setup. After they understand it isn't Windows, then they will be ready for a live/install CD.
The truth shall set you free!
Recently my parents wanted a computer to internet and MS Office on, and asked me for help. I gave them an old machine of mine...P3 800 with a Geforce 2 and 512MB RAM. I was getting ready to put XP on it when I realized I can't find my XP CD. After looking everywhere with no luck, I decided to conduct an experiment. I installed Ubuntu 6.10, Flash, Wine, Office, and VLC.
Initial impressions: My dad didn't care, he only goes to motorcycle forums and youtube, therefore the only thing he noticed is the icon for Firefox is in a different place. But my mom was like "This isn't Windows! I need to learn Windows! I need to learn Office!". I calmed her down and explained that she can do exactly what she needs with this setup, just the things she wants to click are in different places. After pointing out where Firefox was, how to save stuff to her home folder, how to find her USB memory stick, and what to click to open MSword, she was on her way. One day she said "This is fine but when I tell people at work I don't have Windows they keep saying I have a Mac and I'm pretty sure this isn't a Mac". I told her "Just say you run Linux, and see what their reaction is". I talked to her a few days later and she said their jaws dropped, and they were asking her a bunch of questions. I said "Congratulations mom, you are now l33t". A few months have passed since then and she still tells me how suprised she is that she doesn't use Windows, and everyone else does, yet she can still do what she needs to do. I even talked her through installing some stuff with apt-get over the phone. Incredible.
So yeah, in certain cases, I hereby certify Linux as "So easy your parents can use it". I never thought I would say that. I suppose in some way I may be doing more harm than good by stunting her Windows aptitude, but for what she does, it doesn't really matter. She just has to remember the icons she clicks and where she saves stuff are in different places.
(I'm amazed by the number of hard-core Linux programmers I've met who have never even heard of Freshmeat. They've simply never heard of anyone offering a listing of what software was out there - and Freshmeat barely scratches the surface in a lot of areas. They use the tools they know of, imagining those to be the only ones to exist.)
Want a GUI but don't want X? Fine, no problem. Some aren't maintained all that well, but that's not the point. The point is not what could be better, the point is what exists in the first place. Code improvements will happen, if critical mass is reached on the userbase, but critical mass is impossible to achieve if nobody ever hears about these efforts. Don't blame Linux for "only" having one archaic GUI, when it actually has closer to twenty, if anyone made the effort to look. (Those are actual GUIs, not libraries or desktops for X. X isn't needed for, or used by, any of them.)
Want to run binaries for another Intel-based OS under Linux? I only know of five ways to do that at the moment. That's less developed. Not Linux' fault if the distros either don't provide them or don't make them simple to use. Not Linux' fault if users don't know about them, or only know about one or two. So neither the distros nor the users have any business blaming Linux for their own faults and failures.
Want hard real-time multimedia? Now we're down to about four broad solutions, with two options (microsecond precision or nanosecond precision), so that's eight ways to achieve this. Not bad. How many does the typical hardcore Linux gamer or musician install? None? Then my sympathies lie more with the LKML folk. They have achieved near-miracles and it must bother them some to be told that stuff that's been out there for two or three years "doesn't exist".
So am I doing anything different? Yes. I'm fighting the ignorance as best as I can, although my efforts are necessarily limited. It's hard work and I get a great deal of flammage for doing nothing more than letting people know that solutions do exist. My impact has probably been insignificant, compared to that of most Linux advocates, as I'm less concerned with paving over the gigantic holes of obliviousness than I am with filling in the ruts of obscurity. However, how is anyone to know that the ruts needn't be there, if nobody takes the time to show the alternative?
All that I ask is that when anybody - whoever that is, whenever that is - takes the time to show you why Linux doesn't have the limitations it is ascribed as having, please just take the time to have some faith that the system you use, and perhaps like, may actually be better than you once thought. Doesn't it feel better to know that what you perceive as a limitation of a given setup is neither your imagination nor unfixable, and that indeed a fix likely already exists. All you have to do is apply it. Then, the limitation ceases to exist.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
That one fact alone means a whole lot to the average person. They want something they can get help with from people they know, the want something they can replace easily, they want the dominant operating system. Just like most people want the dominant movie format, and will wait to get it.
I don't think the average person wants the dominant OS, what they want to to get a computer with an OS already installed, most never install an OS. And because Windows is preinstalled in most PCs people buy a PC with Windows. If more OEMs offered PCs with Linux preinstalled, yes there are some as I bought one a few months ago, then more people would buy them and use Linux. Unfortunately there's also the public perception that Linux is for nerds and most who have heard of Linux don't believe it can be used to do the same things as Windows PCs can. I frequently hear the same thing stated about Macs, that it's not something that can used productively, or in another area, there's no games for Macs. I'm puzzled about this, if Macs can't be used for productive work and there's no games for them then what are they for? I know Macs can be just as productive as Windows PCs and while there aren't as many there are games for Macs.
Get 4 people to together to discuss OSes and you'll get 6 different opinions.
FalconShould there be a Law?
I want to second this and to be clear, the advice is: avoid proprietary drivers -- they suck
I too learned this the hard way after I bought a Lexmark Optra S 1625 laser printer for my office some years back. I thought "cool -- it has linux driver". Little did I know. That bastard has sucked more time out of me than I'd care to remember with it's POS proprietary driver. In contrast, my HP Laserjet 4L worked instantly and flawlessly with the OS driver, as does my Brother HL-1440 which I use at home. It's a good idea to look at the Linux Printer Compatabability List before buying a printer to use with a linux system and ignore any device with a proprietary driver no matter what the review says. Yes, this reduces the number of printers you can choose from, but if you stick to devices with an OS driver, it makes the printer setup little more than a point and click exercise.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
Explanation of the joke: http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/186700.html