Unfortunately, I can say it's a windows market. I think it's actually BIGGER than what you see in your place. Reason is the low know-how of technical stuff and carelessnes about PC details.
However -thanks to the linux-egypt community- Linux is getting more buzz & people are starting to migrate.
It's definitely Mandrake or Fedora/RH. I can't say which one is more popular (no statistics I can depend on) but I think they're quite close.
Other distros do exist (Gentoo, slackware, SuSe) but -as in most parts of the world- they have a smaller share than the 2 giants.
I didn't attend the installfest, but I'm an old (Egyptian) Linux user and can tell you my opinion.
Most people here just "heard" about linux, either on the net or by reading the installfest advert. Here are the most popular reasons to use/try linux IMHO.
* Linux's reputation as a stable O/S. * Great security (recent virus attacks on WinXP). * Just for the sake of trying a new O/S. * Administering a UNIX/Linux machine which would give them an edge in employment.
I think #1 is the most common reason here. Most people use cheap hardware with stinky setups, add to that the natural crashing of windows, and u got urself an unusable PC.
As for the political part, people don't think that way because Microsoft is all they know. for them, windows is not just an o/s, it's THE o/s.
Price is not an object too, you can get a pirated copy for home use without anyone knowing about it. However, there are some new cyber cafe's willing to install linux in order to save the HUGE costs of windows licenses. They're just starting, yet.
These are only my opinions, which I think are very good due to my experience with linux in egypt.
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Unfortunately, I can say it's a windows market. I think it's actually BIGGER than what you see in your place. Reason is the low know-how of technical stuff and carelessnes about PC details. However -thanks to the linux-egypt community- Linux is getting more buzz & people are starting to migrate. It's definitely Mandrake or Fedora/RH. I can't say which one is more popular (no statistics I can depend on) but I think they're quite close. Other distros do exist (Gentoo, slackware, SuSe) but -as in most parts of the world- they have a smaller share than the 2 giants.
I didn't attend the installfest, but I'm an old (Egyptian) Linux user and can tell you my opinion.
Most people here just "heard" about linux, either on the net or by reading the installfest advert. Here are the most popular reasons to use/try linux IMHO.
* Linux's reputation as a stable O/S.
* Great security (recent virus attacks on WinXP).
* Just for the sake of trying a new O/S.
* Administering a UNIX/Linux machine which would give them an edge in employment.
I think #1 is the most common reason here. Most people use cheap hardware with stinky setups, add to that the natural crashing of windows, and u got urself an unusable PC.
As for the political part, people don't think that way because Microsoft is all they know. for them, windows is not just an o/s, it's THE o/s.
Price is not an object too, you can get a pirated copy for home use without anyone knowing about it.
However, there are some new cyber cafe's willing to install linux in order to save the HUGE costs of windows licenses. They're just starting, yet.
These are only my opinions, which I think are very good due to my experience with linux in egypt.