OT - Which Linux?

[Nick Sabalausky]

"Andrei Alexandrescu" <SeeWebsiteForEmail at erdani.org> wrote in message 
news:h78lf7$7av$1 at digitalmars.com...
> Lars T. Kyllingstad wrote:
>>
>> Good luck! Always afraid of unfamilar territory, I first tried Linux in a 
>> dual-boot setup too, several years ago. I think it took about a week 
>> before I deleted the Windows partition, and I've been using Linux 
>> exclusively ever since. :)
>>
>
> Same here! And the step looked unconceivable just a couple months earlier. 
> I remember how a friend who was in the beginning stages of Linux asked me 
> several times and very incredulously: "What do you mean you don't have 
> Windows at all on your laptop?"
>

Those stories seem almost unfathomable given my experiences with it. I first 
tried Linux via both RedHat and Mandrake back around 2001. Those were both 
widely hailed by everyone I talked to as being extremely easy to install and 
every bit as good of an everyday desktop OS as Win (although I'll grant as 
much as anyone that the 9x line was garbage). I don't remember the details 
very well because it's been so long, but here are some of the highlights 
from that time:

- I completely lost track of the number of re-install attempts I ended up 
needing to do...And then I still needed to reinstall a whole ton more.

- It took easily a couple weeks of heavy research and long work sessions to 
get dual-boot working without any serious conflicts, with *either* grub or 
lilo.

- The default file manager was an unbelievably bloated resource hog.

- Even the simplest tasks always took at least five times as much time and 
effort as the same thing on windows. At first I thought it was just a matter 
of getting used to a new system, but months later, when I had learned a lot 
more about it...nothing went any more smoothly.

- Despite X/KDE/Gnome/etc and all of the "super-easy" "I set it up for 
grandma" hype about RedHat and Mandrake's GUI usability, it was *rare* that 
I was able to accomplish a single task without resorting to the 
command-line.

- As far as the oft-touted stability, my system uptime really wasn't much 
different going from windows to linux (or from win to OSX, for that matter).

- Hardly anything could be used without a full-blown manual, and for most 
things the only *real* documentation (or in many cases, the *only* 
documentation) was an O'Reily book...which quite blatantly contradicted 1. 
all of the "it's a lot cheaper!" claims I had been hearing, and 2. all of 
the "rtfm" bullshit (which in turn, also contradicted all of the "There are 
lots of other users willing to help!" garbage).

- On a related note, it was surprisingly difficult to find another Linux 
user who wasn't an arrogant asshole. So, so much for community and getting 
help.

- At one point, I had a fully-working system. And then almost exactly two 
weeks later, with nothing having changed, X decided it no longer wanted to 
run. At all. Period. Great. Reinstall time. Again. The whole thing then 
happened two more times before I finally ripped it out of my system and went 
back to XP exclusively.

- That was all on my desktop. And that was *easy* compared to my laptop.

I didn't touch Linux again until a couple years ago, when I gave Ubuntu a 
shot (but on a completely dedicated system - I am *not* messing with 
dual-boot again now matter how much anyone claims it's improved...which 
reminds me...people also said OSX 10.2 was *loads* better than 10.1, and 
fixed all the crappiness of 10.1 (which itself was already *claimed* to work 
right), so I shelled out the $100+ for it. Long story short, that's the last 
time I listen to apple fans. Since then, they've fed me the same line about 
10.3, and then 10.4, but by then I no longer gave a crap).

Anyway, when I *finally* gave Linux another chance a couple years ago with 
Ubuntu, it was a *lot* better in nearly every way. And yet it was *still* so 
much of a pain-in-the-ass, that not only was I still unwilling to switch to 
it as a primary system, it ended up just gathering dust.

A few weeks ago, I did finally get the latest Ubuntu again (for a few 
reasons, such as porting some libs I've been working on). And it *is* 
noticably better than before. In fact, I'm starting to see signs of 
improvement in areas of linux I had become convinced would *never* improve. 
And yet it *still* has problems. For instance, I still can't find a file 
manager I actually like (although at least they're actually *responsive* 
now). And if anyone knows how to edit a system-settings text file without 
dropping to the command-line and doing "sudo gedit blahfile &" (and without 
having to start out with "sudo pwd" or "sudo echo" just so the "sudo gedit 
&" does something useful instead of creating a background process that sits 
and waits for input that'll never come from a prompt that I'll never see), 
then *please*, let me know.

But...If MS continues failing to recreate WinXP (and from what I've seen, 
Win7 still doesn't fit the bill. I mean, yea, it's a hell of a lot better 
than Vista, but so what? That's like saying I should switch from XP to 98 
just because 98's better than Me.), then I just might eventually end up 
switching to linux after all. Either that or I'll still be using XP when I'm 
80. And knowing me, that's entirely a possibility ;)

I hate windows (including XP, even though I find it the lesser of the 
"evils"), I hate Linux, and I hate Mac...

So what OS *do* I like? PalmOS, circa "Graffiti 1". Heh. :)

I guess that was a really, *really* round-about way to say it, but my point 
is: You people switched to Linux a week or so after first trying it?!?! 
WTF?!?! That notion breaks my brain! ;)