GREAT story. Thanks.  

-----Original Message-----
From:	Paul Overby [SMTP:poverby at megsinet.net]
Sent:	Tuesday, January 08, 2002 3:09 PM
To:	TCLUG
Subject:	[TCLUG] Linux ain't so complicated

I find it intersting that everyone seems to go out of their way to note
"how complicated" Linux is.

If we really want people to use Linux  maybe we ought to quite trying to
scare them off.

I built a couple of PC's  just before christmas.  One for me and one for
my daughter.

She designs web sites and uses photoshop so she had to have windows
which cost me more than the PC.  I decided
on win98 cause I'm just not ready for XP.

For myself I had Redhat 7.2 laying around so why not.

When I installed windows I had to install drivers for both the graphics
card and the ethernet card.
It certainly wasn't automatic.  Windows got its registry screwed up
because of an attached zip
drive so it couldn't locate the drivers.  (It was looking in the wrong
place)  I'm certain any windows
"newbie"  would not have known what to do.  The ethernet card had
separate folders for each  winOS
so windows couldn't find those either.   Windows never even suggested I
might want to set up my
network connection although IE tried to help me set up a dial connection
even though I have no modem.
Silly me, how could I be so stupid about clicking the  wrong option.
And in the end my new 1.4 gig cpu
was running like a pentium 66.  Finally discoverd that a sound mixer
application was being started
automatically and was hogging all the system resources.  I just end task
on boot cause I haven't bothered
to find out where windows buried the startup for it.  I still have't got
the CD player to work under windows.
Guess I never will.

As for Linux.  It did ask me to verify my mouse and keyboard and monitor
and video card.  I suppose
those  extra four clicks were a tremendous nusance.  I also had to fill
in an IP address, gateway, and
DNS address.This is a toughone since I had to get it from the network
admin (that's me).  I also had
to enter that pesky root password.  Typing its not so bad  but you got
to think one up.  Too many old
fashions and you may never know what you ended up with.  Then they gave
me this incredible array of
CHOICES.  workstation, server, laptop, custom.  Whats a custom anyway?
And of course I had to
insert a second CD and click OK. The nerve of those people giving me
more stuff than they can fit on
a single CD.  So I went off to wrap some presents and before I can get
back  my son, he's 8, wants to
know what the password is so he can check out the new games.  So I go
back to wrapping presents.
He plays the games.

Of course I skipped the part about the four hours I spent trying to get
the partition table set up correctly
so both windows and Linux were satisfied.  But that is the point.  Linux
gets tough when you try to do
things windows won't allow you to do.    Try installing windows over
Linux for a dual boot system.
Hope you don't waste too much of your time.

Oh and I almost forgot.  Linux never asked me to type in that 5000 digit
license code.  What a relief?



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