Complete Switch to *NIX and Linux: May 17, 2015

[simplezz]

hopefully not productivity in real world environment 

Nice troll. Thankfully, we GNU/Linux users know that's completely false. In fact, it's quite the opposite. Linux provides superior productivity in every way imaginable.

Imagine tailoring your environment to your exact specifications and productivity needs with ease. Good luck trying to do that on Windows with your Candycrush crapware

[f0rk_b0mb]

Enjoy, though!

 

All in all, I did have a good time with it, up until a point. Learned a lot. 

 

This was years ago, though. It's probably gotten a lot better since then. 

 

Thanks, I'll try to have a blast! It has come a long way since I first started using it. Every 6 months it gets better.

[cork1958]

Haven't seen a topic on this in a while, it seems. Never have cared for Ubuntu much myself.

 

Good luck!!

 

I have a couple computers here that are strictly Linux, Debian Jessie, and use them very regularly. Don't have any issues going between Windows and Linux and it's a nice change every once in a while.

[simplezz]

The only app that I really miss is Photoshop, but that can be done on my Mac partition.

GIMP + Inkscape covers all my 2d raster/vector graphical needs. However, if you really miss PS, can't you run it through WINE?

[f0rk_b0mb]

Nice troll. Thankfully, we GNU/Linux users know that's completely false. In fact, it's quite the opposite. Linux provides superior productivity in every way imaginable.

Imagine tailoring your environment to your exact specifications and productivity needs with ease. Good luck trying to do that on Windows with your Candycrush crapware

 

Easy buddy. Everybody is entitled to a choice. 

[f0rk_b0mb]

Haven't seen a topic on this in a while, it seems. Never have cared for Ubuntu much myself.

 

Good luck!!

 

I have a couple computers here that are strictly Linux, Debian Jessie, and use them very regularly. Don't have any issues going between Windows and Linux and it's a nice change every once in a while.

 

Thanks! I'll consider Debian if Ubuntu ever gets on my nerve.

 

 

GIMP + Inkscape covers all my 2d raster/vector graphical needs. However, if you really miss PS, can't you run it through WINE?

 

I'm slowly adjusting to gimp/inkscape. I only boot into OS X if I'm inpatient and cant figure something out. I'm investigating running PS with WINE (Crossover/playonlinux/ect) now to see if it is worth it. I honestly don't mind the 2 second reboot time...

[Joshie]

My experiences are that in the not too distant future ( less than a month maybe) you will tire of Ubuntu or other Linux Distro's and just go back to stock OSX. You'll realize that there really is no reason to switch. You'll tire of any type of "customization" you can do and just say "screw it" and switch back.

This was my hit. Customization was a lot of fun for a long time, and kept me interested all through Windows 3.x -> XP, as well as Linux. But man, when it wore off, it wore completely off. And once I was bored of tweaking everything, my interest in Linux plummeted. Once you stop caring about being able to make your OS have a dock and look like OS X, there's really no reason not to just use Windows...

 

But I'll keep playing with Linux on the side every now and then. I just feel like I've been waiting 15 years for KDE to stop looking like design bukkake, and the rest of Linux is determined to copy-but-not-copy OS X, which is simply boring to me. Once there's something it can offer that's truly unique and isn't just MOAR CUSTOMZASHUNS, I might reevaluate it as more than just a toy in a VM.

[Krome]

Been trying Ubuntu on VM and it works great so far... Have to get used to it.  I am more reliant on xterm when I can't seem to access anything.

[simplezz]

Once you stop caring about being able to make your OS have a dock and look like OS X, there's really no reason not to just use Windows...

That's simply not true. I don't do much customisation on a regular basis (now that it's setup to my liking), but that's not a reason to abandon it. The software/package management, configurability, variety (distros, WM's/DE's), productivity, community, and security are what make GNU/Linux a great OS. Windows is like a child's toy in comparison.

 

But I'll keep playing with Linux on the side every now and then. I just feel like I've been waiting 15 years for KDE to stop looking like design bukkake, and the rest of Linux is determined to copy-but-not-copy OS X, which is simply boring to me. Once there's something it can offer that's truly unique and isn't just MOAR CUSTOMZASHUNS, I might reevaluate it as more than just a toy in a VM.

Sounds like you don't appreciate the advantages of being able to fully customise the user experience of your OS. The rest of us however, do. Perhaps you're better off sticking to Windows.

[The_Observer]

how was it getting ubuntu onto your mac, been looking at install ubuntu onto my rMBP and moving to Linux.

[HawkMan]

I actually submit all of my work for university and documents for coworkers using LaTeX (PDF sent to them of course) and LibreOffice. Seriously Evolution > Outlook. The only app that I really miss is Photoshop, but that can be done on my Mac partition. 

 

You caught me. All I wanted was a stranger's satisfaction on the internet and you ruined it for me, God damn it.  /s

 

Evolution doesn't even compare to outlook. but then I'm guessing you used outlook for the wrong use case, it's not a home mail software, though it works for that to, very well in fact in the latest version, I'd say better than evolution, but for home use you're better off with Windows (live) Mail.

 

In an enterprise environment, that outlook is designed for however, there is no real competition for outlook and it's feature set. 

[Haggis Veteran]

Welcome

 

I have been on Linux over 3 years now in march past and i am still loving it

 

I have windows in a VM as my wife does some shopping thing that the submission program they use only works in windows, so once every week i boot up windows for 10 mins lol

 

I also boot it up to do my stats package in VB.NET

 

 

Missing out look? Geary is quite good, i also like thunderbird

Photoshop? I use Gimp, dont get me wrong it took a while to get used to it but its fine now

 

 

The above is right though for a feature rich app you will never beat outlook

 

I have been using Linux on and off for around 20 years now through various distros

 

The furthest back i can remember was Fedora 3

 

Most recently in the last 3 years i have used OpenSuse, Fedora, Debian and i settled on Linux Mint

 

My servers run Debian

 

and i have various different distros in VM's (Fedora, Lakka, Arch, Deepin etc)

[vcfan]

...when you accidentally walk into a Linux Anonymous meeting

[f5s4t3]

What's special about the Linux world is that distros purpose differs. You can get a linux for programming, a linux for multimedia, a linux for server, a linux for ease of use and so on. You won't find this in the Windows and Mac worlds, not at this level anyway.

 

The above I said is important in that you have to define a need and a purpose and then select a distro... and then rinse and repeat

 

Example. CentOS for development as my main distro. I'm also using openSUSE and ArchLinux for development. Chromixium for ease of use, for simplicity and clean look. You can't beat Chromixium at the moment when it comes to Chrome OS-like unintimidating looks.

 

Another thing you won't find in the Windows and the Mac worlds is the ability to share partitions like /home across distros. Or to share one kernel across several distros. Or to have different kernels for the same distro. The level of flexibility is simply astonishing while spoon feeding still exists.

 

Again, the latest above I said is important in that you have to keep focus on your defined needs and purposes... and I also have a Surface Pro  

 

Why a complete switch

[forumhound]

On my MacBook. 10 minutes of tweaking. 

 

screenshot0_small.jpg

 

screenshot1_small.jpg

What are you tweaking? The desktop? The icons? That's not tweaking...that's playing...

[forumhound]

What are you tweaking? The desktop? The icons? That's not tweaking...that's playing...

I just find it funny how most people that are using Linux need to go back into a Windows environment to accomplish something or need to use wine or whatever to use a windows based piece of software. 

I wonder how many people are TRULY committed to Linux? No Windows based anything to function every day? I'm betting not a lot.

[kozukumi]

I switched to Linux only on my ThinkPad X220 and found myself using that machine more than any other as it worked so well. I love having such a small machine as I can take it everywhere and it has really good battery life. The CPU is a 2nd gen i7, 8GB RAM and a Samsung 850 EVO makes it crazy fast. Plus the IPS display is beautiful, it is only 1366x768 but on a 12.5" screen it is actually pretty nice, things are big enough to see with 100% scaling.

 

I love my minimal Linux install. It boots in a couple of seconds, gets me around 9 hours battery life and works exactly how I want it too. I love Windows too but something about putting all the bits together exactly how I want the system to run is pretty great too.

[LargeLarry]

I switched to Arch linux 2 years ago.  I dont know how familiar you are with the command line, but this is the book i learned from. Its free to download.  "The Linux Command Line"  http://linuxcommand.org/tlcl.php

 

[Depicus]

I just find it funny how most people that are using Linux need to go back into a Windows environment to accomplish something or need to use wine or whatever to use a windows based piece of software. 

I wonder how many people are TRULY committed to Linux? No Windows based anything to function every day? I'm betting not a lot.

 

And there is a good reason why, Microsoft spend billions of dollars on marketing and have a near monopoly on distribution so developers follow the money. Hence there are not as many consumer polished apps for Linux BUT that doesn't make Windows any better for everybody. I wonder why you think it has to be a battle between Linux and Windows, can people not use both ? I know I prefer one over the other but both do what I need and that is to work for me.

[forumhound]

And there is a good reason why, Microsoft spend billions of dollars on marketing and have a near monopoly on distribution so developers follow the money. Hence there are not as many consumer polished apps for Linux BUT that doesn't make Windows any better for everybody. I wonder why you think it has to be a battle between Linux and Windows, can people not use both ? I know I prefer one over the other but both do what I need and that is to work for me.

Oh absolutely they can use both. I have no issue with any Operating System. Whatever works for you is what works for you. But I really don't buy the "not as many polished apps" theory. Linux in one form or another has been around forever. They have viable alternatives to just about every commercial Windows software out there. I was just saying that it makes me giggle when I see someone "converting" to Linux when in reality they really haven't. 

"Down with Microsoft"! "Down with Apple"! "They overcharge"! "Big brother" !Oh, wait, I need to use photoshop...never mind

[Depicus]

Oh absolutely they can use both. I have no issue with any Operating System. Whatever works for you is what works for you. But I really don't buy the "not as many polished apps" theory. Linux in one form or another has been around forever. They have viable alternatives to just about every commercial Windows software out there. I was just saying that it makes me giggle when I see someone "converting" to Linux when in reality they really haven't.

 

Fair enough but I disagree with the polished apps argument. You simply cannot get a comparable Photoshop app on Linux. I'm sure there are other examples like Visual Studio - I won't argue Office because for what 95% of people use it for there are alternatives but sometimes you just cannot move away from Windows.

[kozukumi]

Fair enough but I disagree with the polished apps argument. You simply cannot get a comparable Photoshop app on Linux. I'm sure there are other examples like Visual Studio - I won't argue Office because for what 95% of people use it for there are alternatives but sometimes you just cannot move away from Windows.

 

Guess it depends on what you mean by polished.

 

For me a polished application is one that does all I want and does it well. Windows might have Photoshop but they don't have a first party C++11/14 feature complete standard library or compiler. They don't have free kernel level debuggers to the same quality as I can get on Linux, they don't have a POSIX sub-system, it doesn't have built in way to do things like a chroot. These, to me, are highly polished things that Linux has which Windows does not (although some things are coming, such as containers which is cool).

 

For all the billions of dollars Microsoft still don't have a fully featured C++11 compiler yet GCC and Clang have been feature complete for about 4 years now targeting multiple platforms and architectures.

 

The command line on Windows got a bit better with Psh but they still lack a good set of cli tools to work in Psh with. Hell even cmdlets for UNIX-like tools would be better than nothing.

 

So yeah Windows is more polished in some areas, mainly front-end applications like Photoshop and Office but it is pretty poor in many other areas, at least in my use cases.

[Depicus]

Guess it depends on what you mean by polished....

 

So yeah Windows is more polished in some areas, mainly front-end applications like Photoshop and Office but it is pretty poor in many other areas, at least in my use cases.

 

Would not disagree with you on anything there but I suspect we are in the minority.

[forumhound]

Fair enough but I disagree with the polished apps argument. You simply cannot get a comparable Photoshop app on Linux. I'm sure there are other examples like Visual Studio - I won't argue Office because for what 95% of people use it for there are alternatives but sometimes you just cannot move away from Windows.

 I'll give you the Photoshop one but only by a very, very slight margin. However, how many people TRULY NEED to use Photoshop? Are you a professional? Sure but I think the majority of users are just that. Users. I'm sure there are going to be people that say they need to use it for this reason or that reason but I'm talking about the people that have a career and depend on it to feed their family. I'm thinking that number is very small. 

[TDT]

The reason why I'm going Linux is because I'm not spending 5 grand on a Mac Pro. Screw Hackintoshes. That's even harder than Linux. LOL!

 

 

Not anymore. These days, almost everyone can install osx on its desktop/notebook with very little effort. Unless you want a "vanilla" installation, that could be a little harder to do.