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Superboyac is throwing in the towel: I'm going to transition to Linux
steeladept:
I am with you 100% 40hz. I have dabbled in several different distros, use CentOS at work (now moving to RedHat Enterprise, because they are forcing the issue), use Mint Linux Debian Edition with xfce at home, set up others on Ubuntu, etc., etc....
By far, Mint is my choice, especially for the Debian editions...They just work (is this a Mac commercial?). Once you get started you can dig as far as you want to on any distro, so learning on Gentoo or Slackware seems counterintuitive to me. Sure you fight through it because you HAVE to, but if you want to learn it from the ground up, do it with the fallback to something you can find instead of frustrating yourself out of Linux all together. Many find learning through that frustration not worth the effort, especially when they need/want to get stuff done.
I have gone more the other way though. As much as I like linux, especially Debian version of Mint, I am leaning far more heavily toward Windows, since I keep finding many of the apps I want or need are there. Sure there are similar apps in Linux for the most part, but their quality varies far more and the learning curve FOR EACH APP is far higher (in general). The server side is different (it is generally always high regardless of platform), but for the desktop, I just keep coming back to Windows. AND...the apps that are for the desktop that are good and supported in Linux are generally available for Windows anyway; but that is just me. I like most all OS's (not a big fan of System-Z) on the technical level, so I am fairly agnostic there. Of course there is that corporate side of things - but in the end it is, as the saying goes, ALL ABOUT THE APPS.
Rover:
Welcome to the club SuperboyAC :)
Please be aware that Linux is not perfect either. It does give you the opportunity to get very involved in the details of your OS, but it has it's own pitfalls*.
I've got a working Fedora Core 13 Image that I can't move away from. I've tried..... Just tonight I tried openSuSE (make up your own pronunciation) 12.1 as a replacement. :( It doesn't recognize my RealTek 1G NIC. Of all the things to not get... Sheesh. So play with some different distro's. I've previously had very good experience with PCLinuxOS, but they have yet to release their 64 bit version.
MintOS seems like a good place to start for former Windows users. I'm not a huge fan of Ubuntu and/or Ubuntu based distros, but Mint seems pretty cool.
Why I like my Fed 13: I have Virtual Box installed and running. Chrome and Flash work. I have a terminal window and a bit torrent client. My 2 TB backup drive is mounted. My SSD works (quickly) and I feel at home.
I really wish I could upgrade, but I haven't found a good replacement yet. But then I ran Windows XP until 2005 and I still have it on my Work Laptop, so my opinion is skewed. ;)
*Desktop Linux: I think Linux is 100% perfect for any server installation. ;)
mahesh2k:
1) Don't install linux on your working windows machine. Pick another old hardware or desktop which you rarely use or share with someone else and install linux on that. Why? You'll experiment a lot with linux in earlier days and are likely to break things or two, you'll get frustrated if you fail to fix things and then you will give up on linux. That is pretty much the pattern for most windows migrants. That's why pick a separate machine and start breaking things. I mean it, by breaking more linux you'll learn a lot.
2) Choose debian based distros because there is plenty of help (videos and tutorials) available on the internet compared Red Hat/Mandriva distros. Ubuntu may be over-rated but will offer you a better desktop and lots of options. Mint is ubuntu derivative (and in turn debian's grand-child) and you get best of their parent distros if you decide to install them. If you want cool UI based debian distro then try elementary which is ubuntu based but modified to look and work like iOS.
Many people will suggest you some geeky distros like archlinux, where you're supposed to build things from ground, avoid those distros. Use distros that offer easy installers and pre-configured apps. In such case debian child distros like ubuntu, mint and suse are fine.
3) Command line is not evil. You'll find it more useful compared to UI based installation. It is way better than command line in windows.
4) Start using alternative office and entertainment softwares on both windows and linux. This makes things easy for you on both platforms. For example, use Libre instead of MS office, you'll hardly feel any difference when you switch the platform.
5) AHK features are possible indirectly with shell scripts and python/perl/DE scripting. So you have multiple ways of doing things in linux. You just have to digg a lot to get there.
6) Repeat after me : There are some windows softwares that you can't replace. Yes. That is true. You can't replace some softwares and it is also hard to run them under crossover/wine in linux. This is the reason you should keep windows working in alternate machine.
7) Desktop environment is hard to choose. You have KDE, Gnome, XFCE, Cinamon(Mate) and few other options. Try live CD and use every DE possible so that you can test your comfort level. If you like windows XP feel then I'm sure you'll find KDE/XFCE/Mate comfortable to use. If you like OSX type of UI then Gnome and Ubuntu unity is all you need. Experiment with all of them and then decide. Beauty of linux is choice, we used only one shell in our windows/osx life, linux offers us a lot of geeky options even in desktop environment. Use it, just for fun and learning.
8 ) There is big UI shift coming in linux world. Ubuntu HUD is one example of it. If you're still new then you can either start with ubuntu and be comfortable with it or you can switch to KDE/Xfce/Mate and stick with UI which works and looks like windows. I'm suggesting this because linux DE developers are messing with (or experimenting) with UI a lot lately.
9) Android is also available on desktop. If you're not worried about privacy, then you can use it on both phone and desktop. In that case there isn't much to learn or unlearn, it's just your usage and google's way of doing things.
10) Linux isn't dark side or hell, it's just gibberish because of few linux devs.
superboyac:
Lots of great information and advice here. I'm probably going to have to keep re-reading this stuff as I get more familiar.
I think I'm going to try the following experiments these next few months:
--I have an old laptop. I'm going to put Mint on it and play around with it.
--I'll also install some flavor of Linux on a virtual machine on Windows to have something right there on my main machine.
--I still need to build me a server. Maybe I'll start off with a simple tower, put some kind of Linux server and ownCloud on it.
mouser knows me too well...the software is going to be interesting. I'm not sure which software will be the most difficult for me to replace...the ones I use the most are Dopus and the Bat. I'm not worried about DOpus since I'm pretty sure Linux has several really nice file managers. The Bat I'm worried about. I don't even want to think about how to all those emails and stuff over.
And maybe a complete transition isn't the right idea. Perhaps it should be a gentle expansion of my computing habits. I'll just add it to my ecosystem. Use it as my second computer, or backup computer, or media server. Heck, if I can learn how to set up a decent file server easily, that's worth it right there.
You guys know me...I'm going to be all over the place on this. I expect I'll change my mind no less than 30 times, and I'll have some emotional mood swings throughout.
cranioscopical:
I'll have some emotional mood swings throughout.
-superboyac (February 29, 2012, 09:32 AM)
--- End quote ---
Well, you have chosen a roundabout way of doing things.
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