My path to Linux

Quite recently I finally had it with Windows and decided to rid myself of it and move to something different. I installed Linux, Ubuntu Feisty Fawn to be precise. I’ve been talking and thinking about Linux for years, but never got around to really jump in and use it until now.

When I first encountered Linux I got two distros called Redhat and Slackware. I installed and tried to use both of them but I dual booted and never committed to really learning Linux. This was quite a long time ago when Linux wasn’t as usable as Windows. Linux was hard and didn’t have much to offer for me personally at the time. I was a gamer and didn’t have much internet access. The life I lived then just didn’t fit with the Linux that existed at the time.

After some time with Redhat I gave up and only used Windows until just recently. I haven’t had much virus problems and Windows just works for most things. I was happy to just game and surf the net, but lately Microsoft has been pulling some really scary moves that I simply can not  tolerate. I completely refuse to even try Vista, and XP kept bugging me about genuine advantage which I don’t need and reeeaaally DO NOT WANT. (Just gotta link to the Linux genuine advantage, it’s so funny.)

So, I’ve decided to move to Linux, but what flavour? Why Ubuntu? Well, I just thought I had to start somewhere. Any Linux will do as long as I get away from Windows and Ubuntu just happened to be the current most popular kid in the hood. So I just went with that, and I’m happy I did because it works fine.

So far Ubuntu has been so good that I haven’t even done much thinking about trying something else, most things worked out of the box. Sure, there are some quirks but I’ve managed to get through them and solve almost all my problems. Most problems you encounter in Ubuntu seems to be solvable rather easily, at least for someone as knowledgable as me.

Linux has improved its usability drastically over the years while I wasn’t looking. In most aspects I’d say it’s better than Windows.

It’s easier and faster to install than Windows. For Ubuntu you just start your computer with the install disc and start the installation while inside Ubuntu itself, you can even surf the internet in Ubuntu while you’re installing it, though it’s rather sluggish. Best of all, you don’t have to enter a damn long key to prove that you own your copy.

Ubuntu doesn’t impose itself over your work. In Windows  I was constantly troubled because windows services of different kinds demanded attention loudly and disturbingly. Even if I disabled as much annoying alerts as I could, I still got forced out of fullscreen action games and lost focus when I was concentrating on something important.

Ubuntu is gentle, when something happens that you maybe should take a look at, it slowly pulses in a gentle colour or puts an extra icon somewhere. It’s like a gentle whisper in your ear saying “I have something interesting for you over here”.

I did say Linux is better in most ways, not all ways. But the thing that’s bad about Linux isn’t Linux’s fault. I’m thinking about games and software, the high caliber market stuff that Windows is flooded with because they have held the big cake for so long. Software producers still don’t produce for Linux so much, but the situation is improving. Linux is growing rapidly, with governments around the world choosing Linux the market for Linux products is increasing and software producers should follow.

I have high hopes for Linux, it’s growing, improving and gets more and more attention. It’s free and democratic, made for the people by the people. I am not looking back, Windows is history in my life.