Fundamental choices: to Vista or not to Vista

Life is all about priorities and making choices. The launch of Microsoft Vista for me is (again) a moment to evaluate whether Open Source software has matured to such a level that it is useful in a SoHo environment. Microsoft intends to spend millions of dollars to convince us, the public, that we need an upgrade of the Operating System (OS) on our computer. If they succeed (and no doubt they will) that is a major achievement since over 50% of its (potential) users does not understand the concept of an OS and close to a 100% lacks the IT-skills to evaluate in depth the features and benefits of Vista compared to for instance Windows XP. Selling something as conceptually complex as an upgrade of an OS with only emotions to go on; and making billions of dollar in profits while doing it, is something to be proud of from a marketing point of view.

So the market will probably in some time be ‘convinced’ but as an individual, I still have the choice. Condition nr.1 for any alternative desktop environment is that all home users (wife and kids) can do anything they currently do in Windows XP. My first attempts a couple of years ago to install RedHat version 5 did definitely not meet that requirement. A book like “RedHat 6 Unlimited” could be positioned on at least 5 sides without falling over and the upgrade from 5 to 6 in a Unix shell was a small disaster. So RedHat gathered dust on an unused PC and Linux was down at least 1-0 with the rest of the family.

Moving from RedHat to SuSE 9 made live a bit easier since SuSE had YaST: Yet another Setup Tool was a small step for man but a giant leap for mankind since Linuxconf which was in itself a breakthrough in its era. By this time I spent so much money on Linux-literature that I could have subscribed to Vista for life, but using Open Source software is not about license fees; it is about principle and about joining a world-wide community.

The combined launch of Microsoft Vista and to much time at hand due to the Christmas holidays initiated another go. And now I am Ubuntu, or for the in-crowd: Kubuntu, which is the KDE version of this. From their website: Ubuntu - an African word, meaning “humanity to others” or “I am what I am because of who we all are”. That is the true spirit of Open Source and far, far away from Microsoft marketing speak. This was to become my new Operating System! And more, so much more than that…
Lessons learned from earlier attempts to implement a new OS made me keep an internet-enabled-laptop at hand when trying to install Ubuntu 6.10 (Edgy Eft) which helped me through the first setback: during the installation process, my screen went black never to return to live again. Temporary changing a TFT-monitor to an old-fashioned CRT (always have a spare!) killed this issue almost instantly.

Upgrading to the latest version of Firefox and OpenOffice went automatically and understanding that Ubuntu is Debian-based got me the right Skype installation. Since my family is not to be bothered with any one-time-installation-activities, I came close to meeting the family-compliant condition. Even the Firefox Add-ons and Plug-ins went smooth and fully automatic.

A few small issues to be solved now: being able to access the (Windows) file-server and installing printing facilities. Prior Linux engagements learned me that sharing files over a network was implemented by Microsoft using the SMB protocol. This was re-engineered in Open Source and called Samba. Key search items as Ubuntu and Samba and the beloved guidance of the Google search engine did the trick. Tip for the newbies out there: search in Google on “the exact text of that constantly repeating and f&*ing annoying error message” because somebody out there did have the same frustration and most likely entered it with the solution in one of the dozens of communities or forums on the internet.
Printing was easy: System | Administration | Printing | Printers => New Printer | x Network Printer | Unix Printer (LPD) | host: IP address printserver, queue: lp1 | Driver for HP DeskJet 970C was default selected | Description and location are the icing on the cake. Under 5 minutes including the successful print of a Test page!
And that’s where I am today: I can listen to my mp3’s, write CD’s, open, edit and save documents with OpenOffice, even the ones from my Microsoft Office days and I can browse the web.

Still some small dreams: finding an alternative for iTunes to update my iPod, Shockwave for Linux would be nice for the Daily Jigsaw but get real, we are talking a complete royalty free community experience; there must be dreams left!
Now the trial period for family compliancy starts. Since most of the functionality used is web-based, I look forward to this ultimate test with confidence. This post will therefore definitely be continued…

ERegoS