Linux

Post by **Nach** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 3:40 am

I just want to basically get an idea of how Linux is viewed in recent times among technical people who were originally DOS/Windows users.

Jipcy · Post by **Jipcy** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 3:46 am

I don't use it currently, but I've messed around with it.

I also used the Internet for the first time on a Sun Sparc with Solaris and Netscape. On a 14.4 modem. In 1994.

Pictures loaded about a line every 5 seconds... or something like that.

Noxious Ninja · Post by **Noxious Ninja** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 3:58 am

How about, I used to use Linux regularly, then I moved and lost broadband, so I stopped. Now, whenever I have a free weekend, I intend to get things sorted out on my laptop and start using it again.

Hm, Suse or Kubuntu... hard choice.

adventure_of_link · Post by **adventure_of_link** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 4:04 am

I use Linux sometimes, when I get a chance. Had a chance to last weekend, and boy, did I take advantage of it. Mainly because my XP FUBAR'ed and I needed something to live on.

kevman · Post by **kevman** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 5:38 am

My usage of Linux versus Windows is beginning to near 50-50.... It might have even reached that point.

However, I'm still having problems that would keep me from being a 100% Linux user.

Having only 100k of Internet bandwidth makes it a little hard to keep Kubuntu up to date, and installing apps gets annoying when apt downloads at 8K.

Aerdan · Post by **Aerdan** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 6:05 am

And this is why Gentoo is superior. You only have to download the sources, never multi-megabyte binaries.

Noxious Ninja · Post by **Noxious Ninja** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 6:14 am

Like the source code is that much smaller.

xMetaRidley · Post by **xMetaRidley** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 6:20 am

I got broadband about 3 months ago and have been using Ubuntu Linux ever since. I still dual-boot with Windows XP but I only use Windows for light gaming (starcraft, ZSNES, and VirtuaNES is about it). I am on a widescreen laptop and I can't play games on Linux because everything gets stretched in full-screen mode to the 16:10 aspect ratio. I have no idea how to fix it.

Aerdan · Post by **Aerdan** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 6:20 am

Sometimes it is, especially if you're trying to get the dev libraries and headers as well as the applications themselves.

SquareHead · Post by **SquareHead** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 6:39 am

I have been using Linux occasionaly since the redhat 5.2 and 7.0 days. I have only recently (within 6 months), devoted a full machine to it.

Post by **grinvader** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 10:58 am

I pretty much jumped from DOS to dual-boot slackware/win98 setup ~7 years ago.

Lord Alpha · Post by **Lord Alpha** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 1:49 pm

Started with some ridiculously early version of SUSE, just to play with it and went to Mandrake. Since then Linux has been on my system in some form.

Currently using Gentoo more than windows. Say 60-40

casualsax3 · Post by **casualsax3** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 4:06 pm

I don't know why, I've never made the switch from Windows. I do all of my programing in Unix though (SSH)

xaimus · Post by **xaimus** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 4:18 pm

I played around with Debian and Mandrake for a while on my secondary machine. I finally moved from Windows XP to a SUSE/WinXP dual boot on my primary machine at some unspecified time in the past. A month later, I removed both operating systems and installed FreeBSD 5.

Currently, I'm on 6-BETA4.

MCP · Post by **MCP** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 10:30 pm

I originally used...well Atari and Mac. Then moved to windows 95 when we got a new machine.

I've used solaris unix and red hat linux for programming and those are very nice for school projects and research projects, however I am finding the IDE in Visual Studio to be pretty nice for a fairly large project in C/C++.

I also use cygwin on windows so...I generally just sftp in to campus and upload files. I like coding locally. C/C++ is the only language I've had problems compiling locally and finding out it needs some changes on the sun machines at school to run properly.

I use windows mainly.

casualsax, you use putty and vim?

DataPath · Post by **DataPath** » Wed Nov 02, 2005 10:52 pm

On my windows boxen, I spend 90% of my productive time in vim locally, or in vim under putty.

The only thing I'm missing is tabbed putty windows. Then again, if I weren't so lazy, I'd get more proficient with "screen" and it wouldnt' matter.

SquareHead · Post by **SquareHead** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 12:01 am

Know whats funny. This guy makes fun of me, because I can use vim through putty, but am clueless on how to patch and compile my own kernel.

byuu · Post by **byuu** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 12:40 am

WinXP is my primary OS. Given Microsoft's trend as of late, I doubt I'll be using Vista outside of work.

I also use FreeBSD on occasion. It was such a huge leap forward in system-level simplicity compared to the last Linux distro I used (fbsd 4.7 vs redhat 9), that I've never even bothered to look at Linux again. I hear the new Linux distros are just as good now, great. I'm already sold.

I don't use it as a primary now for the typical reasons. No Photoshop and GIMP or PS/WINE blows, no Winamp and XMMS will never compare, Visual c++ runs circles around gcc in terms of compile speed and output program speed, all X11 GUI programming toolkits are shit, no standard input method editor, too many legacy applications that use different copy/paste methods (hello xterm) and really, that's about it. In my opinion the actual user interface for XFCE is far superior to the windows shell (sans my own addons, of course).

Post by **badinsults** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 2:05 am

I switched from a pirated Windows XP to Debian last July. I am now using Ubuntu for my home computer and Red Hat at work. I haven't touched Windows since July.

aminalshmu · Post by **aminalshmu** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 6:19 am

i tried a bunch of different distros at the end of last summer, including mandrake (bleh), suse (bleh), arch, yoper (bleh), and finally settled on gentoo, which is awesome, and had removed all traces of pirated windows XP copies from all computers in my house a few months later. i've been running linux alone for more than a year now, and don't regret it.

however i did get tired of cooking my processors by unnecessarily compiling EVERYTHING, so a few weeks ago i switched to ubuntu. don't regret that either, though i still think gentoo is awesome for many purposes.

edit: oh yeah. screen == the shit

p00f · Post by **p00f** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 7:06 am

I've used slackware many a time. Haven't been active with it in about 6-8 months. Got fed up with slackware, worked great but too much to configure all the time. What is kubuntu like?

soulmata · Post by **soulmata** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 8:21 am

I use primarily linux at both home and work

I use linux roughly 95% of the time, Windows is used on an occasion or two during the day.

I first started using linux in 1998, been slowly migrating ever since, about a year ago is when I fully switched over.

casualsax3 · Post by **casualsax3** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 3:18 pm

I am afraid to make the switch. Don't know where to start. You ask what distro to go with and you get 15 different responses.

MisterJones · Post by **MisterJones** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 4:56 pm

MCP wrote:I've used solaris unix and red hat linux for programming and those are very nice for school projects and research projects, however I am finding the IDE in Visual Studio to be pretty nice for a fairly large project in C/C++.

http://www.codeblocks.org/ ?

MCP · Post by **MCP** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 9:11 pm

MisterJones wrote: http://www.codeblocks.org/ ?

Looks fine to me. Just my ignorance.

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