hi bharat, read your email with interest. especially the part on why you wish to migrate to gnuLinux.
i have discovered an insightful trend over the past few years: 1) those who *react* to the problems they face in the M$ soup of OS and applications, *rush* to gnuLinux, are totally dazzled and bewildered by the completely different paradigm, and sobered, crawl back to their M$, with a 'been there, done that' attitude towards gnuLinux 2) those who *respond* to the problems they face in the claustrophobic and constrained world of M$ OS and applications, also realize M$ is really a small fraction, the visible aspect of the looming iceberg ahead, into which they crash. some aspects of the problems extend to almost all proprietory, non-freedom based software, on *any* platform. those who *respond* to the problem, always migrate successfully. so don't react, just respond. don't blame M$ or any other proprietory software company. Make your thirst for freedom, choices, of being responsible and in control of your computing, your real fuel. the desire for 'muft' and 'mukt' software should be your fuel. so how do you respond? i call it the seven steps to software samadhi by linuxlingam. step 1) get hold of a cd of gnuWin2 this cd contains freedom-based software for windoze. install openoffice, mozilla(web browser), chat software, and other stuff for windows. start using them, taking files back and forth between these and your other software, until you feel quite familiar with these software. step 2) get hold of a cd of knoppix. this is a 'live' cd of gnulinux. pop it in your cdrom, boot the machine, and presto! your pc boots into gnuLinux, forgetting the windoze in your 'c:' drive. the entire operating system and soup sits in the ram of your machine, and works off the cd. explore knoppix, reding the helpful articles provided in the browser window. explore the applications, softare, and other stuff available on the cd. you will find your openoffice, mozilla, and all other software, right there under knoppix, running under gnuLinux. so you have conquered half the battlefield already. log off from knoppix, remove the cd from the hard drive, and reboot the machine, and you are back into the world of win doze. as if nothing happened. step 3) at this point, if you feel you must migrate, buy a very good book on gnuLinux. i recommend peter norton, but you can go pick up a collection of books if you want,. this is always helpful. start reading the book, and playing with knoppix to understand the initial topics. step 4) get hold of monkeyLinux, or dragonLinux, and install them into windoze! these are special versions of gnulinux that install in the start menu of windoze, but on running them, they actually give you a complete gnulinux os! so from within windows, you can use gnuLinux. step 5) reading the book, and with help from mailing lists and friends, and tldp.org, yolinux.org, etc., learn how to partition your hard disk, and dual-boot it into windows and gnulinux. so you can use gnuLinux, and when you find you have to get back to windoze, or have to use that application not with an equivalent yet on gnulinux, use windoze. step 6) configure your gnuLinux, to network with other win based machine on the network, to access your legacy win data over partitions, etc. make sure you do all your work more and more in gnuLinux alone. step 7) my favourite one: the day you discover you don't boot into win for weeks, reformat the win partition, and free up space for more space for your data files, or install a second distribution of gnuLinux, or yet another alternative operating system, on your pc. and do go and distribute the cds of gnuWin and knoppix to your other colleagues as well. so the essence: migration is never instant. it happens in stages, and takes time, in days, weeks, or about 1 to 3 months to the outer-limit. enjoy the migration, it is a beautiful adventure in itself, and quite rewarding. it will teach you many new things. happy gnulinux software samadhi. :-) LL *** copyright 2003: LinuxLIngam. verbatim copying, distribution, and sharing of the above text is allowed in any media, so long as this notice is preserved. _______________________________________________ ilugd mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://frodo.hserus.net/mailman/listinfo/ilugd
