On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 08:49:34PM -0500, John Graves wrote: # Larry, # # I like linux also. The problem is that we all sit around and say that # Chocolate is best and the next guy says yes but raspberry does the # hoop dance better. That's all true, but nobody but the geeks really # care. The rest of the world sees it as Windoes or Apple. Choose one of # the big two. Buy the system and take it home. It works.
Every OS and user interface sucks. They all suck in different ways. # But if do I choose linux I still have twenty decisions to make. And # that's before I figure out how to install the bugger. I will admit it's # getting better. But you can't take a disk and install it with worrying # that something will raise it's head from the swamp. When I started using Linux 15 years ago, it was like that. With a little bit of care Linux is easier to install on a home built system than is Windows. When I built my current desktop system a couple years ago, I built it as a multiboot system with both Linux and Windows. I had no problems at all with Linux, but it took me weeks of work to diagnose and solve the problems I was having getting Windows (XP, not Vista) to install. Download the Knoppix and Ubuntu DVDs, burn them and slap them into your computer. There's a better than 95% chance that it'll just boot up into a Linux desktop. Go out and scrounge up a system out of discarded parts and computers that are more than two years old. Slap them together, throw the latest Knoppix, Fedora, or Ubuntu live boot disk in. See if it'll boot. Now try and run Windows Vista on that machine. # If the process is as interesting as the end result, Linux is the system # for you. Otherwise, until you can go to BigBox and buy a Linux system # and a couple of applications, it ain't gonna play. Last I checked, you can. The Asus Eee comes to mind. Various of the big name companies sold Linux based systems. IBM Thinkpads are legendary for having Linux "just work" on them. # # Can I get off my soapbox now and go back to processing pictures? I will agree that, unfortunately, photo processing is one area where linux falls a bit short. The gimp is only 8 bit, though gegl, or whatever it's called, is now part of it, so 16 bit isn't too far out. On the other hand bibble pro runs like a champ on linux, also Mac, and isn't a bad system for $130. The place I ran into problems is monitor calibration. In theory, there are linux apps to run the spyder2 on Linux, from people reverse engineering it, but the folks who make the spyder do everything they can to prevent people from writing linux drivers because they want to make money off the software. # # John G # \Sorry for the rant...I need some coffee. No worries. I realize that it's often a lot easier to just run the same system that everyone else has. Isn't that why we all own Canons? Larry -- Photographs are like sentences, the best ones have both subjects and verbs. Larry Colen [email protected] http://www.red4est.com/lrc -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
