Linux/Ubuntu Milestone for Clutter

[Cluttermagnet]

I am so happy about this- my friend with the Gateway 510S who has been dual booting Ubuntu and Win XP Pro for 1-2 years asked me today to make the default Ubuntu at boot time. She turns on the computer, goes to make her morning coffee, and returns to find her XP desktop. At one time, she wanted it that way. Now it just annoys her, and she has to restart to get Ubuntu. So I went in and edited /boot/grub/menu.lst so the default is Ubuntu. Yay!The key was getting her to accept Firefox over IE 'back in the day'. We had a bit of a battle over that. Knowing Firefox makes it ever so much easier for beginners to migrate to the new OS. Recently, she had me enable Evolution for her emailing, as an alternative to Outlook, which she knows well from work years. She's just about finished her transition to Linux.

[Frank Golden]

That's what's nice about grub, it is so easily customized. But you can really screw things up if you don't know what you are doing.Good going Clutter.

[V.T. Eric Layton]

I converted my brother to Ubuntu last year. Of course, with him I didn't give any choice. I removed networking from his Windows installation and made Ubuntu his default OS. I told him it was that or he'd have to start paying someone to disinfect his Windows every 3 or 4 weeks cuz I wasn't gonna' do it no more.

[Cluttermagnet]

I converted my brother to Ubuntu last year. Of course, with him I didn't give any choice. I removed networking from his Windows installation and made Ubuntu his default OS. I told him it was that or he'd have to start paying someone to disinfect his Windows every 3 or 4 weeks cuz I wasn't gonna' do it no more.

I still laugh every time I hear that story, Eric. :'( I'm still hammering away at the last of 4-5 friends I encouraged to try Linux. I think I will eventually get him to see what a time waster Windows has been for him. He is the last holdout, all the others went for Ubuntu. Actually, I leave him pretty much alone and every so often I hear of problems he is having. Last night I saw his 6 year old install of XP which is now so wobbly it takes his OS about 4 minutes to get Firefox 3.5 started and see a usable window. Yikes! And this is with an old Dell 8250, probably about a 2.6GHz processor- a pretty decent machine. It's sad, but people get stuck in their ways...I saw some pretty bizarre stuff on that computer last night. I probably would not have the patience to try to get his XP all weeded out- and he is probably sooooo hacked by now. I've lost patience with Windows, especially with poorly run machines. Edited July 3, 2009 by Cluttermagnet

[Frank Golden]

I still laugh every time I hear that story, Eric. :'( I'm still hammering away at the last of 4-5 friends I encouraged to try Linux. I think I will eventually get him to see what a time waster Windows has been for him. He is the last holdout, all the others went for Ubuntu. Actually, I leave him pretty much alone and every so often I hear of problems he is having. Last night I saw his 6 year old install of XP which is now so wobbly it takes his OS about 4 minutes to get Firefox 3.5 started and see a usable window. Yikes! And this is with an old Dell 8250, probably about a 2.6GHz processor- a pretty decent machine. It's sad, but people get stuck in their ways...I saw some pretty bizarre stuff on that computer last night. I probably would not have the patience to try to get his XP all weeded out- and he is probably sooooo hacked by now. I've lost patience with Windows, especially with poorly run machines.

A perfect opportunity to reinstall XP from scratch or install win 7.

[Urmas]

A perfect opportunity to reinstall XP from scratch or install win 7.

Oh, joy. :'(

[Cluttermagnet]

A perfect opportunity to reinstall XP from scratch or install win 7.

I had him almost talked into a fresh install of XP to be done by me. That was nearly 2 years ago. He never got around to it, although I know he did purchase a personal copy of XP (probably an OEM version) for around 100 dollars at the time. There it sits... He had also agreed in principle to let me put Ubuntu on it, dual booting.Fast forward to the present. Clutter is very happy with Linux. Clutter loves the ease and convenience of installs, live CD sessions, updates, helper software downloads and installs, etc. The whole ball of wax is probably 1 to 2 orders of magnitude faster and easier than fighting Windows. And there it is- I so like Linux now and so dread going back to the Windows install nightmares and the Windows security merry go round that I can't really face it any more.At one time my friend was willing to pay me some serious money to do the work mentioned above. I'm not sure at this point that even the money would move me. And heaven knows I could use the extra money. But I just have so little patience for that Windows mess, any more.