[CLUE-Tech] information

[Matt Gushee]

Just a couple of quick responses to Adam regarding the different 
distributions, then on to the main question--why use Linux rather 
than Windows?  

On 30 May 2003 at 0:13, Adam Bultman wrote:

> Red Hat:
> Package management: RPMs.

> Debian:  
> Pkg. Mgmt: .debs, installed with apt-get.

Of course, that's all Greek to someone who has never used Linux. 
There are a couple of important differences between RPM, which is 
used by Red Hat and several other distributions, and the system used 
by Debian and a couple others. First of all, the Debian system has a 
more sophisticated scheme for dependencies (i.e. determining, for any 
given package A, what other packages you may need to install first.). 
With RPM, you have  

    Package A		requires		Package B

or not--with the consequence that a lot of packages are tagged as 
"required" when they're not strictly necessary. Debian has  

    Package A		requires		Package B
    Package A		recommends	Package B
    Package A		suggests		Package B

In general, Debian gives you more information and more choices, which 
is great if you want a heavily customized system, but probably 
overwhelming for new users.  

>  Somewhat harder to use,

On what basis are you judging distributions hard or easy to use? As a 
former RedHat and current Debian user who has flirted with SuSE, 
Caldera, and Turbo, I don't think your choice of distribution makes a 
bit of difference in the ease or difficulty of everyday use: it all 
depends what software you install.  

> Suse:
> Pkg. Mgmt:  RPMs.   Installs quite a bit of software (I haven't used it 
> recently, either).  Desktop oriented, easy to use.

In my experience, SuSE seems to have better support for new hardware. 
I think they are rather pragmatic in dealing with vendors, whereas 
RedHat and some other distributions are more concerned about being 
purely Free Software.

On 29 May 2003 at 21:34, Kevin Cullis wrote:  

> The simpliest issue: Linux is great for DIFYers (Do It For 
Yourself),
> but the differing "distros" that are offered, like Red Hat, provide 
a
> bundle of things to get you started.

Yes, and each one tends to provide a slightly different bundle. It's 
mostly small stuff, though, like configuration and system 
administration tools.

> If we all drove a Ford, there
> would not be much competition, but because Linux is Open Source, 
ANYONE
> can create their own, thus the DIFY perspective.

I think it's worth pointing out that open source (AKA free software) 
has some important benefits even if you never want to personally get 
under the hood and tweak things.

  1) Your rights:
      When you obtain a copy of Linux or other open source software,
      *you own that copy of the software*, and you can legally do  
      almost anything you want with it. You can install it on 2, 3,  
      or 500 computers; you can give copies to all your friends, and 
      so on. Of course, many people do just that with Windows .... so
      it's more an ethical issue than a practical one. That's 
      important to many people in the Linux community though, and I 
      think it matters to many of the people who copy Windows, too,
      though sometimes they may not want to admit it to themselves.
  2) Support:
      Though you don't usually get professional tech support for 
      Linux without paying extra, the informal support from fellow
      users is surprisingly good. Of course there are no guarantees, 
      but when you ask a technical question on a mailing list like
      this one (provided, of course, that you are courteous and 
      reasonably focused), you almost always get at least one good
      answer within a few hours. And you might be concerned about
      falling victim to someone's bad advice, but in practice that's 
      seldom a problem, because there are usually people in these  
      forums with a really thorough understanding of various aspects  
      of Linux--because it's open source, anyone who's interested is 
      free to dig in deep and learn the ins and outs of the system--
      and many of these experts are happy to share what they know.  
      And when someone does give out wrong information, they       
      will usually be corrected in short order by a more 
      knowledgeable person.
  3) Diversity:
      In general, Linux offers more choices: different ways of doing 
      work, different desktop styles, different programs to solve the
      same problem. Of course, more choices means you need to put 
      more effort into choosing, and not everyone likes that.

Finally, there's the robustness/reliability issue. I haven't used 
WinXP at all, so maybe it's better than previous versions, but a 
properly configured Linux system very rarely crashes. And there's no 
more of this nonsense of rebooting every time you install new 
software.

-- 
Matt Gushee
Englewood, CO USA