psycho$hell

UPDATE: Thanks Diggers for all of your spelling and punctuation alerts.

So Amanda has been watching me use my computer for years. She's seen the evolution of my computer usage over time as I have transitioned from OS to OS. When I started using Linux she called it the black hole for it's color and ability to gain my sole attention for hours on end, and with no tangible results, seemingly to her. I was solely using Gentoo then.

My Linux usage only grew and grew since then. I've attempted to gain as much knowledge of it as I can, fettered only by incompatible hardware. FOSS (Free Open Source Software) being free helps, I can install any application and start using/learning without forking out a bunch of money. With most other software, I've noticed, this ease can only be obtained illegally.

More and more, Amanda has been observing my usage of Linux, and naturally she's made comparisons against her windows operating system. She complains about the frequent problems, the fact that I have to reinstall once a year, and it's general stability. She never sees me go though these things, as she did when I was a windows user.

Now I have none of those problems. No viruses. No spy ware. No malware. No Proprietary software vendors releasing unstable code, not any of it. I don't ever have to go to cnet or zdnet to download shite ware. No more clicking through a pile of links to finally find an installer at the bottom, which, when installed, had to be uninstalled because the software didn't do what It said.

Beryl was all it took though. When I started using beryl and the desktop cube, my productivity increased slightly, if only because I enjoyed using my computer more. It was more fulfilling and because of a stupid wobbly window and graphical effects. A friend of mine who specialized in Psychology of UI (User Interfaces) tried to explain the reasons, but I don't really care.

As the Windows problems continued to occur, Amanda became Jealous of my Operating system. She had to have it. So over the next month I had to ask myself all the proper questions and find the answers to them in order to transition cleanly and with few problems as possible. Some of those questions are as follows:

UPDATE: Thanks Diggers for all of your spelling and punctuation alerts.

So Amanda has been watching me use my computer for years. She's seen the evolution of my computer usage over time as I have transitioned from OS to OS. When I started using Linux she called it the black hole for it's color and ability to gain my sole attention for hours on end, and with no tangible results, seemingly to her. I was solely using Gentoo then.

My Linux usage only grew and grew since then. I've attempted to gain as much knowledge of it as I can, fettered only by incompatible hardware. FOSS (Free Open Source Software) being free helps, I can install any application and start using/learning without forking out a bunch of money. With most other software, I've noticed, this ease can only be obtained illegally.

More and more, Amanda has been observing my usage of Linux, and naturally she's made comparisons against her windows operating system. She complains about the frequent problems, the fact that I have to reinstall once a year, and it's general stability. She never sees me go though these things, as she did when I was a windows user.

Now I have none of those problems. No viruses. No spy ware. No malware. No Proprietary software vendors releasing unstable code, not any of it. I don't ever have to go to cnet or zdnet to download shite ware. No more clicking through a pile of links to finally find an installer at the bottom, which, when installed, had to be uninstalled because the software didn't do what It said.

Beryl was all it took though. When I started using beryl and the desktop cube, my productivity increased slightly, if only because I enjoyed using my computer more. It was more fulfilling and because of a stupid wobbly window and graphical effects. A friend of mine who specialized in Psychology of UI (User Interfaces) tried to explain the reasons, but I don't really care.

As the Windows problems continued to occur, Amanda became Jealous of my Operating system. She had to have it. So over the next month I had to ask myself all the proper questions and find the answers to them in order to transition cleanly and with few problems as possible. Some of those questions are as follows:

• What happens if she wants to edit a pspimage file (PaintShopPro)?
• What graphics editor can she use that's closest to what she's used to?
• What will she use as a Media Library?
• Does she visit any pages that require Internet Explorer?
• Is Linux going to prevent her from exhibiting her normail computer usage?

I gathered the answers to these questions and more. I decided I was ready and downloaded the Gutsy Gibbon Kubuntu Beta iso and burned it. Upon install I left the windows partition intact an used the remaining 80G partition for Ubuntu. The install crashed a couple of times but I got through it eventually, this is the Beta Version.

After Installation I saw nothing but problems with the X windowing system freezing and locking up the virtual consoles as well. I thought I had made a bad decision. After two days of trying to get X not to freeze I decided to back track a little and use feisty.

Download and burn. The feisty installer didn't crash once, and everything was installed as Mentioned. I shared her Home directory over nfs from a softraid mirrored partition. I mounted that directory on her new machine and created her user account.

I introduced Amanda to Amarok, Crossover office (for the running of psp 8 & flash), Krita Koffice graphics editor, and of course the KDE Control Center. Once done I left her to use the system for a couple of days. I was trying to get a feel for her initial impression of Linux and it usage.

The first thing she said about Linux regarding her impressions of it was "I don't miss Windows!" Yes! One of my goals had been accomplished. She mentions that she likes beryl and KDE. She enjoys using it just as I did, something she hadn't found in windows. She asked me a simple question that I didn't have the answer to, "If Linux is free, and has all these wonderful features and benefits, then why can't Microsoft [who get's paid] build an operating system with good features, stability, and is usable?"

I hadn't shown her how to install software yet. When I showed her the Add/Remove Applications section, and told her that all the software she'd ever need is in this single window, she flipped. She couldn't comprehend the ability to install software with out 20 clicks on several pages and a stupid installer. "What! you don't have to reboot!? What! You can install any number of programs at one time!?," I then realized that I had forgotten the woe's of Windows.