Re: Desktop productivity with Debian GNU/LINUX

["nate" <debian-user@aphroland.org>]

John & Peg Pickard said:

> In short, will I be able to do something productive with Debian LINUX? And
> then I will want to network it with our laptop running WinME, and a

I don't believe your a good candidate for using debian on the desktop.
Perhaps SuSE, Mandrake or Xandros, despite being more propritary(sp),
they are a step in the right direction(towards more openness) compared to
most other platforms.

I reccomend SuSE professional(~$80), I use it on systems for people who
are less experienced, or linux newbies and aren't interested in learning
the details on how things work. SuSE Personal may work fine too, I just
like the extra stuff thats in the pro version.

I've been using debian as my desktop since 1998, and slackware before
that, with not too many issues. I purchase hardware specifically for linux,
I don't use a file manager, I don't use KDE/GNOME/some other fancy enviornment.

debian is a great system once it's setup, but the initial setup can take
some time depending on the hardware involved. And some of the desktop
software in stable is "outdated". Some like to use testing or unstable
as a solution to this but I prefer to stick to stable, and don't reccomend
newbies to the other trees since they are, less tested.

SuSE may suit you well though, it has a lot of bells and whistles, though
despite using it off and on for 6 months it doesn't satisfy my needs on
a more technical level, so the rest of my family uses it, while I stick
to debian.


nate