People forget all this factors, which are correct and true.
On Sat, Oct 29, 2011 at 4:34 AM, Ralf Mardorf
<ralf.mardorf@alice-dsl.net> wrote:
A good Linux distro for beginners is a Linux distro with a huge
community, IOW a distro that is used by many people and that comes with
lot's of up to date forums, wikis etc., hence a good distro for
beginners would be one of the major distros, any exotic distro in most
cases isn't useful for a beginner.
There are some exceptions, I e.g. already mentioned CNC and DAW.
So you know that PCLinuxOS is not having a huge community but you said you don't know about it! Is this a contradiction?
If a distro mimicries Windows it's completely bad for beginners, because
this always leads to misunderstandings. Linux isn't Windows. Linux isn't
a C64. Linux isn't ... Linux is Linux.
Correct, but Windows users all of a sudden cannot jump into the great
ocean of Linux, they first need something to which they can sustain and
then finally take the more heights. Example: If you know swimming a
little, can you directly be thrown into the ocean to swim? Nope because
you can get immersed in it but before actually swimming in the ocean you
do need a training to swim first in ponds, rivers, etc....
I won't sound rude. IMO a beginner should use Ubuntu, Suse, Debian,
Fedora ... those major distros are made for averaged users and they
usually work OOTB. Especially Ubuntu has ggot a huge community with
lot's of up to date wikis, forums etc..
Nice and correct but I don't know why do you hate with openSUSE, like
Debian, their community too is one of the nicest known in open source OS
world AND people acknowledges this fact.
IMO it isn't wise to recommend an exotic distro.
I always have the impression that Debian as well as openSUSE are very
good but that's doesn't meant that I can say anything of other distros.
We must maintain humanity and code of conduct.
On Sat, Oct 29, 2011 at 4:45 AM, Ralf Mardorf
<ralf.mardorf@alice-dsl.net> wrote:
Too funny, for distrowatch it's a major distro, OTOH if you google for
troubleshooting, e.g. regarding to a bug for an app, without using the
distro's name for the search, you'll get hits for other distros, but
PCLinuxOS
Might be it is new and the people handling it would take sometime. But
that doesn't mean to say low of other distros! Did you tried PCLinuxOS? I
tried and it is radically simple and awesome. And still having things for other people (who are not beginners).
It is in the list of major distros at Distrowatch.com. What more you want?
On Sat, Oct 29, 2011 at 10:38 AM, Doug
<dmcgarrett@optonline.net> wrote:
I wouldn't call PCLinuxOS an exotic distro. Until recently it was number 5 on the most used Linux distro list.
(I don't know where it is today.) It has a Forum that usually answers questions within hours. It works out of
the box, with very minor tweaks--you probably want to unlock the "widgits"--icons to most people--so that you
can move them around to suit yourself and add icons from the menu. If it looks quite a bit like Windows,
that makes a lot of sense. Windows has developed from the original Xerox research over about 30 years,
and everybody is used to it. (That may not be true for Win 8, but W8 is not here yet.) Just because some
distros have gone bonkers with their screen displays doesn't mean everybody--or even anybody--has to like
that nonsense. With the exception of the above writer, I haven't really heard anyone badmouth pclos. It's
a great distro, and I've been using it for about 18 months now, having run from SuSE in 2010 after a batch
of problems with it. I use the KDE version.
I do agree.
I have looked at a number of other distros, including Debian--I don't like their politics; Ubuntu--there's one
distro that believes that just because it's possible to do something, it should be done--also the devs seem
to have done their absolute best (or worst) to make sure there's nothing reminiscent of Windows about it;
Kubuntu--when I looked at it about a year ago, I puked, don't know what it looks like now, and don't care;
Mint--very nice when I last looked; Zorin--also nice, and had the capability of looking very much like XP, if
you wanted it to, or like Gnome 2. Most distros now have several desktops available: you may have to
choose *before* you download the live version which one you want--or perhaps not, depending.
Advice: get a live CD or DVD and try whatever you're thinking about using. See if you can add things that
you want and have them work: *your* printer(s), your scanner, sound, both in headphones and on speakers,
video--make sure that both sound and video work from whatever sources you normally use, including CDs,
MP3s, YouTube, etc. Sound and video seem to be the weak points in some distros, so look carefully at
them. Look especially for software that lets you run "protected" DVDs, if you're going to want to view them.
(When I dumped SuSE, one of the reasons was that I never got a peep out of the speakers, no matter
what the source, and all the answers on their list didn't help. That may be fixed, by now, but I'm not going
back.) If you like to have the familiar icons of some common programs, see if the distro will let you do that,
or only give you clones or imitations. Make sure that the pdf reader works, and that it prints properly to
your standard size paper. You should be able to install Adobe Reader--some distros don't have it in the repo,
and it may be a hassle to get it, if you want it. (There are FOSS readers; I like what I know works.)
I'm sure others will have some other recommendations, and some will quarrel with what I have said above.
To each his own, as the song says. There are certainly some folks who like what I hate, and some who hate
what I like, and I have no gripe with that. Just so long as I don't have to use theirs, I wouldn't force them to
use mine.
I do agree with you and give Live CDs a trial. Thanks.
On Sat, Oct 29, 2011 at 3:03 PM, Ralf Mardorf
<ralf.mardorf@alice-dsl.net> wrote:
I experienced the best howtos for Ubuntu and Arch. I never used Arch,
but the howtos helped me a lot. My recommendation for beginners would be
Ubuntu, while I don't know Unity or GNOME3. For good reasons I switched
from Ubuntu back to Debian, but for beginners Ubuntu has some
advantages.
Oh I see, Ubuntu could be a great choice because it also recognizes all the hardware without a problem.