SuSe Linux 9 experience
Join Date: Sep 2002
Location: Chichester, UK
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OK - I don't really know details for the pieces of software that you mention, other than Lotus support for Linux is not great (despite all the money IBM spend advertising Linux!). However, there is a great piece of software called VMWare which allows you to run a Windows 'virtual machine' from within Linux (you can boot Windows in a window on a Linux machine, and run native Windows software in that - I use it to run Office XP and Lotus Notes on my Linux PC at work). Highly recommended.
Virus protection isn't needed at present - there are proof-of-concept viruses that will infect Linux, but none of them are a problem in the wild. The Linux security model means that, assuming you are sensible, trojans are not an issue because general users don't have permission to do anything damaging to the machine. Security holes are more of a problem (as are trojans that exploit them) but are still rare for personal use - most holes are in software that is of professional interest, web servers and the like. These can be patched using YaST online update. The "out of the box" security settings seem very good in SuSE 9, although I haven't explored them in detail.
Finally, Linux is free - you're just paying SuSE for the cost of the CD and for customer support. You can use one set of disks to install on as many PCs as you like, although support options may be more limited. If you want customer support for multiple PCs they may ask for more money.
Virus protection isn't needed at present - there are proof-of-concept viruses that will infect Linux, but none of them are a problem in the wild. The Linux security model means that, assuming you are sensible, trojans are not an issue because general users don't have permission to do anything damaging to the machine. Security holes are more of a problem (as are trojans that exploit them) but are still rare for personal use - most holes are in software that is of professional interest, web servers and the like. These can be patched using YaST online update. The "out of the box" security settings seem very good in SuSE 9, although I haven't explored them in detail.
Finally, Linux is free - you're just paying SuSE for the cost of the CD and for customer support. You can use one set of disks to install on as many PCs as you like, although support options may be more limited. If you want customer support for multiple PCs they may ask for more money.
Plastic PPRuNer
Thread Starter
Well Charlie S - Evo has answered pretty much all the points you raised. Laptops used to be a bit iffy with Linux since they often have non-standard hardware for which drivers can be hard to find. That said, on a older laptop like yours 9.1 will probably have the drivers anyway.
I replaced 9.0 on one of my machines with 9.1 and was a bit miffed when the upgrade didn't go as smoothly as I expected. Nathing drastic, far better than trying to "upgrade" Windows but enough to be annoying. Saved my HOME and did a clean reinstall which fixed everything up (except OpenGL on my Matrox P650 card). nVidia are the only people who have really solid Linux drivers and support.
Was it worth going from 9.0 to 9.1 - not really. I don't notice any real speed increase, KDE 3.2 is better than 3.1, but 3.1 worked just fine anyway. A couple of utility apps that I liked seem to be broken by the new kernel* but everything else runs just fine.
*I probably just need to recompile them using an older library.
I still don't think much of Konqueror as a web browser, in spite of a lot of improvements and I would suggest that you download and install Firefox (rather than the oldish version of Mozilla that SuSE include).
As regards running Windows programs you might consider downloading/ordering Codeweavers Crossover Office - at $29 it isn't cheap, but it does let you run a LOT of Windows programs under Linux. Otherwise you can see how you get along with Wine (which I've used very little).
Keep us posted and
Welcome to the free world!
I replaced 9.0 on one of my machines with 9.1 and was a bit miffed when the upgrade didn't go as smoothly as I expected. Nathing drastic, far better than trying to "upgrade" Windows but enough to be annoying. Saved my HOME and did a clean reinstall which fixed everything up (except OpenGL on my Matrox P650 card). nVidia are the only people who have really solid Linux drivers and support.
Was it worth going from 9.0 to 9.1 - not really. I don't notice any real speed increase, KDE 3.2 is better than 3.1, but 3.1 worked just fine anyway. A couple of utility apps that I liked seem to be broken by the new kernel* but everything else runs just fine.
*I probably just need to recompile them using an older library.
I still don't think much of Konqueror as a web browser, in spite of a lot of improvements and I would suggest that you download and install Firefox (rather than the oldish version of Mozilla that SuSE include).
As regards running Windows programs you might consider downloading/ordering Codeweavers Crossover Office - at $29 it isn't cheap, but it does let you run a LOT of Windows programs under Linux. Otherwise you can see how you get along with Wine (which I've used very little).
Keep us posted and
Welcome to the free world!
Join Date: May 2004
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I have been using Linux on and off for a few years now, but recently it has really started to be a realistic replacement for Windows. I am using Mandrake Linux, with OpenOffice, and it does just about everything I need. It does take a bit of getting used to, but it's better than it was.
'nough said
Join Date: Sep 2002
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Thought I might revive this thread since I decided to wipe my laptop of anything Micro$oft in favour of a linux distro.
I have a copy of suse 8, wanted to download 9.3 but even on my 1mb bband it was quoting over 7hrs download (3.1gb) - so instead I went for what seems to be the in-distro of the moment - Ubuntu (700Mb).
And wow, what a sleek installation, what a nice interface and a very very usable system - and so far (fingers crossed) my laptop is not crashing like it was before (probably due to a trojan or something).
In short, if you're looking for an easy way in to Linux try Ubuntu - more info here:
http://distrowatch.com/
Download links:
http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=ubuntu
I have a copy of suse 8, wanted to download 9.3 but even on my 1mb bband it was quoting over 7hrs download (3.1gb) - so instead I went for what seems to be the in-distro of the moment - Ubuntu (700Mb).
And wow, what a sleek installation, what a nice interface and a very very usable system - and so far (fingers crossed) my laptop is not crashing like it was before (probably due to a trojan or something).
In short, if you're looking for an easy way in to Linux try Ubuntu - more info here:
http://distrowatch.com/
Download links:
http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=ubuntu
Plastic PPRuNer
Thread Starter
Ubuntu is indeed an excellent distro....
http://www.ubuntulinux.org/
I am proud to say that Ubuntu is South African inspired and led - Mark Shuttleworth (S.A. astronaut and coder) has been the chief architect of the concept of Ubuntu Linux.
Guadalinex is a Debian based GNU/Linux distribution promoted by the government of Andalusia (Spain). It's used in schools, public libraries, centers for elderly people and special info centers on over 100,000 PCs. Recently, Guadalinex announced that the next version would be based on Ubuntu.
See http://www.ubuntulinux.org/guadalinex for a translation of their justification.
http://www.ubuntulinux.org/
I am proud to say that Ubuntu is South African inspired and led - Mark Shuttleworth (S.A. astronaut and coder) has been the chief architect of the concept of Ubuntu Linux.
Guadalinex is a Debian based GNU/Linux distribution promoted by the government of Andalusia (Spain). It's used in schools, public libraries, centers for elderly people and special info centers on over 100,000 PCs. Recently, Guadalinex announced that the next version would be based on Ubuntu.
See http://www.ubuntulinux.org/guadalinex for a translation of their justification.
I put Mepis in an old laptop. Wow ! I have never used Linux before and found the installation great. It even found my Netgear wi-fi Pcmica card and worked straight off. It also has heaps of software bundled with it .
I use Kanotix Linux. It's a Knoppix derived distribution compiled for later generations of Intel processors (i686 & later) & other hardware. Kanotix is more amenable to HD installations than Knoppix. It has even managed to get my laptop's winmodem working, something most other distributions I've tried failed to do.
Knoppix, in turn is a Debian based distribution optimised for running from a CD-Rom (ie it doesn't need to be installed to a HD) with renowned hardware detection.
Knoppix, in turn is a Debian based distribution optimised for running from a CD-Rom (ie it doesn't need to be installed to a HD) with renowned hardware detection.
Plastic PPRuNer
Thread Starter
Welcome to Linux freedom!
See
http://cert.uni-stuttgart.de/archive.../msg00125.html
which addresses exactly your question.
Mac
Linux User # 302442
See
http://cert.uni-stuttgart.de/archive.../msg00125.html
which addresses exactly your question.
Mac
Linux User # 302442
