From: Jacek <balcersk@...>
Date: 2005-11-22T04:57:24+09:00
Subject: Re: [OT] Trying to change my OS from Windows to Linux/Mac

Sam Kong wrote:
> Hello, Ruby people!
> 
> This is not about Ruby itself but about OS.
> The reason that I ask this question in this group is that I've been
> motivated to use other OS's than Windows by this group while I learned
> Ruby.
> Thus the people in this group can answer my question very well.
> Also, I feel very comfortable with people in this group, even if I
> don't know them personally.
> (I feel like they are my friends.)
> This question is not meant to bring flame wars!
> 
> I use Windows at my work and home.
> Of course, I tried several linux OS's (RedHat, SUSE, Debian, Gentoo,
> Ubuntu) and this year I even purchased Mini Mac.
> However, I haven't succeeded to make myself used to these OS's.
> 
> I have some questions to linux users and Mac users.
> 
> 1. When you use Ruby on Linux or just in general on Linux, do you use
> text-mode or graphic-mode?
Most developers I gues uses some sort of GUI (GNOME/KDE/WINDOW 
MAKER/....). When we discuss about Ruby developing some people feel
better using text tools like Emacs/Vi some are using kind of IDE: KDE 
Developer/Arachno/Eclipse RDT etc.
I prefer KDE with EMACS/Eclipse but it is just me:)
> 
> 2. I've never succeeded to make my laptops work perfectly on Linux.
> Sometimes, network card is not working, other times, USB is not
> recognized, or Sound card is not working. I've tried on 5 different
> laptops with different Linux but none was perfect. How do you overcome
> this problem? Well... if you use just a text-mode, this might not be a
> problem.
Well comming from Windows it is not as simple as many Linux fans would 
like it to be. Sometimes, I guess, they forgot about problems thay have 
had. Some are smart enough to underestimate problems normal people will 
fight against. Linux is not Windows at all. Installing linux is not as 
simple as windows becouse of those little tricks that everybody "should 
know".
Let me consider situation, installing video driver on Fedora:
1) Should I use NVidia script or Livna packages or standard ones? 3h of 
reading
2) When I install  new kernel linux stops - why ? becouse boot was in 
grap. mode and old drivers is not working anymore. 3h of reading how to
install new driver, how to even switch from grap. boot to standard. etc.
3) Driver is not working properly - After 1h of reading google I have 
found that this version of NVidia driver is well.... a crap
4) and so on and so on. This same with music drivers, mounting drives,
using smb, installing printer, etc.
Hej people this is not the start point of discussion. What I am trying 
to say is: Linux is great but it hard (a little) to begin with.
> 
> 3. For Mac users, do you feel OK with the simple mouse? Probably I'm
> too accustomed to Windows mouse. Whenever I use Mac, I miss the
> right-button and scroll-wheel.
> 
> If anybody has experience of moving from Windows to Linux or Mac,
> please share the success story.

Well. This is whole new world waiting for you. Depends on what person 
you are.
If you are develeper I assume you should be curious about linux. It so 
much better platform for writing code. I can not imagine working without 
linux bash or Emacs:)

> Thanks.
> 
> Sam
> 
Cheers, Jacek