Ubuntu

Last evening I was talking to a friend and got around to telling him about Ubuntu. He started to listen up, when I started talking about “free”.

Of course, to many people free is an attractive sounding option. What I like about free in this case is the freedom to download what you want when you want to, and install it.

Now, in the case of Linux distributions the last part has often been the real issue. For the beginner it has meant jumping through a number of hoops, most of which perhaps seemed like double Dutch.

With Ubuntu this has, for the most part, changed. It really is user-friendly. There are more and more drivers available for peripherals. I was personally very surprised when I installed Ubuntu onto this laptop on which I’m now writing, and it found the wireless card right away.

I have an older PC upon which I wanted to re-installed Windows XP. When purchased it came with a recovery partition. However, the drive has failed and there is no way to re-install Windows. It came with no seperate recovery CD.

The only way I can do this to purchase, for over $30, a copy of the Windows CD for the machine – a Compaq – from the HP web site. Then we have all the activation nonsense to deal with again, which it will possibly fail, as since purchase, most parts of the machine have been upgraded. This is something I do on a regular basis; it extends the life of a machine, and is cheaper than purchasing a new one.

With Ubuntu, I don’t have any of these issues. I simply use an existing CD, or I can go to the Ubuntu web site and download and burn a new copy. Failing all else, I can order a copy of the Ubuntu CD from their web site, and it will arrive in a few weeks, completely free.

On a daily basis, Ubuntu will not only update itself, but all the packages on the system, so no need to have extra utilities running, for auto-dates of anti-virus scanners as an example. (On a basic home user’s set up, you don’t need Anti-Virus software anyway, but rather a decent firewall).

As more and more applications come along, Ubuntu really can offer, not only a much less expensive option to set up a system -remember when you buy a PC that copy of windows on it, isn’t really free, it’s added into the price – but a complete user friendly package for the average user.

Ubuntu comes with a whole range of pre-installed software from a web browser, to instant messengers, and MS Office compatible software. In fact, Open Office, leads the way in ISO document standards, and Microsoft are only now bleating to the ISO about having their formats recognized. Open Office reads and writes its own format, but will also read AND write MS Office formats as well, allowing users full portability between other systems and users.