First time for Linux... I guess

[Translucent_Daydream]

@Pedro

http://www.dosbox.com/
http://www.winehq.org/

Depending on your needs you’re probably better off running Windows in a virtual machine or dual booting.

Sweet. Yeah, I just want to make sure I can run the occasional Windows program should the need arise.

I already know how to run Dos Box, so thats cool too!

[Casserole]

Technically, Wine Is Not an Emulator. Just sayin’.

Correct, Ubuntu does not play mp3s by default, but if you have a working connection to the internet, the built-in player will pull up a nice dialogue and download and set it all up for you, no typing required. This is to adhere to Canonical’s promise of free software, and as Zeriel mentioned, there is no free implementation of the mp3 codec. .flac and .ogg will play out-of-the-box, though.

In this day and age, if you’re not doing any technical work on the computer (that is, you’re “sticking to the path”), you shouldn’t have to touch the terminal at all.

I also came in to post this: Linux is NOT Windows as a nice read before attempting to compare Linux and Windows, since there is no comparison.

[Epimetheus]

Ubuntu is good, but Mint is better if you want all of the media codecs installed. Mint is actually a variant (or flavor) of Ubuntu.

I’ve been using Ubuntu for years now, and just recently discovered Mint and enjoy it. (using it on my laptop actually, still have Ubuntu on my PC)

edit: I see somebody already brought up Mint. That will teach me to respond before reading all of the posts.

[Digital_Stimulus]

@StinkyBurrito

Digital Stimulus, I read your article. It was pretty good. Worth a read.

Thanks for giving it a look-see and confirming my opinion.

@Translucent_Daydream

I was reading on how to install the codecs from the command line on Ubuntu and Xubuntu, and I am not familiar with that style of command line syntax. I am assuming it is Unix.

You don’t mention what you were looking at, but I’ll assume it was apt-get. If so, FYI, that’s a Debian thing (and Ubuntu is a Debian derivative). There are a bunch of package tools available (e.g., yum), usually depending on (or specific to) the distro.

One thing to do to enable multimedia playing is just to install mplayer, well known to handle things other players cannot. (Personally, I use the SMPlayer frontend to mplayer, finding it preferable.)

All of the above are available in the repositories, and thus via apt-get. Although I suggest using synaptic, a GUI package manager front-end to the apt system (IIRC, available from the menu bar via System->Administration->Synaptic).

Also, you might as well type apt-get moo on the command line to see some super-cow powers…don’t ask me why it’s there, I’m just pointing it out…

[Least_Original_User_Name_Ever]

I’ve been having a devil of a time having an Asus Eee, running Linux, to hook up to the Internet. That sours my appreciation of Linux.

[Epimetheus]

@Least_Original_User_Name_Ever

I’ve been having a devil of a time having an Asus Eee, running Linux, to hook up to the Internet. That sours my appreciation of Linux.

Are you talking out of the box it has linux but still won’t connect to the internet or did you install it on their yourself?

[Hallucinex]

@Least_Original_User_Name_Ever

I’ve been having a devil of a time having an Asus Eee, running Linux, to hook up to the Internet. That sours my appreciation of Linux.

Not sure if you’ve already tried this or if it’s the one you’re using - but there’s the eeebuntu distro that’s apparently designed specifically for the eee’s - so might be set up a bit better for you out of the box.