# Goodbye Cruel Windows-Hello Ubuntu! **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 29, 2006, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/goodbye-cruel-windows-hello-ubuntu/386035 "2006-12-29T22:09:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/goodbye-cruel-windows-hello-ubuntu/386035/21 "2007-01-06T00:23:08Z")
[QUOTE=amarinth] I used to think that way - it seems so nice, so clean, so free of encumberances. And Ubuntu itself is easy to install. (Actually, I’ve never had problems installing any flavor of Linux - but then, I’ve also never had problems installing Windows, either.) Then, I’ll need to install some piece of software onto it … and I find that among the “encumberances” that I was now free of were minor things like “lists of dependencies,” “testing,” and “documentation.” “Human Computer Interaction”?ha. So, after spending days tracking down error after error after error and still not getting something running - I’d switch back to the system that thinks I was an idiot but manages to install and run in under 5 minutes and all I have to do is click “yes” a lot. Sad enough on Windows programs - but this also happens equally as frequently with programs originally designed for and intended to be run on Linux. [/QUOTE] Certainly your experience is not an uncommon one - I’ve heard lots of people say this and for a time, it was my experience too, however, it’s getting to be more and more the case that the software I want is already listed in Synaptic (which handles dependencies automatically, most of the time), or I can find a standalone .deb package which will install it for me. When it works (which is happening an increasing percentage of the time), installation of software under many Linux distributions is easier and more reliable than it is on Windows. If you want to install something that is only available as source, and it requires a whole bunch of different libraries from here, there and everywhere, then it’s hard work - impossibly hard to the Windows user, doubly hard because you can’t always find an experienced Linux user with the patience to explain it to you. ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/goodbye-cruel-windows-hello-ubuntu/386035/22 "2007-01-06T00:51:07Z")
I certainly can sympathise with the situation described by **amarinth**. One thing I’d love to be doing in Linux is sound recording and audio processing, and I’ve made numerous attempts to get set up to do this. But despite my external sound module being recognised in Ubuntu, it causes Audacity to crash…and the thread I started on the Ubuntu forums has been along the lines of “me too”. Oh, and my laser printer doesn’t work. Apart from that, I love Linux 😉 ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/goodbye-cruel-windows-hello-ubuntu/386035/23 "2007-01-06T01:10:09Z")
There is an interview with Ubuntu’s producer Mark Shuttleworth in You Tube: [![]( " - YouTube") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rZXm5ICL4I) ---
**Author:** ![threemae](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/5f9b8f/32.png) [@threemae](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/threemae)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/goodbye-cruel-windows-hello-ubuntu/386035/24 "2007-01-06T01:30:25Z")
Well damn, you Linux people sure showed us PC fan-boys what an immediately useful and productive piece of software Linux can be! Also, is this the DRM issue being alluded to by others? > **[On Windows Vista, DRM, and new monitors](https://arstechnica.com/uncategorized/2005/08/hdcp-vista/)** > > With Windows Vista due to arrive in 2006, questions are arising as to how it … I don’t see how Linux would be better off if it can play HD content at all that has been encrypted with HDCP. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/goodbye-cruel-windows-hello-ubuntu/386035/25 "2007-01-06T01:37:19Z")
[QUOTE=threemae] Well damn, you Linux people sure showed us PC fan-boys what an immediately useful and productive piece of software Linux can be! [/QUOTE] Eh? What is this ‘PC’ thing that you present as an alternative to Linux? ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/goodbye-cruel-windows-hello-ubuntu/386035/26 "2007-01-06T01:38:17Z")
[QUOTE=GIGObuster] There is an interview with Ubuntu’s producer Mark Shuttleworth in You Tube: ![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/8rZXm5ICL4I/maxresdefault.jpg)https://www.youtube.com/embed/8rZXm5ICL4I?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque [/QUOTE] I like the expert’s comment “if something goes wrong, who do you call?” With Windows, isn’t that normally your workmate’s-son-who-knows-about-computers, or similar? ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/goodbye-cruel-windows-hello-ubuntu/386035/27 "2007-01-06T03:31:03Z")
I’ve never owned a Windows PC, but even The Rest Of Us don’t really have brains as part of our computer hardware 😛 Congratulations, though, for trying something new. May it serve you well. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/goodbye-cruel-windows-hello-ubuntu/386035/28 "2007-01-06T04:28:34Z")
[QUOTE=Improv Geek] I think this is a bit unfair. Linux is built so that those who want to really tinker with the software for their system can do so. Your issue is that it requires a bit more know how than Windows. [/QUOTE] But that’s exactly what he said. So how was his comment “unfair”? ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 7:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/goodbye-cruel-windows-hello-ubuntu/386035/29 "2007-01-06T07:51:43Z")
My Ubuntu box is currently torn apart for some hardware reconfigurations, but I like it waaay better than Windows. Yeah, it’s got some quirks and I’ve got this 1,000 page book on it that I haven’t had time to go through and read yet and I haven’t figured out how to get it working with a WiFi connection yet, but hell, it took me a while to get the hang of Win95 when it first came out. IMHO, one of the coolest things about Ubuntu is the package manager, if I need to update a program, I use the package manager, it goes out, grabs the program, and any other software I might need to run it and installs it all. Tres cool. Oh, **Captain\_C** , if you ask around on the Ubuntu forums, there’s emulators specifically written to allow you to play Windows games. You won’t be able to play the latest high system demanding games, but apparently, you _can_ get a good number of them running under Linux/Ubuntu. I’ve also heard, that one of the “features” of Vista is that it immediately seeks out other PCs running Vista and makes “friends” with them. Supposed to be more sophisticated than simple file sharing and what not. I’m thinking that this is quickly going to turn out to be a **major** security hole. ---
**Author:** ![threemae](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/5f9b8f/32.png) [@threemae](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/threemae)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 8:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/goodbye-cruel-windows-hello-ubuntu/386035/30 "2007-01-06T08:07:25Z")
[QUOTE=Tuckerfan] I’ve also heard, that one of the “features” of Vista is that it immediately seeks out other PCs running Vista and makes “friends” with them. Supposed to be more sophisticated than simple file sharing and what not. I’m thinking that this is quickly going to turn out to be a **major** security hole. [/QUOTE] Cite? Given all of the attention paid by Microsoft towards security in recent patches of XP SP2 and Vista, I rather doubt this. ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2007, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/goodbye-cruel-windows-hello-ubuntu/386035/31 "2007-01-06T13:24:08Z")
[QUOTE=threemae] Cite? Given all of the attention paid by Microsoft towards security in recent patches of XP SP2 and Vista, I rather doubt this. [/QUOTE] It was discussed on one of Leo Laporte’s podcasts, which one and when it was “aired,” I don’t remember. And while Microsoft has improved their security practices as of late, they have completely written the network stack for Vista from scratch (rather than building upon that in XP), so it’s vulnerabilities in the wild are somewhat unknown. I’m sure that Microsoft has done their best to make it secure, but until Vista’s been out and hammered at by hackers from every angle, we won’t be able to say how secure Vista is. Same with any OS that’s undergone a similar development process. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/goodbye-cruel-windows-hello-ubuntu/386035.md?page=1)