Jul 11
27
Which Version of Linux Should I Use?
Many business and home computer problems can be solved by simply switching from Windows XP or Windows 7 to Linux. If you are considering trying Linux, Which version should you try?
Linux Mint LTS is the best Linux choice.
Before you fire up your e-mail client to send me a nasty-gram, follow my thoughts.
Linux offers reliability, stability, and frugality.
It has a rich range of applications, yet can run on computers considered obsolete by Windows users. The majority of software is free, as is Linux. Free in the sense of free speech (you can see how it works, and change it to suit your needs) and free as in beer. Most distribution of Linux are free, and the only cost is professional support.
There are dozens, if not hundreds of Linux distributions. A distribution (or distro) is a collection of Linux tools, utilities, drivers and applications assembled as a single CD or DVD that contain someone’s idea of a perfect Linux install. Many have a specific target in mind. It may be specifically designed as a web server, file server, firewall, Proxy server or a desktop PC like most users and businesses want.
Some Linux Versions are More Equal than Others
A visit to the Distro Watch web site reveals that a few distributions rule.
At the moment the top distros are: Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Fedora, Debian and Open Suse.
Here is a quick summary of each:
- Ubuntu – Designed for the desktop user, and very popular
- Linux Mint – Based on Ubuntu, but focusing on getting users moving from Windows working quicky.
- Fedora – Popular and well supported, but it is the guinea pig for new ideas before they are incorporated in Red Hat Linux.
- Debian – Reliable, and the base for many other versions, including Ubuntu. But it is not beginner friendly
- Open Suse - A reliable desktop, but now quite main-stream and perhaps lacking is support.
So my choice is Linux Mint. It is easy to install, has lots of support and is new user friendly. Because it is based on Ubuntu, both the Ubuntu and Mint community can help with problems. There is a wide range of software available. It looks nice.
But notice that I said Linux Mint LTS. Ubuntu and Mint each release a version every two years that they promise to support for three years. This means you can install one of these versions and not have to worry about updating it for at least three years. This is perfect if you want a computer that just works, and works, and works.
That describes the average business and home user.
So I recommend installing Linux Mint 9 LTS. It will be supported until the middle of 2013 with patches, updates and fixes. After that time it will be relatively simple, and free, to upgrade to the next version.
angry-linux-tux – by oddsock – http://www.flickr.com/photos/oddsock/
Posted in Linux by .
Use Linux and help save the environment
Discussing using Linux instead of Windows PCs or MAC computers tends to quickly dissolve into holy wars and name calling. But one real advantage of using Linux on your PC is that it is eco-friendly.
The simple truth is that the computer industry contributes large quantities of material to landfill. Recycling efforts are being made. But computers and peripherals contain a number of highly toxic elements including lead, cadmium, beryllium, mercury, and brominated flame retardants. Even in Australia recycling or disposal of e-waste involves significant risk to workers and communities. Charities and schools may use older computers, but most computers don’t die, they just fade away.
Linux can help save the world by keeping older computers running long past what is normally considered there life expectancy.
Windows and built in obsolescence
Windows needs to be updated regularly because of security issues. Years ago I paid almost $4000 for a Toshiba laptop with 64Mb of RAM and a 200Mhz processor. It did what I needed it to do. It is still running, but I cannot connect it to the Internet because Windows ’98 is far from secure. It is a white elephant. Each Windows PC needs to be upgraded to the next version of Windows, and is rarely able to cope with the minimum requirements of the next version. More RAM can rarely be found, drivers are non-existent. trying to upgrade becomes and expensive nightmare.
Enter the Penguin – Linux
I am writing this article on an old laptop a Toshiba Tecra A4. It was built for Windows XP and will not run Windows 7. It is, to the Windows world, EOL (End of Life) or Obsolete. It runs Mint Linux 9 perfectly. It is secure, reliable and surprisingly fast.
It is talking to a server based on FreeNAS 8.0 running on a 1.2Ghz AMD PC given to me by an old customer who had purchased a new PC. It is fast and reliable. I just added some RAM I bought on eBay for $16 and a decent disk drive. Some of that RAM has also refurbished another old PC purchased from the Mission Shop for $40 that now runs Suse Linux 11.04.
My constant companion is a Asus EeePC 702, the first real net-book. It has a 600Mhz CPU, a 4Gb SSD and a 4Gb SD card. It works perfectly with Ubuntu 10.04 Net-book Remix. I use it constantly for note taking, web browsing, reading e-Books and watching videos. Windows XP will almost run on it, but if you add all the security patches it runs out of disk space before any software is added. Another win for Linux.
And Finally – The Cost of Windows Upgrades
Microsoft lost my vote forever with the WGA fiasco when they slipped anti-piracy software onto users computers as a “security update” and then shut tens of thousands of innocent users down because they had fixed their broken PC with a disk other than the one they got when they bought it. Many well meaning sons and grandsons fixed Mom or Grandma’s Windows XP PCs with their own disks (because you could) and then the computer died in a burst of piracy notifications that forced honest people to pay again for something they could not PROVE TO MICROSOFT that they already owned.
As a result upgrading a Windows PC is an expensive option – cheaper to just buy a new one, and dump the old one at the tip. Moving to Linux costs NOTHING more than the possible cost of a few computer bits like some RAM that can probably be purchased for $5-20. The computer then goes on to a new, long life.
Linux does not become obsolete
A working Windows computer requires constant patches and security updates to keep it safe. Linux also has issues, but at the present, the average desktop user can stay with the current version of Linux for years with little risk. If you install Linux and it does what you want it to do, just keep using it until the hardware finally dies.
The Linux “Geeks” are constantly trying the latest versions, and that is their passion. If you just want a computer that works. get someone to help you install Linux, and then just enjoy the computer. It will run reliably for years with little more that the need for a backup process to save your important files when the PC finally dies.
Long live the green Linux operating system!
Posted in Linux by .
Image courtesy Travis Goodspeed
The recent cloud computing security issues including the possible security breach at Lastpass in May 2011 and now the major breach of the RSA SecureID system leading to an attack on major US military contractor Lockheed-Martin has many of us wondering how safe central password repositories are.
I have been using Lastpass, but with a less than perfect password. I was using 10 random characters. I have decided to fall back to a local solution. I am now using Keepass. KeePass is a local application for Windows, Linux, Android, iPhone, Palm, Blackberry, Mac and pretty much any other platform. It can be used as a portable app, carried on a USB stick.
I keep my database stored in a Dropbox folder and synchronized across my computers. The database is encrypted, and stored in an encrypted state on Dropbox.
I can access it anywhere I can connect to dropbox, or run a Windows app from a USB drive.
And it has one other benefit over Lastpass – Lastpass tends to wind up with multiple versions of passwords (if you change them) and knowing the current one becomes a management problem. Keepass keeps one password, and you can group them. For example I have three WordPress logins for different Blogs. With Keepass I can create three groups, one for each Blog, and keep all relevant information for that blog or personality.
Posted in Internet by .
Google instant search has arrived. Here in Tasmania we had to wait a while, but it is now operating on both Firefox and IE8 browsers on my Windows 7 PC.
The Advantage
Instant search only works for people logged into Google accounts. The differences are extraordinary! Logged into my Gmail account, I just searched the first few letters of Serenity Computing… Seren on both IE and Firefox. Both browsers returned identical first pages. Serenity Computing was the sixth entry. Interestingly IE got its result in 0.07 seconds and Firefox took 0.11 seconds. In fairness, I do have more tabs open in Firefox. Reducing each browser to 3 tabs and re-trying brings a search on Firefox in at 0.06 and on IE8 in at 0.05 on several passes.
Serenity Computing comes in as the sixth item in both browsers. My son, on the same IP adress, same ADSL connection, but without a Google account gets a completely different set of search results. Google cannot guess past the Sernei. Logging out of my Gmail account brings a completely different experience, I now get the same results as him.
To Google, search is king, and they are excited.
The Google Instant page says that Google Instant will save 2.5 seconds on the average search, more than 3.5 billion seconds a day. That’s 11 hours saved every second.
The Google Instant video is here:
If your connection is slow, Google will turn Google Instant off, and you can do it yourself by clicking the “Instant is On” link on the right of the search box.
Google Instant is not available on mobile devices a this time, and given the cost of mobile data in Australia, that my be a blessing here.
The Wall Street Journal comments: At a demonstration Wednesday at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Mountain View, Calif., company said the search engine now tries to predict what customers are searching for and instantly displays results before they finish typing. As an example, an engineer who wanted weather information typed in the letter “W” into the search box and immediately got the local weather forecast above other search results.
Marissa Mayer, vice president of search products and user experience, said Google Instant could shave two to five seconds from the average 25 seconds previously needed to search and choose a link—reducing the collective time spent on Google searches by 350 million hours a year. It’s “search at the speed of thought,” she said.
Offensive Language.
Google Instant will turn off search for words that may be offensive. In some cases, this will pause the search on words that have a character string that “MAY” be offensive. Helene Slutsky is upset that her Blog causes Google to stop the Instant Search. Of course, all you have to do is enter the search string and hit enter, and you will get the requested results.
It seems even searching for “I Hate” will switch off Instant Search. But the results of displaying every result could be embarrassing, so I think they are erring on the side of caution.
The Down Side
By feeding the most likely ending to our search result, Google is subtly training us to follow the most common search strings. This will tend to force us away from what comes naturally to us. We will be slowly pressed into the mold of popular decision. the outliers will be extinguished. Thinking will be squeezed into the path of the masses.
This is good for Google. It means that less and less searches will be unique, and the search will become faster because more searches will already be in the cache containing the most common search results.
It also means that the intuitive jump that makes the break away from the accepted path will become even less likely. Instead of following our own path we will begin to follow the herd more and more .
It means that the results of free minds searching for the unexpected may be slowly extinguished. We may slowly find ourselves being molded into The Image of Google…
Image by Manfrys
Posted in Internet by .
May 11
9
Serenity Computing is Dead, Long Live Serenity Computing!
I have been increasingly frustrated with Serenity Computing for some time. I established the business shortly after I arrived from Sydney in 2005.
My goal was to establish a computer support business for both home and small business. I have the experience and background. I have worked with computers since they were the size of wardrobes. My first personal computer was a Microbee I bought from Jaycar Electronics in 1983 for $499, the limit on my new Bankcard. It strained the marriage, but I survived.
I worked for small and large computer companies. I was retrenched 3 times when companies I loved folded through management discord, competition or lack of foresight. They never failed for lack of trying.
I moved to the University of Sydney, managing “Security Technical Resources” for a number of years. Then I fell in love with Tasmania and moved here in 2005.
Serenity Computing started slowly. The first few months were largely me and my partners (my wife and son) printing and distributing flyers to almost every mailbox in Launceston. People called, and in most cases, had problems solved. If I could not fix the problem, there was no charge. I only had to pay one refund.
Then two things happened:
1) Microsoft stealthily used Window Update to install “Windows Genuine Advantage”(WGA) a copy protection program that trashed the computers of tens of thousands of innocent people because it thought they used pirated copies of Windows. I was busy for weeks trying to help, often to no avail. A new copy of Windows was the only solution if you had lost your original disks.
2) I lost my mind. Well just my memory really. I became one of the 2% of people who suffer memory loss because of Lipitor, a Cholesterol medication. The business went downhill because I could not remember what I had done or said moments before. It took a long time to discover and remedy the problem. I wrote a blog post on “Phil on Whatever“ at the point of my first recovery and another later. I was angry, hurt and confused. Even later I wrote a more measured and better researched article on a new web site I registered called “Escape to Simplicity”. I am still not quite sure what I will do with this site, but the name gives you a good idea where I want it to go ultimately. I still suffer lapses, but they are getting fewer, don’t give up on me yet!
The result of these two events is:
1) I have lost all faith in Microsoft and the Windows operating system and Microsoft Office. I no longer use them.
2) Serenity Computing as a business has shrunk, and I find little enjoyment in sticking more patches on the sinking Titanic that is Microsoft Windows. And because I don’t use Windows, my expertise is aging.
I love helping people, but the real solution is to get the world away from Windows and using a REAL operating system. There are two solutions. Sell everything and buy an Apple Mac, or switch your existing computer to Linux.
Serenity Computing is changing focus
You will note from the links I have inserted here that I am working part-time as a bus driver while I get re-established, so income from Serenity is not my first priority. As a result I have decided to cease all customer support for Windows based client issues.
I will focus the business on supporting people who are interested in moving to a secure, safe, reliable, virus-free and fast operating system, Linux. Linux also has the advantage that it and almost all of the programs it uses are FREE.
I have been trying to find a good alternate home computer support provider in Launceston, and will give a link soon. They will almost certainly cost more, but I will try to negotiate a discount!
Soon the Serenity Computing web site will contain more information on the whys and hows, ups and downs (yes, there are downs) of using Linux. In the meantime, please e-mail me if you have questions. And of course I would LOVE to see your comments on this Blog entry.
I wish to thank all my clients, most of whom I now consider as friends, for their support over the last six years. please feel free to call me if you would like a chance to try Linux on your computer.
Posted in Commentary by Phil Stephens. 2 Comments