[Sussex] New linux user

[John D.]

Liam Derwin wrote:

>Hi
>
>I want to make the switch to linux, but I'm a user rather than a sys admin,
>so I'm looking for a distro that has an installation process that vaguely
>resembles win98 (i.e. check boxes for the things you want installed).
>
>I'm looking for the following to be included in the install...
>
>Firefox
>An email client that has an outlook express feel to it, or thunderbird
>Open office
>A chat client other than kopete, that can do icq, aim, msn and yahoo.  If
>there's one that can also handle xfire I don't mind how complicated the
>install process is, I'll learn ;-)
>A media player that plays dvd without any additional tweaking
>An IRC client
>An ftp client
>Networking with a windoze pc
>
>Additionally, these would be nice (but non-essential features)
>
>Sync with an ipaq running I have no idea what version of wince
>MIDI software (I currently use cakewalk on windows)
>
>I've currently got xandros running on my laptop, but xine won't play dvd, I
>can't see an ftp client, and the networking only goes one way (I can read /
>write from linux to windows, but not the other way round).
>
>I get confused when it comes to all the compiling etc.  I'm quite happy to
>use linux, but I'm looking for the equivalent of a .exe file when I install
>a package.  I don't mind learning more complex ways of doing things, but I
>like my learning in bite sized chunks.  Ultimately I'm looking to switch to
>linux on my desktop and install cedega, after I make sure it's able to
>handle all the games I play.
>
>Any advice you guys can give on a suitable distro would be much appreciated.
>
Liam,

Well, as lots of SLUGS have made their suggestions, I thought I'd get my 
5 pence worth.

Your mention about installs and similarity to W98, Mandriva (formerly 
Mandrake) or the latest SuSE are both pretty good suggestions (I haven't 
tried any recent SuSE, but last time I did (a while ago), it installed 
fine for dual boot with just using the defaults).

I understand that Xandros/Linspire are about as close to windows as 
you'd be likely to get.

Mandriva or SuSE should do pretty much all that you've mentioned - With 
Mandriva/mandrake, I always found that it was worth paying for a "boxed 
set" copy as they'd configured a few of the proprietary (but freely 
available) apps and it made life considerably easier.

As to whether you'd get any distro installed and playing dvds out of the 
box? To be honest, I have played dvds via my PC with reasonable success, 
but don't generally as I don't see the point (got a "proper" dvd player 
anyway).

Don't know about Xfire.

As for the ipaq, you can get them talking to linux systems, but it 
requires some effort - Steve Williams helped me to get my windows based 
smartphone  talking to my system when I had gentoo installed.

With windows/linux networking, I'm still in the middle of working out 
Samba so my system will talk/fileshare with my partners laptop and I've 
not tried cedega, but I have used CrossOver office (from codeweavers - 
check their site, it may support the games you want to use), and found 
it very useful.

I have tried a couple of the so called advanced/expert distros as well. 
I didn't get on with debian, though I did find it very easy to manage 
because of the "apt" packaging manager (one line commands to install 
etc). Likewise gentoo, which I prefered to debian, it's only criticism 
being that as it uses source code/e-builds for it packages, it will 
install from a single line command but it then compiles after download 
and if the app/facility it a large one, it can take a 
loooooonnnnnnnnngggggggg time to compile (whereas debian uses 
pre-compiled binaries) I used to do my package installs over night (the 
main downside of both, is that they can be a complete bugger to install).

My attempt at slackware was a total non-starter.

So as I appreciate where you're coming from with your comment about 
being a "user" rather than "sys-admin". Not only am I "just" a user, but 
I'm a very impatient one as well!

Hence whatever you settle on distro wise, install it as a dual boot 
system to start with (if possible), then you can migrate gradually and 
can always just nip back into windows for anything you haven't managed 
to sort under linux (thinking games etc here!).

The "troops" here at the SLUG list are brilliant. They know absolutely 
"shed loads" (the list has more than a generous sprinkling of IT 
professionals and only a few (one ?) nuggets like me).

Another good place to have a dig round is LinuxQuestions 
<http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/index.php>

I've had a wealth of assistance there as well as here on the list.

Maybe that helps a little???

regards

John D.