google chrome is one of the ugliest application interfaces i have ever seen next to gnome for linux. chrome and chromium are not friendly to ui theme engines and when description of apps, say things like "making the built-in file manager look just like Google Chrome" i think, this is not good a thing.
tabs in explorer should look like windows, not a web browser.
How to Add Tabs to File Explorer in Windows 8.1
http://news.softpedia.com/news/How-to-Add-Tabs-to-File-Explorer-in-Windows-8-1-408296.shtml
Friday, November 21, 2014
Tuesday, November 11, 2014
net neutrality is the embodiment of the free market.
net neutrality is the embodiment of the free market. it makes it so you can, from your house or place of business, start a web page and if it's a good thing it will grow and you can do business. to defeat net neutrality would make it harder, more expensive, or even impossible for you to do so.
without net neutrality you pay not only for the connection, but also for the destination and perhaps anyone in the middle. also if verizon or comcast doesn't like you or a company they feel they do not wish to carry they can just cut them or you off all together and not allow any of that traffic to pass. so if your favorite online store for fishing worms does not pay this double payment, then you could have trouble with their website. if verizon deems them competition with their fishing worms then they can cut them off all together.
yes i harp on republicans, but this is anti-free market to the core and it makes consumers and businesses pay twice and be at the mercy of certain carriers since there may be no other way to connect to the internet in certain areas. which was part of their plan, which i'll tell that story in another post.
without net neutrality you pay not only for the connection, but also for the destination and perhaps anyone in the middle. also if verizon or comcast doesn't like you or a company they feel they do not wish to carry they can just cut them or you off all together and not allow any of that traffic to pass. so if your favorite online store for fishing worms does not pay this double payment, then you could have trouble with their website. if verizon deems them competition with their fishing worms then they can cut them off all together.
yes i harp on republicans, but this is anti-free market to the core and it makes consumers and businesses pay twice and be at the mercy of certain carriers since there may be no other way to connect to the internet in certain areas. which was part of their plan, which i'll tell that story in another post.
Thursday, January 16, 2014
Wednesday, December 04, 2013
general entry
Cleaned up my blogger profile. Have decided to finish up some work in writing. So I started to learn about LyX text formatter. Now I need to write and figure how to self publish the thing. School ends Monday, whew. I had graduated with the Associates and due to some various factors I wound up taking a technical degree in addition to the arts degree. it does transfer to a BA, but I am so out of gas, that I need to concentrate on my health. I only have two semesters left, but i can barely walk as it is. So I guess i could pick back up in the summer and take next year and do it right.
I am looking forward to some time to heal what ever it is that ails me. Fatigue issues that are insane for 5 years now. I quite smoking and that has helped tremendously. 2 and half months now. I'm very interested in the 90 day mark. I think if you are going to quit anything, try and do it for at least 90 days. I think that's a good mark. I've actually only done that with a couple of things. But none were as intense as the smoking. I have no intentions of ever smoking again.
Next is probably beer. ...maybe just a bit of wine i don't know right now. I'm headed back into a vegetarian diet and things that have dead calories are also on the list of "stay away froms".
okay enough personal stuff...
I am looking forward to some time to heal what ever it is that ails me. Fatigue issues that are insane for 5 years now. I quite smoking and that has helped tremendously. 2 and half months now. I'm very interested in the 90 day mark. I think if you are going to quit anything, try and do it for at least 90 days. I think that's a good mark. I've actually only done that with a couple of things. But none were as intense as the smoking. I have no intentions of ever smoking again.
Next is probably beer. ...maybe just a bit of wine i don't know right now. I'm headed back into a vegetarian diet and things that have dead calories are also on the list of "stay away froms".
okay enough personal stuff...
Sunday, September 22, 2013
Sunday, November 11, 2012
so now you want to install linux
before you install linux, you try linux. so booting into it with a DVD and running it for a while is recommended. i'll bust this up in to two posts and republish.
The Short of it. Grab the ISO and burn it to DVD or if you know how, make a bootable USB stick. Boot your PC with it and delete windows, install linux, reboot and enjoy life!
edit 12/11/13 - I'll be updating this soon. I have hesitated on it, since i have to chose a distribution. Since this is a beginner's guide, it will be an easy one and you know that means, Ubuntu. Well I recommend Kubuntu! So more to come. Just email me if you need me to hurry it along.
The Long of it... tbc
The Short of it. Grab the ISO and burn it to DVD or if you know how, make a bootable USB stick. Boot your PC with it and delete windows, install linux, reboot and enjoy life!
edit 12/11/13 - I'll be updating this soon. I have hesitated on it, since i have to chose a distribution. Since this is a beginner's guide, it will be an easy one and you know that means, Ubuntu. Well I recommend Kubuntu! So more to come. Just email me if you need me to hurry it along.
The Long of it... tbc
desktop wars
The desktop interface in Linux to me has suffered somewhat in the last couple of years due to the transition from GNOME 2 to GNOME 3. GNOME 3 is a strange and awkward beast. Since Fedora is sponsored by Red Hat, who contributes heavily to GNOME, Fedora is the flagship of the GNOME desktop. Since Fedora is now running GNOME 3 it basically does not work. This can be argued, but I have found it unstable and difficult to install anything to. I am talking extensions. Extensions give GNOME 3 is functionality and some work and some don't. No rhyme or reason other than maybe developer or control issues. To solve some of the obvious problems as in the fundamental dysfunction of GNOME's lack of work flow since it has no straight forward logical process. Unity tries to solve this issue by the use of what is a called a Lens. You filter apps through "categories" that has some added function. To me at least if you are going to try and make a better wheel, try and make a BETTER wheel!
I am not sure that the argument of GTK2 desktops not working holds water. I guess that one day you might wake up and things start to break, but this hasn't appeared to be a large issue yet. Other communities has started to fix the problem of a functional GTK3 based desktop with a fork by the Mint team called Cinnamon. They also have a fork of the now defunct GNOME 2 desktop called, Mate.
The problems in GNOME has caused a division in the install base and many developers have left the project.This is awful, since GNOME used to be a great desktop and I am sure it still can be, but hasn't started yet. KDE had some of the same issues, but to not the degree. perhaps due to a smaller install base.
The Mint fork, Cinnamon of GNOME 3 has a great look, but it is very unstable.
The old GNOME 2 was a desktop that had a minimalist approach and this can be good and bad. KDE has the opposite view in that it is ultra-customizable.
!!still in edit!!
Saturday, November 10, 2012
the why and how of the linux distribution
My needs are like many others. I
need to use a traditional file manager,where I organize files and
folders, access hard drives, usb drives and network shares, so I can
organize my files in filing cabinet fashion. I need a word processor and
a web browser. Then there are other tools I use for
system maintenance, multimedia, and some
specific programs that I need for academic reasons.
So my needs for a system do have criteria. But of course none of this means a whole hell of a lot, since we can mix and match all things linux in just about any distro we want. We simply pick a distribution and run with it. Which gets me back to some earlier points about Interfaces.
There are distributions and there are distributions based on distributions and there are distributions based on distributions based on distributions. The mother of all distributions is Debian.
You can download Debian and run it, but it has a bit of a curve, but not anymore than any other Linux distro. But typically users do not start with Debian, not to say you can't, but to do this we will have to follow some instructions about installing the right desktop interface, because this is where BIAS comes in. By default Debian uses GNOME, rumor has it changing to Xfce, but Xfce while using good standards is using a slightly outdated tool kit GTK+ version 2. Also is not a very active project, not that this is a bad thing. If applications adhere to the open desktop standards apps should run fine on it. GNOME, Unity and a fork of GNOME called Cinnamon all use the later GTK+ version 3 tool kit.
We want an interface that is not foreign to us or works the way we are comfortable with... and this means looking at the choices in interfaces and looking at them as a functional program that fits our needs and perhaps actively developed. This was not a big issue until the Cell Phone changed the paradigm. Even Windows 8 is that new odd panel oriented looking thing! This gets back to what you desire and need in functionality. For myself, i want my desktop like I have always had. i do not have a problem with work flow and never did. i log into my PC and use it, work gets done end of story. But my choices are changing all because of touch screen pads and phones. This makes me and others a bit frustrated. I like my traditional workstation, nothing is wrong with it and I want to continue using it as i always have done.
So we want a functional desktop and again there are many Linux Distributions to choose from and I have loaded many of them, but my experience is that Debian based distros and CentOS are the best.
Enter the source based distro. Arch and Gentoo are two distributions that are very esoteric. They are installed on the device piece meal or even compiled from source in gentoo's case, which is ultra efficient for the target device, but time consuming for the install. I think this is all great and good (it's about choice right?), the difference in performance in a source distro and a stock Debian distro are going to be negligible on current hardware. If you had 100 hundred identical old machines and wanted to squeeze some more years out of them, compile the install, back up the custom image and place it on the other 99 machines, but the pain of this install is only for those that enjoy this pain or ones that can gain from it. My hardware is modern enough and generic enough to not gain any appreciable speed from a gentoo or arch install. This however can change.
The most functional and stable desktop operating systems you can run on a PC, PERIOD, to me are Xubuntu, Kubuntu, Debian (stable or testing) and CentOS (honorable mention to FreeBSD, but FreeBSD is not Linux). Xubuntu uses the Xfce desktop and CentOS and Debian Stable both use the now defunct GNOME 2 desktop. So we have an issue here. Regardless of the underpinnings GNOME 2 and Xfce are the most traditional desktop metaphors and are similar to Windows prior to Windows 8. Windows 8 is similar to Gnome 3. There are many many more distributions to chose from, but I talk about these exclusively. if you are able to distinguish from other distros then you would probably be reading this for entertainment only.
So which do we use? I am really going to twist things and say Kubuntu. I just lost many readers just now, but maybe some are thinking I am not insane after all.
Over the years i have come to like certain programs and these use a certain widget set called Qt. The desktop environment based on Qt is KDE. I have been mentioning GTK and how GTK3 is now being developed, well Qt is also being actively developed and has quite a large development base. So, since I use many KDE programs and I want to stay with a currently active desktop, it only makes sense for me to use KDE. I also base this on my hardware ability.
I absolutely love Xfce and it's stability, it's no-nonsense appearance and efficiency. I would still be running Xfce if I didn't run so many KDE apps even though I can run KDE apps in Xfce. I also like the KDE education packages for my daughter.
KDE like all things computers has some draw backs and one of them is it is very large and running it with desktop eye candy enabled is resource intensive. It makes my very modern and fast PC work a bit to run its desktop. However Ubuntu is much more resource intensive. There is a Qt based desktop that values your CPU cycles and I mention it in a bit.
Anyway we are getting into some grainy and fickle areas. So let me just say that Xfce is an outstanding desktop and I love it's approach, its function and philosophy, but it is based on slightly outdated technology and it has a lackadaisical development effort.
Enter the Razor-Qt desktop environment. It is a small and fine tuned desktop based on the Qt tool kit and it shows a lot of promise. I have it installed and from time to time log into it and check it out. It is very new and lacks many features and functional applets. If Xfce and Razor could get together I think it would be a great desktop. Easier said than done.
My old laptop is a 1.4 Ghz laptop and if it could run a solid state drive, then it would be quite a number, but as is, it is slow and old. The only fit i have found for it is CentOS. CentOS is a good desktop to run if you are interested in supporting corporate desktops and it runs every program I need for network analysis and even more. I didn't expect CentOS to reignite that laptop so well, but it did and I am very pleased.
So my needs for a system do have criteria. But of course none of this means a whole hell of a lot, since we can mix and match all things linux in just about any distro we want. We simply pick a distribution and run with it. Which gets me back to some earlier points about Interfaces.
There are distributions and there are distributions based on distributions and there are distributions based on distributions based on distributions. The mother of all distributions is Debian.
You can download Debian and run it, but it has a bit of a curve, but not anymore than any other Linux distro. But typically users do not start with Debian, not to say you can't, but to do this we will have to follow some instructions about installing the right desktop interface, because this is where BIAS comes in. By default Debian uses GNOME, rumor has it changing to Xfce, but Xfce while using good standards is using a slightly outdated tool kit GTK+ version 2. Also is not a very active project, not that this is a bad thing. If applications adhere to the open desktop standards apps should run fine on it. GNOME, Unity and a fork of GNOME called Cinnamon all use the later GTK+ version 3 tool kit.
We want an interface that is not foreign to us or works the way we are comfortable with... and this means looking at the choices in interfaces and looking at them as a functional program that fits our needs and perhaps actively developed. This was not a big issue until the Cell Phone changed the paradigm. Even Windows 8 is that new odd panel oriented looking thing! This gets back to what you desire and need in functionality. For myself, i want my desktop like I have always had. i do not have a problem with work flow and never did. i log into my PC and use it, work gets done end of story. But my choices are changing all because of touch screen pads and phones. This makes me and others a bit frustrated. I like my traditional workstation, nothing is wrong with it and I want to continue using it as i always have done.
So we want a functional desktop and again there are many Linux Distributions to choose from and I have loaded many of them, but my experience is that Debian based distros and CentOS are the best.
Enter the source based distro. Arch and Gentoo are two distributions that are very esoteric. They are installed on the device piece meal or even compiled from source in gentoo's case, which is ultra efficient for the target device, but time consuming for the install. I think this is all great and good (it's about choice right?), the difference in performance in a source distro and a stock Debian distro are going to be negligible on current hardware. If you had 100 hundred identical old machines and wanted to squeeze some more years out of them, compile the install, back up the custom image and place it on the other 99 machines, but the pain of this install is only for those that enjoy this pain or ones that can gain from it. My hardware is modern enough and generic enough to not gain any appreciable speed from a gentoo or arch install. This however can change.
The most functional and stable desktop operating systems you can run on a PC, PERIOD, to me are Xubuntu, Kubuntu, Debian (stable or testing) and CentOS (honorable mention to FreeBSD, but FreeBSD is not Linux). Xubuntu uses the Xfce desktop and CentOS and Debian Stable both use the now defunct GNOME 2 desktop. So we have an issue here. Regardless of the underpinnings GNOME 2 and Xfce are the most traditional desktop metaphors and are similar to Windows prior to Windows 8. Windows 8 is similar to Gnome 3. There are many many more distributions to chose from, but I talk about these exclusively. if you are able to distinguish from other distros then you would probably be reading this for entertainment only.
So which do we use? I am really going to twist things and say Kubuntu. I just lost many readers just now, but maybe some are thinking I am not insane after all.
Over the years i have come to like certain programs and these use a certain widget set called Qt. The desktop environment based on Qt is KDE. I have been mentioning GTK and how GTK3 is now being developed, well Qt is also being actively developed and has quite a large development base. So, since I use many KDE programs and I want to stay with a currently active desktop, it only makes sense for me to use KDE. I also base this on my hardware ability.
I absolutely love Xfce and it's stability, it's no-nonsense appearance and efficiency. I would still be running Xfce if I didn't run so many KDE apps even though I can run KDE apps in Xfce. I also like the KDE education packages for my daughter.
KDE like all things computers has some draw backs and one of them is it is very large and running it with desktop eye candy enabled is resource intensive. It makes my very modern and fast PC work a bit to run its desktop. However Ubuntu is much more resource intensive. There is a Qt based desktop that values your CPU cycles and I mention it in a bit.
Anyway we are getting into some grainy and fickle areas. So let me just say that Xfce is an outstanding desktop and I love it's approach, its function and philosophy, but it is based on slightly outdated technology and it has a lackadaisical development effort.
Enter the Razor-Qt desktop environment. It is a small and fine tuned desktop based on the Qt tool kit and it shows a lot of promise. I have it installed and from time to time log into it and check it out. It is very new and lacks many features and functional applets. If Xfce and Razor could get together I think it would be a great desktop. Easier said than done.
My old laptop is a 1.4 Ghz laptop and if it could run a solid state drive, then it would be quite a number, but as is, it is slow and old. The only fit i have found for it is CentOS. CentOS is a good desktop to run if you are interested in supporting corporate desktops and it runs every program I need for network analysis and even more. I didn't expect CentOS to reignite that laptop so well, but it did and I am very pleased.
linux distribution dichotomy
i am sure people familiar with linux might have issue on how i describe the distribution, since i leave many out. I loaded my first linux distribution in 1997 and i am confident in my experiences with them since.
There are corporate distributions and community distributions.
Red Hat is the big corporate release here in the states, but there is a new player, Ubuntu by Canonical. There is also OpenSuSE that used to be a community distro, then was under Novell, but is now under Attachmate. I do not talk much about SuSE, but I used to run it, but do not anymore.
Canonical blurs this line with a corporate supported (if you chose to pay) community release called Ubuntu. It is released in two ways also in many flavors, but, long term and standard. Long term or LTS for Long Term Support are heavily developed version of their linux distribution that is designed primarily for stability and released every 2 years. They are maintained for security purposes for 3 years, but the latest LTS 12.04 is going to be maintained for a 5 year support cycle.The standard release is available every 6 months and used to be timed with the GNOME release cycle, but since GNOME has changed its direction, Ubuntu has developed a shell for gnome shell and called it Unity. The release cadence has now been internalized to fit with Canonical's goals to become a leader in Linux desktops. I have to laugh a bit since that was a very corny statement. The other flavors of Ubuntu have different desktops and are the strict community releases. I prefer them over the big Ubuntu release, but more on that later.
Community based distributions are developed by programmers that are not under a company, they develop it among themselves. Arch comes to mind and again trhe mother of them all, Debian. Red Hat sponsors a community developed distribution called Fedora. Mint Linux has an awesome set of distros that have a large audience and is making some advances in Linux usability.
The corporate release by Red Hat is called Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) and is for sale, but since the code is open source and as such free, paying Red Hat is technically paying for support. We can get the same desktop as RHEL in a distribution called CentOS, but we cannot call Red Hat to have them answer questions about it. One thing to note is that Red Hat encourages people that for some reason or another aren't ready to pay for Red Hat to in fact run CentOS. Red Hat has even made it easier for CentOS to stay current and make the CentOS experience a good one. Perhaps if you like CentOS, then you will opt for Red Hat supported service when you are ready. You have to love that in a company.
Corporate enterprise linux installs are very stable and have a large install base, like hundreds or thousands of desktops within an organization. The software that they consist of has had time to mature and is considered "stable" due to extensive code review. Some consider them boring or less functional, but there is nothing dysfunctional about stabilty.
There are corporate distributions and community distributions.
Red Hat is the big corporate release here in the states, but there is a new player, Ubuntu by Canonical. There is also OpenSuSE that used to be a community distro, then was under Novell, but is now under Attachmate. I do not talk much about SuSE, but I used to run it, but do not anymore.
Canonical blurs this line with a corporate supported (if you chose to pay) community release called Ubuntu. It is released in two ways also in many flavors, but, long term and standard. Long term or LTS for Long Term Support are heavily developed version of their linux distribution that is designed primarily for stability and released every 2 years. They are maintained for security purposes for 3 years, but the latest LTS 12.04 is going to be maintained for a 5 year support cycle.The standard release is available every 6 months and used to be timed with the GNOME release cycle, but since GNOME has changed its direction, Ubuntu has developed a shell for gnome shell and called it Unity. The release cadence has now been internalized to fit with Canonical's goals to become a leader in Linux desktops. I have to laugh a bit since that was a very corny statement. The other flavors of Ubuntu have different desktops and are the strict community releases. I prefer them over the big Ubuntu release, but more on that later.
Community based distributions are developed by programmers that are not under a company, they develop it among themselves. Arch comes to mind and again trhe mother of them all, Debian. Red Hat sponsors a community developed distribution called Fedora. Mint Linux has an awesome set of distros that have a large audience and is making some advances in Linux usability.
The corporate release by Red Hat is called Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) and is for sale, but since the code is open source and as such free, paying Red Hat is technically paying for support. We can get the same desktop as RHEL in a distribution called CentOS, but we cannot call Red Hat to have them answer questions about it. One thing to note is that Red Hat encourages people that for some reason or another aren't ready to pay for Red Hat to in fact run CentOS. Red Hat has even made it easier for CentOS to stay current and make the CentOS experience a good one. Perhaps if you like CentOS, then you will opt for Red Hat supported service when you are ready. You have to love that in a company.
Corporate enterprise linux installs are very stable and have a large install base, like hundreds or thousands of desktops within an organization. The software that they consist of has had time to mature and is considered "stable" due to extensive code review. Some consider them boring or less functional, but there is nothing dysfunctional about stabilty.
the linux distribution
The beauty of Linux is that you can use a system that is "easy" or "hard". In linuxese, individual Linux "operating systems" are called distributions or distros for short. There are many to choose from and again some stand out and some are more esoteric.
So which one to use? Well we need to make some choices. Do you want a traditional desktop sort of like Windows 7 or one that looks like a cell phone or tablet sort of like Windows 8? But wait this is about Linux, correct? Still desktop approaches exist across platforms and we need to understand this. This is the best analogy i can give to someone not of the *nix inclination.
I base my preference on which Linux distribution I run on how well the desktop performs and how stable it is. I am partial to a certain packaging system, but let's not worry about that just now.
Of course choice depends on how you frame it. You can base choice on many things that have to do with a work environment, such as the tools installed and kernel functionality. You can run bleeding edge software that is just now being developed. You can run desktops that are liquidy, soupy flip floppy entertainment desktops that resemble cartoons. I am an old stick and prefer static windows perhaps with some shadows and crisp legible text. I do like wobbly windows, but that is irrelevant right now.
In Linux you get the choice of which desktops you would like to run. There are several, but GNOME and KDE are the big dogs and Xfce is close behind and then there are many more, but those seem to be a bit esoteric in nature.
I suppose the best analogy I can come up with about linux desktops for a windows user would be, if you applied very sophisticated skins or themes to the Windows desktop that made it look and act different that would be somewhat like running different linux desktop environments.
KDE functions much different from GNOME 3, which I am not sure how it functions it is just too strange a beast for me to get used to and believe me I have tried. Xfce and GNOME 2 are quite traditional desktops. Anyway this conversation will be continued in the desktop wars sections. But the short of it... is that different desktops are almost like different operating systems, but only in the way the graphics work, the underpinnings are the same across Linux desktops.
To see the available Linux distributions there is the ubiquitous distrowatch website. I spend a lot of time there.
gnu, linux or gnu/linux?
What is GNU? GNU is a set of tools and a license as well as a philosophy. GNU tools run on top of the Linux kernel which is published under the GPL (GNU Public License) and some even
say the proper name is to say GNU/Linux instead of Linux, but I find this silly for the layperson. The kernel or more technically Linux is non-gnu, so things get strange.
if you are a developer or administrator then probably the distinction is necessary, but all
things must run on the kernel and that is Linux.
The GNU tools are extremely important and they allow us access to the kernel and to create programs. The compiler or the program that makes code runnable for the PC is a GNU tool, it is referred to as gcc or gnu c compiler. Many of the libraries programs need to run are of gnu creation, i.e. the gnu C libraries.
BASH the default shell that we interact with... is a GNU program. BASH can be compared to the DOS command line, but only in a few appearance similarities. They are both text based and you can run programs in each. But after this BASH has things DOS can only dream of being. In of itself BASH is extremely powerful. It is a programming language and sophisticated computer environment at the same time. You will want to become familiar with BASH if it is just to move around the file system or run programs.
One other powerful GNU program is the EMACS text editor. It too is a sophisticated extensible environment as well as the basis for text editing that many programs can employ. The PINE (now alpine) email program comes to mind. Linux users typically fall into two categories, EMACS users and vi users. I am a vi user, however I highly respect the EMACS editor.
Oddly enough, you should never see Linux nor know you are using GNU tools. Again it is all a bit esoteric, but never-you-mind we are simply Linux users and this is fine in the grand scheme of things.
The GNU tools are extremely important and they allow us access to the kernel and to create programs. The compiler or the program that makes code runnable for the PC is a GNU tool, it is referred to as gcc or gnu c compiler. Many of the libraries programs need to run are of gnu creation, i.e. the gnu C libraries.
BASH the default shell that we interact with... is a GNU program. BASH can be compared to the DOS command line, but only in a few appearance similarities. They are both text based and you can run programs in each. But after this BASH has things DOS can only dream of being. In of itself BASH is extremely powerful. It is a programming language and sophisticated computer environment at the same time. You will want to become familiar with BASH if it is just to move around the file system or run programs.
One other powerful GNU program is the EMACS text editor. It too is a sophisticated extensible environment as well as the basis for text editing that many programs can employ. The PINE (now alpine) email program comes to mind. Linux users typically fall into two categories, EMACS users and vi users. I am a vi user, however I highly respect the EMACS editor.
Oddly enough, you should never see Linux nor know you are using GNU tools. Again it is all a bit esoteric, but never-you-mind we are simply Linux users and this is fine in the grand scheme of things.
why and most of all, WHAT is Linux?
Why Linux? Who are we fooling, LINUX IS FREE! I mean it cost nothing. We are poor and we need to compute. So no more serial codes, no more I am a pirate and I am scared of the internet. We are now free to roam around the cabin like a regular passenger in the computer world. If we study hard enough we can roam around the engineering room and design the airplane. For now we install and work and leave worrying behind. Also Linux is extremely virus and malware resistant. When I say we are not scared of the internet, I mean WE ARE NOT SCARED OF THE INTERNET.
What do we mean when we say freedom? Linux is Open Source code and it is all about the code and nothing about the code. We can do as much and as little as we want to with it. It is about choice and freedom in software. We choose which software we like and freedom is to do with it what we like as long as we respect it. In this blog we typically use it, not make it. So here we try and describe the very useful tool that runs our computer, Linux! As well as the programs that run on it.
What is Linux? Plain and simple it is the kernel of the operating system. It is the liaison between the words and or graphics we see on the screen and the hardware beneath. i use Linux to describe the kitchen sink. Linux is like Windows and the Mac OS in that it runs a personal computer, it also runs servers, telephones, TVs and much more. But here we stick with personal computers and perhaps the server and phone.
It is not a specific program it is the operating system, we load it on our PC replacing the original software and we interact with it as we did the computer we bought pre-built, except there are subtle differences.
Yes we can run a dual boot with both Linux and Windows or in virtual environments where one runs inside of the other, but that is getting advanced and I want to stay away from advanced in this post. We load Linux to run our personal computer and all the programs that we load from then on are for linux.
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