[svlug] Fedora or Ubuntu for novis

[Don Marti]

begin Greg Lindahl quotation of Sun, Sep 14, 2008 at 01:00:52AM -0700:
> On Sat, Sep 13, 2008 at 11:50:04PM -0700, Chris Miller wrote:
> 
> > To me it's cumbersome if it doesn't work out of the box
> 
> Then buy a machine that's set up for Linux. And stop harping on the
> point. It's pointless. It's about as useful as a "review" of Linux
> that complains about how it's more difficult to install Linux than to
> buy a machine with Windows pre-installed.

As long as I've been using Linux (since 1994) there
have been two kinds of people who have trouble-free
desktop Linux machines: good hackers and good
shoppers.  The hackers can write their own drivers.
The shoppers can read mailing lists and web sites to
find out what the hackers are using, and then order
the right hardware.  The main skill is the fortitude
and patience not to buy the "almost the same, it will
probably work" hardware if the store is out of the
known working hardware.

(My first Linux box was a 486DX/50 that I bought used,
and drove 100mi. to pick up, because all the parts
were compatible according to Usenet FAQs.)

There's always been something that's a problem.
Anyone else remember when Diamond video cards were
bad, and you were supposed to buy Matrox?

-- 
Don Marti                                               +1 510-814-0932
http://zgp.org/~dmarti/
dmarti at zgp.org         Linux device driver unconference: http://freedomhec.org/