Who do newcomers give up on Linux?

[Chizelle]

Useless forums.

[hendersj]

On Sat, 27 Jun 2009 17:16:01 +0000, Chizelle wrote:

> Useless forums.

Um, excuse me? I was making a joke. Lighten up, this is "general chit
chat". ;-)

Jim

[leecheroflife]

Originally Posted by Chizelle

Useless forums.

Useless post

[NismoTie]

My bet is that they see a nice shiny compiz enabled desktop with flying wobbly windows around the place, and the more adventurous ones think "hey I might grab me some of that". The simple fact of the matter is, is that they need to keep in mind at all times that linux is not doze. In my opinion linux is just a process to get used to, like learning a new map in a game. As soon as they see something that puts them out of their comfort zone slightly, they run back to their windows. I'd say I spend half my time on Linux getting it to work in the exact way I want it to.

Tie

[dragonbite]

I have a scenario that cropped up over the weekend.

I was trying to get Java installed so I could use a website and upload pictures to be developed.

I have a mundane site which uses Java on the front page I usually use to test Java is working. Nice thing is Firefox shows the message "You need to install a plugin" and provides a button. It didn't show up with the picture site so I used this other one instead.

In Ubuntu, when I clicked "Install Plugin" I then saw a screen of 3 choices; OpenJDK, Java 5 and Java 6. So I made my selection and the system downloaded it, popped up the license agreement and installed just fine.

When I tried it in Fedora, it could not install so I needed to do it manually. I looked for it in the Fedora repositories (KPackageManager) and could not find it ("jre" comes back with nothing, "java" comes back with too much, etc.)

I ended up Googling for java on Fedora and find a couple of peoples personal blogs about installing the official Sun version of Java. First you have to install a couple libraries, then download the Sun java version (not the .rpm either) and then run a couple of scripts to hook it to Firefox.

Now, I understand that Fedora is not orientated to the newbie user or anything, but this extreme difference in how they do it, I think, exemplifies one area where people new to Linux will either accept it (Ubuntu's method) or throw up their arms in dismay (Fedora's method).

I'm sorry that I don't know which method openSUSE provides, but if openSUSE is targeting newbies then I hope it is more similar to the method Ubuntu provides.

Oh, and the same method can be used to install Flash (or the 2 open source equivalents).

[quintus22]

I have installed openSUSE 11.1 & upgraded from KDE4.1.3 to KDE4.2.4 on my Laptop and I think it is
#4 wireless: took me more than one day (Atheros AR242x),
#6 sound: not working than expected,
#8 Graphics card issues: resume from RAM (the display remains still black)

I have some years experience as user on RedHat system in my company. Without I had given up at #4!

[DistortedHumor]

Wireless internet issues, Sound issues, and video card issues are in my experince what drives people bonkers, as people expect these "basic" things to work out of the box.

[suse_tpx60s]

Well a little update from me. I installed 11.1 about 5-6 weeks ago. I came from XP. I pretty much decided when I switched that I would make it work and would resist any temptation to go back to XP.

Superficially the install all went fine and everything seemed to work out of the box which made me very happy, that is until you start digging a little deeper and find that actually it's not quite working as you expect. I installed 11.1 on a Thinkpad and chose openSuSE mainly because Thinkpads were offered with SLED so I thought SuSE would have it pretty sorted.

My main headaches are that the docking / undocking doesn't work properly and will require lots of scripts to get it working as it should. This is very annoying as I have to shut the system down everytime before I attempt to dock / undock otherwise the results are unpredictable.
I still have sound problems. Everytime I think I've cracked it something else seems to break it. I've pretty much have it working now except Thunderbird will not play any sound or some reason.
Everything seems to take much longer as I'm constently hitting a wall due to my lack of knowledge, so have to go off googling or posting here.
I find that a lot of my problems come down to permissions and me not understanding them fully and how they work.

So for me the list is
Permissions - A whole new ball game.
Sound - Seems unpredictable
Incomplete functionality - docking / undocking solution not well thought out.
Lack of proper integration of some apps / utilities.

[ahmedelsayed]

Hi all,
this is my first post in openSUSE forums and I'm kinda new to openSUSE.

why do newcomers give up on linux?, that's a really good question because when you know the real problem, it's easier to find effective solutions.

I'll say my thoughts based on my short experience with linux (fedora and opensuse)


#1- Windows is easier to control and use, so why do I need to learn a new OS, which is not as easy?
#2- Colors on windows are better, fonts too.
#3- Touchpads sucks on linux, I have to tap at least twice. I really don't know if this is a common issue or it's just me, or maybe the touchpad's driver needs updating. Anyway, I believe it's not a problem with my touchpad itself as it works perfectly on windows.
#4- Linux is crashy, windows is not, or at least not as crashy as linux
#5- Every 6-8 months you'd set everything from scratch if you wanted to try the new release, which would seem to be more stable than the previous one, but unfortunately you find more bugs and more problems and eventually decide to stay with the older release till they fix all theses problems in the next one
#6- Linux is loaded with lots of apps that do the same thing. so you'll have to check each one to know which one is better. I wonder why don't developers integrate these similar apps into one powerful app which is able to do the job perfectly, like having 1 media player instead of 4 for audio and 3 for video playback

[hendersj]

On Thu, 09 Jul 2009 01:46:02 +0000, ahmedelsayed wrote:

> Hi all,
> this is my first post in openSUSE forums and I'm kinda new to openSUSE.

Welcome to the forums. :-)

> #1- Windows is easier to control and use, so why do I need to learn a
> new OS, which is not as easy?

If Windows is easier for you to use, then you should consider using
Windows. I'm not being snarky here, honestly. Learning a new OS isn't
easy. Learning Windows when you come from a UNIX background isn't easy.
Life isn't guaranteed to be easy.

> #2- Colors on windows are better, fonts too.

Colours are the same on Linux as on Windows - the monitor outputs RGB
values the same way regardless of the OS. So does the video card. Those
pieces of hardware don't know/don't care what the OS is on the system,
they do what they're told to do by the drivers.

As for fonts, I have no problems with the fonts - there are some tweaks
you can put in place (for example if you use LCD displays, which I do) to
enable subpixel sampling and better antialiasing.

> #3- Touchpads sucks on
> linux, I have to tap at least twice. I really don't know if this is a
> common issue or it's just me, or maybe the touchpad's driver needs
> updating. Anyway, I believe it's not a problem with my touchpad itself
> as it works perfectly on windows.

I use a very old ALPS Glidepoint touchpad on my main system and the
integrated touchpad on my Dell laptop (provided by work) as well as on a
Thinkpad (also provided by work). On the Dell I do have some problems
with tuning (circular scrolling, for example, is awful, but when I have
tried to turn it off, gsynaptics dies - I know it was fixed in 11.1 but I
need 11.0 for a few pieces of software.)

> #4- Linux is crashy, windows is not,
> or at least not as crashy as linux

I have to really work to crash a Linux box. I've got a bunch of them
right here. My main server (running Novell Open Enterprise Server 2,
based on SLES10) had an uptime of nearly 200 days before I accidentally
unplugged it while cleaning my home office space this evening.

I find the systems I use to be completely stable. Windows, OTOH, when I
used to use it, was chronically unstable in normal usage. I had to
rebuild the OS installs about every 6 months from the ground up - it just
became a regular thing to do because the system would get so horked up.

> #5- Every 6-8 months you'd set everything from scratch if you wanted to
> try the new release, which would seem to be more stable than the
> previous one, but unfortunately you find more bugs and more problems and
> eventually decide to stay with the older release till they fix all
> theses problems in the next one

If you want to upgrade, then the cleanest way to do it (regardless of OS)
is a fresh install. I've talked to people who work in Microsoft's IT
department, and because they had to go through every alpha, beta, and
product release on production systems they said they would never, ever,
EVER do an in-place OS upgrade if they had a choice. And that's
*Microsoft* talking.

In-place upgrades in general leave a bunch of cruft around that doesn't
need to be there. Doesn't matter if it's Linux, Windows, NetWare,
Solaris, whatever. A clean install should always be the first choice and
an in-place upgrade should be done only if there is no other option.

> #6- Linux is loaded with lots of apps that do the same thing. so you'll
> have to check each one to know which one is better. I wonder why don't
> developers integrate these similar apps into one powerful app which is
> able to do the job perfectly, like having 1 media player instead of 4
> for audio and 3 for video playback

Just like on Windows there's one media player, one word processor, one
math application, etc?

"The job" varies depending on who you are and what you want. No one app
could *ever* do "the job" that everyone expects it to do perfectly. Lack
of choice is anathema to OSS in general, and it seems odd to me that
anyone coming from having to deal with "the monopoly" in desktop
computing would be promoting a monopolistic way of doing things on a
completely open platform.

Anyways, that's my $0.02. Don't let answers like this scare you off the
community - everyone doesn't have to agree on everything (or with
everything you, I, or anyone else says) - I'm trying to point out that
the mindset is very different from what you've known coming from a
Windows platform, and it takes some getting used to. Stay around, read a
little, learn a little, and have some fun.

Jim