Welp, I have converted my entire family’s computers and laptops to Linux based machines, OpenSUSE in particular
Most of them being new and intermediate computer users. They are loving the experience. Hassle free computing. They love how everything just works and not have to worry about any viruses etc…
I remotely administrate their computers and perform updates etc to help with the leg work as they are learning as they go.
I simply put it to them, just use the computer as you normally would and I will handle anything and everything technically that arises.
When we all get together as a big family, usually once a month, I run workshops for the family and they are learning quick.
Another leap for Linux 20 odd MS Windows machine out the window now >:)
Well done! My mother (who lives in a different continent) is on openSUSE, and my wife (who lives with me) has openSUSE on her desktop and Laptop as a dual boot with WinXP, and on occasion she will use openSUSE. I only use Linux at home (I am pathetic with MS-Windows). Both my wife and mother do get upset if openSUSE Linux does not work, so clearly they use it a bit (even though I know my wife uses winXP more). I also remotely maintain their openSUSE Linux systems (not so remote with my wifes. ) . …
This (albeit small) family maintenance requirement is another reason (to some others) that I have a sandbox PC where I install the later alpha and beta versions of new openSUSE releases. I trial out the applications I know they like to use, in order to do a quality check on those apps, and raise bug reports immediately if there are hiccups, BEFORE the GM release. I find it far easy to get bugs fixed during the alpha/beta process of an openSUSE release, than at any other time.
Ever since my (83-year old) mother’s WinME boot partition was fataly infected with a Virus (and I thus remotely removed it from her PC’s Grub boot menu) she has mostly been using Linux. Compared to openSUSE, her WinXP boot partition boots far too slow and she dislikes waiting for WinXP to boot. Once WinXP is running, its speed is comparible to openSUSE.
Her biggest complaints are:
a. it typically takes 2 to 3 more mouse clicks to open attachments to emails with openSUSE (or to print something with openSUSE) compared to winME/WinXP, and
b. with openSUSE-11.1’s 2.6.27 kernel, her webcam support under Linux is no longer good (as compared old openSUSE versions). This is partly my fault, as I could remotely compile the needed webcam driver (instead of relying on the poorly implemented model inside the 2.6.27 kernel) and install the webcam driver on her PC … I just have not got around to doing this yet. Fortunately she does not use her webcam very much.
c. sometimes she received MS-Powerpoint presentations as Hotmail attachments (she uses Hotmail for her email account) and on occasion they do not run as well in openOffice as they did in her MS-Power Point (which was a licenced copy on her WinME - purchased by my brother around 8 or 9 years ago for use with her old Dell PC). Fortunately most play under open Office , otherwise the situation would be difficult …
Reference MS-Power point being difficult, I say difficult because I am convinced most of her friends do NOT have legal copies of MS-Power Point, yet they create, and pass (via email) and also receive/open many Power Point presentations (all the time) without having a legal copy of Power Point (they all have pirated versions). I find that practise (of forwarding documents created with pirated software) frustrating and annoying, as it means my mother really wants to see exactly what her friends are sending her, and she can not always. … Again - its fortunate Open Office can mostly do this.
> Reference MS-Power point being difficult, I say difficult because I am
> convinced most of her friends do NOT have legal copies of MS-Power
> Point, yet they create
hmmmmmm…interesting, i had no idea that receiving a MSPP doc from an
illegal/pirated copy might be the reason that some received here are
less than smooth to view via OpenOffice…
since many of my friends live outside of the ‘rich countries’ they too
use such stolen tools to create…pity that…but, i’m pretty sure
eventually most will switch to OpenOffice…
No. … I did not word the well. Pirated or not does not affect the opening capability.
But pirated is illegal. And her friends are creating slideshows with illegal software. Other friends of hers are opening the slideshows with illegal software. They are enjoying the presentations using illegal software. And my mother has a hard time understanding that her friends would use software illegally. But they do. They do not want to buy Power Point. Neither does my mother.
If they did NOT use illegal software, they would be required to use some other software, like openOffice (or another free app) for their slideshows. But they don’t. They illegally use Power Point.
And presentations from Microsoft’s powerpoint does not always work with openOffice.
So I am frustrated because she is being forced to suffer by not being able to display properly documents that were created illegally, and being opened by most people illegally.
You know and everybody know that illegal software,if someone using it and get nailed they will spend thousand of $ for legal fee.
Me my self what your saying slideshows all the free stuff Im using all the time.Before I use trail nero to burn first time Suse that is legal. Dont forgot trail software is legal to lol!
I’m inclined to agree - one of my major bugbears is incompatibility of Microsoft software with basic data standards. It’s even more irritating when they feel the need to reinvent things that already work to make them proprietary, but they are the software Mafia, so I suppose that’s to be expected; however, on a day to day basis, it’s the .doc files that get my goat - or to be slightly more precise the pictures / graphs in them. The idea that in this day and age opening a lightly DTPed typed up document on another computer should be expected not to work would be ridiculous if it weren’t true.
I pointedly write everything in Open Document Format for exactly this reason.
I too just implement a conversion installation over the weekend. Put together a new box for a friend and now he is running 11.1 _64. He is registered here too (bslboden)
He is loving it. But XP is on a 2nd HD too (Gaming!)
I’ve tested power point under cross over and it works, BUT it is not integrated well into firefox. Sound from power point (under cross over) was also not perfectly smooth She definitely wants the sound, and complains when the back ground sound does not work under Linux …
Also, when she ran winME and clicked on a Power Point attachment from MS-Explorer, it launched immediate. In Linux she had to click a couple of more times (for openOffice under Firefox). For cross over running Power Point, that opening direct from Firefox (with Poweropint under cross over) might not even work at all. This would require her to save the presentation to her desktop, then open … and the menu’s for the file manager under cross over from what I recall are not the same as either windows or Linux (due to the cross platform aspects) and hence that is more complex.
The idea (of crossover) is good for you and good for me (and I did test it) but for my 83 year old mother, … hmmm …
Far better for her friends not to create with illegal software and not to open with illegal software proprietary formatted documents.
About time. I’m using OpenOffice and I to get powerpoint presentations in my email. Have had little trouble so far. Can’t say I miss the noise if there is any.
Ah, good for you! seeing as there’s about 4 computers in my house (not counting the 2 IBM PS/2s that make up my antique computer collection), with only 3 being used (one’s my sister’s, she’s in the military), the only person in the house i’d have to convert when the time is right is Mi Madre. she’d probably oppose at first but she accepts little bits of information from me at a time. it’d be a matter of converting her little bits at a time, i suppose.
Of course, completely switching to linux would be a bit rough seeing as i have some games i’m particularly fond of, and as far as i know, WINE is fail.
) . …
