Linux and Hurricanes

Interesting title, right? Finally have a few minutes to update the blog. I spent most of my time lately shifting our home operating systems to the Linux distribution, Ubuntu. So why am I switching operating systems? Well, awhile back I decided to try out Firefox, the open source browser that challenges Microsoft's Internet Explorer. As a loyal Firefox user, I saw the benefits of open source, when adding extensions to my browser. Now, I could not imagine browsing the internet without my web developer toolbar, weather, built-in Google toolbar, and more. It just makes sense. So then I began to use other open source software. Products such as Audacity and The Gimp allowed me to complete tasks similar to paid software, most times even superiorly (is that a word?). Then I stumbled upon the office suite, Open Office. With this software, I found it did many of the tasks in one step that I needed two or more steps with in Word. Such as saving a file as a pdf. It eliminates the need for programs such as Primo PDF that 'print' files as pdfs.

When I started the new job and choose a Macbook Pro as my laptop of choice, I decided to run a Linux distro using the loaded Parallels. Parallels allows you to run another operating system within Mac OS. While most set it up to run XP, I decided to run Linux. Of course the challenge came from deciding which Linux distro to use. Many different selections abound, from Ubuntu, to Mandriva, to SUSE, the choices are mindboggling. I finally settled for Ubuntu for two reasons. One, their venture into education, edubuntu, would be something I could recommend to school systems, and two the overwhelming support community. Ubuntu is one of the most popular Linux distros, so with my initial lack of knowledge, that appealed to me.

I will post more thoughts on my switch in future posts...

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Did you notice I had fewer posts recently? Compared to last year, I looked for the reason. When you look at my June, 2006 posts, you quickly see why--the STANLEY CUP. This year, as we failed to make the playoffs, I did not post as much. Two nights ago, we ended our reign as defending Stanley Cup champs, as the Anaheim Ducks beat the Ottawa Senators. Hopefully we will see better things from the Canes next year! I did enjoy the playoffs--Myra really like the contrast in the games and Lucy liked watching 'iiiiiice' and 'awkeee'. (-: