The Reg guide to Linux, part 3

Ah, a totally unbiased opinion!

This guide seems to have been brought to you by Canonical.

Linux Is Not Ubuntu.

FAIL indeed

So you want to convert people to Ubuntu, yet start throwing commandline stuff around that is totally unnecessary. What the hell did they invent the Software Center for?

Percentage Fail

1 Billion PCs of which 12 Million Ubuntu Machines (Assuming US billion of 1000000000)

= 12 000 000 / 1 000 000 000

= 0.0012

= 1.2 %

Not really true

"So if you download a file off a website – even a special Linux program – you can't run it by double-clicking it, nor even from the command line." That's misleading. You can do both of those things with certain downloads. Firefox, some games, shell scripts...

Epic package fail

I do realize that this article series is targeted to those not familiar with Linux (although still I'm rather dissapointed, come on el Reg, you can be more technical - we're not children), but your assertion that APT is superior to RPM doesn't even make any sense. One could compare dpkg (the actual packaging system used by APT) and RPM, but really, no virtually no one uses RPM directly, just as it is unlikely one would use dpkg directly. So a more relevant comparison would be APT vs yum vs urpmi and so on - and even then, it wouldn't hurt if you would say why APT is better than the alternatives. No really, I'd like to know. I don't use either at the moment, but as far as I can tell, they all resolve dependencies and have various GUI frontends in addition to CLI usage. So what makes APT so great?

But in a similiar fashion I'll simply conclude that pacman is superior to all the alternatives combined - I could offer reasons why, but why bother.

An introduction?

For an article hyping the polish of Ubuntu why does it give a command line way to install restricted extras? Why not mention the Ubuntu Software Centre? It strikes as just a tad friendlier to people new to Linux.

Anti-Virus

All this is well and good, but I would have liked to see a guide to installing av on a Linux distro!

@ Ray 11

No, you percentage fail.

12 000 000 / 1 000 000 000

= 0.012

= 1.2 %

Congrats "el Reg"

I for one congrats the Register for publishing this, as some people have pointed out there are some imprecisions on the article series, but on my opinion they're minor flaws.

The point is: Try Linux out, you may find it is not the monster some say it is, and it may even suit your needs pretty well. If you do not like it, at least you did not spend a penny and probably you did learn something new.

but of course !!!!

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

sudo apt-get install ubuntu-restricted-extras icedtea6-plugin

sudo wget --output-document=/etc/apt/sources.list.d/medibuntu.list http://www.medibuntu.org/sources.list.d/$(lsb_release -cs).list && sudo apt-get --quiet update && sudo apt-get --yes --quiet --allow-unauthenticated install medibuntu-keyring && sudo apt-get --quiet update

sudo apt-get install app-install-data-medibuntu apport-hooks-medibuntu libdvdcss2 w32codecs

Yes thats so much easier than Windows, I wonder why i didn't see it before........

Sighs with head in hands and goes back to Windows

I have to agree with some of these points.

Whilst I'm all for getting new people into the Linux swing, and completely agree that it's good to know how to do things the command line way, dropping the poor buggers to a terminal shortly after install probably wont win them over. That's only made worse by the fact that there are purpose built and user friendly graphical tools there for just this moment.

Good job on the "Linux doesn't work like Windows" part though, trying to get a windows user's head around the concept of package management can be half the struggle sometimes.

*sigh*

Its tutorials like this that keep people thinking that you have to do everything from the command line in Linux :-| Why couldn't you have taken a few screen shots of the Ubuntu package manager (a while since I used Ubuntu.... can't remember what its called!)

Will have Windows and Mac users rolling in the aisles...

All that command-line stuff will not help convert one single user to Linux. The fact that this article runs to two pages to explain how to do the most Mickey Mouse of activities will have Microsoft marketing men high-fiving each other in to the middle of next month.

Bravo!

Not all Linuxes require you to sod about with the command line. For example, if you're using openSUSE, you can install all the restricted formats with one (yes, one) single click: http://opensuse-community.org/Restricted_Formats/11.2

Apologies for posting an advert for openSUSE to your advert for Ubuntu. Bad form!

The trouble with Linux people is that they're too bloody busy showing off how clever they are and lose sight of the fact that Linux is just a thing to get stuff done. Why not write some articles that show Linux is *easy* rather than akin to changing a tyre blindfold whilst driving at 90mph up the M6 in the rain?

Of course not, because that would deny you the opportunity to engage in a bit of willy waving, wouldn't it?

How very,very true

I quote "APT, is the best, ... It makes Control Panel | Add and Remove Programs look like a sharpened rock tied to a stick."

I LOL'd.

Debian FTW

eltiT

<pedant>

It's *Switch User* not super user.

You can sudo as any user you want so long as you are set up right in the sudoer's file.

</pedant>

Lazy much?

Come on!? I'm reading this, and thinking "yeah, nice description of the package management ease of use, and the graphical goodness of it".

Then it suddenly becomes yet another stupid lazy Internet tutorial like the multitudes that you can find on Google, full of command line stuff, because it's easier to write. Aren't they paying the reviewers enough to take a few screen shots and add them to the text, really? I know, describing "click here", "then click there", "then search" (and adding all the accompanying screen shots) is boring and all that, but someone has got to do it.

Teach them to do it the NEWBIE way first, FFS. Then, later, when they are comfortable with the whole concept, MAYBE then introduce them to the command line tools. If there is no alternative.

(Disclaimer: I myself work on the Linux command line all day long -- except for the web browsing parts and the like, of course -- and I love its boundless power compared to graphical tools for us running scientific applications. So it's not a case of being bitter about the command line at all. It's just that if most users out there had ever seen something like Synaptic in action, wiping the floor with Windows and OS X software installation routines, they would never believe. And you continue not to show them.)

yawn

Yeah - it's so much easier for a user to drop to a terminal, browse to this site, type in various commands, copy & paste etc.

Or just browse to the site, say yes when it says you need xyz and your away.

My mum is still AMAZED she can remember how to copy and paste - dropping to a term and bashing out command just to go on Facebook isn't quite what I had in mind when people have been telling me it's so user friendly...

Linux - still shite for non geeks.

Ubuntu Fanboi?

This artical reads as if it is written by a Ubuntu fanboi, the tone is "Everything Ubuntu is wonderful, all other Linux distros are rubbish, and Windows is even bigger rubish."

Whats's all this command line crap for new users - if you want a Linux that really runs out of the box go for Linux Mint. Mint handles CD, DVDs, MP3,wav,whatever... immediately after the initial boot without user intervention.

The comments about APT .vs. RPM distributions is stupid and wrong and is typical fanboi language. Basing your distribution choice solely on which installation tool it uses is daft, especially when both work equally well.

I have helped at least 30 people to migrate from Windows to Linux and I always give them Linux Mint to get them going. To date 16 of those people have abandoned Windows completely, 4 still need their Windows fix occasionally and 10 have given up and reverted to Windows. Not a bad conversion ratio considering I don't have the time or inclination to do too much hand-holding.

Personally, I run an RPM-based distribution - just to show I am not biased.

Run

"Click on start, then run and type cmd"

"Now type ipconfig /all"

Yup, that Linux command line is REALLY scary.

command line?

More efficent? Of course it is

Heck I could set up the office PC at work to use a CLI for transferring files from the PC to the robots and it would do the job in 1/2 the time it would take the GUI driven program to load.

BUT non-techie people (who are in a very large majority) would never remember howto config the CLI command so a nice helpful GUI which has nice buttons to ask which robot to talk to and which file to send is a lot easier for the non techies to use.

This is being written on my nice fedora box with its nice system updates GUI and its nice add/remove software GUI.

The hardest part about setting this box up was copying/pasting the 3 commands needed to install mp3/DvD video support

Which I hated!

But I agree about this rather long winded article

d/l a gparted live cd

d/l your choice of linux

use gparted to make room on your windoze hdd

reboot with linux cd in drive

select 'install in drive free space' option

WIN!

Circumstances make cases

It is difficult to know who is this newbie thinking of installing Linux (or any other operating system) that is the subject of the article or the commentariat.

I don't believe that this newbie is going to be created in isolation. Most these people that are being described by inference here probably do not know what an OS is let alone how to install one.

My "newbie" goes as follows: they've got some good hardware, it's a bit fscked up, it's been fscked up once or twice before. They're fed up. The bloke in <Dixons|Argos|John Lewis> has suggested the solution is a new something

(You don't want to carry on with XP it's 300 years old, trouble is Win 7 needs the newer hardware, yours for £500)

Now possibly, just possibly they can't or won't spend the £500. (cf Blog of Helios). This newbies bump into "me" at <the watercooler|the pub|somewhere else> and vaguely knows I'm a bit penguin, has vaguely heard there is an alternative.

After some discussion we do the live DVD dance at their place, they like what they see. I say it's a bit different from what they are used to, but it's got all these advantages and once you get used to it (as with anything new) you'll be well happy and much more secure.

I will be doing it with openSUSE

(may I just say "zypper dup" or "YaST", if you don't understand you don't need to)

I will enable the repositories, and install the codecs (video drivers etc) so they don't have to, which solves all the how do I play <DVD|mp3|iplayer> problems. I'll even set up ntp, KWeather an the analogue clock so they don't have to in the first instance and won't notice the clock is always correct (until they do)

This will involve an hour spent mostly sitting around drinking two cups of coffee and eating a piece of cake if I ask nicely.

This will be based on KDE 4.4.4 because it works, it's beautiful and has loads of interesting and useful bits and pieces.

I will explain that each user has their own space which means separate files, privacy and harmony between left and right handed users from the get go and not only once you've logged on and done some other stuff

I'll discuss an external hard drive and luckybackup, as a "need it soon for important stuff"

I'll be around for the rare (in my direct experience) "how do I?" as the user gets the hang of stuff and gains a small dgee of non-technical empowerment including coping with the little green gecko turning into a red triangle or orange thingy, from time to time.

After a while, I might explain that there are alternatives for everything and while I like my computer to look like that, once you've settled in you could choose to experiment with one of the alternatives (i.e. gnome, XFCE etc) but that I only really know about KDE.

What world does everyone else live in?

Cheers

Excellent timing, I've just installed the new version of Qimo for kids, and due to some problems with the previous version (based on Xubuntu) I decided to install and configure Ubuntu first and put Qimo on top.

Everything went well except for the DVD part...

And now that works too.

Have a pint on me.

How about part 4 'how to allow different users to log into different sessions'

Appauled

Quite simply. Not the article, the comments.

I cannot, simply cannot, understand the vitriol in this set of comments.

The basic problem of restricted and non-free add-ons not being installed out of the box has nothing to do with deficiencies in APT or RPM or Yum, but with software patent enforcement, and proprietary software formats.

The fact that there is a CLI way and a GUI way to rectify this is not a problem but a beneficial feature. In both cases, it is necessary to either type or cut and paste, because the same reason that the software cannot be installed by default also prevents the repositories containing this software from being in the standard list.

If there is a Linux which automagically installs MP3, WMV, Flash or Realplayer codecs, or the DVDCSS libraries, then it is exposing the users to potential lawsuits in certain regions of the world. At least Ubuntu lets users make an informed choice.

Canonical are trying to be squeaky-clean, because when you get big, you become a target. When they try to address these problems on behalf of their users, for instance by licensing H.264 so that they can include it, they get criticized. It's damned if they do, or damned if they don't.

None of this is ideal. But getting people sniping at each other about the best Linux distro is completely unproductive. It's bad enough seeing this from Windows and Mac users.

I admit that I have not installed Fedora. The last Redhat release I installed was 9.1 (pre RHEL). But I decided that Fedora was too fast moving for me. I don't have the time for 2 major upgrades a year. I opted for Ubuntu LTS releases, starting with Dapper.

I now recommend Ubuntu to anybody who wants to play with Linux, because it is just so slick. It may not suite everybody, but I want there to be a major distro which gains the critical mass for general acceptance as an alternative OS. I believe that Ubuntu is the closest we have got so far. It's not perfect, but it is going in the right direction, which I don't believe that RedHat is (certainly not in the consumer space). Once we see critical mass maybe the wireless and display chipset problems will go away, as manufacturers package instructions and drivers for Linux as they do for Windows.

OK, you may like SuSE or Fedora or Mint or Debian, but are any of these gaining traction with users? Not as much as Ubuntu, I contend.

And I agree that it is easier to describe how to add the extras for the CLI, but that only needs to deter users if they are trying to understand what it is doing, something that normally never causes Windows users problems (who really knows what a Windows installer program does!). It could have been done with screenshots and the GUI, but not as succinctly. It may be lazyness, but I suspect I and many others here would have done the same, with a comment such as "don't worry what it is doing, just do it".

I would prefer to not have to do it, but that is not likely until all of the required add-ons are no longer required, or they are freed from proprietary control. What a happy day that would be!

If the command line is so difficult...

...then why do we still have keyboards on our desks?

The number of articles on linux that end up with some wintard bitching that they **hate** the command line is unbelievable. How do they get their fury on to these comment boards? Through a gui?

Sorry... fail

Quick intro to Linux for non-techies - great idea.

Part 1 - quick distro comparison - nice start.

Part 2 - dual-boot - mistake; at least one reader has trashed their Windows machine.

Part 3 - it now turns out that this is a Ubuntu advertorial. And, far worse, it's just plain wrong. So wrong, it's difficult to know where to start.

> Linux is different: you get the OS, apps, drivers, media codecs and so on all from

> your distributor, who has assembled them all into a single, more-or-less integrated

> whole. So to add more software, and to get updates, you go to the distro-maintainer,

> not to the original source.

1 - This has nothing to do with Linux - it's just how some distros operate. This goes to the heart of the difference between Linux (the kernel) and GNU (the political philosophy), and is part of the reason why "Linux" (the OS) has failed so spectacularly.

2 - For anyone who uses a computer for real work - ie. not just "Flash, Java, MP3 and so on" - this is also just plain wrong. You have to get the software from the vendor; no commercial vendor distributes through a distro-maintainer.

> What you don't do is get program executables from unknown sources (such as

> downloading them from the web) and run them, like on Windows. Unix isn't trusting like that.

Wrong; this just confuses people about what Unix is. The Unix security model is *completely* compatible with downloading and running stuff from the web; this is how we do things in the 21st century. The GNU and Ubuntu *political* philosophies are the problem here, not Unix.

Quite apart from anything else, the whole premise of this article is misguided:

1 - It starts by telling us what the Ubuntu philosophy is, explains why that's a problem, and then gives detailed low-level instructions for fixing that problem. What?! If the philosophy is a problem, then don't use Ubuntu!

2 - There's an underlying, and unstated, assumption that a computer only needs to run "Flash, Java, MP3, and so on". Sorry, but those of us in the real world use computers for real work. An article of this sort needs to *start* from this premise, and recommend a distro based on this premise.

Sorry, but this article is part of the problem, not the solution. I've been using Unix since V7, and have been waiting 25 years for a usable desktop version. It looked like Linux would make it, but the GNU philosophy has completely screwed it, and the last 15 years of development has led to a vastly fragmented and bloated ecosystem, with absolutely no commercial awareness or sense of the marketplace, and a desktop share of essentially zero. 16 years after 'Linux' we're still getting articles like this, telling us that we're not allowed to download and run things from the web, and that "certain things don't work" for absolutely no logical reason.

Oh, and for anyone who may have been tempted to install Ubuntu, rather than any other distro: there's only one thing you need to know about Ubuntu. They're not interested in binary compatibility with *anything*; it's official. That makes it, pretty much by definition, a dead-end.

Linux distros (Ubuntu) are almost there...

For most computer literate people it is already good to use, just make sure your hardware is supported properly. One of it's weaker points is WIFI, but if you are lucky you can run the windows NDIS drivers in linux using NDISWRAPPER with a bit of fiddling around, worked for me on an card with no modules think it even supports 64bit drivers.

If you are planning on doing anything more complicated like setting up servers and complicated firewall rules then obviously you will need to learn to use commandline, and to be honest what is possible in Linux just isn't in Windows at all for some things. The internet connection sharing dosn't suck like it does in Windows and is part of the firewall (iptables) built into the Kernel. Settiing up windows shares (samba) again you will need to learn commandline for the more custom setups along with user management and permissions.

Remote desktop (NX) is probably the best implementation of a remote desktop that I have seen, and google even maker an NX server (neatx) that appears to work without any setup other than SSH.

Shorewall is the best firewall manager I've used, although you have to read a 20 page manual to set it up, and even then its confusing. Gives you something to do for 4 hours. But there are other easier ones just not as customisable.

rtorrrent + wtorrent (php) is probably the best torrent client I've used, although i needed to create my own scripts to make it work properly and download wtorrent from a SVN.

vmware-server is pretty good, although does not run out of the box and needs patching, blame that on vmware people for not updating it for newer kernels.

For video, whats wrong with VLC?!? then you don't need to install codecs at all...

Encoding MP3's... you could just install wine and run dbpoweramp as you would do on Windows. On a different CPU, then I doubt it would even be a problem for you... not that I have ever encoded any MP3s in my life (FLAC,AAC,OGG much nicer).

But yes the only real issue is the lack of DirectX support... OpenGL stuff works fine, but sadly not much is written to use it anymore. Anything upto DX8 should be OK though. If the wine team ever supported DX9,10 and 11 fully then it would be game over to MS. That is the only thing stopping me running Linux on my desktop comp, as a server it's brilliant.

Just to add my two pen'oth

Windows install process on my dads HP laptop already pre-installed with Vista.

1. Start machine

2. Make emergency DVD's as instructed.

3. Wait for Vista to complete the initialisation and install processes only half done by HP

4. Meanwhile watch a full length feature film on the TV

5. Come back to find it almost ready to use.

So just STFU about how you buy a windows machine and it's all just ready for you.

P.S. daughters Mac

1. Switch on

2. enter your name

WTF Command line overkill!

I agree with about 78.2% of people on these boards. Why in the blasted hell did you include that 5 line PoS?

Ubuntu-restricted-extras is available in the software install thing under the applications menu.

My Missus: "How do I get flash?"

Me: "Applications, software installation thing, type in restricted extras, hit install"

User friendly is being able to shout the instructions into the lounge. Or over the phone.

What really fucks me off, Gnome has a built in screenshot thing that saves to a file (not the clipboard) and if the writer was busy on his linux box anyway, he could have added the pics to the article really easily.

A basic computer user doesn't want to use the command line. EVER. So why are you advising it for users at the beginning of their journey, when they don't need to.

OK, I'll explain.

Some years ago, back before anyone had thought of Ubuntu let alone set it up, another distro was in danger of taking control on Linux. That was the pre-Fedora Red Hat distro. This meant that other developments and distros were being overshadowed and, in some cases, cut out of the loop entirely. What I try to make clear when I say "Linux is not Ubuntu" (not the other way around, since that would be a lie) is that Ubuntu is just a distro, nothing more and nothing less, and has its strengths and weaknesses just as all the other distros do. To dismiss every other distro just because the writer prefers one package system is pointless, especially as I doubt that he has tried them all. While I admit that I'm not a keen RPM fan, I'm not going to dismiss it out of hand as the writer of this article did.

In other words, regardless of what was written in previous documents, if this is an Ubuntu introduction, then call it what it is - The Reg Guide to Ubuntu. Don't pass it off as anything else as anything else is a lie.

sudo apt-get what ?!?

I already knew about the politics of ubuntu not coming with "dirty" codecs by default (which is a f**king joke for the large majority of the world this ISN'T the United States of Infected Patent Bollox), but what's with the command line? Is the author an American? Does ubuntu work differently in America? I ask this because I tried to watch the last episode of Ashes to Ashes on by xubuntu 9.xx setup. It failed, but popped up some sort of message about looking for suitable codecs. Clicky, clicky, progress bar, more on-screen gumph. But my .mp4 file still wouldn't play. So I closed the application, double-clicked the .mp4 and all was well. Maybe this isn't everything, maybe it won't do Quicktime, but I was able to play a demo of a lovely looking Flash game featuring puzzles with a cute scrap-heap robot, so...

.

Bootnote: I'm a Unix newbie, mostly avoided it until now because I don't have the time or inclination for a quirky command line (*u*mount to unmount, why not u*n*mount? Was the omission of one letter worth it? Command line parsing so you prefix single letter prarameters with a dash, but you need two dashes for longer parameters. WTF? And don't get me started on doc.txt, Doc.txt, and DOC.txt being three entirely different files. There's some throwback to the Dark Ages deep in the heart of Unix. Perhaps what we need nowadays is a completely new OS that builds on the strengths of current systems (i.e. borrows heavily from Linux!), introduces some new concepts (I like the idea of the Minix3 reincarnation), and dumps a lot of the trivial obscurities of the current system (i.e. can anybody provide an *actual* reason for case sensitive filesystems except saving a few lines of code and a microsecond or two at runtime?).

No, we (Fedora) don't 'claim' twice as many users as Ubuntu

Author clearly didn't read http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Statistics very carefully. Including the bit underneath the numbers table, where it says:

"Currently there is no reliable way to count total users of Linux or a specific distribution which does have a per user registration process."

"The numbers above do not represent a total user count for Fedora. We are counting IP addresses because that is the only thing we can reliably measure."

It's very unlikely to be an accurate count of current users, because it's a total of all unique IPs that have ever accessed the Fedora repository list going back to Fedora 7.

As the above indicates, no-one knows how many Ubuntu users there are, either. They have all the same counting problems we do. There's no way to answer the question with any certainty.

Newbie with a Dunces cap. Sat at the back

I like a few others are new to the game. Not happy about Dual booting just yet. I can't switch my netbook on, walk away and come back. I have to 'catch' jolicloud before it gets in there first.

Therefore, I'll play in virtualbox first please. Yep, I like some of Distro's Ubuntu NBR, Mint and that Chinese one (YLMK) that looks just like XP and seems to use Mint over the top of Ubuntu.

Theres's acres of stuff written on getting Virtualbox Additions working for starters though, let alone SUDO this that and the other.. Oh you got one character wrong did you and it's done something else entirely, has it.

Works out of the box, does it. I don't think so.. Webcam black screen and wifi have been bugs for three years now. I know it may not be Ubuntu's fault but they know I'm going to try it in a VM first, or am I just 'weak'.. Dual boot to Jolicloud didn't fare much better either..

Oh and Skype from Software Centre.. that was a direct Linux download for me.. Nah, why would I want video conferencing when I'm out and about, that's just a luxury. Sit in a darkened room and type like a twat, till you get it right, boy.. sudo apt gstreamer now.. Shush.. just copy and past more shite you don't care about...

Ubuntu's great only your cam, mic, BT and wifi might not either, no but it's great though... Errr right. I'll plug Windows back in me thinks and get some work done...

apt vs rpm and Fedora

There's a classic mistake right at the beginning of the article (I paraphrase): "ubuntu has apt, fedora has rpm and apt is easier". You're comparing the wrong things. On ubuntu, dpkg is to apt as, on fedora, rpm is to yum. You should have started "ubuntu has apt, fedora has yum and there isn't much to choose between them".

So let me set the record straight in a short paragraph for Fedora.

1. download and burn the Fedora 13 image (or whatever is latest) from fedoraproject.org.

2. boot the DVD and follow the instructions. it's incredibly easy, really, it is.

3. once booted visit rpmfusion.org and follow the instructions for getting the free and non-free repos.

4. google (or look around rpmfusion.org) for which packages you need to get mp3 and dvd support).

You can use the command line (eg "yum install xyzzy" to install xyzzy and all its dependencies) or you can use the gui installer. Both are equally easy to use.

For someone not particularly au fait with computers (eg your mother/grandmother) I'd recommend ubuntu. For someone who wants the latest and greatest, I'd recommend fedora. For everyone else, try both, see what you prefer. But do please try Fedora 13 (which is current), it really is pretty damn good.

Okay now what (or more importantly - now how?)

Have downloaded, burn to USB, installed, but no network connection- how do you set up the network connection? the Cat 5 is in, the green light is on, but then what, do I connect to a server? to my ISP? Sure ubuntu is free, but without something to make life simple for "ordinary users" what is the point of suggesting we should all swap over? sign.. this is like trying to run fedora all over again....