Felix Pleşoianu

Humor: Three types of OS users

Sunday, February 10, 2008 7:09:38 PM

I finally identified the essential difference between Windows users and those of other operating systems. It's very simple, actually. Windows users will bitch and moan about their operating system at every turn. They'll complain about bloat, viruses, bugs, prices, Bill Gates... just about everything Windows, yet they would never, ever try an alternative.

Unsurprisingly, Linux users are the polar opposites. They positively love their OS; if they see any flaws in it, they're totally willing to overlook them. They use what they like and they like what they use. Still, offer to introduce them to some other OS (the more obscure the better) and they'll jump at the opportunity to try something new. As long as it's not Windows, of course.

Last but not least, Mac fans are, well, fanatical about their favorite platform, which they consider perfect. Trying something else? Surely you're kidding! Windows is totally uncool and Linux is for rocket scientists. No wonder everyone else disagrees with them.

Can we all get along, for a change?

(Originally posted on A philosophical programmer.)

Humor: Three types of OS users by Felix Pleşoianu is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

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Comments

Sergio Uribesuribe # Sunday, February 10, 2008 7:42:12 PM

I agree! regards, ;-)

flakbaitCol C # Sunday, February 10, 2008 8:21:21 PM

Amen! What are your thoughts on Ubuntu? It sounds interesting, but ....

Felix Pleşoianuclaudeb # Monday, February 11, 2008 5:12:27 AM

Well, I'm a Fedora user. Haven't seen Ubuntu much. Seems friendly, indeed, but someone new to Linux still needs bits of advice (duh!) If you can tell me exactly what worries you...

flakbaitCol C # Monday, February 11, 2008 6:34:34 PM

I wonder how secure it is and if I can still use my Windows-based software with it. I have read that there is word processor/spreadsheet s/w that is able to handle Word and Excel files. That's critical for me, along with photo editing. What about Fedora? I've never heard of it.

Felix Pleşoianuclaudeb # Tuesday, February 12, 2008 4:48:09 AM

There are at least 3 office suites in Linux that can handle Word and Excel files (though there might be some conversion issues), and then you can use any online office suite. Photo editing is not an issue either. Actually, see for yourself. Try OpenOffice.org and The GIMP in Windows. And yes, if you switch you'll be able to keep some of your Windows software running, too. There is a compatibility layer.

Regarding security, Linux has a firewall built into the kernel, most services run with a minimum of privileges, and so do your applications. A successful exploit can't do much harm, and successful exploits are as good as non-existent on desktop machines. Any security holes that do show up are patched very fast due to the open source development model.

All this is very generic information, but I hope it helps.

P.S. Fedora is the community version of RedHat, an enterprise Linux distro. It's one of the best. Quite friendly, too.

flakbaitCol C # Wednesday, February 13, 2008 2:33:41 AM

Thanks. I'll check it out. I would really like to switch. Maybe getting the dried oatmeal out of this keyboard would help.