Topic: Linux. Gotta love it!

[Secret Santa]

With the pending demise of Windows 7 in January - well, the stoppage of security updates which amounts to the same thing - I've been dabbling in Linux recently with the intention of moving over permanently and avoiding Winbloat 10 and its Orwellian spying tactics (yes I'm aware they've already ported the spyware to Win7 and 8.1 as well).

So, anyway, I've tried about fifteen different distributions as virtual machines and a couple on real hardware and am really liking what I see. Currently settling on MX Linux Xfce and Linux Mint Cinnamon. There's a couple of things I have to sort out before I can jump ship permanently but I expect to have that done by January 2020. I don't really need Adobe or MS Office so no probs there which is what usually keeps people tied to Windows.

I put MX linux on an underpowered notebook I have which absolutely crawls under Win10 and it's as snappy as hell now! I genuinely thought that the Linux is faster than Windows idea was just sales pitch for Linux, but no, it really is faster and by some margin, especially on older and/or underpowered hardware.

Has anyone else considered moving to Linux or are you there already perhaps? I'd be interested to hear opinions pro or con.

[Peripatetic Phil]

Not for me, SS.  I share all of your misgivings regarding Windows 10 (etc) but will stay with Windows 7 until it (or I) die/s.  Linux is just Not For Me^[TM].  I use most members of the Adobe Creative Cloud suite in a daily basis, use MS Office when I have to, and also rely on a large number of other Windows utilities to support my (unpaid) work.  Yes, I know that Unix/Linus devotees believe that it is simply The Only Choice^[TM}, but it's just not for me.

** Phil (i7, 16Gb, 1TB SSD, etc).

[Bob-A-Job]

I was going to go to Linux when it was announced Windows XP was to be canned but since I got canned first, money became tight and my time needed to be deployed to finding other work, which has so far ended up being sporadic and low paid.

There is another alternative to MS Office and 365 though which not only have I been using for years but now most of my friends and relatives do:

Apache OpenOffice

[Secret Santa]

The thing is Phil that apart from Adobe and MS Office there are replacements for virtually all other Windows programs ... or should that be apps?

Even with Office there are at least five good alternatives for Linux but, yes, they all have some incompatibility to different degrees but some are near perfect, depending on how much of the Office suite you actually use. Adobe is a non-starter because there definitely is no alternative where individual components are so seamlessly integrated. But there are good alternatives for each individual Adobe package.

I think it's easier for me because my needs are almost equally met by the Linux equivalent programs, or indeed the exact same Linux ports from Windows programs.

Hardware can be a problem though as Linux is not as well supported in terms of drivers for the bleeding edge hardware such as latest Nvidia graphics cards.

But for anyone not happy to continue with Windows, Linux really is now a much more matured platform. In fact Linux Mint and several other distributions look and act very similar to Windows 7, which is why I like it. I want the familiar feel of Windows without the bloat and spying. Linux is that.

By the way, how do you intend to mitigate the increased possibility of malware affecting your Windows 7 after January when they pull the plug on security updates?

[Secret Santa]

There is another alternative to MS Office and 365 though which not only have I been using for years but now most of my friends and relatives do:

Apache OpenOffice

Absolutely. That's my alternative of choice to MS Office. Mainly that's because I've been using MS Office 2003 for what seems like forever and when I first ran Openoffice Write I thought I'd accidentally opened MS Word they look that similar. But I can understand that power users that use a good proportion of Word's copious facilities might not agree. For me who uses about 10%, though, it's perfect.

For a more modern alternative WPS Office is good if you can suffer the fact it's Chinese in origin and phones home about who knows what, so not for me.

[Peripatetic Phil]

Adobe is a non-starter because there definitely is no alternative where individual components are so seamlessly integrated. But there are good alternatives for each individual Adobe package.

The intellectual investment in (attempting) to master { Dreamweaver, Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Acrobat, ... } was/is so great that I just cannot face doing the same for open-source alternatives.  And then there are the Longman Pronunciation Dictionary, Cool Edit Pro, Total Recorder, Vector Magic, MultiAVCHD, TeXworks, and so many others that I use (and rely on) on a daily basis.

By the way, how do you intend to mitigate the increased possibility of malware affecting your Windows 7 after January when they pull the plug on security updates?

Just as now

[Secret Santa]

The intellectual investment in (attempting) to master { Dreamweaver, Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Acrobat, ... } was/is so great that I just cannot face doing the same for open-source alternatives.  And then there are the Longman Pronunciation Dictionary, Cool Edit Pro, Total Recorder, Vector Magic, MultiAVCHD, TeXworks, and so many others that I use (and rely on) on a daily basis.

Yes I entirely understand your point of view. It's one that stymies many potential converts to Linux. By the way when you mentioned open-source software you forgot the crucial selling point, it's also free! (Thus FOSS). But all of those apps you mention have direct Linux equivalents.

And when Microsoft do pull the plug on Windows 7 security updates, the flak that they will get from (e.g.) the American military will be so great that they will be forced to re-think the whole thing.

If only! There will be continued support for Windows 7 for the foreseeable, as there is for WinXP (NHS!), but not for the likes of us plebs only for those corporate and, as you say, military entities with pockets deep enough to afford the extortionate cost of being part of that select group.

[Peripatetic Phil]

But all of those apps you mention have direct Linux equivalents.

I am certain that the LPD does not, and would be very suprised if any Linux equivalent to the others were in the same league, to be honest.  Linux and its tools are very good for what they are intended for, but the work that has gone into InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop, Acrobat, Dreamweaver, etc (and for that matter, into Cool Edit Pro & Vector Magic) suggests to me that any FOSS clone is likely to fall well short of the mark ...

** Phil.

[Bob-A-Job]

I can't speak to the specific applications that you use Phil as I don't use them (all) but for the open community, the reasons we have created alternatives are many and varied, let me see if I can give you a few:
- We would love to break MS's monopoly.
- We would prefer to have common standards (MS only has standards MOSTLY in it's on products and not even then all the time IE being an example).
- We do it allow for more frequent updates and problem resolution.
- We do it to show that we understand what users want and not what developers are prepared to offer.
- We do it, because we can and to prove that we are capable of doing it.
- We do it for you.

I am sure there are many more contributors to open source projects out there that may have other reasons.

I guess the point I am trying to make is that there are options for everything, sometimes for the better, such as NOT staying on a big 6 standard energy tariff, just because it is who you have always used... (personal family issue I have).

If you are happy with what you have, then good, but if you are willing to try new stuff, then there is much more out there than is advertised and mostly safe.

BAJ

[bhamcurry]

I made the switch to Linux permanently about a decade ago. There is only 1 Windows program I don't have a replacement for, so I run a WinXP install under virtualisation so I can run that one game. As it doesn't need network access I run WXP without any connectivity.

Everything else is either an equivalent (LibreOffice is under aggressive active development and becomes a little more accomplished each iteration) or is run as an online/cloud version, or I just use something else (GIMP instead of Photoshop).

I wouldn't switch back to Windows, and Apple can go pound sand