100% Dragon-proof hat, or your money back.

“I setup another “older lady” (her name is Penny) with Ubuntu because she absolutely could not stand vista. She would rather use win98, but she opted for Ubuntu instead. So then she was using the computer, and the only gripe she had was that the genealogy program called “PAF” she had, wouldn’t work with Linux. So after I looked into it, turns out the PAF works beautifully in Wine – I set her up and she was good to go. But then, her daughter’s computer had a hardware malfunction, and so she passed her Ubuntu computer on to her because the daughter needed a computer immediately for her home business. I remember the day she took the machine over.. Penny called me up and said the large monitor she plugged in, wasn’t working with Ubuntu. So I talked her through rebooting into the recovery menu option, then we used the “Attempt to Fix Graphics Configuration” and sure enough, it fixed it and she was on her way.”

“I’ve also setup my mother in law, she lives in another state, with Ubuntu Ultimate edition (in a dual-boot configuration with winxp), she’s been booting into Linux since.
I’ve also installed Linux on my Son’s friend’s computer (using wubi). He recently contracted a nasty winxp virus, and had been booting into Ubuntu GNU/Linux for months (per the directions from his dad)…. But then I recently cleaned off the virus from his winxp machine, where most of his games are installed. So this scenario might be iffy… lol
Every chance I get, I send people home with an Ubuntu GNU/Linux cd and ask them to try it out.”

Has anyone noticed that none of these people are able to now function without Shannon’s tech support? Evidently, this is how Shannon feels the world should be: people running linux, and he’s their tech support.

Fuck that, i’ve a life.

My inlaws have 3 windows machines and one 17″ powerbook. They’re not technical, but they’re not stupid either. Problems from them? once a quarter. maybe. I think i’m almost up on a year now.

That, by the way, is the most precious myth of Linux users: that windows is nothing but trouble forever and ever. Alas, Microsoft has been doing the work to make that not true, and it never really was as true as Shannon wants it to be.

But then, if other operating systems work, well, his justifications for linux go down the crapper. So, he’s got to keep the propaganda machine going.

My dad uses Vista. The reason. If he needs it set up HE can do it. He puts the disk in, boots from it, follows a few instructions (mainly clicking next), et voila, a fully working system. Updates are installed automatically and everything is as user friendly as it gets. He then downloads some free AV tools from Microsoft and he’s happy.

My mum uses Windows for the same reason.

I use Windows 7, Mac OS X and Slackware. I use Slackware to play (I’ve used Ubuntu and it’s nice but I prefer Slackware). For me it is fun. I use Windows 7 because it assures me compatibility with systems that we use at work for when I work at home, and also for gaming. I use Mac OS X as my main OS. Why? because it’s rock stable, it came with this computer, and I prefer the way it works.

I wouldn’t wish Linux of any kind (except perhaps Google Chrome OS) on any mainstream user. They don’t want to hack, they don’t want to play. They just want to switch it on, use it and piss off. If it goes wrong, they want to put the disk in, follow a couple of on-screen prompts and be up and running again. They don’t want to have to worry about proprietary or FOSS drivers. As John put it they don’t want to dick around.

I can offer technical support to mum and dad should they need it, as using a tool like gotoassist I can remotely log on to their desktops and deal with issues myself. I’ve never had to do it and don’t want to. Should something go wrong, I want them to deal with it. If that means a backup and reformat, so be it. For them only 2 OS families can do what they want. Mac OS X or Windows. They don’t want a Mac, so Windows it is.

Thats the whole point, I believe. Most people expect this these days, and rightly so. I certainly do.

I mean, let’s talk through it.. You buy your “granny” friend a Mac Pro tower… would you then talk her through(on the phone), the installing of a PCI modem on it? Nope, not gonna happen. Same scenario and result for windows. The point is, there are certain administrative tasks that will use the terminal, or perhaps otherwise non-GUI means of performing maintenance on a computer that no computer professional would suggest the end user perform(over the phone) anyways. So it’s a moot point.

And contrary to what your article here states, it’s actually very, very easy to install Linux on most computers(assuming you are using a modern Linux OS, i.e., Ubuntu, Fedora, openSUSE, etc.). In fact, I would argue that so long as a person’s computer boots successfully to the Linux LiveCD(this is another feature windows/mac lacks), a person would have an easier time installing Linux, and keeping their currently installed operating system(s) intact than with windows or mac anyday. Let me put that another way – Linux is easily installed, and has some of THE BEST options for being installed alongside other operating systems, to include even the linking to the alternative operating system (and installing directly onto the windows NTFS operating system(for wubi)) than the other OSes. Try to do that with windows, nope – not gonna happen.If you install windows while Linux is already installed – it will destroy your Linux – it won’t even give you the option of having a “choice” to boot to one or the other. For mac, if you partitioned correctly, you can hold the alt/option key when you power on, and then choose to boot to the Linux partition, although I haven’t tested whether installing Mac OSX will be friendly to the Linux if it’s installed after the fact(particularly if the Linux takes up the whole drive). I think I will test this right this moment actually, I have a mac sitting next to me over here. I’ll install Ubuntu Linux, using the whole drive, and then I’ll come back and install Mac OSX and see what happens. Will it give me the option to move the pre-existing OS over and install itself (like Linux does). I’m thinking NOT. With Linux, the install will resize other OSes partitions(both on windows or mac) and then install itself alongside. In this respect, Linux is actually more advanced than other systems.

So here’s the thing, what if the IT Pro were to configure the Linux machine to work well(this could even mean having a remote help solution(i.e., SSH or VNC or something)), and then give it to granny? What’s the likelihood you would you ever have to help granny remove a virus from her machine? Try Vundo or Smitfraud, or various other rootkit type nasty malwares… would you recommend trying to talk granny through trying to remove one of those on the phone? Good luck with that one… namely because with malwares like windows live antivirus – it’s hard enough to get on the web while the virus has the machine possessed, much less try to fix anything. Are you going to walk granny through using combofix, or booting into safe mode and trying to modify the HKLM/software/microsoft/windows/current version/run registry key, or removing the un-delete-able-by-normal-means malware *.dll’s that are in the system32 folder? Good luck with that.

My wife uses Linux, and her training is in acting, speech pathology, and education.

If you say “Oh, that doesn’t count, because you can sit at her computer and fix things,” then I will add that my sister and niece, who live about 600 miles away, use Linux as well. The first time I gave them a hand-me-down computer, I suppressed my gag reflex and put Windows 95 on it. Big mistake. Eventually I moved them to Linux, and the hassle decreased significantly. My sister isn’t schooled in computers, but has said she wants to learn. My niece? An English Lit major.