Who currently uses Linux?

[Harrison]

I know I asked it before, but I thought I would ask again as the OS is still as popular as ever.

Are you currently using Linux? And if so what distro and version are you using? What do you think of it compared to the other OSs you have used in the past? And what are you currently using it for?

I've been using Fedora for a few years now and still think it's a great Distro, and I've also used SUSE quite a lot and think that is one of the nicest Distros to use for ease of setup. But as Ubuntu has become very popular lately and is the only distro many seem to be talking about at the moment I thought I would finally give that a go now.

So I'm currently setting up one of my spare PCs ready to install it. The server edition looks good too, being able to install and have a complete LAMP server up and running in 15 minutes sounds impressive and something I could find very useful for testing.

I am going to install the desktop version onto the PC to have a play around, and might then setup the server edition in a virtual machine on my main PC to use an an extra test server.

[Tiago]

I am not using now, but i used for 2 years the Mandrake 10. It was a good Linux, but i used it as user, not to develop, it was only for office tasks, web, mp3.
Today i only have XP, but i am not using it to develop or to do complicated works, so one of this days i will try Ubuntu,i read nice things about it.

[Harrison]

I never tried Mandrake. It it still be developed. These days you mostly only hear about Fedora (and Red Hat), SUSE, Ubuntu and Debian.

Did you know about virtual machines and live discs? You can try Ubuntu on CD as the install disk is also a Live CD, so it will run completely from CD. It is also possible to install Linux on a virtual machine and run it that way. A free virtual machine called Innotek Virtualbox supports Linux installations so you can install and run Linux without needing to setup a real HD or system for it. I've tried Virtualbox with Windows 98 and it works perfectly, so I'm next going to try it with Ubuntu.

[Tiago]

I will try ubuntu to one of this days, i will install on top of windows to have a 2 boot option, just like mandrake did.

[Harrison]

You will need to repartition your HD for that though, which is a bit more hassle. That is why I'm trying it out in a virtual machine so I can install it, test it and then just delete the virtual HD image if I decide not to keep it.

[Tiago]

Well i try the virtual machine before (VMplayer) but the speed is not the same....

When i installed Mandrake some time ago, he creates a new partition for Linux and did something like "pull the win partitions to other side of HD" and rearange them all, but it was very fast to do it. And both mandrake and XP did work fine! I am sure ubuntu will do the same. .... later if i see that ubuntu do everything i need, i remove windows... i only have XP because there is allways 1 application i cant find in linux.... but if i get all in linux (dont need to much these days) i will keep linux only...

[Ritty]

@Harrison: Speaking of Linux, which is the basis for emulation of Uae I think,... have you ever used Uae for a Mac? Is it possible?
Also, I have Ubuntu and I wonder how it can be used on this pc here with Amiga emulation. I have tried Amiga Forever but I couldn't mount the AF because I didn't know how nor do I understand enough computer-eze to do it from emails and forums...I'm a layman computer fan, since I use computers to draw , hence I have little time to study computers...any suggestions?

[Harrison]

@Ritty. Yes, you are right in thinking Amiga emulation on Linux is via UAE. If you are using Ubuntu or Fedora then you might be able to find the correct version of UAE for your version of Linux directly from the OS using it's package updates program.

As for the Mac, yes there are distros of Linux for the older PowerPC based Macs. And with the newer Intel Macs you can just use the same versions of Linux as the PC. Because an Intel Mac is basically a standard PC, but costing twice the price for the Apple logo!

[Stephen Coates]

Has anyone here used MacUAE?

I used it on the powerbook about 6 years ago and it was very slow. But said computer now has a G3 upgrade so i might try it again sometime.

[Harrison]

I don't think MacUAE is being developed any more. Would still be interesting to find out how well you can get it to run on a newer Mac though.