Some more observations on Ubuntu. I brought out my jump drive this afternoon and plugged it in to the usb slot. I wasn't greeted with any obnoxious noises from the machine but didn't see anything happen either. After a brief moment of holding my breath, I notice on the desk top in big bold letters the name of the jump drive! I was able to open up the drive, and see a list of the files I knew to be on there.
Now for the big test. Could I open the files and see what was on them. There was a Powerpoint presentation, a MS Word document and a spreadsheet. Open Office was able to open all and I was able to work with all three. Hurray, another minor hurdle overcome and yet more (mostly) seamless and (basically) painless work with Linux!
However, here comes the sticky point. I am sure it's on here somewhere, but for the life of me I can't seem to find it. When I exit from Firefox it kindly asks me if I want to save my tabs. I thank it kindly and tell it that I really would like to save them. Unfortunately, when I re-open Firefox it hasn't saved the tabs. It looks at me with that dumb expression and says, "Tabs? What tabs are you looking for?". Sigh. I am certain that I am missing a preference box somewhere I will just need to hunt down that little sucker!
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Goodbye Windows, Hello Linux!
So I have now made the leap from a Windows operating system to Ubuntu Linux. How I got here is a tale unto itself.
Back up your hard drive now. Back up your hard drive now. Back up your hard drive now. What I tell you three times is true. Go do as I say and not as I have done. I usually am the one preaching the gospel of backing up your data. But do I listen to my own advice? In this one (and vitally important lesson) I did not. Hence my silly time since before Christmas.
Shortly before Christmas, I noticed I was having difficulties with my laptop. It would freeze up during odd times. It wouldn't respond to keyboard commands and had to be powered down. Finally, I was faced with the dreaded blue screen of death. Grrrrr! Now what do I do? The system would boot up, come to my desktop and then promptly blue screen out. Too late to back up my files, the hard drive was dead, dead, dead.
Luckily for me, I was not without a network of people far more knowledgeable about computers than I. After letting Mark from my office (huge tip of the hat to you Mark!) take a look, he pronounced the death of my hard drive to be official. However, he thought he might be able to at least pull off my documents. Hurray! At least I wouldn't be without my pictures and documents. A quick trip down to Computer Direct Outfitters, a small payment, and out I came with a brand new Seagate hard drive.
The next step was to install the drive and decide what to put on it. I have my Windows XP disk some where. I am quite certain that with a little bit of hunting I could put my hands on it. However I have a golden opportunity! I have, essentially, a clean slate. I've wanted to experiment with a Linux operating system for some time. Now seemed like the perfect time to give it a try, so why not? So now here I sit typing away and generally speaking the transition is painless and almost completely transparent.
As I do more with this system, I will update this site, so stay tuned!
Back up your hard drive now. Back up your hard drive now. Back up your hard drive now. What I tell you three times is true. Go do as I say and not as I have done. I usually am the one preaching the gospel of backing up your data. But do I listen to my own advice? In this one (and vitally important lesson) I did not. Hence my silly time since before Christmas.
Shortly before Christmas, I noticed I was having difficulties with my laptop. It would freeze up during odd times. It wouldn't respond to keyboard commands and had to be powered down. Finally, I was faced with the dreaded blue screen of death. Grrrrr! Now what do I do? The system would boot up, come to my desktop and then promptly blue screen out. Too late to back up my files, the hard drive was dead, dead, dead.
Luckily for me, I was not without a network of people far more knowledgeable about computers than I. After letting Mark from my office (huge tip of the hat to you Mark!) take a look, he pronounced the death of my hard drive to be official. However, he thought he might be able to at least pull off my documents. Hurray! At least I wouldn't be without my pictures and documents. A quick trip down to Computer Direct Outfitters, a small payment, and out I came with a brand new Seagate hard drive.
The next step was to install the drive and decide what to put on it. I have my Windows XP disk some where. I am quite certain that with a little bit of hunting I could put my hands on it. However I have a golden opportunity! I have, essentially, a clean slate. I've wanted to experiment with a Linux operating system for some time. Now seemed like the perfect time to give it a try, so why not? So now here I sit typing away and generally speaking the transition is painless and almost completely transparent.
As I do more with this system, I will update this site, so stay tuned!
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