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I'm making my parents convert to Linux.

Nick

Nick

Well-Known Member
NLC
So my Mom called me up and gave me her credit card number and said to build my Dad a new computer for around $350. Well I just ordered an AMD AM2 processor, 2 gigs ram, a nice mobo & case, and stuck a high speed 80gb hdd in there.

So after I get it all together, Mom let me know that I can just go ahead and put Windows 2000 Professional on there -- which is what they had before. That seems like a waste.

After talking to her about it, I found out there are only two requirements beyond the surf the internet, check email, load pictures off digital camera that might pose a problem if I switch them over to Linux. Those are a) Dad's Quicken stuff needs to be transferred over and usable without being too confusing of a leap and b) some old documents in Word Perfect and Word Perfect Works (I'm talking Windows 3.1 here people) have to somehow be accessible.

Is this going to be doable in the next week? Even though the annoying phone calls for the first week of getting used to it might be frustrating I'm thinking no longer dealing with questions on antivirus, "they said I should worry about adware, what do I do", "should I get a firewall", "what emails can I open", defragmenting, "why does it keep freezing to where I have to reboot", etc. would heavily outweigh this.
 
Judge Fudge said:
Damn, sh1t was so cash.
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~ServerPoint~ said:
Linux requries skills and knowledge. Do you parents have a lot of time?
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Not true anymore.

Have you heard of Ubuntu, Mint, and Sabayon? All he needs to do is get it set up for his parents including a cron job to update everything (unless the distro he chooses is strictly set to certain release dates, which would mean he just has to show up every 6-8 months and update it for them), and all they have to do is learn how to log in, find everything in the menus, and shut it down properly.
 
I know, but for the aged people it is difficult to cover something new. Anyway that is up to the parents. Good luck to them ;)
 
Just set the BIOS to auto-boot. Power strip off = computer off, power strip on = computer on. Saves the hastle of doing that.
 
It only takes 30 minutes to an hour to install and get Linux up and running. *ubuntu is what I would recommend.

Once you install linux and update it. Install a web browser, like Firefox. If they use an online email client then they shouldn't have a problem. Otherwise, Thunderbird would work.

If you install kubuntu, then you can install digikam to import pictures from a digital camera.

Linux is simple enough. You turn on your computer. There's a simple login, like Windows. After that, there is an icon like the start menu.

Updates are easy as well. Once the update icon appears, click on it then click apply changes and it'll update automatically.

At least, this is what it is like for Kubuntu
 
I shudder at the thought of giving my mum a pc with linux on it, my mum can't understand that her blog is on the internet and not her computer, nor can she understand that her favourites aren't stored on the internet they are stored from the internet ... and she's an amazingly intelligent woman ...
 
My mum doesn't even know what 'internet' is.
She refers to my computer all the time as either a 360 or a Playstation. :p
 
Haha, my Mom called any video game I ever had "sega" until about a year ago. Now everything is referred to as "xbox".

Joe, I shudder at having to constantly get phone calls about adware, viruses, and Windows crashing. For some reason they have the most difficult time keeping things up to date, even with automated ones. I'm hoping being less vulnerable to dangerous software plus easy updates will fair better than windows has treated them.

Do I understand correctly that there is a Windows emulator available? There's a couple legal software programs that they use from time to time (seldom, really) that would be good to put on there as well to make sure this runs smoothly.
 
I created my mum an account with limited permissions, she cannot install software, I connect using RDP a couple of times a week and do a quick scan, I'm there all day on sundays for lunch and normally dinner ...

WINE actually stands for "Wine IS NOT AN EMULATOR", it's an implementation of the windows API on linux, to that end, it cannot do everything windows can, some complicated applications will fail, it's normally much better ( esp. if data loss is a problem ) in the long run to find an alternative software. OpenOffice has come along leaps and bounds in the past years, I use it over MS office on windows now, that's most things covered.

When it comes to document conversion, there's normally a bash/perl/php/ruby/tcl script to take care of business. If for some unimaginable reason I was forced to take an OAP down the linux road at such a late stage, I wouldn't confuse them with API layers, emulators or any of that nonsense. Convert their documents to an opensource format and get them used to using the alternatives targetted at their environment. In the end they'll learn the software and not need to know about anything more complicated than they do already, a lot of the time opensource alternatives try ( as much as possible, without asking for lawsuits ) to emulate their commercial counterparts, much of the software will probably feel comfortable for them anyway ...

It's not the lack of software, or interface that bothers me about your idea though, it's, lets be honest catastrophic system failures, which are quite common on linux even today, I would suggest you enforce as many permission restrictions as you can on an account for your parent(s) and even find something with SELinux enabled, SELinux can be a ----, but at the same time, it stops you making the sort of stupid mistakes that cause the sort of failures I mention ...

CrossOver are sneaky, source code is free: http://www.codeweavers.com/products/source/
CrossOver started as a ( free, if I remember correctly ) project to port DirectX to the WINE API, somewhere along their way the got lost and started charging for the privilege of the build process. If you are a confident linux user, DIY ...
 
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