[Ham-Computers] Latest XP Security Updates

[jeff]

On Tue, 2006-11-21 at 22:42 -0800, Jim Hill wrote:
> Frank and the group:
>  From my experience, if you are just starting with Linux and don't 
> have a computer background, Ubuntu is a better choice.  I've 

Jim - thanks for some really well thought-out advice.

I'd like to take it a step simpler.  Get what's called a live distro,
which you dl for free and burn to a cd.  The computer boots from the cd,
never messing with the hard drive or current (flawed) operating system.

The detection routines are pretty good (I have a lot of experience with
Knoppix - knoppix.net).  It has always found 95% of my hardware and inet
connections and I get going quickly.  You can play with it to your
heart's content and decide if it's right for you.

I don't recommend it to total newbies just yet.  Yes, you can get it up
and running with the cd, you can use all sorts of open-source apps, you
can surf, but the moment you need to perform any technical operations,
you're going to have to go on a search mission to figure out how to do
it.  This includes looking for help at the boot prompt in case some of
the hardware detection misses something.

I like a challenge, so I always suggest putting it on one machine but
having another one there with a net connection so you can do necessary
research.

Lest I scare anyone, it *does* work from the boot cd.  It comes right up
into a graphical environment which will be familiar and operable by
anybody who has used a computer in the past ten years.

The boot cd can be and is used by people as a `rescue cd', in case your
OS goes down - you can rescue the data this way.


> installed both Debian and Ubuntu, and Ubuntu is much easier.  

agreed, as of the last cd I tried.  Darn friendly.


 
> first attempt was installing Debian in a Linux adult education class, 
> where the school computers were really old and slow.  We spent 
> literally weeks getting successful installations, as a reinstallation 
> took hours.  The instructor spent most of his time helping those with 
> the worst problems, and the rest of us compared notes on our 

sounds like a real planning nightmare.



> Over half of the class quit.  The guy who wrote the Debian 
> installation instructions really should have taken it home and had 
> his wife and a few neighbors try it out and give suggestions. 

this is where web research comes in handy.  There are a bunch of really
good sites where actual humans have written up directions or described
their experiences.


> Debian screen. While fixing it, I ended up on a path that asked 
> endless questions about the most intimate details of my monitor 

the x-server, yes.


> (fortunately, I had the manual), plus a generous ration of questions 
> about the mouse and keyboard.  Windows gets an A+ in this area for 
> ease of installation.  I finally got a good display, but I have never 
> been able to repeat it and get the same clarity.

depending on which x-server you're using, you can re-input the relavant
data and clear things up.  IIRC, Ubuntu is Debian-based, so something
like `dpkg-reconfigure xserver' then hit TAB to complete (it will be
either xserver-xf* or xserver-xorg, I think) should get you into the
configuration.  But like before, you'll want to have all the data
on-hand.  Horiz+vert rates, etc, in case it can't auto-detect.


> very useful.  I wish I could find a similar book for Debian.

you don't have to know too much at first with the live cd's.  Most if
not all come with installation instructions.  Knoppix has a script that
takes care of it, but you might want to read up on disk partition
requirements for any distro.


Again, thanks for your observations and recommendations.


-jeff
semi-successful linux geek for a while now