Changes to the linux faq sticky

riddlermarc · 7 Jan 2007 at 15:22

Seeing as we need to try to shoe-horn some decent linux information into this forum, can we have a re-vamp of the linux sticky please? If so, can we take the initiative and have some suggestions as to what needs to go in?

I think the main thing that needs to be added is a "Which distro?" section right at the top. I know people will argue the toss over which distro is "best" but there are a few standard replies to the generic question "which distro?":

Ubuntu for absolute beginners, laptops
Fedora, SuSE for the next step along
etc...
etc...

Also the links need updating?

clv101 · 7 Jan 2007 at 16:46

riddlermarc said:
Seeing as we need to try to shoe-horn some decent linux information into this forum, can we have a re-vamp of the linux sticky please? If so, can we take the initiative and have some suggestions as to what needs to go in?

I think the main thing that needs to be added is a "Which distro?" section right at the top. I know people will argue the toss over which distro is "best" but there are a few standard replies to the generic question "which distro?":

Ubuntu for absolute beginners, laptops

Fedora, SuSE for the next step along

etc...

etc...

Also the links need updating?

Good luck... it's just a shame the "powers that be" have (irrationally in my opinion) decided to kill off the OcUK Linux comunity by not moving the Mac stuff out of here.

cb_linus · 7 Jan 2007 at 17:06

Which distro would be a good one ('which penguin is the right one for me?'

).

Also, I guess it would be useful to have a common applications list, to include open source alternatives to Windows programs (Gaim, Kopete etc for MSN Messenger, GIMP for Photoshop, Open Office for MS Office etc).

It possibly might be quite interesting to take a look at different window managers and desktop environments and maybe think about linking to some common projects that can be done with a Linux / Unix box (I'm thinking of MythTV for example)

riddlermarc · 7 Jan 2007 at 17:34

clv101 said:
Good luck... it's just a shame the "powers that be" have (irrationally in my opinion) decided to kill off the OcUK Linux comunity by not moving the Mac stuff out of here.

Seconded, but if there are to be any linux users left on these forums we need to make a bit of an effort.. I'm not convinced it will work but hey, worth a shot.

GarethDW · 7 Jan 2007 at 18:53

riddlermarc said:
Seconded, but if there are to be any linux users left on these forums we need to make a bit of an effort.. I'm not convinced it will work but hey, worth a shot.

I'd gladly contribute some stuff... been a Linux fanboy for a while.

cb_linus · 7 Jan 2007 at 20:13

For the 'which distro' part, it might be interesting to include a Linux distro timeline, to see how various distros are related:

clickety

MrWhippy · 7 Jan 2007 at 21:19

i'd suggest also that the "which distro" is a question usually posed by the linux newbie, and he/she is exactly the sort of person who should be pointed towards / educated about live distro cds.

by all means stick a which distro list near the top of the sticky, but i reckon an explanation about live cd's should be right up there with it.

it's where most linux newbs should start these days.

Una · 7 Jan 2007 at 21:56

MrWhippy said:
i'd suggest also that the "which distro" is a question usually posed by the linux newbie, and he/she is exactly the sort of person who should be pointed towards / educated about live distro cds.

by all means stick a which distro list near the top of the sticky, but i reckon an explanation about live cd's should be right up there with it.

it's where most linux newbs should start these days.

Yeah I agree with that. Its better to provide people with links to the possible distributions than to say which distro is right for someone - which clearly depends on personal preferences.

In other news, linux is running on my intel mac and is a hell of a lot more responsive than osx is

BoomAM · 8 Jan 2007 at 18:45

We all know that the mods wont make 2 forums for Linux & Mac.
But what about one main forum for general *nix questions, and then two sub forums in it for Linux & Mac specific?

Hate · 9 Jan 2007 at 00:20

hang on, ubuntu for absolute beginners then fedora for the next step?!

kiwi · 10 Jan 2007 at 20:21

BoomAM said:
We all know that the mods wont make 2 forums for Linux & Mac.
But what about one main forum for general *nix questions, and then two sub forums in it for Linux & Mac specific?

<macboy>mac isnt *nix noob!</macboy>

sorry

i agree about the sticky, i had actually started a new sticky but lost it on my HD which was about a year ago anyway.

clv101 · 10 Jan 2007 at 22:02

BoomAM said:
We all know that the mods wont make 2 forums for Linux & Mac.
But what about one main forum for general *nix questions, and then two sub forums in it for Linux & Mac specific?

We'll have a Apple ecosystem (laptops, desktops, iPods, MacOS, iPhone... etc) forum one day. Things just move a bit slow - remember how long it took the SFF forum to happen and the Apple ecosystem is larger than that.

The only shame is that in the meantime the Linux/Open source community get crowed out.

BoomAM · 10 Jan 2007 at 22:43

kiwi said:
<macboy>mac isnt *nix noob!</macboy>

sorry

i agree about the sticky, i had actually started a new sticky but lost it on my HD which was about a year ago anyway.

MacOSX is based on the Darwin kernal. Darwin is a derivative of Unix. So i was correct when i said '*nix'.

kiwi · 10 Jan 2007 at 22:46

BoomAM said:
MacOSX is based on the Darwin kernal. Darwin is a derivative of Unix. So i was correct when i said '*nix'.

damn, i missed a <sarcasm> out

BoomAM · 11 Jan 2007 at 01:54

kiwi said:
damn, i missed a <sarcasm> out

...long day.