The majority of the distros I've been talking about in the past few weeks are fairly straightforward in their installation routines; after entering the various bits of information --language, keyboard layout, user and host names, user and root passwords, location and time (local or UTC), partitioning scheme, etc., the system is installed and you are asked to restart in your new environment.
A couple of exceptions to this are OpenSuse, Mandriva, and PCLinuxOS, which have an initial reboot before you've entered your personal information. I was going back to Suse on my new machine (Ubuntu on the external drive) and forgot about this; so when I got cute and fiddled with the BIOS in between boots, I was locked out from a perfectly good install. And for some reason Suse didn't want to play nice with Ubuntu, saying (when I chose it in the GRUB menu)that it was a corrupted install. Turns out that the GRUB install was the corrupted part, and Ubuntu had no problems.
While Suse is a wonderful install and a truly polished Linux distribution, it's probably a good idea to either a)install it first (in a dual-boot environment) b)not fiddle with the BIOS between its initial reboot and entering your personal info, or c)learn a hell of a lot of command line to edit the user lists without an X server (i.e., graphical interface).
There's an interesting post on how to get by without an X server and all the things you can do here; I probably should have read it before I had the little slip-up yesterday. And that's all it was; once I installed a smaller distro on top of Suse (took ten minutes), Ubuntu started up without a problem from the external hard drive. Naturally I could learn to edit the GRUB menu from the command line, but as a former Mac loyalist I have a certain standard of dumbness to live down to.
Speaking of dumbness, there's this post (pulled out of somebody's nether region) on why more people haven't switched to Linux, and this brilliant rejoinder from Stephen Vaughn-Nichols on how in actual fact that we already are all Linux users (Google, 80% of web servers, etc.). But let's look for a moment at the waste of ether argument that said individual makes (summarized here to avoid summary execution at the hands of the DMCA and other dumb copyright fiats): 1) Windows users not that dissatisfied; 2)Too many choices--it's confusing; 3) People want to know for sure stuff will work (driver support and things labeled Linux-capable); 4)Command Line System is archaic; 5)Too geeky--Linux geekdom cliquishness(wtf?).
Assuming this fellow represents 'conventional astroturf wisdom', let's pick him his argument apart point by point.
One, the complaints from users themselves are just FUD spread against the FUD empire. Fair enough. Not exactly a rousing thumbs-up, but a valid point. Not total crap!
Two, too many choices--it's confusing, and consumers want fewer choices, which coincides nicely with Microsoft's thinking. People want less, and Microsoft offers less. Again, possibly true, though a sad state of affairs if so.
Three, not enough device driver support, and not enough labels on things (??!?) that say 'works with Linux' or some-such. Mmkay. The drivers bit of the point is absolutely false, but not enough labels,while possibly correct is totally irrelevant.
Four, the command line system is archaic, and ....nothing. Implying that you have to spend all your time editing files in the command line, without actually having the guts to say something so brazenly false. While a complete straw-man, bonus credit for not going that low.
Five, Linux is too geeky, and reeks of 'Linux geekdom cliquishness'. Apart from a completely silly made up description, no evidence what constitutes this, just that the average user will know it when they see it, and be scared. Or something.
Can't they even hire talented shills writers to cover the tech beat anymore? This individual really has a low opinion of computer users--and he gets paid for this stuff? Sigh. Update: someone far smarter than me rips apart the same post, but with greater relish.
Every so often the sheer idiocy of these things drives me nuts and makes me want to stop posting; but then someone will post a comment and say 'thanks for writing this', or 'I like your series', and it makes me want to continue to fight back against all the disinformation and FUD out there.
While I appreciate that there is some uncertainty involved in trying out something new, I just can't believe that there is the abject terror described in that fellow's work. Mostly I think it's the lack of any real information out there that lays out in quite clear terms how easy it really is, how much fun it can be having total control over your computer (and your music and video files), and how you can use the command line if you want to, but that it's not a pre-requisite, especially if you are using Ubuntu, PCLinuxOS, and a host of other really new user friendly distributions. Throw in the absolute kindness and helpfulness met with in the forums for the various distributions, and you have a rock-solid combination.
I was as newbie as newbie could be six months ago, and after just a couple of weeks I was able to operate (and operate well) one of the more 'difficult' distros, OpenSuse Linux. Ubuntu has been just a breeze, and it's only going to get orders of magnitude easier in the coming months.
It's almost laughable when I hear the same tired old chestnuts being dragged out again (and again, etc.) to try and combat this increasing interest in Linux and open source; it's the same people who spent years saying 'But Macs don't have any software', but now their final argument is 'just get a Mac'. Like I have that kind of money just lying around. I wish. And even if I did, at this point, I think I'd save it for some rainy day, coming to an economy in your local area soon.
And here's Beryl on Slackware: