Linux and the Tweaker
It seems like it was so very long ago that I downloaded a copy of SuSE 9.2 and tried it out on my laptop, but in fact, it was just 1 year ago today. Since that fateful day, I have become a full time Linux user, and have helped countless others make the switch. This time last year, I was a ‘newb’ by anyone’s standards, with only a basic understanding of the Linux file system and its many commands. Now, many people look to me for help and guidance with their Linux issues. Many of these same people consider me to be a guru. While I am greatly flattered by this title, I know that I still have a very long way to go before I feel I deserve it. I would prefer to label myself as a ‘tweaker’. I define a ‘tweaker’ as someone who is never satisfied, a person who is plagued by an insatiable desire to understand and improve on everything around them. It is the biological need to know how things work on as many levels as possible and then see if they can make them better.
Then & Now
It has been almost 10 years since I first tried to switch to Linux and it has been only 1 year since I was finally able to do so. Everything I know was learned through a variety of methods, largely talking to people on IRC, but also from a staggering amount of research and trial and error. I remember when I was installing SuSE 9.2, thinking about how incredibly simple installing Linux has become. Back in 1997, when all installers were text, you had to use command line partitioning tools like ‘fdisk’, or at best ncurses partitioning tools like cfdisk. My personal favorite part of installing Linux when it was in its infancy, was the 10+ disk floppy installations. Now, there are LiveCDs, support forums, and graphical installers that are almost effortless to use.
The Great Journey
You see, I had been trying to switch to Linux since mid 1997. Since that time, I have tried many different Linux distributions. If I remember correctly, my first Linux install was Redhat 4.2, next I tried Slackware 4.x, Debian, Caldera, Mandrake, Fedora, Gentoo, Linspire, Ubuntu, and even a few BSD flavors. With all of these distros, I had varying levels of success, but ultimately failure. I would then wander back to Windows in quiet desperation.
For me, installing Linux was only challenging the first time, after that, no matter what the distro, it was all pretty much the same. The hard part came after you had it installed and wanted to have a usable workstation. For example, setting up PPP for your dial-up connection was a major PITA. I remember spending 2 days solid with Redhat trying to get on the Internet before I finally succeeded. Unfortunately, I still found Linux cumbersome to use, and ultimately unable to do what I wanted. So, I would always end up deleting the Linux partitions and going back to Windows with my tail between my legs. The upside being that with each attempt, and with each new distro I tried, I learned more and more about Linux, and computer systems in general.
I Love a Challenge
I have always loved computers, and I enjoy trying to setup Linux in much the same way as someone might enjoy a logic problem or a crossword puzzle. Something I learned about myself a long time ago, is that I have never been able to leave well enough alone. I am perpetually trying to make everything around me better. I have intentionally broken things that were working fine, just so I could fix them and learn how they worked. This is especially true when it comes to computers. I find this to be one of the most attractive aspects of Linux and the Open Source movement as a whole. Linux and Open Source are the perfect drug for the tweaker in all of us. I am currently too busy trying to support myself to pick up a new programming language, but I hope that some day I will be able to contribute more to the movement and to the code base. Until then, I will continue helping other make the switch, and preaching the Open Source ethos.
Self Discovery
When I first started writing this article, it was intended to be a reflection on my wonderful experience with SuSE Linux over the past year, but it turned into an article about my many attempts to switch to Linux, starting in mid 1997, and my own desire to understand the inner workings of everything around me. It has been a very long road, with countless late nights and failures along the way, but looking back, it was all necessary to get me where I am. Throughout this journey, I have learned so much about computers, but most notably, I have learned a lot about myself. I learned that I enjoy fixing things that are broken and I especially enjoy breaking things that aren’t. I have an insatiable passion for technology and understanding how things works on as many levels as possible. Perhaps most importantly, I love the feeling I get when I ‘fix’ something. The longer the road and the harder the journey, the greater the feeling of accomplishment when you finally get there. If I ever do finally get ‘there’, I will let you know. Until then, I plan to keep on breaking stuff, and fixing it, only to break it again.
damn.
A good read, as i can relate to this desire to switch, for probably similar reasons.. i started off using Redhat back in the mid 90’s too. The first thing that burnt me was the lack of a built-in firewall, and the open services, and getting hacked eventually - that was me with my tail between my legs. Took me a whole year to get over it and come back to linux.
The problem with Linux is lack of hardware support. Almost anything runs in Windows.
As someone who is on a budget (myself) and who has already purchased his essential hardware including peripherals, it’s impossible to justify moving to an OS where I have to buy new equipment.
I think the stability, increasing user-friendliness (still not up to Microsoft standards), relatively secure (although not perfect) architecture, and free/low OS cost is great… more and more fantastic applications such as the newly powerful OpenOffice.org are supported.
Linus Torvald once spoke of back in the day when “real men wrote their own device drivers”.
Unfortunately, that seems still to be necessary and I plead wimp here!
Finally, multimedia… I’m listening to streaming audio on the very functional (I quite like it, actually) Windows Media Player… tough to give that all up for intermittent mass multimedia support at best.
Thank you for taking the time to comment on my post, but, you missed the point of that article, it was not so much about Linux as it was about why myself and people like me are drawn to Linux. Also, your point is completely misguided.
Linux has poor hardware support because 99% of hardware manufactures will not tell the public a damn thing about the hardware they make. Most Linux drivers had to be reverse engineered in the spare time of regular people with better things to do. So your complaint should be directed at the manufacturer not the poor Linux developers that are doing amazing things with VERY little help from the manufacturers.
Hey Jacob,
I Support Linux and I Am Intrigued I got both your points and agreed with you in advance before I posted. My writing must be poor lately! I was very recently (and have been over a long period of time) drawn to Linux for its many strengths not to mention Windows multitude of problems and I spent a lot of time investigating it, mostly with Live CDs and a 3-day attempt to install cygwin (a UNIX environment for Windows) so I could install the KDE desktop environment… which is a Sourceforge.net project that unfortunately doesn’t seem to be supported any more so despite huge variations in my approach, the furthest I got was Linux error messages. And this in an attempt to get Konqueror on my desktop so I could test cross-brower compatability for my new website(s) especially since it also uses the same graphical rendering as Safari.
Okay, back on point… I totally understand that the reason Linux has poor hardware support is because most equipment manufacturers haven’t written drivers for it or won’t release info. This is changing as Linux grows in popularity, yet it’s still a reality for much existing equipment including that which I own. Unfortunately, that’s a fact.
I certainly am NOT in the slightest upset at Linux developers… I think they do wonderful work and have provided an operating system that is top-notch for certain applications including basic computing, advanced sciences, mathematics, being a server, word processing, et al. Yet the multimedia support isn’t there considering what codecs the main content websites use.
The big problem I perceive in my layman’s newb way is that Windows always has ONE current version… and Linux with a tiny fraction of the marketplace has a dozen or more. This allows choice, but leaves compatability and hardware support difficulties. I think even Linus Torvald agrees with me on that. Well, that makes sense to me. What do you think? Kind regards, — Chris