[ubuntu-uk] suck it and see

[Tony Travis]

norman wrote:
> It's really great to read about all the applications that folk use with
> Ubuntu. It makes a wonderful change from kicking Windows and expounding
> on its problems. Every time that that OS is mentioned it is drawing
> attention to it and this, all good and true Ubuntu users, do not want.
> The motto should be that Ubuntu is the greatest because of what it is
> not because of what it isn't.

Hello, Norman.

People compare Windows and Ubuntu because they are different solutions 
to the same problem. If Ubuntu can't bear comparison with Windows, or 
MacOS, or openBSD or any other operating systems then it's not doing 
what people want a computer to do.

Yes, Ubuntu is the greatest and deservedly so because of many years of 
effort by the FLOSS community. Windows users benefit from FLOSS too and 
many people who are locked into that proprietary world at work use the 
same applications that we use under Ubuntu like FireFox and openOffice.

FLOSS is not limited to these applications: Cygwin is an almost POSIX 
compliant environment for Windows and can run most GNU software. I've 
even run the GIMP under Windows - just because I could :-)

What matters to me are questions like "Why would I run Ubuntu when I've 
already got Windows installed on my PC"?

My answer would be that Ubuntu does the same job a lot better and is 
'free' in both senses of the word.

Best wishes,

	Tony.
-- 
Dr. A.J.Travis,                     |  mailto:ajt at rri.sari.ac.uk
Rowett Research Institute,          |    http://www.rri.sari.ac.uk/~ajt
Greenburn Road, Bucksburn,          |   phone:+44 (0)1224 712751
Aberdeen AB21 9SB, Scotland, UK.    |     fax:+44 (0)1224 716687