Back to Windows...

[stude.list at googlemail.com]

On 23/10/06, K S Balaji <balajiks2k at gmail.com> wrote:
> It was good to be using Ubuntu for about a month.
Glad you liked it.

> I lost my Thunderbird
> mails as I had to reinstall Ubuntu.
Yeh I had to reinstall Ubuntu once, system upgrade screwed the machine
up, it was taking way too long to fix (fixed 2 major problems with the
help of some people on IRC, then gave up and did reinstall).
Of course one thing I did first was, BACKUP ALL IMPORTANT FILES!!!
I of course use IMAP, so if my computer dies my email lives on, if the
server dies I am somewhat stuffed though (lets hope the server techs
know what they are doing).

> Even though I had a copy of the mails
> on CD, I could not restore them in the new installation even after going
> through various How Tos.
Was it in an Open standard format or some obscure proprietary format
that Ubuntu hasn't a hope in hell of opening?

> I had to remove Ubuntu and reinstall XP, buy a licensed software to convert
> my thunderbird mails to .eml format and print them.  Even though Ubuntu was
> free, I still had to pay heavily for it.
You didn't HAVE to do anything, if you created proper backups then you
wouldn't have had a problem, of course I often fail to create as many
backups as I should, but I backed up prior to an OS reinstall, of
course keeping /home on a separate partition would have helped, now if
only someone had mentioned that prior to me installing everything, oh
well we live and learn.

> Ubuntu as well as Linux distros have a long journey to make before they can
> compete with Windows which I had to learn the hard way.  Now I have to get
> my XP activated again...:-(
Your right how could Linux ever compete with Windows, think of all
those Windows servers kicking Linux's ass, oh wait most major sites
run *nix, my mistake, please be specific about the market you're
talking about (you probably meant desktop market).

Don't worry about activation, even if you do activate it there is no
guarantee its going to stay active, Microsoft have deactivated
perfectly legitimate software before now but lets just hope your
lucky.

Anyone want to take a guess on how long it will be till your screaming
at Windows?
Maybe you should create some backups, you really need them on Windows.
There are some viruses that think its fun to encrypt all your files
than hold you to ransom for the decryption keys, but that won't happen
to you, your a lucky guy right?

But at least you get good quality tech support on Windows, £30 phone
call to be told "we don't know whats wrong, but we'll phone you back
tomorrow when we know" and to never be called back (bad experience
with HP tech support, they don't support Linux but then they hardly
supported windows so this mailing list is somewhat better than the
payed support I got off of them ;))

Don't blame Ubuntu for your mistakes.
If you have any constructive criticism for Ubuntu make some
suggestions, you know where launchpad, the wiki and forums are located
right?

- Andy

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