12-07-2009, 10:45 AM
Actually, mac os 9 was becoming outdated. Macintosh needed a drastic new direction. Linux was the only system available that could offer it... Mac OSX is essentially a linux distribution. It's been hacked and modified by the Macintosh guys. But all those changes were also pushed upstream.
They're essentially the same system. It just looks different. Just like mandriva redhat and ubuntu all look different.
I don't mind them using linux to create their own distribution. That's what linux is for, to build your own stuff on the basis of someone else's previous work. But the fact that so few of the people using mac osx actually know that they're working on a real version of linux kind of bums me out. Linux has this stigma of being hard. Which was true about 10 years ago but it's actually much easier to use than windows these days. And much safer. Yet people say "Go mac OSX, it's easier than linux". While it IS linux...
Sorry, just a pet peeve
I agree on the rest though, try out ubuntu. It's the simplest of them... And these days if your pc has no esoteric hardware it should pretty much work out of the box, and you can test this with booting from the live cd..
They named the distribution after an african word. Here's a bit about the meaning of the word ubuntu you might like.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODQ4WiDsEBQ
Games don't work under linux. If you want the full 3d accelerations under 64 bit ubuntu meaning rotating desktops wobbly windows and fancy effects that windows has not actually dreamed of yet. Then you might have some bad luck with internet flash movies. Youtube for example sometimes does not respond to mouse clicks.. I'd recommend disabling that feature. Other than that I've seen no problems.
They're essentially the same system. It just looks different. Just like mandriva redhat and ubuntu all look different.
I don't mind them using linux to create their own distribution. That's what linux is for, to build your own stuff on the basis of someone else's previous work. But the fact that so few of the people using mac osx actually know that they're working on a real version of linux kind of bums me out. Linux has this stigma of being hard. Which was true about 10 years ago but it's actually much easier to use than windows these days. And much safer. Yet people say "Go mac OSX, it's easier than linux". While it IS linux...
Sorry, just a pet peeve
I agree on the rest though, try out ubuntu. It's the simplest of them... And these days if your pc has no esoteric hardware it should pretty much work out of the box, and you can test this with booting from the live cd..
They named the distribution after an african word. Here's a bit about the meaning of the word ubuntu you might like.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODQ4WiDsEBQ
Games don't work under linux. If you want the full 3d accelerations under 64 bit ubuntu meaning rotating desktops wobbly windows and fancy effects that windows has not actually dreamed of yet. Then you might have some bad luck with internet flash movies. Youtube for example sometimes does not respond to mouse clicks.. I'd recommend disabling that feature. Other than that I've seen no problems.