But why should you download it now and install it? What does 10.10 offer that you need? Why not just stick with the perfectly find 10.04 and wait until the next major release? Let’s take a look and find out.

First and foremost

You probably want a link. That’s simple. Go to the Ubuntu Download page and begin the download of the live CD. Of course, if you want the KDE version of 10.1o, head over to the Kubuntu Download page. You can even get the XFCE spin of Ubuntu from the Xubuntu Download page. So no matter your flavor, you can get it. Once you have downloaded that ISO file you will want to burn it onto a cd. This is very simple in both Linux and Windows. Just make sure you burn this ISO as an IMAGE and NOT a data file. An ISO burned to a data file will not be installable.

After you burn your ISO you can put that into your CD drive, boot from it, and either just run it or install it.

Installation

There is very little to say about the installation as it has become so easy. You will notice something new to the 10.10 install routine. You can choose to automatically download updates during the installation. This will cause the installation to take significantly longer, but in the end you will wind up with an up to date system the second you log in.

What’s new and improved

There are plenty of notable features for 10.10. One of the most notable is the ability to actually purchase commercial software from the Ubuntu Software Center. Although this feature is integrated and ready to go, you might not find any commercial software ready to purchased yet. But these titles will be coming. I predict that, at first, the software center will be populated by software titles similar to what you can buy for mobile devices. This will mean small games, social apps, and the like. This, of course, will be a nice feature and will give Ubuntu a much-needed head start when other OS start following suit. These small apps will probably have a price-point similar to that of the mobile apps.

Eventually, I would imaging, more business-oriented applications will start showing up as well. Also, you can probably expect various types of multi-media codecs to pop up as well. The Fluendo media playback codecs can already be purchased!

Of course you can expect tools like CrossOver Office and Cedega to appear. This will be a real boon for the companies that produce these titles. When new Linux users see Cedega and the ability to easily run Windows games, they will be quick to purchase.

Multitouch support

For those fortunate enough to have the hardware, Ubuntu 10.10 will have the ability to support multi-touch thanks to uTouch. Here is Mark Shuttleworth’s blog on uTouch. As of the release, uTouch should work, out of the box, on Dell XT2, HP tx2 tablets and the Lenovo T410s laptop. Of course Canonical has released the full gesture stack to the open source community.

You decide

Download and install Ubuntu 10.10 and then report back here your impressions. If I were of the betting type, I would wager you will be impressed.

Puppy Linux is one of those distributions that you just might come to depend on and you will want to get to know the ins and outs of this little beauty. Why? It’s not a vanilla Linux distribution. Because of its size there are many tools that are used that might not be your average tool. There are so many ways Puppy Linux can help you out. But before that can happen, you will want to get to know Puppy Linux. In this introductory article, I will show you around Puppy so he can some day be your best friend.

What is Puppy Linux?

Puppy Linux is a special build of the Linux operating system (not based on any other distribution) that prides itself on being very small and very fast. Puppy can boot onto older computers, making them seem like power houses. The entire live CD comes in at 85 MB and contains more applications than you would imaging. If you boot up Puppy and take a glance at the start menu, you will be shocked at how much has been packed in. With this tiny distro you can:

• Browse the web.
• Create spreadsheets.
• Analyse your hardware.
• Mount drives on the machine.
• Run a web site.
• Rip CDs.
• Pl.ay music.
• Create images.

In other words, just about everything you can do on your normal PC, you can do with Puppy. But there is one thing I like to use Puppy for more than anything else. Hardware discovery.

Fetch boy, fetch!

I don’t know how many times I have installed another operating system (Windows XP is a big offender) only to have a piece of hardware not recognized. This is all fine and good when you have the disc handy in order to install drivers. But what if you don’t have the disk AND you can’t remember what hardware is installed on your machine? That is where Puppy really shines. When you boot into Puppy Linux click Menu > System > Pupscan to start up the Hardware Information tool. Once this tool opens you will see a complete listing of the hardware information for the system (see Figure 1).

Figure 1

In Figure 1 you can see the listing for PCI interfaces of my laptop’s display. From these results I could then google “Intel Graphics Controller Device 2a03″ and see it is:

product: Mobile GM965/GL960 Integrated Graphics Controller [8086:2A03]
vendor: Intel Corporation [8086]
bus info: pci@0000:00:02.1
version: 03
width: 64 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities:
Power Management,
bus mastering,
PCI capabilities listing
configuration:
latency: 0

That’s more information than I actually need…but it will work. You can do this with all of the hardware on your machine.

Final thoughts

I highly recommend having Puppy Linux around on a CD or thumb drive. It will come in handy in numerous occasions. Whether you are trying to rescue a machine (you could even install an anti-virus on Puppy and scan the infected machine) or just use an OS other than the installed OS, Puppy is there for you.

So how does a new-to-Linux user decide? With so many choices, how is it possible to start off on the right path? Without help, it’s not easy. My first Linux distribution was Caldera Open Linux 1. It was rough and nearly pushed me back to Windows. It wasn’t until I found Red Hat (4.2 at the time) that I found the right distribution for the right purpose. That was ten years ago and the choices were much more limited.

Because the new year is here, and I am always one to want to help people make the move to Linux, I thought I would create a flow chart to help Linux users make the right choice. Is it perfect? Probably not. Do I include every possible choice? No way. The distributions I have included are:

• Ubuntu
• Ubuntu Server
• Ubuntu Studio
• Slackware
• Fedora
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server
• SuSE Enterprise Linux Server
• SuSE Enterprise Linux
• Gentoo
• Mandriva Power Pack
• CentOS
• PCLinuxOS
• Linux Mint
• Debian

It’s still a healthy list of distributions, but not everyone. And I’m sure there will be those that disagree with my approach. That is understandable. So much so, that I am (in the spirit of open source) including my .dia file for the flowchart. NOTE: The .dia file is hosted on my domain (outside of ghacks). I would love to see how readers change my flowchart to better fit their opinions/experiences.

Figure 1

But for those that do not want to bother messing with editing the flowchart, and just want to see it in all its scattered “glory”, take a look at Figure 1.

One of the first things you might notice is the predestination paradox (temporal causality loop) I created for those unsure of their purpose for choosing Linux.

There might also be some initial confusion as to why I have included, in some choices, distributions that are rather similar. For example: The difference between Mandriva and PCLinuxOS might not be that great, but notice I have included the Mandriva Power Pack which includes pre-installed flash, various codecs, and Mandriva support.

Final thoughts

I hope this flowchart makes your choice of Linux an easier one. Even more, I hope this flow chart helps you to start your new year off on an open source foot, and that you find this path a rewarding one.

Choose the right distribution.

Let me begin at the begining, or at least the best starting point. The Linux operating system is built with a number pieces. The most underlying piece is the kernel – that is the heart of Linux. On top of the kernel rests a ton of libraries, drivers, and system applications. Overlaying that is user-space console applications. The next layer is the X Windows system. X Windows is the piece that gives Linux a graphical environment. The final layer is the desktop.

Linux is separated into distributions. A distribution is, for all intents and purposes, a “brand” of Linux. There are many distributions: Ubuntu, Fedora, Red Hat, Mandriva, PC/OS, gOS, SuSE, etc (hundreds of them in fact). Each distribution is based on a different base. There are five main bases: Debian, Slackware, BSD, RPM, and Gentoo. Each “base” is formed around a package-manager (a package manager is a system for installing, removing, and managing the software that is on the system.)

How a distribution puts together its version of Linux defines their audience. Some distributions are better suited for new users. These are:

• Ubuntu
• PCLinuxOS
• Mandriva
• Linspire

Some distributions are better suited for mid-level experience users:

• SuSE
• gOS
• Fedora
• Red Hat

And some distributions are better suited for advanced users:

• FreeBSD
• Debian
• Gentoo

NOTE: As gHacks user MrBuddha has already pointed out, BSD is not actually a Linux distribution but a variant of the BSD operating system. I do generally lump BSD in with Linux because they are both UNIX-derived operating systems and share a number of similarities.The lumping in of BSD is two-fold: 1) simplicity and 2) applications created for Linux generally can be used on BSD.

If you are a new user your choice of distribution should be limited to the top four listed. That will make your learning curve far more shallow. Distributions such as Ubuntu have done everything they can to make using Linux simple. From the installation to the desktop, you will find these distributions to be the easiest operating systems you have ever used.
[poll=2]
But what makes them easier?

Let’s take a look at the Linspire distribution. The Linspire mission has always been to make Linux the easiest operating system available. And many of the easier-to-use distributions are following suit. Linspire and Ubuntu can be found on many pre-installed computers. One of the aspects that makes these distributions so much easier is package management. Each of the easiest distributions have a centralized location for software installation. If you want to install something, you fire up Synaptic (or whatever opens when you click Add/Remove Software) and search for a package to install. It’s simple. But don’t think, for a second, that you’ll have your operating system up and running and have to install a bunch of software. A Linux operating system usually comes complete with everything you need. You could effectively install the operating system and never have to install another piece of software again.

Another piece of the puzzle that makes one distribution easier than another is choice of desktop. There are some Linux desktops that make the migration from Windows a no-brainer. Both KDE and GNOME can be made to mimic the look and feel of Windows so well some users wouldn’t know they are using Linux.

Freedom of Choice

Ultimately the choice is yours. Do you select a distribution that targets new users or do you go for a more advanced Linux? Don’t fret. Most modern Linux distributions offer Live versions of their operating systems. This means you can boot from the LiveCD and run the operating system without making any change to your computer. This allows you to test-drive Linux. Do this with the easiest distributions and I bet you’ll find one that meets your needs.

Lets see, we have short reviews of Debian, Slackware, Fedora, Mandravia, Suse, Ubuntu, Knoppix, Gentoo, Mepis and Xandros. Every distribution is summarised with cons and pros for the particular distribution and every review of course features a link to the distributions homepage. This is of course an opinion based review and people will probably dislike what is being said. Just look at the comments and the remarks of the users and you know what I mean.

[tags]linux, distribution, slackware, suse, fedora, debian, knoppix, ubuntu, xandros, mandravia[/tags]