Linux

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For a project in one of my grad school classes, we're asked to install Linux and use it for awhile to report how installation & usability goes. Anyone have a recommendation on a decent free version of Linux?

I'll Google it, too, but I value many opinions here. Thanks!
 
I downloaded the Knoppix Linux on a CD and burned it to a disc with Nero. Now I can boot up in Windows or stick the CD in and boot to Linux. Works great. It auto-configures to your hardware and you don't have to do anything special.
The Link
 
Mandrake is probably still the best bet for a newbie breaking into Linux and still having all the power of it under the hood.

Gentoo is excellent but the install alone would take half a week of compiling since it is completey based on source... not binaries.
 
Any of the popular distributions should be fine. It has been a few years since I've run Linux on the desktop or used a unix machine as a workstation. But even several years ago on several distros, the default install was simple (easier than windows or OS X, for sure) and it ran right out of the box.

The difficulty came when I wanted to do something like change the resolution or install a graphics driver to take advantage of hardware support for OpenGL.

The real pain comes when you realize the desktop managers (KDE and GNOME) suck eggs and all of the meaningful software (read: anything that's not a second rate clone of software available on other platforms) has a CLI.

Keep in mind that the real power of unix systems is in piping, redirecting and regexps. When you properly use them, CLI pograms become extremely versatile and powerful in a way a GUI system just can't be (yet).

To be honest, you really can't comment on the usability of Linux until you learn the concepts I described above. If you try to use it like a desktop system, it will never seem like anything more than a second rate desktop system.

(btw, Slackware isn't a distro you'd want someone new to Linux to try out. At least it wasn't and didn't even try to be as of a few years ago.)
 
I guess I cold give you a lowdown of the distros out there. The six "mainstream" ones:

Red Hat, main target is business, you can get Fedora Core 2 now. I never used it myself, but I will curse its package management system till I die.

Mandrake, easiest of the 6, install is a brezee. RPM packaging system.

Suse also geared for business, easy to install too, however they do not release their binaries to the public, you can however get them through mirrors or buy the distro.

Debian, very conservative distro, their release schedule is slow as snails but it has better stability because of it. Apt-get is the best binary package manager of the 6.

Slackware the most conservative (ideologically) and first distro. From out of the box you have to compile everything manually. You also have to mess a lot with config files.

Gentoo: my fav but by far the hardest to install, portage is a clone of the ports packaging system from FreeBSD, it is source based and IMHO it is the easiest distro to maintain. Big community, forums and documentation.

All six can pretty much do any task desired.

The list for smaller distros is huge but I will try to give you the most relevant in the ease of use department. Their emphasis is desktop not servers.

Linspire: They try to appeal to the windows crowd, have to pay 100$

Xandros: You also have to pay for this one, never tried it.

Lycoris: Free money wise, and very easy, they have excellent hardware/driver support.

Knoppix is obviously easy but your prof may disqualify you for cheating.

You can get most distros atThe Link
 
i have redhat on my desktop and suse on my laptop. THey are both simple to install and for a general user i think there's not a huge difference. It's just a matter of getting used to them
 
My company is running Linux across all of our desktops, and have been for 6 months. We are running XD2 with SUSE for now. Since all of our business apps are web enabled, we have found Linux to be perfect, as all you really need is a web browser. We are testing Open Office and CrossOver office as our productivity suite and have found that it is more than sufficient for 90% of our users.
 
I have tried both Mandrake and RedHat and neither installed as advertised. Haven't tried Linux since.

This was a few years ago, though, so installers might have improved since then.
 
Thanks for all the great advice, everyone. Yes, this is just a grad school project, not a thesis. I think I'll attempt to tackle Mandrake at this point.

When I begin failing miserably at the installation, I'll be sure to check back in.
smile.gif
 
Mandrake is a good choice, I would recommend that you go to
The Link

If you need distro specific help, you have to pay a fee to use their forum, but hey they are giving you the OS for free, helping them get out of their monetary problems would be nice.
The Link

Is also a well populated forum for linux.

Lastly if you have problems with hardware detection i would recomend
The Link

They are the only distro that recognized my cdrom, from a very old box.
 
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