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I’ve been impressed with the passion of Mark Shuttleworth as he brings Linux to the masses with Ubuntu. Having just released version 8.04, better known as Hardy Heron, the distro is poised to gain additional ground in the desktop market space.

As it stands now Linux is running on two-percent of all desktops world-wide. That’s a far cry from “total world domination” which has been the battle cry of its adherents since around 1995 when I rolled my first kernel on a Slackware distribution.

Linux, it seems, is perpetually “just a few years” from dethroning Windows on the desktop…

Having switched from Linux to OSX in 2005, I had missed the Ubuntu movement. Last summer curiosity got the better of me and you may recall that I purchased a new Dell system that had Ubuntu pre-loaded. My impression was very favorable. Let me tell you friends, a decade ago when I fancied myself a Unix wizard, just getting the sound card to work on Linux required many sleepless nights and the sweating of great drops of blood.

With Ubuntu, everything just works. Wireless networking, printing, file sharing, multi-media, you name it and it all works with little or no extra effort beyond inserting a CD or DvD and answering a few questions. Much like Windows or OSX — perhaps even easier.

Having heaped all manner of praise and kindness on Ubuntu and its growing community I do have one major complaint. In making a Unix like system easy enough for the unwashed masses, Ubuntu has destroyed the cachet of Linux. Whereas in the early days Linux was the playground of wizards, now it’s become an operating system for muggles.

Any moron can now install Linux and based on much of the drivel found on the Ubuntu-Users mailing list archive, many of them apparently do.

But don’t let that put you off. Ubuntu is an amazing distribution and one that will have you running a full-fledged Linux desktop in just minutes. It can introduce you to an entirely new world of computing fun and adventure and there’s always room in the community for more.

73 de Jeff

Last week’s emergency transportation drill in Brattleboro, Vermont hit some unexpected snags, most notably a communication failure.

Walkie talkies didn’t work as expected. Whether that was because of the distances or terrain involved is still under review. Instead, staffers in the incident field office relied on telephones, runners and HAM radio operators when the walkie talkies failed.

73 de Jeff