MX Distro for "not new" users

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KBD
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Re: MX Distro for "not new" users

#71 Post by KBD »

Eadwine Rose wrote: Fri Jan 18, 2019 3:52 pm Not just new users.. I can usually make sense out of it, but often I will try to avoid it, or I must have done it before and know the command works and is safe.
When I use it, I stick with very familiar commands, or commands that 'look right' to me, or are suggested by the pros here. It's a dangerous thing to just copy and paste any command found on the Internet, but many do :(

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Eadwine Rose
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Re: MX Distro for "not new" users

#72 Post by Eadwine Rose »

Absolutely!! I had to sort something once.. and didn't know if a command would work or not. Simply installed on a different drive, ran the command and found it safe to use and to apply on my active machine.
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Moltke
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Re: MX Distro for "not new" users

#73 Post by Moltke »

Eadwine Rose wrote: Fri Jan 18, 2019 4:19 pm Absolutely!! I had to sort something once.. and didn't know if a command would work or not. Simply installed on a different drive, ran the command and found it safe to use and to apply on my active machine.
This is why I love having VMs around; I can test things out and if something goes wrong is just as simple as reverting the state of it. Install virtualbox or qemu whichever works best for you, although I do recommend virtualbox but qemu is also good and despite lacking as many features as virtualbox it seems to be lighter on resources, then try things out in a VM; experiment, install themes, icons, software, DEs whatever you can think of, then when satisfied save it to a snapshot or if not simply go back to a previous state and that's it; safer and easier. I've created several VMs so I can try different distros and even one with Windows 7 on it for a couple of apps that don't work in Linux. I dont think there's a better way of getting to know your system as running it from a VM and trying things in there.
Without each other's help there ain't no hope for us :happy:

Zeh
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Re: MX Distro for "not new" users

#74 Post by Zeh »

seaken64 wrote: Wed Jan 16, 2019 10:56 am Even the upgrade from XP to Windows 10 was a nightmare.
It looks like it's not a Windows vs Linux issue, than.
We've finally got it sorted out but, man!
Wouldn't you manage to sort out a change to an user friendly Linux distro like MX, as well? I trust you would. Just give people the same time they needed to get into win 10.

skidoo
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Re: MX Distro for "not new" users

#75 Post by skidoo »

a better way of getting to know your system
Without regard to "better", just posting to mention that experimenting during non-persistent liveboot sessions has been immensely helpful for me.

skidoo
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Re: MX Distro for "not new" users

#76 Post by skidoo »

An empowering aspect of learning "commandline basics" is that you gain a diversely applicable set of skills/tools.
many many people do not want to learn it.
and, instead, they choose to invest time learning "proprietary" (desktop-environment -specific) jumpinghoops, toward making changes to their system and/or launching programs. Who moved my cheese? Where, in the nested navigational soup dialogboxes and tabs, have the DE designers hidden my cheese?

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seaken64
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Re: MX Distro for "not new" users

#77 Post by seaken64 »

Zeh wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 11:27 am
seaken64 wrote: Wed Jan 16, 2019 10:56 am Even the upgrade from XP to Windows 10 was a nightmare.
It looks like it's not a Windows vs Linux issue, than.
We've finally got it sorted out but, man!
Wouldn't you manage to sort out a change to an user friendly Linux distro like MX, as well? I trust you would. Just give people the same time they needed to get into win 10.
No, the issues between Windows and Linux have to do with some of the software we use for database and accounting applications. They are Windows only.

Yes, I can sort out the changes and setup the Linux distro to look almost like the Windows system. But it's an awful lot of work to keep up with a bunch of users who have no tolerance for learning how computers work. And since we need to use Windows anyway I choose to spend that effort in WIndows 10.

I set up two Linux machines to be used for browsing only. They didn't even need to get at the databases, just browse the web. But I got constant grief from some users who needed the screen to look EXACTLY like their Windows terminal or they would wait to ask me a question before they could move forward. That was too much like being an IT department and I have other work to do. It's just easier to put Windows 10 on every desk, except my own office, which has Windows 10, Windows XP, and Linux (Xubuntu 16.04, antiX-17, and MX-17).

Seaken64
MX21-64 XFCE & W11 on Lenovo 330S LT. MX21-KDE & MX21-XFCE on Live USB.
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antiX21 on Compaq PIII 1 Ghz DT, w/ Debian, MX18FB, W2K

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BitJam
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Re: MX Distro for "not new" users

#78 Post by BitJam »

kc1di wrote: Fri Jan 18, 2019 10:26 am [...] But it's true many many people do not want to learn it.
Reminds me of a quote by Don Marquis:

If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you;
but if you really make them think, they'll hate you.
"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself -- and you are the easiest person to fool."

-- Richard Feynman

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figueroa
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Re: MX Distro for "not new" users

#79 Post by figueroa »

The Terminal is just the Unix/Linux way to get the equivalent of the DOS Prompt/Command in Windows. It's where real work gets done and most users don't have any interest whatsoever in doing anything but point and click in the GUI. Linux desktop users don't need the Terminal any more than Windows users need the equivalent. It's people like us who want to learn how to do things that venture into this territory. So, pat yourselves on the back. :-)
Andy Figueroa
Using Unix from 1984; GNU/Linux from 1993

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BitJam
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Re: MX Distro for "not new" users

#80 Post by BitJam »

Many years ago when I was teaching Linux and programming at a university, in my Linux class one of the first homework assignments I gave was to read In the Beginning was the Command Line by Neal Stephenson. That was 20 years ago. Time flies. So the book/essay is dated now but I think it still provides some useful context. In one section he makes an analogy between OSes and car dealerships:

With one exception, that is: Linux, which is right next door, and which is not a business at all. It's a bunch of RVs, yurts, tepees, and geodesic domes set up in a field and organized by consensus. The people who live there are making tanks. These are not old-fashioned, cast-iron Soviet tanks; these are more like the M1 tanks of the U.S. Army, made of space-age materials and jammed with sophisticated technology from one end to the other. But they are better than Army tanks. They've been modified in such a way that they never, ever break down, are light and maneuverable enough to use on ordinary streets, and use no more fuel than a subcompact car. These tanks are being cranked out, on the spot, at a terrific pace, and a vast number of them are lined up along the edge of the road with keys in the ignition. Anyone who wants can simply climb into one and drive it away for free.

Customers come to this crossroads in throngs, day and night. Ninety percent of them go straight to the biggest dealership and buy station wagons or off-road vehicles. They do not even look at the other dealerships.

Of the remaining ten percent, most go and buy a sleek Euro-sedan, pausing only to turn up their noses at the philistines going to buy the station wagons and ORVs. If they even notice the people on the opposite side of the road, selling the cheaper, technically superior vehicles, these customers deride them cranks and half-wits.

The Batmobile outlet sells a few vehicles to the occasional car nut who wants a second vehicle to go with his station wagon, but seems to accept, at least for now, that it's a fringe player.

The group giving away the free tanks only stays alive because it is staffed by volunteers, who are lined up at the edge of the street with bullhorns, trying to draw customers' attention to this incredible situation. A typical conversation goes something like this:

Hacker with bullhorn: "Save your money! Accept one of our free tanks! It is invulnerable, and can drive across rocks and swamps at ninety miles an hour while getting a hundred miles to the gallon!"

Prospective station wagon buyer: "I know what you say is true...but...er...I don't know how to maintain a tank!"

Bullhorn: "You don't know how to maintain a station wagon either!"

Buyer: "But this dealership has mechanics on staff. If something goes wrong with my station wagon, I can take a day off work, bring it here, and pay them to work on it while I sit in the waiting room for hours, listening to elevator music."

Bullhorn: "But if you accept one of our free tanks we will send volunteers to your house to fix it for free while you sleep!"

Buyer: "Stay away from my house, you freak!"

Bullhorn: "But..."

Buyer: "Can't you see that everyone is buying station wagons?"
"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself -- and you are the easiest person to fool."

-- Richard Feynman

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