Comments on: The Linux Setup

The Linux Setup

puckupdate — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 13:52:28 -0800

I love reading about people's desktop Linux setups, so I started sending out interview requests to Linux users, asking them to answer some questions about the hardware and software they use.

This project came out of running out of stuff to write about on my Xubuntu blog (previously).

Here is a list of all of the interviews so far.

It goes without saying that any MeFi members who want to participate should drop me a memail.

By: COD

COD — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 16:06:35 -0800

For reasons I can't explain, I voted for your original project, but never subscribed to the blog. Doh! My attempt to upgrade to XFCE 4.8 on Xubuntu 10.04 went very poorly last week. I don't have 4.8 working, and 4.6 is hosed and unusable. Attempting to reinstall 4.6 puts me into dependency hell. So I'm using Gnome with Xubuntu right now...and will probably just deal with it until 12.04 hits the street in April.

By: Gary

Gary — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 19:14:22 -0800

Nice. I really like the original The Setup but it can get very Apple centric at times (rms interview notwithstanding)

Also, you missed your Valorie Zimmerman post in the interview index.

By: cjorgensen

cjorgensen — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 21:04:53 -0800

I've always wanted a Linux box, but never got around to building one. Seeing how others use it may eventually get me to do it.

By: rangefinder 1.4

rangefinder 1.4 — Sun, 19 Feb 2012 00:29:17 -0800

Nice grouping of interviewees. I periodically try out a few distros (mostly to see which latest versions will still work with some older machines), so it's interesting to see the various responses -- looking forward to seeing more.

Wanted you to be aware of something -- clicking on some of the desktop screenshot images results in an "AccessDenied Request has expired" error, instead of showing a larger version of the image -- in Firefox 10.0.1, I see the error messages in XML format.

I haven't checked all the screenshots, but they include the ones in these posts:

2011-09-24 (URL used for larger screenshot image)
2011-09-17 (URL used for larger screenshot image)
2011-07-31 (URL used for larger screenshot image)

Each URL used for the larger images has an "Expires" parameter.

By: puckupdate

puckupdate — Sun, 19 Feb 2012 05:02:36 -0800

Thanks, guys!

Gary: I added Valorie to the index.
rangefinder: I fixed those images

By: rangefinder 1.4

rangefinder 1.4 — Sun, 19 Feb 2012 18:08:00 -0800

Cool, thanks, puckupdate. Just FYI, a lot of the oldest posts in the archive also have screenshots that link to outdated image URLs.

(As an aside: it was neat to find in the desktop screenshot for François Marier that he uses Workrave (the little sheep icon), which is something I've used on Windows after finding out about it from AskMe a couple of years ago. I'd forgotten it was available for Linux.)

The non-"Linux Setup" posts of the blog look interesting, too. So far I've especially liked the one on Linux and digital recording/music.

By: puckupdate

puckupdate — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 10:01:30 -0800

Thanks rangefinder! I'm trying to hit a sweet spot for intermediate desktop Linux users. There's a ton of content available for new Linux users and lots of dense, sysadmin type stuff for the experts, but there isn't much online for experienced Linux users who maybe aren't super technical (ie, me).

Also, thanks for the busted links. Those are fixed now.

By: philipy

philipy — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 09:13:41 -0800

Unfortunately, after the last awesome update, the package broke...

Strangely poetic in its summation of the human condition vis a vis tech.