migration windows to linux

[JonCarleton]

I run both my scopes with Raspberry Pi4's running Ubuntu Mate.  Flawless, faultless.  Never an issue.  I run a VNC console on my laptop when away from home (also Linux), but at home I wired a cat5 cable from the deck to the media room and use a cat5 KVM extender plugged into a big screen TV and remote keyboard.  VNC works very well if there isn't much distance for the WiFi to travel, but the extender is like plugging the keyboard video and mouse right into the Pi.

I use this KVM device:  https://www.avaccess.com/products/hdex80-kvm?_pos=1&_sid=0c98b954a&_ss=r

It extends the USB port for keyboard and mouse plus 1080P HDMI for a monitor/TV.

You could certainly connect a keyboard, mouse and monitor directly to the Pi, if you sit with your scope outside.  I don't, primarily because of mosquitoes and other nighttime "bitey" creatures.

 

[BCN_Sean]

12 hours ago, alacant said:

It's a pity. Few have seen Linux on a modern box; the type you'd use to run the latest Windows a Mac operating systems.

I think that comes from the old fallacy of "Linux can make an old computer run like new", where it was more the nuking of ten years of grot on a boot drive when the file system changed that created the illusion.   Whilst I don't think it'll be on everyone's desks in the future, even though now it's in a lot of people's hands, the stuff that can be pulled out of Linux now especially in the areas of machine learning, also with old Linus taking a step back from the day to day goings on and going to work on his anger management issues and (whilst it's probably not relevant to folk like us that much) more games developers working targeting Linux then things might just start getting interesting!

[JonCarleton]

I ran large UNIX systems before I retired.  Mostly, Solaris on SPARK gear, but a good deal of Linux.  We especially used Linux clusters for MySQL clusters and Tomcat Webserver clusters, some of which were reasonably spectacular in scale.  My primary desktop has been Linux since the 1990's.  When I did work for companies that provided Windows workstations, the first thing I would do was either load CygWin (Linux emulator) or VMware and create a Linux virtual server, so I could do all my "real" work in a Linux environment.  Once you get used to it, Linux is difficult be without.

For example:  I just got a little NUC with Windows 10 as a telescope server.  I didn't care for the way it ran under Windows, but just wanted to keep the Windows OS, because I paid for it and am thrifty to a fault.  Windows was fighting me for making a complete backup, wanted me to create rescue disks and all sorts of other things, so I just booted a Linux OS and used the default tools to create an ISO image of the drive and burn it to a SDcard.  I'm sure there is probably a way to do the same in Windows, but I prefer not to fight with an OS if another one will gladly help me do what I want in the first place. 

It really is a shame that people and businesses alike get so tied to Windows that they don't get an opportunity to experience alternatives.

Edited June 27, 2021 by JonCarleton

[7170]

4 hours ago, JonCarleton said:

It really is a shame that people and businesses alike get so tied to Windows that they don't get an opportunity to experience alternatives.

I firm I worked at many years ago did give Linux a good try, they had quite a large number of users involved in the trial. It failed because of one thing, Microsoft Office, or rather a lack of it. Word and excel files were more ubiquitous across the firm than was realised, and it was too hard to change that. I don't recall users having any real issues after some basic training.

[JamesF]

14 minutes ago, 7170 said:

I firm I worked at many years ago did give Linux a good try, they had quite a large number of users involved in the trial. It failed because of one thing, Microsoft Office, or rather a lack of it. Word and excel files were more ubiquitous across the firm than was realised, and it was too hard to change that. I don't recall users having any real issues after some basic training.

For some time now I've found that Libre Office is a sufficient substitute for MS Office, though it/Open Office used to be a bit ropey in places.  I'm hardly an Office "power user" though.  As long as I can read files that people send me then it's all good.

I've only had a brief flirtation with the dark side though, for a few months on a work project that never came to fruition.  Other than that I've used UNIX or Linux pretty much exclusively for the last thirty-five years, since I started my (Computer Science) degree.

James

[BCN_Sean]

28 minutes ago, 7170 said:

I firm I worked at many years ago did give Linux a good try, they had quite a large number of users involved in the trial. It failed because of one thing, Microsoft Office, or rather a lack of it. Word and excel files were more ubiquitous across the firm than was realised, and it was too hard to change that. I don't recall users having any real issues after some basic training.

I've seen it fail as well for the fact of MS Office, and not for power usage; admittedly I've not found anything better than Excel on Windows for certain things that most people wouldn't do normally, and because of the wife being a business admin it's why we keep a Windows box at home.  The reason for it failing, though, is brand mentality where an end user thinks they are being short changed or devalued by an employer if there isn't a paid product on a machine; but it doesn't matter if it's a pirate version, as long as it's something the employer should have to pay for.  A couple of places around where I am have had union action because they've switched, and usually it's not to cheap out, but the employees got in a mood about it and the companies have quietly switched back as it's cheaper than solving staff problems.

[StevieDvd]

Not many people know of how much IBM & Microsoft have invested in Linux over the past years.  Some of the products my employer owns (bought the companies to get the products) run on Linux and are used by many of the biggest banks. Interfacing these to others  on Windows was fun to get running. But once established it became easy having Clouds systems with both Windows & Linux provided by the cloud providers, had many Linux setups on the MS Azure cloud. MS also provided Hyper-V with easy Linux setups for embedded VMs.  Today we can run a Linux app in gui mode from the WSL in Windows 10, I hear we will soon be able to do the same with Android apps too.

 

 

 

[JonCarleton]

Most folks I have seen make the swich seemed happy enough with Libre Office and its predecessor, Star Office as a MS Office replacement.  There are some differences between Libre Office Calc and Excel, Writer and Word, Presentation and Powerpoint, but not so many that a few moments of fiddling was required to settle in.  Then too, I never liked leaving SuperCalc for Lotus123, or Lotus123 for Excel. 

I tend to use databases rather than spreadsheets due to large data size for most of the things I used to do.  I also blame spreadsheets in general for most of the data entry errors that exist today everywhere.  Not because you can't put in controls to prevent errors with ranges and data types, but more because one isn't forced to do so and people generally don't bother.

[sloz1664]

On 27/06/2021 at 18:11, JonCarleton said:

I ran large UNIX systems before I retired.  Mostly, Solaris on SPARK gear, but a good deal of Linux.  We especially used Linux clusters for MySQL clusters and Tomcat Webserver clusters, some of which were reasonably spectacular in scale.  My primary desktop has been Linux since the 1990's.  When I did work for companies that provided Windows workstations, the first thing I would do was either load CygWin (Linux emulator) or VMware and create a Linux virtual server, so I could do all my "real" work in a Linux environment.  Once you get used to it, Linux is difficult be without.

For example:  I just got a little NUC with Windows 10 as a telescope server.  I didn't care for the way it ran under Windows, but just wanted to keep the Windows OS, because I paid for it and am thrifty to a fault.  Windows was fighting me for making a complete backup, wanted me to create rescue disks and all sorts of other things, so I just booted a Linux OS and used the default tools to create an ISO image of the drive and burn it to a SDcard.  I'm sure there is probably a way to do the same in Windows, but I prefer not to fight with an OS if another one will gladly help me do what I want in the first place. 

It really is a shame that people and businesses alike get so tied to Windows that they don't get an opportunity to experience alternatives.

It's really who gets products to the market first and shouts the loudest. A bit like the VHS - Betamax story. Although I doubt Linux will fade into the past.

 

Steve

[StevieDvd]

Most people who say they are Excel/Word experts can't even record a macro let alone write a function.  They should be OK with Libre or OpenOffice but they seem to think it's more complicated 🙄

[Alien 13]

I did load Linux Mint onto my high end gaming laptop as a dual boot option and like most have said the installed software like Libre Office etc is fine for most uses, things I didn't like was the need to constantly enter passwords and the slow boot up time which was something like 14 seconds compared to the 5 seconds with Win 10..

Alan

[JonCarleton]

4 hours ago, Alien 13 said:

I did load Linux Mint onto my high end gaming laptop as a dual boot option and like most have said the installed software like Libre Office etc is fine for most uses, things I didn't like was the need to constantly enter passwords and the slow boot up time which was something like 14 seconds compared to the 5 seconds with Win 10..

Alan

You can configure away as much of the sign-in stuff in UNIX as you are willing to expose.  My telescope (Raspberry Pi4) servers boot right into the desktop, load CCDciel, SkyChart, INDI, and PHD2 without a touch from me.  But, it does have enterprise security as a default.

Linux or at least UNIX will always be around.  You can't do big infrastructure with Windows.  And by big, I mean thousands or tens of thousands of clients, rather than maybe a few hundred or so in a corporation.  Windows is a single user platform that was adapted to manage light networking.  Unix/Linux is networked multi-user from the core and doesn't really care if the network consists of just one user.

I recall a cable operator (who shall remain nameless) that was a die-hard Windows proponent.  One day there was a wide-spread outage in is coverage area.  The bank of Windows servers he had setup for DHCP and TFTP took almost 30 hours to manage getting his whole client-base back online.  One of our clients was in a neighboring area that suffered the same fate.  His downtime was closer to 40 minutes.  There is a -reason- Cisco's DHCP server uses the Berkeley Sleepy Cat database in Berkeley UNIX as the core of its function.  A single device can outrun a room-full of Windows servers.  Most routers and other network devices run Linux some UNIX variant internally.

Edited June 28, 2021 by JonCarleton

[alacant]

On 29/06/2021 at 00:54, JonCarleton said:

Linux or at least UNIX will always be around. 

+1. It most certainly shall.

Almost 100% of the top Internet houses run Linux servers. I doubt very much the Internet would be where it is today without the security and stability it offers. 

It's not just top end either. My school saved a lot of licence fees by replacing windows servers with Samba 4 DCs and file servers. As we go cloud, we'll all be using Linux to an ever greater extent.

Desktop replacement I don't think it's meant to be. But anything client-server -and lest we forget which forum upon which we are posting- including running an astrophotogrphy setup , a big fat yes. 

Cheers.

Edited September 21, 2021 by alacant
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