Some people have been asking how my Linux project is going. I have been meaning to write it up, but you know how it is. My office and home desktops are Linux, as is my wife's desktop. My web server is, of course, Linux. My laptop remains Windows because no wireless internet driver is available for the special Dell built-in wireless PCI. The Linux is working pretty well. But it's not all gravy. For example: I wanted to access a service on NHL.com a couple of days ago. It requires that my browser have the Java plugin. Click here - so I did. Software downloads and installs, just like it's supposed to. And then - nothing. The plugin is probably somewhere on my computer, but nowhere I - or my browser - can find it. This sort of thing is typical of Linux - and I know, having configured a number of these units by now. Some plugins are tricky (Flash), some require extra stuff be installed, some are just plain weird (Real Media), and some don't exist at all (QuickTime, Windows Media). To make Thunderbird launch the Firebird browser properly, I had to write a shell script. So this isn't turnkey yet. Anyhow. Novell hopes to change that. "We're focusing on building a complete Linux desktop as an alternative to what you've been using," they say. Good, go for it. The software's all there - it's just the user experience that needs tweaking. A lot of tweaking.
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