The author seems busy trying to put out small fires, instead of focusing on what's really burning: Windows. There is, for most people, very little reason to stay on Windows.
In todays world of wonderfully powerful machine, a WindowsXP or Windows7 installation in a seamless Virtualbox machine will solve most Windows-related problems: proprietary apps at work, a photobook creation Windows app or maybe an old game or so. For everything else there's at least one Linux distribution that works.
I install Mint 15 Mate for my retirees and with it they can surf, bank, write e-mail and word process. After installing it I never hear about viruses, trojans or weird popups telling them that something is out of date.
Now if only younger people would have the courage to try something other than Windows for once. Unfortunately you're going to be playin the latest Call of Duty or Madden 2047, but them's the breaks.
Have your retirees tried installing something them selves?
I, today, had a very quick look at installing Libre Office on a Fedora VM. Windows: download exe file, double click, it installs. Now go look up the instruction for Linux. So absurdly, hilariously complicated. I thought of Linux fanbois, and began to laugh, then cry. Right there is one reason Linux has a long, long way to go.
Yeah, fine for geeks and great for running server services, as I have been doing for decades, but as a general desk top for normal human beings? No way. Not even slightly. Sure Windows has its issues, but you know what? It works.
But, I'll give your Mint a go. See if that is as easy as Windows. You never know....
The biggest problem I have is what to do when a newer version of something comes out. Sure I run 3rd party repos for things like Node.js... but getting Postgres 9.2 on Ubuntu is an exercise I can't imagine a normal GIS person undertaking. Sure a developer or sysadmin would dive right in. But on Windows, it's download exe and run. Mac it's download DMG and double click. For linux it's "hope they have the release I want to use in their packaging system".
I don't use Postgres, but on their website they tell you that 9.2 is the default on Ubuntu, and how to downoad other versions. Trolling? Or is there a real issue here?
It's hard to argue that secure boot, on which your machine comes with keys installed by Microsoft (I don't trust them) and requires the user to know how to a: install another set of keys to run Ubuntu (or b: disable the feature entirely and forsake bootloader signing)... should be blessed
... but that users installing a piece of software as complex as a database server, on a system where packages are cryptographically signed, can't be arsed to follow the instructions on this page provided by the vendor, that was the first search result on Google, to install the vendor key and to download vendor packages from the vendor's own PPA repos.
Now try latest PostgreSQL with latest PostGIS, especially when a new release is out, but the Windows binary is still missing. Building PostGIS for Windows is not for the faint of heart.
Isn't LibreOffice in Fedoras' repository? It should be GUI-clickable to install it. (In Ubuntu, it is. I would be very surprised, if Fedora didn't have something similar.)
Young people are trying something other than Windows. It goes by the name OSX.
For most people, there is also very little reason to make the effort of switching from Windows (or OSX - whichever they're on) to a Linux distro. Do you also think regular people would understand the concept of a VM well?
I think you're getting a little ahead of yourself.
Anecdotal evidence but yes - whomever I have shown cool things with virualization likes them a lot and has no problem with the whole windows inside windows thing.
In todays world of wonderfully powerful machine, a WindowsXP or Windows7 installation in a seamless Virtualbox machine will solve most Windows-related problems: proprietary apps at work, a photobook creation Windows app or maybe an old game or so. For everything else there's at least one Linux distribution that works.
I install Mint 15 Mate for my retirees and with it they can surf, bank, write e-mail and word process. After installing it I never hear about viruses, trojans or weird popups telling them that something is out of date.
Now if only younger people would have the courage to try something other than Windows for once. Unfortunately you're going to be playin the latest Call of Duty or Madden 2047, but them's the breaks.