Back near the beginning of last term, the in thing was to install Ubuntu. Everyone wanted to learn Linux because they wanted to be leet and so off they went to grab their copies of Edgy Eft or whatever it was back then and started to partition their drives, eagerly anticipating the magic of Linux sinking into their hard drives.

Now the thing about Ubuntu is that I find it hard to feel leet about anything after finishing an installation, because it consists of it doing everything for you. That is, unless something went wrong, in which case the typical response was that Linux was being gay and fleeing off to Windows again. In the event that Linux was running well, most people got tired of dual booting and just stuck with Windows again within the month.

And on to the problems. During the period that those people use Linux, they go on about how great it is and how productive they are and how it absolutely destroys Windows in every conceivable way you can measure it. They are now Linux experts, because installing Linux successfully it enough qualification to label yourself as knowledgeable in how every operating system works.

After this period, they’ll return to Windows and start spouting out how garbage Linux is, and again, because they had it installed for three days, they are qualified to pass obviously impartial judgement upon operating systems.

This is damaging to prospective Linux users for two reasons. First of all, Linux users come off as arrogant jerks, especially the ignorant ones who say ridiculous things regarding memory usage and performance in quantitative terms as if they were quoting some hard data. Second of all, these experts who’ve returned from Linux let loose the same torrent of arrogant bashing against Linux, again involving ridiculous claims and figures.

This is true of any operating system. This is why I’ve stayed out of OS debates in the software lab. This is why I wish some of my friends would shut up, because some of the stuff they say is pure misinformation and ridiculous crap.

So under what circumstances should you be allowed to speak critically about operating systems?

First of all, I’d suggest not dual booting. I think dual booting is the number one cause of people who are eager to learn not learning. For one thing, it’s a hassle, and for another, you always have somewhere to run off to. You can always go back to the familiar, the easy. You never actually have to learn. And so, your alternate OS becomes stripped of purpose, and there really is no reason to boot into it.

Second of all, in addition to not dual booting, I’d suggest actually using the OS for some length of time. See, not dual booting actually leads into this because you’re less likely to reinstall your OS than just nuke a partition. Also, you’re forced to actually learn how the OS works and understand the philosophy behind how it’s been crafted.

All of those people who say that switching was easy are lying. Until you’ve learned how to switch and adapt to a new OS, it will never be easy. Learning and using a new OS is a significant commitment and investment. People need to learn to treat it as such.

This happens to be because text editors are the basic tools in the Unix world. Coding and editing files is a must and a text editor is your best friend. You’ll be editing many a fstab or crontab with this thing and you want it to do what you want. It’s very much like a sword that’s attuned to you.

So I ended up going Scryer. The decision to go Scryer or Aldor is much easier than choosing a text editor. But I did decide to throw my lot in with vi. Why? After I eventually get around to learning the rest of the commands in vi, I’ll be able to do superhuman things with it. Emacs on the other hand can do anything else, which is not really what I look for in a text editor.

So with my move to the Mac, I was in search for another text editor. The environment was very different for this sort of battle. For one thing, the text editor users weren’t dominated by Old Unix Zealots, but designers. Yes, web designers are the ones who influence me, at least, as to which text editor to use.

The thing about text editors on the Mac is that most of the good ones are commerical: TextMate, BBEdit, and others. The problem is that I didn’t want to spend money on a text editor.

So far, the only true alternative I’ve come up with is Smultron. It’s free, it’s open source, and it’s as beautiful as any other Mac program, and just as functional as any other text editor. It’s become my text editor of choice for anything on my Mac, really, from HTML to Java to that vaunted VHDL. Is it the one true text editor? No, but it is pretty darn good, so give it a whirl and enjoy the giant berry sitting in your dock.

Power Users

First of all, let me rant. I don’t believe anyone gets to criticize another operating system until they’ve used it extensively. That is, where do all of these Windows users come from, talking about how Windows is the only worthy OS when that’s all they’ve known? You don’t go around saying how awesome English is and how it should be the only language man should ever speak. If you do, I’m pretty sure everyone around you shouts “racist” as you go on your tirade.

For instance, Windows users crying about how hard other OSes are. “Wah wah wah, I have to manually bootstrap my system.” Alright, sometimes it’s justified, but usually, it’s more like this: “Wah wah wah, OS X doesn’t use Ctrl for its shortcuts, it’s so hard.” That’s not hard, that’s just muscle memory. It’s “hard” because you think that you’re using Windows.

Here’s a secret: just because you know how to use Windows doesn’t mean you know how to use a computer.

All of my computers at home are running Linux. The computer my parents use runs Ubuntu, actually. I had no choice, actually, because the only other thing it could really run was Windows 98. So, I opted for Ubuntu. My parents don’t really use computers that much, just once in a while to go on the Internet or check some e-mail. So I set up and everything and I made one large icon in the middle of the desktop and called it Internet which was for Firefox.

I told them how to go on the Internet, and they did. Wait, what? They’re using Linux? But Linux is hard. That is some hard stuff. I mean, they can even type in OpenOffice and print stuff.

There are people who are new to computers and they learn how to “use” a “computer”. They learn that the taskbar and the start menu are at the bottom of the screen. They learn that to make a new document in Microsoft Word, they click the little piece of paper in the toolbar.

But what if it’s not there? Then they’re screwed. Then they call technical support and tell them that the little row of pictures are gone. On the other hand, my mom is so noob that she doesn’t have any of those preconceived notions from those awful ‘learn how to use a computer’ classes. My dad has been able to recognize similarities once I point them out and he *gasp* learns.

So back to power users. The problem with power users is that they are so knowledgeable about Windows that they’ve come to associate Windows’ peculiarities with all computers. Restarting your computer solves most problems. Restart your computer after you’ve installed something. You need to format your computer once a year. Programs close when they have no windows open.

Then there’s the arrogance: they think they know how to use a computer, and when something doesn’t work like windows, it’s either broken or stupid.

Of course, when not-Windows people question why things are broken or less efficient, Windows users shrug them off as crazy, because that’s the way it’s always been. I mean, drive letters are the only way to denote different volumes. How could you live without drive letters?

This applies universally of course, power users of any sort. The other offenders are those Mac zealots. The only difference of course is that there are much fewer Mac and Linux fanboys than Windows fanboys.

Normal People

I didn’t really run into that many people who were interested in my Linux adventures. Once, I got a Mac though, everyone became all “So you got a Mac, eh?” I guess it has to do with the image that Apple has built up as being the provider of pretty, expensive machines for artists and rich snobs.

It’s interesting how people react to the fact that someone they know is one of them, those weird people who don’t use real computers. They start asking you how it is and sometimes throw in something like “But you can’t use Office” or “But it can’t read Windows files” or “But it doesn’t come with any Internets.”

For whatever reason, people think that Macs are even slower and less stable than the Windows machines that they’re using. They think that if they switch, they’ll have to say farewell to their loved ones and never look back.

Liberation

I have now used Linux, Windows, and Mac extensively now. Outside of my class (those crazy software engineers), I’m the only person who knows all three well (well, not Windows so much nowadays). I can see the flaws and shortcomings of all three. I can see the strengths that all three have. I can use all three much better than a lot of people I know who’ve concentrate on one platform all their lives.

Windows users tend to think that the destiny of computing is tied to that of Windows. Of course, it hasn’t always been like that and it won’t always be like that. Mac and Linux users know that this isn’t the case, because they’ve been computing fine for years. They aren’t dependent on the nuances of their operating system and know how to adapt to new environments. Windows users are wondering how anyone can use a computer anymore without a GUI.

I think that Windows users are very much like our neighbour to the south, the United States of America. They pretty much rule the world and think their way is how it should be done. Non-Windows users are a lot like Canada. We do things a bit differently, but in a lot of ways, we’re like our neighbours. Of course, we’re not as loud and collectively, our minds are a lot more open and we know a crapload of stuff about our neighbours while they know nothing about us.

Oh, and I guess Windows users are always talking about moving up here if they lose the next election.