On Fri, 2008-09-26 at 11:03 +0800, Xiaofan Chen wrote:
> To some people, Linux is really not an option due to the lack of certain
> programs. Even for me ( using Linux since 1998, touched Unix/VAX since
> 1991), I do not think I can use Linux for work.

I thought the same, until I just took the plunge and went for it.

In the end I still do one machine at my desk that runs 2k. It's rarely
powered, but it is there for the odd time.

Despite what many at my company think (and after much fiddling on my
part), my email/contacts/calender works fine (exchange server), printing
works fine (I bypass the windows print server and print directly to the
printer, only caveat is my printouts always come out in the "fax" tray,
I don't mind, means my printouts are never jumbled up with others).

Some of the web services need tweaking (since my linux machine doesn't
log into the windows "domain"), but I've gotten pretty much everything
to work, everything else I've found workarounds that work fine for me.

It does mean I've pretty much dropped PICs altogether, a shame really,
but MChip just doesn't care about people who don't use windows, so I
don't care much for their products anymore from my professional side (I
do still consider them for hobby projects), evil little circle there.

It took alot of work, pain and effort to get everything working (getting
my email working was tricky, getting the calender a little more so,
getting wireless to work at work took me a LONG time, due to the odd
secure config they have, but now it's as stable as on windows), but it's
SO worth it. I don't have to worry about IT mucking with my machine
(yes, we rebooted your PC last night due to a critical update, sorry you
lost your work...), I have a built in X Server (don't have to purchase
one for windows, the free ones have too many bugs to be useful). I don't
have to download a SSH, SFTP, or VNC client, it's all there. I wanted to
set up a web server, it was all there.

It's not for everyone, but for me I hope I never have to go back.

TTYL

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