Raoul's China Saloon (V5.0) Beta
The Bar Room => The Bar (ON-TOPIC) => Tech Talk, or If Yer So Damn Smart, What The Hell You Doin' Teachin' English? => Topic started by: MissMotz on March 05, 2009, 10:55:44 PM
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Ok, I've read the word and understand its a computer thing...but what is Ubuntu??
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it's one of the most user-friendly linux distributions..
http://www.ubuntu.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubuntu
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It's a completely and totally free, user-friendly virus avoiding alternative to Windoze... plus what Noles said.
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oh very cool, can you still run things like Word, Publisher etc?
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oh very cool, can you still run things like Word, Publisher etc?
Some programs you can run either if they are also made for Linux or through a Windows OS emulator but most of the time you just use another program that does the same thing.
For Word, most people use OpenOffice. Open (free) software that reads and saves in doc format if you like.
For those of you with older laptops. Some Linux distributions can really give new life to the old girls.
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Open Office is awesome. Once you go OO you never want to go back.
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can you keep windows 'silent' while you trial Ubuntu or do you need to ditch it first? Also what about printer drivers and things like that? Do you just need to find new drivers?
Will OpenOffice "talk' to wORD? FOR INSTANCE I'm secretary of my local Basketball club and often need to send stuff to the president who only has Word...woul dhe still be able to read the documents and vice versa?
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You can "try" Ubuntu by downloading their software from www.ubuntu.com. It's an .iso image which you should burn as a CD. Burn it and boot your computer with the CD in the drive and it will start the Ubuntu system and completely by-pass your windoze OS. Everything then is running off the CD, so it's a little slow (don't judge the installed system by that!) but it gives you a good opportunity to try the system, look at the different features and programs. You won't be able to save anything, but you will be able to play. It has open office, firefox and lots more good stuff already installed.
When you're done restart the computer again, take out the CD and let the system start normally and your back into your normal windoze.
As long as you have an internet connection you should be ok for most of the drivers you need. There can be some issues, but they can usually be solved pretty quick. A wonderful thing about the ubuntu community & resources is that the software is located in "repositories", or computer directories and these are accessed by the system to install new software, drivers, updates, etc. The contents of these repositories are all open-source, free, fully licensed and freely accessible for anyone to download from at any time.
I have a Canon scanner/printer - I plugged it in and Ubuntu found the drivers in about 10 seconds.
Open Office talks to word fine. I've often opened word docs ans saved OO docs as word to give to others to use. No problems. It can also save docs as pdf, which is a really useful and universally accessible format - particularly if you don't want people editing or changing your document.
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Thanks ND...I reckon I now have something to do other than Uni work next weekend :-)