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The Linux Open-Source Operating System: Linux Distributions and Free Linux Software - Page 1

Last updated on 27 May 2010

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Linux is much less buggy is far more secure than Windows and the most popular distribution, Ubuntu Linux, is getting easier to install with every new version

Since 1999, the source code of the Linux operating system has been subject to analysis by a team of researchers at Stanford University.

The project is now being run by a company that was set up by these researchers called Coverity - http://www.coverity.com/.

The latest Linux 2.6 kernel contains 5.7 million lines of code in which only 985 bugs were identified - far below the average incidences of bugs found or estimated to be in other commercial enterprise software.

Windows XP Home Edition has 40 million lines of code, but no one yet has tried to establish or estimate how many bugs per thousand lines of code it contains. However, given the rate at which Microsoft has to issue patches and security updates for all of its software, Windows XP must have at least and probably much more than the 20 to 30 bugs for every 1,000 lines of code that commercial software is estimated to have.

And, because Linux is open-source software, for which the source code is available to any software developer, most of the identified bugs discovered in it have either been fixed, or in the act of being fixed by someone.

Because Microsoft keeps its source code secret, only it can correct the bugs and security holes in its software. Therefore, there is a much longer period between identifying and fixing them than there is in Linux, which has far fewer bugs or security holes to identify in the first place.

Ubuntu Linux, a free download from http://www.ubuntu.com/ that can be burned to a CD/DVD and used as a rescue boot disc that allows you to try using Linux from its disc before you install it. It is probably the most popular distribution of Linux and is getting easier to install with every new version, to the point now where it is installing as easily as Windows Vista and Windows 7 (released on 22 October 2009).

However, unlike other distributions of Linux that install best on old hardware, Ubuntu 9.04 (see the review of the latest version 10.04, available from May 2010, below), installs best on the latest hardware. The reviewers of the following review installed it with ease on a new PC with an AMD Phenom II 940 processor, 4GB RAM memory and an ATI Radeon 4850 video/graphics card.

Canonical Ubuntu Linux 9.04 [Review] -

"Ubuntu 9.04 worked almost perfectly as soon as we installed it. It detected our hardware immediately and we had no trouble getting everything working. We've used it to watch films, play online games, encode audio files, run Windows applications, wake us up in the morning and even write this review. With a massive team of volunteers to track, report and correct bugs, errors were resolved in hours rather than days. It costs nothing and, unless you're a hardcore gamer, it can do all the day-to-day computing tasks that Windows can."

http://www.expertreviews.co.uk/reviews/258442/canonical-ubuntu-linux-904.html

Ubuntu 10.04 LTS: Lucid Lynx Benchmarked And Reviewed -

"Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu, is pinning its hopes of OEM acceptance on the Lucid Lynx. We've put the screws to this new Long Term Support (LTS) release, comparing it to Canonical's previous LTS release, 8.04 Hardy Heron, to look for progress.

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/ubuntu-10.04-lucid-lynx,review-31905.html

Ubuntu, lessons learned -

"A thread about using Linux Ubuntu in a dual-boot system generated a surprising number of comments about this alternate operating system. Threads can have long lives — this one was started over a year." -

http://lounge.windowssecrets.com/index.php?showtopic=754317

Linux security: How to make a Linux computer secure

Even though systems running Linux are inherently more secure than systems running versions of Windows, it's not a good idea for a Linux user to take a relaxed attitude to security. Here is a page that provides information on how how to make a Linux system secure.

Articles and Information To Help You Secure Your Unix/Linux Computer -

http://netsecurity.about.com/od/secureyournixcomputer/...

The safest way to upgrade RAM memory: Use the UK and US Crucial Memory Advisors

Paul Mullen, who was the highly-respected computer guru of the Helpfile at ComputerShopper.co.uk - "I have recently been buying my memory only from Crucial Technology. I would rather pay the extra cost than waste time trying to track down the obscure program faults that bad memory can cause."

The best way to choose RAM memory for a brand-name desktop or laptop computer, or memory for a paricular make/model of PC motherboard is to make use of the Crucial Memory Advisors (provided under the brief guideline on the minimum memory requirements for Windws XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7). If the Crucial memory you receive does not work, you are guaranteed a refund and standard shipping is free.

The memory requirements of the versions of Windows Vista and Windows 7

Most of the versions of Windows Vista require more RAM memory to run optimally on a computer that doesn't use memory-hungry applications than Windows XP. A video-editing application is an example of memory-intensive software. Only Windows Vista Home Basic has a recommended minimum amount of memory of 512MB, which is the same amount recommended for Windows XP. Windows Vista Home Premium, the most popular version, and Windows Vista Ultimate require a recommended minimum of 1GB (1024MB) of memory, which is twice the amount of minimum memory recommended to run Windows XP. Note that if you are using a 64-bit version of Windows, up to 4.0GB, it requires twice the amount of memory as a 32-bit version, which can only use a maximum of about 3.5GB. For more information on computer memory, read the RAM pages of this site, which includes information on the lower memory requirements of Windows 7.

How to Use the Crucial Memory Advisor

For example, if your computer has an Asus motherboard, open the menu, scroll down to ASUS, and click GO. If, say, you have a Dell computer, scroll down to DELL, and do likewise. You will be taken to the relevant information on Crucial's website.

If you don't know the make and model of the motherboard installed in your computer, here is a good free utility - Belarc Advisor - that creates an analysis of the hardware and software on a personal computer. Look under FREE DOWNLOAD - http://www.belarc.com/. Another utility that also provides detailed information on the memory itself is CPU-Z.

The latest Linux kernel

Linus Torvalds released the long-awaited Linux 2.6.0 on Wednesday night (31 December 2003). The release arrived almost three years after the last Linux release, the 2.4 kernel, in January 2001.

The kernel is the core of the operating system that developers can build upon to create their own distributions of Linux.

New features include improved threading support, and better virtual memory and wireless support.

As the release of the new kernel was announced, most of the Linux distributions using the final 2.4 kernel were receiving excellent reviews.

For instance, as far back as in August 2003, Charles Stross gave SUSE Linux 8.2 a five-star review in issue 188 of the UK version of Computer Shopper magazine (now called Expert Reviews on the web).

"The payoff is a slick, well-integrated system that is at least as easy to configure as a Windows or Mac OS X desktop system... When you buy SuSE Linux Professional 8.2, you receive a surprisingly heavy box.... SuSE supplies a fat wallet of discs (five CDs as well as a single DVD with everything on it) and two thick manuals: the User Guide and the Administration Guide... The quality of the documentation is a real eye-opener. While early SuSE manuals appeared to have been translated from the original German without human intervention, the current manuals are as good as anything I've seen in the software business and can only be described as excellent.... SuSE 8.2's easy installation system is as convenient as Mac OS X and Windows XP. The autodetection of hardware, including sound cards, Ethernet [network] cards, video adapters, and so on, mean that unless you're using unusual hardware it should go smoothly... If you've got a clean box [computer] to install everything on, it works well, but if you're trying to install a system that will coexist with another operating system [such as Windows] you must read the section on User Defined Installation in the User Guide."

There have been a few updates to the 2.6 kernel. The latest Linux kernel is available from http://www.kernel.org/ and other mirror sites.

The five best things in Linux 2.6.27 -

http://blogs.computerworld.com/the_five_best_things_in_linux_2_6_27...

Puppy Linux

Mission Statement

"Puppy will easily install to USB, Zip or hard drive media. Booting from CD, Puppy will load totally into RAM so that the CD drive is then free for other purposes. Booting from CD, Puppy can save everything back to the CD, no need for a hard drive. Booting from USB, Puppy will greatly minimise writes, to extend the life of Flash devices indefinitely. Puppy will be extremely friendly for Linux newbies. Puppy will boot up and run extraordinarily fast. Puppy will have all the applications needed for daily use. Puppy will just work, no hassles. Puppy will breathe new life into old PCs." - http://www.puppyos.com/

Reviews of Linux distributions

Linux Distributions - latest reviews - Anandtech: http://www.anandtech.com/linux/

Distrowatch - http://distrowatch.com/

Linux Reviews - http://linuxreviews.org/

You can find many other review sites by entering a suitable search term, such as linux reviews, in the Google search box at the top of this page (with its Web radio button enabled).

Installing Ubantu Linux on a laptop/notebook computer

I have a laptop PC that was running Windows Me that I was going to bin, but I decided to experiment by installing Ubantu 6.06 Linux on it. The computer was running very slowly, its Ethernet network card was no longer working, and there was not much space left on its small 10GB hard disk drive.

Ubantu recognised all of the computer's hardware, including the Ethernet network card. I added a wireless network card. When Ubantu was installed with all the free Linux software I needed, there was plenty of disk space left, and the computer worked at a respectable speed. Ubantu has a very good-looking desktop interface. The computer is now part of my home network.

Since then, my positive experience of Linux inspired me to install a more advanced Linux distribution on a new laptop. The free open-source Beryl/Compiz Fusion desktop that I use on my new laptop is very attractive, and the amount of quality free open-source software matches any software for Windows.

Compared: SUSE Linux Professional 10.0 and Windows XP

SUSE Linux, owned by the famous software developer, Novell, is one of the most popular and user-friendly distributions of Linux. It is now up to version 10.0, but most of the following information was written for version 9.2. Most of the information on version 9.2 still applies to version 10.0, so I have made it plain where I have included information that is relevant to version 10.0.

The forums that support SUSE Linux provide excellent support for the distribution.

openSUSE Forums - http://forums.opensuse.org/

At its best, SUSE Linux Professional 9.2, can match Windows XP, and even excel it in some departments, but, due to licensing restrictions, its multimedia capabilities are not fully comparable.

SUSE's installation is simple, and it comes with many free and excellent Linux open-source applications and utilities that a legitimate Windows user has to purchase separately.

In short, SUSE Linux Professional 9.2 is an excellent choice for the business user.

SUSE uses the YaST configuration tool to install itself. YaST can be run at any time to correct any mistakes or make changes. I have installed SUSE successfully just by accepting the default options and by supplying a root password when required to do so. If SUSE detects that another operating system is installed, such as Windows XP, it repartitions the available disk space and creates a dual-boot system. You're presented with a boot menu at start-up that allows you to choose which operating system to use. SUSE uses the same NTFS file system as Windows XP, so it can share XP's files.

Installing Linux

The installation procedure for versions 9 and 10 asks the user to make a choice between the KDE and Gnome desktops. The two desktops have different ways of doing things, but give the user equal access to all of the applications. My favourite, the KDE desktop and a default installation requires 2.1GB of disk space.

KDE is the most widely used Linux desktop. It has two support sites:

http://www.kde.org/ and http://www.kde-apps.org.

Linux distributions can all be downloaded free from the developers sites, but you have to pay for the packaged product that comes with the CDs, user manual, and technical support. The free download is only supported by free access to updates. But, because Linux is open-source software, the price is a fraction of the cost of Windows XP Professional.

Novice users can be prone to install all of the applications and programs, most of which will never be used. A full installation takes several hours, therefore, it is advisable to look through YaST's software installation facilities and only tick the applications that you'll be using or would like to try.

How to install the Linux operating system on a notebook/laptop PC

If you want to use an alternative to Windows, you can try using a distribution of Linux on your notebook PC that supports masses of free open-source software. The following how-to provides some useful information on the subject.

Linux-ize Your Notebook: Linux-izing Notebooks Is Getting Easier, Really -

"As various Linux distributions continue to mature, the pathway to a successful Linux installation on a notebook becomes smoother and easier to follow. In this how-to, we take you step-by-step through the installation of current Fedora and SUSE Linux versions on a standard notebook PC." - http://tomshardware.co.uk/2006/08/07/.../index.html

Note that using Linux on a desktop PC tends to be even less problematic.

User authentication

YaST asks the user to choose bewteen local authentication - using the /etc/passwd file - and LDAP, NIS, or Samba to verify users. Most home user would opt for the /etc/passwd method.

Linux driver support

Apart from the processor, which the operating system itself runs, all of the devices in a computer require software device drivers in order to function. If you visit the sites of most of the major motherboard manufacturers, you'll find that they don't supply Linux drivers for their motherboards. If Linux wasn't able to install its own drivers for the motherboard in a system it was being installed on, it wouldn't be able to function as the operating system. You should be able to install most of the latest distributions of Linux on any computer, because it either installs its own drivers for the motherboard, or it has the drivers for devices such as video cards in its driver library. Many of the other major computer hardware manufacturers are now providing Linux drivers for their products. For instance, the video-card manufacturer, nVidia, provides excellent Linux drivers for its video cards and video chips. However, note that ATI, the other major manufacturer of video cards and video chips, doesn't produce Linux drivers of the same excellence.

SUSE's software firewall

The Personal and Professional versions of SUSE Linux 9.1 and 9.2 come with a built-in firewall. It is installed by default, but, but to provide intrusion protection while you're online, you should make sure that it's running. It is found by running the YaST setup tool, mentioned further up this page. Choose the option called Security and Users, and click on the sub-category called Firewall.

Linux office applications

Business users using Windows XP Pro would need a copy of MS Office, but the retail SUSE Pro 9.2 comes with OpenOffice 1.1 included in the package. The price of MS Office 2003 (in February 2005) was between £300 and £370, depending on the version purchased. OpenOffice 1.1 contains a word processor (Writer), and spreadsheet (Calc) that are comparable to Microsoft's Word and Excel, and both of them can read MS Office documents. Moreover, the word processor can create PDF documents, which is something that Word can't currently do. Note that macro programs created in MS Office won't run in OpenOffice, because the two use slightly different macro languages. The SUSE package also contains a very useful accounting package.

Linux e-mail, antivirus, and anti-spam programs

For e-mail, SUSE uses Kmail, which is supplied with the retail distribution and which is very much like Microsoft's Outlook Express. Kmail can import messages and addresses exported from Outlook Express. Spam Assassin and the Sophos AntiVirus scanner, both excellent free open-source anti-spam and antivirus programs, are included with the retail package, and both are installed by default when SUSE is installed.

The default installation in SUSE Linux 10 is an application called GMX, which can scan for suspicious messages and delete them. However, the othe applications, such as Spam Assassin are still available.

Linux music programs

To take full advantage of SUSE's music-making applications requires a fast processor, plenty of RAM, and a high-end sound card.

Inserting a CD in the computer's CD drive activates a dialog box that enquires if the user wants to open KsCD, which is the CD player that SUSE installs automatically during its own installation. KsCD looks more basic than the Windows Media Player, but it plays audio CDs just as well. Other alternative players are bundled with the package that can be used instead, such as Real Player 10, Amarok, KAudioCreator, and Grip. The last two programs allow a user to convert audio files to the MP3 format, and K3B can burn the files to recordable CDs. Grip is particularly good, and it can repair any distortions caused by files being transferred to a hard disk drive from by a scratched CD.

SUSE Linux 10 also provides the impressive Hydrogen, a 32-track sequencer, and the Hammerfall Digital Signal Processor, to which MIDI signals can be routed by using SUSE's patch bay facility.

How to play DVD movies in SUSE Linux

SUSE's bundled DVD media player is called Kaffeine. However, to play a DVD movie, you need to install the DVD codec, which can be found at:

http://kaffeine.kde.org/

Read the FAQ there to find links to the codecs. Here are two more pages about DVD in Linux:

Linux DVD HOWTO - http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/DVD-HOWTO.html

YoLinux Tutorial: Video, DVD, TV and Multimedia - "This covers Linux video, DVD, TV, HDTV and Hauppauge WinTV PCI card use. Included in this tutorial are links to software, video formats and information pertaining to video multimedia on Linux. This page also includes a tutorial on the use of the Hauppauge WinTV PCI card under Linux." -

http://www.yolinux.com/TUTORIALS/LinuxTutorialVideo.html

Linux photo editing

The retail package of SUSE Pro 9.2 comes bundled with several digital photography and photo album applications, such as Digikam.

The most popular and most powerful application is called Gimp. It is an excellent program that competes well with Microsoft's digital photography programs, but has some way to go to reach the same level as the latest versions of Paint Shop Pro and Adobe's Photoshop. It can download images from a digital camera, and has plug-ins that the user installs to make it capable of handling data in the AVI movie format as multi-layered images, etc.

Linux movie making

MainActor 5 has full FireWire support and is the video-capture and movie editing suite that comes with SUSE Pro 9.2. It supports the MPEG2 movie format and the raw1394 and dv1394 formats that allow the capture of video from analog and digital cameras. However, the default installation doesn't provide the drivers required for video capture. The user has to find the free drivers from sources on the web. Using a search phrase such as mainactor + video + drivers in the Google search box provided at the top of this page should provide them.

SUSE Linux 10 comes with MainActor 5.5 and Kino video-capture and editing applications.

Scanning images in Linux

Using a USB scanner with any of the latest distributions of Linux is a simple matter. If there is a scanner connected to the system when Linux is installed, the software driver support is installed automatically. The same goes if the user attaches a USB scanner after Linux has been installed - the scanner is detected and the driver support is installed.

Kooka, is the comprehensive scanning and optical character recognition application that comes with SUSE Pro 9.2, but other included software such as Gimp, the graphics editor, can acquire images directly from the scanner.

Instant messaging in Linux

Kopete 0.9.0 is the very impressive chat program/client that comes with SUSE Pro 9.2. Unlike Microsoft's MSN Messenger, it isn't restricted to Microsoft's chat network. It supports an impressive number of chat services, such as AIM, ICQ, MSN, Yahoo!, Jabber, IRC, Novell GroupWise Messenger, and Lotus SameTime.

Networking in SUSE Linux

SUSE has all of the networking protocols that the different versions of Windows have, such as TCP/IP, IPX/SPX, NetBEUI, etc. For file and printer sharing, the excellent Samba server software is included with SUSE Pro 9.2. It's a simple matter to set Samba up with SUSE's YaST system configuration tool. The user merely has to enable the Samba service, enter which directories (folders) to share on the network, and provide a user name and password to protect access. Windows users on the network can then just add the shared resources to My Network (Windows 9.x) and My Network Places (Windows XP), and access them as they would any other shared network resources.

SUSE Linux 10 comes with an open-source utility called ndiswrapper, which allows the user to set up a WiFi wireless network card that is not yet supported by Linux so that it uses its Windows drivers. The utility used to have to be downloaded but is now installed as part of SUSE Linux 10.

Linux Internet browsers

The retail package of SUSE Pro 9.2 comes bundled with the Konqueror 3.3 browser, which has many plug-ins that extend its functionality. However, a Linux version of the superb Mozilla Firefox 1.0 browser is available. It's so good that it is forcing Microsoft to upgrade Internet Explorer.

Free Linux games

Even though there is a demo version of Doom 3 for Linux on the web, the time has not yet arrived to use Linux as the operating system of choice on a gaming PC. This is because the developers of games have yet to create versions of their games that can run on Linux. However, SUSE Pro 9.2 comes with many challenging action, adventure, arcade, card, puzzle, sports, strategy, and children's games.

SUSE Linux: Dial-up modem support

You don't need to use a Linux driver for a hardware modem (a modem that has its own signal processor), because Linux is already programmed to run any hardware modem, but finding a driver for a winmodem (a software-driven modem designed for use with Windows) used to be a problem. However, the situation is much improved now. SUSE Linux provides support for many software modems by installing the drivers automatically, but if this is not the case for a particular dial-up software modem, visit this site to look for a driver file. -

http://www.linmodems.org/

The Apache web server

Apache is the name of the most popular web server software. It currently hosts around 70 per cent of all websites. It is provided free with SUSE Linux 9x Professional, along with everything else that is necessary to build professional websites, including advanced features such as linking to a database.

The current version (June, 2005) is 2.0.53. If you have a version of Linux that doesn't include it, you can download it free from the Apache Software Foundation: http://httpd.apache.org/download.cgi. The documentation section of the site provides full installation instructions.

Many websites provide free scripts that can be used with Apache. To locate them, try entering apache + scripts (as is) in the Google search box at the top of this page with its Web radio button enabled.

Linux and the defragmentation of a hard disk drive (Linux defrag)

The hard disk drives using Windows systems can suffer so badly from file fragmentation that it can take a long time instead of a few seconds to display the information from, say, a database. Therefore, it is essential to defragment hard drives running any version of Windows - regularly. Usually it's a good idea to defragment the drive even when a defragmentation program reports that it's not necessary to run it.

Running a defragmentation program is usually a time-consuming business. But what programs can be used to defragment a Linux hard disk drive? The news is good. Believe it or not, you don't have to worry about it. Of course it can be done. There's almost always a way to achieve anything in Linux, but it's unnecessary because Linux is designed to handle fragmentation as it manages the files. Therefore, a computer running Linux will almost never have to make excessive page-file searches when opening a program due to the fragmentation of the files on the hard drive. If the hard drive is working hard (page-filing to the swap file), install more RAM and/or make sure that you have enough space on the hard drive. At least 10% free space seems to be a working rule of thumb. There should be no need to defragment the drive.

The following links on this subject were found via a Google search for "linux defrag" or linux + defrag. -

http://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2003/debian-user-200308/msg03496.html

http://www.salmar.com/pipermail/wftl-lug/2002-March/000603.html

You can make use of the Google search box at the top of this page (with the Web radio button selected) to conduct your own searches.

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