* GNOME 2.24 desktop environment
* Google Chrome 4.0.206 web browser
* OpenOffice.org 3.0 office suite
* Flash Player 10.0 plugin
* and much more!

Booooring .. Stop the hyping about Google OS ..

Still there is alot of proprietary drivers that are not just “wizard”-drivers and needs some (if not intermediate) linux experience.

I have no problem getting things to work just as you. But I know that people trying out Ubuntu always stops at the same point.

I am perfectly aware that Linux has much better hardware support than Windows in many cases .. Still, these USB peripherals that people find at their local retailstore is not linux compatible ..

A new linux user doesn’t know that Broadcom, ATI, X-Fi or others is a bad choice. You simply cannot deny that ..

The problem is that hardware that is sold locally is not supported by Linux and your old computer maybe isn’t either.

With a change to Linux you will also have to change your thoughts on hardware buys and other common things that are natural to a Linux user.

Most new Linux users like on Ubuntu seem to install alot of packages from source just because they don’t know better and they expect to see a “Wizard” on the screen. Telling them about their pkgmanager is one thing, but secondly you will have to make them get used to making the right choices.

People who’ve used Linux for years knows common sense such as:
- If a program needs kdelibs, it’s most likely bloated and slow.
- If your hardware is not listed in lspci or dmesg it is likely that it needs proprietary drivers or kernel patch etc.
- Forget about installers, use the package manager.
- Don’t use ATI.
- If you want your ass powdered you should rather go with a desktop environment.

Techies can keep saying that Linux is ready for the desktop and yes it really is .. But people tend to choose what they are familiar with and they would also like to use (almost all) their Windows applications on Linux easily (double-clicking) ..

What is common sense for you is rocket-science for your grandmother who just bought a Kodak camera that needs some special driver to work with it’s special protocol if it’s not just mountable by VFAT.

I understand perfectly fine why and that is why I do not recommend Linux to non-techies but only people who is not scared of reading a bit to understand.

Google is no different. If they make a linux distribution it may only get alot of attention like Ubuntu, but it will not move anything if you ask me ..

While there are some hardware vendors that have worked very hard to keep their specs out of the open source light, 99% of the hardware today works just fine. Sorry, but I buy stuff all the time without any issues whatsoever. From my Wii guitar to my USB audio recorder to my WACOM tablet – all out of the box.

If I had a list of the incompatibility headaches seen with Vista. From my newer wifi dongles to my bluetooth dongle, even my freaking printer was giving me issues driver wise.

No, it is not accurate to say that Windows has better support than Linux. It’s simply not true. While select wifi chipset manufactures have made it clear that they are not interested in providing needed data to Linux devs for compatibility, such as Broadcom for instance, I have found that avoiding companies like this is actually easy. I have a drawer full of 802.11 G dongles that work great with WPA2 and cost me less that $30 a piece. And my System76 notebook running Intel wifi gives me great 802.11N access.

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This is not to say one is easier than the other though. That depends on what the system is being used for. I have seniors with ZERO computing skills using both operating systems. So it is really a matter of what they are looking for. Just my perspective as someone who knows both OS’ very well.

I don’t believe it will change anything at all with operating systems when it is so largely based on others ..

Drivers is the problem for Linux it’s not the OS itself it is more mature than any other OS out there except for maybe some commercial unices.