Today’s rant is about Linux

well,

really hard to believe you didn’t succeed.
even my grandma can setup network under linux, so you must be very limited.

finding network cards that are not supported by linux is a hard task nowadays… only some wireless card manufacturer insist to keep the specification a secret… so they don’t want you to use these cards with linux.

but most manufacturers are not like this…

manual static network setup:
$ ifconfig eth0 192.168.0.2 up;
$ route add default gw 192.168.0.1;
$ echo ‘nameserver 192.168.0.1′ >> ‘/etc/resolv.conf’;

if your IP shall be 192.168.0.2 and your router has 192.168.0.1.

automatic network setup, one of these two:
$ dhcpcd -i eth0;
$ pump -i eth0;

with windows you would have needed at least six screenshots to explain this…

but probably you are a troll anyway… such persons shall better stick to windows.
we don’t want them in our community.

linux mint

just works

Well anonymous, I am hardly a newbie when it comes to computers. But your little bit at the end says all I need to know.
You don’t get to make the decisions on who is in the community as it isn’t yours. Seems you are the one trolling and your attitude is what gives some Linux users a bad name.

What ‘anon’ did not tell you is what to do when the above commands don’t work…which does happen.

I have found that Linspire was the easiest to network, along with Fedora. I have had the most troubles with the smaller distributions. If you remember what the target is, you won’t go wrong usually. [i.e. Novell Suse is aimed at the corporate consumer, where networking without incident is a must...I have yet to have a situation where, if the network card was detected, the desktop did not come up the first time with all the network shares.]

Have a good time with it, don’t let the bastards [or trolls, as the case may be] get you down.

Don’t give up! If you need some Linux help, come talk to me on the WyldRyde IRC network, I look after Chris’ servers, and you can guess what they run. ;-)

Are you sure the network card is working?

The only trouble I ran into was the drive for a onboard intel network chip. So I too would look hard at the network card.

Instead of ranting about how Linux will not network with Microsoft XP or Vista. I would suggest you call or write Microsoft and complain. Prior to Windows XP SP2 and Windows 2003 Server R2, I had many Linux servers networked using Samba. After installing Microsoft’s SP2 service pack on XP machines and R2 or SP1/SP2 on Windows 2003 Server the Samba connections no longer worked. After many hours on a call with Microsoft I gave up on them. They were stumbling… looking for the reason. It was obviously something to do with the so called security features that were added that broke the Samba connection. I find it sad that Microsoft could not even tell me what they changed cause the break.

I’m hardly a techie, but I’ve had no problems installing ubuntu and setting up the network. So I don’t know how a techie guy would have problems with this.

What you should try is Mandrivia Linux it has lots of wizards just like windows has :-). And you can also buy some cheap support by joining the club if you are really struggling which it sounds as if you are. This distribution is one of the most powerful in terms of GUI based distros out there and I have never had a problem with networking at all.

Lastly you would have most likely received a better response if your post was titled something like “Linux is great I just can’t get it to talk to windows. Please help!”
Cheers,

Andy

What you should try is Mandrivia Linux it has lots of wizards just like windows has :-). And you can also buy some cheap support by joining the club if you are really struggling which it sounds as if you are. This distribution is one of the most powerful in terms of GUI based distros out there and I have never had a problem with networking at all.

Lastly you would have most likely received a better response if your post was titled something like “Linux is great I just can’t get it to talk to windows. Please help!”

If it were me I would also have posted more exact details of what your problems are rather than a sweaping statement saying that it doesn’t work!
Cheers,
Andy

networking was a nightmare for me too. In my case it was 2 winXP machines. I was trying to move my wife’s data files from one winXP to another and it was a major hassle getting the two machines to see each other. So yeah, I agree with you, networking computers can be a pain.
- greg

i don’t buy it. i’ve been using gnu/linux for seven years now, including debian, early slackware, early and late red hat, fedora core, and, more recently, gentoo and sabayon. i’ve had a LOT of problems (christ, i couldn’t even begin to list them!)–inability to get scanners working, printing problems, video capture headaches, dvd authoring issues, package management hell–but _networking_?!?!?! wtf?

in addition to using gnu/linux in networked environments, i’ve also had to support gnu/linux (as well as aix and solaris) in networked environments. i have never, ever, ever had a problem getting networking working. i think the biggest networking-related problem was related to an incompatible character-encoding scheme used across a samba share once.

with every distribution i’ve used in the past *five* *years*, networking has just worked, automatically, right out of the box–usually requiring zero user intervention or setup. in fact, quite a few of my friends, unfamiliar with gnu/linux and initially concerned about how they were going to be able set up their dial-up, dsl, or broadband access, were amazed to discover that unlike microsoft windows, the distribution automatically set everything up without requiring the user to do ANYTHING.

in contrast, i’ve often had a hell of time getting microsoft windows-based networking to work properly!

the idea that somebody would encounter significant difficulty getting networking working with a modern gnu/linux distribution and modern hardware is just a bit much to swallow.

i sincerely hope that somebody mike takes a decent gnu/linux distribution for a spin–for real and not just as a token sort of thing that he’ll use to fuel more whining. all operating systems pretty much suck (to varying degrees and in different ways) and gnu/linux is definitely not for everyone, but for some, the right gnu/linux distribution can provide the building blocks for a software platform that’s as close to ideal as they’ll find anywhere.

woops! the last line of that last paragraph should have read:

“i sincerely hope that mike takes a decent gnu/linux distribution…”

terribly sorry about that.

Do a quick search on Google and you’ll see I’m not alone with my frustrations. Even a few of my friends who use Linux exclusively have told me of their problems getting things to work at times. You’ve been using it for 7 years by your own admission so it is easy for you. Not so for some of us new to it.

I consider myself pretty versed on most/all of the common operating systems, from Windows, to Apple, to Linux and BSD systems. And I have got to say that Linux (as a whole, to the entire 350-odd active distributions) is disjointed, without quality control for code, and generally a insecure system. I recently did the numbers just for basis of comparison, a Windows, Linux and BSD comparison.

Windows was nearing 120000 known viruses that has been identified at one point in time or another.
Linux had 1111 viruses for the same time period
BSD had 40 viruses for the same time period.

It’s absolutely required to understand that what 40 viruses were listed for BSD were not really dependent on BSD, because they were dependent on a vulnerable version of Apache (for example) to be infected, and Apache was the real host to the virus(es). I found -NO- viruses that would affect BSD at it’s base without the help of vulnerable add-on software. I found at least -ONE- virus that isn’t dependent on any add-on software to infect Linux based systems.

I run FreeBSD, in fact, that’s what I’m using now to post this. You have to understand that FreeBSD (among OpenBSD and NetBSD as well) won’t initiate or setup anything you don’t explicity allow. It’s as capable as Linux in many ways, and superior in others. For those who are dissatified with Linux, I really recommend looking at FreeBSD or one of the other BSD variants. You will see that BSD prides itself on the work they’ve done to create what you can use for free.

I’m tempted to give my IRC nickname out but I don’t want to personally be flooded with personal requests. Consider me a highly regarded helper on FreeNode though.

Good Luck.

The single biggest problem that I run into with new users is those who own ‘made for Windows” boxes, only to discover that they do not work as expected with various Linux distros. It’s an educational flaw that most distros do a terrible job at making clear.

In short, it’s like purchasing a PPC Mac and becoming flustered when XP will not install. Not pointing fingers as Mike is totally right, it’s frustrating. but when it comes to very select desktop boxes and plenty of notebook PCs designed for Windows, the headaches are a-plenty.

First, understand what is and is not going to happen. 99.9% of the desktop NICs will work out of the box, zero config. I promise that a trip to the store to buy a $10 NIC will do just fine.

Wireless on the other hand, is what I like to call the great Linux lie. There has been success with MadWifi (Atheros) and rt2×00.serialmonkey.com (RaLink). Yet the problem with notebooks designed for Windows is that they purposely use the crap-tacular chipset known as Broadcom, nearly always.

My suggestion is to start off like this:

On a desktop machine, get your feet wet with Wubi.
http://wubi-installer.org/

If it turns out that this is the kind of box that you would want for a notebook, you should then subscribe (RSS) to Linux Fanatics and do some back pedaling on some of my articles there.
http://tinyurl.com/3dgldk

Remember, Windows boxes are designed for…Windows. Getting Linux to work on them is nothing more than a testament to the developers that made this possible.

The single biggest problem that I run into with new users is those who own ‘made for Windows” boxes, only to discover that they do not work as expected with various Linux distros. It’s an educational flaw that most distros do a terrible job at making clear.

In short, it’s like purchasing a PPC Mac and becoming flustered when XP will not install. Not pointing fingers as Mike is totally right, it’s frustrating. But when it comes to very select desktop boxes and plenty of notebook PCs designed for Windows, the headaches are a-plenty.

First, understand what is and is not going to happen. 99.9% of the desktop NICs will work out of the box, zero config. I promise that a trip to the store to buy a $10 NIC will do just fine.

Wireless on the other hand, is what I like to call the great Linux lie. There has been success with MadWifi (Atheros) and rt2×00.serialmonkey.com (RaLink). Yet the problem with notebooks designed for Windows is that they purposely use the crap-tacular chipset known as Broadcom, nearly always.

My suggestion is to start off like this:

1) On a desktop machine, get your feet wet with Wubi.
http://wubi-installer.org/

2) If it turns out that this is the kind of box that you would want for a notebook, you should then subscribe (RSS) to Linux Fanatics and do some back pedaling on some of my articles there.
http://tinyurl.com/3dgldk

Remember, Windows boxes are designed for…Windows. Getting Linux to work on them is nothing more than a testament to the developers that made this possible.

Mike i feel your pain !
Ive been beta testing several main -stream linux o/s and they gotta change there way of thinking if they want to go main stream (of course there are many that don’t want that and are just helping Microsoft).because it just doesn’t work on every system.
This is just a tool and if its going to work with MS it has to make the adjustments not complain thats its MS fault - because DAH you really think there going to fix it -NOT.
I wish they would stop the dang complete new o/s every 6 months and just fix the crap that hasn’t worked in years ie: printing , wifi , samba , firewalls on ms systems .
I run several flavors of fedora and Debian because 1 doesn’t work on all my computers , so FLAME away loosers but instead join in to fix it so there isn’t comments like this .
TY
VOYAGER

I recently replaced a Novell 4.11 Server with Samba. I had two problems but had a working system for 10 users up in a day. Problems I had was a NIC that didn’t work under Fedora (25 Euro replacement card solved that) and then a colleague spotted that I had enabled SELinux so shares weren’t working. Disabling that solved the shares problem and everyone is happy.

Linux is not easy but it is not that difficult either so long as you have Net access for looking for answers. What took me a day would have taken an “expert” a couple of hours but at least I understand how things work now.

Your experiences with Linux in it’s various forms are not unique. I have tried to get Linux installed on my machine and finally resorted to the much vaunted Wubi installer which is suppossed to make the installation a snip. It did: 3 times: except that it still hasn’t worked. I can’t understand why Linux isn’t more accessible for average users like myself. It’s never going to be more than a minor curiosity which only the initiated will understand and the dream of an OS., free from corporate controls shall for ever be just that., a DREAM
So until Linux or Ubuntu or the various distros are as easy to instal as Microsoft systems, I’m sorry, but most of us are giving it a very wide berth..

I’m using Linux Mint Cassandra 3.0 (dual boot with XP). I am not, in any remote sense, a techie savant. My first foray into linux-land was in May 2007, with Ubuntu (Dapper). I had never before partitioned a hard drive or networked anything. With a bit of reading I managed to network my 2 WinXP computers to backup my files (Windows does make this super-easy, I must admit). Then I took the dive. I answered a few questions and in less than an hour I had an XP/Ubuntu dual boot, and Ubuntu had also detected the network ( a very basic wired connection) and could access the internet via my other computer. I don’t see how this should be a problem for a techie sort, but on the flip side, I still haven’t figured out how to share files from my linux computer with the other one. But maybe networking isn’t supposed to be too easy…for security?

I had a lot of trouble installing Linux Ubuntu at first but found out all I had to do was burn a new disk at 4x recording speed rather then the fastest and it installed with no errors. For some reason Linux and BSD distros are so picky when it comes to burning CDs or DVDs of the OS. They seem to become corrupt if everything doesn’t work 100% on the cd burning process, I have no idea why? Also I do think with distros other then Ubuntu and a few limited others Wireless networking is something to be desired. Also gaming on Linux is abysmal, but that’s not Linux Fault its the Game Designers Windows Only Formats. There is utilities you can download that will allow you to play some games even WOW with WINE. Linux’s main strength besides being free and open sources is how customizable it is.

I had a terrible time trying to get samba networking going on Ubuntu - I followed all suggested instructions perfectly, and sometimes the network shares would appear, and then suddenly disappear. Most times nothing worked at all. I eventually solved it by myself when, acting on nothing more than a wild hunch, I uninstalled the Firestarter firewall, and instantly the samba stuff was working perfectly. I replaced Firestarter with GUFW and now everything is hunky dory.

Oh, and I’d like to add that the dismissive response of some Linux evangelists to genuine persistent difficulties with Linux doesn’t help anyone, except perhaps the ego of the said evangelist.

Sometimes Linux just doesn’t work in some systems. Sure, maybe an experienced user can hack the config files and get things happening, but that isn’t good enough for people who don’t give a crap about the mechanics of the OS, they just want it to work so they can be productive. Denying that this ever happens is counter productive.