Larry Blanchard wrote:
On Sun, 15 May 2011 16:04:08 -0400, clare wrote:

And by jove, they HAVE. They get an OS that works reasonably well for
PEANUTS with their computer, and they have the option of having
WHATEVER OS THEY WANT installed on their machine for a price. They
can then have WHATEVER SOFTWARE THEY WANT produced to run on that
OS, for a price.

At the risk of sounding like a missionary, I didn't pay anything for
Linux (Ubuntu version), Open Office, Firefox, Thunderbird, scanner
software, etc.. If I need an app to do something, I type a keyword or
two into the Package Manager and find one.

So far, the only thing I've found wanting is a good CAD package and
support for my ancient camera's pseudo floppy disk interface. I
haven't needed CAD for almost a year now and I need the camera
interface about 6-8 times a year. When I do I reboot into XP. If I
had to reboot more often, I'd install the Windows emulator (WINE) and
see if those two apps would run under it.

But for the average user who needs only the network, web, and office
apps Linux will work right out of the box.

And it comes with *lots* more games than Windows :-).

Did I mention that there are very few virii written for Linux? Not
enough users for the hackers to annoy and the O/s is better protected
than in Windows.

Hmmmm - ignore everything I said - I don't want too many people using
Linux :-).

Don't worry, not too many are.