Yes, I did code professionally in C on a 386 machine with 4MB RAM - using Borland C 4.x (I think it was 4.5 - but may be slightly earlier than that too) Used the Borland Graphics Interface to draw my own custom made 'Voltmeter', 'Ammeter', 'RPM Meter' etc. I was writing a diagnostic program using Data Acquisition cards to acquire data from Metro Railway train - on board the train.

My team wrote the Program Logic for the Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) which was on board the train - which was taking commands directly from the train driver. The application I wrote was to analyse the behaviour of the electric motor on the train, prove it to the Railway Authorities that our PLC Logic Controller was behaving correctly and so on. All of this was done using MS Dos 6.2 based 80386 PC.

Those were exciting times.

I used Mandrake years ago (well, when it was still Mandrake) and that's where I started, did a little here and there but never really got into it. Started using Windows again for a few years and am totally back to Linux again, didn't have an option for that since I don't think I qualify as a long-term user so I put that I've been using it in the last few years.

Around year 2000 i bought for 20.00$ a box version of Corel Linux. (piece of crap). It always froze on installation at around 98%, one day i tried again and FINALLY it installed.
I was disappointed because the GUI was very unstable but i was very intrigue with Linux and did not give up, then i found out there was other Linux distro and that they were (free).
I downloaded and installed Mandrake 8.xx then 9.xx and so on. I must have tried 20 different distros over time like most of people here but Mandriva is still my favorite. I also run Debian Lenny on my other machine.

started in the early 2000s when windows ME totaly borked out on me in a kinda final way.
got linux for dummies from the library and installed of the CD in the back...
that was redhat 7 i think.....

soon learnt after much tinkering that it was massively out of date so i tried the only other distro i had heard of, slackware.

I kind of managed to get slackware (9 or 10.0 i think) installed but soon gave up when i encountered dependency hell with PKGtool. thankfully slackwares website has a support fourm link, that pointed directly to the LQ slackware subforum! after some browsing i tried ubuntu (hedgehog) and hated it, before settling on suse (10.0)
used suse for a couple of years including the massibly broken 10.1 all the way up to 10.3 when i managed to corrupt everything. With no network connection avalable to me except wireless i knew i couldn't reinstall suse as to get my card working i needed to download madwifi (how can you download somthing with no net connection?)

so i tried ubuntu (7.10) this detected my atheros wifi card out of the box and i have been with ubuntu ever since (as yet up to 9.10) though i want to try suse 11 when i can get my drive to burn a DVD without errors (actually i think i need a new drive it wont burn cds without errors anymore....)


for age 22 ive been using linux a fair time allmost exclusivity for the past 4 years or so or so i thought untill i bought a new netbook last week,
came with winxp on it and allthough ive installed UNR 9.10 i decided to keep windows for tinkering with, (and using MPLAB to program PICs)
so this is the first time i have actually owned a comp with windows for many years!

I certainly wish that I had been one of the early adopters of Linux, if only so I could tell some tall stories about those times .

My first computing experience was however with DOS and 'Windows for Workgroups' 3.11 on one of the early Pentium 75 computers, just before the release of Windows 95. Pretty much ignoring the rise of the Internet at the time I spent too many hours from then on using dial-up bulletin boards and playing Descent online via a Kali server. Does anybody remember the BlueWave offline mail reader of these times? I remember my big goal at the time was to create my own BBS but the BBSs started dying as the Internet grew which is still a sad thing for me.

My first experience of Linux was many years later in 2006 with Ubuntu Breezy Badger which came preinstalled with an EEPC from eBay. The only reason I bought this computer was that it was cheap, I was more than happy with Windows XP at the time. Although I broke this system pretty quickly it marked my first great interest in Linux and I followed this up with each Ubuntu distro forward to the present day.

With Slackware 12.0 in July 2007 my great fascination in Linux really happened and eventually Ubuntu has been relegated to Virtual Machines where I continue to pay back the debt I owe to the many more experienced users who cope with my initial blunderings as the world's greatest n00b! But it is Slackware where I do all of my day to day computing and it is there that I continue to learn and grow in the Linux world.

So perhaps not the greatest of Linux stories but it is mine anyway .

Andrew