Move to Linux
 

I am a :newbie: to Linux, and I understand people at forums don't like stupid questions. Please accept my apology if this is a stupid question.

I am thinking about moving to Linux from Windows XP. Actually, I'd like to make a dual-boot Linux/Windows system. When the new version of Windows comes out, I will have a dedicated Linux box and a dedicated Windows Longhorn box. Anyway, what currently would you recommend for this:

-Linux distro (looking at Red Hat 9)
-E-mail
-Internet (preferably fast, tabbed)
-PDF Creation
-Office suite similar to M$ Office (OpenOffice.org 1.1?)
-FTP Program
-HTML/PHP Editor
-Anti-Spyware/Adware
-Advanced multichannel audio mixing/editing (currently Adobe Audition 1.0)
-PDF Reader
-CD Burning and CDRW Packet Writing (should support VCD, images, etc.) (currently Nero 5.5)
-AOL IM
-MSN IM (is this possible?)
-Cursor/Icon Creation
-Screen Saver Creation
-Color Grabber (gets hex codes for colors displayed on the screen-use an eyedropper to select a color anywhere on the screen.)
-Video Editing (preferably advanced)
-RSS Feed Reader
-Spam Filter
-Image Mapper (HTML)
-Multimedia player (WMA, Windows-compatible media files, MP3, DVD, etc.)
-C/C++ Development and Setup Creator
-Multimedia Presentations
-Disk Defragmenter
-Desktop Notes (Like Post-it Notes)
-Macromedia Shockwave/Flash Player
-VNC
-Screen Capture to SWF, AVI, GIF, still images
-Grep
-Zip/File Compressor/Decompressor
-Firewall

And, do they have Linux drivers for these devices:
-Palm handheld (USB)
-Creative "PC-DVD" Remote Control (Serial)
-External DVD Drive (USB)
-Logitech QuickCam (Old Version) (USB)
-Creative Nomad IIc MP3/WMA Player (USB)
-Pinnacle Deluxe Video Capture Device (USB)
-PNY SmartMedia Card Reader (USB)

Possibly, surround sound driver!

Sorry for posting this huge list, but I need help!

I'd prefer open-source or free solutions as well.

Thank you so much in advance for your help!:)

-cdrom600

P.S. I'm sure this will need way less security patches than Win XP - last week I needed 4!!!

-E-mail - Mozilla Thunderbird
-Internet (preferably fast, tabbed) - Mozilla Firebird
-Office suite similar to M$ Office (OpenOffice.org 1.1?) - Open Office
-FTP Program - gFTP, lftp (lftp is command line but extremely capable!)
-HTML/PHP Editor - Bluefish, Gvim
-Anti-Spyware/Adware - None needed :)
-Advanced multichannel audio mixing/editing - Ardour (http://ardour.sourceforge.net/)
-PDF Reader - Adobe Acrobat or any of the PDF aware apps out there
-AOL IM - gaim
-MSN IM (is this possible?) - gaim (yes, recent version work fine with MSN)
-Cursor/Icon Creation - the Gimp
-Spam Filter - Spam Assassin
-Multimedia player (WMA, Windows-compatible media files, MP3, DVD, etc.) - mplayer (movies and audio), xmms (audio only)
-C/C++ Development and Setup Creator - KDevelop, Eclipse
-Disk Defragmenter - fsck
-Desktop Notes (Like Post-it Notes) - Lot's of 'em out there but I use none
-Macromedia Shockwave/Flash Player - Macromedia Flash Player for Linux
-VNC - TightVNC, RealVNC
-Screen Capture to SWF, AVI, GIF, still images - the Gimp, ImageMagic (import -window root screenshot.jpg)
-Grep - grep
-Zip/File Compressor/Decompressor - zip, unzip, gzip, bzip2, tar
-Firewall - Linux iptables/netfilter (built-in, rule creating apps often come with your distribution)


Håkan

Thank you!

Are the zip/gzip/tar/etc. included in the distro, and what distro would you prefer or think would be best for this kind of stuff? This is basically a list of what I use my computer for (gaming is low-priority)

I also forgot in my original list...
Device driver for PS/2 2-wheel mouse (one for vertical, one for horizontal) and 3 buttons. I know this sounds weird, but you get so used to the horizontal wheel...

zip, gzip, tar and bzip2 are included in all distributions I believe. They are installed by default most of the time - tar and gzip are pretty much required so you won't find a default installation without them.

Distribution is your choice. I use Debian, others use other distros. :) Use the one you feel comfortable with.

Getting both wheels working on the mouse could be a problem but I don't really know. You will find that most simple USB devices (storage, etc) are supported but they can be royally tricky to get going. Palms are well supported, at least they were when I had my serial Palm V.

Håkan

What are the main defferences between different distros? I mean, they all use basically the same kernel, and KDE or Gnome (Does Red Hat have these, BTW?)?

>Linux distro (looking at Red Hat 9)
I would use debian because of its good maintainability, but mandrake seems to be quite
popular among new users.
-E-mail
mutt (or evolution for curses-impaired)
-Internet (preferably fast, tabbed)
Internet is allready out there, no need to invent it. You probably mean web-browser.
mozilla or mozilla-firebird.
-PDF Creation
From where?
*LaTeX? pdflatex
*PostScript? ps2pdf
*Device-independent format? dvipdf
*XML-FO? fop
-Office suite similar to M$ Office (OpenOffice.org 1.1?)
OpenOffice.org
-FTP Program
-ftp, ncftp or own client of KDE.
-HTML/PHP Editor
-emacs with psgml -mode
-Anti-Spyware/Adware
-Such crap does not exist in the free world; no need for anticrap either.
-PDF Reader
-xpdf or acroread
-CD Burning and CDRW Packet Writing
k3b, or a good shell handling and base tools (cdrecord, mkisofs). Not sure about the
packet writing.
-AOL IM,MSN IM
centericq (or gaim for curses-impaired)
-Cursor/Icon Creation
Arbitrary image editor, for ex. gimp.
For windows icons: icoutils.
-Screen Saver Creation
Create screen saver from what? A bunch of images? chbg.
-Color Grabber
Newer had a need. I think the gimp can do this.
-Video Editing (preferably advanced)
See Linuxartist.
-RSS Feed Reader
multiticker or liferea
-Spam Filter
spamassassin or bogofilter
-Multimedia player (WMA, Windows-compatible media files, MP3, DVD, etc.)
mplayer or xine
-C/C++ Development and Setup Creator
kdevelop (or emacs with proper packages)
-Multimedia Presentations
What are those? Something what M$-nopoint produces? Use oo.org (or if you prefer
doing some markup: pdfscreen).
-Disk Defragmenter
ext2-filesystem does not frament itsef in a same scale as fat does,
but if you want to, you can use defrag.
-Desktop Notes (Like Post-it Notes)
I prefer devtodo for the same task, but xpostit, xpad, gnotes(in gnome-applets
package) or knotes should do what you are looking for.
-Macromedia Shockwave/Flash Player
Flash plays well, shockwave doesn't. You need some wine-plugin mess to get
shockwave functioning.
-VNC
krdc, xtightvncviewer or tsclient.
-Screen Capture to SWF, AVI, GIF, still images
import (in ImageMagick package)
-Grep
grep
-Zip/File Compressor/Decompressor
zip, unzip
-Firewall
iptables. Either managed by hand or by a frontend like shorewall or similar.

RH9 is good, also take a look at Mandrake: www.linux-mandrake.com

Can't name any right now, but most distrobutions come with several for you to choose from.

What do you mean by 'fast internet'? Almost all of the several web browsers that come with most Linux distrobutions (distros) have tabbed browsing.

Office suites like OpenOffice (not sure if it comes with RH) can save as pdf. As for other programs that can't do this directly, they can 'print to file' in PostScript, then you can convert the file to pdf using the ps2pdf program. Pdf is just compressed PostScript.

Office suites other than OO; KOffice, another for GNOME, forgot it's name.

Prob. more than one ftp program.

HTML can edited with any text editor. Take a look at Quanta and Bluefish.

Spyware? What spyware? It's all made for Win. Not sure if there's a program for this. Besides, I think it would be pretty hard for spyware to get into your Linux with you being unaware.

Not sure what that is...

There's Acrobat for Linux, pdf reading built into KDE, xpdf, probably way more.

For cd burning you'll need the command-line tool cdrecord, and a graphical front-end like k3b or Xcdroast if you like. Not sure if packet writing is supported at all.

AOL/MSN IM: GAIM. Supports alot of IM protocols. You might need to install modules for certain protocols (esp. MSN). Unfortunately, fancy features like voice chat/video chat aren't well supported.

Cursor/Icon creation: Don't know of any particular software, but in KDE the icons are just regular PNG images. Edit em' with any graphics editor.

Don't know - check on ww.kde-look.org or something?

Don't know

Don't know

Don't know

Don't know

Don't know

Don't know

Lots of media players, mplayer off the top of my head should be able enough.

C/C++ dev: Lots of software for this, kdevelop is one.

If you're talking about something like Power Point, then you have the office suites...

Linux filesystems are 'smart'; they don't fragment as fast as Windoze ones. Not sure if there is software for this.

Use Post-Its? :) Not sure.

Not sure.

What's VNC?

Lot's of screencapture, ksnapshot, xv, ...

What's Grep?

Linux has that, in many forms: ark, zip,... lots more

They say Linux is a firewall... There is stuff for this, just can't think of the name.

Don't know about any of the drivers.

If it isn't on your cds (they don't provide several for no reason!), look at these sites:
www.sourceforge.net
www.freashmeat.net
Several more, can't think of them...
Good Luck on your Linux endeavours!

-PDF Creation
From where?
*LaTeX? pdflatex
*PostScript? ps2pdf
*Device-independent format? dvipdf
*XML-FO? fop

On further research, OOo 1.1 may be able to do this.

-Internet (preferably fast, tabbed)
Internet is allready out there, no need to invent it. You probably mean web-browser.

Yeah, I did mean Web browser.

-Anti-Spyware/Adware
-Such crap does not exist in the free world; no need for anticrap either.

I know this is the truth, but I find your terminology humorous.

-Screen Saver Creation
Create screen saver from what? A bunch of images? chbg.

I guess - I have a Windows one that lets me do it from AVis, Flash, images, FLI/FLC, more...

Thanks!

distro: depend on your taste
ICQ/aim/yahoo/msn IM: gaim
browser: mozilla firebird
mail client: mozilla or thunderbird
spam filter: whitelist (hint: make your own filter to classify all incoming mails according to sender/sender domain)
audio/video player: mplayer (yes, I like command line)

"What are the main defferences between different distros? I mean, they all use basically the same kernel, and KDE or Gnome (Does Red Hat have these, BTW?)?"

Usually just where they put everything, little things like how they startup (Slack uses BSD-style startup, RH & most others use the SysV style), the graphical tools they give you for doing things, the themes they put, the tweaks they make... It's all the same kernel though. RH does have KDE/GNOME, and lots more... but they shy away from things with licensing issues; at one point they didn't provide KDE!

Thanks everyone for all the help.
I'm making a spreadsheet to compare programs that do the same task.
:D

How could I forget?!
Anti-virus programs?

An anti-virus program that prevents all three of them? ;)
Well, in fact some viruses have succesfully got working with windows emulator in their own sandbox, but in general, you don't need such a thing as anti-virus program (see the crap
anti-crap argument again.. ;)

Or maybe you need. There are a lot of mail scanners that filter the stuff send to an other windows box and a virus-scanners that scan other windows machines from local network.

I use knoppix (a linux that boots and runs itself directly from cd) and f-prot for linux to recover windows machines from virus infections.

No, just an anti-virus program for Liunx like Symantec AV is for Windows.
Or are there no viruses for Liunx, either?

There are several vendors of antivirus software for Linux. F-Prot, McAffee and Sofos come to mind. F-Prot's Linux version is free.

Running antivirus is a good gesture - even though there are very few Linux viruses in the wild (if any), you still run the risk of forwarding infected files to Windows users through mail, filesharing, etc.
It's *your* responsibility to NOT spread viruses. :)

Håkan