Series: Linux vs Windows

-TONS of different applications. Since many programmers are concentrating on Windows, you'll easily find the software you need. And if you use Google properly, you'll even find a good freeware program^^

-Solutions for problems. Many ppl use Windows and probably encountered your problem already. Google the error msg you recieved you might find the solution

-Many PC games you can choose from.

-Safety. Windows is like a big Bulls Eye for hackers. Many viruses are targeted at Windows, without proper configuration, you'll soon end up with a very slow and bugged OS.

-Windows costs money. Yes, that's a disadvantage. If you think that the money you pay is deserved, you should actually check what Linux offers

-Trash will slow you down. The more you use your Computer with Windows on it e.g. for surfing, the slower it will get. The reason therefor are installed programs, startup services, tmp-files.. You should get used to use CCleaner every day...

-Freeware Software. Linux is a paradise for those. Just type the name of the application you want to use into your Package Manager, press Enter and you may install it without bothering to buy activation keys or limited trial use.

-Safety. Linux wouldn't actually need an antivirus application or a firewall. It's pointless to attack it since you can get all for all applications on the internet(thanks to Open Source). But I do recommend using at least a firewall^^

-Wine. Lol, not Wine you can drink, but the application layer available for Linux. Wine means "Wine Is Not and Emulator", with it, you can use Windows applications on Linux. Want to play a game? Install Wine and then the game, then you're set^^

-Almost no games for Linux. If you don't want to use Wine, there's almost no chance that you'll be able to play your favourite games. There're 2 reasons for that: The majority of PC users use Windws, the 2nd reason is that software always belongs to the user and thus can be shared without limits.

this is Linux' version of the paging file. If the RAM is full, temporary files will be saved on the Swap partition. Since Linux' memory management becomes better with every new version, it's not as necessary as it was some years ago. Many Linux Users say that 1.5 GB should be enough. I created a 4 GB Swap partition because of the games I want to play and the space I have

The most Important "folder" you could say. It's Linux' Equivalent to Window's "WINDOWS" folder. Putting it on it's own partition has a major benefit: If you for whatever reason wreck your OS, you will not loose your personal files saved in Home. The Size should be between 5 and 15 GB.

The Folder the user will probably interact most with. It's a combination of Window's "Program Files" and "Documents". All Personal files will be saved in here by default. As I mentioned in the previous bullet, it's good to create a special partition for Home, so recovery is simple and fast. This Folder can use the entire remaining space on your hdd.

"File Allocation Table", MS' original Filesystem. It's old.. very old. Maximum capacity per partition is I think 2GB.

Same as above, slightly newer than FAT. The maximum capacity per partitions is 32GB.

lol, "New Technology File System" . Windows needs this FS if you want it to run properly. But on Linux, you will quickly relize that this FS is useless

"Journaled File System", this one is quite old, created 1990 by IBM, it's supposed to be very safe, so if you experience a HDD crash, you could restore your files thanks to the Journal which logs everything

Wicked FS I say, it's very fast and safe. Maximum capacity is 8 EiB which is about 1ZB(!!!)(that are more than 9 million Terabyte). It also uses a Journal, but is saving it serial. It has however some drawbacks: eventhough it supports Journaling, it might happen that files get lost whenever the PC (or HDD) Crashes. Files cannot be recovered and changing the architecture(i386 to x86_64) will requre xfs_repair, so the filesystem in the Journal will be emptied

The Reiser File System really sounds like a racing team in the game wipEout. It's very efficient when using small files; those will use less space and can be accessed faster

"Extended File System", files will be saved block-wise which gives some speed. The big drawback is that it doesn't provide a journal and is thus not safe(files can be lost)

Finally, the last one... Extended File System Version 3 and Linux' favourite. It's slower than XFS or JFS but faster than NTFS. It provides a Journal, so files can be restored after system failure. On top of that, it's downward-compatible to ext2. The drawback: Deletion will overwrite the Block-Pointer of the Inodes with zeros which ofuscates restoration

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sudo pppoeconf

What is WINE?

WINE stands for "Wine Is Not an Emulator". It's basically and application layer, capable of executing windows applications. In theory, you're indeed able to install and play a PC Game which would actually require Windows.

So can I play any game with WINE?

Well, I mentioned "in theory". WINE is still worked on and every new version brings improvements in compatibility. But that doesn't mean that you're indeed able to play any game. MMORPGs usually do not work because of installed Hack-Shield-Daemons. Big MMO's like WoW or Guild Wars are exceptions, both should be fully playable. In addition, not everything works perfect yet: AvP2 for example can have a problem with mouse look. Other games will just crash

How many games/apps are playable/usable?

There're too many to list, but you're save saying that about 60% of all possible windows applications will run on linux. Half of those will run very good and in rare cases even better than on Windows(examples are Games which use OpenGL instead of DirectX or some software like 7zip)

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sudo sh filename.sh

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sudo mount /iso-location /mount-location -t iso9660 -o loop

I mentioned this one in Chapter 2. The screen looks like someone pulled a fork horizontally over the screen. To fix this, you can just need to press F4 at installation and select "Safe Graphics.

Also mentioned in Chapter 2, this can be established with running "sudo pppoeconf". A configuration window will appear, all questions can be answered with yes, but don't forget to enter your login data, usually the phonenumber and a password you recieved from your ISP.

I gave up on this one, sometimes you can change it and your Linux OS will indeed keep the new configuration. I suppose that this is an ATI specific bug and probably not very common. One possible way to fix this is to edit the xorg.conf file located at /etc/X11/. Since you need root permissions to edit it, you need to open a terminal and type sudo "Your-File-Manager", on Kubuntu, that would be kate. You can then browse for the file. Configuring xorg.conf can also cause problems!
Another way which may work sometimes is to open the Catalyst Control Center and change the Resolution there. Then log off, restart Server X and login again. This worked once for me.
Not a fix but a workaround is to cange font size so you can actually read everything

This bug is abit weird and not easy to describe. It looks like only a small part of the Desktop is actually displayed. I wasn't able to fix thix, a work around is to apply and use the maximum resolution. Usually, you get this when you're able to login, if that happens, log in normally, open system settings and edit the resolution. If you cannot access your panel with the application launcer on it, add a temporary panel to the visible part of your desktop and add an Application Launcer Widget.

This one was annoying. After a crash, some of my icons where gone. I used XFS for my /home partition, but the trade off for extreme read and write speeds are that system crashes can cause corruption in files. It's easy to fix actually, you just need to overwrite the broken icons with working once. If the Icon paths are broken, a system fix can help, but afterwards, reconfiguration might be necessary. This also only works if your OS CD-Rom has a repair function. There're probably many other ways to fix this, too. A workaround would be to use another Icon theme.

This is probably a nightmare for everyone. You don't know why? I will explain it: Every HDD(Hard Disk Drive) will need formatting before it actually can be used. Formatting will write a journal and set up the Filesystem. These will later be used to write/read files. The Journal e.g. is used to log any changes to any files as well as some sort of "register". If your Journal becomes corrupted, some parts or in extreme cases your entire HDD will be inaccessible. Some FS offer commands which can be used to restore it after such a corruption. ReiserFS e.g. fixes itself should any files experience corruption due to a crash or power loss.
Well, I chose XFS which is fast but can have problems if your system really crashes. This combined with the Dragon player problem listed next corrupted my journal. I was thus not able to boot my account anymore. Luckily, my wife's account still worked so I could backup any important files. I decided to reinstall Kubuntu from scratch. That also gave me the opportunity to pick another FS for my /home partition. This time I picked ReiserFS^^

I really hate this bug. The only thing I liked on windows as private user was the media player which is indeed an enrichment. Kubuntu uses the Dragon Player. It sounds nice, but it has a major bug: Resizing it can cause the entire system to freeze. Switching to Fullscreen included. Well, it can cause it, that means that this doesn't happen all the time which makes this quite frustrating. Currently, there's no fix yet. The Developers need to fix this themselves. I recommend using mplayer or VLC player.

Open Source/Free Games
On my research, I found many of those, believe it or not. And they are good, actually so good that it's hard to believe that they are absolutely free!

Nexuiz

If your liked Q3A(Quake 3 Arena), you will probably love this game. It's focus lies on multi player ofc, but it is also playable alone. Just like in Q3A, you will play against bots then. The Graphics are truly awesome and boredom is also far away since this game offers tons of maps and weapons. Several different modes are also available, simple Deathmatch, CTF, or maybe a Race?

Warsow

Warsow is a really fast paced FPS. The 1st time I played it, I was surprised about the speed the characters get when doing specific things. The levels are also based on this BUT: even if your new, you have still realistic chances against experienced players. Finally, the Cell-Shading graphics look really great. I was very impressed about the character animations: No matter if you wall-jump, bunny-jump or just Dash, all movements are animated properly.

Warzone 2100

Yes, your read right, Warzone 2100 is back! And yes, those screenshots are taken form warzone. Ok, it's the newest build, fans are still working on it and as you can see, the Graphics received a major Overhaul. Hard to believe that this game is already 10 years old.. If you like RTS, then this is your game on Linux

Neverball

This game is truly special. You do NOT control the ball, but the world! By "tilting", you can roll into a direction, but be careful! Tilting too much will give your ball uncontrollable speed. I played this game for hours, it's very fun. This is one of those games which make you want to gain better times or more coins.

Comercial Games for Linux
There're not many of those, but still a few nice ones to list:

Doom 3

Doom 3, created by ID software is a very popular and already old game. Even though, this game still looks very good! The big difference to previous Doom Games is the atmosphere on the infested Mars station. The most used Item is no doubt your torch with which you need to light your way through the dark corridors.

Exorince wrote:What Linux distro are you using?

Exorince wrote:"Linux is more secure" is actually a common misunderstanding. The reason Linux users hardly ever get viruses or unwanted spyware is simply because the people who create those things want to aim for the OS with the most users; Windows. Same applies for Mac OS X computers, they are not more secure, there are just fewer viruses out there designed to do damage to that OS...

Exorince wrote:Designing a "Computer killer" virus for Linux isn't even that difficult, this -> "rm -rf /" simple script would destroy your OS if you ran it.

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sudo rm -rf

Why are Linux and Mac OS X safer?

First, look at the two factors that cause email viruses and worms to propagate: social engineering, and poorly designed software. Social engineering is the art of conning someone into doing something they shouldn't do, or revealing something that should be kept secret. Virus writers use social engineering to convince people to do stupid things, like open attachments that carry viruses and worms. Poorly designed software makes it easier for social engineering to take place, but such software can also subvert the efforts of a knowledgable, security-minded individual or organization. Together, the two factors can turn a single virus incident into a widespread disaster.

Let's look further at social engineering. Windows software is either executable or not, depending on the file extension. So if a file ends with ".exe" or ".scr", it can be run as a program (yes, of course, if you change a text file's extension from ".txt" to ".exe", nothing will happen, because it's not magically an executable; I'm talking about real executable programs). It's easy to run executables in the Windows world, and users who get an email with a subject line like "Check out this wicked screensaver!" and an attachment, too often click on it without thinking first, and bang! we're off to the races and a new worm has taken over their systems.

Even worse, Microsoft's email software is able to infect a user's computer when they do something as innocuous as read an email! Don't believe me? Take a look at Microsoft Security Bulletins MS99-032, MS00-043, MS01-015, MS01-020, MS02-068, or MS03-023, for instance. Notice that's at least one for the last five years. And though Microsoft's latest versions of Outlook block most executable attachments by default, it's still possible to override those protections.

This sort of social engineering, so easy to accomplish in Windows, requires far more steps and far greater effort on the part of the Linux user. Instead of just reading an email (... just reading an email?!?), a Linux user would have to read the email, save the attachment, give the attachment executable permissions, and then run the executable. Even as less sophisticated users begin to migrate to Linux, they may not understand exactly why they can't just execute attachments, but they will still have to go through the steps. As Martha Stewart would say, this is a good thing. Further, due to the strong community around Linux, new users will receive education and encouragement in areas such as email security that are currently lacking in the Windows world, which should help to alleviate any concerns on the part of newbies.

Further, due to the strong separation between normal users and the privileged root user, our Linux user would have to be running as root to really do any damage to the system. He could damage his /home directory, but that's about it. So the above steps now become the following: read, save, become root, give executable permissions, run. The more steps, the less likely a virus infection becomes, and certainly the less likely a catastrophically spreading virus becomes. And since Linux users are taught from the get-go to never run as root, and since Mac OS X doesn't even allow users to use the root account unless they first enable the option, it's obvious the likelihood of email-driven viruses and worms lessens on those platforms.

Unfortunately, running as root (or Administrator) is common in the Windows world. In fact, Microsoft is still engaging in this risky behavior. Windows XP, supposed Microsoft's most secure desktop operating system, automatically makes the first named user of the system an Administrator, with the power to do anything he wants to the computer. The reasons for this decision boggle the mind. With all the lost money and productivity over the last decade caused by countless Microsoft-borne viruses and worms, you'd think the company could have changed its procedures in this area, but no.

Even if the OS has been set up correctly, with an Administrator account and a non-privileged user account, things are still not copasetic. On a Windows system, programs installed by a non-Administrative user can still add DLLs and other system files that can be run at a level of permission that damages the system itself. Even worse, the collection of files on a Windows system - the operating system, the applications, and the user data - can't be kept apart from each other. Things are intermingled to a degree that makes it unlikely that they will ever be satisfactorily sorted out in any sensibly secure fashion.

The final reason why social engineering is easier in the Windows world is also an illustration of the dangers inherent in any monoculture, whether biological or technological. In the same way that genetic diversity in a population of living creatures is desirable because it reduces the likelihood that an illness - like a virus - will utterly wipe out every animal or plant, diversity in computing environments helps to protect the users of those devices.

Linux runs on many architectures, not just Intel, and there are many versions of Linux, many packaging systems, and many shells. But most obvious to the end user, Linux mail clients and address books are far from standardized. KMail, Mozilla Mail, Evolution, pine, mutt, emacs ... the list goes on. It's simply not like the Windows world, in which Microsoft's email programs - Outlook and Outlook Express - dominate. In the Windows world, a virus writer knows how the monoculture operates, so he can target his virus, secure in the knowledge that millions of systems have the same vulnerability. A virus targeted to a specific vulnerability in Evolution, on the other hand, might affect some people, but not everyone using Linux. The growth of the Microsoft monoculture in computing is a dangerous thing for users of Microsoft products, but also for all computing users, who suffer the consequences of disasters in that environment, such as wasted network resources, dangers to national security, and lost productivity (note: the link is to a 880 kb PDF file).

Now that we've looked at the social engineering side of things, let's examine software design for reasons why Linux (and Mac OS X) is better designed than Microsoft when it comes to email security. Microsoft continually links together its software, often not for technical reasons, but instead for marketing or business development reasons (see the previous link for corroboration). For instance, Outlook Express and Outlook both use the consistently-buggy Internet Explorer to view HTML-based emails. As a result, a hole in IE affects OE. Linux email readers don't indulge in such behavior, with two exceptions: Mozilla Mail uses the Gecko engine that powers Mozilla to view HTML-based email, while KMail relies on the KHTML engine that the Konqueror browser uses. Fortunately, both Mozilla and the KDE Project have excellent records when it comes to security.

Further, the email programs themselves are designed to act in a more secure manner. The default behavior of the email program I prefer - KMail - is to not load external references in messages, such as pictures and Web bugs, and to not display HTML. When an HTML-based email shows up in my Inbox, I see only the HTML code, and a message appears at the top of the email: "This is an HTML message. For security reasons, only the raw HTML code is shown. If you trust the sender of this message then you can activate formatted HTML display for this message by clicking here." But even after I activate the HTML, certain dynamic elements that can be introduced in an HTML-based email - like Java, Javascript, plugins and even the "refresh" META tag - do not display, and cannot even be enabled in KMail.

Finally, if there is an attachment, it does not automatically run ... ever. Instead, I have to click it, and when I do, I get a dialog box offering me three options: "Save As ..." (the default), "Open With ...", and "Cancel". If I have mapped a file type to a specific program - for instance, I have associated PDFs with the PS/PDF Viewer, then "Open With ..." instead says "Open", and if I choose "Open", then the file opens in the PS/PDF Viewer. However, in either case, the dialog box always contains a warning advising the user that attachments can compromise security. This is all good, very good.

For all these reasons, even if a few individuals got infected with a virus due to extremely foolish behavior, it's unlikely the virus would spread to other machines. Unlike Sobig.F, which is the fastest spreading virus ever, a Linux-based Virus would fizzle out quickly. Windows is an inviting petri dish for viruses and worms, while Linux is a hostile environment for such nasties.