The technology bug hit me in the early 90s and I ended up with a job at a Mom and pop's PC repair shop. I got interested in alternate operating systems and stumbled on Mandrake and the original BeOS.. which was a great little operating system that unfortunately got Microsoft stomped. I made the final jump to Linux somewhere in the early 2000s because I got tired of the Microsoft tax and never looked back.
I hated how much telemetry was in Windows (10 at the time, 11 is even worse), and I wanted something that better respects our privacy while being lighter on resources. Used linux now on and off for 7 years. Just switched my gaming PC back to linux. On Void now and I love it.
truth be told? I had an old vista machine, couldn't afford a win10 license, because i was a broke college kid. So, I downloaded ubuntu 18.04 and away I went! I moved on from Ubuntu a long time ago, but I'll always have fond memories of that 'ole bionic beaver.
openoffice.org, when I was using Windows Vista in 2008 and Microsoft Office 2007 was under a free trial. Then I discovered the world of open source, and afterwards Linux.
long time ago, I was using Windows 98, and it had many bugs and problems. Then came Windows Me, and I was hyped and paid money for it. I got an blue screen in the first hour of usage, and decided to look for an alternative. My uncle gifted me an old S.u.S.E. Linux box (I think it was 6.3), and never returned to Windows ever since (but went from S.u.S.E. to Debian to Gentoo, Ubuntu and currently Arch )
I was running Minix and Coherent then I heard about this new, free OS that ran on 386. I found somebody on campus that was writing the stack of floppies to install Linux. I ran the machine mostly for my email and soon found that I could run an SMB server on it and then I was hooked.
a friend in college handed me a copy of Ubuntu Breezy burned on a CD. I booted it on my ThinkPad and never looked back😊 I now work with and Live with Linux and I couldn't be happier!
during the first year in college, I needed a computer. A friend of mine suggested using Linux, something I've never Heard of before back then. That was in 2000. Now, I'm using Linux since then and also introduced my oldest to Debian.
Being at university where they used Unix alongside WindowsNT & Novel Netware. I found Unix and the command line much more interesting to work with and got used to working with their email client of choice, Mutt 😀 They shortly introduced Linux after I started and the rest, as they say, is history! IRC between Universities across the world was a big thing too. Being able to chat with other students in real time, from the terminal, in Brazil! for eg, was amazing at the time. Good ol'days!
Hassle free setup of a complete C development environment with gcc, make, autoconf, emacs, awk, grep, sed in 10 minutes was a real showstopper with Debian GNU/Linux in 1996...
In the 00s MS updates kept slowing down my PC. Two years in and my desktop was sluggish. I'd do a clean install and notice how peppy things were again for just an hour or two. Then while update after update was applied slowly over the course of a couple of days things reverted back to the same slow experience.
It was then I played around with dual booting into Linux. Boot up times were fast and programs opened quickly. I still liked Windows but that changed with Win10.
My destroyed hard drive many years ago Someone in my distant family was retired IT employee and while he tried to find crash cause, he lent me Ubuntu LiveUSB so I could use my laptop without hard drive for some weeks.
Being able to dual-boot away from an IBM corporate Windows install in the 90s. (I had to boot back to Windows temporarily for annual audits.) Fond memories of great support from like-minded individuals in the Hursley IT department.
Using it everyday to repair borked Windows Installs, data recovery, forensic hardware diagnostics & examination.
Combine with that a very long conversation with Microsoft on the impossibility to customize the desktop experience for dedicated purposes (again someday I will tell that story) led directly to a career in embedded Linux and a lifelong Desktop #Linux supporter.
In 2005, my choices were Windows XP, Mac OS X, or this thing a friend used called Gentoo Linux. Well, I jumped into Gentoo as a n00b and learned a lot — the hard way. Eventually, broken dependency hell drifted me back to Win7 and a MacBook.
Jump ahead to 2017. My custom-built Win10 PC was randomly blue-screening and I gave up. I installed Ubuntu. Everything worked great! I imported my data and thought nothing of it.
Three months later, I was cleaning dust out of my PC and I noticed that my memory sticks were loose. Yes, Windows couldn’t handle it, but Linux ran **perfectly fine** on half-inserted memory modules. I haven’t looked back.
on my first Computer I had - must have been a 386something - I started tinkering with Trinux after reading some stuff about mostly harmless hacking.
Later I bought a new Computer with AMD K5 processor without an operating system installed. Although I had a probably pirated copy of Windows 95 I started using Linux and stayed there till now.
Started with SuSE Linux 6.0, now using Debian stable for years....
Finding an operating system that didn't waste resources on the ever increasing amount of non-removable bloatware and sending reams of personal user data across the internet to personalise my experience. Those are two things I lost control over. Linux has given me that control back.
I got a laptop as part of college tuition. It (barely) ran Windows 95. When I took a C++ programming course, IT upgraded the hard drive so that it could run Windows 98 and Borland C++. It was so frustrating to use that I looked around for an alternative and found another student who had put Linux on his laptop.
I had some trouble explaining to the C++ TA how some of my source code had compiled since it worked with GCC, but he couldn't make it work with Borland.
When you ask for what first sparked it I must admit that, more than 20 years ago, it was actually a person that I admired for a number of reasons. At that time I tried and failed to make it work on my laptop, but kept it in my mind.
That spark was lighted now by MS's in insistence on my "upgrading" to Win 11 so I decided to leave MS, maybe naively, from one day to the next, for Mint. I've now got some trouble with specialist Windows software I am using but nothing I can't put up with.
Gorobar
in reply to It's FOSS • • •John
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Asheville Charlie
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Gianni Livore :linux:
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Peter McKeown
in reply to It's FOSS • • •UnixMan1230
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Olle Gladsø
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Kierkegaanks, π/🦴
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Ignacio 🇪🇸🇺🇦:peertube:
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Sergeant Silas
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Clot
in reply to It's FOSS • • •ピゴスパ :t_blink:
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Marcus Jenkins
in reply to It's FOSS • • •me-instance :heartaro:
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Bork
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Torger Åge Sinnes
in reply to It's FOSS • • •It's FOSS
in reply to Torger Åge Sinnes • • •Tom
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Weirdly it was the old collection of videos, sounds and pictures that were included in Ubuntu. Was it a Nelson Mandela speech?
Ah yes, this one: https://youtu.be/UT-3Eh65kkA Pretty sure he would have hated them stealing this and using it for their project 😁
Mandela's Example of Ubuntu
YouTubeCaptain Steph :fedora: 🇨🇦
in reply to It's FOSS • • •𝕸𝔞𝔩𝔦𝔫
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Will Wasley
in reply to It's FOSS • • •a friend in college handed me a copy of Ubuntu Breezy burned on a CD. I booted it on my ThinkPad and never looked back😊 I now work with and Live with Linux and I couldn't be happier!
#Ubuntu #Linux
odefey
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Health Is Wealth
in reply to It's FOSS • • •feralpetrel
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Airikr
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Andy
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Sandwich
in reply to It's FOSS • • •KaliLinux
Small me: Hello Google, how to hack an WiFi Router?
It's FOSS
in reply to Sandwich • • •D. B. Stuck
in reply to It's FOSS • • •In the 00s MS updates kept slowing down my PC. Two years in and my desktop was sluggish. I'd do a clean install and notice how peppy things were again for just an hour or two. Then while update after update was applied slowly over the course of a couple of days things reverted back to the same slow experience.
It was then I played around with dual booting into Linux. Boot up times were fast and programs opened quickly. I still liked Windows but that changed with Win10.
Madiana A. Argon :qurio:
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Someone in my distant family was retired IT employee and while he tried to find crash cause, he lent me Ubuntu LiveUSB so I could use my laptop without hard drive for some weeks.
Peter Hanecak
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Derek 🌈
in reply to It's FOSS • • •dyedfox
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Ԏєηυкι, 手抜き🚀🐧♏🔭
in reply to It's FOSS • • •xuxxux
in reply to It's FOSS • • •auticomics
in reply to It's FOSS • • •glyn
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Ebsku
in reply to It's FOSS • • •MrCopilot
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Using it everyday to repair borked Windows Installs, data recovery, forensic hardware diagnostics & examination.
Combine with that a very long conversation with Microsoft on the impossibility to customize the desktop experience for dedicated purposes (again someday I will tell that story) led directly to a career in embedded Linux and a lifelong Desktop #Linux supporter.
#TLDR #Knoppix #FreeSoftware #Philosophy #Community #Licensing #Freedom
aldonogueira
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Eugen Neuber
in reply to It's FOSS • • •dusoft
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Colin Cogle :verified:
in reply to It's FOSS • • •In 2005, my choices were Windows XP, Mac OS X, or this thing a friend used called Gentoo Linux. Well, I jumped into Gentoo as a n00b and learned a lot — the hard way. Eventually, broken dependency hell drifted me back to Win7 and a MacBook.
Jump ahead to 2017. My custom-built Win10 PC was randomly blue-screening and I gave up. I installed Ubuntu. Everything worked great! I imported my data and thought nothing of it.
Three months later, I was cleaning dust out of my PC and I noticed that my memory sticks were loose. Yes, Windows couldn’t handle it, but Linux ran **perfectly fine** on half-inserted memory modules. I haven’t looked back.
murxmaster
in reply to It's FOSS • • •on my first Computer I had - must have been a 386something - I started tinkering with Trinux after reading some stuff about mostly harmless hacking.
Later I bought a new Computer with AMD K5 processor without an operating system installed. Although I had a probably pirated copy of Windows 95 I started using Linux and stayed there till now.
Started with SuSE Linux 6.0, now using Debian stable for years....
Philip Tomlinson
in reply to It's FOSS • • •Jeremy Wakeman
in reply to It's FOSS • • •I got a laptop as part of college tuition. It (barely) ran Windows 95. When I took a C++ programming course, IT upgraded the hard drive so that it could run Windows 98 and Borland C++. It was so frustrating to use that I looked around for an alternative and found another student who had put Linux on his laptop.
I had some trouble explaining to the C++ TA how some of my source code had compiled since it worked with GCC, but he couldn't make it work with Borland.
as234
in reply to It's FOSS • • •When you ask for what first sparked it I must admit that, more than 20 years ago, it was actually a person that I admired for a number of reasons. At that time I tried and failed to make it work on my laptop, but kept it in my mind.
That spark was lighted now by MS's in insistence on my "upgrading" to Win 11 so I decided to leave MS, maybe naively, from one day to the next, for Mint. I've now got some trouble with specialist Windows software I am using but nothing I can't put up with.
WayNKG
in reply to It's FOSS • • •It's FOSS
in reply to WayNKG • • •