Hello,

Many are afraid of linux due to the mass exploration of microsoft.
They are afraid they can not handle the system.
I am running linux since the mass virus attacks on windows 95.

Currently I am using OpenSuse Tumbleweed, a rolling distribution that gets constantly updated.
https://www.opensuse.org/
https://www.opensuse.org/#Tumbleweed

Bertus

 

I started long ago with SysV and BSD UNIX running on minis but when I started using microcomputers it was DOS, then Windows. My first desktop UNIX was OpenBSD but eventually I started using Linux, Slackware was the first. I tried many distros, including SUSE, over the years.

Eventually, I settled on Debian, which I prefer, and my OpenBSD machines aged out. So it’s Debian for me. Ubuntu is a Debian fork, and it has some advantages for strictly desktop users, neophytes, and people who just don’t want to get into the internals of Linux and systems administration.

I must say, I don’t use Linux on the desktop at all. My “home” is MacOS and I have a couple of Windows 10 machines for those things that demand it. Linux on the desktop took a long time to be very usable, I understand it is now pretty good, and I have had a reason to occasionally build and use an Ubuntu machine for it, but not recently.

We now return to your regularly scheduled thread.

 

Foxboro I/A control systems were very slow about moving to Windows due to stability issues. Which are a very important safety criteria for controls. Even when they did, the controls were still running on Unix and interfacing with Win thru NutCracker. Windows was only used for the graphic displays interfaced with the controls. I let the boat pass me by when Linux first became popular the same as I did with small computers back in the 70's. Kinda, nice computer but what does it do? Once they finally came out with VisiCalc and WordStar I got the bug. Never was a big fan of programming from scratch and kept telling folks "I'm NOT a programmer" even though I was programming as was necessary to build and config control systems. What I've seen so far of Ubuntu and its desktop package of applications has impressed me. And it sure runs better than Win8 was on that old hardware. In our corporate IT world, the approach towards public domain software was along the lines of "Who are you going to sue when it craps on you?"

 

Foxboro I/A control systems were very slow about moving to Windows due to stability issues. Which are a very important safety criteria for controls. Even when they did, the controls were still running on Unix and interfacing with Win thru NutCracker. Windows was only used for the graphic displays interfaced with the controls. I let the boat pass me by when Linux first became popular the same as I did with small computers back in the 70's. Kinda, nice computer but what does it do? Once they finally came out with VisiCalc and WordStar I got the bug. Never was a big fan of programming from scratch and kept telling folks "I'm NOT a programmer" even though I was programming as was necessary to build and config control systems. What I've seen so far of Ubuntu and its desktop package of applications has impressed me. And it sure runs better than Win8 was on that old hardware. In our corporate IT world, the approach towards public domain software was along the lines of "Who are you going to sue when it craps on you?"

Concerning F/OSS, the amount of open source code in commercial products today is substantial. It is used in every sort of product, almost never exclusively (unless the company is anopen source organization) but it;s everywhere.

There are many companies that provide open source, free-as-in-beer “community editions” of their otherwise commercial software. Sometimes, the only difference is paid support. For companies that want to use F/OSS there are organizations that will provide support in general, and products that come with it, and there are companies like RedHat and Ubuntu that siupport their OS distorts.

So, it’s not like it was, you can safely use OSS and manage your risk based on what you pay.