To the tech interested (but not just ubergeeks),

I write this open letter to you.  Windows XP has been good to you. 
Things work with relative ease and we were all happy.  Now that the
black dawn of Vista is upon us, XP looks to be supported through at least the first quarter of 2008.  I, for one, am hoping this turns into longer.

Furthermore, I wanted to share the idea of Open Source
software with you.  It’s the area of the software world I feel very
strongly about.  Open source, as it applies to software, has provided
many great programs that you may use today.  Arguably, the most
recognized open source project to date is Firefox,
but many other pieces of open source software are great!  Wonderful
software exists for both Mac, Windows, and Linux that is open and free
today.  Oh, that’s right, I forgot to mention it is free!  Not only is
this powerful software that lets you see everything it does via the
code, it’s free!  I want to share a few links with you which are a
great resource for Windows users and Mac users. 

I’ve used OpenOffice, Firefox, Thunderbird, Gaim (now Pidgin), VLC,
Filezilla, Gimp, and more for years now.  In the past year, things have
really evolved making these items necessary for me when I run Windows. 
Here’s where my evolution begins.  It’s the spring of 2007 and Vista
has been released but with no real excitement behind it.  It’s slow,
with some pretty high hardware requirements, costs an arm and a leg,
and phones home calling you a criminal all the time.  This is not
something that comes across as appealing to me.  The problem for me is
that I have a fair amount invested in current hardware that seems to
work fine in XP doing everything I could ask for.  Since the eventual
road for Microsoft is Vista with XP support eventually falling to the
wayside, I decided to look elsewhere for my current system and future
upgrades that I plan on.

First, Apple catches my eye and makes me think real hard.  I love most
of the things about OS X and it’s leaps and bounds beyond Windows.  The
problem is the price tag.  (and I really can’t stand that one button
mouse that people argue about, but it’s final, I hate it!)  Since I
can’t run OS X on my current PC hardware and I’m unwilling to fork over
a grand, Linux is next up.

Linux is another widely heard, but often misunderstood item in the open
source arena.  Linux itself is just a kernel that talks to your
hardware basically.  People combine Linux with a whole lot of GNU, open
source, free, and sometimes proprietary software to form a
distribution.  My current favorite and advised distribution to use is Ubuntu. 
Feel free to read about the project and the company Canonical who is
the primary backer.  I appreciate the ideas, the community, and most
importantly, the free download of the product!

Upon installation, it works really well on my laptop recognizing all my
hardware without any effort from me.  I have my familiar applications
such as Firefox, Thunderbird, OpenOffice, Gaim, Gimp, etc. and a few
new killer applications such as Rhythmbox and Sudoku?! have splashed the palette along with loads more.  A whole library of software is available in Ubuntu and is easily
installed in minutes.  I urge everyone thinking about Microsoft Vista
to take a look at Ubuntu.

Signed,

An Open Source Advocat

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