[LUNI] Stuck!

[Jutta Buschbom]

Hi Steven, Mike and Sten,

Thanks a lot for your comments and suggestions!

First, I would like to come to the next Installfest. Is there public 
transport from downtown Chicago/Hyde Park (directions?) or do you 
know anybody who could give me a ride?

Steven and Sten, I very much appreciate your suggestions and comments 
- don't be mad if I have to say that somehow many of them don't fit 
my world. Before I ever tried to install something Linux-wise I read 
similar comments and thought that sounds straightforward and with 
some insistence and using all the information resources available, I 
should be able to get Linux up and running, no problem. Just, when 
you are starting at zero every stupid little task or concept can take 
you a weekend or more to figure out, working your way though books, 
manuals*, web sites, man pages etc. - exactly what you suggested and 
what I did until now. However, after 1.5 years that didn't get me 
very far, especially since during the end of a thesis weekends and 
evenings are "prime" research time and thus very much gone. I also 
think that certain concepts and procedures are plainly learned better 
interactively. It is like the experience that I make as system 
administrator for the Macs in the department: for problems which are 
trivial for me to solve, other people look at me as if I just nicked 
the Holy Grail.

The main difference for me - and thus the main problem of switching 
to Linux - is that the MacOS conveniently and quietly takes care of 
most configurations, file dependencies, program linking and what not 
by itself. From my limited experience I only can say that 
partitioning and installing either MacOS 9 /X or SuSE on any not too 
obscure Mac, dual boot or not, is not the problem. If you are using 
your Linux OS primarily for emailing, web browsing or KDE Office etc. 
that is also not so difficult to deal with. The situation becomes 
utterly different when you are starting to deal with lots of tasks 
and applications. Then, under MacOS it is plug and play while Linux 
goes ballistic. Unfortunately, I need my system to do all kinds of 
tasks. Linux expects me to understand how things run and fit together 
at a level that on the Macs is - at least at first sight - hidden. I 
would guess that this is not too different from Windows. Now, it is 
fun to get an inkling what operating systems are all about and to set 
out on your do-it-yourself-comp.sci-degree. Just at one point I 
want/need to get somewhere and actually get some work done.

Looking forward to the Installfest!

Jutta

*Suse's handbook?! - garbled gibberish for my ignorant and lowly mind :)