Journal mhall119's Journal: Switcher's view of Windows XP
After reading article after article about someone migrating from Windows to Linux (some positive, some not), I've decided to write up about my experience migrating from Linux to Windows. Now I'm no new comer to Windows, and I'm certainly more tech savvy that your grandmother, but I have been mostly removed from the Windows environment for several years, using Linux exclusively at home and at work. Now that I am at a new job that requires that I use Windows, I'm finding the road back just as rocky. Below are some of the things that have cause me trouble, confusion, or just mere annoyance.
1. Hardware Support: Not related to my new job, but I recently purchased a new laptop for my wife, and we decided to donate her old one to a family member. Her old laptop originally came with Windows XP, but was downgraded to Windows2000 long ago. Not wanting to give the family member an unsupported OS, I decided to re-install Windows XP from an OEM cd. While the install had no problems, it did not have drivers for the video (stuck me at 640x480), the sound card, the network card, the wireless card, or the modem. All of these had to be located and installed from the manufacturers website (good luck doing that without a working network card, wireless card, or modem). Again I want to emphasize that this laptop was made for Windows XP, and still a vanilla install didn't support half of the hardware. I dare any Windows user out there to try installing their same version of Windows from a vanilla CD, and see how much of your "hardware support" doesn't come with Windows by default.
2. Luna: Now we've all had our laughs about Ubuntu's default brown theme, but Luna isn't much to look at either. And while Ubuntu only ships with a half dozen or so themes, Windows XP ships with Luna and "Classic", and nothing else. Luna itself has 3 different colos schemes, yes, but Clearlooks lets you change the colors to anything you want from a simple color selector. Not only that, but Ubuntu's Artwork Manager lets you pull god only knows how many alternative themes from the internet, without a browser. You can even make your own themes just by editing a gtkrc file in a text editor. Sure a GUI designer would be awesome, but I don't even know how to make a WindowsXP theme, and the Luna.msstyles file certainly can't be edited in notepad. And if a theme isn't signed by Microsoft, you have to use a hacked uxthemes.dll file to even use it!
3. The Taskbar: The Windows taskbar hasn't changed much since Windows 95. You can move it to a different screen edge, or make it multiple rows, but why are you still limited to having only one? And why can't you change the placement of the start button, or system tray? Why can't I include menus in the task bar, since any more than a handful of Quick Launch icons and they start to get hidden? And if it's ok to hide a system tray icon, why put it there in the first place?
4. The Start Menu: I realize that it is *technically* possible to put your start menu programs into functional categories but nobody in the Windows world does this, not users, not software developers, and not even Microsoft themselves. Trying to fix this by *hiding* rarely used entries only serves to make those entries harder to find, and leads to annoyances when an item is in the *customized* list one day but gone the next. And don't even ask me how Windows sorts these entries, it makes no sense to me, individual shortcuts intermixed between submenus, it's a complete mess.
5. The Window Manager: This is another component that has barely changed since Windows 95. Still only certain programs will let you set them to be always on top, it's not even an option in the window manager. I can live without a shade option, but why are there still no virtual desktops? There are plenty of add-ons that provide everything form a poor implementation to an abysmal implementation. Seriously, I don't know how developers on Windows get along without this.
6. Software Install/Update: Installing software on Ubuntu is brain-dead simple, I don't know how I ever got along without Apt. Not only is almost everything you'll ever need easily available and easy to install, but the OS keeps them up to date, automatically, all of them! I have exactly 2 applications on my Ubuntu desktop that were not installed via Apt. One was a
7. Integration: For the most part Microsoft apps try to integrate with other Microsoft apps, but once you leave that realm it's pretty much every app for itself. Even among Microsoft apps there are opportunities for integration that aren't taken. On Linux, Evolution and the date/time applet integrate, Evolution and Pidgin integrate, Beagle and Firefox, Tomboy and Evolution, F-spot and the screensaver, Deskbar and, well, everything. That doesn't even count the obscure things like AWN and Rythmbox, BeagleFS, or any of the obscene number of command line utilities that can be strung together to perform tasks that are nearly impossible in Windows. Now look again at that list, because for the most part all of these applications are developed by different groups, their integration is usually the result of a one-sided effort not collaboration, but it is still possible because all of these programs are designed to allow for integration with other apps.
