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DIY Guide - GNU/Linux and Free Open Source Software. Updated: 22nd September 2009
GNU/Linux - An IntroductionWe have entered the next stage of mass computer use where the Intel/Microsoft monopoly is beginning to end. It seems that most Netbooks and Laptops users just want to browse web pages and watch multimedia content - and they aren't too bothered what Operating System or CPU they've got. The old issue of being 'compatible' with the Intel/Microsoft monopoly is increasingly becoming irrelevant. Microsoft have seen the strategies used to maintain a near 25-year monopoly and drive consumption in the computer industry become outdated. Previously M$ were able to release a new version of Windows every few years - more bloated and resource-hungry than the last - which would force most of the world to upgrade their computers, software companies would bring out new versions, and most of the industry would fall into line behind Microsoft, because that's where the money was. Vista - the bloated new Windows which people couldn't see the need to upgrade to - was the turning point for M$ which they won't recover from. As Microsoft's monopoly gets questioned, so does the assumption that it takes market forces and large corporations to move computer technology forward. It just so happens that one of the factors which is also attacking M$'s supremacy - and the assumption that we need someone like M$ driving technology at all - is the rise of free/open source software. Already the majority of the internet is run using free software, but it is only recently that free software is able to compete head-on with the commercial wares of Microsoft, Apple, and Adobe etc on your computer desktop. Still, you're saying to yourself: "I get pirate software for free - why bother with free software?" You're trying to get all nasty mega corporations out of your life, aren't you? You boycott Starbucks and McDonalds don't you? We are at a transition point at the moment, where anti-piracy measures being taken by commercial software companies are making using cracked software harder, but, at the same time, free/open source alternatives have improved and are equally useful, and not hampered by being illegal and a pain to crack. Mozilla Firefox is becoming the choice web browser, and why buy M$ Office when Open Office is free and mostly functionally identical? What Is GNU/Linux?GNU/Linux is a free operating system and set of programs, replacing M$ Windows or Mac OsX, and the commonly used commercial software used on them such as M$ Office or M$ Internet Explorer etc. It is all free to download, and yes your computer will run GNU/Linux whatever it is. This software is not just commercial software which is being given away, like freeware, but remains free through a specific copyright system geared towards co-operative development - aka copyleft - and in this respect is an important example of technology and information in the public domain which is resistant to being sold-off and commodified. What Can It Do?Most of the things a Windows computer will do: in desktop form it's a GUI graphical display with all the commonly needed desktop apps eg web browser, word processor, CD burner, media player, email, image editors, games etc. That said however, it is a relative newcomer to the role of a direct competitor for Windows on desktop computers, as its strength over two decades has been in large scale networking, and running networked file or email servers in institutions or large offices - and in fact over 70% of the Internet is run on the free/open source 'file server' program called 'Apache', mostly running on Linux, or UNIX. In other words a big part of the transformation for GNU/Linux over recent years has been to take it from being the preserve of experts, to something more user friendly, mouse-driven and idiot proof. Many of the major free/open source programs are also available for Windows or Mac, and in fact are considered as good if not better than M$ products - eg Firefox and Open Office, which replace M$ Internet Explorer and M$ Office respectively. If it's not possible to abandon Windows or Mac OSX at the moment, it is still worth using these alternatives instead - particularly Firefox and Open Office - see links below. While GNU/Linux, and the range of software available for it is growing to become something which is allowing people to abandon M$ and other big commercial software in droves, it has to be said that it is up against the sheer monopoly and ubiquity of Windows, and M$, and many other parts of the computer industry are hostile to it. So therefore if you want to switch to GNU/Linux you need to check that your hardware has 'drivers' to work with it, and that the 'equivalent' free/open source program can use the commercial file types you are using. And while some free/open source programs are better, when it comes to areas like video editing or multi-track audio recording, in reality many of the programs aren't as well developed as the commercial products (all this is changing as Linux hardware support and free/open source software improves). BackgroundYou might be wondering - how come it's free? It's in fact part of a project which began over twenty years ago by a hacker and programmer called Richard Stallman, who initiated the 'Free Software Movement', with the intention of creating a range of programs which were compatible with UNIX, and eventually replace the operating system itself - but these programs had to be free to use, and modify. This project was a reaction to the trend during the time (and since) towards 'proprietary' software, forcing users to pay a licence for software, which hadn't always been the case during the early days of the computer industry. Stallman envisaged that if software is free to use, and modify, then the community of programmers using it will make improvements - which will benefit all for the common good. To legally structure this model of 'co-operative' programming, a new copyright agreement called the GNU General Public License (GPL) was initiated, meaning that anybody could contribute to GNU software, but the resulting work had to also remain free, and commonly owned - eg - no party could take this software and gain ownership of it. Another word for this type of copyright status is copyleft, and it has gone on to have many other uses in the fight to create information and techology in the public domain which is resistant to the onslaught of privatisation and commodification (Wikipedia is another great example). A lot of GNU/Linux has been the work of individual programmers working for free, while other chunks have been funded by institutions and corporations. Another term which this software is known by is 'Open Source' - so called because under the GPL, the original code for a program - before it's compiled and turned into machine code which the computer can use - must be openly available, so it can be modified or improved. Commercial software companies like M$ never release the 'source code', to protect their technology, and to prevent it being modified by a third party. This is anathema to Free Software/Open Source people, who say this approach holds back development. Having said that it can and does happen that companies 'open source' commercial software, opening it up to community participation - examples include SunOffice which became OpenOffice and Netscape which became Mozilla. While it is commonly known as Linux, Richard Stallman personally emailed SchNEWS in April 2007 to correct us on what he considers its proper title: GNU/Linux (to see his reasoning click here). This is because GNU was going a decade before the Finnish wiz-kid Linus Torvalds offered his UNIX-like operating system kernel - called Linux - under the GPL in 1992, which became one of the big pieces in the jigsaw for a complete operating system, on top of which has since developed a full graphical interface and applications. Stallman and others are quite rightly pissed off that Torvalds gets a lot of the credit for something which was started long before he arrived on the scene, and that in fact the whole GNU project is much wider than just the operating system kernel and encompasses the total range of software. Also there's a philosophy behind GNU about freedom of information and community spirit, and Torvalds, like many other uber-geeks, isn't that political. Then there are those in the 'open source' camp who support the GNU model for pragmatic reasons, but not its idealism (for more see here). It's probably the case that the word 'Linux' just fits the bill and sounds right, so people just lazilly call it that. These debates all reflect the political tension within GNU/Linux, where some like Stallman are holding tightly to ethical principles, while others involved are quite apolitical, and just want something that's practical, or they just want to make money from it. Where Do I Start?Which 'Distro'?
Which Desktop: KDE
or Gnome? If you have an older system with less memory and slower processor, there are other, less graphics-heavy and system-hungry versions - this is due to the modular design of the operating system. Keeping in the Ubuntu fold, they have now released Xubuntu, which uses the Xfce graphical interface more suited to slower machines, but yet it runs all the same programs as Ubuntu. Trying
It Out For The First Time Installing It Onto A PC: If you've got a spare computer you could install GNU/Linux onto it as a trial to get used to it - but top tip make sure the computer isn't too slow or low spec because a graphical interface like KDE may be sluggish (pref. at least 1.2GHz cpu, 400meg ram) - or else try Xubuntu but you won't be getting all the bells and whistles. Or else it is possible to make a single computer 'dual boot' - that is both Windows and GNU/Linux are installed, and you have a choice at start-up. To do this, have Windows already installed first, and boot it from a 'live' GNU/Linux CD, and follow the installation process where it will search for blank space to install onto, and it will automatically create a 'boot' menu at start-up. The safest way to do this is to put a wiped (eg all partitions deleted) hard drive into the computer, and as you install Ubuntu (and most distros), it will detect the blank hard disk and the other 'operating system' (eg Win), ask to install itself on the blank disk. [Caution - If you are setting up a dual boot PC - take precautions to make sure nothing gets accidently wiped!! Better to make sure that the spare hard drive has definitely got no partitions (put the disk into the computer, boot into Windows and use 'Disk Management' in Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Computer Management to wipe its partitions) - so that way when you've booted into GNU/Linux off the CD, and it's about to install, you can point it to the empty disk space, and if it starts threatening to wipe any existing partitions... don't let it! Don't muck around with hard disks if you've got valuable stuff on them and don't really know what you're doing.] Installing
New Programmes Pros Cons Free/Open Source software under Windows or MacHere's a list of the most common commercial software used in Windows with examples of main 'free open source' alternatives (though there are many more). If you have a GNU/Linux distro installed, use its 'package manager' to download these automatically, but if you're on Win or Mac, see the links below to download installable versions. For more info and news on open source software see www.sourceforge.org
Handy One-Stop Ubuntu
Help - http://ubuntuguide.org Like Free Open Source Software, SchNEWS is 'copyleft' - so feel free to use this text for your own non-profit use, and even change it. If you have suggestions or improvements email SchNEWS at mail@schnews.org.uk
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