Wasn't someone somewhere meant to be designing a mock up for viewing? E
-----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of James Tait Sent: 12 June 2007 15:41 To: British Ubuntu Talk Subject: Re: [ubuntu-uk] Leaflets Andy wrote: > On 12/06/07, James Tait <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> Having asked a few people to ask me about Ubuntu, I got the following >> questions to add to the (already pretty long) list already raised in the >> thread: > > I shall attempt to answer some of them ;) Perhaps I should have included the responses I sent, all of which should be corrected where necessary and may be used freely in such a leaflet, if and when it comes into being. >> > What does the word Ubuntu mean? > >>From the FAQ (http://www.ubuntu.com/aboutus/faq) > Ubuntu is an African word, which has been described as "too beautiful > to translate into English". The essence of Ubuntu is that "a person is > a person through other people". It describes humanity as > "being-with-others" and prescribes what "being-with-others" should be > all about. Ubuntu emphasises sharing, consensus, and togetherness. > It's a perfect concept for Free Software and open source. Here's a > great article that describes Ubuntu, which may help define it. > Wikipedia also has a good definition. It is an ancient African word which has no direct English translation, but roughly means "Humanity to others", or "I am who I am because of who we all are". It engenders the qualities of community and togetherness which make the project possible. >> > What support would I get if I needed help? > > You can get commercial support (which you have to pay for) or free > support from the community. If you bought your PC with Linux > pre-installed your vendor may be able to help you. > > We have extensive online documentation. > We have a malling list to ask questions on (you email your question > and it gets sent to a huge number of people who will try to help) > We have an IRC chat channel (like a big chatroom) > We have a forum > We also have a "support ticket" style system. > > The chances are somebody will know how to fix your problem. Lots! Starting on the desktop, there is a built-in help browser that gives you access to help on every aspect of the Ubuntu desktop in several languages. Then there is the official Ubuntu documentation site (https://help.ubuntu.com/) which contains some more in-depth information. Then there is the Ubuntu Community, which as an Ubuntu user you would already be a part of. The Ubuntu Community range from the users to developers, packagers and other contributors, including volunteers and commercial organisations. Ubuntu has Local Community (LoCo) teams which all have an IRC channel for real-time discussion as well as mailing lists. They also help to maintain the Ubuntu Forums (http://www.ubuntuforums.org) where you can often find other people who have experienced, and solved, your problem and the Ubuntu Users' mailing list (http://lists.ubuntulinux.org/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-users). There is also Launchpad (https://launchpad.net/) where you can ask questions, and report and trace bugs. If an application on your Ubuntu desktop crashes, a crash report will normally be submitted to Launchpad so that the developers can see what went wrong and fix it. Finally there is commercial support -- people and companies who can help you with your Ubuntu-related problems for a price. The Ubuntu Marketplace (http://www.ubuntu.com/support/commercial/marketplace) is a good source of information for these companies. >> > Does it have a GUI similar to Windows or do I need to learn code? > > Depends on what you mean by "similar". It has a point and click > graphical interface. > > It does have a very powerful command line interface but it's there for > the people who want to use it, you won't really need to use it if you > don't want to. > > You don't need to be able to "code" or "program". The Ubuntu desktop is very similar to the Windows one. It has the now-standard WIMP (Windows, Icons, Mouse and Pointer) interface and the vast majority of what you will need to do is possible using this interface. Many of the free applications available for Ubuntu (e.g. OpenOffice, Mozilla Firefox, Mozilla Thunderbird, GIMP) are also available for Windows, so you can try them out even without trying Ubuntu! There are some, usually more in-depth, tasks for which the command line is required, as is the case with Windows. The command line is a very powerful tool and is not to be feared! >> > How secure is it? > > It has a better security model than Windows. Fine grained access > control and limiting what users can do "by mistake" make it more > difficult for a virus to take over your entire system. > > Also the software update system adds some more protection as it will > update all the core software together. You won't need to check for > updates in all your programs one by one anymore. In its default installation, very secure. By default, Ubuntu will not run any programs that will accept connections from other computers. When you login to your Ubuntu desktop, you will be an "unprivileged" user, which means that you cannot do any damage to your system simply by running applications. Administrative tasks, for example installing software, are only available to administrative users after they have entered a password. This prevents any viruses (of which there currently are none in the wild) and other malware from installing itself and doing any damage to your Ubuntu desktop without explicitly asking for your permission. >> > Is Linux a passing fad? > > It's not passed yet. And it doesn't show any signs of doing so now. Not at all! Linux has been steadily growing in popularity for over a decade and now runs the majority of the web servers on the internet. Dell has recently announced a deal with Canonical, the company supporting Ubuntu, to ship some of its laptop and desktop PCs with Ubuntu pre-installed and provide hardware support for those PCs. The French Parliament uses Ubuntu on the laptops and desktops of over 1,000 MPs and their assistants. Linux, and Open Source in general, are gaining in popularity for a variety of reasons, not least because people are starting to realise that there are alternatives to Microsoft and they work together, rather than locking each other out, to improve the overall standard. Cheers, JT -- ---------------------------------------+-------------------------------- James Tait, BSc | xmpp:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Programmer and Free Software advocate | VoIP: +44 (0)870 490 2407 ---------------------------------------+-------------------------------- -- ubuntu-uk@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-uk https://wiki.kubuntu.org/UKTeam/ -- ubuntu-uk@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-uk https://wiki.kubuntu.org/UKTeam/
