Granny Picks Linux Over Windows, OS/X, FreeBSD...
Granny heads out on a new adventure and realizes there's nothing so sweet as Linux running KDE.  

Read more of our Reallylinux.com Granny Files:  Linux Makes Granny Cry  and   Even Granny Has Linux Installed  and   Granny Dumps MS-Office for Star-Office.



Hello my dear Linux friend,
Thank you for stopping in to read my newest thoughts about Linux and that very easy to learn and use KDE desktop. I want to share an adventure I had thanks to my son. I'll be the first to admit that I don't get out much. Between my rheumatism, bursitis, and my rather clunky hip, going to the bathroom is an adventure in itself.


But I did indeed go last week. Thanks to my son's perseverance and patience I was finally able to visit his office. I'm very proud of him and all of those brilliant computer people. I think people who write computer programs are absolutely amazing!

It all began last Friday, when Jason, that's my big boy, drove me to his office. We began the tour downstairs and Jason showed me where the receptionists spend their days. I met a nice blonde gal named Susie. She was a pretty little lady although a bit thin. As I approached her, I thought she might be great for Jason until...

She let out an "Oh, sh$@!"


It shocked me so much that I had to sit down right there on the floor of the lobby. Susie, such a sweet looking young gal, seemed so upset. She apologized and helped me up and then went back to working. As Jason held my arm keeping me steady, dear little Susie yelped again. This time I was thankfully holding on to the front desk and Jason had my arm.

When I asked this young lady what was bothering her so greatly, she pushed her monitor slightly so I could have a look. All I saw was a bright blue screen with some jibberish text. I didn't have my glasses on so I can't tell you what it said, but the message must have been quite upsetting to make a nice young gal spew such harsh words!

I looked up at Jason who was still holding my arm, and he softly said, "Windows, mom." Now I finally understood why this sweet young gal suffered so. I opened my purse and handed little Susie, my goodness how thin and pale she looked, a Knoppix Live Linux CD. "Here you are honey. This will help cheer you up."

I wanted to share some of my raisin and date snack with this young emaciated gal, but Jason was already pulling me along to the next stop.

If that poor girl knew how easy and compatible using OpenOffice is, or the stability of Linux she would be a lot better off.

We walked a few steps down the hall and entered a large room filled with posters, pictures, signs, and paper everywhere. I had never seen such a clutter and immediately began to pick up papers that had fallen on the floor or been thrown together in untidy piles on nearby desks.

Jason kept insisting I stop cleaning up and meet his friends. One of the gentleman, a tall stout man, stood and greeted me. He was very well dressed and impressively courteous.

I turned the corner to peak at his monitor. He was designing a sphere of some kind with many details. It looked like he was painting a picture of a planet and I was quite impressed by the beauty and the detail. I asked him how long it took to draw this pretty sphere, to which he replied, "oh, a couple of days."

I couldn't believe my ears. How could a sphere like this take him so long? I shook my head in disbelief. Jason tried to explain that he was creating three dimentional figgy majiggy, but it didn't matter.

I told that young man he should be ashamed of taking so much time to draw a sphere. Oh, if I had my KDE running Gimp I could draw a sphere with shading, directional lighting and floating star background in just a few minutes. Jason kept insisting the graphic was much more complex than all that, but I wouldn't have it. I told that young man to get cracking or his employer may crack a few with his whip!

Of course it would also not hurt if instead of paying a lot of money for all that fancy software he was using, he could enjoy the benefits from free open source programs.

Next we stepped into a fancy elevator. "Is this where you work Jason?"
"No mom, I'm on the next floor up, this is the computer room."
"You work all the way up top then!" I was so proud of my son.

As we stepped out we were greeted by a burly man, bearded and soft spoken. He welcomed us and asked if I would like to see the computer room. I wasn't sure I could keep walking like this, even with my prosthetic shoes. But he kindly grabbed my hand and led me into a very large and noisy room. It was so cold I felt my bones freeze up.

I was told this was the server room and that all of these machines were running free BS. Jason kept insisting I refer to it as Dee, he said, "no mom, it's Free BS Dee." But I couldn't figure how some lady named Dee could conceive of such a thing. All I noticed was that these machines were apparently running so hot using this Dee software that the room was set to arctic frost. The big burly man explained how the major part of his day is spent making sure the servers are all up and running. I began to share with him how I never have to worry about my Linux server at home. I asked him if he could show me the monitor he uses. He walked me over to a large cabinet and pulled out a keyboard and flicked on the monitor.

I understand why this poor man had to keep standing even to use his computer in such an extremely cold room. I felt myself weaken and had trouble standing. Nevertheless, he quickly showed me some of what he does. I asked him if he wouldn't prefer to use a more graphical desktop, and whether he didn't prefer to point and click rather than type so many commands. He didn't quite understand me, so Jason helped.

"My mom's quite fond of using Linux running the KDE desktop. She loves the icons and all." To which the burly man smiled in acknowledgment.

I wish I had remembered to share with that gentleman this great article regarding the comparison between FreeBSD and Linux as web servers.

Well, off we went. It was finally time for me to visit Jason's office. I wished the nice man farewell and walked back into the elevator.

As we stepped out, Jason met another of his friends. They were all so courteous and friendly. Everyone was on such good terms, calling each other by their first names and patting each other on the back.

Jason led me into a room that looked more like a dumping ground for computer parts. In the corner, on the only clean desk, was a large black cube with a monitor, printer and other fancy gadgets.

"What's that Jason," I asked, pointing at the black cube.

"Oh, that's the next machine," Jason responded matter-of-factly.

I was excited to be able to see the future and pleaded with Jason to let me try out this next machine before we moved on. He didn't seem to be very interested. But he compliantly pushed up a chair and told me to enjoy.

I thought the black mouse was very fancy and the whole system was quite spectacular looking. Jason typed his name and password and then told me to try out a few things.

I was impressed by the uncluttered desktop. It was very pretty to look at. I clicked a few icons and then suddenly was shocked to hear a woman's voice.

"Your printer is out of paper." "Your printer is out of paper."

"What's this all about," I demanded of Jason. This next system talked with such femininity and seductiveness I began to worry about all of these young vulnerable men.

I demanded to know who had concocted such a machine that it would try to seduce men and distract them with a female voice. Jason told me it was made by the same man who had led the creation of those systems the artists were using.

"He's trying to distract you men from working! You need to get a practical computer that fosters work!" Jason just shook his head.

Then he grabbed my arm and gently led me into his office next door. There I saw several systems all running that familiar and comforting KDE desktop. I sat down and let out a sigh.

I asked Jason if I could send aunt Bertha an email using Kmail to share my adventure. I clicked a few icons, typed away in glee, then sent off my note.

I started Gimp and made a sphere using the script-fu, added a few extra lighting effects, used supernova to create a few dozen brilliant stars and showed Jason what I had been telling his friend from downstairs. Jason just smiled. Then I started his Kwrite and began typing my adventure of the day so I would not forget.

Time flew as I played with more and more applications that I was so familiar with in the KDE environment. "All these wonderful free programs," I thought to myself as I opened application after application.

All too soon it was time for me to head back home. I needed to take my medicine and to have a few hours of snoozing before dinner. Jason had shown me so many wonderful and interesting things. I begged him to go back and check on that poor little Susie. Jason assured me he intended to check her out every day.

Thankfully, I was back at home and my last act before going to sleep was to kiss my monitor and say a word of thanks that I had a computer with Linux/KDE that treated me so kindly.

So ends my adventure of the week. I must admit I enjoyed seeing so many different computers, but nothing could ever replace my friendly and familiar Linux/KDE.

Love,
Granny
ReallyLinux.com
Special Ed writer

Many more beginner articles are available here.
Share your thoughts and opinions with Granny on our Message Boards