wiki.ubuntu.com — "If users could install Ubuntu knowing that all of their existing Office documents would be placed in their Documents folder, their email would be imported into Evolution, and their bookmarks imported into Firefox, they would have much more incentive to make the switch, be it from Windows or another Linux distribution."
Jul 5, 2006 View in Crawl 4
1coreduoJul 6, 2006
Well, your Lotus Notes archive, stored on your desktop/laptop only, and your HD gives up... (same may apply to Outlook, I do not know, since Lotus only ...) I do also work as an admin and I do tell people to use the script/shortcuts/batch-file to backup their data, but it's like talking to the wall, no one listening. When the S...t hits the fan, I'm the one to blaim.It's almost the same, when you switch OS, some data can be restored, some may not. Email formats are mostly proprietary and converting proprietary Emails to open source might just lead headache.Yes, user would 'kill' if all emails are not restored w/ new OS, but mostly they will get over it.
bcp1551Jul 6, 2006
Very true, fragmentation is the fatal flaw of Linux... It is similar to the way in which the fatal flaw of democratic societies is too many ideas freely expressed, causing fragmentation of vision. The only efficient and effective way to improve society or software is through authoritarian leadership and concentration of decision making. As we all know from history any undertaking without a centralized controlling authoritarian leadership is doomed to failure. If only Linux could come under the complete control of a strong leader, then it could possibly be as successful as North Korea.
xirxcisJul 6, 2006
Indeed... migrating away from MacOS to, well, anything, would be a good move!
ntensifyJul 6, 2006
"I've been using Ubuntu for a half a year and the best Linux distro I've ever used. However, the power of GNU/Linux has a fatal flaw: fragmentation. "How does a problem with Linux (the concept) affect a single distribution? Oh, that's right, it really doesn't."The Linux community is not unified, and forks and derivatives undermine organized efforts to take on Windows. How many flavors of Ubuntu are there now? "Forks sometimes undermine the work, and other times generally improve the work. Ubuntu is a prime example of this: it is essentially a fork from an earlier distribution called Debian, which promised a lot of what Ubuntu is doing now, but because of its dedication to its cause (Free Software), Bureaucracy, confusing development concepts, extended delays, etc. Debian started to fall far behind the rest of the community and Ubuntu (a much better version of the proposed UserLinux, which was about to fall into the same level of bureaucracy) stepped up in its place.Ubuntu is becoming a powerhouse because of its determination to innovate on Linux. They come up with the problems they see with the distribution, and they move quickly to fix them. Their community is diverse and focused, and very quickly set itself apart from other distributions due to this. As for how many different "flavors of Ubuntu" there are: ONE. Ubuntu. There are different installation schemes of Ubuntu (Kubuntu for KDE users, Edubuntu for Education machines, etc), but they all tie back to ONE Ubuntu system of repositories for code, which means software from one Ubuntu will work just as well on Kubuntu or Edubuntu, etc. The differences between Kubuntu and Ubuntu are much like the differences between Windows XP Home and Windows XP Professional; same code, different abilities presented to the user.
brknJul 6, 2006
pabster: It's not a matter of whether they can handle it or not, it's a matter of making the transition as easy and hassle-free as possible, you could say lowering the barrier for entry. And I think that's a great thing - I recently installed Ubuntu over Windows on my PC and this tool would have saved me a good few hours getting everything changed over and set up again.
tgoneJul 6, 2006
"How does a problem with Linux (the concept) affect a single distribution? Oh, that's right, it really doesn't."I never said it did."Ubuntu is becoming a powerhouse because of its determination to innovate on Linux. They come up with the problems they see with the distribution, and they move quickly to fix them. Their community is diverse and focused, and very quickly set itself apart from other distributions due to this."I agree, this is why I like Ubuntu."The differences between Kubuntu and Ubuntu are much like the differences between Windows XP Home and Windows XP Professional; same code, different abilities presented to the user."Windows XP Home and Professional use the same desktop environment. Ubuntu and Kubuntu use completely different desktop environments. Moving between GNOME and KDE is not like moving between XP Home and XP Professional. I think this division will ultimately weaken Ubuntu.
chilimonkeyJul 6, 2006
Versora already has a smilar product : <a class="user" href="http://versora.com/products/progression_desktop_linux.php">http://versora.com/products/progression_desktop_linux.php</a>
srg13Jul 7, 2006
I got one of my two copies OEM. I found the other one in that collection of tubes...
ryuuzakiJul 9, 2006
That's good, but I hope it's optional and also that they don't force users to migrate to a specific program like evolution, so the choice of, say, thunderbird (which I use at work, quite nice) is possible.