Ok, I finally got Linux to boot on my system.  Had to find a third party
burner to be able to burn the ISO image for reasons I do not understand...
but, hey, it worked.

OK, some initial thoughts on my rather limited experience with a modern
Linux: Ubuntu/PowerPC_hoary

1) Wow... they sure manage to shove a lot on that one CD.  Really very
impressive - the whole OS, Firefox, OpenOffice, the Gimp, GAIM, Evolution,
etc.  Lots of relatively high quality apps... while I have used OpenOffice
and the Gimp and find them lacking in relation to MS Office and Photoshop,
still cool that they can fit them on one CD and there is no doubt that the
applications are good - very good even... just not top of their class.

Some of my later complaints may be from them having to make some concessions
to get everything on one CD... and just from being a LiveCD

2) Had some continued trouble boot - I have dual monitors and Hoary does not
seem to like that.  Had to boot with the option "linux video=ofonly", which
is kindly suggested right on the initial screen.  Still, for a computer
novice this would have likely been far more stressful than it was for me.
The first thing you see is a bunch of text telling you how to deal with
possible problems... I can see why, but not sure novice computer folks would
be as happy with that as they could be.

3) Once it did start its boot process it went into a bunch of "DOS" looking
text screens with a bright red background.  Not sure that was the best
choice of color...

4) When it gets past that it shows little icons of what it is loading...
sort of like OS 9.  :)

5) The mouse was smooth - very smooth.  No complaints there!  Did not play
with the options, but did not feel the need since it was set up by default
to be just right.  Hmmm, did not test opening tabs in Firefox with my middle
mouse button.  Presumably that worked, too, but I will test it later.

6) I like the date and time with the calendar... nice touch.  I needed to
get shareware to do that on a Mac, it did not come with it.  The time,
though, was incorrect.  When I went to the ...um.. whatever they call the
control panel it was right there!  Could not get them to match up... that is
odd!

7) Icons and window elements are somewhat clunky.  The menus are flat and
the whole interface was sort of blah.  I asked my wife what she thought of
the look and she said "It looks old".  Maybe there are better skins and they
just used that one to save room?  I sure hope so...

8) Windows are very Windows like... min, max, close... even the menu on the
left... not impressive to see them copy Windows like that.

9) To make changes I had to use my root password... but I had not set one
up!  Did not see in my quick look in help or docs what the default is.
Guessed it on my third try (yeah, I am a freakin' genius, it is "ubuntu").

10) The help system does not have a search!  What the heck!  That is
silly...

11) It did not recognize, at least not that I could tell, that I had
inserted my thumb drive.  Disappointing.

12) There are dual menus... they have a menu on the top sort of like the
Mac, but each window is like Windows.  You can move and even remove the
"panels", which is what they call the Mac like menu area... and you can add
more of them if you like.

13) Played with applications... they took a while to launch, but, hey, they
are all on the CD.  Hard to complain.  Actually, considering that, they did
just fine.  Have used OpenOffice before and use Firefox often.  They seem
just as good in Linux as they do elsewhere.

14) Oh, man... forgot to play with save and print dialogs.  Oh well... next
time.

15) Decided I had played enough and wanted to reboot.  But how.  Looked for
a bit and could not find the option.  How odd.  Decided to at least log
out.. and lo and behold the option came up... sort of like how Windows
combines all the reboot / shut down / log out type options.  Not a huge deal
once you get used to it, but I do not see the logic.

Just a few thoughts... I am sure I am leaving things out.  Will play with it
more later.

_________________________________________
Usenet Zone Free Binaries Usenet Server
More than 120,000 groups
Unlimited download
http://www.usenetzone.com to open account