Linux for Japanese computing and advancement of Japanese resources

[Tori Johnson - Teenage Mutant Lab Rat]

Any thoughts on linux and its contributions to Japanese resources online?

[Nick]

You'll have to sell me on this one, Tori. What can Linux do that I can't do on Vista? (Note: Vista Ultimate lets you switch between languages). I like the sound of having an OS on a USB memory stick, but what would I use it for?

[Tori Johnson - Teenage Mutant Lab Rat]

(I'm not try (too hard anyway) to sell you on linux, I just think it is interesting)

Yes, but vista ultimate is a $200 upgrade. Of course if it takes you a long time to figure it out on Linux $200 would be worth the saved time.

For me, I like the challenge of Linux. It's not that it is necessarily better (somethings are and somethings are not) or even that it is free. I like it because I can "get my hands dirty."
It is like tinkering with a machine. With MS, everything is polished and boring. It is a little hard to explain..
Also there are communities around the different flavours of linux (like "puppy linux" "RedHat linux, Ubuntu, etc.) similar to the communities for CMS like wordpress. And each flavour of linux has its own specialty/advantage.

Puppy linux is really small but robust. It's one of the ones that fit on USB. That doesn't appeal to everyone, but let's say you were going somewhere for a month and couldn't take your laptop (or didn't want to). You could take your USB, plug it into a computer there and have your OS with all the programs/settings that you normally use. Also, when you use the USB (OS on a stick) you do not touch the hard drive of the machine you are on. So if you are on someone else's pc or a public pc, you do not leave any of your sensitive information on that pc's hard drive.

I believe MS may something somewhat similar to this for WindowsXP (google "windows on a stick"

Interestingly, Lifehacker just posted an article titled "why lifehacker readers switched to linux" !
http://lifehacker.com/5044212/why-lifehacker-readers-switched-to-linux

[Tori Johnson - Teenage Mutant Lab Rat]

(I tried to add something else to that reply but I must have waited past the 15 minute time limit.)

Jim Breen (Jdict creator) does all of his computing on linux machines and the dictionary server is powered by linux.

I'm sure you know that most of the world's servers run on linux (I think it is around 70%). From powering server farms, linux scales down to running on/ manipulating ps2, ipods, even a wrist watch (no joke). That might not be useful for normal human beings but it is interesting none the less.
An older pc can be converted into a DVR, for example (google MythTV). The rabbit hole is deep, Alice :)

But the real main reason reason (despite the noble excuses) for playing with linux is hatred of Microsoft.

Ok, that is enough linux rant for me

[Nick]

Cool rant! Unfortunately, I know too little about Linux to expand on the question you posed at the top of this thread. ;)