Making an Old Computer "New" with Linux

I have three small children at home from four to seven years old, so hasn't taken too long to realize that we're going to need another computer. Even first graders are accessing their school work online, and school districts are realizing that computer literacy is a critical skill and an invaluable tool in delivering enrichment and content to their students. And, of course, all their favorite characters are online as well, from Dora the Explorer, to Star Wars to the Wonder Pets and Word World, too. With the proper supervision and guidance, a computer can be a wonderful addition to a child's educational experience. So what's the downside? Well, it's hard for two people to be on at the same time, especially if it's one very little person who is just starting to grasp what's going on in the Word World episode and one big person who desperately needs to meet a deadline or send a critical e-mail.

When my neighbor across the street was getting ready to move into her new farmhouse in the Hill Country of central Texas, she had a problem; she'd bought a new laptop to take with her, and she wanted to recycle her old computer but was worried about how to erase her name from the copy of Windows that was installed. The computer was old, but not ancient - it ran Windows XP, but barely, and with the new service packs and updates, it was pretty much at its max. Even so, we both realized at about the same time that the answer was pretty simple - my kids needed a computer of their own. If I took the poor old thing home, it could be useful again and she wouldn't have to worry about her private information. Our den was already wired for a second cable outlet - it was a simple matter to hook a cable modem up to it and it was ready to go. I could have set up a wireless network, but with the cable already in place, that was the quick, easy and fast way to go.

Everybody was gathered around and riled up as we set up the computer, hooked it up and... waited. We waited for it to boot up, we waited for the browser to load, we waited for screens to be drawn. It wasn't a complete bust, but it was certainly anticlimactic. The kids were used to our computer, which was built for speed. One quick meeting of the three kids later, and they'd decided that the "new" computer was mine, and they'd use the "old" computer. That wouldn't do - I knew what had to be done and I had to move fast.

The vast majority of computers in use today are running some flavor of Microsoft Windows, and odds are that they're running Windows XP. Chances are equally as good that whomever is at the keyboard typing at this very moment has or will complain about Windows and how slow their machine is running, especially if they're running an older machine. Why? Because much like the English language, Windows serves people all over the world doing all kinds of things with their machines, from simple web browsing and word processing to doing all kinds of engineering and heavy duty database crunching. Unlike the English language, there is very little room for dialects to emerge - a Windows computer in Madagascar would be expected to run a software developed in Bakersfield. Windows dominates because it does so many different things for so many different people on so many different computers; so many different brands, builds and capabilities. There may also some architecture and technical reasons that Windows might be slower than other operating systems on older machines, but the technical is beyond the scope of this article.

"Wait a minute", you might think - "what other operating systems are you talking about"? "What the heck is an operating system anyway?" Well, an operating system is what you see when you turn on the machine; it provides the framework that supports all the programs that run and all the hardware that you attach to your computer, the monitors, printers, scanners and all the other peripherals. What other operating systems? For most people on a budget, or with an extra PC laying around, Apple's operating systems used on the Macintosh, like OS X, are not always an option - Apple operating systems are designed to work on Apple machines. That's too bad, because I've heard nothing but good things about their operating systems. What can you do? If you read the sales literature on OS X, it brags about being based on "a rock-solid, time-tested UNIX foundation". Hmmm... what if you could run a "rock-solid, time-tested Unix foundation" on that old PC? You can - the "Unix foundation" that is available to PC users is called Linux, and believe it or not, you can get it free of charge.

Linux is a mature, freely available alternative to Microsoft Windows that seems to have less overhead and runs better on older computers. It's genesis was in a project by a graduate computer science student in Finland named Linus Torvalds, who started development in 1991 and immediately made the decision to offer the operating system free of charge. Much in the way that IBM revolutionized the PC world by offering their machine as an open-standard machine, meaning that anybody could build a PC as long as it complied with their standard, Linux similarly exploded on the scene after Linus Torvalds decided to offer his operating system under an open-source license. Because the source code was free to anybody who wanted to work on it, Linux eventually evolved into a mature, stable operating system that is constantly being tweaked and improved by some of the finest system developers in the world. The open license works because as developers improve and expand the system, they can use without paying royalties or licensing fees to any big corporations. You and I get the benefit of their work.

For most computer users, the idea of replacing Windows is scary, and real questions pop up quickly; do you have to be a computer guru? Will I know how to use the new system? What about the software I use every day? The answers are a lot more reassuring today than they were even five years ago.

Do you have to be a computer guru? No, most major distributions or "brands" of Linux are built to be user friendly. Installing Linux in most cases is not harder than installing Windows, and many distributions have extensive "how to" guides. In addition, of course, there is a "Linux for Dummies" book available.

Will I know how to use the new system? Probably. There will be some minor changes that you'll have to get used to, but in my experience, the change isn't as dramatic as moving from Windows XP to Vista.

What about the software I use everyday? This is the beautiful part; it's available free. No, really. If you use Microsoft Office, there is a suite called Open Office that will read and create documents in Microsoft Office formats. The Firefox browser is available in Linux, as is Real Player. More software titles are being ported to Linux all the time. Is everything available? No. I use Adobe Acrobat professional, and it's not available, though Adobe Reader is available. Linux is good, but it won't work for everybody - there are, for example, some financial, payroll and accounting websites I use that require Internet Explorer and Windows. Some will work under Linux through software that acts as a Windows emulator, but I don't want to get that technical here. Let's say that if you are an average user and do office work and browse the internet, you're covered.

What do you mean by "free"? Free means free - you download the software, install it and you're done. As grown-ups, though, we know that there is no such thing as free, and there's no such thing as a free lunch. The software is not exactly free; somebody paid for it with their time and labor, and is providing it to the community in exchange for getting the benefit of other programmers' work. If you're not a programmer, but want to do your fair share, you can donate your time or money to the community, there are always plenty of volunteering opportunities; manuals to be edited, text files to be updated, and so forth.

What's the upside and downside? Most Linux installations by default create a "dual boot" PC that leave Windows in place and let you choose freely between the two. The upside is that I found that Linux breathed new life into our "new" old PC, and it ran flawlessly. The new system is so close to what we're used to that nobody in the family had trouble adjusting. The downside was that, yes, there is no getting around the fact that we had to learn a new system. The weakest point now for Linux is wireless (WiFi) support - not all USB adapters are supported out of the box, although I've found that most built-in adapters will not be an issue. Cell broadband support is phenomenal in SUSE - my Sprint Ovation U727 was 100% plug and play.

What distribution did you use? I use Linux on my work PC as well, and I like the idea of having a corporate-oriented distribution with available support. We chose SUSE Enterprise Edition (SLED), which is supported by Novell. The free version is OpenSUSE. I've been impressed with its stability, and the fact that it handled all my hardware flawlessly. That being said, most major distributions are just as good - it's really a matter of personal preference.

Links:

Advantages of using Linux

How to choose a Linux distribution

Lesson plan - Getting started with Linux