# Linux Customization



## mohityadavx (Feb 12, 2011)

Hi!

Q1)My friend is buying a basic desktop. Now he doesn't support piracy so he want to use Linus. (He & even me have no first hand experience of Linux). so please tell which is the most windows resembling easy usable linux.

Q2) As we can't use windows app in linux plz suggest all *free* alternative to windows for *linux*. Some we have selected
Browser : Firefox
Media Player: VLC
MS Office : Open Office
Adobe Acrobat Reader : ???
Photoshop : ??
Winrar : ??
TuneUpUtilities: ???
Any other software which is used on regular basis but we can't remember right now.

Q3) Is there any way to make the linux iso with all these software already preinstallled in it. IIf even tough plz give a small tutorial. 


Thanx in advance!!!


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## thetechfreak (Feb 12, 2011)

photoshop- Gimp

WinRaR- 7zip but sumthing should be preinstalled

tune up- linux needs no maintanence

pdf- built in




install latest Linux Mint or Ubuntu 10.10


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## nims11 (Feb 12, 2011)

I currently use mint in my laptop and it is gr8


> tune up- linux needs no maintanence


+1
@mohit
This link below looks good but i havent tried it...
6 Tools to Easily Create Your Own Custom Linux Distro


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## mohityadavx (Feb 12, 2011)

thinking of building a distro with opensuse it  just looks perfect with so easy UI on web. Express ur opinion on  Opensuse vs ubuntu 4 beginners.


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## thetechfreak (Feb 12, 2011)

to make a distro requires knowledge of coding

all info of making your own distro was given as a fast track to open source
August 2009


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## mohityadavx (Feb 12, 2011)

nims11 said:


> I currently use mint in my laptop and it is gr8
> 
> +1
> @mohit
> ...



Thanx 4 the link opensuse link is damn useful



> to make a distro requires knowledge of coding
> 
> all info of making your own distro was given as a fast track to open source
> August 2009



it ain't difficult at all at this link 
Welcome &ndash; SUSE Studio

and no invites are required. 

Tell me ur opinion about ubuntu custimazation kit (UCK) is it easy to use is it easy to use.

still awaiting for reply about uck and opensuse vs ubuntu


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## desiibond (Feb 13, 2011)

yes. ubuntu is much better than OpenSUSE. The driver support is terrific and app instllation is easier than that on windows.


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## nims11 (Feb 13, 2011)

I feel OpenSUSE quite heavy on graphics


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## utkarsh009 (Feb 13, 2011)

@nims11: are you nimesh ghelani? @OP: i would suggest you to opt for ubuntu (you can go for 10.10 but you should know that they release a new version in every 6 months. which are april and october and that is what .04 and .10 conveys. befor the decimal its the year. so next version will be 11.04) now you can customize it later to get a heavy desktop with kde or a lightweight desktop with xfce. cheers!


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## The_Man (Feb 13, 2011)

Ubuntu is not user-friendly at all.You will have to type in commands for doing even the simplest of things.Mint is a good choice.
Another excellent distro is PCLOS KDE.Take a look here:
KDE Desktop  PCLinuxOS
First try Ubuntu and Mint.If you don't feel comfortable try PCLOS.It's very user-friendly.


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## utkarsh009 (Feb 13, 2011)

@the_man: in most cases you can opt for gui methods. can you give some examples where we have  to type in commands specifically and cannot perform the task using gui method in ubuntu? well i dont find any important tasks which do not have a gui method.


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## The_Man (Feb 13, 2011)

Ubuntu is definitely the best distro out there but I don't think newbies will find it easy.
Btw,I personally feel he should dual boot windows and linux .There are some good software that run on Windows/Mac only.What do you think techfreak?


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## The_Man (Feb 13, 2011)

utkarsh,ubuntu is not that easy to customise.In Windows all you need to do is launch the control panel and in a few minutes you have everything setup the way you want and you can forget about the OS.
@thetechfreak
oops.I forgot about gaming.  Another reason to dualboot.


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## The_Man (Feb 13, 2011)

Don't know.Maybe using wine?They have better alternatives.
I really really love this thing eventhough it's not a Linux exclusive.


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## thetechfreak (Feb 13, 2011)

the more we talk about popular software more linux feels different

Rhythmbox gets the job done though.


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## The_Man (Feb 13, 2011)

that's a nice cute app.
But aren't you worried about the future of the IT industry.What would happen if everything goes for free?How will we earn money?
We surely cant live off the 1 or 2 dollar daily donation that we get for our software.


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## mohityadavx (Feb 13, 2011)

@ all
System config is :
core2duo 2.4 Ghz
ATI Radeon X1650XT 256MB Graphic Card
ATX 300w psu
2 gb ram
intel dg 31 pr motherboard

Now for the final time we have customized a distro at susestudio which includes following:-

OPENSUSE
GNOME
OPEN OFFICE
VLC PLAYER
WI FI DRIVER
ATI DRIVER
WINE

All these repository will be included in one package.
So what say shall we still go for mint or ubuntu.


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## The_Man (Feb 13, 2011)

System configuration is good enough.
The Linux Mint Blog  Blog Archive  Linux Mint 10 KDE RC released!
I strongly recommend Mint.The newbie's OS.
New features in Linux Mint 10 KDE - Linux Mint
Take a look at Julia KDE!So beautiful an so easy...


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## mohityadavx (Feb 13, 2011)

What is difference between Linux MINT 10 and Linux MINT debian?


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## The_Man (Feb 13, 2011)

Mint is a Linux distro that is based on Debian os.10 is the version no.of Mint.It is also the latest edition of Mint.


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## nims11 (Feb 13, 2011)

@utkarsh yup, nice to see you here.
@all I am currently using a very ancient laptop with a 1.6Ghz processor and 256MB ram as my PC's monitor has blown off. I am dual booting Mint 10 with XP and am using Xfce in MINT but i still need some performance boost. i usually do programming and watch movies in MINT. any suggestions?


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## thetechfreak (Feb 14, 2011)

does Linux has inbuilt Cd burning software?


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## utkarsh009 (Feb 14, 2011)

^^yah some distros have brasero preinstalled. although there is a cd burning tool in kde which i like more because it has support for multisession disks whereas most of them do not have this capability. i still use nero in xp for burning cd because once i had wasted 4 cd's in burning a single image with brasero and it failed to burn properly everytime. better use rewritable cd's to check whether the image or files are burning properly or not.

@nims11: people say that fedora is distro for true programmers. it uses rpm packages and yum is the package manager. but its installation has quite complex options which i did not understand but i know that you know all those stuff. secondly, all the partitins are under lvm (logical volume management) and i was not able to set up a dual boot with ubuntu (maybe there is some option somwhere. find it out). i am sure u will find it interesting. you can find its image on digit december dvd (or maybe some other month's dvd, i dont remember.). try it out and post your experience. also some people say that softwares are released first for fedora and then for other distros!!!!!!!!!

@nims11: people say that fedora is the distro for true programmers. it uses rpm packages and yum is the package manager. but its installation has quite complex options which i did not understand but i know that you know all those stuff. secondly, all the partitions are under lvm (logical volume management) and i was not able to set up a dual boot with ubuntu (maybe there is some option somwhere. find it out). i am sure u will find it interesting. you can find its image on digit december dvd (or maybe some other month's dvd, i dont remember.). try it out and post your experience. also some people say that softwares are released first for fedora and then for other distros!!!!!!!!!


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## thetechfreak (Feb 15, 2011)

I will miss foobar when I start moving to Ubuntu.


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## nims11 (Feb 15, 2011)

^^WINE might be able to run it.
@utkarsh i once tried Fedora in my PC(I installed it in my portable HDD and it was screwed when once i by accident directly pulled out its plug) and i liked it. I am still not a heavy programmer and i am comfortable with any environment. I got loads of distros to experiment after my boards nd competitive exams.


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## ico (Feb 15, 2011)

No use of running Foobar in Wine. Just use Rythmbox in GNOME or Amarok in KDE (my favourite). Although in Windows I still prefer Foobar.



thetechfreak said:


> does Linux has inbuilt Cd burning software?


You can use Google for this.

When you install Ubuntu, it gets installed with ALL the basic softwares which you need - Firefox, OpenOffice.org, Rythmbox (music management), Brasero (CD/DVD burner) and many more.

Start reading blog posts from this page in reverse order, it will sort out your "basic" queries: *www.linoob.com/page/10/

Or just read these links in sequential order. (2 years old and outdated posts though)

*www.linoob.com/2009/04/landing-on-planet-ubuntu/
*www.linoob.com/2009/05/135/
*www.linoob.com/2009/05/sudo-installing-packages/
*www.linoob.com/2009/06/basic-applications/


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## Anand_Tux (Apr 17, 2011)

For beginners Linux Mint 10 GNOME is perfect, I am using Mint 10 for quite some time and it rocks.


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## Anand_Tux (Apr 22, 2011)

utkarsh009 said:


> ^^yah some distros have brasero preinstalled. although there is a cd burning tool in kde which i like more because it has support for multisession disks whereas most of them do not have this capability. i still use nero in xp for burning cd because once i had wasted 4 cd's in burning a single image with brasero and it failed to burn properly everytime. better use rewritable cd's to check whether the image or files are burning properly or not.
> 
> @nims11: people say that fedora is distro for true programmers. it uses rpm packages and yum is the package manager. but its installation has quite complex options which i did not understand but i know that you know all those stuff. secondly, all the partitins are under lvm (logical volume management) and i was not able to set up a dual boot with ubuntu (maybe there is some option somwhere. find it out). i am sure u will find it interesting. you can find its image on digit december dvd (or maybe some other month's dvd, i dont remember.). try it out and post your experience. also some people say that softwares are released first for fedora and then for other distros!!!!!!!!!
> 
> @nims11: people say that fedora is the distro for true programmers. it uses rpm packages and yum is the package manager. but its installation has quite complex options which i did not understand but i know that you know all those stuff. secondly, all the partitions are under lvm (logical volume management) and i was not able to set up a dual boot with ubuntu (maybe there is some option somwhere. find it out). i am sure u will find it interesting. you can find its image on digit december dvd (or maybe some other month's dvd, i dont remember.). try it out and post your experience. also some people say that softwares are released first for fedora and then for other distros!!!!!!!!!





Fedora is indeed a tough distro but over the years it has become very easy & very popular thanks to the fedora community. It's popularity is due to the fact that Fedora always comes with latest softwares & technologies like the Fedora 15 coming with Gnome 3 etc.


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## abhijangda (Apr 22, 2011)

utkarsh009 said:


> ^^yah some distros have brasero preinstalled. although there is a cd burning tool in kde which i like more because it has support for multisession disks whereas most of them do not have this capability. i still use nero in xp for burning cd because once i had wasted 4 cd's in burning a single image with brasero and it failed to burn properly everytime. better use rewritable cd's to check whether the image or files are burning properly or not.
> 
> @nims11: people say that fedora is distro for true programmers. it uses rpm packages and yum is the package manager. but its installation has quite complex options which i did not understand but i know that you know all those stuff. secondly, all the partitins are under lvm (logical volume management) and i was not able to set up a dual boot with ubuntu (maybe there is some option somwhere. find it out). i am sure u will find it interesting. you can find its image on digit december dvd (or maybe some other month's dvd, i dont remember.). try it out and post your experience. also some people say that softwares are released first for fedora and then for other distros!!!!!!!!!
> 
> @nims11: people say that fedora is the distro for true programmers. it uses rpm packages and yum is the package manager. but its installation has quite complex options which i did not understand but i know that you know all those stuff. secondly, all the partitions are under lvm (logical volume management) and i was not able to set up a dual boot with ubuntu (maybe there is some option somwhere. find it out). i am sure u will find it interesting. you can find its image on digit december dvd (or maybe some other month's dvd, i dont remember.). try it out and post your experience. also some people say that softwares are released first for fedora and then for other distros!!!!!!!!!



No it's not that Fedora is the distro only for true programmers, although it contains many preinstalled tools required for programming. It can be used by beginners also. 
Yes, it's installation has quite complex options but that are not that much complex which will prevent a beginner to install it. 
Also, it's not that softwares are released for Fedora first and then for others but Fedora is the first one to release those softwares in it's final version. That's why Fedora is sometimes called somewhat unstable distro but the one with all latest softwares. Fedora is the first one to try those in it's final release.!!


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## tejjammy (Apr 23, 2011)

Fedora is nice but the only problem is the size of its installation disc(>4GB) which makes it bit problematic to download on our *special* internet connections.
Also if you are interested in customisation, ubuntu is much easier. see the video  YouTube - Mac OS theme on Ubuntu


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## Krow (Apr 23, 2011)

Slightly offtopic: For maintenance in Ubuntu, try Ubuntu Tweak.


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## Neuron (Apr 23, 2011)

The only problem I have with linux is that there are no sound enhancement utility like DFX.I'm getting poor or uneasy bass on headphones.


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## ico (Apr 23, 2011)

well, you can try PulseAudio Multiband Equalizer in Ubuntu.


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## Liverpool_fan (Apr 23, 2011)

tejjammy said:


> Fedora is nice but the only problem is the size of its installation disc(>4GB) which makes it bit problematic to download on our *special* internet connections.
> Also if you are interested in customisation, ubuntu is much easier. see the video  YouTube - Mac OS theme on Ubuntu



There's a CD image also.


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## tejjammy (Apr 24, 2011)

Liverpool_fan said:


> There's a CD image also.


Can it be used to install too? i thought it was just for live desktop


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## Liverpool_fan (Apr 24, 2011)

tejjammy said:


> Can it be used to install too? i thought it was just for live desktop



Yes.Installation Quick Start Guide

Doesn't contain software like OpenOffice.org/LibreOffice, but it's still a pretty functional desktop. And you can always install with yum.


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## tejjammy (Apr 24, 2011)

Liverpool_fan said:


> Yes.Installation Quick Start Guide
> 
> Doesn't contain software like OpenOffice.org/LibreOffice, but it's still a pretty functional desktop. And you can always install with yum.



Well im currently running Ubuntu Maverick so will try fedora when i will update next time.


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## Krow (Apr 26, 2011)

^Install KDE 4.6 on it. KDE is amazing.


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## Faun (May 1, 2011)

I just love this scroll bar thingy 
*i.imgur.com/qrsQZ.jpg


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