+1 generally. I played with desktop Linux for ten years before I was satisfied enough to switch my desktop environment full time. I finally settled on Ubuntu, they have done a tremendous job of making Linux accessible to end users.
I have different systems set up different ways: - desktop - I run Ubuntu desktop OS (dual core, 4GB RAM). For Windows programs, I have Windows XP Pro installed in a virtual machine (I user KVM rather than VirtualBox for virtualization. KVM is the "official" Ubuntu package for virtualization. You can always try both and see what you prefer). I run Flex Builder in the VM when I work on my desktop. - laptops - I have a tablet PC (dual core, 4GB RAM) that has XP Pro and Ubuntu in dual boot. I have it set up that way mainly because I need Windows for the full tablet functionality to work and it isn't accessible through a virtual machine (read the docs on virtualization to understand the limits of working with hardware from a virtual machine). I also have a 500 GB drive in that system so there is plenty of space for both OS images. I also have my new laptop, an HP Envy (quad core, 6 GB RAM, moving to 16 GB soon), that is running Windows 7 Pro. The Envy also has a custom Linux OS powered by its own little CPU that you can quick-boot into for Web/email/chat/movies/music/pictures for easy access and long battery life. I might install an Ubuntu system in dual boot mode once I get 16 GB RAM so I can set up an Ubuntu cloud environment on my laptop for some research I'm doing right now. As to how you set up a dual boot system, you have the ubuntu Live CD, just pop it in and boot and it should have an install icon on the desktop. It's easier to install Windows first, so you are good there. You need to identify a partition to install Ubuntu. You can get a new disk and install it there or re-size a current partition if you have plenty of free space. I suggest a separate drive. Lastly, searching the Web is your friend. The Ubuntu forums are really good and there are lots of other blogs, tutorials, and resources for Ubuntu. There are thousands of little programs that do incredibly useful things but are not well known. A good example for developers is sshfs, a command line program that allows you to map a folder on your local system to a folder on a remote Linux system, no need for FTP, although there are integrated FTP clients for Eclipse if you need to use FTP. I use CFEclipse on Linux. I wish CFBuilder was available :-(. Mark Mandel got a pre-release installed manually, with some glitches: http://www.compoundtheory.com/?action=displayPost&ID=414 On Fri, Apr 23, 2010 at 9:51 AM, Judah McAuley <ju...@wiredotter.com> wrote: > > Ubuntu Desktop for the OS. > > VirtualBox as a virtual machine to install Win 7/XP. It works > especially well if you have a chipset that supports hardware > virtualization, like AMD. You can turn on hardware virtualization in > the BIOS and then VirtualBox can call directly into the hardware for > some of its operations, speeding things up. You'll want plenty of ram > though as you are running 2 os's at once. > > Development: CFEclipse. A very decent CF IDE that is getting better > every day. If you use the Aptana plugin for Eclipse, you'll also get > good FTP support, local file system browsing and good JS/CSS insight. > > Graphics: use Gimp. Gimp supports PSD files and will do layers and > alpha channels and bending text to paths and rendering cute difference > clouds and all that other crap. > > Browser: I'd suggest using Chrome. I've found it to be much faster > than Firefox on Linux. Chrome has a pretty decent set of dev tools, > similar to firebug. I still install Firefox and firebug though. I > would also suggest keeping a Windows VM around to test with IE. > > All of the above software is free, btw, and it is cross platform. I > use the same bundle of software on Win 7 that I use on Ubuntu. It just > works. > > Cheers, > Judah > > On Fri, Apr 23, 2010 at 6:56 AM, Matthew P. Smith <m...@smithwebdesign.net> > wrote: >> >> So I've pretty much had it with windows. I was all excited with 7, and it >> worked great for a couple of months, but now my systems has slowed way down >> and I can't figure out what is going on. At this point it looks like I will >> have to reinstall, and frankly, I don't really have the time for it. >> >> I'd like to make the jump to actually using linux, at least give it a shot. >> >> I've used the Unbuntu live cd to recover files from virus infected pcs but >> that's about it. >> >> So I will be doing a reinstall of windows, but will create a second >> partition and slap linux on it and give it a go. >> >> How do I set up a dual boot system? >> >> I use CS3 for dev, DW and PS, and need to find OSS alternatives. For my >> IDE, these are the features I like about DW and would like to see in the >> software I use: >> >> 1. Integrated FTP. Right click and put/get files or folders. >> 2. Multiple site management. >> 3. CF code auto complete/tag insight. >> >> That's about it. >> >> For photoshop, really I just need a decent editor, preferably one that can >> work with psd's, though I can always boot into windows if need be. >> >> Also, I would like to be able to remote desktop to a windows xp machine, as >> my server is running that and I may need to access it from time to time. >> >> So what distro should I look at? >> >> Thanks! >> >> >> > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Want to reach the ColdFusion community with something they want? Let them know on the House of Fusion mailing lists Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:316574 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/unsubscribe.cfm
