Ubuntu means "I love you"...

Wow, maybe it's just because I've been pounding away at an OSX machine for so long that I've somehow inadvertently become adept with a un*x box... or maybe Ubuntu is friendlier than my last foray into the Linux universe... or maybe I haven't tried anything *really* exciting yet. Here's the story so far...

Installation wasn't as breezy as advertised. Well, no, that's not fair. I'm sure installation would be straightforward enough on a more... serious machine, replete with gobs of RAM and a chunkier processor. However, this poor little machine only had 256mb of RAM, and it plugs along on an old Celeron 1.8gHz. I'd get two steps into the install, and the whole machine would lock up tighter'n... well, tight.

I was under the impression (mistakenly) that Linux would have lighter requirements than Windows XP, but no, the documentation states that the minimum requirements are 512mb of RAM. Annoying? Kinda... I tried installation with the "Alternative", text-based install, but to no avail. Blegh.

So I had to scrape up another 512 DIMM (two 128 DIMMs and two slots in the Optiplex), so I ended up with 640mb. Installed just fine, got GNOME all juicy and running nicely... and I thought "why aren't they using KDE?". What little experience I do have with Linux is associated with KDE, and the way Ryan (resident Linux/Unix monkey and overall impressive guy) described it: "GNOME is The Windows Way, KDE is The Mac Way." Indeed.

So I'm gonna start playin' around with this crazy thing. More to come!