Why I switched to Linux

When I first encountered Linux as an operating system, it wasn’t exactly love at first sight. As a kid, I learned computing on an Apple II clone called the LASER 128, and eventually an Apple II GS (which I happily ran until 1999). Then as now, when I commit to a computer it’s for the long term. I enjoy the process of becoming familiar with the software and hardware I run on a computer, so when I discovered Linux my immediate reaction was frustration. It wasn’t enough like what I was used to, it made me feel like I had to start learning yet another computer all over again. The thing I never expected was that this very discomfort turned out to be for the best thing for me.

Being an Apple II user in an “IBM clone” world meant I was an expert on a very niche topic. For most of my life, that was a useless qualification, aside from sometimes getting to skip gym class so I could fix computer problems for my over-worked school teachers.

All good computer stories start with printers

As an adult, knowing all about Apple software and hardware meant I could easily contract myself to publishing houses in need of help setting up printers (the publishing industry used Macintoshes running a proprietary software called Quark Xpress).

It was easy money for a while, until Mac OS 9 was discontinued and Mac OS X became the default. I was working at a computer store at the time, so I got a employee discount on a display Macintosh computer, and already I was hearing a lot about how the new operating system was built on UNIX. My father had been running Mac OS Server for years on his home network, so I had a concept of what UNIX was but no experience with it. I was curious, so I started to read about it.

With almost no printer drivers available for the operating system, people were desperate for a solution, and not by coincidence I had just recently learnt about the Common UNIX Printing System (CUPS). To me, it was a simple trick you did in a web browser. To everyone else, it was a magic (including to Apple itself, which purchased CUPS wholesale not long afterwards).

I was providing a legitimate service to people, but I was keenly aware that I was benefiting from something called open source software. It wasn’t really me making people’s printers work, but because I had a little extra knowledge, people were actually depending on me. Following this realisation through to its logical conclusion, that meant that with even more knowledge about UNIX and the world of open source software, I would be able to depend solely on myself. I’d be immune to the turmoil I was witnessing in the world of Apple, and had witnessed during Microsoft’s Windows Me misstep (the short-lived OS before Windows XP).

First steps with UNIX

My first steps with UNIX were on a Macintosh computer. I’d bought the Visual Quickstart Guide to UNIX by Deborah S. Ray and Eric J. Ray, and was opening the Terminal application as often as I possibly could just for the chance to learn yet another command. I discovered the Fink Project, and later the Mac Ports repository, and started compiling UNIX software on my Macintosh.

I discovered software that freed me from trying to use software I couldn’t afford, and started using applications like OpenOffice and GIMP. The applications were different, but I could see that learning new software meant I wouldn’t ever have to worry about acquiring software I didn’t like and couldn’t afford to run legitimately.

I still had a problem, though. I was running my applications on an operating system I didn’t really trust. Apple had changed a lot about its OS over a short time, and I didn’t always enjoy their choices. I enjoyed even less that I couldn’t opt out of them, or choose not to use some of the “features”. Discovering “secret” UNIX software emboldened me to find more open source applications, and I eventually cobbled together a collection of workarounds to make up for annoyances in the OS, but deep down I could sense that I’d reached my tolerance threshold for an operating system that was swiftly trying to push me down an upgrade path I neither wanted or could afford.

My initial Linux experience

Having read one book about UNIX, I started reading in tech and film magazines about something called Linux. I didn’t understand what it was, because to my mind a computer and its operating system were inseparable. When I went to a store and bought a computer, I was buying the hardware and that graphical desktop thing I saw when I pressed the power button. I couldn’t conceive how you could acquire a disc and put it into a computer and boot off the disc, and then install a new operating system. But I found a book that included a Mandriva Linux install disc in the back, and when a client told me to keep the PC they were upgrading from, I took it home to finally try Linux.

With nothing but skepticism, I inserted the Mandriva disc into my new PC, held down the key that took me to BIOS, and booted off the disc. I fully expected to see Windows because I still couldn’t understand how a PC could possibly be anything but a Windows machine, but instead I got the shining star logo of Mandriva Linux (now OpenMandriva and Mageia Linux).

I was using Linux!

But Linux wasn’t modeled after Mac OS or Mac OS X, the operating systems that had been, for my entire life, synonymous with computing. Linux was different. To my advantage, many applications were already familiar to me because I’d been learning them in my Macintosh’s UNIX environment. However, the desktop itself was totally foreign. I spent months trying different desktops, with a focus on the ones that people said were “more like Mac OS” than others. I don’t think the people who said that had ever used a Mac, because there just wasn’t a drop-in replacement. Even on desktops that had been meticulously themed to look like Mac OS’s Finder didn’t act like Mac OS’s Finder. There were too many options here, and too few options there. Nothing ever responded the way I expected it to.

The power of distraction

Luckily, as frustrated as I was with the differences between Mac OS and Linux desktops, I was equally intrigued by the differences in the operating systems. I loved that I could change the way I interacted with my computer just by adding some lines to a configuration file. I loved how Linux allowed me to build commands that could operate on hundreds of files, and then run it in the background while I worked on something entirely different. I’d gained an avatar of myself that could perform routine tasks for me while I worked on new challenges.

I loved that I could configure my computer to use applications of my own choice for major tasks. I got to choose my desktop, my file manager, my network manager, my video player (no more Quicktime!), the way I routed audio, my photo library, and practically anything else I wanted to customise. There were no underhanded hacks required, nothing that would get reset by an update, nothing that I needed to keep from phoning home, nobody telling me how I had to use my computer.

Curing the not-invented-here syndrome

It didn’t take long for me to feel empowered to just start fixing my “problems” myself. Some things I didn’t know how to do. For example, Mac OS famously had (and maybe still has) a “global” menu bar that changes depending on which application you happen to have in focus. At the time, I thought this was reasonable because I couldn’t imagine wanting to see more than one application’s menu bar. I had to give that up, or at least de-prioritise it.

Other things I could replicate. For example, most keyboard shortcuts for Linux desktops were unfamiliar to me, so I methodically re-configured the functions I was used to on Mac OS with the keyboard shortcuts I knew.

I didn’t know it at the time, but I was using one of Linux’s most powerful features for the most regressive of tasks. I had fallen prey to the not-invented-here syndrome. I was so inflexible in how I used computers that I was spending all my energy on “fixing” problems that weren’t problems. Luckily, I also fell prey to that other reviled syndrome of complacency. The more I used Linux, the more comfortable I became with the way its desktop worked. The more I used GIMP, the more comfortable I became with what it did differently to other photo editors.

What I didn’t expect was to prefer those differences, but that’s exactly what happened.

I still remember the day, about two years after switching to Linux, when I sat in front of a friend’s Mac. I took it for granted that I knew how Mac OS worked. After all, I’d spent the past two years complaining about the ways Linux wasn’t like Mac OS. Imagine my surprise when I got frustrated that I couldn’t have two applications open on my screen and see both of their menu bars. What I could do in a glance on Linux required a move and a click on Mac.

The keyboard shortcuts didn’t work the way I remembered, either. There were almost no global shortcuts. On Linux, I used the Super key for global shortcuts, and Control and Alt for application-specific shortcuts. But on Mac OS, I couldn’t use a shortcut for Finder while another application was in focus.

Everything else (binary configurations, preferences you didn’t actually control or own, and so on) I’d already happily abandoned. As I floundered at my surprise unfamiliarity with the OS I’d grown up with, it occurred to me that it was often easier to learn something new than to force complacency for a familiar but outdated system.

Continuing education

Linux has taught me a lot, and not just about computing. I learned to code on Linux, and how to manage servers, and what started out as a hobby has grown into a fulfilling career. Most importantly, I learned the value of evaluating problems and prioritising solutions. Switching to Linux was a response to the problematic Mac operating system, but it solved more than just proprietary lock-in. Learning Linux gave me the flexibility to interface with computers on my own terms, and it taught me flexibility in how I approached any given task.

Of course, learning Linux isn’t something I’ve completed. As with most things in life, Linux is developing and changing. There’s always something new to learn, and embracing that can lead to new discoveries about computing and, in some cases, about yourself.