On the personal technology front, I'm happy to report that there is a genuine alternative to the tedious fracas of the Microsoft juggernaut of Windows and Office versus the Apple cult of Mac and ..... Office.
Over the last week, I've been running ubuntu/gnome on my netbook and I am greatly pleased to report that it is a delight. It's is fast, secure, easy to use, and it's.....open source.
The available Linux alternatives to Office are solid. You can easily set them to use the xlsx, docx, etc. file formats. There are issues with PPT but I'm sure that's just a matter of time. I'm running all kinds of the other usual tools, like Dropbox and Skype, with great results.
Plus, there are skads of cool software products you can download and use and get rid of if you don't like them.
Here's where you go: http://www.ubuntu.com/download/ubuntu/download - try it for yourself. Worried it's too technical? My 11-year-old uses ubuntu.
Look, I've never really cared much about the OS wars. Perhaps I should have cared more but i didn't. The religious branding battles over the last two decades between Mac and MS have been mostly distracting. It's an operating system for god's sake. Steve Jobs is merely human. Then there was the Vista debacle.
Then Apple eclipsed MS for market captialization, and then I overheard a young woman say that she wouldn't date a guy who used a PC. What a bunch of nonsense across the board.
Is google far behind? Will android or chrome, or whatever else, sneak up and grap a piece? For now, I don't really care. I'm delighted with ubuntu.
I am tickled to say that the open source world for the end-user is not the future - - it is the present.
(Image source: Entrepreneur.com)
