Jumping between operating systems

I was very pleased to find out that I was allowed to make a choice between two operating systems when I started in my new job. Of course, the choice was to be made between OS X and Windows. At the moment, Linux is used only on our development servers.

I have been quite happy with OS X, even if it lacks some of the command line tools I would like to use for getting things done. After installing some additional tools like Aquamacs, the OS X is more than adequate desktop system for an internet marketing consultant. In addition, using a Mac laptop is probably something that my clients expect from a marketing consultant.

At home, I'm mostly using OpenSUSE on my main desktop. This box is probably about 6-7 years old. A year or two ago I upgraded it with a new memory chip. 1 GB seems to be more than enough for my needs.

A week ago I decided to wipe out the Zenwalk from the harddrive of my old eVectra box. I installed Debian stable on it, and now the venerable 1 GHz box serves my as a development server running Wordpress and some other content management systems. It is a lot more convenient to develop small web sites using a dedicated development server than to hack the site either on my desktop or horrribile dictu directly on the server that is live online.

* * *


In the autumn, I hope to be able to finish my studies of economics and finance. Even if the degree is probably not very useful for my current career, one never knows what the my future will be like.

In any case, I want to be ready for as many different possible futures as possible.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

"In addition, using a Mac laptop is probably something that my clients expect from a marketing consultant."

Pathetic.

Anonymous said...

Sad waste of electrons, that previous comment.

Shahana Shafiuddin said...

I had got CD for lightweight linux, my husband used it in his pc. and he was happy with it.

Anonymous said...

"In addition, using a Mac laptop is probably something that my clients expect from a marketing consultant."

No wonder we're in a recession.

Mikko said...

It is a part of the dresscode, just like Wall Street brokers, mutual fund managers and London cityboys are expected to wear a suit.

Anonymous said...

Hi there...
I've a PC which has a RAM with bad sectors(i suppose, becoz after installing WinXp or ubuntu the PC restarts and a h/w guy said the ram is corrupted...i dont much believe him)PC is very old..Dell optiplex 245...RAM is SD-Ram...and i'm not able to get it...can u tell me any OS which my RAM can handle without a new RAM(coz u know we cant throw away our old PC's, if at all i dont get a new ram...its just brutle :)
I am thinking tiny OS or puppy OS ..but, also i need to code in php and perl..will it be possible with the os's menioned above?

pjrobar said...

You can get just about any missing UNIX tool for OS X by installing MacPorts.

Note that OS X comes with a FreeBSD based UNIX user environment.

Mikko said...

True, that's why I spend most of my time a terminal window open on my desktop :)