[Zanth]

For those that are happy with their windows systems, this thread is not for you. For those that are pleased as punch with their Macs...this thread is not for you (though incidentally OS X has a bsd base...so its close enough

)

For 12 years I have been into and away from linux and various bsd systems.

I got my feet wet with a custom build of linux for a beowulf cluster at my alma mater which really got me interested in trying out an early release of Redhat on my desktop. I dual booted for a few years but no doubt, I was using windows 95/98 then 2000 and XP 90% of the time. All of my math apps ran under windows and moreover, if they could run under linux...they were never quite as responsive or stable. Mathematica and Maple both run exceptionally well under linux though Mathematica requires some tinkering to get it to work well with Ubuntu (they really need a .deb). MS Office and Wordperfect were necessary (and still are) and until recently Open Office could not compete and Crossover Office wasn't keeping pace enough to have me stay in linux.

In the early part of this century I began using Debian heavily and then FreeBSD on my server, then finally OpenBSD, but the desktop still wasn't polished enough to hold me in Debian.

Enter Ubuntu. A distro based on Debian, it takes the stability and package management and puts some finesse around it with the help of its founder, visionary benefactor and uber rich guy Mark Shuttleworth.

Though for the most part, Debian has everything Ubuntu has to offer, Ubuntu was able to make everything work and work well in a more timely fashion (Debian's stable releases are notoriously delayed, and in many ways this is a good thing because their stable releases are usually rock solid, running testing or unstable grants one access to the latest and greatest, but one may be breaking their system every other night)

I was pleased that there was a desktop OS that was fun to use and was very productive, KDE or Gnome it doesn't matter overly...both offer a wide array of applications that can really help folks break away from the iron-clad grip of MS. Not only that, but using Beryl/Compiz one has the most advanced desktop gui on the market. It is far and away more configurable, more responsive and down right cooler than anything MS or Apple has to offer. One just has to "spin the cube" to know what I'm talking about.

That all said...many of us are still bound to MS or Apple because of applications that are necessary for school/work or home use. Wine and Codeweaver's Crossover Office are helping pave the way for folks to seemlessly migrate from MS by providing a windows api, but they lag behind in a big way for many applications. Ideally one wouldn't need these OS-centric apps, but at least for me, I'm stuck depending on them for the near future.

Recently though, I have been pushing to migrate my entire network to a *nix/bsd enviro. My wife uses a Mac laptop, as do I, our server is Openbsd and my workstation is Ubuntu/XP. I can manage 90% of the time in Ubuntu but I'm still caught on some applications.

Here is a list of my must have apps:

Foobar2k
EAC/FLAC
DBPoweramp
Systat
SPSS
Office 2003/2007
Wordperfect X3
iTunes
Nero
Photoshop CS3
Lightroom


These are apps I either need for work/school or have come to depend on in my day to day personal needs.

Wine/Crossover Office has granted me access to foobar2k, EAC, Systat and older version of Office and iTunes but to keep pace, I really require current versions of both of the latter. There are alternatives to Nero which work very well but Photoshop and Lightroom are key apps that will force me to reboot when I need them.

I thought I was trapped with iTunes until last night I tested out the lastest build of Rockbox, I'm elated with the performance and I get a dual booting iPod capable of retaining my iTunes structure while reading my FLAC files.

I am so close to ditching windows for good...but I'm bound by a handful of apps...mainly imaging software and office applications. Wine/Codeweaver are doing an excellent job of helping me migrate my beloved audio apps but I would love something like Parallels where I could run them from my windows partition as easily as I do when I'm using my Mac.

SPSS needs to migrate to linux...all the Adobe apps...and game companies need to use opengl and start releasing games for linux...I'm fine to reboot to play games, it is a rare event for me, but SPSS and those Adobe Apps, not to mention later versions of Office and Wordperfect really keep me bound to windows.

What are the apps you can't live without? What is keeping you bound to Windows? Perhaps there are applications that are at least as good/functional but you might not be aware of them or don't feel they can really compare (like I did with Rockbox).

 

[blessingx]

Well my apps keep me tied to OS X, not Windows, but I agree Ubuntu is a huge step forward for the desktop and I run it on my Mac. Could someone tell me if there is a DEVONthink/Yojimbo/SOHONotes freeform DB on Linux (or even Windows)? That would go a big way towards me being happy. Otherwise the biggest obstacle is advanced graphics (especially vector) programs with all the related support (full font, third party development, printer/rip support, etc.). Otherwise I think especially Ubuntu is getting close. I just wonder if apps will end up on *nix or on the internets (thus rendering the OS question less important) first.

 

[hugz]

Nothing

 

[unclejr]

apt-get, baby. My journey through the nix world sounds similar to yours, Zanth. The last Linux I used full time was Debian PPC on an old powerbook, but it was a constant struggle and by Mac OS X 10.3, most of the speed issues were at a bearable level with the hardware finally catching up. Anyway, after many years of solely Mac OS X-dom (I live inside iTerm) I am now dual booting into Feisty Fawn and am amazed at how far Linux has come in the last few years. My BT mouse recognizes with a minimum of pain, and most other things are working just fine. Software wise is also better than ever, and by the way, you probably know about Inkscape, which is a pretty decent, reasonably active implementation of a vector drawing program.

And speaking of customization, Beryl totally looks better than anything in the commercial OS world. The novelty hasn't worn off for me yet!

Oh, and to answer the question, it's not really apps that I cannot live without but apps that I find I would have a hard time replacing, but I'm confident that nearly everything has a suitable work around these days. If Mac OS X wasn't so stable and didn't include all those great BSD/etc utils, then I'd be pushing to all the way Linux.

 

[jbloudg20]

Thought I would list what I sue in place of many of these apps:

Foobar2k: Amarok
EAC/FLAC: Flac codec, but no EAC replacement yet.
DBPoweramp: I don't use it, but there are plugins for Amarok
Office 2003/2007: Open office suits me fine
iTunes: Amarok (I have a zen, and I sue gnomad for it)

I still have one machine dedicated to Lightroom/Photoshop, so I'm not 100%
However, Bibble has made some nice headway in terms of a Linux competitor to Photoshop.

 

[NoValidTitle]

Whats stopping me? My cursed smartphone runs windows. *shakes fist*

 

[HFat]

Mainly intertia.... as well as the need to maintain those Windows skillz.

I don't know why people who want to run MS Office, Adobe software, iTunes and such even bother with free operating systems. If running a free OS means having to defile it with stuff like that, I'd rather run the real thing. It's easy to run free software (and even a free OS) inside Windows anyway.

 

[meat01]

Solidworks
Pro E
EAC/LAME
Photoshop CS2. Gimp is pretty good, but it has its limitations

I dual boot Ubuntu and Windows XP on my laptop.

 

[szeder]

My Garmin GPS. I need to boot the preinstalled Windows on my notebook to up/download maps, tracks, and routes to/from it before and after bigger excursions, which happens 2-4 times a year.
Other than those few minutes for the GPS my computers at home, at work, and my notebook run Debian since a few years.

 

[krmathis]

My work place!
We are committed to buy IBM laptops, running MS Windows XP.

Or else I would be 100% *nix (Mac OS 10.4)

 

[hugz]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jbloudg20 /img/forum/go_quote.gif EAC/FLAC: Flac codec, but no EAC replacement yet.

cdparanoia seems to do something similar to EAC.. honestly i haven't researched it to see how "hifi" it is, but it has a command that causes it to abort on any imperfection. "-x" i think.

edit: the wiki seems to indicate that cd paranoia is indeed a flawless rip. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cdparanoia

 

[Zanth]

Quote:

Originally Posted by HFat /img/forum/go_quote.gif Mainly intertia.... as well as the need to maintain those Windows skillz. I don't know why people who want to run MS Office, Adobe software, iTunes and such even bother with free operating systems. If running a free OS means having to defile it with stuff like that, I'd rather run the real thing. It's easy to run free software (and even a free OS) inside Windows anyway.

I think you misunderstand the motivation then. Folks who feel bound (and many ARE bound) to apps like Photoshop and MS Office may very well want the security, configurability and control of a free system but their work necessitates that they use proprietary software. My father works heavily with Photoshop, so he is a Mac guy, has been his entire life. He'd consider using Linux if he could use Photoshop, but he can't so he doesn't bother even trying to convert.

How about those bound to MS Access, or all those custom macros in Word and Excel...this might be someone's bread and butter, working with Office apps but everything else they do could be accomplished with a FOS OS. Although I am a strong advocate of FOSS, should I perpetually wait until the apps that production-class make it to *nix/bsd? Open Office is NOT as robust as MS Office. Gimp et. al, give a good college try, but they pale in comparison to Photoshop. Of course there are the gazillion proprietary custom apps in the legal, medical, scientific and engineering fields that are at this point Windows-only. Should these folks not try a flavour of Linux because one or two apps they desperately need for work are not yet available?

Until the masses push the companies to release their software on various platforms (and ideally at some point as OSS at least) then a mass conversion will never happen because frankly, key apps are missing.

It will take years before FOSS gets to a level where it can compete head to head in every sector of software, but the more it is used the less locked in we are to proprietary formats and software.

So, while I prefer to use Photoshop for my home needs because it is the most capable application for what I want to do and because some of my software that I must use for school/work is windows only, I'm stuck. iTunes can be circumvented, Foobar2k can be replaced (though I still don't like anything the FOSS community has to offer over Foobar2k) but for those key apps I am searching to find ways around it. There is no bastardization of my system, instead, I'm attempting to get the most productive and fun workstation possible, without having to reboot. Parallels for Ubuntu would be the ultimate solution until apps are compiled for linux.

 

[hugz]

I find that switching to linux is just a matter of letting go. While preparing for the switch its so easy to get into the mindframe of ".. but how will i ever be able to live without THIS app", but in reality if you allow yourself to just forget about the old app you'll find a new one to replace it and you wont miss it anymore

I hate having to switch back to windows because it lacks the linux apps i really like. Many people seem to act like windows is superior to linux when it comes to the availability of programs, but I find it to be the opposite.. the only difference is that you actually have to research and find the program to replace your old one.. whereas on windows everyone knows the names of all the popular apps. And to make it even better, its all free and so easy to obtain on linux

the only time i ever switch back to windows is when I have a piece or hardware which only works in windows.. but i've been exclusively on linux for at least a year now and I'm loving it. The key to longterm linux BLISS is to avoid hardware makers whose products require windows. I dont want to pay my money to a company which helps to enforce a monopoly anyway

 

[goldenratiophi]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jbloudg20 /img/forum/go_quote.gif EAC/FLAC: Flac codec, but no EAC replacement yet.

Rubyripper.

 

[Zanth]

Quote:

Originally Posted by hugz /img/forum/go_quote.gif I find that switching to linux is just a matter of letting go. While preparing for the switch its so easy to get into the mindframe of ".. but how will i ever be able to live without THIS app", but in reality if you allow yourself to just forget about the old app you'll find a new one to replace it and you wont miss it anymore I hate having to switch back to windows because it lacks the linux apps i really like. Many people seem to act like windows is superior to linux when it comes to the availability of programs, but I find it to be the opposite.. the only difference is that you actually have to research and find the program to replace your old one.. whereas on windows everyone knows the names of all the popular apps. And to make it even better, its all free and so easy to obtain on linux the only time i ever switch back to windows is when I have a piece or hardware which only works in windows.. but i've been exclusively on linux for at least a year now and I'm loving it. The key to longterm linux BLISS is to avoid hardware makers whose products require windows. I dont want to pay my money to a company which helps to enforce a monopoly anyway

Interesting take on things, the problem though is that there are simply some apps that are windows-only where no comparable piece of software exists on the linux platform. MS Access is a perfect example. If an office uses this program, running something "like" MS Access isn't going to do anyone any good because what is needed is MS Access. Though there have been some great examples of up and coming vector graphics suites, nothing compares to Photoshop. Sure for the average home user, linux has an abundance of software and likely 99.9% of one's needs would be met, but for a full workstation, something to replace home and work (I work from home 60% of the time) then software must be up to production level.

This thread is intended for those to indicate what is missing for them as well as ideally suggestions by others of software that could replace what others feel are missing.

The vector packages indicated thus far are a great example. Photoshop/Lightroom offers far more, but for most home users out there Inkskape, Bibble and Gimp may be enough.

I don't like Amarok (resource hog on my box anyway), Listen and Music Player are close to Amarok in functionality but fall short, xmms as a winamp sub is great, but not as an iTunes or Foobar2k sub, so that leaves me wanting Foobar2k...sure there are alternative and listening to music is not part of my job, so I can suck it up, though thankfully I don't have to, Wine makes it work marvellously.