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or RISC OS - What are the real differences ?

You are used to RISC OS; it is a great operating system with a bundle of familiar features and a wonderful Graphical User Interface. Linux is a great operating system too, but it is very different. Much of the difference has its roots in the old quandary which software developers always face between producing flexible and accessible software:

• Should they write a brilliant application with all kinds of flexibility included in it, so that users can configure the application to meet their needs?
• Or should they consider that the user wants it to be convenient to use, and does not want to keep changing colours, screen resolution, menu lengths, and so on. The user may even use the application for years without discovering all its features. Disappointing for the creative person behind it, but it works for the user.

You already know how to use RISC OS. Linux is more flexible and adaptable and so it is harder to use. We make no apology for this; that is what Linux is like. Aleph One is working to make Linux available to more people and is starting with RISC OS users but some of them may need to change their preconceptions in order to work with Linux.

To take one example, Linux has a choice of GUIs rather than a standard desktop because you can use it with the KDE, fvwm, Afterstep and GNOME window managers.

Linux is worth considering because:

• It Is Not Windows.
• It is a well-established operating system with massive, distributed, development and support under way by a huge body of users around the world.
• It can operate well on CPUs which are relatively slow and old compared to those which Windows now requires.
• It is a modern multi-threaded operating system, with robust memory-protection so that applications cannot crash the system.
• It can run several threads at once. This capacity to monitor what is happening in one application, (Internet access and phone/modem use, for example) from another thread running at the same time, is a marked difference from RISC OS, which can have several tasks on the screen, but only one actually running. This is a good starting point for developing your skill with multi-threaded applications.
• It is becoming more and more widely adopted by serious users because it is cost-effective, very powerful, and robust. Compaq and Dell are supplying it on fresh PCs now and IBM is developing its use on new platforms too.
• It comes with shell scripts, Perl and other powerful programming tools which those who can handle BASIC can use in a multitude of ways.
• Its stability and freedom from rebooting (so common in some other OSs) make it the obvious and dominant OS for Web and LAN Servers, which need to get on quietly and reliably with their work.
• It can use a huge body of free application software, of which an example is Star Office, a comprehensive personal productivity suite from a German company recently bought out by Sun Microsystems. We expect to make this available to our users soon. Other examples are the GIMP and Emacs, which were also developed for Linux.

 Last Updated: 2001.02.19

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