3 Ways to Try Out Linux, For a Windows User
One of the arguments I often hear from people who are trying to use linux for the first time is that they are not sure if they can switch back to their original choice of OS (usually windows), if they are not satisfied with their experience with linux. These are usually the people who are not as tech savy or previously had bad experience while trying to install linux which resulted in destroying their windows installation. With each iteration of windows OS Microsoft has made it less friendlier for linux to be installed along with windows.
Linux is all about choices, and I believe the users should have the choice to switch back and forth into whatever OS they want to. And in order to do so we have to make this experience for new users as friendly and as non-destructive to their experience as possible. And hopefully when they see the true power and the convenience they get from Linux experience, they will make the full switch themselves.
1) Cygwin: Cygwin lets you run powerful linux applications under windows environment, without having to install the whole OS. This is possible with the help of cygwin1.dll, which acts as a Linux API emulation layer. The programs themselves need to be recompiled to run under cygwin. There are a large number of application available for you to run under cygwin. This is a great way for you to get your toes wet with Linux environment and try out some of the more common linux applications out there. Don’t be fooled by my description; but cygwin itself is very powerful and widely used by many serious developers working under windows environment.
You can read more about Cygwin and download it from it’s website: http://www.cygwin.com/
2) Virtualization: Virtualization puts some spice to your computer experience, and with the help of seamless virtual machine setup (read my how-to), you will have a hard time justifying installing linux in a separate partition or even ever having to reboot to your linux partition. There are currently two leading OS vitualization application out there: Commercial application VMware, and freeware and my favorite Virtualbox. Virtualization has come a long way from it’s early days, its support for external devices like USB, wifi, DVD are better than ever before. But Virtual OS is not for everyone. You will will need some decent memory and CPU power to appreciate the true strength of virtualization. Even with all it’s its features and performance there is still a lot to be desired in terms of graphics and speed. VirtualOS is right for you if you find yourself using linux not as often. For more information, check out VirtualBox and VMware.
Here is an image of Seamless virtualbox setup where firefox is running under windows and Linux setup separately at the same time:
(click for larger image)
Another form of virtual linux installation that is quickly gaining popularity among virtual linux users are virtual desktops with coLinux (Cooperative Linux) kernel. What sets these virtual machines apart from traditional virtual installation is it’s speed, which runs almost as good as a native installation; as it get full control of host machine hardware. Cooperative Virtual Machine (CVM) is a rather new development and is not as widely adopted or used by the linux community, yet. You can find a small list of linux distro using coLinux kernel, here. I have personally used Ulteo, and it works great; it is a plug and play Ubuntu-derived coLinux distribution that provides hundreds applications out of the box, has very easy installation and works on XP and Vista (32-bit only). Check out ulteo for yourself, here.
Here is Ulteo in action:
3) Wubi: Wubi stands for (Windows-based Ubuntu Installer). I swear by wubi and highly recommend to new users thinking about using linux with minimum risks. With Wubi, you get to install a full-featured linux distro (this case Ubuntu), inside a windows partition, without loosing any performance and risking your system by creating a separate partition. Wubi works so great that it performs as good as a native linux installation. Wubi also gets full access to graphics card which lets you use compiz-fusion functionality, and other third party devices which is not always possible with virtual machines. To remove a wubi based linux system, you would uninstall it the same way you would uninstall any windows application. From my experience, installing with wubi is much faster than installing in a separate partition. The only drawback with wubi-based system is that since it’s installed on top of a NT file system, over time performance might degrade because of fragmentation; which you can improve by defragmenting your linux file system.
Installing Wubi:
Uninstalling Wubi:
Hopefully this will help you make the switch to linux, without the fear of loosing anything. Linux can be a great alternative to your primary OS, and these are some great ways to try it and compare it yourself.
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Here’s another 2:
1. play with live CD’s (it can get you used to linux, no great distros, but meh)
2. Free Shell Accounts…you can get used to the command-line in a non-destructive environment.
@JD good points. However Live CD is very slow, which might not be attractive for new users trying linux for the first time. Also livecd is very limited in terms of functions and performance. Free shell accounts has it’s own sets of limitations, you are probably better of with cygwin, if you are new linux user. But thats my opinion and I could be wrong.
I like the 2nd ways. Built you own linux like real one but in vitual machines. But probably you need a lot of memory resources.
1. Cygwin is “unix within windows”. It will give new users a taste of the BASH shell, but it isn’t really anything like a usual Linux desktop, unless you spend a lot of time installing and configuring additional packages. It’s way easier to just do a regular partition and install, with today’s distros. Despite the disclaimers, should we really be telling people they are “risking their system” by partitioning these days?
2. VM - also way too complicated for Linux novices.
3. Wubi - no personal experience, but sounds appealling.
To which I would add:
1. Live CD - as long as you understand that it is just a demo and the real thing will be way faster, it is a good introduction (your comments noted).
2. Live USB - exceedingly cool, way faster than Live CD, but not so simple to make, and BIOS has to allow booting from USB drive. However, it is a *great* way for a Linux enthusiast to demo Linux on a friend’s machine. When you pull your tiny pen drive off your keychain, plug it into someone else’s computer, and reboot into a completely portable OS environment, it makes a great impression.
3. Use an old PC - there are tons of old computers lying around or available very cheaply.
4. Add another hard drive - this is extremely easy. We need to get people to not be afraid to open the case. Afterwards, they will be so proud that they feel like they have transplanted a new organ into someone!
@David in general, I agree with you. But Vista users really do risk quite a lot in attempting to install any linux distro on a seperate partition, when Vista is the primary installed OS. You were less at risk of loosing your windows partition during the windows 98/xp days than now. It’s a sad truth. But I have seen it happen countless times. There is no reason not to state the obvious fact. However what we don’t want is new linux users having a bad experience with linux the first time. So I was discussing the less risky alternatives of a full featured linux installation.
In case of Virtual machine, I also mentioned Ulteo, it takes 15 minutes to install (maybe less); a fully functional virtual linux system along side widows; and its also faster than any virtual guest install I have ever tried.
I strongly suggest Wubi, and it’s hard to explain what a fantastic thing this is for new linux users. Even for existing ones, who uses windows quite often. It’s hard to believe that no one thought of this before. It’s so amazingly simple. If you already have the ISO downloaded it takes 15-20 minutes to install, with one reboot. Highly recommended. A ext3 file system on top of a NTFS file system; it runs faster than vista! Just cracks me up, everytime I think about it.
Or you could try fedora on a USB stick.
A brilliant way to testdrive a cracking OS and more interactive than a Live Cd as it allows you to save data back to the stick, like a portable OS!
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FedoraLiveCD/USBHowTo
I would like to learn linux
It seems to be for a certain type of person who like to endlessly tinker
If its out of the box thats great - but what happens if you want to change things - who do you ask if you do not have a local linux guru on call
There’s another option which is to install something like AndLinux, it’s basically the linux kernel ported to run under Windows.
Cool I want to try Wubi, any info on a tutorial to getting it set up. I don’t want to mess around with creating another partition unless it’s needed. I wish there was a full blown tutorial for that.
Live CDs are great as well because they give you a sniff of Linux without installing anything, and they’re so plain simple to use. The only problem is they run much much slower because they’re reading off cd so it’s not too great.
I am with Michael. I like andlinux for this purpose:
http://www.andlinux.org/
It is as easy as installing most Windows program.
I installed Ubuntu / wubi and like it. I haven’t booted XP in months and it boots about 100 faster than my pregnant windows installation on my 5 year old eMachine!
I love Wubi, this is how I convince friends to try out Ubuntu. If they don’t like it just uninstall it.
Installed wubi. Sounded great. Unfortunately moving the mouse left trails and blocks behind on the screen. I googled for a solution and didn’t find one. I have an older dell but it runs XP fine. Too bad because this would have been really nice… but for me…Linux frustration again. I can understand spending time to look for more advanced stuff in Linux… but I can’t get basic functionality most of the time. It’s free so no complaints. It’s never ruined my system or anything. There is a little bit too much goofing with it to begin with tho. I guess I need to befriend a Linux guy who can get me started. Too bad …I was excited this time.
just try live cd. It’s the easiest way to try out linux.
OK, I got it to work. used it for about a week and it’s fine… the screensaver crashes the computer for reasons unknown and I cant use a UBS memory stick with it. Really have to keep windows because I am not going to hunt down all the little issues. Computers are not really a hobby of mine and don’t want to make them that. I will boot up Ubuntu and goof around with it some, but not going to make it my primary OS on my primary computer. Windows is still worth the money.
Eric, I use linux, Windows and Mac. I think everyone should use whatever they feel like using. the whole point of this post and most posts in this blog is to get you more familiar with linux, so that you can try it and judge for yourself what you would like to use. I never ask anyone or try to convince anyone to leave whatever OS they are using and start using linux from now on. That would be very unreasonable. I use windows quite often, and there are certain things that windows offer that I can’t do in Linux and there are certain things that Linux offers that I can’t do in windows. I am quite happy with both, and I am making myself more familiar with MacOS everyday. For me Computers is a hobby and I like experiencing new things everyday. I don’t like to be bound by one system. :)
Wubi is, so far, the best way to \”try\” linux. at least thats what i think. There just isnt anything hard about it. if you dont like it, boot your precious windows and \”add/remove programs\” and easy peasy, its so easy it could have been something open source!!
How about if I do not have admin rights on my windows? Is there anything I can do?
-Live CD and USB is not possible (bios is passworded)
-Wubi affects boot menus and therefor needs full access (is this right? can I use it some else way)
-Cygwin and VirtualBox are programs (how about andLinux?), can I install either to my home-folder? (even if I abandon some features)
Few years ago I used ‘cygwined-bash’ with restricted user. I just download exe and couple of dlls and put them on MyFolder and just use it.
I don’t like the idea of telling users to try cygwin as a way to “play with Linux” especially if it will be a person’s first experience. I use Cygwin everyday but I see it more as a way for Linux/Unix users to use *nix apps on Windows when there is no Windows equivalent or the Windows equivalent is inferior.
First of all, Cygwin is not visually appealing so it doesn’t have that initial WOW! effect that many Linux distributions have when using the default install. This WOW! effect is sometimes enough to get engage users who then continue using Linux. Remember, first impressions are important. With cygwin, users will install it and think “Okay, now what?”.
Also, running cygwin apps differ significantly from running the same apps in Linux. This is mostly because the apps are limited by the Windows environment but other times the app itself is different. If users become comfortable with cygwin they may have a harder time when using Linux. Given the choice I’d say learn Linux well then use Cygwin when you’re stuck on a Windows box (like at work).