Question: what initially attracts you to an operating system?
Answer: eyecandy of course :D

Question 2: what is one of the major advantages of Linux?
Answer: customization

Question 3: what would attract more people to Linux?
Answer: an application that lets you easily customize every aspect of the Graphical User Interface

yes yes i know that you can make your own skins but realistically most people dont know how to write a gtkrc (or metacity theme etc etc..) and dont have the patience to learn, and yes i do know that you can download a whole range of skins and themes from places such as www.gnome-look.org. The point I am trying to make however is that its all fine and well to download a nice theme but in order for the Linux experience to be truly personal the end user must be able to customize the look of their system with ease the way that they want it, not just looking through a site and getting the best theme they could find. Its almost like cooking- the food that you cook yourself always seems to taste better than other peoples.

Now when I talk about an application that would customize every aspect of the GUI I'm talking about every aspect. Take the close window button for example, the user would have the option to change the shape, texture, glow, shadows, position, colour, gradients, transparency (possibly through integration with beryl or compiz) even how matte/glossy it would be, they could even have the option of importing a custom pixmap if they were a bit of a dab in photoshop (or the GIMP- whatever tickles your fancy). When the user was finished customizing their skin they could upload it to the web so other people could download it and modify it a little (or a lot) or use it for inspiration on their own themes. The best part is that they could do all this without seeing a snippet of code.

So let me know what you think guys- is it a good/bad idea, is it realistic?

About a month ago I decided that enough was enough- I was going to escape from uncle Bills pocket and dip my toes in the world of freedom that was open source. The first step for this was of course to get this open source operating system called "Linux". Oh yes i had it all sorted out i was going to download this "Linux" and set up a dual boot system with Windows XP just so i had something to fall back on- and then came the problem:


TOO MANY GOD DAMN DISTROS!!!!!!!!!!
Beforehand I had always thought that there was just "Linux" but no it turns out that there is the Linux kernel and about a zillion quadrillion so called "Distro's" now that may just be fine for all those Linux guru's who can hack into the matrix and actually know what to look for in a distro but for me a 16 year old at the time who had only ever used Windows and knew only very basic things about Linux the choice was daunting. I've come to the conclusion that operating system are a lot like places to get food. Windows is a lot like one of those hot chip stalls you get at fairs, the choice is easy because you can get hot chips or hot chips with tomato sauce (or ketchup for the Americans). Linux on the other hand is more like a 5 star restaurant and there are lots of different dishes. I come from a hot chip stall so when I get to the 5 star restaurant I'm not used to all these dishes like the regulars are and I don't have a clue what to get so in the end i decided that "Ill just have what they're having"- enter Ubuntu.

Ubuntu glorious Ubuntu
All across the interweb (more specifically Digg) im constantly finding people bowing before the awesome might of Ubuntu so i found a guide to dual booting it with XP and went on my way- unfortunately for Mr Gates I can be a bit lazy at times so when I booted the live cd and experienced Ubuntu for the first time i was instantly addicted and couldnt really be bothered attempting to make my system a dual boot so i just installed Ubuntu right over the top of XP. I dont think I've ever had such a trouble free installation- I simply pressed ok a few times and it went about its business. 20 minutes later I had my freedom, all my hardware had been detected and was working just dandy, hell it even managed to squeeze an extra gig out of my hard drive. The only teeny weeny problem was that my modem was a software modem and Intel hadn't released support for the 2.6 kernel- oh joy- my life was destroyed it was like going for a really fantastic run in the morning only to step in the smelly remains of the dogs breakfast walking up the driveway. A week, $18 and an external serial modem later I was finally able to connect to the internet- then came the next problem

WHAT!!! I CANT PLAY MP3'S!!!!!!!!!
Thats right ladies gents and geeks of the in between kind you have to install multimedia support- it took me about an hour just to figure out how to get it. They should really have the default desktop wallpaper with big words on it "GET AUTOMATIX IT WILL FIX YOUR PROBLEMS" it would save soooo much time especially for the guys coming from hot chip stalls.


Again Ubuntu glorious Ubuntu
With all the problems ironed out of my brand new ubuntu clothing i was able to get back to the Ubuntu way of computing without any fences or walls (because without these who needs Gates and Windows). I customized my desktop and got new themes and new icons and i downloaded some of the thousands of FOSS (free open source software) programs with ease through the add/remove function. I can do everything with Ubuntu that i could do with XP and more and no one was trying to charge me a few hundred dollars to do it- I love it! power to the penguin.