Linux Benefits Useful For Desktop Users, Server Users, Programmers & Gamers

Lot of companies now-a-days offer Linux as pre-installed operating systems in their equipments like Laptops, Desktops or net-books. But most of the people do not use it rather they remove Linux and install another desired OS. There are many reasons for this but the foundation of all those reason is as discussed below.Before some 15-20 years, In India, computer education was made available by various Institutes which was then followed by many Schools, colleges and other institutions. Right from the age in child hood people are given Microsoft Windows as their only way of computing.

Resulting to which we can see that most of the people do not know the term Operating System but they do know Microsoft Windows. Most of the people do not know that as an operating system there are lot of other options available in the world of computing.Even Microsoft Strategies for Licensing encourage this in India. They charge a very small amount for Licenses in Educational institutes. But as and when a student grows up and if they want to use MS Windows or in that matter any MS products they have only two ways out. Number 1 is Piracy and Number 2 is huge investments on Software Licensing.

A very small number of people are really aware about capabilities of Linux. Those people really have the capabilities of selecting or not selecting Linux for their own working environment. But we can see that even people who are not aware of Linux also some how decide for not selecting Linux or Open Source for their computing. Or rather we can say that people who dont know Linux would only decide for not selecting Linux

Mr. Richard Stallman, of gnu.org, who has seen ups and downs of software in both the world of Licensed and Free software made hard efforts for offering freedom to people as far as software usage is concerned. Following him there came many other communities who really put some hard, smart and intelligent efforts on creating great software applications for people.

Today we are able to see a huge no. of communities working on different open-source projects to create some really great software. We have around 100s of Linux distributions available at various projects run by different group of people.

Talking about Software Programming Linux has got a huge potential on offering almost any type of programming support. Same is the case with server OS technologies. Linux offers a safe and stable environment. And now since last 4-5 years Linux has been evolved to the highest potential as far as desktop computing is concerned. OSes like Ubuntu, Fedora, Suse and many more offer a huge set of applications for people to select. Even in the area of Gaming Linux has a great support in both 2D and 3D games. Linux also has a good support on new and old generation graphic cards to encourage gamers and people who love to work with animation and video graphics.

On the other hand getting support for Linux and other open-source software seems to be tougher for newbies which in reality is very easy but only when they adapt to getting support in the way they get. There are lot of forums run by various communities to get support. There are lot of commercially operating companies that provide support for organisations and enterprises that are seeking Linux support. People just need to go thru various websites, forums and blogs available for Linux and OSS (open-source software) both Free and commercial.

Direct Benefits of Linux for different category of people

Direct benefits for Desktop Users :

1. They do not have to be a software pirate neither have to make huge investments of software licensing
2. They get a dynamically fantastic desktop
3. A huge set of desktop applications.
4. Best support for almost all of their hardware devices on usb, serial etc. ports
5. A huge set of Multimedia Applications
6. Very Good support for Web cam and Audio/Video chat with gtalk, msn and skype is available
7. Very good support for Internet applications like Web browser, email clients, chat clients, social site clients, etc. is available
8. With A huge set of Games

Direct benefits for Software programmers :

1. Software Developers can have a selection out of various programming platforms available in the world because almost all the programming platforms are supported by Linux.
2. They get A great set of IDEs. Example Netbeans, Eclipse and many more.
3. Very Important Point to note

• Software applications created with Windows and its native programming support are all limited to windows users. So that means if you want to use such applications you will have to pay for the software and also for Windows. This means that if a windows software developer is charging at the rate of Rs. 5,000 Per user, then the user ultimately pays Rs. 15,000 per user, because he will have to buy a copy of windows for 10,000. But imagine if the software is made for OS like Linux they can rather charge more for their software say Rs. 8,000 people won’t mind as they are saving Rs. 7,000.

Direct benefits for Server Users :

1. They do not have to pay heavy costs on server OS licensing.
2. They get a Safe and Stable server environment.
3. A huge set of server applications for Web Server, Email Server, File Server, Proxy Server, DNS and many more are easily available. While services for them are also eaisily available

• Total Cost of Ownership is much lower if at all we count the deployment cost as it reduces downtime, licensing cost and maintenance.

Direct benefits for PC Gamers :

1. A huge set of Free Open-Source Games is available at various sources
2. A huge set of online game clients are available
3. Good support for Graphics Card is available with Linux
4. Open Source alternatives for some commercial games can be found using google

So it is time to finally change the questions in our mind for Linux and give it a try whole heartedly as the new question that comes is…..

Linux is ready but are we ready for Linux ?