Emery Fletcher

This is a response to Installing Firefox 3.6 on Linux: Only Pros Need Apply— ed. Back last August, as soon as Firefox 3.5 was released, I installed it on Ubuntu 9.04 (I can never remember the animal names). I didn’t know how to do it, because I was a rank beginner. Still am. But back […]

Back in June, when I wrote an opinion piece about the enduring competition between the three major operating systems, I assumed the race would just go on indefinitely. After all, the three systems have been locked in combat for the hearts and minds of the public for years and years, and the likelihood of any […]

Has Microsoft become bipolar? You might think so, from the news reports over the last few weeks. On the plus side they’ve issued a version of Windows that has so far received glowing reviews and which – to date – has dodged at least two fairly major security bullets. They’ve also made a number of […]

Last week Amazon, without prior notice, withdrew certain books from the Kindles of people who had purchased the books. Purchased, remember, not rented or leased or time-shared – the buyers were of the opinion that the money they had paid somehow guaranteed them the right to read the material whenever they chose. Amazon credited their […]

I’ve been on a history kick lately, inspired by the fact that the foundation of the Unix operating system was created just 40 years ago this summer, starting with software written by Ken Thompson at Bell Laboratories. He wrote an OS, a shell, an editor, and an assembler all in just one month, in assembly […]

Editor’s note: Emery Fletcher is a 75-year-old Linux newbie who’s chronicling his experiences with the open source OS. His goal is “give you a newcomer’s view of some of the significant experiences I’ve encountered in moving from a monolithic, self-contained, and nearly immutable system like Windows to a flexible and self-directed OS like any of […]

[Editor’s note: in a recent article about Ubuntu, Linux guru Carla Schroder — author of the Linux Cookbook — noted that she had never met anyone who bought a “how to” book for their PC – though she recommended it. A Datamation reader wrote to respond.] Dear Ms. Schroder, In your article Linux for Newbies, […]