Catholic Info
Traditional Catholic Faith => Computers, Technology, Websites => Topic started by: MiracleOfTheSun on February 29, 2024, 05:19:53 PM
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When using Linux, do sites like CathInfo have to be specially formatted to be viewable on Linux? Or can I use Linux to download Mozilla (or any other browser) and surf the web per the usual?
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It's not about the operating system but about the browser. If you can get a good, modern HTML5-compliant browser (most of the big names are), you should have no issues.
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So download Linux, put on Mozilla, and things would be good to go? ( aside from navigating the new system )
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When using Linux, do sites like CathInfo have to be specially formatted to be viewable on Linux? Or can I use Linux to download Mozilla (or any other browser) and surf the web per the usual?
You'd be surprised how much of your computer life is done through the browser. And yes, the browser experience is the same on Linux, Windows, Mac -- or Chromebook.
That's the whole theory behind low-cost Chromebooks. "We don't need CPU power or software. Just give them a cheap laptop that can surf the web, and most people will be good to go." And they're right, in most cases.
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So download Linux, put on Mozilla, and things would be good to go? ( aside from navigating the new system )
Most Linux distros come with Mozilla Firefox as the default browser, so there's really nothing you'll have to do. CathInfo works perfectly on my Linux laptop using any normal browser.
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When using Linux, do sites like CathInfo have to be specially formatted to be viewable on Linux? Or can I use Linux to download Mozilla (or any other browser) and surf the web per the usual?
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Nope. I'm using Linux to type this. :cowboy:
The internet doesn't look any different on Linux than it does on any other operating system. And you can use any modern browser in Linux. I'm using Firefox, but you can also use Chrome, Safari (probably), Chromium, Opera, Vivaldi, etc. They all come with Linux versions that work exactly the same as how they work in Windows.
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Thanks all. Will take a look at the Linux link in the other thread and poke around.
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Again, I keep repeating: I'm a power user. I'm a software developer and do a lot of web development; I need several browsers on my PC, including various plugins, to do my work. If Linux wasn't adequate, I would be the first to discover it, not the last.
Imagine a hammer that is used by a handyman to do 25 different things, all day every day. Then I come along and ask, "Yes, but will it drive a nail into the wall? That's what I need done..." Um, DUH! of course it will! If it will do various exotic tasks for that handyman (a specialist), things you'll never need to do, of course it can do the absolute basics like driving a nail in the wall.
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I've downloaded Cinnamon 21.3 from Linux Mint onto a usb but it didn't automatically open up Linux. Isn't it supposed to just open and start operating? Attached is a screenshot of the usb files. I put in the usb then turned on the computer. Any quick thoughts or should I download it again as this is a clear indication something went wrong? Thanks
(https://i.imgur.com/8NJ3X5Z.png)
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Hunted around and got it operational so it looks to be up and running. Should it typically be a faster system or just sapping less resources?
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Hunted around and got it operational so it looks to be up and running. Should it typically be a faster system or just sapping less resources?
For your previous question, I was about to say that you needed to reboot your PC and press the appropriate key (based on your device, sadly the hardware manufacturers do not use a universal standard :fryingpan:) to pull up your list of boot devices. I'm glad that you were able to get Linux running. Are you just using the Live USB environment, or have you installed it on your internal drive? Using Linux off of a USB, and especially off of a CD/DVD, will be noticeably slower than running it installed on a hard drive or solid state drive.
For your current question, Mint using Cinnamon desktop should be faster than Windows 10, and definitely use way less resources. There's not a bajillion Microsoft spyware and update services running in the background on Mint, which significantly lightens the load on your CPU, memory, and internal storage drive. You can always check resource usage with whatever resource monitor program that ships with Mint (I can't remember which one it comes with on Cinnamon, but you can find it in your list of applications) to see just how lean it's running. I like to use a terminal-based program called Htop for system resource monitoring.
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Hunted around and got it operational so it looks to be up and running. Should it typically be a faster system or just sapping less resources?
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Both.
Any operating system run from a USB drive is going to be slower than the same thing run off a normal hard drive because of the slower read/write rates with a USB thumb drive. You can expect significant speed improvements if you install to your hard drive.
The real purpose of installing and running Linux from a thumb drive is to see if it works for you and if you are comfortable with it.
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So far I'm just running it from the usb but the difference in speed is already noticeably different and faster. I still need Windows for a couple of things so I guess I'll look into partitioning the drive. It looks and feels just like Windows so I'm pretty happy it's already working. Any hot tips on the best way to set it up to have access to both operating systems? I'm a real newb at this stuff so anything appreciated.
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Actually, gotta say this difference in speed is amazing even from just the usb.
Had another question for any computer person. Anything wrong with Adblocker Plus? I was using it on Windows and just want to make sure it isn't clutter and is worth putting on the Linux. Thanks.
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So far I'm just running it from the usb but the difference in speed is already noticeably different and faster. I still need Windows for a couple of things so I guess I'll look into partitioning the drive. It looks and feels just like Windows so I'm pretty happy it's already working. Any hot tips on the best way to set it up to have access to both operating systems? I'm a real newb at this stuff so anything appreciated.
The best way to to have 2 separate Drives. One for windows and another for Linux. when you boot you can set it to which one you prefer, or take you to the boot menu and let you pick, otherwise you will need to press a button manually to bring up the options if you want to boot from a 2nd OS that isn't your default.
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Actually, gotta say this difference in speed is amazing even from just the usb.
Had another question for any computer person. Anything wrong with Adblocker Plus? I was using it on Windows and just want to make sure it isn't clutter and is worth putting on the Linux. Thanks.
AD+ is a browser extension and it's not very good. Use ublock origin. And yes it will be worth using it on your browser even in linux. (Ps. on mobile firefox allows extensions so you can have adblock or use brave browser, good for IOS blocking as well).
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I'll have to chew on this info for a while, about the two op systems. And thanks for the tip on Ublock too.
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So far I'm just running it from the usb but the difference in speed is already noticeably different and faster. I still need Windows for a couple of things so I guess I'll look into partitioning the drive. It looks and feels just like Windows so I'm pretty happy it's already working. Any hot tips on the best way to set it up to have access to both operating systems? I'm a real newb at this stuff so anything appreciated.
Like AnthonyPadua said, having a second drive will be the best way to use both Windows and Linux together. Technically you could permanently install Linux on another flashdrive and just use that to boot from, but you may run into some performance issues down the road. If the flashdrive is USB 3.0 (the blue end instead of the black) and plugged in on a USB 3.0 or greater port, it would be fast enough for daily usage and still be faster than Windows. Though for best performance, having another internal SSD for Linux is the best.
Actually, gotta say this difference in speed is amazing even from just the usb.
Had another question for any computer person. Anything wrong with Adblocker Plus? I was using it on Windows and just want to make sure it isn't clutter and is worth putting on the Linux. Thanks.
AnthonyPadua also gave the best answer for this, which is to use uBlock Origin and/or Brave for ad blocking. Even in Brave, I still use uBlock Origin alongside Brave's built-in ad blocker :laugh1:. They work better than Adblocker Plus, and with uBlock you can do a lot more customization with what and how it blocks. It can even be used as a content filter if you paste in the URLs in its custom rules section. uBlock Origin also has an "element picker" tool, which allows you to block certain elements on a website. So if a website you visit has annoying and/or immoral banners that are not ads, you could quickly block them with the element picker and never have to worry about seeing it again. If you break the rendering of a website with the element picker, you can revert its changes easily.
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So far I'm just running it from the usb but the difference in speed is already noticeably different and faster. I still need Windows for a couple of things so I guess I'll look into partitioning the drive. It looks and feels just like Windows so I'm pretty happy it's already working. Any hot tips on the best way to set it up to have access to both operating systems? I'm a real newb at this stuff so anything appreciated.
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Linux automatically detects the presence of Windows on your system when you go to install Linux. What it will do is ask you if you want to install alongside Windows. This is what I usually do, and I can assure you it is very easy to set up and works very reliably. It carves out a chunk of your hard drive to install Linux on, of a size you can specify with a sliding bar (it shows you how much of the Windows partition is used, how much is free, and so on.) Then it installs a special program to boot up your computer. What happens when you boot your computer after that is that as soon as the POST process is over, you get a menu asking you which operating system you want to boot up. The default is Linux, with a ten-second timer to continue booting Linux automatically if you don't press any buttons. Or you can select Windows from the menu, at which point Windows boots as normal.
Linux is highly adaptable at customizing this start menu, and automatically updates it if you install yet another Linux version on your hard drive, giving you two versions of Linux and one of Windows.
I've done all of these things over the years with no problems. Then, if you want to delete Linux and go back to Windows (you won't, but ...) you can run some Windows command that will restore the normal Windows boot option if you want. You'll have to look at your particular version of Windows to do that.
This is all very easy and convenient, because you can install both operating systems on the same hard drive, without even having to open your computer's case or buy another hard drive or anything else. Actually, I think installing Linux on a separate hard drive would be more difficult, because the bootloader might not be able to find Linux on the other hard drive. I'm not sure, but the dual-boot, one-hard drive approach is something that is extremely convenient, automatic, and reliable.
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the dual-boot, one-hard drive approach is something that is extremely convenient, automatic, and reliable.
This is all pretty much new to me - partitions, 2 op systems, etc. - but checking out gootube vids it seems like there are plenty of 10 - 15 min clips showing how to do it.
Also, I was running it from the usb and when I opened it the next day everything had reverted like the font sizes and date. Is that normal or did I miss something?
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Also, I was running it from the usb and when I opened it the next day everything had reverted like the font sizes and date. Is that normal or did I miss something?
When you boot from the live USB, none of your changes are saved. If you want to save any changes to the OS, you will have to install Mint persistently on a drive. If you still want to play around with it and not make a big commitment, you can buy a cheap USB 3.0 flash drive (32-64 GB will be sufficient) and install Linux on that. With that, you would need to boot to your live USB environment on your current flash drive, and then make sure to have the other flash drive plugged in so that you could install to it. When the installer prompts you for which drive to install on, make sure to choose the 2nd flash drive, otherwise you may overwrite your Windows drive or your live USB flashdrive.
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otherwise you may overwrite your Windows drive or your live USB flashdrive.
That's good to know. I think I'll try to avoid that and look into the partition way of things. Thanks
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That's good to know. I think I'll try to avoid that and look into the partition way of things. Thanks
You're welcome, but trying to partition a single drive for multiple operating systems will actually be more difficult, especially since you'll have to resize your existing Windows partition and Windows doesn't always play nice with Linux on the same drive. The last time I tried that, I was trying to put Linux on half of my laptop's SSD after I had installed Windows on the other half. Lo and behold, the Windows boot manager did not like sharing a drive with Linux's boot manager GRUB, so the dual-booting failed. I ended up wiping the drive and only installing Linux after I realized I didn't need Windows for daily use. Now on my desktop at home, I do use both Windows and Linux, but I have them on separate internal drives. The only thing I have to do to swap between them is to reboot my PC, pull up the device boot menu, and select the drive with the operating system that I want to use. It's a clean setup, and I can even specify in my PC's settings which drive to default to when my computer boots. And on my daily use laptop, I have Linux on the internal drive, but I carry a portable SSD that has Windows on it that I can boot from.
As long as you look closely at what drive you're partitioning, you shouldn't have to worry about overwriting the wrong drive. The listed drives for partitioning generally have the manufacturer of the device along with the capacity of the drive as its name. For example, a SanDisk Cruzer 32 gigabyte flashdrive might show up as something like SANDISK_32GB. As long as your live USB and flashdrive that you want to install Linux on are not identical in model and storage capacity, the chance of mixing them up is very low.
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I installed Linux Mint Cinnamon onto a sluggish old Windows 8 Toshiba and it has been running like a champ for the last few weeks. Thank you for the info.
Now I want to dual boot the Windows 11 laptop but I've never done a dual boot. Looking at Yootube there's a ton of how-to vids but is there anything I particularly need to know or anything I should look out for? How much space should ideally be allotted to each Op System or does that matter?
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I installed Linux Mint Cinnamon onto a sluggish old Windows 8 Toshiba and it has been running like a champ for the last few weeks. Thank you for the info.
Now I want to dual boot the Windows 11 laptop but I've never done a dual boot. Looking at Yootube there's a ton of how-to vids but is there anything I particularly need to know or anything I should look out for? How much space should ideally be allotted to each Op System or does that matter?
The easiest way to dual boot is to install another drive in your laptop and load Linux on that. Depending on your laptop, you may have some good options for this. For example, on my 13 year old Lenovo ThinkPad T420, I already had an SSD with Windows 7 on it, but I also wanted to use Linux alongside it. The T420, in addition to the SATA slot that the main drive was hooked up to, has an MSATA slot (the pre-cursor to the current trend of M.2 SATA) that was easily accessible from the bottom of the laptop. I bought an MSATA drive, installed it, and then installed Artix to it with no issue. The only thing I have to do when it boots up is to press the right key to bring up my list of devices to boot into, otherwise it defaults to the Linux drive. If you'll post what model your Windows 11 laptop is, I can check for you to see if installing a second drive is a viable option. Worst case scenario you could install Linux on a portable SSD and hook that up whenever you want to use Linux. I use a portable SSD for my current laptop, but I have Windows on it since I don't need it often and can get by with daily driving Linux.
Otherwise, you're going to have to use Disk Management in Windows to manually resize your partition. Should you do this, I'd recommend leaving at least 60 GB for Windows 11 given how much space it continues to gobble up with each update. Leave more if you plan to use Windows a decent amount, or if you are currently using more than 60 GB for it. With Linux, the base system is drastically smaller, so you don't have to set aside as much space for it (could probably get away with 30 GB with normal use). Ultimately, it depends on your use case and how big your current drive is. I personally don't recommend putting Linux and Windows on the same drive, because the Windows boot loader gets all jealous when it sees the Linux bootloader and causes some problems, probably by design.
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Indeed that first paragraph, while I very much welcome the info, is a great example of why these machines can feel like soul crushing destroyers.
I think a portable could make sense and would be easy for someone like me to use. A computer to me is music recording, stock analysis and regular web surfing. Real basic stuff.
I did a quick search for a model number and think this is it - System SKU 3Y058UA#ABA. HP Windows 11 Home edition. Thanks again. Appreciate it.