I’ve had an on-and-off relationship with Linux for the past 10 years. It all started with RedHat 5.2, which I got on a CD that came with a book (because it would have taken 3 days to download on the old 56k modem, and I thought the book was a good way to start). Now, just to clarify, I was thirteen at the time.

It took me a while, but after about a week of tweaking, recompiling the kernel, finding a stable driver for my 10MBps network card, and making X work with my video card, it finally was up and running. Just the installation taught me a ton about computers, hardware, Linux, and problem solving skills that would surely help me in the future.

But I couldn’t really use it after that. I went through 5-10 distros in all after that, maybe once a year I’d give it another shot.

Last week, I installed Ubuntu 7.10, Gutsy Gibbon.