Here’s a good article about Ubuntu (and its founder Mark Shuttleworth) in the New York Times. Here’s an interesting quote.

The often quirky software remains in the realm of geeks, not grandmothers.

If the machine is built on hardware that is known to be Ubuntu compatible, then I’m not sure the above quote applies.

My mom wanted to give my grandmother a cheap computer that was powerful enough to use Skype – so she could video conference with Simon.

So my friend helped me build her an Ubuntu machine for Christmas. I’ll let you know how it goes.

2 Responses to “New York Times Article on Ubuntu”

1. 

   thomblake

   January 11, 2009 at 10:23 pm

   In my experience, ubuntu is not good for a user-administered computer. At some point, something will require manually editing a text file. Not user-friendly.

   Reply
2. 

   Andrew Cullison

   January 12, 2009 at 12:20 am

   It depends on what you’re going to do with the computer, right?

   For someone who is just going to surf the internet on Firefox (e.g., a grandmother) – and maybe use Skype – do you really think it will require text editing after the initial setup.

   In my experience, editing a text file only happened at the initial setup or playing around with some beta software.

   Reply