Hay gaiz moar Linux

[ApprenticePhreak]

So I've been using Linux for a while now and it's faithfully stood beside me and worked when I needed it to work and was repairable when shit hit the fan in the most spectacular way. For the most part on various distributions the community has been very helpful and responsive and tend to know what're they're talking  about. In this respect I tip my hat to trvelyn for being a huge help in a lot of areas.

But here's the prospect. My lady is looking into trying out the ol' Linux world here for various reasons. She's grown ever so tired of Microsoft and their shit storm dances and programs constantly bugging out. This is only couple with the fact that she's an artist and uses her computer as a canvas to paint out her worlds on. Most all the programs cost an arm and a leg and will work only when they feel like working and a mountain of other issues.

Macs aren't an option for her. We both despise the product, OS, and stuck up and mentally challenged social fan base who wave their tail feathers in some sort of ritualistic mating call any time Apple creates something new. New in the sense that it's been around for a while but it now has the letter i in front of it proclaiming the pure symbolism of the mis-begotten no talent artist and dead end musician.

M'lady can adapt fairly well. Like every other user on the face of the planet she'll either adapt instantly or trip and stumble a lot seeing as the differences from Windows to Linux/Unix are going to be large enough to envelope her. I tripped and stumbled but quickly adapted. Fun times.

Here comes my question: which OS do I start her off on? Normally Ubuntu would've been my first recommendation for this project, but I've grown very tiresome of the whole ordeal. I've been becoming very friendly with Mint lately as has everyone else. So maybe, just maybe, I'll introduce her using Mint. I know. It's an Ubuntu based OS; but fuck you.

Are there any other more "friendly" versions you guys can think of? I'll be over her shoulder helping her to adjust but I want to make sure it's as painless as possible a switch for her.

GIMP is going to be my weapon of choice when the switch happens. It pretty much plays out like Adobe Photoshop in the sense I can edit pictures to put balls or butt cheeks on something. Seeing as I also lack artistic ability and tend to stray away from art programs, can you guys recommend any?

I'm begging a lot. Sorry.

[PHISH-PHREAK]

Assuming your lady is a female just get her one of these and tell her shes connected to the internets. She'll never know the difference!

[Arox!]

tl:dr

[SpaceBison]

blah blah....
Here comes my question: which OS do I start her off on? Normally Ubuntu would've been my first recommendation for this project, but I've grown very tiresome of the whole ordeal. I've been becoming very friendly with Mint lately as has everyone else. So maybe, just maybe, I'll introduce her using Mint. I know. It's an Ubuntu based OS; but fuck you.

And what the fuck is wrong with Ubuntu? Fuck you too.

[ApprenticePhreak]

blah blah....
Here comes my question: which OS do I start her off on? Normally Ubuntu would've been my first recommendation for this project, but I've grown very tiresome of the whole ordeal. I've been becoming very friendly with Mint lately as has everyone else. So maybe, just maybe, I'll introduce her using Mint. I know. It's an Ubuntu based OS; but fuck you.

And what the fuck is wrong with Ubuntu? Fuck you too.

Ever since version 8.1 it's become super flakey. Network connections some times decide they want to stay connected for more than an hour. There are times when the machines it's running on go the speed they were previously. Recompiling the kernel does virtually nothing. Ubuntu just feels like its gained miles harder and faster than it should have since the day of Feisty Fawn. Honestly it feels like it's starting become the Vista of the Linux world.

[SpaceBison]

Huh, I have 9.04 running on my laptop and it seems to run about the same as 8.04, better actually since I don't have to recompile my wireless drivers every time the kernel updates. I never could get 8.10 running on it though. Maybe you should stick to 8.04 since it's a lts release.

[MattGSX]

I also enjoy 9.04. It has decent power management, lots of bundled wireless drivers, and the aforementioned lack of problems with recompiling (in my experience). It has some little quirks that I'm not crazy about (one of which being problems with multiple displays), and its compatibility with WINE seems to have depreciated. I also find myself using the terminal less, but I'm not sure if this is a good or a bad thing. As far as network connections go: I use a card with the Atheros chipset in my notebook, and my connections actually seem MORE stable with Ubuntu than they do Vista

You may want to try something like Ubuntu Studio (assuming it's still active) with the extra multimedia tools added in. I also like Mint, but have been loath to switch distros on my main computer because of all the file transferring I would need to do. I also liked Mandriva and PCLinuxOS, but I abandoned those because of driver issues (Mandriva didn't have the driver for my USB bridge, PCLinuxOS's latest releases seemed too buggy and bloated).

Also, there is ArtistX (http://www.artistx.org/site2/), but it is based on Ubuntu 8.1 and may have some of the same inherent issues (I also had problems with 8.1, so I feel your pain). Otherwise, you could always just take a look at the programs bundled with that and install them on a fresh Mint install.

Whatever you do, if your ladyfriend needs to use things like a tablet or special hardware, try several live CD's to test the hardware first. You may also want to consider installing a more lightweight window manager or desktop environment (I used to be a big OpenBox fan, but have been content with either GNOME or xfce). The IceWM is also very nice. I don't know if she will have latency issues when working, so this whole thing may be a moot point anyway. Avoid enlightenment if you want to minimize her learning curve (though trev may disagree).