...here is the latest hot trend in anti-Linux baloney: supposed Linux fans and advocates who really really love Linux and have been using it for years, but can't recommend it for anyone else because "It's not ready."

I have spent the better part of the weekend finally experiencing what so many new Linux users experience - Hardware woes. I purchased a nifty Wacom CTL 460 pen tablet for my budding artist step daughter. I assumed it would be a no-brainer. Oh was I ever wrong.

If you have friends or colleagues who you would like to have try the Linux OS, an important decision would be the distro you choose. There are over 500 out there and whatever distro you choose will be a great factor in shaping your friends view of Linux.

"If a collection of software contains (or suggests installation of) some non-free program, I do not recommend it. [...] I therefore exercise my freedom of speech by not including OpenBSD in the list of systems that I recommend to the public."

I read a recent post called “Why I Won’t Be Recommending Linux to Family this Holiday Season.” The funny part is, the real reason…he doesn’t want to take the heat for telling them to use Linux and have something go wrong! Wimp!

"...In the GNU Project we usually recommend people use copyleft licenses like GNU GPL, rather than permissive non-copyleft free software licenses. We don't argue harshly against the non-copyleft licenses—in fact, we occasionally recommend them in special circumstances—but the advocates of those licenses show a pattern of arguing harshly against the GPL..."

Last week we took the eagle's eye view of the principles behind SELinux. Today we'll dig a bit more deeply into SELinux policies, and then fire up Fedora 8 and see what SELinux looks like in practice. I recommend using the latest Fedora version as a SELinux training tool, because Fedora has the most mature implementation and userspace tools. Red Hat Enterprise Linux and CentOS, the leading Red Hat clone, have similar SELinux setups to Fedora. Gentoo also has a nice SELinux implementation. I don't recommend starting from scratch. Start with a working setup, and then plan to spend considerable time learning your way around it, because it is a big complex beast.

Ubuntu is a popular and widely used Linux distribution today. Ubuntu is simple, easy to use, and user-friendly. Its my personal favorite GNU/Linux distribution. Ubuntu is the best alternative to Windows operating system. If you consider switching from Windows to GNU/Linux, I would personally recommend Ubuntu.

As we wrote recently, KVM has a lot to recommend it as a virtualization solution in Ubuntu 10.04, especially in the server room.  But how ready is it for the desktop, and can it contend with applications like VirtualBox when it comes to ease-of-use?  Read on for a comparison of two of the Ubuntu world's most popular virtualization products, and some thoughts on which one is better for desktop us