My Technology

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A common discussion in any of the technology forums is which platform is better. Some argue that Windows is best, others that Mac is and others, still, argue that Linux beats them all. What is my take? Well... it depends.

I am Operating System Agnostic

Truly, I am. I have all three operating systems in use in my home as I write this.

I started my technology back in 1984 or 1985 with a Commodore 128. It didn't take long at all to capture my imagination and soon I was doing some Basic programming, playing games, writing papers, etc all on that little computer. I'm not sure my wife was all that impressed. But, boy, I sure was!

I ordered the C/PM software that would run on the Commodore, but never quite figured that out. I was just beginning to learn about the workings of the device, so that OS was beyond me. I'd love to get my hands on a working copy now, just to see if I could understand it better.

From that humble beginning a nearly forty year love affair with computers was born.

Windows:

I've used Windows since the 3.1 days and have had every iteration of that OS since. I think my first real Windows PC was a Packard-Bell 286. I don't remember the specs (it's been over 30 years) but you can imagine that it wasn't terribly impressive compared to today's computers, but it was close to state-of-the-art in 1987 or 1988.

As you can imagine, I'm quite comfortable with Windows. I know it. I can use it without thinking (almost). And the range and depth of software that is available for Windows is hard to beat. Sometimes the only option is a Windows-based solution. In those cases, the mini-pc that runs Windows gets fired up and off we go to get my work done.

In addition to the various desktop versions, I also ran Windows Home Server until it was deprecated in 2011, then switched over to Windows Server 2012. While WHS seemed to work well and I had few problems with it (I was sad to see Microsoft drop it), I never really got comfortable using the full-blown Server version. Just seemed more complicated than it needed to be. I jumped over to Linux for my server needs and never looked back.

There are three Windows computers in my home.

  1. My wife uses one for her personal work (though not terribly often as she prefers her iPad).
  2. My work computer is provided by my employer and I spent at least 40 hours a week tapping away at the technology that resides on that device. I regularly use Microsoft products -- Word, Teams, Outlook, Excel, and so on in order to get my work done.
  3. I also have a personal Windows computer, An Asus VC-66 mini-PC running Windows 10 pro. That one isn't seeing as much use as it once did for reasons that I'll outline below. Mostly now I keep it around for some of the programs that I can't get on one of the other devices.

Mac OS:

I bought my first Mac in 2005 -- a mac mini. I loved that little device even though it was a bit more expensive than I would have liked and required all the peripherals be purchased separately. Sadly, it was based on the now-defunct PowerPC G4 which would be deprecated the following year when Apple moved to the Intel processor. Still, I used the mac mini until around 2012 when I could no longer get updates for the PowerPC processor. Shortly thereafter, (sometime in 2012 or 2013) it began to fail and was put out of my misery a few months later. I was quite sad to see it go.

While I did not replace the MM with another, that experience did begin my quest for smaller, more compact and less power hungry PCs which is pretty much where I am today.

My next Mac acquistion was a 2009 iMac. Huge monitor, huge hard drive and lots of power. I ran every version of Mac OS on that one up until it, too, died this past year. Getting more than 10 years out of a computer that is on 24/7 and in pretty much constant use is actually pretty amazing. I still have the body, it just wouldn't boot. I've read somewhere that you can use an old iMac as a secondary screen. I may look into that at some point.

I've also owned two Macbook Airs. The first was a 2011 model, purchased, as I recall sometime in mid-2012. At the time I was traveling regularly for my doctorate and needed something light and powerful and easy to type on. when you're writing a lot (and I mean A LOT) you want a comfortable keyboard. The Air fit the bill. This was replaced in 2020 with a more powerful Air. That laptop now lives primarily in my living room where it is used for surfing the 'net and getting some work done when I want to work outside the office. (I love working on my patio when the weather is nice. Beats the heck out of a stale office!)

IOS:

I would be remiss to not mention that we have two iPads in the house. My wife's favorite device is her iPad. She's on it almost more than I'm on any of my machines. I used mine much less often, mostly for quickly skimming the news or reading books (when not using my Kobo or Kindle). And, of course, we've also two iPhones.

I won't say much else, since there's not much else to say about these! They are what they are.

Linux:

Okay, here it get's a bit interesting, I think.

Somewhere around 1997 I obtained my first 'live' linux distro in one of the PC magazines (I forget which one). At that point my only experience was with the Commodore 128 and Windows. Needless to say, my curiosity was piqued (as it had been with C/PM a decade earlier) and I quickly loaded up the disk and was met with a black screen and a blinking cursor.

Now what?

No instructions, no guidance on how to use this OS or what could be done with it. I mucked around for maybe half an hour, shutdown and threw the disk away, pretty much as I had done with C/PM (though I had not thrown those disks out, I just set them aside forever).

Fast forward about three years and I found myself in an intensive technology program where I was introduced to programming (primarily C and Perl), web development, database development, and networking. I was in love. We were using Sun Sparc computers with the Solaris operating system. I quickly learned a great deal about Unix and figured out what could be done with that blinking cursor in the black abyss of the computer screen. For some reason, that black screen invoked an image of the infiniteness of space in me. (too much Star Wars, I guess.)

Well, from there I moved into the Linux world and over the next several years bought several used computers on which to install Linux. I think I tried just about every distro there was. That love affair has continued for more than 23 years.

The biggest challenge with Linux has always been installing software and 'dependency hell'. With the advent of Snaps, Flatpak, and AppImages (not to mention Docker), this issue has pretty well disappeared. I routinely install software packages without a hiccup and they just work.

Today, I have five computers running Linux in various flavors and forms.

My 'daily driver' is Fedora 38 running on a used Dell Wyse 5070 Thin Client. Those make great little low-power Linux boxes. They're powerful enough, even, to run virtual machines!

I have Proxmox running on a renewed HP EliteDesk 800 G3 with 64 GB ram, an i7 quad core processor and about 1.5 TB of storage. On that device I have an additional four Linux VMs (Ubuntu, Debian, and Windows 10) and multiple LXCs that host various services I use. The Ubuntu instance serves as the foundation for about two dozen Docker containers that provide a range of services I regularly use.

I also have an HP Microserver Gen 10 Plus with 3 TB storage and 64 GB ram. This one is running Unraid (I wanted to try it and figured out I rather like it). This one serves as a NAS and also hosts several more Docker images for services I use, but less often than those on the EliteDesk.

Finally, there's are two more computers that are used primarily for learning (currently Ansible) and testing. First is a 2011 Lenovo Yoga 2 and a rebuilt 1L PC that I originally bought in 2009 as a weather server (I ran a personal weather station for 10 years). The original motherboard was 32 bits, so I upgraded that one about three years ago to an ASRock MB with a Celeron processor. I wanted low-power for learning and this one fits the bill. Both the Lenovo and this no-name are running Ubuntu or whatever flavor of Linux I'm testing at the time. While VMs can be used to test software, I like to do bare metal installs to get a better feel for responsiveness than the VM experience can sometimes provide.

Wrapping It Up

So, where does that leave me with respect to my operating system preferences?

As I said at the beginning, I routinely use all three OSes. Excluding my work PC (over which I have no control) I tend toward the Linux machines. Here's why:

  • I like the idea of using something a little less mainstream
  • Both Mac OS and Windows gather a lot of analytics about their use. On the one hand I don't mind that since most of it is used to help enhance and improve the product. On the other hand, there's a little bit of paranoia about them knowing too much about what I do, what products I use, what I type, etc. Linux doesn't collect analytics for the most part. As I understand it, you can still opt out of any data collection. I like that idea.
  • It is free and doesn't require periodic (and sometimes costly) updates to maintain function.
  • I like the challenge that Linux can provide in figuring out how to do things. This has actually gotten easier, though, as I mentioned above, with the advent of Snaps, Flatpak, etc. Still, it can be a challenge at times. I spend. a lot more time on the command line than I would have expected.
  • Maybe it's just the result of a bit more familiarlity, but doing things like working with webservers and databases seems easier in Linux. Trying to figure out IIS on Windows is a pain! Build an Access database? Thank you, no. I find it easer to create a MariaDB and associated front end than to sort out how Access handles things.
  • The quality of the software available today rivals that of Mac and Windows. Not in all respects, to be sure, but for 99% of what I do it is more than adequate.
  • Finally, and perhaps most importantly, it meets my needs. I can make it as simple or complex as I want it to be and that suits me just fine!