Anurag Bhandari

So, what’s keeping me busy these days? It’s office work, of course. Working on quite a challenging and bigger project has its side-effects as well (working till late and missing daily fruit juice doses in my case). Other than that, I am enjoying the work as it has to do with web development, my area of interest.

Being a strong advocate of open-source and Linux, I read a lot of articles on these topics daily. And I hate when people use words like “switch”, “migrate”, etc. when referring to making the move from Windows to Linux. Why do people, who try to compel people to switch from Windows to Linux, forget that there is always an option called “dualbooting” and that Windows still has the astronomically largest market share? I really hope people use the word “dualboot” more when advocating the use of Linux to others. By the way, I am also writing an article highlighting this matter (Why Switch? Dualboot!), which I intend to share pretty soon.

Talking about Linux, the latest Ubuntu release (10.4; Lucid Lynx) has been getting good reviews from all around. I can hardly wait to get my hands on it. I am planning to install it on my home PC (the one currently in use by my Dad and sister).

Also, two of my good friends, Chandan Puggal (working at Aricent) and Amritpal Singh (working at Accenture) recently joined me in Gurgaon (my present work location).

Finally, I did mention it earlier also, but it really is a frustrating life without a proper Internet connection. (Looking upward) God, please me my EV-DO back. Amen.

VS

Windows Vista and Ubuntu Linux – both are totally disparate entities and I am talking about similarities? Yup, I sure am. And I have reasons to believe this.

Most of us know what Vista is. Vista is the latest edition to the most popular operating system (OS) lineup – Windows. For those who are unfamiliar with Ubuntu, Ubuntu is one of the most popular Linux-based OS that is available for free.

Here I discuss some of the similarities that I have noted in due course of my usage of both the operating systems.

Computer
In both, the name given to the central access point to all the disks and partitions on a computer is “Computer”. In earlier versions of Windows, we used to know it with the name “My Computer”.

Sub-folders in user profile folder
The default folders present in the user profile folder (or the home folder) are something like – Documents, Music, Pictures, Videos – in both the OSes.

Graphical effects
Starting from Ubuntu 7.10, both the OSes have given stress on providing graphical desktop effects to the end user. In Ubuntu, the effects are a result of Compiz Fusion software. In Vista, the most common and appealing effect is Flip 3D.

Creation of a new folder
When a new file/folder is created within another folder in either of the OS, the newly created item rearranges itself automatically in alphabetical order with respect to the other items contained by the parent folder. This wasn’t the case in earlier versions of Windows.

Renaming file
When a file is renamed (by right-clicking and choosing “Rename” or by pressing F2) in either of OSes, only the name of the file is selected, leaving the file extension unselected.

Navigation strip
When a folder within a folder within a folder (and so on…) is visited, a navigation strip appears near the top of the explorer/file manager window. In both the OSes, this navigation strip is very similar looking and a helpful aid.

Verdict
Does this imply anything? Were Vista’s features inspired by Ubuntu? Or Ubuntu’s features by Vista? Or neither of the cases. It’s upto you to decide.

Note: The similarities between Vista and Ubuntu are primarily because of the desktop environment used by Ubuntu – GNOME. So, these similarities are common between Vista and many other Linux distributions that use the latest version of GNOME.