A recent story here on Slashdot got me thinking.

Well to understand how I got to my train of thought you have to read my comment and the replies that followed.

One poster replied that his Dad now uses OpenOffice, and his Grandma uses Ubuntu. (Linux you insensitive clod!)

I am tech savvy, but no way near guru status. Heck I am only now becoming Linux proficient. Yet the switch was not that difficult. I remember when I still worked in an office and I was the only guy that still used Windows 98, except for the receptionist who ran a thin client and basically used Windows 2003 on her 98 box.

Having taken the leap into the Land of the Free (hah!) I can now muse over the “How Hard” factor, and the why I hesitated.

The honest truth is that I saw no real need to switch over to XP. Even the Receptionist got upgraded when her PC bogged down (why the bogdown is still a mystery…) which left me to be the only die-hard in the office, and me moonlighting as tech support…

XP irritated me. 98 was familiar, and I could fool around to fix stuff in a way that XP would not allow me to. When I was still selling PC’s way back when ME came out, we recommended 98se because we believed it was better, and in the end it was.

It was not THAT hard to start working with XP when I bought a computer for the house and it had XP preloaded (this was a little over two years ago, go figure), and in fact after a while I was, erm, comfortable.

On day to day usability I saw no gain over 98, but I decided to bid my old friend goodbye and embrace my new work environment for what it was – the only perceived alternative.

Now we sold the odd Linux PC’s alongside Win 98, Mandrake Linux I think it was, so Linux was not new to me, we never installed it mind you, just passed the package along with the clean PC to the customer and wished them luck. The problem was my perception. I perceived it to be “hard to work on”, “incompatible”, “…have to learn a new OS…” and the list went on.

Why oh Why? Having crossed over, and having a wife who crossed over, I can now honestly say that my perceptions where at the very best skewed. My 57year old dad browsed the web last night on my Linux Mint laptop using Firefox, and while he did not do anything more than browse, he immediately felt at home.

I submit that it is easier to convert to using Linux than it is to move on from XP to Vista. Heck I would have hung on to XP the same way I hung onto 98!

As an example of me resisting upgrading, I still haven’t tried Gutsy or Linux Mint Daryna. I still use Feisty and Cassandra. Fact is change of OS or upgrading makes people uncomfortable. Unfortunately consumers tend to act like sheep in this regard, “well XP was perfect for me” – and to many it is – “but if Vista is the only option I probably have no choice but to learn how to use it…”

Because it is the only perceived alternative.

I installed my Wireless PCMCIA card with a Windows Driver, loaded a bunch of Windows Programs via Wine as a proof to a skeptical brother who said it couldn’t be done, sat back, and realized I’ll never need Windows again.

The key to Linux success is killing the bad perception. Crossing over has been made dead easy.

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