"About a year ago I read something about Linux by an author who had a fine and sophisticated sense of humor, and it occurred to me that if someone like that was a proponent of Linux, there must be something interesting about it that I might like.
"I started -- as any former academic would -- with books: Ubuntu For Dummies (Paul Sery), Introducing Ubuntu (Brian Proffitt), Beginning Ubuntu Linux (Keir Thomas). I ran a couple of the live CD's, which showed me an interesting new desktop, but of course they ran VERY slowly on my little old Compaq.
"I also looked into some of the Help forums, but the endless accounts of unexpected crash and burn from people who seemed to know computers far better than I totally discouraged any notion I might have had of dual booting Linux with Windows on my only computer. You see, the forums are to offer help, so they are all about problems that can occur."
