Tuesday, February 14, 2006

Which OS is Easiest to Learn?

Over the weekend I had a small debate with some fellow ninjas and computing science students regarding operating systems. It all started whene I said that I would buy an Intel Mac if dual booting to Windows worked.

I explained to them the advantages of doing non-administrative tasks as a non-privileged user. By the end of the debate I managed to convince some of them that if you are teaching a typical desktop user to browse the web, check email, and do some word processing, then all three OS' (Windows, Linux, and Mac OS) are equally easy to learn.

Having used Linux and Mac OS more than the typical person, I wondered if my point of view was biased. I asked my sister what she thought. She isn't nearly as technical or interested in computers as myself, but she is a heavy user of Windows and has used Linux and Mac OS on occasion. I asked her which she felt was easiest for a new user to learn. Her answer surprised me: "They're about the same."

What does everyone else think?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I would think that Linux would not be as easy to learn/set up as Windows, at least for novice users. I know that my father would prefer to stick with Windows--I don't think he'd even want to try other OSs at this point in his life.

StoneWolf said...

I'm not talking about setting up/installing OS' here - I'm talking about strictly using them for day-to-day tasks. Installing the OS would be a whole other story-- most Windows users don't know how to install Windows.