NILUG

Linux Opportunities/Next Meeting

Microsoft has announced that Windows Vista will not be available by the end of the year. This is unsurprising. In 2003, they announced it wouldn't be available until 2006. Why isn't anyone calling this vaporware?

The Vista that Microsoft will be delivering in 2007 bears no resemblance to the Vista (Longhorn) that they began building sometime prior to 2003. It is missing most of the features that Microsoft has promised. You may consider Vista to be a simple upgrade of Windows NT (as Win2k and XP was), not a complete re-design as promised by the Microsoft marketing machine.

This is a tremendous opportunity for Linux advocates to make great inroads into Microsoft's desktop turf. We need to evangelize our operating system – get out there on the weekends and show the public how easy, convenient and trouble-free Linux is. We need to give away Live CD versions of Linux, so people can see for themselves just how easy Linux is to use.

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With that in mind, the next meeting of the North Idaho Linux User Group will be held on Saturday, April 8, 2006 at the usual time and place. Part of the meeting will be spent discussing how to implement the above suggestions. The rest of the meeting will be the usual – helping each other and new attendees.

NILUG March Meeting

The next North Idaho Linux User Group meeting will be on Saturday, March 11, 2006 at Frank Ten Thy’s house. As always, the meeting will start at noon.

There are no scheduled talks at this meeting, so if you need help with Linux or are interested in loading Linux on your computer plan to attend the meeting and get your questions answered.