AviDardik.com

Last episode I've detailed my computer background a bit, and the reasons for making the move.
Today's episodes detailes the first steps of the journy.

I've backed-up everything. All my documents, MP3s, family photos, old university assignments, emails, contacts, appointments, even Half-life 2 saved games.

I've backed them all up on a few DVD-Rs – This is always the most important step.
This part was easy – I've done so many times before. Installing a fresh Windows copy from scratch every year or so was a must for me.
Only this time, after backing everything up, I've erased my HD completely.
Goodbye Windows.

I have chosen Ubuntu 4.10 ("The Warty Warthog") since it's all the rage these days, and I've wanted to try out something new that I haven't played with before.
The distribution comes on a single bootable CD which I have downloaded and burned.
I booted the CD and started the installation.
It was the shortest, easiest, installation I have met so far. Just a few simply questions and everything is done.
I've chosen to install all the non-base components from the Internet, so I'll have the newer versions of verything.
That's it – The installation was complete, the machine rebooted – And OH MY GOD- X refuses to load!
But I haven't even DONE anything yet.
I was greeted with a message saying that X couldn't load – And I couldn't find ANYTHING that explained what actually went wrong.
I Googled the problem – Couldn't find any lead.
How frustrating. This was by far the soonest I hit a problem when installing a Linux OS… Maybe I should re-think this whole business…

I've opened XFree86.0.log – X's log file to try and see what is the problem – And it was complaining about some unknown "AD string unrecognized" or something like that. Of course I had no idea what that meant.
I searched for "AD" in the XFree86 config file and found the problem.
My LCD display was recognized as: CMC 17" AD
But – The string in the config file was – Monitor "CMC 17" AD" – So apparently the parser processed the quotes character, which really meant INCHES, as the end of the line, and was confused by the rest of the line…
I simply deleted the quotes character, and rebooted the machine.

And  – Ubuntu has loaded. And it's nice-looking too..
OK, problem solved and business as usual.

Now, first I need to handle my desktop. GNOME or KDE?
I chose GNOME as my desktop windows manager – I've tried both GNOME and KDE before.
I can't explain why – But GNOME simply seems cooler.

I quickly downloaded and installed a new wallpaper – That part was easy.
That's as far as I'm going with customization for now.. I'll have plenty of time to play with it later. I've left all other desktop components defaults.
Here's a screenshot of what it looks like now:

I found a great Ubuntu installation/customization guide over at Tuxme.com.
It's a short article explaining quickly how to install and customize Ubuntu.

Another great source for help is the Unofficial Ubuntu 4.10 Starter Guide – Again, a quick reference guide of install and customizing Ubuntu. Recommended!

Both sites helped me get going.

Following the guide descriptions I have updated my /etc/apt/sources.list file, which lists all the software resources I can download from,
and performed apt-get update and apt-get upgrade to update all the software components.
Everything upgraded smoothly.

Surprisingly – Even though the first guide I've mentioned discusses problems with Firefox installations – the above procedure also upgraded Firefox to version 1.0 smoothly.
Cool!

I quickly installed the Firefox extensions I'm using:

All-in-One Gestures, GoogleBar, Tabbrowser Preferences and User-Agent Switcher  which is especially important now that I don't have IE anymore for backup.
Finally, I fine tuned and tweak Firefox settings following this guide.

Now I simply inserted my DVD backup and imported my good old bookmarks file – and I'm feeling right at home, I've been using Firefox as my Windows browser for a long time now, so coupled with my old bookmarks, extensions and tweaks – It looks like I've never left.

Next step was another obvious one – Setting up DVD, MP3 and DiVX capabilities on Ubuntu.

Following the guides I have mentioned, it couldn't be easier. I've Simply cut and pasted the following commands:

$ apt-get install gstreamer0.8-plugins

$ apt-get install xmms

And that's it. Another checkmark.

Finally, I've installed QTParted (Partition Magic clone) and Firestarter (A firewall).
And I'm done with the applications for now.

And for the final step of the initial setup for this session – Since I live in Israel, and naturally use Hebrew as my first language, I have to install and setup somehow Hebrew support.
Two important notes:
1. Hebrew support is not very easy, as say French or German, because it's written right to left. It has always been a tricky issue with software.
2. I didn't have the slightest idea of even where to start..!

Luckily, I've found an excellent Hebrew Ubuntu guide.
I've simply followed the step-by-step instructions, without REALLLY understanding what I'm doing – And it worked!

That's it – Every basic thing is setup. Honestly, at least so far things have worked smoothly and it was real easy too.

BUT, my mission is far from over! There are still plenty to do and plenty to learn.
The main task ahead of me, and one of the reasons I've never done the move before is – Importing Microsoft Outlook information.

I've been using Microsoft Outlook as my PIM and email client for years now.
I have hundreds of megabytes archived in the form of a PST file – emails, contacts and appointments.
How the hell do I import them to Linux?!

I've installed Evolution, since I read it's simply a Microsoft Outlook clone. BUT – There's no option to import a PST file.
I went ahead and installed Thunderbird – Yet again – No PST import feature.

So I've decided to make this journal an interactive one. This should be an interesting experiment – Join me readers (Hoping there ARE readers) and making the move to Linux.

I have a few questions already up my sleeve. But for Episode 3 I need you to answer me with one simple question:

How do I import Microsoft Outlook data (PST file) ?!

<– Episode 1: Introduction