Ok, I am a linux guy and most of you will be thinking that why I am writing this . Let me say , even though many people are agreeing with the statement Ubuntu is always better than Windows , there are a lot of people how think that Ubuntu has too few applications available for use . Ubuntu would be more secure , most faster and more stable , but is it up to par with Windows in doing things , like can we use photoshop cs 4 in linux , or can we play assassins creed 2 in Ubuntu . I am not promising you that you could , but I assure you that you can make your ubuntu linux much more better in doing things . Let me show a handful of essential applications for your linux machine which would transform your ubuntu to a real star performer , doing almost everything you can do in windows . Ok , here is it :

1. WineHQ – If you were a  windows user , you might sometimes need to carry your favourite app to ubuntu. WineHQ is good at running such windows stuff . If you need to know if your favourite app runs on linux you can check this here . To download wine, check out this link .

2. VirtualBox – Most of you might be familiar with VirtualBox , from Sun Microsystems , a nice virtualization software which is available for free . There are many commercial virtualization softwares like vmware , which is much more powerful than virtualbox . To see a list of virtualization softwares have a look at this .

3.Scribus – Scribus is an opensource desktop publishing tool available for free . Scribus offers a modern and easy to use interface .and even supports advanced and professional features like CMYK color, separations, Spot Colors, ICC color management and  PDF creation.What to say more, visit its official website .

4.Gimp – Available by default in your Ubuntu machine . If you are interested in photo-editing  gimp would be a good start .Read more about gimp and how to use gimp .

5.Blender – Blender is an opensource 3-d content creation suite available for free . Blender is as effective as other commercial software like maya , 3-d max etc , without taking you in to complex processes. Blender is definitely worth a look , you can even watch  how powerful is blender viewing the blender, gallery page .

6. Other crazy stuff like vlc player ,firefox, evolution ,pidgin , openoffice , k3b disc burner , songbird , x-chat etc are definitely worth a look . Here are a few tutorials and reviews on getting in touch with various nice free software programs , take a look at them .

7.If you are interested in making your linux an eye-candy , then opt for compiz .Compiz offers a stylish look without sacrificing too much system resources . Oh ! , I know you need to make your linux appear similar to mac os , here it is it mac4lin .

Windows is never equivalent to Linux as both are distinct operating systems . I , here present my personal opinion .

Gnome 3 the new member of linux desktop have finally hit the tech world with its new technologies posing as a strong rival for the windows 7.With GNOME 3, developers will be introducing a number of new concepts and technologies to the Linux desktop, including more advanced 3D as well as more tightly integrated messaging system.

screen shots for gnome 3

n GNOME 3, most of the user interface level stuff is JavaScript that is built on top of clutter toolkit. clutter is an opensource framework for the development of apps  which provides enhanced support for 3D environment.Most of the users complain that  search and the ability to find applications easily are not effective in GNOME 2.x. This problem will be effectively solved in the new gnome 3.Also unlike transition from KDE3 to KDE4 the transition of gnome 2 to gnome3 will be much more smoother.So we suggest all our readers to try out this and post your valuble comments here.

Have you ever dreamed to end the trouble of licensing and copyright of Microsoft Windows ,but also not willing to stop using it, as you were using it for years and you may be missing your favourite applications if you shifted to any other OS  like Mac OS or linux.Then there is a good news for you,ReactOS.ReactOS  is an OS developed on windows NT platform completely written from scratch.It is not related to linux but it is a free software licensed under GNU GPL license. which takes you out of all the bottle necks of copyright.

It can work the same way as your Windows XP or Windows 7 or whatever.Fully loaded ,it supports all windows softwares and drivers.It is also having appearance similar to windows operating systems as people are accustomed to using it.ReactOS project reimplements a state-of-the-art and open NT alike operating system based on the NT architecture-design.It includes the strength and power of NT kernel.Considering the case of security it doesn’t share the common security flaws unlike others.ReactOS  incorporates various design decisions from other operating systems like Unix,MacOS etc.

One of the powerful features of reactOS is that it is a lightweight os that can be run in computers with low performance.It is sure to overtake other bloated os in several ways.Considering portability it is just about 35MB in size as an .iso file.

System Requirements

* x86-compatible processor, Pentium or later
* 24 MB  or above, RAM
* FAT16/FAT32 Boot partition
* Standard keyboard and PS/2 compatible  mouse.
* 2 MB VGA graphics adapter
* IDE hard drive of at least 150 MB in size,it even supports SATA harddisks.

Note:Alpha version of ReactOS 0.3.10 is available and not recommended for daily use.For more details visit official site at : http://www.reactos.org.

Screenshots of ReactOS

top 7 linux distributions

SCREENSHOT

Microsoft proves that seven is indeed a lucky and magical number. It would be too, for a company which decided to skip a version 13 for their Office suite to avoid bad luck.

Despite the criticism and negative publicity, Windows Vista was a significant Windows release, and a step forward in the evolution of the Windows operating system.Windows 7 is a marked improvement over Vista all around, and its new features and improvemnts make it a strong competitor for Windows XP as well.

Ironically, Windows 7, isn’t even Windows 7.0! It runs a slightly improved kernel of Windows Vista with a version number of 6.1 much like Windows XP ran an improved Windows 2000 kernel with a version of 5.1 (Windows 2000 was 5.0). However as Microsoft has painfully pointed out on several occasions, this makes Windows 7 no less significant.

Windows 7 will support both 32-bit and 64-bit systems. The bare minimum requirements for the 32-bit include a 1GHz processor, 1GB RAM, 16GB available hard-disk space, and a DirectX 9 graphics device with WDDM 1.0 or higher driver. 64-bit systems will require at least a 1 GHz processor, 2GB RAM, 20GB of free space on your hard drive, and a DirectX 9 graphics device with WDDM 1.0 or higher driver. A touch-screen monitor is required to take advantage of the native touch features. Do note that some users have claimed to have limited success running the Windows 7 beta with less than 1GB of RAM, but that’s not recommended.

What’s Good
Windows 7 is the biggest step forward in usability since Windows 95. In fact, over half of what makes it better than Vista boils down to user interface improvements and enhancements, not so much actual new features.

Its fancy new user interface—the heart of which is Aero Peek, making every open window transparent except the one you’re focusing on at the moment so you can find what you’re looking for—actually changes the way you use Windows. It breaks the instinct to maximize windows as you’re using them; instead, you simply let windows hang out, since it’s much easier to juggle them. In other words, it radically reorients the UI around multitasking. After six months of using Aero Peek and the new launcher taskbar, going back to Vista’s taskbar, digging through collapsed app bars, or even its Peek-less Alt+Tab feels barbaric and primitive. I wouldn’t mind an Mac OS Exposé ripoff to complete the multitasking triumph, though.

Windows 7 brings back a sense of a tightness and control that was sometimes missing in Vista—there’s a techincal reason for this relating in part to the way graphics are handled—moments where I’ve felt like I wasn’t in control of my PC have been few and far between, even during the beta and release candidate periods. The more chaste User Account Control goes to that—the frequency with which it interrupts you was grating in Vista, like standing under a dripping faucet. But it actually works as Microsoft intended now, with more security, since you’re less likely to repeatedly hammer “OK” to anything that pops up, just so it leaves you the hell alone.

Other super welcome improvements are faster, more logical search—in the Music folder for instance, you can narrow by artist, genre or album—and more excellent file previews, though they’re not quite as awesome as what OS X offers up. (And why aren’t they on by default?) There are lots of little things that make you say, “finally” or “that’s great,” like legit codec support baked in to Windows Media Player, Device Stage when you plug in your gadgets, or the retardiculously awesome background images.

In short, Windows 7 is what Windows should feel like in 2009.

As the battle between windows and linux is hotting up ,the newly discovered windows 7 vulnerabilities may lead way for linux preference by many according to the recent reports.From the time windows 7 beta has been released it gave a pleasant experience compared to its predecessor windows Vista.It had smooth graphics and performance using limited system resources.Actually it was received with both hands by the world.But as time progressed it too like vista started showing signs of security vulnerabilities.Will it have the same fate as the Vista.

Firstly some vulnerabilities were found and Microsoft has patched them in Windows 7 since last November, and a zero-day exploit of vulnerabilities in Microsoft’s Server Message Block (SMB) technology affected both new and old versions of Windows.Some people even continue to complain that the implementation of Microsoft’s User Access Control feature in Windows 7 could create even more security problems than were seen in Windows Vista. By simplifying the user’s ability to change UAC controls microsoft gave the chance for hackers to easily distribute malware.With UAC code injection it is possible that any program can do anything they want. Also there may be many security flaws which might be discovered.

Considering this present scenario it is reasonable to say that Windows 7 can’t kill linux .Linux is much more secure than the Windows 7 as it is opensource and every vulnerability is found and rectified fastly unlike Microsoft.The amount of security flaws in case of linux is not even 1% that of windows.

Windows 7 ,the new member of windows family have won applause all over the world just after the release of its beta version, a few months ago.Being both flashy and stable it has proved to be a lot better than the vista.Here are some tweaks to add more efficiency to your win7

1.Magic of right clicking

The right click feature of  windows 7 is simply awesome.for instance just right click on the desktop and you’ll find a menu entry to set your screen resolution and options for adding gadgets.You dont have to  browse through the whole display settings any more.

windows7 right click

Just right-click the explorer icon on the taskbar for speedy access to common system folders: documents, music ,desktop,pictures and more.

You can also unpin or pin a program to the taskbar with just a click.This may be very useful when you are accessing your favourite browser or yahoo messenger.

2.Trouble shooting made easier

For trouble shooting problems you no longer need to go through the whole control panel.Just click Control Panel > Find and fix problems and the troubles, and the wizard pop ups.These wizards are great and can fix most of your problems in a few seconds.

Troubleshooting Win7

Windows 7 comes with some very attractive new wallpapers, and it’s not always easy to decide which one you like the best. So why not let choose a few, and let Windows display them all in a desktop slideshow? Right-click an empty part of the desktop, select Personalise > Desktop Background, then hold down Ctrl as you click on the images you like. Choose how often you’d like the images to be changed (anything from daily to once every 10 seconds), select Shuffle if you’d like the backgrounds to appear in a random order, then click Save Changes and enjoy the  show.

4.Open command command prompt in any folder

Now we can open command prompt in any folder or even desktop!.To open a command prompt just press and hold down the shift button and select the “Open Command Prompt here” tab.You are done.Now execute whatever you want in command prompt.

5.Disable search indexing for more performance

If you know where your files are stored and never really use search using the indexing function, stop this service and you will gain a significant performance boost in Windows 7.

• Click on the Start button in taskbar and type “services.msc”
• Right click the “Windows Search” and click properties
• In the startup type field choose “Disabled”
• Reboot your computer

Now your computer will be more faster.

Hope you enjoyed the post.Dont forget to give your valuable comments

Windows 7 even in its beta state has created a great hype and won appreciation for being stable and at the same  time flashy.I too installed windows 7 recently as many of my friends kept recommending it to me.To my surprise i found a lot of things common between windows 7  and the latest kde version 4.3.2 .Upon the startup itself i was stunned by the similarity windows 7 was exact ditto of kde4.Large buttons, password login, glassy superbar , dynamic animation buttons with glow, Scenic control themes, start bar were all the same.

KDE IN KUBUNTU

Windows 7

Another striking feature was the taskbar.The large transparent taskbar and animation reminds any common linux users about KDE.Other features like Aeroshake and Aero peek were copied from KDE.”Aero Shake” lets you minimize all running windows except the one which you are currently using on using a simple mouse shake .Aero peek has replaced the old “Show Desktop” feature in Windows 7. It can be found as a small rectangle present at last in Windows 7 taskbar. When you hover the mouse cursor over it, it allows you to peek behind all open windows by hiding all windows and showing only outlines of all windows.

Overall windows 7 is nothing but a modified(quite polished) Kubuntu Kwin theme. Also there is no point in arguing that KDE copied from Win7.Windows 7 was not planned before KDE.KDE started development on 11/05/2007. Windows barely had a working GUI when KDE was started.So why still going for win7   ,switch over to KDE linux the– real one and that too for absolutely free of cost. Also see gnome vs kde and Gnome 3.