Linux and XyWrite.

[Wendell Cochran atrypa@xxxxxxxx]

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 2004 04:47:58 +1000
From: "Michael Edwards" 

[snip]
>   My older brother uses Linux professionally, and he will
probably be my main source of help; and he has recommended that the
Red Hat version might be the most suitable for me to use. (I think
it's called something else I forget now, but it's essentially the
same one. Fedora, or something?)

It's Fedora. And even if you don't begin with Fedora, find the

Linux Pocket Guide
Daniel J. Barrett
 2004 O'Reilly
191 p. $9.95

It 'Covers Fedora Linux' but I can't see that it's at all
distro-specific.

>  Given that other versions of Linux have been recommended in this
group, my question is: should I go with one of these others and
forget Red Hat? Or is it a relatively minor point, and can I use
Red Hat, as my brother recommends, and still use XyWrite reliably?

If your brother is to be your guru, go Red Hat. Aside from
cosmetics you'll hardly know any differences between distributions
for a long time to come. (Installers do differ, but even that
barrier is disappearing.)

>   I suppose no-one in this group would *ever* recommend against
XyWrite, so maybe it would be futile to ask whether my best course
might be to abandon XyWrite altogether, and instead find a good
Linux-based word-processor.

Five years ago, an imminent deadline & the calamitous recalcitrance
of Win95 forced me to switch overnight from XyWrite to vi -- & I've
never since booted WinDOSe.

I do miss XyWrite, but vi does everything I need (as a
free-lance editor of technical reports in geology &
geophysics), & I've not found time to explore DOSemu, WINE, etc.

I may as well add that to my mind Unix -- the same thing as Linux at
this level -- makes far more sense than any OS out of Redmond. It's
more logical, & I can open the black box without incurring the wrath
of billg.

Wendell Cochran
West Seattle