“What’s the security like under UBUNTU or KUBUNTU?
Since it’s an open system, isn’t it very acceptable to all sorts of malware? “
^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Rock solid, and no real viruses to speak of. That doesn’t mean it couldn’t happen, but there isn’t much reason for virus writers to write for Linux. Linux distributions, especially the Debian-based systems like Ubuntu and Linux Mint are auto-updating. The systems are automatically updated daily behind the scenes and so vulnerabilities are fixed quickly.
Linux was designed to be more secure from the start; Windows was written for home users in the pre-internet era. Computer security for early Windows programmers was to keep the door locked. Linux was crafted after the Unix/BSD tradition, used for corporate mainframes where security was an issue.
Mac OSX is based on BSD, so Linux and OSX are cousins in a way.
I’ve run Linux for the past five years — Kubuntu, Ubuntu and next will be going with Linux Mint. Not one virus.
Linux is very stable and you have a literal ton of free programs to choose from, most found in the repository of your distribution. If you want a program you choose it on a list, click OK and it will auto-install.
Games are another issue. If you’re into games on the side, you’ll need to dual-boot into Windows. Same goes for any proprietary program you can’t do without, but for the most part Linux has an alternative package that will do just as well.
Check out Linux Mint and Ubuntu — both are Debian-based and can update software easily.
Some Linux Alternatives
* may not be as powerful in some cases, but don’t cost $hundreds.
MS Office => LibreOffice, OpenOffice
Photoshop => Gimp, Krita
Adobe Illustrator => Inkscape
Adobe Indesign => Scribus
Media players => huge number, too great to even list
DVD players => Kaffeine, and many more
Freemind Mind Mapper
Firefox
Google Chrome => Chromium
Geany — awesome light text editor
And hundreds of others
By Todd R. Weiss, Computerworld | Published: 00:00, 20 February 04