Full Circle Magazine FR

It has been about 6 years since I took my first dive into the ocean of open source. The first open source operating system that I was introduced to was OpenSolaris. I was very eager to know about Linux and Unix systems when I was completing my 11th standard in high school. (In India, graduation starts after 12th standard.) Until now, I was mastering in Installation & Troubleshooting of Windows. I loved to fix my friends' systems as I am crazy about operating systems. I love to have a challenge, find solutions to problems, fix systems, and try new things. I was well known in my school days and college days among classmates and senior students for having IT skills. In the first year of my engineering at Government Eng. college, Dahod, I loved to stay in the internet lab till it closed. Once my head of department professor found out about my IT skills, he gave me the responsibility to maintain the system health of all computer systems in the Internet lab. As a reward, I got systems for testing and trying out new things. At that time, internet connections were very limited to a few colleges and enterprise organizations, and there were slow and unstable dial-up connections. I was looking for an operating system more powerful than Windows. At that time in India, the word “Linux” was heard by a only few IT geeks. Linux was used rarely in giant enterprises in India. I tried out OpenSolaris, but I didn't find it better than Windows.

Cela fait environ 6 ans depuis ma première plongée dans l'océan de l'Open Source. Le premier système d'exploitation open source que l'on m'a présenté était OpenSolaris. J'avais hâte de connaître des systèmes Linux et Unix au moment où je terminais ma « 11ème standard » au lycée. (En Inde, on termine à partir du « 12ème standard ».) Jusqu'alors ma majeure était l'installation et la résolution de problèmes de Windows. J'aimais réparer les systèmes de mes amis, car j'adore les systèmes d'exploitation.

J'aime relever des défis, trouver des solutions aux problèmes, réparer les systèmes et essayer des choses nouvelles.

In September 2009, I came across the Ubuntu website while Googling about Linux. Ubuntu was different than what I had heard about other Linux distros. I found Ubuntu more user friendly than any other Linux distro—with a nice GUI and powerful security features. I began to gather more and more information about Ubuntu. Due to the slow and unstable internet speed (max download speed 15 kbps) at that time, I could not download Ubuntu 9.10. It would take 3 to 4 days to download it, and bandwidth was also costly at that time. Around October 2010, when Ubuntu 10.10 was launched, I decided to download Ubuntu 10.10 anyhow. Internet speed was good enough but there weren't stable internet connections yet. We could hardly download up to 150 MB per day. After downloading 5 consecutive days with a mobile dial-up connection, I downloaded Ubuntu 10.10 successfully on my friend's desktop. We tried to make a WUBI installation, but failed. I decided to install Ubuntu by creating a new partition and have a full installation. Finally, I got Ubuntu installed within just 20 minutes on a P4 with 512 MB RAM. This was my first installation of Ubuntu. I had seen Ubuntu just in screenshots before. Within 3 days I explored the whole system. My friend was confused about how to use the system, but I taught him Ubuntu. My friend was very happy with Ubuntu because now he had a virus-free system with all required software preinstalled. We got every device working with Ubuntu from a camera to 3G modem without installing any additional drivers. My whole computing world changed. I was entering the world of Ubuntu.

In November 2010, I assembled my own desktop with Core i3, 2 GB RAM, 500 GB HDD, and Ubuntu. Many questions arose in my mind: How is Ubuntu being developed? How do contributors work together? What does this wonderful system consist of? After spending some weeks on the Internet, I got my answers. I checked out the whole Ubuntu history and came across the Launchpad platform, Ubuntu forums, wiki, and Ubuntu documentation. I was also introduced to other Ubuntu derivatives like Backtrack, Linux Mint, and Linux Deepin. Ubuntu proceeded with 11.04 Natty, 11.10 Oneric, 12.04 Precise, 12.10 Quantal. I have enjoyed every Ubuntu distro and never had faced a problem during installation. For the last two years, Ubuntu has grown and improved a lot. After the launch of Ubuntu 11.10 Natty, many users didn't like Unity, but I never faced any problem with it. Unity became stable in 12.04 and fixed problems with other users also. I joined Askubuntu in April 2012 and have a good reputation there.

As a student of Electronics and Telecommunication Engineering, I was interested only in the telecommunication part and have a keen knowledge of technologies in my field. Now I am interested in Linux servers as they are a core part of telecom networks and IT Enterprises. I decided to learn about Linux servers and move towards system administration. I came across many Linux server distros like Red Hat, Fedora, Gentoo, Arch Linux, Centos and Debian. Most of all I love to work with Ubuntu Server and Debian. It took time to learn about servers due to a busy engineering schedule. During the time, I remained connected with the Ubuntu world using newsletters and news sites like Omgubuntu and www.ubuntu-news.net. In time I came across FCM. I downloaded previous issues. After that, every month I download FCM and never miss a single issue. I introduced lots of friends to Ubuntu by installing on their laptops and desktops. In December 2011, after completing my 7th semester exam, I started my journey with Ubuntu Server. Within some months I self-learned Ubuntu Server. I also got command of Red Hat, Fedora and Centos. Currently I am working as a Linux System Administrator in an IT organization at Surat, Gujarat, India. Thus, Ubuntu has played an important part in changing my life and showed the way to my career. The Voyage has been just started, we have to build Cloud Computing platforms within a few months.