What can I do for Linux?

One of the biggest differences between Linux and a commercial operating system is how it is developed. If you can't find a flavor of Linux that does what you want it to do, you are usually free to modify an exiting distro to suit your needs. That's why there are so many distros.

For example, Mandrake, which is recognized as one of the most newbie-friendly distros, was based on Red Hat, which is one of the distributions most commonly used to replace Windows in small businesses.

But I'm not a programmer? What can I do?

The Linux community welcomes contributions in many forms. Here are just a few of the ways you can contribute:

• Documentation - If you have some technical writing skill, you can make a valuable contribution to the community. Write documentation for a specific program, or write general HOWTOs. Or start a website with information to help newbies.
• Advocacy - Linux distros do not have multi-million dollar advertising budgets. The main reason more businesses are not running Linux, and more companies are not producing Linux software, is that Microsoft spends more advertising money in one day than any Linux distro spends in a month.
  If you want to help promote Linux, build a website like this one, or simply provide a link to it on your site.
• Make your site cross-browser compatible - IE and Netscape aren't the only browsers in existence, although they are the most popular. The World Wide Web Consortium (http://www.w3c.org) has established web design standards to help you ensure that everyone can view your website.
  If you use IE-specific widgets, you are hiding your site from potential visitors.
• Coding - If you are a programmer, this is the most obvious contribution. If you can code in C, C++, Python, or any other commonly used language, you can help develop distros, applications, kernel upgrades, or any other programs.

If you would like to provide a link to Why Linux? on your site, you may use the graphic below, or provide a text link. I am not a graphic artist, so if you would like to create your own (better) image to use as a link, please do so and send me a copy. (Remove the obvious from my e-mail address before sending.) Please link to the top page of this site: http://geobeck.tripod.com.