Support & Suggestions from non Geeks users

Do you have the latest HPLIP from the HPLIP site?

1/ Thanks for the help but asking an idiot like me if I have an HPLIP is tantamount to speaking Swahili to me.

A/ I did get my 1018 Laserjet to work after requestiong help from a techie and that brings home the point that if we want open source to beat MS, we need to be more user friendly.
Some HP website ubdated my driver.

Now if I can just follow instructions on getting the darn MFC 490CW all in one to work...

Il be happy to contribute what I can to ubuntu : My strngth is not techie but helping make things user friendly.

Go here and grab the run file:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/hplip/files/hplip/3.10.9/

You then need to mark it as executable and run it in a terminal as user (NOT sudo).

Many of the things may sound foreign, if you web-search for solutions based on the direction I give, rather than not understanding then just giving up you will not learn your OS very quickly.

Well to begin with, what was my question ?
That would be the first step towards making the system more user friendly ?
Also there is no obvious possibility to answer that comment without hitting this solved my problem
NMA

Ubuntu is used by many. I think you are confused what an OS is.

It's a tool for a job. There is no "blowing MS out" or whatever and to think so is incredibly immature. If a system is to perform a certain set of tasks then the most suitable OS for that task should be used. Linux should not be used 'just because'. The IS should be comared in how it will perform it's task under its destined situation.

For example, a proprietary application may ONLY run on WIndows (My workplace codes a number of them), sure you coud run virtualbox etc but if that is the systems main purpose then you will ALWAYS be running the vbox which is incredibly inefficient with resources. So Windows in this case is a better option.

Some sound engineers love the audio and video capabilities in Mac and so use those but they should not shy away from trying other OSes and apps to achieve their goals and Linux may be a smoother or easier solution for them, or they may still find the Mac software the best for them.

It may feel geeky but if you think about how many years you have used Windows compared to your 9more than likely) limited exposure to Linux you cannot make a fair comparison. The only real way to compare fairly is to grab somebody who has never used either and test. I'm sure you can navigate windows quite gaily and this will be due to experience. As you use an OS you learn it's nuances and such and you will with Ubuntu.

Yes you may need to use the terminal a few times and *shock* type on the keyboard outside of the word processor, but this is no bad thing at all and in fact a LOT of the power in Linux is held in the temrinal and it can do things windows can only do using a 3rd party app like powershell. The OS is ever improving and the community logging bugs gets things sorted but you have to remember that the guys at Microsoft are PAID and you pay for the OS, most of the projects are either completely voluntary or funded by kind donations by kind users so the development speed is slower compared to the paid techys at Microsoft.

Personally Linux fits my needs as the apps I need are there and my hardware is low end. I have no chance of installing a supported Microsoft OS on any of my hardware yet Linux runs smoothly and I can do what I need. Others have other reasons for using it.

I gave the link to HPLIP so you could (hopefully) get your printer working. Did it work?