Counter point, Ubuntu specifically has so many old posts and answers that aren’t necessary in modern systems, deprecated, or straight up no longer correct. Also a lot of recommendations that can screw up a system in strange ways. I feel like many issues (ie. Bluetooth, USB, Wifi) are due to people stumbling on old posts with configs and tools that have changed and blindly applying them
First off, I love Linux. It’s my daily driver and I wouldn’t want to use anything else.
But in my past career I was the CIO at a very large firm. Lawyers need Microsoft Office and Windows. If you hire a good assistant or paralegal with word processing experience, they are going to need Microsoft Word. LibreOffice is good, but it’s not a replacement in this scenario. Good word processors are like wizards and will save you hours. It’s not worth it to make them learn something else.
Then there’s drafting software, templating, practice-specific tools, etc. Anything geared for legal is going to run on Windows. What are you using for time entry? What about accounting?
Not to mention, you have some information security obligations under the model rules and you don’t want to mess with that. Although Linux has security advantages over Windows, you still have to take measures to secure it. Maybe that’s easy enough for you to do on your own laptop, but your practice will grow to at least a few staff and an associate. Somebody has to do IT because you’re sure as hell not going to waste billable hours on it.
I had to use Windows in that old gig and it really wasn’t bad. It’s stable, reliable, easy to support. Everyone you hire will have used it before. It’s an unpopular opinion around here, but it’s a quality operating system that’s affordable. I guarantee your cost of ownership will be lower on Windows in your particular situation.
i know i’ve wanted something like this for a while. i really didn’t want to have to figure out how to get the existing keyman keyboard layout to work on linux, because fcitx works fine for all my other input needs, and i already knew how fcitx worked as i made an addon to get on-screen keyboards to work with it a while back…
as i know not many people would dare venture in the world of fcitx addons, due to the quite horrendous state the documentation is in… so if i wasn’t gonna do it, likely no-one else was, so i did it! and shared it with everyone, because the worse that could happen is that someone helps me make it better!
Its fun to open the terminal and learning the language of the computer, even if it disagree with you sometimes. Most times. Also i can do anything, including messing it up irreparably!
I always install the Noto fonts for things like emojis and asian characters, extra fonts to cover the Cyrillic alphabet, and finally OnePlus’s Slate font, which I fell in love with back in the days when I rocked a OnePlus 7 Pro.
You can do everything but you will have problems with word documents. There’s online office for better compatability with the caveat of reduced functionality. There’s great compatability with Only Office and WPS Office but its not perfect.
There was a comment recommending Zorin OS and I agree. Its a great distro to switch to from windows. Setup is easy and flathub is included in the software store.
I’d recommend trying Linux on dualboot and see if you can replace windows!
depending on the type most NVR’s are just custom linux builds, so VLC has few issues. I have yet to find an NVR video I could not run on my box, but my sample size is not huge, and its not corporate surveillance level gear im testing with
Liberation fonts, Noto fonts, Deja Vu fonts and Nimbus fonts pretty much. Add in Cantarell too and you are set I would say. Those are the ones you should install for compatibility.
I always install Inter for UI and JetBrains Mono for terminal usage. I find they render way better than pretty much anything else.
Update: Discovered Geist and Geist Mono and they are amazing, I am going to replace Inter and JetBrains Mono from now on: github.com/vercel/geist-font
Is Online Office 365 good enough for you? Or, is an ‘almost fully compatible’ word processor enough?
The features are there, but it’s a whole new interface to learn, and if you export to a word document, the document produced may look wonky when viewed in word. OTOH, whatever PDFs you produce, those will look right. And if Online Office 365 is enough, that’s great, because you won’t have to worry about that.
You’ll need to establish a workflow, and others in your office will need to use (and get used to) the same workflow.
It’s not a small leap for an office to take. I love Linux, but check out that it has what you need before you fully commit. Give it a try by dual-booting or by installing it on a secondary system.
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