quackers
largerAbout Melarger
I am semi-retired and live in the north of England. My introduction to computers came in the form of a ICL ME29 mainframe in 1989. I had absolutely no computer experience. I didn't even own a personal computer at the time (and I didn't own one for another 15 years after). Within a year I was running the mainframe and writing small search programmes to cut down on the amount of "legwork" required to find accounts with a given set of circumstances.
I bought my first pc (a laptop) in 2004 and started using Windows XP at that time. I've since moved through Vista to Windows 7, but along the way I became disheartened that a company the size of MS, which had been writing operating systems for so long could still be getting it so wrong. I tried Ubuntu in 2007, and although I liked what I saw, it didn't work very well with my hardware. I therefore persevered with Windows in its various forms. I finally had had enough of it and installed Lucid Lynx on my newer hardware (a Sony Vaio AR51SU) and was extremely pleased with how much worked "out of the box".
Ubuntu Contributions
I needed help at times and that help was forthcoming from the UbuntuForums - willingly and pleasantly, I might add. I was impressed with both Lucid Lynx and the community spirit offered at UF. I decided early on that I would try to help others in the same way that others had helped me. I have spent most of my spare time on UF giving help and advice where I thought I could. The majority of which has been spent in the Absolute Beginner, General Help and Installation & Upgrade forums trying to help people with booting problems/partitioning problems and anything else that I thought I could give help with. I have also taken part in the Maverick and Natty Testing Forums giving (but mostly receiving) help. I now run Natty Narwhal and am currently enjoying its new interface.
Goals
As I learn more I hope to play a greater role in taking Ubuntu forward to total world domination by means of bug reporting and testing new versions.