I recently installed Mandrake Linux 8.1 on my home computer. The installation was a snap, with the only glitch being that the program had a hard time identifying my mouse. That was easily resolved.

I have not had a lot of time to play with the system but I like what I've seen so far. I probably won't get to go very deep into the system until my workload drops a bit but I look forward to the adventure.

When it comes to Windows executables, don't forget the WINE project. Those folks are attempting something pretty cool - they're implementing the Windows API in Linux. Already, some simple Windows programs will run under WINE (Windows Emulator) and they're making good progress. It's a tough challenge. There are over 2,000 API calls in the Win32 library and Microsoft keeps upgrading the OS all of the time, so they're attempting to hit a moving target.

There's also a commercial alternative that I've heard good things about. It's called VMWare. The product allows you to run multiple operating systems on a single computer concurrently. For example, you can be running Linux and pop open a session and run Windows 2000 at the same time. Very cool, especially from a software testing perspective.