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As told to YouCanToo
What is your name/username?
My name is Joe Alders, and my username is AnalogueMan.
How old are you?
Last January, I reached the age of seventy.
Are you married, single?
I am married for more than forty years, approaching forty five years.
Here is a picture of my wife Emique and me after a sunny day in a southern-east part of France.
The red tan on my face is due to the sun or after a few glasses of red wine or both…...
How about Kids, Grandkids ?
God, in His Infinite Wisdom, did not give us children.
Do you have pets, what is your favorite?
I once had a cat: Mr. Perkins. He lived with us for almost twenty years. After he passed away, it took at least a year for me to get over it. Cats always have my greatest affection, but after the death of Mr. Perkins, I did not want another one around our house.
Are you retired, still working and if working, what do you do?
I am now in my tenth year of retirement and haven't even had one dull day since retirement.
Where do you call home? What is it like? IE: weather, scenery
I live in Holland (the Netherlands) and have lived here for almost thirty seven years, in a small town called Grave which is not far from the large city Nijmegen. Before that, I lived in several other towns in Holland due to my father's job changes, and he ended his job hopping in the town where I was born: Nijmegen. After my marriage and living with my wife another few years in Nijmegen, we moved to Grave and settled there. Grave is situated closely to the river Maas and it has a bridge (John S. Thompson Bridge) which played an important role during "Operation Market Garden" in September 1944.
Where did you go to school and what is your education level?
I have an education in electronics engineering and designed Integrated Analogue Circuits as a senior designer at the Philips Semiconductors Company in Nijmegen.
What kind of things you like doing? hobbies, travel, fishing, camping?
My most important hobby is playing the classical guitar which I started playing when I was around fourteen years old. But during my professional life as an electronics designer, I was "on/off" practising it due to lack of time. But since my retirement, I am practising it almost every day for at least an hour. Although I am now retired, I am still designing electronic circuits but in stead of using semiconductors as amplifying elements, I am using vacuum tubes to design analogue audio amplifiers. Moreover, I read a lot of English, German and Dutch literature.
Why and when did you start using Linux?
Before I became a Linux convert, I was using Windows for a very, very long time. I started with Windows 95 then Windows XP and finally Windows 7. But in the last few years I got fed-up with those virus protection software. Although I always had installed the latest antivirus definitions, my computer got infected several times and had to get rid of sometimes very nasty infections. But the "turning point" reason that I switched from Windows to Linux was the fact that after having to install a new SSD because the old one crashed, I was forced to do a "fresh" Windows re-install because Windows refused to re-install a backup which I dutifully made every week or so. Those backups, which I made using Microsoft's own backup software, appeared to be useless. Windows considered my repaired computer as a completely new one. Whatever I tried, I could not install one of my backups again. Then I kicked out Windows and went to Linux about one and a half years ago.
After that decision I had to go through a steep learning curve, because not only I had a lot to learn about Linux, but I also had to abandon a lot of programs which I used in Windows. I had purchased software from the Serif Company: Drawplus, PagePlus and PhotoPlus, which I used for writing and drawing and designing my electronic circuit diagrams, etc. It took me a lot of time to obtain some skills using Inkscape, Gimp and other free software as replacements. Not to mention how to make reliable backups in Linux.
PCLinuxOS Family Member Spotlight is an exclusive, monthly column by YouCanToo, featuring PCLinuxOS forum member. This column will allow "the rest of us" to get to know our forum family members better, and will give those featured an opportunity to share their PCLinuxOS story with the rest of the world.
If you would like to be featured in PCLinuxOS Family Member Spotlight, please send a private message to youcantoo, parnote or Meemaw in the PCLinuxOS forum expressing your interest.
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