Well, the title is stupid. How you can call a person 'smart' anyway? Of course I have my definition and that's simple: first, always know what exactly they are doing and secondly, never refuse to learn things that are useful. Yea, the smart people always try to do things in the most efficiency way.

*A little technical tip: the term Linux refers to most Linux based distributions, Ubuntu and Fedora for example. For me, it is Ubuntu, which is based on the GNOME window manager. But it's not really that different between an Ubuntu based on GNOME and a Fedora based on KDE.

So let's back to our nonsense OS talk. Why I said Linux is the best? First let's see our old friend Windows. I am one of the people those don't install any anti-virus software, so I'm not going to say how unsecured Windows is, because it's actually your fault that not being smart enough to know what you're doing. But it is also a fact that most virus are windows based. The real problem is, we should spend more time in installing windows updates and running windows defender, which is a standard component of Windows Vista. How am I gonna feel when I spend so much time and system resource on this? If there's no comparation it will be OK, but once you tried Linux and Mac OS X, you'll be surprised how you can forgive Windows on this point.

But for a desktop OS the most important thing is not efficiency in most cases, it's user friendly. Windows is user friendly. But unfortunately, after you tried Mac OS X, it will be hard for you to go back windows. The most stupid thing for windows is the 'install' concept. To use a software you need to copy a bunch of files from here to there, editing a binary file called registry, disturbing a lot of shard libraries in a complex 'COM' way, which cost a lot of time. And the most ridiculous thing is, you need to spend the same time once you don't want it - that is , 'uninstall'. Microsoft tries to convince people that this makes their OS running faster. And that is a BIG LIE. See the Unix way which lasts several decades. Windows uses this way only because it's not well written itself. Once you have tried Mac and 'installed' a bunch of software you will surely know what I mean.

Except for the ugly 'finder', Mac OS X leopard beats Windows Vista in its every bone. The use of hotkeys, hot corners, multi-desktops, dashboard, and the docking - yes, the 'start' menu was cool ten years ago, but it isn't now. Microsoft used 10 years to improve their start menu which even has a unique key binded, and you'll see how stupid it is. Microsoft itself is not stupid, it's just slow. Watch what's going on in Windows 7 and you'll understand what I mean. (If you're not only a smart person but also a smart engineer, I don't need to explain how important it will be to have a handful console with you, but this will be off-topic so I'm gonna gonna talk about it here.)

But when all these Mac has meets Linux (Ubuntu + GNOME), they are no longer advantages anymore. For software installing, if you own an iPhone you may be surprised about the App Shop and how convenient it is, but know this: the way searching and installing software by a single command / a few mouse clicks exists for several decades already. This is the power of open source and open source community. It's hard to explain how great it really is, you have to try it yourself to know how the applications should really work.

Back to our UI talk, beginners always use cool stuffs like compiz fusion, avant window manager etc to make their Linux looks even better than Mac. I used be one of them, til' one day I found that I don't ever need them: first, unlike in Windows or Mac, you don't need to open a lot of windows in most cases. IM (pidgin), music player (rhythmbox), downloaders (Azureus) can be found on panel, and don't need to keep open all the time so it's OK for them to stay there. GNOME-Terminal, Firefox and PCManFM work in a multi-tab way. You can easily access them by hotkeys - that's what a well designed desktop OS should be FOR SMART PEOPLE. I think that's also why in Ubuntu they put only 2 workspaces as default; in most cases you don't even need a second desktop.

Linux is not perfect, of course. But I'm really amazed by how fast it improves. Getting used to work with hotkeys and you'll find Linux your best friend.