windows 3.1 -> DOS was cooler, wrote some programs using be.exe including reboot "virus" windows 95 -> first computer at home windows 98 -> multiple users = not so much win2k -> HTML (SSI, JavaScript) laptop for me -> win2k (friends all using it) tinkered with suse, caldera, freebsd, solaris _very_ briefly (friend obsessed with switching OSs), wanted to try skyos powerbook G4: OSX OS9, OSX (March 2001) fall 2001: school begins, class languages Scheme, Java, C, Squeak installed Darwin and RedHat on friends computer, OS X server at work, RHEL as a grad student 2002 php march 2003 -> got desktop from a friend, played around with RHEL, went backpacking for the summer. may 2003 -> hurt leg, came back, decided to learn Linux. spent entire Summer getting gentoo installed and working as a server. Gentoo on PBG4 october 2003 -> bought rack mount server, first "real" server runs linux. automating things with bash, etc summer 2005 -> perl october 2005 -> bought another rack server, first nice one, put in a colo summer 2007 python