[Qgis-user] (no subject)

[Alister Hood]

On Mon, Mar 12, 2012 at 2:13 PM, john raskulinecz <jerasku at hotmail.com> wrote:
> David,
> You're right,
> ?I wouldn't have got it then but do now. But seriously, does windows 7
> restrict QGIS'S abilities?
> ?J.R.

1. It is common for QGIS plugins to have dependencies which are not readily available for Windows (you may need to put in the effort to build them yourself).
2. Plugins sometimes have Windows related problems.  I guess some of the developers don't do much testing for Windows.
3. As was mentioned, there is no readily available 64bit version of QGIS for Windows (you would need to build it and its dependencies yourself).
4. There seems to be a reasonable history of issues with QGIS that only appear on Windows, particularly problems with printing.  Again, I think this is due to the developers not using windows.  Some of them are also issues with dependencies of QGIS, e.g. QT.
5. FWIW I get a reasonable number of crashes when I try to run QGIS on 64 bit Windows 7, and none on 32bit Windows XP.  I do always run a self-compiled (on XP) master version of QGIS, not an official build, but I don't really see why that would affect running on 64bit Windows 7.  As you have seen though, some people report no trouble on Windows 7.
6. This is 2012.  You don't need programming ability to use Linux.  You are _much_ more likely to need it on Windows, to work around the issues above.  Just make sure you don't purchase some esoteric hardware that doesn't work with Linux.

> FROM YOUR REPLY I BELIEVE I'LL START WITH WINDOWS 7-8 AS MY O.S.

Well, you don't seem to have a reason for doing that, but do what you like...