Issue 329, available now (May 2025) in the UK, is the final issue of Linux Format (LXF). The magazine lasted for 25 years and that is an amazing achievement in the modern age of websites delivering information and answers 24/7 – but before “always on connectivity” and broadband speeds it was a little different.
It’s the early 2000s. Dial up internet (56K) was connectivity of the day and involved sharing a phone line with family that wanted to use it to make phone calls. A young me is in a local newsagents looking at technology magazines during a lunch break. My eyes came across a Linux magazine and I picked it up intrigued as to what Linux was.
When I got home I pulled out my Windows 98 PC and attempted an install of Linux. I want to say it was Mandrake or Mandriva but at this point my memory is foggy on the details, but I do remember having an operating system and then realising that it would not run my Windows 98 games.
LXF have issue 1 available on their website, and it really does help bring back memories of the 2000s. It even has an application called Terraform in the reviews section, though it’s not the one most would refer to today.
It was a quite some time later that I found myself using Ubuntu on a different aging computer, and picking up copies of Linux Format to learn more about different distros, how to use the terminal to install applications (amongst other things) and when the Raspberry Pi launched how it was being used in many different projects.
Picking it up from a supermarket during a shop, and being a subscriber for a bit, I decided that I needed to write this small blog post just to say thank you LXF for many years of great reading material!