After reading the Desktop Wars post i decided to go out and get Linux. It came free on a magazine. Its called "Xandros Desktop 2.0". Is there any way I can run executables on it.

Yes, just chmod +x them.

And then, cd to the directory in the shell, and type ./program, replacing program with the name of the executable.

Or type in the full path to the program. Or make a link to it in your ~/bin directory.

Thanks for the help! :)