I’ve been planning to switch my PCs at home to Linux as a winter project this year.
I just installed a new SSD and put Mint on the main newer machine yesterday. Nary a speed bump in the process, and it’s so nice to have the snappy desktop and update experiences I’m used to from running Linux all day at work.
I said this in another thread but I set up a windows vm for someone because they needed it to run literally one scam tax software, otherwise they had no reason to switch back from Linux.
Even stuff like icue that uses windows drivers for peripherals will run in a VM with USB pass through.
And even then there’s a nice open source alternative for icue; you only need it if you want to edit hardware profiles.
US? Here in scandi tax seems to work well automatically, as in, we just log into the government website and click OK most years. Corrections are easy enough too, if you need it, but it’s usually not required.
My reason is that VR gaming is not feasible on Linux, so I need to keep a Windows VM to play VR games.
why not?
Most VR headsets don’t work at all on Linux, and for those that do, most games don’t work anyway. For those that do work, they are unstable, and SteamVR itself is unstable and prone to crashes. Even when things work for a while, the frame rate is lower than on Windows, which is much more important for VR games.
So as much as flat games work perfectly on Linux nowadays, it’s just not there for VR.
I ask because it works fine for me
What sort of hardware are you using (gpu and headset)? I’m thinking of picking something up soon.
amd gpu, have tried quest and index. quest takes some work but index doesnt have issues. performance might be better on windows but I wouldnt know
Nice, thanks. I’m on nvidia. I was thinking about the quest simply because it is so much more affordable, and newer than the index. Only thing holding me back is I don’t have a meta account nor do I want to make one, even if it’s just for the quest.
Soooo many of these threads go like this
Op - “I have xyz problem on Linux”
Commentor - “I don’t have that problem I’m using amd”
Op - “yeah I’m using nvidia”
Nvidia is just anti-Linux lol
meta account would be necessary unless there’s another way to run developer tools
i never saw one to begin with
People who come here to say Linux is not good or that this community is an echo chamber and get mad for pointing out obvious flaws in the OS miss two things:
-
The post is an opinion of someone. Notice the “I” in the title? That should give you some clue.
-
You are offended when people suggest that you learn and adapt to the OS, but you suggest that Linux should support your workflow without any effort on your part to learn the OS. Which is hypocritical to say the least.
-
Why is this thread getting flooded with people saying how they can’t use Linux? Isn’t that a little odd coming from a Linux community?
Lemmy is weird and this showed up on my ‘all’ page yesterday and again today. So that’s where you’re probably getting those comments (and mine!)
But I’ve been using Linux servers long enough and switching to Linux for my workstation once i finish getting parts for a new build
I don’t see why. You can be interested in Linux and like some aspects of it but still get annoyed at the blinkered zealots claiming that there’s no reason to use Windows.
There is no reason for some people to use Windows
Definitely true for a minority. Not the way most of these articles are presented though (including this one).
I never had a reason to use Windows outside of job requirements. If I bothered I could find a job without such requierements.
Ignore the trolls
Because on lemmy a post getting 100 up votes is enough to end up somewhere high on all, so your seeing people from outside of the Linux community in here.
That’s why I’m here, front page.
I would say “people don’t see the community a post is in before commenting?” But of course they don’t. :'(
People outside of the community are allowed to have a different experience than those within it.
Of course, but sometimes communities have a specific context that is important to be aware of. Just to give an extreme examples: Communities like unpopular opinion, that you should upvote if you do not agree with that opinion. Or circle jerks communities that the point is to be tongue and cheek about the particular subject. Or the nosleep community that, if am not mistaken the name, everyone has to interact with the post in character as if it was real.
The title of this post is “I Don’t See a Reason to Switch to Windows from Linux Anymore in 2025”, surely that invites discussion?
I read the combo before my original reply as “there is a bunch of people with no interest in Linux or that just hates Linux coming to a Linux community just to say that Linux sucks”. I feel like that if it was a more general technology sub it is fair, but in a Linux community is more weird, like people interested in Linux will discuss its shortcomings in a more positive way not just being dismissive. But I may be interpreting things wrong.
Because people are mad any time someone suggests they could change anything about themselves. It’s pretty sad.
But this is a Linux community
Lemmy is still a small place with a lot of Linux users, so this likely shows up in several people’s /all
I understand. I agree with you. Just commenting on how personally people take things and how stubborn they are
Hiya, intending to switch from Windows to Linux (it looks like I’ll finally be pulling the proverbial trigger this holiday season!) but I got here via Local sorted by Active on programming.dev. I am not subbed to Linux.
In other words, people outside the target audience are getting exposed to this post.
But… I wanna play Fortnite.
Play better games lol (/s)
I know it’s not a solution for everyone, but this is why I dusted off my Xbox. Fortnite on Xbox supports keyboard and mouse too
I don’t have an Xbox. Come on.
I figured, which is why I worded my comment the way I did.
It’s an option worth considering for games that are incompatible.
I mean, if the option is “just have a separate device that runs a Microsoft OS”, it might as well be my desktop.
I don’t exclusively mean Xbox. Playstation, Nintendo consoles, take your pick.
I get that, but the suggestion is still to have a dedicated device to play Fortnite and that’s exactly what I’m doing, the device just happens to be a PC running Windows.
Okay, look, I don’t want to be a hater, I promise. I have a setup with a Linux dual boot in my computer right now. But man, the crazy echo chamber around this issue is not just delusional, it’s counterproductive. Being in denial about the shortcomings isn’t particularly helpful in expanding reach, if that’s what you all say you want.
So, in the spirit of balance, my mostly unbiased take on the listicle:
1 - Web tools get the job done: This is true when it’s true. I work with Google’s office suite, so yeah, many tools are indistinguishable. But not all tools are web tools. A big fallacy in this article is that just because a subset of items have embraced a solution doesn’t mean that the solution is universal. If you need to work with Adobe software you’re still SOL. MS Office still lacks some features on the web app. Some of the tools I use don’t work, so I do still need to run those in a native Windows app. Since I’m not going to switch OSs every time I need to push a particular button, I’m going to default to Windows for work.
2 - Plenty of distros to suit your preference: This one is an active downside, and it pisses me off when it gets parroted. When I last decided to dual boot Linux I had to try five different distros to find one that sort of did everything I needed at once, which was a massive waste of time. I’m talking multiple days. Yes, there are a ton of distros. I only need to use one, though. But I need that one to work all the time. If one of the distros can get my HDR monitor to work but not my 5.1 audio and another can get my 5.1 audio setup to work, but not my monitors, then both distros are broken and neither is useful to me. This actually happened, incidentally.
3 - Steam has a decent collection of Linux games, plus Steam OS: Yes. Gaming on Linux is possible and works alright, but it’s far from perfect. Features my Nvidia card runs reliably on Windows are hit-and-miss under Linux. Not all games are compatible in the first place, either. And while Heroic does a great job of running my GOG and Epic libraries, which are themselves just as big as my Steam one, it is a much bigger hassle to set up to run under the SteamOS game mode UI. Don’t get me wrong, this has made huge strides but again, I’m not going to change OSs every time I hit a compatibility snag. This is the least fallacious of these points, though.
4 - Proprietary choices on Linux: Yes, there are some. Like the web app thing, the problem isn’t what is there, it’s what’s missing. Also, as a side note, I find it extremely obnoxious when you have to enable these manually as an option in your package manager. As a user I don’t care if a package is open source or not, I just want to install it.
5 - Electron makes app availability easier. Cool. Will take your word for it. Acknowledging the ideological debate behind it goes to the same argument I made in the previous point. And as above, it’s not about what’s there, it’s about what’s missing.
6 - No ads in your OS. I mean… nice? I still get ads for my selected distro on first boot, as well as on web apps and notifications for installed apps. Beyond a few direct links to first party apps in the one page of Win 11’s settings app I don’t find anything in Windows particularly intrusive, either. Which is not to say I don’t dislike some of the overly commercial choices in Windows, they’re just not a dealbreaker… yet.
7 - Docker, Homelab and self-hosting: This is… off topic, honestly. I do self host some things. Even used Docker once or twice… in my NAS, where the self-hosting happens. You don’t need to switch your home desktop to Linux for that, and nobody is questioning that Linux is the OS of choice for a whole host of device ranges, from servers to the Raspberry Pi. Linux is great as a customizable underlying framework to build fast support for a niche device with a range of specific applications. We should be honest about how that breaks down if you try to use it as a widely accessible home computer alternative where the priorities are wide compatibility and ease of use.
Well, that became a huge thing, but… yeah, I guess I was annoyed enough by the delusion to rant. Look, I’d love to step away from Windows, and it’s a thing you can do if you’re tech savvy and willing to pretzel around the limitations in your hardware choices and your willingness to tinker… but it’s not a serious mainstream alternative by a wide margin. I wish it was. Self-congratulatory praise within the tiny bubble of pre-existing fans (and why are there fans of operating systems in the first place?) is not going to help improve or widen its reach.
The only point I can really agree with you on here is Adobe products (and some other niche proprietary stuff like AutoDesk – I don’t consider MS Office an industry standard and if your job does I’m very sorry). And that’s just corporate lock-in, if you’re already paying hundreds of dollars a year to use those programs then yeah you’re gonna stay on the corporate OS.
Other than that, everything you brought up just isn’t quite accurate, or evaporates as you get more comfortable with the Linux ecosystem. The distro point, for example: every distro is just a starting point. Outside of some niche exceptions like Gentoo and NixOS that will radically redefine how you configure the system, any distro can largely be made to work similarly to any other. The major differences are just a) initial package set, b) the package manager, and c) the set of available packages. There is no one-size-fits-all answer to “what software should be on a computer”, which is why there are so many distros and spins out there.
I would say gaming is actually pretty close to perfect, provided you don’t play any of the games that have decided they just will never work on Linux – almost exclusively games that use invasive kernel-level anti-cheat software which I wouldn’t want to install on Windows either. There are a handful like Fortnite and Apex Legends which use EAC, which works great on Linux now, but the devs explicitly decided to disable it. Just like the corporate lock-in point, if you’re committed to those games stay on Windows. Heroic and Lutris take a few more clicks to set up than Steam’s one-click magic, but it’s generally pretty straightforward for any game with any popularity.
The point about ads is where I start to think you’re deliberately being obtuse. You think that, what, a splash screen telling you how to use your computer when you first boot it, and notifications from apps you installed, are advertising? And you find them similarly annoying as the actual sponsored content that shows up in your start menu, on the lock screen, in Edge, when you use Cortana… Not to mention the constant pressure from the OS to use those things? The only way I can interpret this without you just trolling is that you’ve spent too long in the Windows ecosystem and you’ve just adjusted to not notice how often it’s shoving something in your face.
Well, that’s your opinion. For others it works fine. I’ve been using Linux since 1995 and exclusively for both home and work for well over a decade now. And there are rarely issues these days. Teams is a piece of shit, but my coworkers on Windows agree on that. Apart from that everything works for me.
Well, yeah, I think “Teams is a piece of shit” is a very uncontroversial statement.
I think “there are rarely issues” is demonstrably wrong, though. At least if we agree on the definition of “issues”. Every Linux support forum I’ve visited looking to fix my HDR monitor support seems to agree that HDR support in Linux is tentative at best, which I’d call an “issue”, or that setting up a Nvidia card in distros that don’t come preinstalled with the proprietary drivers can be a mess, which I’d call an “issue”.
Linux desktop is certainly functional, but having learned to work around the limitations, to live without certain features or to purchase the better supported hardware alternative is different to there being no issues for a user migrating whatever PC they have over and expecting everything to work first time.
LOL. Never tried HDR on Linux but I find it very funny that it sucks on Linux because it sucks on Windows too. What the hell doesn’t it suck on? I need to try it my wife’s Macbook.
Nah, man, they finally fixed it at some point on Windows 11. PCs for the longest time struggled with it, but these days out of four dedicated PC monitors being used by different people in my house right now three are HDR-compatible and working just fine on Windows out of the box, as are multiple portable devices (including, incidentally, the Steam Deck OLED). Plus all TVs in the house, obviously.
HDR was standardized for TVs and started getting content almost a decade ago, it’s been a gaming and video default on consoles for two hardware generations and is increasingly a default feature on even cheap PC monitors. I agree that Windows took waaaay too long to get there, which was incredibly frustrating, considering MS were supporting it just fine on Xbox, but it works well now and I miss it immediately when shifting to Linux on the same setup.
VRR, too, but the situation there is a bit different.
I run W11 daily and it isn’t fixed. Sure, HDR content works but my screen needs to flicker for a bit before it gets enabled and sometimes it doesn’t. Don’t even get me started on games that require you to have it on in the system before you can turn it on in the game. Sure, I could just leave it on all the time but then SDR content looks washed out. I’m not saying it doesn’t work, just that it’s kinda annoying. As you mentioned, I can just turn on my TV, play an HDR video and it works, then switch to a SDR content and it also works. When am I getting that experience on PC?
Hm. SDR content on HDR containers have been working well for me on both DP1.4 and HDMI 2.1-enabled GPUs, no washed out content, which I did use to have. It did not work over HDMI on an Intel A770 I tested where their weird DP-to-HDMI adaptor didn’t support HDR at all (I hear it’s working on the Battlemage cards, thankfully), but it does work over DP, and it also works well out of the box on my monitors using the integrated HDMI out on a 7 series Ryzen APU, so I’m guessing it’s doing fine on newer AMD cards, too.
I do believe you that it’s borked for you, and if you’re on a last-gen card with HDMI 2.0 I have seen it do the old “washed out SDR” garbage even under Win11, so I absolutely concede that it’s still crappier than the way more reliable solutions for TV-focused hardware. Still, it works way more reliably than it used to on Windows and it’s way more finicky and harder to set up on Linux than it is on Windows these days (or outright unsupported, depending on your flavor of DE).
I actually upgraded to Windows 11 specifically because I was told they fixed HDR. I do have an RX7600 so it’s technically “last gen” but I’m running DP (I have no idea which version but it has to be at least 1.4 because it runs 1080p at 180Hz). Washed out SDR content isn’t that bad, I actually didn’t even notice until I dragged a window playing SDR content to my second monitor that doesn’t have HDR and the blacks looked, well, blacker. I don’t doubt that it’s worse on Linux, I wasn’t trying to defend it. Just wanted to point out that it seems like no OS that isn’t designed to run only on TVs gives a crap about the HDR experience.
I am only saying that I rarely have an issue. Even HiDPI and scaling works just fine for me. The only annoying issue I am having is that the Ctrl keys are not working in a VMWare remote desktop session when using barrier with another machine being the server.
HiDPI and per-screen scaling work well on my Wayland KDE Plasma install, too. The addition of the word “even” there is telling, though, and if I had chosen to stick to a different combo of distro, DE and compositor I would be annoyed by that on the daily. And that would be an issue.
That’s what I’m trying to impress here. You can tinker until you find a setup that works for you, I’m not questioning that. But “I’ve solved all the issues over the past decade of tweaking this setup” is not the same as “there are no issues”, and it’s important to acknowledge the difference if you’re going to be out there recommending that every normie user shifts to Linux.
Have used Linux for decades. Switched over full time a few months ago and have generally been happy but all your points are extremely valid.
Plasma will occasionally freeze the taskbar/desktop when it wakes up or I switch back to my desktop from work laptop using a KVM, effectively connecting a monitor.
For me that’s fine, manually open a terminal and kill the process so it’ll restart. For all but a handful of my extended friends and family that means the computer is broken until you log off or restart. It’s not a smooth experience.
why are there fans of operating systems in the first place
Operating systems are huge endeavours of engineering and design by entire teams of people over decades, which are used literally daily. Is that not enough of a reason for people to be fans of them?
Hah. Of the concept of operating systems, maybe. I can see one appreciating technical solutions and UX choices just as a matter of skill and execution. Actively fanboying for them? Getting into playground-style arguments where you root for your favorite? Nah. Seems super immature to me.
There aren’t even that many of the things anymore. It’s not like the old days, where every computer brand had their own. Where are the TOS fanboys these days? All them kids and their obnoxious modern software interfaces. That’s not a OS, it’s just graphics.
That is true for any fandom. Why is being a fan if flavour x software bad but being a fan of flavour x car or flavour x sports team is OK?
You are making a ton of assumptions about my opinions of car brand fans and sports fans that I am not ready to verify, friend.
playground-style arguments
Perfect description of your angry ranting ITT
Your derisive laughing in response to this valid question validates anyone’s negative opinion of your trolling here
Man, the version of me that lives in your head is amazing. I’m gonna dress up as him next Halloween, twirly mustache and everything.
This is a weird hobby I gotta say. Wanna say a few words about how evil Firefox is but zero about chrome/Google while you’re at it? Maybe write a paragraph or two about the perfect blameless business practices of Microsoft? I think your Halloween costume would be great, you can just continue to follow the model of a Ben-Shapiro-style weirdo who says how much they despise the idea of Linux while pretending to be unbiased, in every conversation. You’re like the anti-evangelist. In every conversation you are not looking for ways to sell people on Linux, you’re looking for ways to bring up how “awful” it is.
Again, pretty fucking weird hobby.
See, that version of me is something. Bet he makes more money, too. Probably gets paid by Microsoft.
For the record, I’m typing this on Firefox, which is my main browser on all OSs, Android included. It’s actually perfectly fine. I’d like more competition outside of Chromium, and I keep a Chrome install mostly to keep the Google Workspace stuff I do for work separate from my personal browsing, but… yeah, no, use Firefox, there are no downsides. Well, except the lack of tab grouping. They should steal that one already.
And man, I’ve been whining about Microsoft since the Windows 95 launch. I’m on the record with Microsoft support telling them that OneDrive is the single biggest liability for my business and the piece of software that has cost me the most money in my career. The moment I find a forum built entirely about praising Microsoft’s software as a fanboying collective you will see me point those out on the daily because come on.
But there isn’t one of those popping up on my feed. There is a Linux one, though, where people seem to be on different degrees of denial about the reality of the situation, so I sometimes point that out. Because man, do I wish the Linux community made different decisions so we could have a more viable desktop OS alternative for general use.
But yes, I am the anti-evangelist. On every angle. No evangelism here, in any meaning of the word. If you’re an evangelist of any persuasion for anything and you’re not getting paid, you should stop. I’d much rather look at things honestly, even the things I like. It’s both better for you and a lot more fun.
There is absolutely Zero things wrong with encouraging Linux use and a million things wrong with contributing to the reams of misinformation floating around about it. So expect pushback every single time. I see you’re getting a lot of it. Seems to be the goal.
Regarding Office, fear not! Microsoft is working hard to remove functionality from the Windows and Mac desktop apps, so soon we’ll have feature parity! See: “New Outlook”.
They’ve been pushing this shit for years already, nobody wants it, and they’re forcing it next year despite still not fixing shared calendars (among other things). New Outlook is basically just the web app in a wrapper.
I must be nobody, because I like the new Mac outlook. Granted it’s because I like the option to pin emails in top and I don’t recall any missing feature. Why the hate?
Granted I am used to the web version from the time I used Linux at work. The windows version seemed much worse in comparison
Personally I’m a fairly basic user, so for me it’s “fine”. But I also work in IT so I’m aware of some the problems preventing wide adoption across the org.
Shared calendars and delegation still don’t work correctly. It’s a dealbreaker for a lot of the admin assistants, who are generally the most advanced users.
On the Windows side, PST support is basically gone. Microsoft will claim they support PSTs, but their idea of “support” is to use old Outlook to manually copy your PSTs into server-side folders. That would be bad enough even if it were reliable, and in practice it would take eternity for some users to migrate all their stuff. We have nearly unlimited storage in O365 but it’s still a pain.
The only things I actually like about new Outlook are a couple UX changes that would have easily been applied to old Outlook if MS still gave a shit. Instead, old Outlook has been nearly frozen in time since…2016? Maybe 2019?
I mean, cool. Works for me. As soon as there is feature parity between their web app and their native app I no longer have a problem working with Office out of Windows. Not that I want to use Office in the first place, it’s just not my choice.
But right now I need to push a button that doesn’t exist on Linux, so I have to do it on Windows and that determines what I boot, which is the same situation from anybody who hates Adobe but has to use their software suite as well.
It works for me and has done so for almost 10 years.
Sure it won’t work for everyone but to say it isn’t viable isn’t true either. It depends on the person.
It’s not viable for the mainstream. “It depends on the person” suggests it’s luck of the draw, but the Linux desktop penetration is something like 1-4%, at best, and that’s inlcuding SteamOS and PiOS in the mix.
That’s not, “depends on the person”, that’s “doesn’t work for the vast majority of people”. There is a reason for that.
“it’s not ready for the mainstream because it’s not mainstream” truly fantastic logic
For someone who does a good job of pointing out fallacies in Linux fans’ logic, I find it surprising you’re making the argument that because there isn’t wide adoption yet, it doesn’t work for most people.
That premise only floats if nearly everyone has tried Linux for a while to see if it works for them. Obviously that’s not true.
I disagree with your argument, though. It depends on why people aren’t trying Linux. If they aren’t trying Linux because they don’t know it exists, then yeah, sure.
But it’s been over twenty years. If Linux was convincing people who just stumble upon it reliably it would have done better than going from 2 to 4%. In the time since you’ve been able to install Ubuntu (“it installs just like Windows!”, the PC magazines said at the time) mobile phones were taken over by Symbian, replaced by iOS almost entirely and then iOS lost the lead to Android.
So no, not everybody has tried it, but a whole lot of people have heard of it and avoided it for its (earned) reputation for being finicky, incompatible and hard to set up without tech expertise. If you solve the issues I’m calling out you solve that issue as well.
Yes it is a good point you’re making. Since windows, Mac, and Linux all three spent billions of dollars marketing their product, Linux clearly lost and that shows everyone said no to it. /s
It has that reputation because 10-15 years ago it was actually true. And that reputation remains because of people like you who lie and say that’s still how it is. Serious question, why are you doing this? It’s obvious you’re either ignorant or intentionally misinterpreting how Linux would work if a large company with brand recognition had the balls to preinstall it on all their machines.
It’s pretty obvious it wouldn’t be noticed except people would wonder why their computers were so much faster and streamlined than all their other ones.
But you can’t allow for the obvious. You’re just here to naysay and the agenda is visible from space. Why though, makes no sense. Because it truly is doubtful you’re paid by Microsoft. Too many people do what you’re doing here to be paid for it. It’s a kind of self affirmation if I were to guess. But that still wouldn’t really explain the compulsion to do it so often and forcefully.
Dude, I don’t mind your fanfic, but maybe we should keep it to a single subthread? No need to interfere with the conversation elsewhere to theorycraft narratives for your anti-Linux Avengers movie.
Anyway, on whatever morsel of a point there is here, I’m actually going to argue that the sweet spot for Linux feature parity and ease of use was a while ago. Back in the late 00s there was a beautiful moment where the hardware was standardized enough and the user-friendly distros were hassle-free enough that Linux had effective feature parity. Plus Windows was still fairly unstable and hacked-together, so it didn’t look great in side by side comparisons against competitors. The bummer then was that the software compatibility just wasn’t there to capitalize.
These days we have a lot better software parity, but the hardware support and streamlined UX have regressed a bit, partially because GPUs are kind of nuts now and GPU drivers are this gargantuan babel tower of per-game tweaks that needs constant support and display specs are kind of absurd as well. And because laptops are increasingly reliant on custom hardware and software, at least in mainstream brands that often don’t provide explicit Linux support. But also because the Linux community has been weirdly resistant to embracing baseline contemporary functionality, let’s be honest, particularly on the display side. In any case, it’s actually harder to migrate any given piece of kit to a Linux install seamlessly now than it was back then.
That bit of history, incidentally, also answering the first bit, because while Linux has never been marketed quite as aggressively as the paid alternatives, it is certainly no secret mystery. People were aware of it, it was often proposed as the fallback default install if you didn’t want Windows OEM fees and it’s had decades to spread via word of mouth. It’s just not kept up with the way modern computers are put together.
Lol it’s obviously disingenuous to even say Linux was marketed at all. But being disingenuous is your thing so it makes sense
I agree with some of your points but in this one and other comments you are referencing “data” multiple times to provide validity for your opinions, yet you either fail to understand what the data is able to measure or you are using it dishonestly to further your argument.
A usage percentage does not provide reliable data about the usability (“viability for the mainstream”). There are too many factors at play distorting it to make a reliable connection between these two.
“It depends on the person” suggests it’s luck of the draw, but the Linux desktop penetration is something like 1-4%, at best, and that’s inlcuding SteamOS and PiOS in the mix […] that’s “doesn’t work for the vast majority of people”
The only way in which the percentage would be useful is, if you are implying that the other 96-99% chose to not use linux, because it doesn’t work for them, which is obviously not the case. Otherwise it is completely meaningless, as users were never exposed to linux, thus didn‘t have to make a decision, and thus didn’t deem another operating system superior.
There are a few objections along these lines in this thread, where the implication is that Linux is underused because it lacks awareness. Maybe it’s a generational thing? Linux has been around for a long time now, people are aware of it. There are multiple popular device lines out there that use it, several companies even put some marketing behind it.
I don’t know if you were there when Ubuntu first hit, but it was pretty widely reported. And that was twenty years ago. And of course Valve and Raspberry and Android and ChromeOs all were reported to carry flavours of Linux to the masses.
I mean, I’m sure a bigger, more coordinated marketing campaign would help, but it’s not a secret tucked away on nerdy cycles. I remember being in a college classroom in what? 2006? And when a professor didn’t know what Linux was the entire classroom laughed at them for reacting in disbelief at the notion that Linux was free (“so if something breaks who provides support?” I remember them asking, it was hilarious).
Look, it’s been a long time since you can just pull installation media of Linux from the Internet and just give it a try. Awareness is a factor, but it’s not THE reason Linux isn’t more widespread.
I disagree that the implication is only about lack of awareness. Further my point wasn’t that Linux is underused because of a lack of awareness. My point is that user popularity is not a valid measurement for usability.
Awareness definitely plays a role in user numbers but there are other more important factors. For example awareness of Linux doesn’t beat what comes preinstalled, this is a much bigger factor if we are talking about all desktop users in my opinion. Linux could have the best usability out of all desktop OS, most would still not change preinstalled OS for different reasons e.g. not knowledgeable enough, indifference etc… You might argue that if it was the OS it would come preinstalled, but then you would be ignoring the economic reasons that guide that. I still maintain that popularity of an OS is not a metric that can be used to infer usability. As long as there are different hurdles to getting to the actual using part, actual usability can‘t be determined by popularity.
On a side note about awareness:
Maybe it’s a generational thing?
It could very well be, or it could potentially be something geographical. Anecdotally in my friends group of university students(20-26year olds) in a non-technical-field, not a single Person (beside me) knew what Linux was, and most had never heard the term before I mentioned it in a conversation. Neither would my parents. So maybe not a generational thing. I think you might be viewing the extent of awareness from the eyes of someone broadly in the tech field?
For the record, in the anecdote in question the professor was teaching marketing in a non-tech degree, so I’m not sure about that one. The argument, IIRC was about them arguing that the Win95 launch campaign had been one of the, if not THE most successful marketing campaign ever, which all the millenials in the room were not having. Prof argued “nobody even knows what the second most successful PC OS would be” and the Linux incident happened. It was very funny.
Anyway, on the underlying point I agree that you could change the usage numbers in many ways, but the argument here is not that the low usage info proves the bad usability, necessarily. I’m saying the bad usability and compatibility issues are a major problem that makes the OS hard to embrace for most users. That’s the hypothesis. The info that after decades of public, free availability Linux remains a marginal choice is a piece of info that reinforces that hypothesis. It doesn’t prove it by itself, but it’s certainly very consistent with it.
I’d argue that the fact that Linux is free and it’s not preinstalled more often also reinforces that point. In fact some PC builders would offer it as a fallback if you didn’t want to pay for Windows, especially back in the 00s when the functionality gap was actually narrower than it is now, and that didn’t seem to help much, with most people still paying the fee to get a OEM Windows install.
But all of that is still indications we see in the market of the ripple effects of Linux’s reputation, which would be ripple effects of its UX and compatibility issues. It’s not the entire picture, but it sure fits in the picture, if you see what I’m saying.
That is not true though. The vast majority of people are people that don’t do much on their systems at all. Maybe look at Facebook or a few sites, write the occasional document or email and maybe play a few simple games. The type of people that have never heard of Linux or even know what an OS is let alone able to switch to another one. Those types of people will be perfectly happy on Linux if it came pre installed.
The people switching ATM and having issues are the highly technical people that have far more complex requirements and for those it does depend on the person and what they need to do.
The low percentage of users is not a sign of of it not being ready, just the sheer marketing and effort Microsoft has put into making windows the default option.
Again, same as the response above: that use case is covered in phones and tablets. Nobody who is just browsing the web is changing their entire OS. Especially if their main device is currently running Android or iPadOS/iOS. I am sure my parents could use Linux the same way they use their current device, but their current device is an Android tablet they know how to use and works just like their phone. I’m not switching them over for nerd bragging rights.
I mean, sure, they mostly would use a Linux device as a ChromeOS device (ChromeOS also at residual usage levels, incidentally), but it’s disingenuous to pretend articles like the one linked here are targeting those users, and it’s definitely not the focus for Linux desktop usage and development, either.
You just proved nous@programming.dev point. Android OS is a Linux kernel variant. Since it comes pre-installed, most users have no issue with it.
No no but see the narrative is that they are a completely neutral Linux user who just knows the truth that no one besides them would ever like Linux because reasons!
To suggest otherwise is straying from that narrative and that is not allowed. Bad XBeam!!
Man, I would love for desktop Linux to get to the level of Android when it comes to dedicated support. Are you kidding me? Hell, I was telling raging fanboy down there that I actually find desktop Android is a more reliable experience for light usage at this point. At least you have some expectation of universal app support across the ecosystem and the hardware comes pre-configured out of the box.
The problem is that a desktop OS is a much, much harder challenge. You’re not shipping a custom image dedicated to the specific piece of hardware and just ensuring all software runs in it, you have to provide a modular install that will not just adjust to whatever weird combo of hardware the user has at the time, but also support radical changes in that hardware going forward. It’s kinda nuts that computers ended up working that way.
But they do. And Windows handles it by way of being the default use case for all that hardware, so it gets all the third party support. And Apple doesn’t handle it because they ship their OS like phones ship their OSs, so they don’t have to.
But I’m telling you right now, the day the desktop Linux experience matches Android I will default to it, no questions asked, just like I did on my phone and on my tablet.
Well that’s unlikely to happen since Android is locked down spyware.
I’m not really seeing your point. You don’t have to use Linux and you are perfectly free to use whatever you want. The strange part is how you keep insisting that it is somehow behind. Linux for me is the only thing that works for me. Windows simply lacks a lot of the Linux feature set and apps. Plus I can’t stand ads, AI and other user hostile stuff. I straight up could not use Windows as it would slow me down.
Yeah I’m not going to lie that’s kind of a weird take.
By that logic captain crunch cereal isn’t ready for mainstream because it doesn’t have enough market share.
We may not be reading the word “mainstream” the same way here, because when you have a small oligopoly with one player at 75%, one at 15% and one at 4%… well, yeah, one of those is mainstream and one of those is not. That’s kind of how being mainstream works. Hell, that’s borderline monopolistic.
That’s not the same as a commodity where dozens or hundreds of options are available and compete on relatively equal footing. The comparison isn’t Captain Crunch versus Corn Flakes, it’s Coca-Cola versus Green Cola. I can find Green Cola in my supermarket… but it sure as hell isn’t the mainstream choice.
That’s different to “being ready for the mainstream”, though. Linux is not mainstream because it has big blockers that prevent it. The lack of readiness is a cause of the lack of mainstream appeal, not the other way around. For the same reason that Green Cola’s stevia-forward absolutely wild aftertaste is a cause of its lack of mainstream appeal.
I do realize not everybody will get this comparison, but if you know you know.
There are more people who only browse and use cross platform apps that don’t realise they could switch easily, than there are people for whom a switch would be problematic.
Windows has more supported software, but many people use a small range of common software. Gamers are just one niche. Just like you think Linux users are an echo chamber here, you are not considering the echo chamber of gamers you’re in that dont represent most windows users.
Honestly I’m waiting for a small company to license a Linux desktop to companies with support. It would need to be desktop focused and designed to be indestructible.
And those people have phones and iPads.
My concern isn’t gaming. If you do read what I wrote above, I actually say explicitly that gaming improvement is one of the more solid improvements on Linux recently.
The real problem isn’t PC gamers, who are typically tech savvy (although the issues with anticheat and display hardware compatibility are relevant for a big chunk of many millions of casual gamers). The problem is with people who use their PCs for work using unsupported software in Windows or Mac. Those people have no time for troubleshooting. One key piece of software doesn’t work or isn’t available? That’s a dealbreaker. One area of the setup has a problem that needs tinkering for troubleshooting? That’s a dealbreaker. I am using my computer to make money, I don’t have time for posturing. Either all the stuff I need works or it doesn’t.
Gaming is a problem, but it actually has a lot of people working to support it because at least one major company is betting on that to make money. Software and hardware compatibility doesn’t have the same corporate backing and it makes Linux impractical.
I’ve even known gen z people who would prefer a laptop because they are easier to reliably type on and have bigger screens, yet here you are denying that anyone wouldn’t just settle for the crippled experience of a shitty phone or tablet if they could opt for better. As if there aren’t millions of people who would prefer a desktop OS, because of several reasons, but having grown up with them as just being one of them.
You really have a rage boner for Linux.
That is barely a sentence, let alone a cogent argument.
We do have data on these things, we know how the market breaks down. For the record, the experience for tablet devices is way less crippled than you may remember if you haven’t used one in a while. The tablet my parents use has a very nice detachable keyboard and a dedicated desktop mode. For web applications there isn’t much difference from using a laptop, and they do appreciate the ability to use it as a screen with no keyboard for media consumption.
I have tried to get Linux running on a few PC hybrids and tablets, but most of them are a bit too quirky, and even the ones with some attempt at dedicated support from the community are a bit of a hassle, unfortunately.
Great, my grammar is somehow imperfect so you win. /s
Popularity is far from an indicator of preference. Tablets and phones are cheap and thus popular. Unfortunately I use both often for testing work stuff. It’s never fun. Typing on a touch screen is trash.
It is not a problem of whether it works for most people or not. It is a cultural problem. People hate change. That’s largely why people hate windows 11 even.
And it even leads people to spend an hour arguing with strangers about how completely unacceptable Linux is for most people when there’s actually a lot of arguments against that and very few in favor of it.
Rage on. No one believes you’re unbiased lol
The only reason I have a windows laptop at home is because my employer forces me to. It’s true that Adobe and MS stuff doesn’t run or runs bad, same with some specific live service games. Personally I hate all of those and am more than happy to avoid em like the plague outside of work hours. They’re horrible inadequate tools and horrible predatory games. Everything I actually wanted personally, has so far run just fine for years.
Edit: Remembered one specific thing that does really suck on Linux, and that’s music production. That area is absolutely cluttered with proprietary shit. Even switching between windows and macos is a pain as many of the tools are just not compatible.
Spot on. And like ants to sugar you have 20 or so ACKTUALLYs responding to you.
I’m not reading all that- anyway
I switched to full-time Linux this year. One of my programmer friends, whom I never expected to embrace Linux, switched to full-time Linux and is not going back. Our libraries have switched to Linux on all user-facing computers. 2 of my e-friends have approached me about Linux. Another friend is, despite not being a computer nerd, going to switch because Windows is forcing him to- and that’s my point. It’s not that Linux doesn’t have deep flaws inherent to its development model, it’s that those flaws are now less significant than those of Windows. Nobody likes Windows 11 and it’s pushing people off.
Nobody even thinks about Windows 11, they just use it if it comes preinstalled. And from the data we have, the people that don’t like Windows 11 are more likely to be on Windows 10 (or Mac OS).
There is no mass exodus to Linux. No data point we have shows that. The biggest Linux uptick we’ve seen recently is related to Steam Deck, which is as much Linux as Android or ChromeOS are.
Desktop Linux is better than it was, and it will be closer to its competitors if people ever agree that one consolidated system to support features that have been standard for years is the way to go… but it’s not a mainstream option. Yes, even against Windows 11.
I didn’t imply a mass exodus, I’m just telling you that ‘linux has issues’ isn’t a good argument when both W10 and W11 also have issues of the same grade and that it is, in some nerd circles, pushing people into Linux because they’d rather deal with Linux problems than Windows problems.
But I want a mass exodus.
I want to be on the OS with all the support and the software and the compatibility and the patches and the drivers. I don’t want to be in the nerd corner manually troubleshooting every piece of hardware I want to use. More to the point, I have things to do and can’t afford that anyway.
And I would love if that OS happened to be free, open source and not trying to sell me crap.
Hey, if you’re happy with the nerd corner, then that’s great for you, but man, does it not line up with the headline of “I don’t see a reason to switch to Windows anymore”, which is what we’re discussing here.
But I want a mass exodus.
Then why are you investing so much energy telling everyone why there shouldn’t be one?
I never said there shouldn’t be one, I said there are good reasons for most people to not migrate that need to be resolved before they will be one.
I don’t think it’s annoying to have a million distros that each have their own quirks and problems with my system because I don’t want people to move out of Windows, I think it’s annoying because it IS, and it’s one of several reasons preventing me and many others from moving out of the corporate walled gardens.
You sure fooled me. Your whole attitude in this thread is anger at the simple truth: the vast majority of computing done by end users is done in a web browser, and therefore many people could switch oses and barely notice any negative impact. How much irreplaceable desktop software are you running that shapes this perspective?
I’m a power user by all measures and i still typically have no more than 2-3 apps running outside my browser. And even most of those are cross platform apps. It seems like you’re time traveling from 2005 with this take.
Steam OS is just a Linux desktop with the Steam client in fullscreen. With two clicks you are on an ordinary KDE desktop. It’s not at all like Android or ChromeOS. If it were, Android would be a much bigger market for Steam to want to put their games. Everyone outside the US having their Steam library in their pocket would far outweigh however many thousand Decks they’ve sold.
Your ignorance on this tracks with the less obvious clues that you don’t know what you’re talking about, like your talk of “Linux games on Steam”. Linux games on Steam vs playing Steam games on Linux are two different things.
Thankfully Valve has done a ton of work to minimize that divide, although even the two checkboxes you have to tick on most desktop Linux installs to automatically fire off Windows games under Proton instead to filtering out only native Linux games are completely unnecessary and kind of annoying.
As for SteamOS, people need to get their story straight. Either it’s just Big Picture running by default over Linux, and then it’s just like having Steam Big Picture autolaunch on boot on a Windows handheld, or it’s a fantastic consolized UI that is the killer app that makes the Deck so much better than any other handheld.
Honestly, I lean towards the latter. SteamOS is great, compatibility aside. But if you do want to use it as a full Linux install then you have the same limitations you have on any Windows handheld, which kind of defeats the point.
🙄 but my Linux works so well on this embedded device, totally the same thing as a desktop!
Again, it’s just a computer. You can open it and replace parts. You can plug in a USB hub and a monitor and do spreadsheets with keyboard and mouse.
My favourite bit of weirdness from it being just a computer is that the screen is actually a vertical screen by default, so when you boot to the desktop, for half a second the cursor is rotated the wrong way.
deleted by creator
I literally tagged you a Linux hater months ago because you were raging about Linux. So I don’t believe you’re not a hater.
Also I tried to read what you wrote and the idea that it’s unbiased is laughable to me. Claiming to have a dual boot doesn’t sell me that you’re remotely unbiased.
You can tag people on lemmy? Great! I’ll tag you as an asshole. Can you please tag me as a shrimp-dick bitch? Thank you.
Cry harder
No u 🥲
It’s not a claim, I do have a dual boot set up at the moment. Manjaro (on KDE Plasma using Wayland, hence my whining about HDR setups) and Windows 11. Also a Lenovo Legion Go dualbooting Bazzite and Windows 11 and a Steam Deck. Plus a bunch of Linux handhelds, Raspberry Pis and assorted devices around the house that also count, I suppose.
You can ignore me all you want, it’s your prerogative, but I’m as much a part of the actual userbase as you are.
My daughter wants to play Sims 3 and use her Zune. I’m sure it’s possible to do both with enough work and time spent tracking down old utilities but how much time do I want to spend on that when I could just crank out a VM.
I remember Zune did not play well with Linux at all. One time I plugged my Zune into a Linux laptop just hoping to charge it. From that point on, until I plugged it back into a Windows PC, the Zune would play one song then skip the next two. As in track 1, 4, 7, then roll over to 2, 5, 8, etc.
That was the only problem I had with my Zune though, RIP Zune, you were the best.
Oh wait except for the leap year glitch. Microsoft apparently didn’t think people would still use Zune in 2008 so all the Zunes stopped working for the duration of the leap day lol.
Did I just go back in time?
It’s funny to me that I couldn’t* even tell which post of mine this was a response to 😅
Yes, we are quite anachronistic in my house.
I’m surprised that Zunes even work anymore. I thought that Microsoft had that locked down so tight that it wouldn’t work without the Zune software on your PC (which likely hasn’t been updated since 2012).
I have multiple 120GB Zunes, one being my original and the others I bought for cheap when everyone was dumping them for their phones. They all work fine. You do have to track down the software; I keep the executable on my local file share. I just found my old brown 30GB Zune in storage. It has music from a bunch of local bands from the area I grew up in that are irreplaceable. Unfortunately the software can’t read it because the firmware is out of date, and it can’t be updated without wiping the music off it, which defeats the purpose. There’s a utility called zalternator that allows you to mount the zune as a disk but I haven’t been able to find a copy anywhere. I was going to make a Windows XP VM and install the 1.1 version of the Zune software and see if that works. I digress, they do work still, with a bit of effort. MS could have brought it all back after GotG3 and cashed in, but nope!
deleted by creator
After the 3rd (iirc) Guardians of the Galaxy movie referenced Zune, they have had a small resurgence
sims 3 works ootb with proton… why do you need your computer for a zune?
That is not my experience. And you need a PC with the Zune software to manage your media on the player.
Let me give you 2 big reasons:
- Linux does not work with the particular hardware or software you want or need to use.
- It’s a PITA to just do basic stuff.
- Linux does not work with the particular hardware or software you want or need to use.
That’s a good reason
- It’s a PITA to just do basic stuff.
What’s outright bullshit so kinda obviated your argument. Sure, if downloading onto a thumb drive and rebooting a few times is hard becase you expect your OS to be preloaded then maybe but that wasn’t even your point.
Mint has a web browser, Office Software, Graphic Software, Music Players etc all loaded. Open up the Application Installer, a GUI and type in the obvious bar at the top for what you want, download and good to go.
Sure, if downloading onto a thumb drive and rebooting a few times is hard becase you expect your OS to be preloaded then maybe but that wasn’t even your point.
You’re right. It wasn’t. Not sure why you brought that up.
Open up the Application Installer, a GUI and type in the obvious bar at the top for what you want, download and good to go.
You’re intentionally misrepresenting the situation. That’s great if the software you’re looking for is available in the “application installer”. That is very often not the case. If it’s available at all, it’s often a .deb or .rpm or appimage, or you’re expected to compile it yourself from scratch.
AppImages won’t even run without some fuckery. And when you do that, they still have no icon and can’t be pinned in your app tray. Sure, you can install Gear Lever to greatly simplify this process if you know about it but it’s not typically not installed by default, which makes this process completely unintuitive.
And if they only make a .deb available, and you’re running Fedora, well fuck you.
These are all complications that simply don’t exist on Windows or Mac.
Point 2 is wrong. It’s very easy to basic stuff. I’d argue it’s easier than Windows, which is a convoluted mess. You’re just used to it being shit.
Point 1, maybe. The fact you just keep repeating “particular hardware or software that does not work” without actually giving an example shows you’re talking out of your ass though. Sure, there are a few cases, but not many anymore. Most, if not all, of those cases can be handled by a VM though.
I can’t agree with you tbh. It depends on the distro. On Windows I can basically one-click install OpenMW and it Just Works™. I can’t even play it on my distro because for whatever reason it’s broken. I ended up having to flat out purge it and install the daily build to get it working. Maybe it works better on other distros, idk. Worked fine until my distro updated some months ago. When I was still running Lubuntu I had to build it from source to get it to work.
This is the nature of open source and decentralized platforms. And there’s nothing wrong with that. But if anyone expects the mainstream to adopt it when ease of use has been the name of the game for the last 20 years then they’re mistaken. As good as Linux has gotten, there are still kinks that need worked out before the average user will adopt it. One step towards that is government adoption. This will almost certainly lay out a stable baseline standard that can be built off of for a more coherent experience. I can see Linux competing with Windows provided it comes up to par on UX.
Having an app store is easier than expecting people to download things from the internet, just because your distro fucked up doesn’t mean this isn’t generally a win for linux.
i work IT, software fails to install ALL THE TIME on windows for all kinds of reasons
Having an app store is easier than expecting people to download things from the internet
…how exactly do you think the app store works?
Do you just not realize that Windows and Mac also have app stores?
…how exactly do you think the app store works?
I meant websites, obviously.
Do you just not realize that Windows and Mac also have app stores?
On windows, the app store is extremely lacking, mac, sure.
Glad we sorted that out.
You keep implying Windows has ease-of-use on its side. That is just blatantly not true. I don’t know a Windows user that hasn’t had to edit registries, for example, and that’s a pain in the ass. Windows is just a piece of shit that people stepped in so long ago they stopped smelling it. They don’t pay attention to how bad it is to work with because “that’s just the way it is.” The one benefit is the software mentioned above (with just a vague notion of “some software” when the vast majority is fine), though again most work with a VM if Wine isn’t enough. Support is an issue of getting users there though. If people keep assuming that what you’re saying is true they’ll believe you and not try it. If they switch the software developers will start targeting Linux.
Playing old games is also often really painful on Windows, and requires a lot of hacks. On Linux I’ve had a very good time with that honestly. Maybe I’ve just gotten lucky, but Wine with Proton has made the experience with old games pretty easy.
Sampling bias. The people you know are likely more technologically inclined than the average user. Really, effectively anyone who uses Linux is simply due to the nature of the thing. To people like you and me, the average user is a literal idiot. And that’s something we forget. The average user doesn’t ever have to finagle with registries and probably doesn’t even know they exist. Hell, they probably don’t even know how to change their default browser from Edge. And don’t get me wrong, Windows is a piece of shit. But it’s undeniable that its standardized protocols and coherent ecosystem make it easier for the average person. I do concede that this is due in part to software developers targeting Windows primarily, but I don’t see a world where Linux is used by the masses unless some distro sees adoption and standardization by some larger body.
As for old games, if I played Morrowind via Steam it would work fine but the reason I play OpenMW is because it modernizes the engine. 1080p isn’t even possible in vanilla. 100% improvement imo, but it causes me problems on occasion.
I don’t know a Windows user that hasn’t had to edit registries, for example
You’re experiencing more delusions. 99.9% of Windows users wouldn’t even know what that is.
(with just a vague notion of “some software” when the vast majority is fine)
Again you’re asking me to write out what is a list a mile long. I’m not doing that.
I will give you one example though. I went to download GrayJay yesterday. I got the file. I have no idea what to do with it. Because there are a dozen types of files for Linux and all of them have to be installed differently. I got a folder. I know from years of experience how to install .deb, .rpm, flatpak and appimages, this folder has 398457 files in it and none of them are those. That’s not even getting into how a lot of Linux software, you’re expected to know how to compile the fuckin thing yourself…
You know how to install programs on windows? You download the .exe, double click the file and it installs itself, every time.
You know how to install programs on Mac? You click download on the .dmg, double click the downloaded file and it installs itself, every time.
It looks like GrayJay only has an android application, with a desktop one in testing. I’m assuming you have to compile that yourself because it’s in testing. You aren’t supposed to be using it if you can’t compile it from source. Just run the android one in an emulator if you need it on desktop. That’s the same thing you’ll need to do on Windows.
You know how to install programs on windows? You download the .exe, double click the file and it installs itself, every time.
Yeah… You have to go to their website, hope it’s the real one, download the .exe and install it. Then to update it you have to do the same thing. On Linux you just tell your package manager to install it and then you’re done forever. It’ll keep it updated and you never have to think about it. The fact Windows apps are required to check online for updates and then you have to open it in a browser and download and install it yourself is the most garbage experience. You’re just used to it.
I’m assuming you have to compile that yourself because it’s in testing
Weird, you don’t have to compile the Windows or Mac versions…? 🤷♂️
hope it’s the real one
…why wouldn’t it be the “real one” on their website?
The fact Windows apps are required to check online for updates and then you have to open it in a browser and download and install it yourself is the most garbage experience. You’re just used to it.
…no, they update themselves? Have you just never used anything other than Linux? It’s hard to imagine how you would not know this unless you hadn’t.
It’ll keep it updated and you never have to think about it.
Other than the pop-ups telling you you need to update every 5 minutes?
From their FAQ: “Do you have a desktop version? A desktop version is actively in the works, and already in internal testing phases.”
It looks like you can download the pre-built applications for all of them though, including Linux. You probably just need to use chmod to let your system know it’s allowed to execute it.
…why wouldn’t it be the “real one” on their website?
I meant the website.
…no, they update themselves? Have you just never used anything other than Linux? It’s hard to imagine how you would not know this unless you hadn’t.
No they don’t… They tell you if there’s an update and then you have to do it.
Other than the pop-ups telling you you need to update every 5 minutes?
Mine doesn’t. I’m on Garuda. It just has an icon on the task bar.
The fact you just keep repeating “particular hardware or software that does not work” without actually giving an example shows you’re talking out of your ass though
LOL I love it when people get offended because someone disagrees with them and then try to put forward their experience as if it’s a fact. I didn’t repeat anything. I said it literally 1 time. You expect me to sit here and list the dozens of hardware configurations that I’ve personally used that have conflicts with Linux? Hell anything with an Nvidia GPU (which is the vast majority of GPUs in existence) is an exercise in software engineering just to get it functional.
- It’s a PITA to just do basic stuff.
In my experience basic stuff like browsing files, editing documents, launching apps, installing apps, and obviously a million things using a web browser, are all easy and snappy in a fresh out of the box install of Linux Mint.
That’s cool. That’s not been my experience at all. Nor has it many many other people. It’s like the number 1 complaint, and the number of delusional people who try to pretend like it doesn’t exist is insane.
is it a pita because you expect it to function like windows or are there specific roadblocks youve encountered?
It’s a PITA because there are a dozen different installation methods, and if anything at all is not functioning perfectly, the only advice you’ll get is typing random commands into the terminal that report back some generic error that you have no idea what to do with.
i dont mean this in a judgemental way but that sounds like you dont understand or just dislike the process and conflate that with difficulty. the commands aren’t random, you just don’t know them. people who have learned how to use the OS (granted, not everyone has the time for that) generally know what commands do before they paste them in. I have a much easier time running a single command rather than navigating through layers of GUI but not everyone will share that preference
that sounds like you dont understand or just dislike the process and conflate that with difficulty
LOL and what exactly else would you call that? They’re random to me. I don’t know them, I don’t want to know them, I just want it to work like every other sensible OS where I can figure out how to complete basic tasks without needing a computer science degree. That’s what most people want and it’s why Linux will remain a niche OS by nerds and for nerds, because that’s the way they like it, which is fine, but let’s not try to gaslight people into believing there’s no reason people might want something else.
and what exactly else would you call that?
I’d call it baby duck syndrome. I hate hunting for exes online to install the most basic software and how there’s no way to update all of my apps with a single click but I understand the way I’m used to isn’t the same as the best way.
i literally said it’s up to preference, and I don’t have a CS degree, I did in fact figure it out
Linux Mint is very simple to use these days.
Ubuntu is even easier. If we’re trying to convert windows users on ease we really should be sending them the beginners kit
Mint is Ubuntu, minus controversial Canonical stuff, plus an extra layer of polish and a very nice DE that is Windows-like out of the box.
Controversial stuff and polish are fundamentally changes that make it that much harder to Google an error message and look at step by step fixes which is what most end users will need.
All mint adds for people who won’t bother to learn the differences (most people) is confusion
That depends entirely on what you’re trying to do.
Most things work without hiccups.
Once again, that’s fine so long as you don’t need the things that don’t work.
Like most articles on itsfoss, this one is only a notch over clickbait — a kernel of an idea not fully developed, written with the last minute energy of a student who pushed off the assignment until right before deadline — but I’ll be damned if that title isn’t beautifully turned.
I haven’t had to have Windows installed for more than a decade, but on recent occasion I’ve borrowed Windows and Mac computers for work. Those revisits didn’t give me reason to switch back, only to long for my lean Arch install.
As the next major version of Windows approaches like a Santa down the chimney with all sorts of “AI”-infested gadgets in his sack, I do hope more will make the more often mentioned switch to a Linux distro from the
advertising platformOS that came with their computer.But this headline deliciously reminds us that there is already a good chunk of users who made the jump, or are sitting on the dual booting fence, one boot (sorry!) on either side. This article is for them, yes, but also a gentle nudge for those still gathering courage.
At this stage, it is time to seriously change the perspective of that switch. The single reason for switching from Windows to Linux is … the utter state of Windows. Only the most blinkered of tech journos can continue to pretend that all is well on Windows, and not at all a sophisticated malware infection.
So bravo itsfoss for the clever barb, less so for the depth of the article itself.
I like the writing style of It’s Foss. They don’t make there articles dry and the tone is always positive and honest.
I think the Linux switch will heavily depend on your work flow and whether you like to tinker at all. I think It’s Foss is right to say that for some Windows is not an option. People like me use a lot of Linux tools and apps.
I agree that the tone of their articles helps push the quality above some other tech blogs. At the very least they’re sincere!
Windows is no longer an option for me either — I had made a conscious effort to use FLOSS apps even before switching, so there wasn’t much holding me back. And, as you say, once I’d started modifying system settings to disable Microsoft telemetry, I was already at Linux tinkerer levels…
“Anymore”? I haven’t ever owned a Windows machine, and I haven’t used a Windows machine since 2015. I do have to fix a random issue on my wife’s work laptop about once a month.
I get that there are some things some people can’t do without and which keeps them in Windows: games, and requirements of their business (Word, Excel, PPT), but nothing about Linux has gotten significantly better in recent years. Incrementally, over there past decade, sure, but no big, recent change that might justify the title.
Except in the same way I’ve never needed Windows: in a very specific, individual way.
Coming from someone who just migrated myself and my family within the last year. Flatpaks were a big deal. I get people have their criticisms of it but wow, installing and updating apps is so much easier now compared to when I tried linux last and flatpak is probably the main reason why we are still on Linux today.
As a person who was all in on the AppImage distribution system (vs Flatpaks), I’m both sad and excited to see how well Flatpaks seem to be working out.
I guess they won that little competition in the end - which seems good, as there’s now a healthy standard we can focus on.
It’s genuinely great to now have widely accepted distribution independent packaging standards.
I’m glad Flatpack appears to be winning over the utterly horrible Snap, but I still don’t like it. I fear a day when it becomes difficult to get software that isn’t packaged in Flatpack, and I have good reason to: Ruby Gems. Long ago, I was big into Ruby, and was a major contributor (I authored one of the core standard libraries). Gems came along, and I hated them; eventually, for unrelated reasons, I stopped using Ruby altogether, and now when I encounter it, it’s impossible to use anything that doesn’t have Gem woven into it. Consequently, AFAIK, my current system has nothing Ruby installed on it - unless my OS package manager is doing it under the hood.
IMHO, Flatpacks are a really poor work-around for people supporting and using programming languages that don’t build software correctly. Rust and Go do it right: they build stand-alone executables. Flatpack adds literally no value to software built with these. They’re not the only languages that do this, but they’re the ones having their moment; any language that builds stand-alone, statically linked binaries would do.
I’m with you about AppImage; it would have been a better solution. Any packaging solution requiring extra software to be installed and a service to use is a bad design. I’d be objecting less if AppImage were emerging as the winner.
Incidentally, this is why Podman is superior to Docker: yes, you still need extra software to be installed, but there’s no system service with crazy, root-level permissions required to run containers with podman.
I wish. NVIDIA is still a buggy mess for me, and it seems that I am the only person with these issues, I see people praising NVIDIA on Wayland all the time now.
And VR is still bad on Linux.
I still love Linux, but I can’t use it for now. God i miss NixOS );
Nothing is stopping you from using more than one OS. Use NixOS for everything other than what you’re having problems with. And not using it at all won’t do anything to solve the problems, use it and try updated and new things every now and then, eventually it’ll work.
I mean, yeah. But it gets tiring to switch between them all the time.
I actually installed NixOS again, and I’m trying to figure out the solution. God help me with NVIDIA.
Last round of nvidia drivers made a mess, nix has a wiki on the issues on how to fix them until they are resolved.
I said good riddance to Nvidia forever. My amd card is better anyhow and has never had an issue on Linux
I use X11 with Nvidia without issue. While I like the idea of Wayland, and it being pushed a lot now, it really remains beta software. While I think it’s good Wayland is being focused on and promoted by the distros and DEs, I think it’s a bit of a distraction from Linux as a whole.
I’ve had to switch back to X11 on both Nvidia and AMD devices due to bugs or compatibility issues in Wayland.
I agree about VR - I keep dual boot windows on my PC and VR is about the only thing I use it for now. But the result is I just use VR less.
I dual boot Windows for VR and Fusion360. Do alternatives exist? Yes, but it’s just not something I want to spend hours tinkering with for what I perceive to be a worse experience.
I tried ALVR but it kept disconnecting if it connected at all. VD on Windows works flawlessly every time.
I heard of an ALVR alternative made by Collabora, you could try it. Dunno if it’s good or not.
Thanks for the heads up. It looks like it’s called ElectricMaple. I’ll definitely give it a go, although having no updates on the main branch in 6 months doesn’t fill me with confidence.
I suspect your issues stem not from hardware incompatibility but outdated kernel/applications. If i had to guess you run one of the ‘stable’ distros. Which translates to dealing with bugs for longer.
How out of touch are you? Thry are using the most up to date repo.
Nix has the largest and most updated repo of all of them by a large factor according to live stats.
Ah yes nix… The famously immutable distro. Yeah 100% pebcac.
Tbh running AMD isn’t easier. For my workload I needed OpenCL and when it wasn’t installed by default, and wasn’t apart of apt package manager. I had to follow a script which involves amdgpu and only having OpenCL install if I wanted my machine stable.
Not the best experience.
For Nvidia some distros have installers built in to handle it. Like Mint where it’s one click and a restart and I have everything.
My problem isn’t installing, it’s after installing. Vsync has extra bad latency, frames are reversed, and more. And this is on 565, the latest version.
Games are unplayable.
The best way to use AMD GPU compute is to use containers. Keep in mind AMD only really has good performance on newer cards.
I never had any major issues with nvidia and VR is improving aswell
That just makes it even weirder, how does seemingly nobody have any problems on NVIDIA, except a small minority?
What driver version are you using?
I’m semi convinced the downloads don’t work right if you use the GUI distros like Mint provide for Nvidia drivers
My 2080ti had multiple issues until I installed a different version (same issues) and then RE-installrd the original drivers manually
When I updated later: same exact series of events went down except I was able to get it to install on the third try from GUI properly because I wanted to see how many tries it might take for the lulz
I think it’s older cards and some sort of glitch in the proprietary driver manager shit most people use by default
It can’t be that, I use NixOS. But yeah, GUI installers are buggy as shit for me too. And i don’t use an old card.
Nvidia is just universally shit :(
It’s mostly people on older cards with those problems I guess
Me for example on my GTX 1080 can’t use G-Sync (monitor blacks out in specific fps ranges). Nvidia “fixed” this like 5 times already. Newer cards work correctly I guess?
I also get graphical bugs in Wayland after Nvidias final Wayland “fix”. Other people somehow do not experience this so I guess newer cards work correctly (again)
Imo Nvidia just didn’t bother fixing this on their old cards so there is a minority left with those problems which can be ghosted safely by Nvidia because “those bugs got fixed”
It’s not uncommon for Nvidia to ignore their normal users since the most money comes from other companies purchasing their GPUs anyway
I have an rtx 3060, i don’t think that counts as old. I feel you, should have gone with AMD
I have an rtx 3060, i don’t think that counts as old
Huh, that just makes everything weirder
I feel you, should have gone with AMD
Yeah, this is definitely my last Nvidia card
I am using the latest proprietary driver on a gtx 1650 gpu and my distro cachyos preinstalls it
- Web-based tools get the work done: agreed,especially when half of these web tools are Electron like number 5
- Plenty of distributions to suit your preference: my personal favorite thing about Linux
- Steam has a decent collection of Linux Games (& you may get a console): True,And outside of steam will work nicely aswell (like touhou 6 for example like Proton/soda does a great job of running touhou 6 patched with THCRAP)
- Proprietary choices on Linux (Better late than never): True and maybe even custom versions of wine (like elemental warriors fork and vanilla wine but vanilla wine cannot run complex apps tho)
- Technologies like Electron make it easier for app availability: Controversial opinion but True
Technologies like Electron make it easier for app availability: Controversial opinion but True
I do agree, but currently Electron is great for apps the way Flash was considered great for the web. It solves one problem, but creates a bunch more.
In itself, Electron is pretty bloated*, but I don’t dare check how many versions I have installed because different apps have stuck with older ones. I’d really like to see a less resource consuming, backward compatible alternative to Electron.
* From my thrifty perspective of keeping older hardware alive with Linux, that is. On your high grade, best-of-class gaming rig, mileage will definitely vary.
It’s quite a storage hog having multiple 500+ MB electron blobs. Unfortunately that’s a platform agnostic issue now.
That is true, definitely not an OS exclusive problem!
yeah true its spinning a instance of the Chromium browser which is where the bloat is at.
@Sunshine Agree! Left Windows decades ago. Except for some ocassional office compability snafus and still poor gaming, it does everything I need and well.
Gaming is catching up. Valve has done a tremendous job getting games supported with Proton on SteamOS
There will always be a game that is not supported.
@naonintendois @craigcorbin catching up? From what I heard, Linux surpassed winlol in gaming for certain titles, but yes, if you take the average, there’s still a gap, and it’s becoming smaller and smaller
@bargo @naonintendois Awesome 👌
@naonintendois Cool. I’ll have to check that out. Thanks.
Still poor gaming? I have all of my games working with zero effort on Steam. The only exception are my sim racing peripherals.
@AstralPath Good news. I tried a few games in October but the graphics were off. I’ll have to give them another try. My machine is pretty old, too, so I may need to upgrade. Thanks
Definitely give it a go! My machine isn’t crazy modern by any means but it’s decent.
