this post was submitted on 01 Mar 2024
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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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How on earth can people stand using Windows full time? Everything I'm on a Microsoft product I feel claustrophobic!
Uh, most apps are still for Windows. That's why so many people use it.
If you tell someone to use an alternative OS, but then they are left on their own to run alternative versions of apps that don't work the same, forced to give up features they are use to, or run dozens of different programs through Wine or Proton or emulation or virtualization or whatever, JUST BECAUSE "Microsoft bad", they're going to laugh at you and go right back to Windows.
It's taken Linux 30(?) years to make it to 4%, and a lot of that is recent because of games. It's still a niche platform.
Create an 'average user' friendly OS. Similar to ElementaryOS but more easier.
The GUI is elegant and its easy to download apps(applications).
For medium to heavy users, have a developer or advance mode.
Yeah, that is what Linux needs.
More segregation with yet another distro.
/s
Another distribution doesn't mean segregation. Diversity and compatibility is the strength of Linux.
Yes it comes with a small cost, but without it Linux wouldn't have the success it has today.
PopOS, Mint, Ubuntu. All have that mission.
Honestly I'm at a bit of a loss what people think needs to become simpler.
The people hating on it are either shills or people that tried linux 10 years ago and it wouldn't run their game so they'll talk shit. I've been over a year now full time linux and it plays all the games I have and have gotten. I'm really impressed with how much better it's gotten over the past few years.
I run pop os with AMD hardware on wayland.
I think the AMD hardware is a big part of things being a good experience.
I know it helps, but I do have an Intel/Nvidia machine hooked to my tv that my son uses and it's just as flawless so far.
As someone who has tried it on multiple devices in recent years, it still isn't smooth enough. And I've been assembling computers for 2 decades now. So not entirely technically illiterate, but just not adept in linux. Definitely heavily reliant on use cases for how smooth the experience is. The server side is very well developed with years of linux leaning heavier on that side, but the splintering of frontend has a bit of an android effect. Lots of really cool things but still some jank that you can't get rid of.
"recent years", yeah I agree, years ago it wasn't very good for a daily driver, especially if you want to game. I have no complaints now and it feels great to not be using a malware os.
Recent years of 2021, 22, 23, and 24.
What distro's and what issues did you have? I'm curious because of how good it has worked for me this past year. I wanted to switch to Linux for the past 15 years but there was always something that didn't work out enough that it was a deal breaker. Now, I have no issues with anything.
Copied from another comment I made
" I have a home server on debian and after a bit of setup woes(partly linux still being so reliant on CLI, partly my inexperience with it), it's been running super smoothly. Have multiple dockers and it has been a joy. And same for the steam deck, it just works. Some glitches here and there with controller support but that's just PC gaming. But I installed it on my laptop as well and that was a shitshow. All biometrics wouldn't work, wifi kept dropping in and out, phantom touches now and then. Sure I could have done some cli technical wizardry but I gave up after trying to make it work half as smoothly on my workflow as in windows. And the windows 11 on it is utter garbage. Partly this is manufacturing not having linux drivers available and partly it is linux just not having guis for essential functions. Hope steam is able to have enough of a push to get much needed consumer friendly guis for more system functions. "
Maybe. But this does not change the fact that managing Windows is so much pain even if some of clients I manage computers for have Windows because of the software like Adobe, I think every day how good it would be to get rid of it.
Stuff just works on windows, I have a proxmox box with some Linux vms to run containers and I've tried several times over the last 20 years to move to Linux on my main pc but there are just too many faffy bits.
I really dislike what windows has become, it's bloat ware that's getting worse and worse, but I begrudgingly use it as I can be productive, the moment I can be as productive in Linux I'm off of windows, but even simple things like drivers are often not as good, lots of commercial software has barebones or no Linux support, there are many different package managers (on one hand great) but some have permission problems due to sandboxing when you need something like your IDE to have access to the dotnet package, also as a developer building apps/libs for Linux is a nightmare.
For example if I make an app for Windows I build a single binary, same for mac os, for Linux it's the Wild west, varying versions of glibc various versions of gtk and that's the simpler stuff.
Anyway I REALLY WANT to like Linux and move away from windows to it, but every time I try its hours/days of hoop jumping before I just end up going back to windows and waiting for windows to annoy me so much I try again.
(just to be clear the annoyances I have with windows are it's constant ad/bloat ware, it's segregation of settings and duplication of things, it constantly updating and forcing you to turn off all their nonsense AGAIN)
Honestly, you get used to whatever you use and learn to avoid the faffy bits. I was like that with Windows back in the day, I just learned how to deal with it.
Now when I have to use a Windows box, I end up in a rage because of all the stupid shit I just used to avoid or knew how. Most of the useful bits are hidden from that Settings app that seems like it's designed for children.
So really, if you get down to it and pushed your way through the familiarity stage, you'd be fine. If you want something that doesn't give you much visible complexity for configuration, use Gnome, if you like to have every setting at your fingertips, use Plasma.
If you want your applications in a single bundle, use AppImage which is essentially what MacOS does.
And for development, being able to do things like containers/distrobox for your toolchains right on your dev box, without whatever the hell it is that Windows does these days is pretty sweet.
That's exactly it. I've been using Linux on my desktop for literally decades now and to me it just works.
Whereas using windows is an endless string of frustrations because everything is awkward and broken and unclear and hidden in places that make no sense.
Of course I manage because I've been around long enough, but I always wonder why people choose to use it.
I have the same experience as the author you just replied to. While some of what you are saying is true, I have never had everyday issues like these on windows. I switch to Linux once a year to change things up. Mint, arch, Debian... A few major issues I experience
These are essentials, not something I can simply learn to live with or fix on the fly.
Would love to switch! I can get through work without proprietary software so that's not the issue.
Well, that sucks. I've used it for decades now and the last 8 or 10 years seems really low-maintenance.
Maybe try a Fedora spin like Nobara next time you get around to it. It's pretty tuned up and seems stable as hell. And fairly cutting edge.
Linux is a far more reliable operating system at the kernel level, which is why the vast majority of the Internet runs on Linux, and is very stable compared to anyone's personal computer (no matter O.S). It's also lighter weight at its core, which is a big plus for servers.
The thing about Linux desktops that tend to be finicky is interop with some proprietary software (e.g nvidia drivers) or desktop environments (gnome can freeze/crash if you like running bleeding edge before bugs are ironed out). Windows has issues too however, free software often literally doesn't run on Windows (requiring WSL, the same way games on Linux require wine), and the desktop environment is essentially indistinguishable from the base operating system. When you get a desktop environment crash on Windows, your system will BSOD and restart with no recourse, in Linux I can ssh into my still functioning computer and kill my DE, or drop to the TTL and do the same thing.
The end might not seem like a big deal for some people (who cares if you have to restart by a button press or kill your DE and login, they'll take a similar amount of time), but for someone like me where reliability is a big concern (as in, uptime for the half a dozen services/containers I run for people), this is great. People watching media off of jellyfin don't have to stop because of a DE bug, but on Windows a BSOD would stop their media (and within the last week we've had several BSODs on Windows PCs due to bugs relating things like adaptive sync or sometimes just unknown reasons).
For what it's worth I also game exclusively on Linux, vk3d, dxvk, and proton are godsends. Somethings don't work, developers who won't flip the switch for EAC (e.g Fortnite), but for me the games I play always worked. This will actually change soon, Vanguard is coming to League and that only works on Windows, but also probably not my last install of Windows (I tried W11 when it came out because I'm just curious about new tech), but I had to do a TPMBypassCheck despite having ftpm enabled in the BIOS, and afaict, at least from people I know with similar builds to me, if this happened then firmware TPM probably isn't being picked up by W11, and that means I need to buy a TPM module or drop to W10 to play League. Plus, vanguard is an intense rootkit with full 24/7 access to your O.S so I probably don't want that installed anyway, even if it happened to work on Linux. Just going to stick to SoD for now in my free time lol
I have a steamdeck and it's a brilliant bit of kit and if the whole Linux eco system had this same sort of cohesion and "out the box" working experience then it would probably be far more adopted.
Your point on stability is great, but for most people I would say they rarely see BSODs, windows is pretty stable too, I think a lot of the reasons that corporate servers use Linux over windows is more to do with licensing and permissions, I have seen plenty of windows server setups which works fine 24/7 so I don't think windows is any less stable, it's just more faff to setup things which are based on Linux conventions/features (i.e docker).
If Windows went back to how it was in window ls 7 where it didn't ram garbage down your throat every update I wouldn't have any problems with it.
Exactly this. To both points actually. I have a home server on debian and after a bit of setup woes(partly linux still being so reliant on CLI, partly my inexperience with it), it's been running super smoothly. Have multiple dockers and it has been a joy. And same for the steam deck, it just works. Some glitches here and there with controller support but that's just PC gaming. But I installed it on my laptop as well and that was a shitshow. All biometrics wouldn't work, wifi kept dropping in and out, phantom touches now and then. Sure I could have done some cli technical wizardry but I gave up after trying to make it work half as smoothly on my workflow as in windows. And the windows 11 on it is utter garbage. Partly this is manufacturing not having linux drivers available and partly it is linux just not having guis for essential functions. Hope steam is able to have enough of a push to get much needed consumer friendly guis for more system functions.
Really? Busybox is more-or-less feature equivalent to a BSD userland (FreeBSD userland can be a bit more bloated, see the ls man page), but how many people have picked that up? Still using GNU coreutils, haha.
I saw many *BSD developers told Linux kernel developers to hang their work for a while and fix quality problems.
I use both. Sadly, I have lots of software that doesn't work (or works pretty bad) on Linux. I love Linux, but there's no denying it can be frustrated, specially if your hardware doesn't support it, and that applies to too many people who has no saying in the hardware they use.
So in what world? Corporate world, science, CAD modelling...
There is a big misunderstanding in people's mind. LInux claims to run on pretty much every system (and it does ofc), but people take it as in every device and drivers is supposed to run flawlessly. I bought a 200 euros thinkpad knowing lenovo supported Linux directly, and I'm more satisfied with it than my 3000 euros macbook pro. In fact I havent opened my work one for 6 months+ lol
Mandatory I use arch btw
Current distros doesn't support many hardware platform, despite being very well funded. Compared to OpenBSD. (NetBSD is too much, right? and it is not really usable.)
Fedora: Only run on amd64, arm64, arm, ppc64le, s390x
Debian: i386, amd64, arm64, arm, ppc64le, mips64le, s390x, riscv64 (testing).
Alpine: same as Debian but no MIPS support
Add your own here.
There isn't sparc64 support at all!
OpenBSD: alpha, amd64, arm64, armv7, hppa, i386, landisk, loongson, luna88k, macppc, octeon, powerpc64, riscv64, sparc64 (all equally supported except Alpha)
(VAX is discontinued after 6.9)
I use a Windows 10 virtual machine for this purpose and run Linux on my bare metal hardware. And if I absolutely have to use Windows, I can boot the virtual machine, use Windows, and then shut it back down again until I need it again.
I mean, that's what I do, do you think that's feasible for everyone? No. Not everyone is willing to go through that much hassle.
CAD world and corporate PLM is supported on REL or SUSE by Siemens NX v12 and Teamcenter
Most people are not really using the OS. All they do is starting the webbrowser and that's it. They need input & sound from the OS, but that's it.
I have to use it at a job. It's awful, the ads on windows 11 especially.
This is exactly how I feel. I can't relax into my work (and my work quality is impacted) when I have to use Windows.
The majority of people ... just aren't into OSes enough to care.
Windows does what they want it to do, comes with the laptop they bought and doesn't require much setup for them to start using it. Even a tech illiterate can setup a Windows in 15 minutes.
The more advanced users just know how to read settings, and disable all the parts they do not like. Windows can very much be molded to adapt to the users preference, no matter what the Linux fanatics claim. Most of their arguments come from an ignorant perspective that hasn't rang true for 10+ years.