I’m curious to hear thoughts on this. I agree for the most part, I just wish people would see the benefit of choice and be brave enough to try it out.
“Why dont more people use the linux desktop” its because they don’t care about computers. To most people computers are a tool and they are not interested in what the underlying software is doing as long as they can run a web browser.
Or because Windows comes pre-installed on almost all machines. Many people don’t even know what “operating system” is. It’s just a part of the computer for them.
steam deck proves this. If everyone loved windows so much they would install it on the deck but they don’t. Microsoft pays the PC makers in the states a lot of money to keep Windows Pre-Installed. Even then Hp put our a dev Linux Laptop because Dev’s want a Unix like OS ether Linux or Mac.
Valve made games “just work” on the Steam Deck. No tweaks, CLI, hacks, or major performance issues. They took away the friction. I hope that in time all games will just work on Linux. When that happens and I can use my gaming peripherals like wheels and pedals I’ll be giving up Windows on my gaming PC.
Bingo.
Despite what the clickbait headline says, the main barrier to entry is not just knowing what an operating system is but the know-how to go about replacing the one that came with the computer in the first place. The decision over which distro to choose is relatively easy once you’ve got past that initial stage.
Or MacOS. They’ve made it seem like those are the only two options besides chromebooks which are just for those who don’t want to spend money.
On the same token - anyone who also knows what an OS is shouldn’t care either. Use the best OS for your job and needs. Reap the benefits of all of the OSs that you can run and switch between them like an army knife. It is the best when all of them complement each other.
For me I dont agree with “Use the best OS for your job and needs” sometimes I am willing to use a less functional product because I believe that the future would be better with more FOSS software. Morally I cant dual boot windows to play the games that dont support linux because then im supporting microsoft and games that support mircosoft.
I feel the same way. I’ve been riding the Linux daily driver train for over a decade now. Back when I first made the switch, Proton wasn’t a thing. I could dual boot to play the games that wouldn’t run on Wine but I instead made the decision to only buy new games that were Linux native and if existing games didn’t run on Wine then it was tough bikkies.
But the issue is that most people sadly don’t give a shit. They don’t give any thought at all about sending money to Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Apple, etc. despite the fact that those companies are playing a part in actively degrading the user experience (amongst other things). They don’t think about how they’re screwing over themselves in the long run as well as the younger generations. Most people don’t think much beyond what the advertising tells them to buy, convenience and ease of use.
I wish people made more ethical consumer choices but they just don’t. And that habit won’t change while big business has collectively billion dollar advertising budgets, gets away with monopolising and centralising and has government and regulators in their back pockets.
Not only do people generally not do ethical consumerism, but also often ridicule those who do. Quite infuriating, and would be astonishing if it wasn’t so predictably human nature. Presumably it is painful to be reminded that one did not go through the effort to make a conscientious decision but someone else did, and so one belittles the decision and the person willing to make it.
That’s ok if you look at it that way. But at the end of the day, it’s just a tool like any other. Personally I find it really silly to put any moral questions into it because I don’t believe it’s worth my time to think about it, lose time on silly things and/or sacrifice the quality of my work. I’m not trying to imply anything about Linux, btw, it’s the same for the other ways around. It just feels stupid because it ends up like a political discussion, when it really shouldn’t be. You have the option to use basically anything and choosing to limit yourself over that is just plain stupid imo. You could make the arguments for how they process data, which is a whole other discussion, but then again, there are plenty of workarounds to all of those problems (which is exactly what some people are doing with virtualization, different machines entirely, OS tweaks, etc., which is fine, because they’re benefiting from it). Nothing against FOSS or otherwise, btw, I do agree about the need to support, but there are so many other ways to do it. Just using it isn’t enough, sadly. As the point of this OP is - it’s also market adoption, marketing itself, etc. None of this changes the fact that using certain tool(s) (e.g. gdb) is best done on a certain OS (e.g. a Linux distro) at a given time.
i will agree with this when Linux has 5 to 10% market share just enough to where manufacturers can’t ignore us anymore. The problem will come cause the stuff they ignore us with. Is full featured but garbage drivers with Spyware like crap print drivers with pop-up ads or games with rootkits for drm.
deleted by creator
I have friends who pc game a lot and their desktop background is the default Microsoft logo. Everytime I see it i say “don’t you want to customize your computer even just a bit” and they reply “what would I even do?”
Somewhere between 2000 and 2015 pretty much everyone had a computer, because you needed it for doing all the computer stuff. Nowadays you can do so much on a mobile device that there’s no urgent need to even own a proper computer any more unless you need to do something very specific.
Professionals and hobbyists will continue to need computers in the future, but Joe Average won’t. You can pay your bills using a phone and watch movies on a tablet. Joe doesn’t have a 3D printer, write ISO images on USB sticks, try to recover data from old hard disks, flash LineageOS on an old Android phone, or SSH into a raspberry pi. If he still has an old laptgop tucked away in a drawer, it’s probably been sitting there for years because he hasn’t really needed it for anything.
The author is an idiot.
When someone comes to me asking how to get into Linux, they do not need to hear a laundry list of distributions to choose from.
Only techies ask anyone how they “get into Linux”. Say it with me now. “People don’t buy, buy into, get into, install, or use operating systems” They buy fuckin computers. It is perceptibly to virtually all non-techies a feature of the device.
There are a million types of cars but people manage to pick one and buy it same with breakfast cereals or shampoo because they are obligated to make a decision or go hungry, dirty, or walk everywhere.
People don’t particularly like making decisions and they decided what OS they were going to use when they bought the computer and they have no intention of downloading an iso, write it to a USB, figure out how they boot from it, figure out the bios options they need to disable and what works differently than what they are familiar with.
You lost them around step 2 and lost all hope of moving forward unless the prize at the end is something much better than “does everything I used to do but differently”
The success of Chromebooks, android phones, and the steam deck is that it was driven by devices people wanted to use not an OS people wanted to use. If you want to see more Linux use that is the story you need to focus on.
This is one that we can’t just solve by putting computers on the shelf.
Some people have tools that don’t work on Linux natively. If somebody is using and is familiar with Microsoft Excel, there isn’t a straightforward way to install it and FOSS options aren’t the same. The same can be said of Adobe.
Linux as a desktop environment will have to be for enthusiasts for a while longer. Hopefully, somebody gets more feature parity with the existing suites and the transition can just work out of the box.
But Linux when compared to Windows and Mac is a case study of capitalism vs FOSS. We (Linux users) generally think Linux is better and maybe it is, but Microsoft and Apple spent tons of money to make theirs what they are today and we didn’t.
The open source ecosystem by virtue of being free software just doesn’t have those billions of dollars to invest. For office software google docs are sufficient for a whole lot of use cases and easily shareable whereas more complex usage is easily handled by libre office.
Photoshop is legitimately better than alternatives but popular as it is only a tiny fraction of PC users use or need Adobe.
26M vs 2B is approx 1.3% of PCs
I also don’t need to select my car based on its ability to haul thousands of pounds of cargo or its performance on a racetrack either.
If we want photoshop for Linux we need to collectively bankroll it. If not there is plenty of space in the market for computers without photoshop because that is by far the majority of computers.
Alternatively coming soon to a web browser near you
Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/watch?v=vvNoZxoMuGI
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source, check me out at GitHub.
Microsoft and Apple spent tons of money to make theirs what they are today and we didn’t
Not personally, but there’s loads of companies that work and contribute to the kernel and all the surrounding software, they give funds, obviously not as huge as Microsoft’s paycheck, but with less I’d say we have achieved way way more in several aspects, application support is entirely on the devs, be it Microsoft (again) or Adobe or what have you, yet we’re able to run alternative suites that are at least an 80% of what those proprietary options offer, for the office suite in particular I think we’re pretty well off with Onlyoffice.
Money, though important, is clearly not a measure of quality in software
My point wasn’t that they spend money on quality. Much of what they spend on is perception and awareness.
Ah then I misunderstood, but what do you mean with that exactly, advertising?
Marketing is a big portion of it. There’s also less obvious versions. Microsoft was busy making deals behind the scenes with OEMs for a long while with the intention of getting Windows to be the default OS in stores. Early OEMs didn’t just wake up and start building for Windows. Bill Gates showed up at there office and convinced them to.
Apple donated a bunch of computers to schools. Many people just believed that it was because they cared about education but really it is an attempt to get kids hooked into the Apple ecosystem early.
Building brand loyalty isn’t just about advertising and it’s not even about making the best product. Early and repetitive access is more important. Advertising and product placement are more about awareness than loyalty. Loyalty is generally exploiting people’s fear of change.
If Lenovo or HP or whatever started selling their notebooks for way cheaper without the windows license on the machine linux would probably get a lot more usage. But they would probably have to put big warnings on that to avoid a big return wave, which would hamper the whole deal.
Actually OEMS get money for including Windows because they include shovelware trials of crap like Norton that is of greater value than the reduced cost of Windows to the big players. If sold at difference in cost the decrapified Linux version would be more expensive not less.
That’s not mutually exclusive with the author’s argument, though.
if a computer vendor offers multiple distributions to choose from, the problem of choice remains.
And if the vendor only offers one option, which one should it be? And how can a user verify that it’s a “good” option?
It wouldn’t really matter, does everyone wonder if the Android ROM they’re running is the best and if they should install a different one?
People do notice how good or bad they are, but that’s it, at most they’ll switch to a different vendor next time they buy a productHmm good point!
Most people don’t know how to install operating system, even if it’s just pressing next in the installer mostly. The reason Linux is not primary system is that it’s not preinstalled. It has a bit of chicken and egg problem with some support missing due to low user base, and base lowered by that soft missing but that would change in the instant if everybody suddenly bought PC with linux preinstalled.
Even the win mentioned with linux in gaming is basically just that. Linux preinstalled on steam deck.
Agreed. I’ve gotten several none technical folks (including older folks) in my life using Linux Mint and loving it.
What did I do?
I installed it for them. That was it.
They’re scared of installing a new operating system. It’s just so weird.
Because windows is preinstalled on the computer they buy. That is literally it
Because Windows or iOS is already loaded when they buy the machine.
This is the only answer, and anybody who doesn’t agree just doesn’t understand users. They just use whatever you give them.
… and by implication, it guarantees that Linux will (almost definitely) never be the world’s desktop. Mainly because there’s no one single company to blackmail.
Android managed it, so can desktop Linux. We just need manufacturers who will ship it as default.
This guy:
There are 100 competing distributions:
“Let’s add one more, one that’s standardized and designed to make it easy for users to start using Linux.”
There are now 101 competing distributions.
To the question it’s clickbaiting you to see:
The problem is the lack of a representative version of Linux.
And the response is that Linux is not Windows or OSX. It doesn’t work the same way. The point of 80 gazillion different flavors is that it can be made to be what is wanted or needed. ChromeOS and Android are Linux and I’d argue they both qualify as “desktop” even if Android rocks many phones in mobile mode. If you don’t like sysv init for whatever reason you can find a bunch that don’t use it. Want to install a modern version on a 486? You can with lightweight 32-bit distros, though it’ll be terrible and it means you’re a masochist.
Possibly because OSX is pretty similar under the hood by its nature as a *BSD derivative, and Windows has WSL which has become pretty good from what I’m told. A casual user may simply not encounter the need to install a whole different operating system on bare metal anymore.
But I think the reason, special cases aside, is that they haven’t given it an honest try. It’s not the Duplo of operating systems, to get what you’re after out of it you have to actually try, to learn how. It’s easier to give up and go back to what seems to work based on it being the first thing they saw.
you only view those as positives because you are not the average user. for the average user those are actually negatives. The average user’s answer to “do you prefer systemd or sysvinit?” would be “why the fuck should I care? I just want something that works. And I want that something to work the same whether it’s on my personal machine or my work machine, or my mom’s.”
If you force the user to have to choose, most times they just won’t. So they choose something that does not offer the choice at all. Other operating systems do not require them to give an honest try at being able to try them.
Your hypothetical user could throw a dart at a list of distros and just install the one it hits.
but how does one ensure that their dart lands in the same spot as their employer’s and their mom’s? consistency is very important for the average user, at odds with us enthusiasts’ joy at being able to change anything.
I am not against linux, (I use arch btw) but I accept the fact that most people don’t find computers as exciting as I do.
Their employer is probably using Windows because they’re locked in so that’s a red herring. Their mom, if not using Windows for similar reasons, is probably using some variant of Ubuntu.
it’s a hypothetical scenario. And you still failed to even acknowledge my point, let alone get it.
What is your point? That you’re more enlightened than us plebs or something?
you keep saying that the average user can do this or that. when the point isn’t whether they could, but whether they want to. The average user does not want to choose. Look up the paradox of choice.
It’s hard for a system to become mainstream when techy people keep boasting to them that its biggest feature is the one they specifically do not want
Win wsl is awful.
“When someone comes to me asking how to get into Linux, they do not need to hear a laundry list of distributions to choose from. When they ask, I don’t want to have to say, something akin to, “You could try Ubuntu, Linux Mint, elementary OS, Zorin OS, or Ubuntu Budgie.””
Ok, so what if I need a car? People will give me a laundry list of car brands to choose from, so I don’t really see that as a valid point. What if I want to buy a pair of shoes? Is there another laundry list? Yes there is.
Just pick something popular, and try it out. If you don’t like it, you’ll have a better idea of the features you want or don’t want in the future.
You mean you DON’T drive a Car brand car, wear Shoes brand shoes and drink this delicious-looking beverage??
There’s also literal 15% food. Better not think about the remaining 85%. Just see what google translate says about “ruoka” (in Finnish) or “mat” (in Swedish).
75% no?
Wolfram aplha is probably just violating some fundamental axioms of mathematics to say the answer is 85. I’m not a mathematician, so who knows.
Well, it’s all about expectations and alternatives. People don’t expect to be overloaded with choices before the OS even boots.
Linux is the only OS on any platform where they have (to make) this choice.
Windows, Mac, Android, iPhone, all of these Systems don’t give you a choice between wildly different versions.
Also, the issue extends to after the installation as well. If someone asks me about a Windows issue of medium intensity, I can tell them on the phone how to fix it without having a PC nearby.
Say they ask me how to do something as simple as to install a program from the repository.
Depending on the Linux they are using, they will (or will not) have any one of a few dozen package manager GUIs, which will work wildly different. Even if they don’t use the GUI, they might be using apt, yum, pacman, snap or any other of a few dozen CLI package managers.
And depending on their distro, the package in question can have one of a few dozen different names, or might not be in the repo at all, so that I need to add a ppa or some other form of external repository.
That is a massive issue in everyday use. The only viable thing is for the local family/friend group admin to decide which distro to use and then everyone needs to use that distro or get educated themselves.
For example, I got a lot of experience (~10 years) on Debian-based OSes. Put me on Arch and I have no clue.
The same is not true for e.g. Windows, where I have used every single version extensively (except of Win11).
That description sounds a lot like fixing a car or trying to operate it.
How do I turn on the windshield wipers? Oh that depends on the brand. You need to find that thing that’s usually on the right, but in some cars it’s on the left. Then you need to press, pull, turn or twist it clockwise or counterclockwise depending on stuff…
How do I replace the left headlight? Could be easy, could be a nightmare. Depends on so many things.
That’s kinda true, but because of that reason you need to take more than 40h of lessions (at least over here) and two tests before you are allowed to operate a car.
When you then buy a car, the salesman takes about an hour to show you everything you need to know about your car, and the car gets delivered with a pretty well-written 500+ page manual that tells you everything you need to know about operating and maintaining it.
The same is not true for operating systems in general and Linux distros specifically. There you get no course at all, nobody that shows you anything and all your resources are Google and toxic online communities where you get called names for asking questions. Makes it much harder for beginners to get into it.
Can we please stop this nonsense already? With Linux on desktop we had two goals:
- hardware support
- software support
We achieved both goals. Since probably 20 years ago I’ve been using Linux exclusively both at work and at home. All my hardware works, all my software works. Why would I care if Linux gets to 20%, 80% or 100% market share? At this point if some companies or game developers don’t support Linux it’s their loss, I will find an alternative. And if some users is still using Windows it’s also their loss. I feel sorry for them but I stopped encouraging people to use Linux years ago. We’re good, our feature is secured, we don’t need to push for more users anymore.
You have a very loose definition of “achieved.” There are countless hardware devices lacking support. Microsoft Office, the most widely used business productivity tool in the world by far, still has either limited or no support on Linux. Most of the top 20 games on Twitch are either completely unsupported, or require onerous workarounds with poor performance.
It’s great that you have achieved what you desire, but you’re not representative of everyone.
I’m using outlook on Linux (at work), it has a web interface. Office 365 works on Linux. As for games it’s entertainment, you can choose what you play. There are alternatives for pretty much everything (Figma, Gimp. Krita, Blender). Even if Linux gets 50% of the market some companies/game studios still will not support it. We will never get to 100% support so that’s simply unrealistic goal. You can disagree but for me the goal was to make sure that Linux will not get abandoned and die. The danger was in proprietary protocols and standards, in closed source firmware and drivers. Today it may seem obvious but when I was using Linux 20 years ago it was only possible because someone was reverse engineering protocols and drivers. Main communicator on the internet had only windows client, lots of hardware didn’t have Linux drivers, MS was actively trying to kill Linux by promoting closed standards. It was a real possibility that this shit will spread and make Linux on the desktop unusable. Today we’re passed that. We won. If someone is on windows it’s because they want to play specific games or use specific software. Their choice, I don’t care.
Office 365 (which I have to use at work) works well enough in their Online Web variants for me on my Linux laptop.
But yeah. Still a lot of hardware especially the kind for casual people is still not well supported by their manufacturers.
It’s not Linux’s job to run software designed for another OS. It’s great that it sometimes does (thanks to wine/proton), but as a litmus test it seems a little odd.
I’m with that guy. It’s exceptionally easy to run Linux full time these days for anyone who wants to. (Have been doing so since 2007, and it was already easier then than it was for the trailblazers.) It requires almost no thought to ensure the hardware I buy will be fully supported.
I don’t care in the least if someone chooses something else to run on their computer, and I’m years past the point where I can even understand why I’m supposed to.
It’s not Linux’s job to run software designed for another OS.
It doesn’t matter whose fault it is. This isn’t about assigning blame. It’s about acknowledging reality. The bottom line is that Linux is still lacking a lot of software and hardware compatibility which Windows offers.
And thus, if it’s not a good fit for you don’t use it. Not getting into another long discussion here.
My only grumpiness (targeted primarily at the article from OP) is the idea that the Linux community is supposed to be handwringing about the fact that more people don’t use Linux.
I would love more people to use Linux. MS and Apple are both in their own respective ways bringing all the worst aspects of profit-over-all into an area that used to be and should be about wide open spaces, experimentation, and learning. (shakes cane)
You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink, and I stand by my assertion that for the vast majority of people it’s desire, not technical barriers, that prevent them running Linux. AND THAT’S OK, not everyone has to want the same things I want. But I don’t feel an obligation to chase those people, and I don’t think the Linux community at large should chase those people. The Linux community should be making decisions and providing tools that Linux users want; it seems ludicrous to focus on the wants of people who don’t use it at all.
Without taking the time to go through the specific Twitch top list, I’m still very doubtful that the gaming side of things is as dismal as you state, given my very positive experiences gaming with Linux in recent years. Regardless, your litmus test about running software not designed for it remains a metric that is useful for disqualifying Linux if that’s what you want to do, but not a useful metric for assessing the success of Linux overall.
Edited to add: I use and support Windows on the desktop and server for my job. I see firsthand the things that suck about Windows, and they are certainly no less than the things that suck about Linux. Living in Windows 8-12 hours a day has not once made me regret my transition at home. Each successive Windows version since I left it in 2007 has served only to reinforce it.
Get outta my head. 100% agree and could have written your post.
Last time I wanted a gaming laptop (go away gatekeepers, laptop was the right choice for me) I grabbed the first RTX2080 machine that fit my price point from one of my preferred mfr and the build I did just after I got it is still on it today. Have done everything I wanted to with it.
I wanted something smaller and lighter for some other tasks recently, so without much money to spend grabbed a 4ish year old refurbished Lenovo. Touchscreen, stylus, fingerprint reader, everything just works. I did no research beyond a quick google to be sure there weren’t immediate results telling me to stay away for Linux for that specific model.
I can’t remember the last time I cared what someone else ran on their computer, and at this point I’m annoyed that ZDNet and others think I’m supposed to.
I also use and support Windows at work, and I know how absolute bullshit the idea that everything works flawlessly on Windows is. (Setting aside things like “telemetry”, the way you have to force windows to behave as desired, all the other privacy stuff, and all the ads) But, at least I only touch windows when being paid to do so now, so there’s that.
I literally don’t think the plethora of choices has anything to do with why Linux is not installed by the masses. The only reason is that Microsoft and Apple are huge market forces with the ability to advertise, make deals with other business partners, pre-install their operating systems onto hardware that’s sold, operate technical support services, and so on. They have completely flooded the market with their stuff.
Linux has these things, too, but nowhere in scale or scope, and with relative industry latecomers to sell it. If Linux were created 10-12 years sooner and companies like Suse, RH, Canonical, System76 were all formed earlier than they were I think we’d see a healthy amount of Linux out in the world, with maybe a few percent higher market share (which would be extremely massive).
Keep in mind that Apple, as a company, rebuilt itself truly not on the technical excellence of Macintosh, but by driving sales of iPods then iPhones.
The issue isn’t an official Linux distribution, per se (and note: Canonical have wanted to be that for years with their Ubuntu).
The issue is that laptop and desktop retail machines come with Windows. And until that changes, Linux on the desktop will never see more traction.
There is probably only one real way this comes to fruition: a company, like Apple, that engineers their own hardware with full stack integration to their own Linux distribution — and the hardware has to be aesthetically pleasing, reasonably priced (unlike Apple), and with in-person support (a la Apple Store).
The closest to that we have, at least in the United States, is System76. But they do not engineer their systems. They basically cobble together all the parts that are known to work with the Linux kernel, toss them into an outsourced chassis, and sell them at what I would consider somewhat bloated prices.
That being said, I love what System 76 is doing with Pop!_OS, but the name sucks, the software versions will always be lagging behind unless using snap and/or flatpak, gaming on Linux is still an uphill battle despite Proton’s strides, and at the end of the day, the user will actually have to do something at some point on the command line.
What Linux desktop users need to embrace is that it is okay to not be the primary desktop operating system of the world. It is okay that it is relegated to geek enthusiasts, developers, and the like.
There really is nothing wrong with that.
There really is nothing wrong with that.
I don’t think it’s completely fine, because, as we see time and time again, Windows being the default, and so the largest player, allows developers, especially in the enterprise and education sectors, to be lazy and support only Windows for their applications. The expectation has been created that everyone has to own a Windows computer and that damages us, since it restricts our choices, for some people it can nullify entirely the effort they put into switching to Linux.
For example, in my country, to do the admission exam to university you need to install the SEB browser, which amounts to pretty much a Windows-only rootkit, now I wouldn’t enjoy putting that on my Linux system, but the laziness here is clear, they could have made a a live single-purpose Linux distro that boots up a locked down browser and checks that it hasn’t been tampered with when it runs, it didn’t have to be the only option, it could have been an additional option for privacy concious users, but why won’t they do it? Because it’s not trivial to build and the Linux market share is too small to care about and if you use it you are weird.To a certain extent it’s the fault of our institutions that don’t allow choice of OS most of the time, let alone forcing the use of Linux, if more would do the latter (because, let’s be honest, if they only let us choose they’d treat all other OSes as second class citizens), we might see companies developing more for Linux in turn.
That said, it’s not in such a bad situation and it can already be used without issue in many occasions.
Linux needs more companies like steam that develop certain things into Linux that enable more software support. I feel like the steam deck and proton greatly increased the number of people using linux primarily or at least dipping their toes in. Having popular mainstream creative suites, office suites, and a greater userbase is probably what would allow Linux to actually absorb windows users.
For me, the biggest reason not to use linux are windows-only apps like CAD software. That software was a must have on my university, and now Im stuck with it lol. I switched to linux anyway, but still struggling to find best workflow between dual boot and windows in VM.
But linux today is so available and friendly. I have POP! OS on my desktop and partner can use it with no problem (windows user). Its so freaking intuitive, much easier to install and use compared to windows IMO. I believe people are not afraid as much as they dont care and microsoft is pushing their OS much more than any other alternative
FreeCAD isn’t the worst and has the ability to output several file formats. But it’s definitely wonky and probably not up to the task if that’s like your actual job or whatever. I don’t know your scenario, but you might check it out if you’re still using CAD. It is free.
But yeah, in general, required software is the big hiccup.
Thx, I did try it. FreeCAD is great, but cant compare with software like Solidworks. Feels like 30 years difference unfortunately. Im afraid Im too old for that, but Im sure future generations will have proper FOSS alternative on Linux. I just try not to use it because I hate dual boot hehe.
There are fow more programs I need, but I can run them easy in VM/vine
Time for me to mourn autodesks killoff of eagle again
I dont want to learn their fusion 360 shite and it doesnt run on linux anyway.
I’ve settled on using wsl2 on a windows machine. I run Ubuntu and kali in wsl as virtual machines on my main windows computer. I was an early user of linux and bsd but have found it’s just plain easier to run day to day on windows.
I run both Ubuntu and kali simply because I haven’t been able to make sound work correctly with Ubuntu on wsl but it works great in kali, plus kali has all the pentesting stuff so I can play around with that in my free time.
Lazy theory. Think about cars. If the diversity of alternatives was putting off people, I guess we would still all be driving black Ford cars.
I have been using Linux since 1996 and what is putting off people is:
- First and foremost: habits and lack of will to learn new ways.
- Proprietary apps that have no exact equivalent. See 1.
- A closed proprietary system that limits interoperability. Even if it has improved, certain fenced software perimeters remain an occasional issue.
Also, MS pays computer makers to preinstall Windows.
This. Exactly this.
tl;dr FrAgMeNtAtIon
There, saved you a click.
People se Linux fine when it comes preinstalled. See the Steam Deck.
