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> Somehow I shut my laptop off and it booted backup to a failure message, I had to make another bootable USB and go online to find out how to do a fsck. I was u

> Somehow I shut my laptop off and it booted backup to a failure message, I had to make another bootable USB and go online to find out how to do a fsck. I was using external monitors without issue for a month, and then one day the configuration changed to a point where I couldn't even use the laptop with it's built-in display. The sound and volume controls are a joke. I was prevented from installing any packages because of an issue with a package from Google. A bit of a rant ahead, but I am really tired of people still treating Linux like it's 1997 or expecting it to work like their old OS did and then running into silly problems that none of us, who actually spend our day in Linux, run into. These problems sound more like inexperience in using Linux to me than anything else. fsck works automatically after a power failure, configuration doesn't override itself and installing a package from the web, while not a great way of doing things, definitely does not prevent you from installing other packages, unless you somehow broke a whole lot of other stuff by deleting dependencies without really understanding what you were doing.

johncolanduoni 10y ago
> These problems sound more like inexperience in using Linux to me than anything else. ... unless you somehow broke a whole lot of other stuff by deleting dependencies without really understanding what you were doing. That's the problem right here. There's a vanishingly small percentage of people who can afford a laptop who are also willing and able to spend the time to gain "experience in using Linux". Sure it's much easier than it used to be, but it used to be a completely unmitigated disaster (I remember things like having to teach myself enough C to fix a wireless driver that didn't want to compile under a newer gcc version) so that's not saying much.
UhUhUhUh 10y ago
Seconding that. I have a hard time understanding why professionals would look down on an OS that gives the user pretty much all the power, which, let's remember was the seminal idea of personal computing. Interestingly, Linux comments are about 5% of the thread, which is also roughly the market share.
- Neeek 10y ago
  I 'm kind of more confused at everyone's seeming aversion to learning. Friends ask me why I go through the trouble of running Windows and Linux side by side with virtualization, or why I'm bothering to write my own blog site in python when Wordpress exists; why are you going the long way? The answer is always "Because I'm learning cool new shit and enjoying myself".
  - austenallred 10y ago
    Sure, but time is a finite resource. You know when the last time I even thought about my OS was? Probably 8 yrs ago. I'd much rather fiddle with the stuff I'm building than with the stuff I just need to work in order for me to build what I'm building. So I have no aversion to learning, but I want to focus my time learning the stuff I want/need to learn. And if there's an OS that runs well enough I don't need to think about it then that's fantastic.
    - AsyncAwait 10y ago
      Sure, but you had to learn something about this OS when it was new for you so that now you don't have to think about it. When you switch to Linux, there's maybe a week of adjustment to learn how are things around town, which is really the same for Windows and macOS. The argument is that if you're going to try Linux, it's only fair to give it a fair shot at adjustment, rather than complaining that it doesn't work like you old OS, because guess what - it's not supposed to.
    - Neeek 10y ago
      Not even as a side project or something though, running on some old hardware you were never going to use again? I guess this whole thread is about working environments and precisely not what we play around with in our spare time though. To be honest, I hadn't really given much thought to my OS for even longer before I decided to go looking myself, I'm glad I picked that fight though. Granted, 8 years ago I was 15, digging in to the guts of an OS for the first time is very different from focusing your time to build what needs building :)
freehunter 10y ago
With great power comes great responsibility. If you want raw power, you can buy a car with 500 horsepower. But you handle all of that power, you'll need traction control and maybe stability control, and anti-lock brakes for when you need to stop it. But all of that limits the amount of power you have available, limits your control. Now, a race car driver would look at these driver assist tools and say "I'm sick of people expecting race cars to work like their Jetta and then running into problems that us professional race car drivers don't run into". When you complain that the tires spin or you are having a hard time working the clutch and steering wheel without power assist, they might even tell you "these problems sound more like inexperience with driving race cars than anything else". And they'd be 100% right. But I'm trying to get to the grocery store, not win the Daytona 500. I want a car with power steering and an automatic gearbox and anti-lock brakes and traction control and an airbag. You may say "computers were designed for power and Linux gives you maximum power!" like the other guy commenting did but I don't want that because when it inevitably breaks (because I'm inexperienced), I don't want to be stuck on the side of the road reading manpages and stack exchange posts with no answers and trying to navigate mailing lists. I have a job to do. (Seriously, did saying "sounds like you're just inexperienced with Linux" sound good in your head? Because it certainly didn't sound good reading it.)
- saghm 10y ago
  I don't think your analogy is very compelling; if a regular person untrained in driving race cars bought a new race car, crashed it on the way to the grocery store, and then blamed the car rather than their lack of experience driving race cars, I'd definitely find it a bit silly.
  - freehunter 10y ago
    Now imagine every race car driver on the Internet was saying "you should be driving a race car, your Nissan is just a toy".
    - saghm 10y ago
      It's strange that you think that's what's happening here; if anything, the comment that the grandparent was objecting to was saying not to use a race car if you don't know how to.

johncolanduoni 10y ago

> These problems sound more like inexperience in using Linux to me than anything else. ... unless you somehow broke a whole lot of other stuff by deleting dependencies without really understanding what you were doing. That's the problem right here. There's a vanishingly small percentage of people who can afford a laptop who are also willing and able to spend the time to gain "experience in using Linux". Sure it's much easier than it used to be, but it used to be a completely unmitigated disaster (I remember things like having to teach myself enough C to fix a wireless driver that didn't want to compile under a newer gcc version) so that's not saying much.

UhUhUhUh 10y ago

Seconding that. I have a hard time understanding why professionals would look down on an OS that gives the user pretty much all the power, which, let's remember was the seminal idea of personal computing. Interestingly, Linux comments are about 5% of the thread, which is also roughly the market share.

Neeek 10y ago
I 'm kind of more confused at everyone's seeming aversion to learning. Friends ask me why I go through the trouble of running Windows and Linux side by side with virtualization, or why I'm bothering to write my own blog site in python when Wordpress exists; why are you going the long way? The answer is always "Because I'm learning cool new shit and enjoying myself".
- austenallred 10y ago
  Sure, but time is a finite resource. You know when the last time I even thought about my OS was? Probably 8 yrs ago. I'd much rather fiddle with the stuff I'm building than with the stuff I just need to work in order for me to build what I'm building. So I have no aversion to learning, but I want to focus my time learning the stuff I want/need to learn. And if there's an OS that runs well enough I don't need to think about it then that's fantastic.
  - AsyncAwait 10y ago
    Sure, but you had to learn something about this OS when it was new for you so that now you don't have to think about it. When you switch to Linux, there's maybe a week of adjustment to learn how are things around town, which is really the same for Windows and macOS. The argument is that if you're going to try Linux, it's only fair to give it a fair shot at adjustment, rather than complaining that it doesn't work like you old OS, because guess what - it's not supposed to.
  - Neeek 10y ago
    Not even as a side project or something though, running on some old hardware you were never going to use again? I guess this whole thread is about working environments and precisely not what we play around with in our spare time though. To be honest, I hadn't really given much thought to my OS for even longer before I decided to go looking myself, I'm glad I picked that fight though. Granted, 8 years ago I was 15, digging in to the guts of an OS for the first time is very different from focusing your time to build what needs building :)

freehunter 10y ago

With great power comes great responsibility. If you want raw power, you can buy a car with 500 horsepower. But you handle all of that power, you'll need traction control and maybe stability control, and anti-lock brakes for when you need to stop it. But all of that limits the amount of power you have available, limits your control. Now, a race car driver would look at these driver assist tools and say "I'm sick of people expecting race cars to work like their Jetta and then running into problems that us professional race car drivers don't run into". When you complain that the tires spin or you are having a hard time working the clutch and steering wheel without power assist, they might even tell you "these problems sound more like inexperience with driving race cars than anything else". And they'd be 100% right. But I'm trying to get to the grocery store, not win the Daytona 500. I want a car with power steering and an automatic gearbox and anti-lock brakes and traction control and an airbag. You may say "computers were designed for power and Linux gives you maximum power!" like the other guy commenting did but I don't want that because when it inevitably breaks (because I'm inexperienced), I don't want to be stuck on the side of the road reading manpages and stack exchange posts with no answers and trying to navigate mailing lists. I have a job to do. (Seriously, did saying "sounds like you're just inexperienced with Linux" sound good in your head? Because it certainly didn't sound good reading it.)

saghm 10y ago
I don't think your analogy is very compelling; if a regular person untrained in driving race cars bought a new race car, crashed it on the way to the grocery store, and then blamed the car rather than their lack of experience driving race cars, I'd definitely find it a bit silly.
- freehunter 10y ago
  Now imagine every race car driver on the Internet was saying "you should be driving a race car, your Nissan is just a toy".
  - saghm 10y ago
    It's strange that you think that's what's happening here; if anything, the comment that the grandparent was objecting to was saying not to use a race car if you don't know how to.