5 ms·

Losing on desktop. Yeah, any decade now. There is of course a constituency of Linux Nerds primed to move to Windows: people who want to develop software for Li

by cwyers 9y ago

Losing on desktop. Yeah, any decade now. There is of course a constituency of Linux Nerds primed to move to Windows: people who want to develop software for Linux servers but don't want to run Linux on the desktop. Many of those people are using OS X, which is POSIX enough to run some Linux software unmodified. WSL is a way to target those people, who may be being left behind by Apple's changing strategy in laptops (and the continued neglect of the Mac Pro and Mac Mini).

taylodl 9y ago
How healthy is the desktop market outside of the corporate environment? Consumers seem largely content with phones and tablets.
- seiferteric 9y ago
  Pretty much, even as a developer, I feel the desktop paradigm is less and less important each year since I mostly only use a web browser and a terminal.
  - arvinsim 9y ago
    I assume that is because you can SSH into the machine of your choice? Most of the developers who don't live in a country with fast internet connection will still continue using a desktop for the foreseeable future.
    - seiferteric 9y ago
      Nope, just vim, and a browser mostly. I use sublimetext sometimes. That's the bulk of my desktop app usage.
  - Stratoscope 9y ago
    You're one particular kind of developer. There are others. For example, my usual "working set" right now includes: Araxis Merge, Calculator (the Windows 10 version with the new programmer features), Dynalist, Evernote, FlashDevelop (don't laugh), IntelliJ IDEA, TraceView Plus, Notepad++, Office 365, Process Hacker, SecureCRT, Slack, SmartGit, Visual Studio, VMware Workstation, VS Code, XVI32. And less frequently: API Monitor, Dependency Walker, Spy++, Hexinator, PaintShop Pro, IDA Pro. Also utilities like 3DxWare, 7-Zip, AquaSnap, AutoHotkey, Brother scanner utility, Eye-One Match (so my monitors are calibrated the same), Everything (the search utility), GraphicsMagick, JKLmouse (keyboard mouse control), Macrium Reflect, FolderSizes, Pandoc, ZoomIn/Zoom+, and the usual browsers and stuff. WSL too. Along with more personal tools like Foobar2000, Google Earth, Moneydance, Musicnotes (sheet music player), Total Recorder, Transcribe! (music transcription and pitch shifting), TurboTax, VLC. I'm not saying my set of tools is typical either, of course! Just that for some of us the desktop is alive and well, both for business and personal use. I have no idea how I would replace most of these tools with a terminal and a web browser, other than the ones like Dynalist and Slack.
- domenukk 9y ago
  Tablets are still a thing? Large phones and Laptops is what my bubble uses.
  - dredmorbius 9y ago
    The vendors aren't doing themselves any favours. I'm typing this on a Samsung Tab A with a bluetooth keyboard. It's actually a pretty slick form-factor -- 9.7" screen, 1024 x 768 dispaly, 128 GB additional storage, and converts from a deskable or lappable landscape to portrait in under a second. Charge lasts all day. The basic concept of a mobile device whose display is separable from its keyboard is _wonderful_. Laptop hinges suck. That's the hardware -- and you can do better on several counts (memory, ROM, MicroSD, display) now. But for two major limitations: 1. NOBODY has a decent keyboad, and there is NO standardisation for cases, outside a minsuscule handful of products. Samsung's Tab 3S has a keyboard ... five rows -- no function keys. Which kills off a whole set of applications right there. The keyboard I've got (Logitech Type S) was broken from the start, and Logitech have abysmal warranty support. The keyboard is no longer made (they claim), and loses keys and other function over time. 2. The OS and applications space is abysmal. Here I'm including iOS and Android. Neither Google nor Samsung support updates to my device (it was apparently EOL as I was buying it). It's also not supported by CyanogenMod / LineageOS. The best thing I've found since getting this has been Termux, a Linux console environment, which offers a small but very, very, very useful set of utilities. Even that is crippled by what appears to be a bad terminal emulation (exceptionally slow on any scrollback), background-process termination (I'm never sure I'll find my sessions when I return to them), and something insanely buggy with SSH emulation. iOS of course doesn't even have a userland / console space. I'm looking at the Samsung Tab Pro line. It's expensive -- more than twice the price of an Asus Chromebook, say, but has the benefits of a folio-case and seperable keyboard form-factor. It seems to come with Windows 10 rather than Android, and I'm trying to sort out if that can be converted to either LineageOS or Linux. The surveillance-capitalism market of Android / Google is no longer tenable. The App ecosystem is fatally broken. Google's own apps (notably Chrome) are beyond frustrating. So really, the faults are all on the OS/applications side. I've some fairly strong reservations about installing Linux on a tablet as I doubt that Linux tools will play well with a touch-based surface (and touch itself ... has massive problems). In particular, the inability to distinguish a touch vs. click/drag action, the inability to navigate with the pixel-perfection of a desktop/mouse (though with high-def displays even that is pretty dicey these days), and the lack of multi-button mouse equivalents. I find all quite annoying. But for straight console-mode operation within Termux, the tablet's actually reasonably useful. What would help here? 1. Size standards on devices, including port and switch locations, such that cases could be designed for them across vendors. There are cases which work for only specific variants of Samsung model lines. 2. Keyboard standards, including interactions with keyboards, "special" key placement, and standardisation on a six-row, ~78 key standard. Samsung's 64-key error on the Tab 3S is absolutely inexcusable. 3. An alternative to straight-touch interfaces. 4. Bootloader unlocking and a sane standard for non-cloud device backup. 5. Mandated, effective, and usable privacy controls. https://ello.co/dredmorbius/post/lqgtwy_rhsfbdh5cdxb1rq https://ello.co/dredmorbius/post/lqgtwy_rhsfbdh5cdxb1rq
- arvinsim 9y ago
  As long as PC gamers exists, the desktop market will never die.
  - monkmartinez 9y ago
    This is a great comment. I have never been a gamer... but now that I am moving back to windows... it just might become a thing.
  - rbanffy 9y ago
    And that is the single most popular reason to run Windows I hear in my bubble.
- flukus 9y ago
  Still pretty healthy if you include laptops, which are functionally desktops, down a bit but still quite healthy (includes a forecast): https://www.statista.com/statistics/272595/global-shipments-forecast-for-tablets-laptops-and-desktop-pcs/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/272595/global-shipments-...
solotronics 9y ago
nobody is doing Linux dev on Windows, the only people I know at work on Windows are sysadmin types that just never learned Linux desktop and non-programmers. 95% of the dev people I know are on OS X or Linux
- pjmlp 9y ago
  On my bubble the only place for Linux is on servers. OS X machines are too expensive and we get to share a pool of devices. 95% of devs are on Windows.
shub 9y ago
Yeah, that's me in a nutshell. My employer recently sent everyone new hardware and I was initially bummed about getting the just-before-Touch-Bar MBP. Then I saw how gimmicky and awful Touch Bar was for the "lucky" colleague stuck with it. I'm typing this on a five year old MBA that isn't quite up to scratch for work anymore. If Apple would take this case, stick updated hardware and a Retina display in it, I'd buy it on launch day. Never gonna happen so I guess I'm never gonna buy another Apple laptop. Desktop Linux, especially when your employer runs Exchange, is a barrel of pain I've opened far too many times for my own good. Not going that route again.
- executesorder66 9y ago
  > Desktop Linux, especially when your employer runs Exchange, is a barrel of pain That's been me at my current employer. The whole dev team moved to linux, becuase it's just so much more productive. But the #1 pain point is Exchange. I tried Evolution, which connected to Exchange without any issues, but the mail client itself was buggy as hell. I tried thunderbird with some plugins (can't remember which ones) and that didn't work at all. Then I found out about Hiri. I thought it would save me, but it couldn't connect to Exchange at all. So our last resort was outlook webmail. What a fucking pile of garbage, but at least it "worked". I lived with that pain for months until I discovered davmail [0] I could easily connect thunderbird to exchange via davmail. I got all my email, contacts and calendar synced up nicely with exchange. I have had 0 issues fo far. [0] http://davmail.sourceforge.net/ http://davmail.sourceforge.net/
- criddell 9y ago
  I think the touchbar is a very cool idea, but I don't understand why they put it on their pro machines. Who uses function keys? Pro users. Who would benefit most from the touchbar? Consumers.

by cwyers 9y ago

taylodl 9y ago

How healthy is the desktop market outside of the corporate environment? Consumers seem largely content with phones and tablets.

seiferteric 9y ago
Pretty much, even as a developer, I feel the desktop paradigm is less and less important each year since I mostly only use a web browser and a terminal.
- arvinsim 9y ago
  I assume that is because you can SSH into the machine of your choice? Most of the developers who don't live in a country with fast internet connection will still continue using a desktop for the foreseeable future.
  - seiferteric 9y ago
    Nope, just vim, and a browser mostly. I use sublimetext sometimes. That's the bulk of my desktop app usage.
- Stratoscope 9y ago
  You're one particular kind of developer. There are others. For example, my usual "working set" right now includes: Araxis Merge, Calculator (the Windows 10 version with the new programmer features), Dynalist, Evernote, FlashDevelop (don't laugh), IntelliJ IDEA, TraceView Plus, Notepad++, Office 365, Process Hacker, SecureCRT, Slack, SmartGit, Visual Studio, VMware Workstation, VS Code, XVI32. And less frequently: API Monitor, Dependency Walker, Spy++, Hexinator, PaintShop Pro, IDA Pro. Also utilities like 3DxWare, 7-Zip, AquaSnap, AutoHotkey, Brother scanner utility, Eye-One Match (so my monitors are calibrated the same), Everything (the search utility), GraphicsMagick, JKLmouse (keyboard mouse control), Macrium Reflect, FolderSizes, Pandoc, ZoomIn/Zoom+, and the usual browsers and stuff. WSL too. Along with more personal tools like Foobar2000, Google Earth, Moneydance, Musicnotes (sheet music player), Total Recorder, Transcribe! (music transcription and pitch shifting), TurboTax, VLC. I'm not saying my set of tools is typical either, of course! Just that for some of us the desktop is alive and well, both for business and personal use. I have no idea how I would replace most of these tools with a terminal and a web browser, other than the ones like Dynalist and Slack.
domenukk 9y ago
Tablets are still a thing? Large phones and Laptops is what my bubble uses.
- dredmorbius 9y ago
  The vendors aren't doing themselves any favours. I'm typing this on a Samsung Tab A with a bluetooth keyboard. It's actually a pretty slick form-factor -- 9.7" screen, 1024 x 768 dispaly, 128 GB additional storage, and converts from a deskable or lappable landscape to portrait in under a second. Charge lasts all day. The basic concept of a mobile device whose display is separable from its keyboard is _wonderful_. Laptop hinges suck. That's the hardware -- and you can do better on several counts (memory, ROM, MicroSD, display) now. But for two major limitations: 1. NOBODY has a decent keyboad, and there is NO standardisation for cases, outside a minsuscule handful of products. Samsung's Tab 3S has a keyboard ... five rows -- no function keys. Which kills off a whole set of applications right there. The keyboard I've got (Logitech Type S) was broken from the start, and Logitech have abysmal warranty support. The keyboard is no longer made (they claim), and loses keys and other function over time. 2. The OS and applications space is abysmal. Here I'm including iOS and Android. Neither Google nor Samsung support updates to my device (it was apparently EOL as I was buying it). It's also not supported by CyanogenMod / LineageOS. The best thing I've found since getting this has been Termux, a Linux console environment, which offers a small but very, very, very useful set of utilities. Even that is crippled by what appears to be a bad terminal emulation (exceptionally slow on any scrollback), background-process termination (I'm never sure I'll find my sessions when I return to them), and something insanely buggy with SSH emulation. iOS of course doesn't even have a userland / console space. I'm looking at the Samsung Tab Pro line. It's expensive -- more than twice the price of an Asus Chromebook, say, but has the benefits of a folio-case and seperable keyboard form-factor. It seems to come with Windows 10 rather than Android, and I'm trying to sort out if that can be converted to either LineageOS or Linux. The surveillance-capitalism market of Android / Google is no longer tenable. The App ecosystem is fatally broken. Google's own apps (notably Chrome) are beyond frustrating. So really, the faults are all on the OS/applications side. I've some fairly strong reservations about installing Linux on a tablet as I doubt that Linux tools will play well with a touch-based surface (and touch itself ... has massive problems). In particular, the inability to distinguish a touch vs. click/drag action, the inability to navigate with the pixel-perfection of a desktop/mouse (though with high-def displays even that is pretty dicey these days), and the lack of multi-button mouse equivalents. I find all quite annoying. But for straight console-mode operation within Termux, the tablet's actually reasonably useful. What would help here? 1. Size standards on devices, including port and switch locations, such that cases could be designed for them across vendors. There are cases which work for only specific variants of Samsung model lines. 2. Keyboard standards, including interactions with keyboards, "special" key placement, and standardisation on a six-row, ~78 key standard. Samsung's 64-key error on the Tab 3S is absolutely inexcusable. 3. An alternative to straight-touch interfaces. 4. Bootloader unlocking and a sane standard for non-cloud device backup. 5. Mandated, effective, and usable privacy controls. https://ello.co/dredmorbius/post/lqgtwy_rhsfbdh5cdxb1rq https://ello.co/dredmorbius/post/lqgtwy_rhsfbdh5cdxb1rq
arvinsim 9y ago
As long as PC gamers exists, the desktop market will never die.
- monkmartinez 9y ago
  This is a great comment. I have never been a gamer... but now that I am moving back to windows... it just might become a thing.
- rbanffy 9y ago
  And that is the single most popular reason to run Windows I hear in my bubble.
flukus 9y ago
Still pretty healthy if you include laptops, which are functionally desktops, down a bit but still quite healthy (includes a forecast): https://www.statista.com/statistics/272595/global-shipments-forecast-for-tablets-laptops-and-desktop-pcs/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/272595/global-shipments-...

solotronics 9y ago

nobody is doing Linux dev on Windows, the only people I know at work on Windows are sysadmin types that just never learned Linux desktop and non-programmers. 95% of the dev people I know are on OS X or Linux

pjmlp 9y ago
On my bubble the only place for Linux is on servers. OS X machines are too expensive and we get to share a pool of devices. 95% of devs are on Windows.

shub 9y ago

Yeah, that's me in a nutshell. My employer recently sent everyone new hardware and I was initially bummed about getting the just-before-Touch-Bar MBP. Then I saw how gimmicky and awful Touch Bar was for the "lucky" colleague stuck with it. I'm typing this on a five year old MBA that isn't quite up to scratch for work anymore. If Apple would take this case, stick updated hardware and a Retina display in it, I'd buy it on launch day. Never gonna happen so I guess I'm never gonna buy another Apple laptop. Desktop Linux, especially when your employer runs Exchange, is a barrel of pain I've opened far too many times for my own good. Not going that route again.

executesorder66 9y ago
> Desktop Linux, especially when your employer runs Exchange, is a barrel of pain That's been me at my current employer. The whole dev team moved to linux, becuase it's just so much more productive. But the #1 pain point is Exchange. I tried Evolution, which connected to Exchange without any issues, but the mail client itself was buggy as hell. I tried thunderbird with some plugins (can't remember which ones) and that didn't work at all. Then I found out about Hiri. I thought it would save me, but it couldn't connect to Exchange at all. So our last resort was outlook webmail. What a fucking pile of garbage, but at least it "worked". I lived with that pain for months until I discovered davmail [0] I could easily connect thunderbird to exchange via davmail. I got all my email, contacts and calendar synced up nicely with exchange. I have had 0 issues fo far. [0] http://davmail.sourceforge.net/ http://davmail.sourceforge.net/
criddell 9y ago
I think the touchbar is a very cool idea, but I don't understand why they put it on their pro machines. Who uses function keys? Pro users. Who would benefit most from the touchbar? Consumers.