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Having never really used Windows, except from a brief inter job as a kid, it seems to be getting better and better, to the point were I'm beginning to consider

Having never really used Windows, except from a brief inter job as a kid, it seems to be getting better and better, to the point were I'm beginning to consider it as a viable alternative. Unix + Photoshop is what I need and MS seem to be coming from the other side by embracing Linux more and more.

commandlinefan 9y ago
I abandoned Windows 15 years ago; I switched over to Linux for about 7 years and then OS/X for 8 after that. I only returned to Windows this year, as it was required for a new job. Trust me: no, Windows is still as awful as it ever was.
- mgkimsal 9y ago
  for what sort of workload? I'm primarily in text editors, IDEs, browsers and command line. jetbrains stuff is cross-platform, and I'm assuming runs well on windows. the surfacebook world looks enticing, and my macbook is ... well, i'm getting enticed by the surface world. What sort of problems do you encounter?
- robbyt 9y ago
  I believe you, but I'm curious if you're using Windows 10? Also, what specifically is bad. (I'm a Linux desktop user since '99, MacOS since 08)
  - mr_toad 9y ago
    It’s still a major PITA to install & maintain many open source tools, like curl, Ffmpeg, wget etc. The tool chain is hit and miss. Recompiling Ffmpeg with h265 support is one command on MacOS. I just recently had to recompile a R package that depended on some fairly obscure third party libraries. No problem, just a couple of brew install commands. I’d hate to think how much manual work it would have taken to line up all the dependencies for that in Windows. Likely I’d have just given up.
  - commandlinefan 9y ago
    It takes _ages_ to start up, for one thing. Debian, on the exact same hardware, starts up in seconds - Windows 7 takes minutes. You might argue that Windows is offering more functionality, but OS/X also starts orders of magnitude faster. There's no visibility on what the hell it's doing or how you can tune it. Wifi is hit-and-miss, and again, there's no way to peek into the internals and figure out what's going wrong. Configuration options are scattered everywhere; sometimes they're in control panel, sometimes they're in some random .msc file, sometimes they're just somewhere else for no reason. Linux is persnickety, but open - it takes some dedication to get things working, but you have the tools you need to do so. OS/X is closed, but "just works". Windows is persnickety, closed, and only sometimes works - you get the worst of Linux with the worst of OS/X and none of the good.
- basementcat 9y ago
  I think it depends on what you're doing. If you stay in the Linux subsystem, it is very similar to an actual Linux userland. I find many of my struggles with Windows is the result of trying to solve a problem in the Windows subsystem in a "Unix-like" way instead of a "Windows-like" way.
z3t4 9y ago
I switched over from Windows to Linux about a year ago and the only thing I miss is some games that doesn't run on Linux. Things you would probably miss in Windows: The console, apt-get, open source software, config files, able to fix stuff, support/community, ZFS, support for new technology programming languages and frameworks. And stuff you will not like in Windows: Editing the registry, finding stuff in the GUI that switch places from time to time. Installing random programs from the web and give them Admin rights, paying for those programs, getting spy updates you did not ask for, your OS showing ads and tracking your every step and then calling home to send data about you, old programs doesn't work.
- tambourine_man 9y ago
  > getting spy updates you did not ask for, your OS showing ads and tracking your every step and then calling home to send data about you Yeah, that’s a big reason holding me back. And registry, drive letters, etc.
chmln 9y ago
You can run Photoshop in Wine. Maybe it won't be the latest CC version, but it should get the job done. As someone who jumped to Linux 5 years ago, I would never consider running Windows again. Paying for a license to get my data harvested regardless and see ads on my lock screen, no thanks. Instead I donate that money to a handful of Linux organizations, distros, and devs to support an ecosystem I love being a part of.
- tambourine_man 9y ago
  >Maybe it won't be the latest CC version, but it should get the job done. I need the latest and I’d go crazy with some glitch or graphic acceleration missbehaviour due to Wine. >Instead I donate that money to a handful of Linux organizations, distros, and devs to support an ecosystem I love being a part of. That’s a nice atitude.

commandlinefan 9y ago

I abandoned Windows 15 years ago; I switched over to Linux for about 7 years and then OS/X for 8 after that. I only returned to Windows this year, as it was required for a new job. Trust me: no, Windows is still as awful as it ever was.

mgkimsal 9y ago
for what sort of workload? I'm primarily in text editors, IDEs, browsers and command line. jetbrains stuff is cross-platform, and I'm assuming runs well on windows. the surfacebook world looks enticing, and my macbook is ... well, i'm getting enticed by the surface world. What sort of problems do you encounter?
robbyt 9y ago
I believe you, but I'm curious if you're using Windows 10? Also, what specifically is bad. (I'm a Linux desktop user since '99, MacOS since 08)
- mr_toad 9y ago
  It’s still a major PITA to install & maintain many open source tools, like curl, Ffmpeg, wget etc. The tool chain is hit and miss. Recompiling Ffmpeg with h265 support is one command on MacOS. I just recently had to recompile a R package that depended on some fairly obscure third party libraries. No problem, just a couple of brew install commands. I’d hate to think how much manual work it would have taken to line up all the dependencies for that in Windows. Likely I’d have just given up.
- commandlinefan 9y ago
  It takes _ages_ to start up, for one thing. Debian, on the exact same hardware, starts up in seconds - Windows 7 takes minutes. You might argue that Windows is offering more functionality, but OS/X also starts orders of magnitude faster. There's no visibility on what the hell it's doing or how you can tune it. Wifi is hit-and-miss, and again, there's no way to peek into the internals and figure out what's going wrong. Configuration options are scattered everywhere; sometimes they're in control panel, sometimes they're in some random .msc file, sometimes they're just somewhere else for no reason. Linux is persnickety, but open - it takes some dedication to get things working, but you have the tools you need to do so. OS/X is closed, but "just works". Windows is persnickety, closed, and only sometimes works - you get the worst of Linux with the worst of OS/X and none of the good.
basementcat 9y ago
I think it depends on what you're doing. If you stay in the Linux subsystem, it is very similar to an actual Linux userland. I find many of my struggles with Windows is the result of trying to solve a problem in the Windows subsystem in a "Unix-like" way instead of a "Windows-like" way.

z3t4 9y ago

I switched over from Windows to Linux about a year ago and the only thing I miss is some games that doesn't run on Linux. Things you would probably miss in Windows: The console, apt-get, open source software, config files, able to fix stuff, support/community, ZFS, support for new technology programming languages and frameworks. And stuff you will not like in Windows: Editing the registry, finding stuff in the GUI that switch places from time to time. Installing random programs from the web and give them Admin rights, paying for those programs, getting spy updates you did not ask for, your OS showing ads and tracking your every step and then calling home to send data about you, old programs doesn't work.

tambourine_man 9y ago
> getting spy updates you did not ask for, your OS showing ads and tracking your every step and then calling home to send data about you Yeah, that’s a big reason holding me back. And registry, drive letters, etc.

chmln 9y ago

You can run Photoshop in Wine. Maybe it won't be the latest CC version, but it should get the job done. As someone who jumped to Linux 5 years ago, I would never consider running Windows again. Paying for a license to get my data harvested regardless and see ads on my lock screen, no thanks. Instead I donate that money to a handful of Linux organizations, distros, and devs to support an ecosystem I love being a part of.

tambourine_man 9y ago
>Maybe it won't be the latest CC version, but it should get the job done. I need the latest and I’d go crazy with some glitch or graphic acceleration missbehaviour due to Wine. >Instead I donate that money to a handful of Linux organizations, distros, and devs to support an ecosystem I love being a part of. That’s a nice atitude.