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I hate to say it but I feel like the 90s was a better time all around for the casual computer user. - You had total customization over your computer, every app
by sephoric 8y ago
I hate to say it but I feel like the 90s was a better time all around for the casual computer user.
- You had total customization over your computer, every app was skinnable including Windows or MacOS itself
- Linux was in a great spot, finally becoming usable as a desktop OS with a ton of fun toys and UI/UX experiments that got a lot of us into Linux before we knew about CLIs
- Products were sold per-unit instead of *aaS, so when you bought something, you knew you could use it as long as you needed to
- Social networks didn't exist, so if you wanted to interact with people, you had to learn something - which is what made geocities and later MySpace fun, since people had to learn a little HTML in order to update their friends on their current status, and could use that new skill to decorate their "home" page
I miss the 90s. I want to bring that back. That's why I got my kids PICO-8, at least it's a little taste of the good old days!
- kaishiro 8y agoOh man, you and I remember 90's Linux very differently.
- sephoric 8y agoTrue, I may be thinking of 2000s Linux. Compiz and the wobbly windows examples were fresh in my mind from the other day's HN discussions.
- nathancahill 8y agoAww Compiz. Converted so, so many people to Linux by showing off the effects.
- jzoch 8y agoExcept those are rose tinted glasses youre wearing imo. Linux isnt worse today than it was in the days of yore, it just hasnt kept up as well in your mind. Computing as a whole has improved so much that linux couldnt keep up with your higher expectations.
- sephoric 8y agoLinux today isn't worse, but laptops are much more prevalent now, and they're harder to support drivers for than desktops. Especially Apple laptops which I've been using for a long time now, they're notorious for not being that easy to get Linux running smoothly on. Some people can manage it but more people have trouble. I've wasted dozens and dozens of hours trying to get Linux working smoothly on this thing and I just gave up a few years ago. But when desktops were king and the internet just started to become mainstream and everyone was flooding into that new space, it was a great time for desktop Linux.
- tobmlt 8y agoYep. I've been running dual boot OSX/mint for some time and god the hardware has never been happy about it. Especially with regard to the GPU and multi-monitor support but I suspect also with regard to battery usage and other power issues. It always ran just cool enough that I did not do anything about how hot it was. The display issues cropped up so that I could at least anticipate when it would occur and try to minimize that. GPU computing... well these old macbook pros with Nvidia chips were dogs anyway. Would a windows laptop fair any better with Linux? Honestly asking because I really want a solid Linux laptop for HPC/computational engineering development but not sure what to do.
- greenhatman 8y agoI've never hand multi monitor problems with Linux. I'm running Mint on my MacBook. The only thing that was difficult for me, was installing my webcam drivers.
- tobmlt 8y agoWow - that is interesting to hear. Let me toss in a caveat by saying that I had 2 different multi-monitor setups that I transferred between while running straight off the machine quite often as well. Typically problems would crop up after shifting to or from the non-mac monitor setup. Never tested the cam on the linux side.
- marcosdumay 8y agoCompiz is certainly from the 2000s. I think I only managed to make it work on any computer of mine at the end of the decade, but people were all saying nice things about it since 2002-2003. By 1997 I was able to get X running with xclock and xterm. Any other X application would freeze my computer due to sheer lack of CPU.
- bengrunfeld 8y agoAlso, music was WAY better and pop hadn't eaten everything yet.
- manicdee 8y agoLinux in the 90s was figuring out which distribution had usable versions of the software you wanted to use, and hoping that an update to one package didn’t break everything else. That, or rolling your own distro from scratch and spending ALL YOUR TIME maintaining your Linux install somthere was no time left to do the stuff you actually wanted to do. Oh look, updating my windows manager means sound no longer works. I guess that’s three hours I need to invest to get my music player working again. See you tomorrow.
- greenhatman 8y agoIf you want total control over your computer, Linux is still here. And it's better than ever.