4 ms·

This is why I won't use open source for a desktop anymore. It's so convoluted and changes so often that I have to constantly keep track of multiple kernel and u

This is why I won't use open source for a desktop anymore. It's so convoluted and changes so often that I have to constantly keep track of multiple kernel and userland systems in order to know what tweaks I don't need to make. "Don't use the faffle-fille.123456 tweak, that's for the 2016 driver; the 2019 driver inherits the booble-babble hack from the nzudzu core. Also, the 611-double-decker-dev release added FOO_MANCHU support so you just need the abcdefghijk=999 argument to set up all the things you would expect to work by default." I just want to pay someone to make my computer work the way it's designed to.

m712 7y ago
If you are hinting to proprietary systems in your last sentence, you can go ahead and pay someone to lock you into their ecosystem. This is how Free Software works and I wouldn't have it any other way. People work on their own and bring it together into one whole system, and that can cause incompatibilities. However lock-step design is also one of the key ways to destroy innovation. If you lack the desire to learn how to configure your system, then you will probably not want to use a Free system. That's just how it is.
- zbentley 7y ago
  I hope this doesn't sound rude, but that is exactly why desktop Linux and friends are a piss-poor experience compared to their proprietary counterparts. There is a negative feedback look here. With enough of that kind of "customization freaks only, casuals need not apply, enjoy your non-innovative proprietary shitware" talk, user bases stay small and niche, people get alienated, and don't contribute to or use free OSes. It's perfectly reasonable to want to trade customizability for usability. Chasing people who think that away from free software helps nobody.
  - floatboth 7y ago
    There's plenty of free polished out-of-the-box experiences, from Ubuntu/Mint/elementary/whatever to hardware from Purism and system76. There's definitely some "customization freaks only" assholes on the internet too, but… very very often, it seems like some people perceive that when a non-out-of-the-box OS just exists and people like using it just personally for themselves.
    - zbentley 7y ago
      There is definitely progress here since the early '00s. However, there's a very long way to go until even the most polished home-user Linux distros approach the level of usability (and supportability, even more critical) of proprietary OSes for non-power-users. And I wasn't trying to paint everyone who wants to tinker with the same "gatekeeping" brush, sorry if I came off that way. GP equated proprietary software with "pay[ing] someone to lock you into their ecosystem" and "destroy[ing] innovation", and ended with > If you lack the desire to learn how to configure your system, then you will probably not want to use a Free system. That's just how it is. That's the sentiment I had trouble with. Not the existence of knobs (which should continue existing! Just with better tuning experience for casual users, and saner defaults).
- peterwwillis 7y ago
  I just want software that works well. In some ways, Free Software is that, and in some ways, it isn't. I reject the idea that this is how it has to be. There is no reason Free Software has to be user-unfriendly.
  - floatboth 7y ago
    You can use Ubuntu/Mint/elementary/etc. and it's very user-friendly. You can pay Purism or system76 to deliver you a literal physical out-of-the-box experience. But, like, let tinkerers tinker. Nobody said that this should be the way to go for everyone or that user-friendly unix does not exist. You brought the assumption that all Free Software is like that into a thread about a specific less-popular explicitly-not-desktop-oriented OS ;)
asveikau 7y ago
But you are replying to a comment that says you don't need the tweaks. I think the situation is a little bit made worse by the fact that historically, FreeBSD had some poor or out of date defaults, so it is prone to putting something in a config file and forgetting about it as it meanwhile becomes obsolete. This is not really an "open source desktop" problem so much as a FreeBSD problem.
00N8 7y ago
Yeah, I think it really comes down to the fact that the only way to have every detail on your system exactly the way you want it would take more time than you'll have in your life, so we make compromises. Commercial software & community-driven open source software offer different sets of compromises
siddboots 7y ago
I think you have misinterpreted the parent comment. The point is precisely that manual tweaks to drivers selection, kernel settings, and Xorg/wayland, survive in modern desktop Linux mostly as an example of cargo cult. They aren't necessary, or even advisable in most cases.

m712 7y ago

If you are hinting to proprietary systems in your last sentence, you can go ahead and pay someone to lock you into their ecosystem. This is how Free Software works and I wouldn't have it any other way. People work on their own and bring it together into one whole system, and that can cause incompatibilities. However lock-step design is also one of the key ways to destroy innovation. If you lack the desire to learn how to configure your system, then you will probably not want to use a Free system. That's just how it is.

zbentley 7y ago
I hope this doesn't sound rude, but that is exactly why desktop Linux and friends are a piss-poor experience compared to their proprietary counterparts. There is a negative feedback look here. With enough of that kind of "customization freaks only, casuals need not apply, enjoy your non-innovative proprietary shitware" talk, user bases stay small and niche, people get alienated, and don't contribute to or use free OSes. It's perfectly reasonable to want to trade customizability for usability. Chasing people who think that away from free software helps nobody.
- floatboth 7y ago
  There's plenty of free polished out-of-the-box experiences, from Ubuntu/Mint/elementary/whatever to hardware from Purism and system76. There's definitely some "customization freaks only" assholes on the internet too, but… very very often, it seems like some people perceive that when a non-out-of-the-box OS just exists and people like using it just personally for themselves.
  - zbentley 7y ago
    There is definitely progress here since the early '00s. However, there's a very long way to go until even the most polished home-user Linux distros approach the level of usability (and supportability, even more critical) of proprietary OSes for non-power-users. And I wasn't trying to paint everyone who wants to tinker with the same "gatekeeping" brush, sorry if I came off that way. GP equated proprietary software with "pay[ing] someone to lock you into their ecosystem" and "destroy[ing] innovation", and ended with > If you lack the desire to learn how to configure your system, then you will probably not want to use a Free system. That's just how it is. That's the sentiment I had trouble with. Not the existence of knobs (which should continue existing! Just with better tuning experience for casual users, and saner defaults).
peterwwillis 7y ago
I just want software that works well. In some ways, Free Software is that, and in some ways, it isn't. I reject the idea that this is how it has to be. There is no reason Free Software has to be user-unfriendly.
- floatboth 7y ago
  You can use Ubuntu/Mint/elementary/etc. and it's very user-friendly. You can pay Purism or system76 to deliver you a literal physical out-of-the-box experience. But, like, let tinkerers tinker. Nobody said that this should be the way to go for everyone or that user-friendly unix does not exist. You brought the assumption that all Free Software is like that into a thread about a specific less-popular explicitly-not-desktop-oriented OS ;)

asveikau 7y ago

But you are replying to a comment that says you don't need the tweaks. I think the situation is a little bit made worse by the fact that historically, FreeBSD had some poor or out of date defaults, so it is prone to putting something in a config file and forgetting about it as it meanwhile becomes obsolete. This is not really an "open source desktop" problem so much as a FreeBSD problem.

00N8 7y ago

Yeah, I think it really comes down to the fact that the only way to have every detail on your system exactly the way you want it would take more time than you'll have in your life, so we make compromises. Commercial software & community-driven open source software offer different sets of compromises

siddboots 7y ago

I think you have misinterpreted the parent comment. The point is precisely that manual tweaks to drivers selection, kernel settings, and Xorg/wayland, survive in modern desktop Linux mostly as an example of cargo cult. They aren't necessary, or even advisable in most cases.