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Eh, I disagree with a lot the fundamentals here. I don’t believe that windows devs who have avoided Linux so far are going to ‘try out’ WSL at all, let alone b

by ddek 6y ago

Eh, I disagree with a lot the fundamentals here. I don’t believe that windows devs who have avoided Linux so far are going to ‘try out’ WSL at all, let alone be converted. I work in a .Net house, and the only people who use WSL at all are those who have Linux experience. The rest? Nothing could change their view that windows ‘works’ and ‘is secure’. Also he mentions shells - in Windows we have PowerShell, which is pretty great actually. It’s not as concise as Linux (Resolve-DnsName vs dig), which hinders interactive programming, but the scripts are more readable. In that example, the Linux version requires knowledge of dnsutils, while the powershell is obvious. I’m still more inclined to write scripts in PS than in bash, for this reason. WSL isn’t about giving windows users the ‘Linux experience’ - it’s about keeping people on Windows. With linux dominance in the cloud, there’s more reason than ever for devs to shift to Linux. WSL _extends_ those developers by _embracing_ them, then finally _extinguishing_ them because it’s still a bit $%#= and if they develop for Linux they’ll end up transitioning.

sah2ed 6y ago
OT: To achieve italicized text, you need to use asterisks not _underscores_. "Text surrounded by asterisks is italicized, if the character after the first asterisk isn't whitespace." From https://news.ycombinator.com/formatdoc https://news.ycombinator.com/formatdoc
virtue3 6y ago
you're spot on. Thanks to covid I want to use my desktop at home, it's windows, I'm not gonna put linux on it (don't feel like it). WSL allows me to still do modern web development on windows. (fiddler saved my ass with routing to ports). I've heard WSL has pretty poor adoptation. WSL2 fixed a LOT of things. Docker runs fast, the IO is pretty fast now. Overall it's ok. I stopped doing windows updates cuz they kept breaking my shit. :/ Ultimately, M$ needs to provide an ability for developers to do linux. Every server is linux. They would be insane not to have the ability to code that stuff up on windows. What annoys me a bit is how much M$ has moved away from its previous model and people don't see it. They're been pumping SO MUCH into the .net core it's ridiculous. They have fully embraced linux because they realize that they wont keep devs by having windows only on Azure. They've abandoned the platform and they're fully going for service oriented products, and deploying them on everything. (or web).
qwerty456127 6y ago
I hardly am too much of a shell hacker on whatever an OS, but PowerShell seems obviously a huge step forward (because of objects instead of text interchange, overall consistency and readability). I actually hope it's going to gain more popularity on Linux, it's the best shell I've seen so far. Long command names look awkward the first time you see them, but as soon as you get the point this design decision immediately looks brilliant.
wayneftw 6y ago
> then finally _extinguishing_ them because it’s still a bit $%#= and if they develop for Linux they’ll end up transitioning. I didn't understand that part of the sentence. "WSL is still a bit $%#=" (scuffed?) "and if they develop for Linux they'll end up transitioning" (because WSL is scuffed compared to just running Linux?) - not sure... Anyway, I was on Windows for most of my career. In 2010 when I got interested in Node.js it still didn't run very well on Windows. Having only ever used Linux seriously as a server and having tried unsuccessfully many times to keep a Linux desktop running, I wasn't ready to switch. So, back then, Node.js was just for side projects. Fast forward 5-6 years and most of my projects are now SPAs with a .NET backend. Node.js is running okay on Windows, but package management with NPMs thousands of little files is just slow on Windows. Despite that, I transition to doing more and more backends with Node. I stick with Windows. Forward another 2 years and I'm finally sick of the Windows tax with regards to Node and NPM. I'll never move to a Mac as my main machine since they can't even get window management and other basic facilities right and I hate the hardware lock-in, so I figure I'll try a Linux desktop yet again. This time I find many people hailing Manjaro Linux as the distro that is the least maintenance desktop. So, I installed it on one laptop using the default XFCE desktop environment, which I never really tried before. Holy cow! I used to have to fight with Windows to make it this minimalist! XFCE actually does Windows better than Windows. Out of the box it lets me re-order windows on the taskbar and right-click to close them (a feature I had to install 7+ taskbar tweaker to get on Windows). Oh and the file explorer (Thunar) has tabs and so does the terminal! I can also control the whole OS GUI with just a keyboard, just like in Windows. I got all the major software I need - Chrome, VS Code, Thunderbird, Slack, Beyond Compare, Remote Desktop (FreeRDP) - and now I get to use all the famed Linux tools without any issue at all. Within three months I had installed Manjaro on my main workstations both at work and at home and I've been running it for over 2 years now. It's actually way less maintenance than any Windows machine I've ever had. There's just so much less crap to fight against, like forced updates downloading and installing, slowing down my machine right in the middle of my so-called "active hours". I used to spend hours researching how to force Windows to do exactly what I want to do by setting various group policies, registry entries and so forth - now I only do that minimally for my gaming and home entertainment machines. I'm so happy!

by ddek 6y ago

sah2ed 6y ago

OT: To achieve italicized text, you need to use asterisks not _underscores_. "Text surrounded by asterisks is italicized, if the character after the first asterisk isn't whitespace." From https://news.ycombinator.com/formatdoc https://news.ycombinator.com/formatdoc

virtue3 6y ago

you're spot on. Thanks to covid I want to use my desktop at home, it's windows, I'm not gonna put linux on it (don't feel like it). WSL allows me to still do modern web development on windows. (fiddler saved my ass with routing to ports). I've heard WSL has pretty poor adoptation. WSL2 fixed a LOT of things. Docker runs fast, the IO is pretty fast now. Overall it's ok. I stopped doing windows updates cuz they kept breaking my shit. :/ Ultimately, M$ needs to provide an ability for developers to do linux. Every server is linux. They would be insane not to have the ability to code that stuff up on windows. What annoys me a bit is how much M$ has moved away from its previous model and people don't see it. They're been pumping SO MUCH into the .net core it's ridiculous. They have fully embraced linux because they realize that they wont keep devs by having windows only on Azure. They've abandoned the platform and they're fully going for service oriented products, and deploying them on everything. (or web).

qwerty456127 6y ago

I hardly am too much of a shell hacker on whatever an OS, but PowerShell seems obviously a huge step forward (because of objects instead of text interchange, overall consistency and readability). I actually hope it's going to gain more popularity on Linux, it's the best shell I've seen so far. Long command names look awkward the first time you see them, but as soon as you get the point this design decision immediately looks brilliant.

wayneftw 6y ago

> then finally _extinguishing_ them because it’s still a bit $%#= and if they develop for Linux they’ll end up transitioning. I didn't understand that part of the sentence. "WSL is still a bit $%#=" (scuffed?) "and if they develop for Linux they'll end up transitioning" (because WSL is scuffed compared to just running Linux?) - not sure... Anyway, I was on Windows for most of my career. In 2010 when I got interested in Node.js it still didn't run very well on Windows. Having only ever used Linux seriously as a server and having tried unsuccessfully many times to keep a Linux desktop running, I wasn't ready to switch. So, back then, Node.js was just for side projects. Fast forward 5-6 years and most of my projects are now SPAs with a .NET backend. Node.js is running okay on Windows, but package management with NPMs thousands of little files is just slow on Windows. Despite that, I transition to doing more and more backends with Node. I stick with Windows. Forward another 2 years and I'm finally sick of the Windows tax with regards to Node and NPM. I'll never move to a Mac as my main machine since they can't even get window management and other basic facilities right and I hate the hardware lock-in, so I figure I'll try a Linux desktop yet again. This time I find many people hailing Manjaro Linux as the distro that is the least maintenance desktop. So, I installed it on one laptop using the default XFCE desktop environment, which I never really tried before. Holy cow! I used to have to fight with Windows to make it this minimalist! XFCE actually does Windows better than Windows. Out of the box it lets me re-order windows on the taskbar and right-click to close them (a feature I had to install 7+ taskbar tweaker to get on Windows). Oh and the file explorer (Thunar) has tabs and so does the terminal! I can also control the whole OS GUI with just a keyboard, just like in Windows. I got all the major software I need - Chrome, VS Code, Thunderbird, Slack, Beyond Compare, Remote Desktop (FreeRDP) - and now I get to use all the famed Linux tools without any issue at all. Within three months I had installed Manjaro on my main workstations both at work and at home and I've been running it for over 2 years now. It's actually way less maintenance than any Windows machine I've ever had. There's just so much less crap to fight against, like forced updates downloading and installing, slowing down my machine right in the middle of my so-called "active hours". I used to spend hours researching how to force Windows to do exactly what I want to do by setting various group policies, registry entries and so forth - now I only do that minimally for my gaming and home entertainment machines. I'm so happy!