4 ms·

I really don't care much about the desktop wars thing, but if there's one thing that I honestly thing this is it: In the desktop wars nobody has really won, bu

by znpy 6y ago

I really don't care much about the desktop wars thing, but if there's one thing that I honestly thing this is it: In the desktop wars nobody has really won, but all the users have lost. GNU/Linux on the desktop has improved a lot, but it's still very far from being good. Mac OS is very good, but it's extremely expensive because of the hardware. Windows was very good for desktop but had stability problems. Nowadays Windows is just awful for the desktop user, Microsoft is literally conducting a war against its own users. Just tonight my father in law was complaining because he couldn't find the solitaire app. Turns out that my gf installed the binary of the previous version because the stock windows one was filled with advertising. Windows update had different opinions, and REMOVED A BINARY THAT THE USER HAD SETUP BY HAND. It literally: either you do computing the way Microsoft tells you, or you don't do computing at all. Microsoft literally removed a binary off the system. Unbelievable. I wonder if I could sue Microsoft over that. It's borderline sabotage. They removed a binary that the user installed by hand, knowing what they were doing.

thelazydogsback 6y ago
> Windows was very good for desktop but had stability problems. Nowadays Windows is just awful for the desktop user, Microsoft is literally conducting a war against its own users. I don't get this. I've been using *nix since PDP11 and VAX/Ultrix and I have no problems with Win10 at all, stability or otherwise - I'd much rather use it as a desktop dev environment than Linux. When it comes time to deploy something, sure it makes sense to run on Linux.
- WWLink 6y ago
  >I'd much rather use it as a desktop dev environment than Linux Yikes! I use Windows on my desktop at home because I like to play games on my computer that tend to not run well in WINE. I cannot program in Windows. I just can't. Even with WSL and vscode, I can't. Maybe I just suck as a programmer, but windows has a way of getting under my skin when I'm trying to get shit done. I can use a Mac, but stuff like SIP forcing me to have a nonstandard disk layout (god forbid I want /usr/bin/python3 to be a thing because it is on every linux machine I use) pisses me the fuck off. I'm kinda tired of Apple making the computer into an iPad. Which is too bad, because it's been my programming platform of choice for a very long time.
- znpy 6y ago
  We technical people should really start to understand that we're not the average use. Not even close. I'd have no problem in mutilating Windows enough to make it usable, and keeping an eye for when it tries to do something nasty. But the average user won't, and will have a computing experience filled with unnecessary advertising, encumbered by background processing and bandwitdh usage (telemetry collection and other windows background stuff that are not end-user activities). It's just awful.
  - thelazydogsback 6y ago
    I guess it depends on what you want to spend your time and emotional energy on. I use Win10 as it is "out of the box", and apply all automatic updates. If MS wants my telemetry or whatever, that's okay by me. If I'm in Firefox or running multiple VsCode/VStudio/IntelliJ/etc instances or running bash scripts or whatever, I can't see how it would offend so much - but I guess that's just me - but I'm not even trying to make Windows look like Linux or use it like it as one. As for the UI, all I really do is hit the Win key and type a few chars and hit enter and run what I want - no desktop icons, no theming, etc., and I Alt-Tab between full-screen apps or Ctl-Alt-Arrow between desktops -- that's about it. Maybe I'm just weird, but I don't find anything especially that gets in the way. Edit: Okay, I probably turned off indexing and the Cortana mic. access (was that enabled by default?), but that's about it. And I had to disable some Dell-specific bits from my son's laptop that limited network bandwidth for all non-video packets. WTF? I achieved a huge about of peace when I went from HD to SSD -- in addition to the speed, once I couldn't see the drive light or hear the disk being accessed when I wasn't doing anything, I found it wasn't really getting in the way.
    - thelazydogsback 6y ago
      If I had long-running servers at home or were using a runtime that didn't run on Windows very naturally, I supposed I'd feel differently - but that's not the case at the moment.
  - thelazydogsback 6y ago
    Advertising? I've never seen an ad. Are you talking about some OEM Windows install with extra bits??
fsflover 6y ago
> GNU/Linux on the desktop has improved a lot, but it's still very far from being good. Not sure what you are talking about. Just buy a Linux-certified laptop and don't install Linux on Windows-certified one and it will work just fine. Happy Linux user here.
- rstuart4133 6y ago
  yeah, that statement surprised me too. I guess the most telling statement about it came from my wife. She asked me to do to her laptop whatever I did to my daughters to make it run so fast. What I had done was replace Windows with Linux. I suspect I have the rapid change mobile phone GUI's to thank for no one even bothering to mention the difference between Linux and Windows - let alone needing to ask how to use it. How can they be "very far from being good" when they are so close? I guess I'm biased, as for me Linux + Cinnamon about as good as it gets. But it is a close thing. They are all good - Android, iOS, OSX, and yes Windows. I'd put Windows at the bottom of the pile, mostly because it's slow and because Microsoft's continual nags to hook you into their ecosystem (one drive, get Microsoft account, email, yada, yada). Oh, and the other annoying thing about Windows is the 1/2 baked transition between the control panel and the newfangled way of configuring things. There is enough clicking as it is without having to check a bunch places for a setting.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
littlestymaar 6y ago
> Mac OS is very good, but it's extremely expensive because of the hardware. Every update for the past 5 years had gone between bad and nightmarish, and the power user ergonomics are going from bad to worse every time. MacOs was probably the best OS in 2015, but it has steadily damaged itself since then. The solitaire example you give is a good illustration: on MacOS Catalina, you wouldn't be able to run the given binary without clicking twice on a button saying almost “yes I want to install a virus that will destroy my computer”, the default choice being “delete the said file”.
magnetowasright 6y ago
Totally agree that users have lost. > GNU/Linux on the desktop has improved a lot, but it's still very far from being good. What do you think is lacking for it to be 'good'?

by znpy 6y ago

thelazydogsback 6y ago

> Windows was very good for desktop but had stability problems. Nowadays Windows is just awful for the desktop user, Microsoft is literally conducting a war against its own users. I don't get this. I've been using *nix since PDP11 and VAX/Ultrix and I have no problems with Win10 at all, stability or otherwise - I'd much rather use it as a desktop dev environment than Linux. When it comes time to deploy something, sure it makes sense to run on Linux.

WWLink 6y ago
>I'd much rather use it as a desktop dev environment than Linux Yikes! I use Windows on my desktop at home because I like to play games on my computer that tend to not run well in WINE. I cannot program in Windows. I just can't. Even with WSL and vscode, I can't. Maybe I just suck as a programmer, but windows has a way of getting under my skin when I'm trying to get shit done. I can use a Mac, but stuff like SIP forcing me to have a nonstandard disk layout (god forbid I want /usr/bin/python3 to be a thing because it is on every linux machine I use) pisses me the fuck off. I'm kinda tired of Apple making the computer into an iPad. Which is too bad, because it's been my programming platform of choice for a very long time.
znpy 6y ago
We technical people should really start to understand that we're not the average use. Not even close. I'd have no problem in mutilating Windows enough to make it usable, and keeping an eye for when it tries to do something nasty. But the average user won't, and will have a computing experience filled with unnecessary advertising, encumbered by background processing and bandwitdh usage (telemetry collection and other windows background stuff that are not end-user activities). It's just awful.
- thelazydogsback 6y ago
  I guess it depends on what you want to spend your time and emotional energy on. I use Win10 as it is "out of the box", and apply all automatic updates. If MS wants my telemetry or whatever, that's okay by me. If I'm in Firefox or running multiple VsCode/VStudio/IntelliJ/etc instances or running bash scripts or whatever, I can't see how it would offend so much - but I guess that's just me - but I'm not even trying to make Windows look like Linux or use it like it as one. As for the UI, all I really do is hit the Win key and type a few chars and hit enter and run what I want - no desktop icons, no theming, etc., and I Alt-Tab between full-screen apps or Ctl-Alt-Arrow between desktops -- that's about it. Maybe I'm just weird, but I don't find anything especially that gets in the way. Edit: Okay, I probably turned off indexing and the Cortana mic. access (was that enabled by default?), but that's about it. And I had to disable some Dell-specific bits from my son's laptop that limited network bandwidth for all non-video packets. WTF? I achieved a huge about of peace when I went from HD to SSD -- in addition to the speed, once I couldn't see the drive light or hear the disk being accessed when I wasn't doing anything, I found it wasn't really getting in the way.
  - thelazydogsback 6y ago
    If I had long-running servers at home or were using a runtime that didn't run on Windows very naturally, I supposed I'd feel differently - but that's not the case at the moment.
- thelazydogsback 6y ago
  Advertising? I've never seen an ad. Are you talking about some OEM Windows install with extra bits??

fsflover 6y ago

> GNU/Linux on the desktop has improved a lot, but it's still very far from being good. Not sure what you are talking about. Just buy a Linux-certified laptop and don't install Linux on Windows-certified one and it will work just fine. Happy Linux user here.

rstuart4133 6y ago
yeah, that statement surprised me too. I guess the most telling statement about it came from my wife. She asked me to do to her laptop whatever I did to my daughters to make it run so fast. What I had done was replace Windows with Linux. I suspect I have the rapid change mobile phone GUI's to thank for no one even bothering to mention the difference between Linux and Windows - let alone needing to ask how to use it. How can they be "very far from being good" when they are so close? I guess I'm biased, as for me Linux + Cinnamon about as good as it gets. But it is a close thing. They are all good - Android, iOS, OSX, and yes Windows. I'd put Windows at the bottom of the pile, mostly because it's slow and because Microsoft's continual nags to hook you into their ecosystem (one drive, get Microsoft account, email, yada, yada). Oh, and the other annoying thing about Windows is the 1/2 baked transition between the control panel and the newfangled way of configuring things. There is enough clicking as it is without having to check a bunch places for a setting.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

littlestymaar 6y ago

> Mac OS is very good, but it's extremely expensive because of the hardware. Every update for the past 5 years had gone between bad and nightmarish, and the power user ergonomics are going from bad to worse every time. MacOs was probably the best OS in 2015, but it has steadily damaged itself since then. The solitaire example you give is a good illustration: on MacOS Catalina, you wouldn't be able to run the given binary without clicking twice on a button saying almost “yes I want to install a virus that will destroy my computer”, the default choice being “delete the said file”.

magnetowasright 6y ago

Totally agree that users have lost. > GNU/Linux on the desktop has improved a lot, but it's still very far from being good. What do you think is lacking for it to be 'good'?