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I just moved to Linux as my primary OS; been fucking great. 11/10 Overall, everything seems to "just work" at least as well as on MacOS and is not quite (for m

I just moved to Linux as my primary OS; been fucking great. 11/10 Overall, everything seems to "just work" at least as well as on MacOS and is not quite (for me) as endlessly frustrating as Windows. Gaming has also been effortless and honestly just the most delightful surprise about the whole thing. I can write code AND play games... on the same machine... and it's running Linux?! I would've lost that bet ten years ago. I was/am totally prepared to use GPU pass-through to a Windows VM to get native gaming performance or work around bugs-- but I haven't needed to. I'm using PopOS but am pretty indifferent toward the distro I use. I honestly got it confused for different distro, but it was still Debian/Ubuntu based so I'm chill (ha). Really, most modern Linux distros are pretty god damn nice. It's a little weird to even think about dialing in the aesthetic more to my liking coming from the world of MacOS. But I've found themes like Nord (https://www.gnome-look.org/p/1267246/ https://www.gnome-look.org/p/1267246/) provide some visual familiarity while maintaining their own unique aesthetic qualities. Making apps, or interacting with the OS, is absurdly easy using GTK and Python vs anything Microsoft or Apple have to offer. I have the same effective level of support which is to say none-at-all or via the community of volunteers. I can't ever imagine calling Microsoft or Apple for meaningful help (roflcoptr and we say we pay for support). Linux is rocking the desktop hard, if you haven't tried it in a few years or just maintain a Windows installation to play games-- seriously give it a try. It's wonderful.

Osiris 6y ago
I'm using PopOS (with i3 instead of Gnome) on a System76 laptop. I have some serious issues with resume from sleep. All browsers and electron apps have significant rendering issues after I resume and I have to close them down and restart them. I was able to fix Chrome and Firefox by enabling Vulkan, but Slack still requires a restart after every resume. My external monitors periodically stop working due to an NVIDIA driver bug. Have you had any similar issues?
- edgyquant 6y ago
  Yeah outside of Lubuntu I’ve had bad luck with resuming sleep on laptops. My desktop doesn’t ever go to sleep (Nvidia 1660x) but that’s because over the years I’ve just had so much trouble. I’d still take Fedora or Ubuntu over Windows any day as that’s my only complaint. Then again I’ve been a Linux users since 2006 so to I’m amazed at how great driver support is now even compared to a few years ago.
- leetrout 6y ago
  I am using pop on an oryx and my external monitor doesn’t wake up from sleep. Most flat pack apps don’t work right - especially anything electron based. Zoom is a hot mess and fractional scaling still doesn’t work right. I just tried disabling the hidpi daemon in hopes my monitor wakes up correctly. We’ll see. All that said I am addicted to the speed of the OS compared to windows or Mac OS. I feel like I’m using the full power of the laptop. I’ve not tried plasma but I miss a lot of my Mac shortcuts like super + left or right going to the end of the line. Still don’t have that working. It’s so much better than it used to be but I would love to see one of the desktops reach the same level of polish as Mac or windows 10.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- lytigas 6y ago
  It's possible the Chromium/Electron thing is this bug[1], which affects new proprietary nvidia drivers on recent Chromium versions. I also experienced that bug, though I don't think it affected Firefox for me. It resolved itself for me recently in all apps except Slack. I have no idea why. I'm fairly sure I didn't update anything. While it was still reproducing, I tested a purported fix in the upcoming Chromium 87 (or 88?) and it was resolved. So just wait a bit or try Canary. More specific info in the bug thread of course. [1] https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=1113040 https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=111304...
  - pmontra 6y ago
    Yep. Only Slack ever had that problem for me. I reopen it again after every resume, when I have to work with my customers. I don't use Slack for anything else.
    - RMPR 6y ago
      I can't stand the electron client of Slack, so I use ripcord instead.
- dav 6y ago
  I have same problem. It’s 100% with Slack (and I suspected because Electron) but only occasional with Zoom and rarely with Firefox.
- cluoma 6y ago
  I think this is a common problem on Nvidia. Firefox used to crash for me all the time coming out of hibernate. You can try Nvidia's solution.[1] [1]: https://download.nvidia.com/XFree86/Linux-x86_64/455.38/README/powermanagement.html https://download.nvidia.com/XFree86/Linux-x86_64/455.38/READ...
- wazoox 6y ago
  I'm running Pop_OS on my IdeaPad and have very few problems. From time to time, the Wifi doesn't come back up after resume (particularly when I've let it in sleep overnight, or switches networks while sleeping) and I have to reboot. As the machine boots in less than 12 seconds that's a tolerable annoyance though. The machine is Ryzen5/Vega so it requires no proprietary driver though it isn't Linux certified at all. The only piece of non-working hardware is the fingerprint reader (apparently a driver will come someday...).
- mcjiggerlog 6y ago
  I have this exactly same problem - Chromium, Firefox, Electron - and it's apparently an unfixed bug in the nvidia drivers. For me it only started a few months ago. I'm on Ubuntu 20.10 and it's still a problem.
heavyset_go 6y ago
> Really, most modern Linux distros are pretty god damn nice. I agree, and what really sold me was Plasma Desktop, as someone that couldn't stand KDE 3 & 4. It used to be that GNOME was the desktop environment you could turn into a Windows or macOS clone, but it looks like that switched with GNOME 3 and KDE 5. I have Plasma Desktop set up[1] to take advantage of my macOS muscle memory when it comes to the GUI and keyboard short cuts, and I couldn't imagine going back. > Linux is rocking the desktop hard, if you haven't tried it in a few years or just maintain a Windows installation to play games-- seriously give it a try. It's wonderful. It's not just developers or power users that Linux shines for, either. I'm of the opinion that if ChromeOS would suit a person's needs, so would a polished distribution like Ubuntu along with a browser like Firefox or Chrome. Ubuntu has an app store-like interface to install Zoom, Slack, and other work apps. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23607374 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23607374
- Accacin 6y ago
  I finally got fed up with tweaking Arch/DWM and switched to Manjaro with KDE on my main machine, I went through all the versions of Manjaro and all had their problems and I finally settled on KDE. Looks good, allows me some tweaking, runs surprisingly light. Although, still some annoying bugs, the most annoying being when I open an application on my 1440p screen, KDE often opens it on my second monitor for no real reason.
  - BRedSox 6y ago
    If you hare looking for a more arch experience again, check out endeavouros. Phil and the Manjaro group have increasingly proved their incompetence.
    - onlydeadheroes 6y ago
      There is funny business going on at manjaro, but by god do they deliver! I run 5 linux computers at home for various ends and I got tired of putting a new Ubuntu on them every now and then. At the time I looked at manjaro, other rolling distros couldn't even survive an update from the latest installation media to current (sidux). Arch is/was a hobby in itself and the opposite of what I was seeking, but it is an excellent foundation. Manjaro has kept these 5 machines for over 5 years through every possible update and it never broke them. Kernel switching is a joy. Driver installing switching is a joy. This is a very tall order. That said I do hope endeavouros or others can fill Manjaro's immense boots.
forgingahead 6y ago
+1 to this -- invested in a desktop earlier this year to tinker more with ML projects, and dual-booted Windows and Linux (Ubuntu 18 LTS) on separate SSDs with separate HDs for data storage for each system. I have spent 95% of my time in Linux, and only get into Windows for a game or two that I haven't bothered to figure out a Windows VM setup for. Definitely recommend Linux for those looking for dev machine alternatives to a Mac. There are certain finiticky things when setting up, and it doesn't have the immense MacOS polish, but I would say it's 80-90% of the way there to a good, intuitive dev machine that gives you a very similar experience to a Mac programming setup. Note, I'm referring to a desktop setup, no idea about how it works with laptop hardware and I have a MBP for my portable needs.
- hanklazard 6y ago
  re: linux laptops, I'm writing this from one of the new Lenovo Carbon X1 models that comes pre-installed with Ubuntu. I prefer pop!_os (except for the name) so I installed that when I first got the machine, and it's worked with no issues. I've had it for a few weeks and zero complaints. The fingerprint reader even works with linux, which wasn't the case on my previous gen CX1 laptops. Let me also just say that I am basically at the point where I may soon recommend a pop!_os machine to my parents (who are in their late 60's and have limited abilities on computers). Given that I'll personally be on the hook for any and all tech support, take that as a strong vote of confidence!
  - mnahkies 6y ago
    I setup Debian on an old desktop for my mum a few years back, and she was able to use it happily with no issues or support from me - for the average person that just wants a web browser and some word processing it works great! When it comes to development I find it immensely better, and found that it has also made me much more confident when I poke around on servers - no context switching between my local environment and remote. The only thing I miss is Adobe lightroom, but I don't do so much photography these days so it's not a deal breaker
    - utxaa 6y ago
pxeboot 6y ago
> Really, most modern Linux distros are pretty god damn nice. This has been my experience recently as well. For laptops at least, as long as you buy a system with known good Linux support, the vast majority of the common complaints I see are not really valid. If you need macOS or Windows to run a specific application exclusive to that platform, great. If your software all runs on Linux, you can gain a lot of freedom and privacy for little effort these days.
- rrobukef 6y ago
  My last three laptops (3y/laptop) have been bought without consideration for Linux. All three worked splendidly.
- jamaicahest 6y ago
  > as long as you buy a system with known good Linux support And that is where the problem lies. With Windows I can buy pretty much any laptop and expect it to work with. With Linux I have a limited selection of laptops, if I want it to work fully. I'm a developer and I know my way around Linux pretty well, still I usually run into "missing drivers", "package management is broken", "hardware working mostly but not fully" when I try Ubuntu or Debian.
  - sammorrowdrums 6y ago
    I sympathize with this as I had a laptop with Nvidia Optimus and installed Linux on it back before it was really supported, which wasn't fun. However with Dell XPS Linux version, Lenovo has a couple, and also System76 and things you have now hundreds of laptops guaranteed to work and many more that actually still will. Just research them first if you're not sure. These days there is so much info on laptops that work well. The first class supported ones like XPS (which I'm on my second) get firmware updates etc. it gets easier and easier every year.
    - rbanffy 6y ago
      One of the best things of Linux support is that the more mundane the laptop is, the better supported it tends to be. And also cheaper. All I'm doing to have perfect Linux support in all my laptops is to go for the boring models. No RGB keyboard, no bleeding-edge dGPU's, and no dual, or foldable screens.
willhoyle 6y ago
+1 for Nord. I used it everywhere - terminal, vs code, browser theme, gtk theme
simonh 6y ago
In 2018 I ended up calling both Apple and Microsoft for phone support within a few months of each other and, to my surprise, got excellent support from both of them. The Apple issues turned out to require an NvRAM/SMC reset to fix a weird performance issue. The Apple support person was very polite, helpful and knowledgeable. The Microsoft issue was I’d bought a laptop which came with an Office trial, but wanted to enable Office using a license I bought through work. It required uninstalling the trial version, running a power shell command line tool to clean it up, then install the required SKU of Office. The MS rep was also very knowledgeable, logged on remotely with my permission and I watched the whole process. It took a while, but the engineer knew exactly what to do and did a great job. That was the first time I’d had phone support from Apple or Microsoft. I wasn’t too surprised at Apple, I’ve had great support from the stores before so that extending that to over the phone wasn’t too much of a stretch. I was pleasantly surprised at the speed and quality of the support from Microsoft though, I really couldn’t have asked for more. It’s just brain bindingly ridiculous that getting their software, that’s supposedly already on the blasted machine to actually work took such a torturous set of steps to perform. I suppose that’s all incidental to the thread, but anyway. The things that annoy me about Linux are the lack of system upgrade options, you basically have to reinstall from scratch every time, and the awkwardness of system backups. I’m spoiled by a Time Machine I suppose, it’s the thing I miss the most on Windows as well. [EDIT - Looks like I'm missing some options on keeping Linux up to date, thanks for the tips]
- wayneftw 6y ago
  > The things that annoy me about Linux are the lack of system upgrade options, you basically have to reinstall from scratch every time... Run a rolling release then like Manjaro or another Arch based system. I’ve been running the latest release of my distro for years, never had to reinstall. Also, there are plenty of free backup apps for Linux like Deja Dupe or Back-in-time. I don’t really bother with them though because all of my important stuff goes into git, even my dot files.
- f1refly 6y ago
  I'm not sure how high your requirement on the "it just werks" factor are, but I can not recommend borgbackup enough for general use. They have a script[0] for local backups one can copy-paste in a cronjob and it takes care of backups reliably from that day on. Saved me from my own stupidity more times than I'm comfortable admitting. [0] https://borgbackup.readthedocs.io/en/stable/deployment/automated-local.html https://borgbackup.readthedocs.io/en/stable/deployment/autom...
imtringued 6y ago
I use Nord in vim. I wasn't aware of the GTK theme. I'll check it out!
whatch 6y ago
> I have the same effective level of support which is to say none-at-all or via the community of volunteers. I find community support for linux much much better (askubuntu, superuser and numerous blogs rather than official ms forums). Not sure if this is because I am software developer and am used to stackoverflow-like kind of support or windows "community support" is a mess.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
  Official (free) support from Microsoft is pure garbage, but at least in my experience it is much easier to get support from the Windows community than Linux for a few reasons: 1) no ideological bullshit, 2) there aren't 100 different distros, 3) the way things are done doesn't change drastically every few years.
  - whatch 6y ago
    1) I agree, but it is quite easy to ignor. I do not see it often though. 2) Agree, but with popular distributions it is relatively easy to find help. With unpopular ones not so much, but you can always choose more common one. If you need to use some special distro experience can be worse. 3) Sorry, cannot disagree more. For me OS utilities in Ubuntu are dead simple and this works for me quite well. But once upon a time windows 10 decided that for some reason I must have 3 different English laouts (UK, US and Latin or smth like that). I did manage to remove redundant ones by performing some unobvious actions in unobvious settings sections. And extra layouts kept returning after reboots. I had other similarly annoying problems and they were difficult to resolve because solutions posted literally month before had completely different settings layout on screenshots compared to mine. In windows 10 settings do change drastically every few... months? Command-line-based interfaces seem more stable. And most common issues are already have accessible solutions if you use stable release of popular Linux distro. At least in my experience.
- bartread 6y ago
  I literally dread ever having to Google for help on Windows related issues because the various forums are some of the worst cesspools of crowdsourced ignorance out there[0]. Every question has a dozen or more responses and almost none of them have anything useful to say. Absolutely awful. I suspect the reason the quality of the community support for Linux is so much better is that the community is smaller, self-selecting, and generally more knowledgeable versus the majority of the Windows community. Up until recently it required a certain commitment to run Linux on the desktop and that still bleeds through. Normally when I buy a new computer I just get a Macbook Pro but, with Apple seeming a bit off the rails, and working from home making a desktop machine more viable again, I'm thinking about building my own machine. I'm also seriously considering Linux because Windows 10, I'm afraid, drives me to distraction most days (I have to use it for work unfortunately). [0] The StackExchange sites aren't quite as bad, but the other forums are absolutely grim.
tchelow 6y ago
Personally I'm not a fan of gnome, but If you have a MacOs background Its understandable to prefer it on top of other Desktop-Environments. Do not forget to give a try to other D.E's thou, its always good to check new stuff, I always find delightful stuff effortlessly (: For a long time I tried to make my Linux desktop look similar to my old windows machine, until recently I understood that I was compromising my productivity, so I started to look for new looks for my desktop, its like shopping at a free mall haha, I love it.
MeinBlutIstBlau 6y ago
Linux is an acceptable alternative. In reality, when you have to interact with the "real business world," you need windows.
fomine3 6y ago
> Making apps, or interacting with the OS, is absurdly easy using GTK and Python vs anything Microsoft or Apple have to offer. I strongly doubt Python+GTK is easier option compared to WinForms/WPF. Maybe installing IDE is blocker for you?
mekster 6y ago
Are you saying it's finally the year of Linux desktop? But I can't resist using macOS at this point and their hardware. I'd like to see someone run Linux on the new M1 hardware.

Osiris 6y ago

I'm using PopOS (with i3 instead of Gnome) on a System76 laptop. I have some serious issues with resume from sleep. All browsers and electron apps have significant rendering issues after I resume and I have to close them down and restart them. I was able to fix Chrome and Firefox by enabling Vulkan, but Slack still requires a restart after every resume. My external monitors periodically stop working due to an NVIDIA driver bug. Have you had any similar issues?

edgyquant 6y ago
Yeah outside of Lubuntu I’ve had bad luck with resuming sleep on laptops. My desktop doesn’t ever go to sleep (Nvidia 1660x) but that’s because over the years I’ve just had so much trouble. I’d still take Fedora or Ubuntu over Windows any day as that’s my only complaint. Then again I’ve been a Linux users since 2006 so to I’m amazed at how great driver support is now even compared to a few years ago.
leetrout 6y ago
I am using pop on an oryx and my external monitor doesn’t wake up from sleep. Most flat pack apps don’t work right - especially anything electron based. Zoom is a hot mess and fractional scaling still doesn’t work right. I just tried disabling the hidpi daemon in hopes my monitor wakes up correctly. We’ll see. All that said I am addicted to the speed of the OS compared to windows or Mac OS. I feel like I’m using the full power of the laptop. I’ve not tried plasma but I miss a lot of my Mac shortcuts like super + left or right going to the end of the line. Still don’t have that working. It’s so much better than it used to be but I would love to see one of the desktops reach the same level of polish as Mac or windows 10.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
lytigas 6y ago
It's possible the Chromium/Electron thing is this bug[1], which affects new proprietary nvidia drivers on recent Chromium versions. I also experienced that bug, though I don't think it affected Firefox for me. It resolved itself for me recently in all apps except Slack. I have no idea why. I'm fairly sure I didn't update anything. While it was still reproducing, I tested a purported fix in the upcoming Chromium 87 (or 88?) and it was resolved. So just wait a bit or try Canary. More specific info in the bug thread of course. [1] https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=1113040 https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=111304...
- pmontra 6y ago
  Yep. Only Slack ever had that problem for me. I reopen it again after every resume, when I have to work with my customers. I don't use Slack for anything else.
  - RMPR 6y ago
    I can't stand the electron client of Slack, so I use ripcord instead.
dav 6y ago
I have same problem. It’s 100% with Slack (and I suspected because Electron) but only occasional with Zoom and rarely with Firefox.
cluoma 6y ago
I think this is a common problem on Nvidia. Firefox used to crash for me all the time coming out of hibernate. You can try Nvidia's solution.[1] [1]: https://download.nvidia.com/XFree86/Linux-x86_64/455.38/README/powermanagement.html https://download.nvidia.com/XFree86/Linux-x86_64/455.38/READ...
wazoox 6y ago
I'm running Pop_OS on my IdeaPad and have very few problems. From time to time, the Wifi doesn't come back up after resume (particularly when I've let it in sleep overnight, or switches networks while sleeping) and I have to reboot. As the machine boots in less than 12 seconds that's a tolerable annoyance though. The machine is Ryzen5/Vega so it requires no proprietary driver though it isn't Linux certified at all. The only piece of non-working hardware is the fingerprint reader (apparently a driver will come someday...).
mcjiggerlog 6y ago
I have this exactly same problem - Chromium, Firefox, Electron - and it's apparently an unfixed bug in the nvidia drivers. For me it only started a few months ago. I'm on Ubuntu 20.10 and it's still a problem.

heavyset_go 6y ago

> Really, most modern Linux distros are pretty god damn nice. I agree, and what really sold me was Plasma Desktop, as someone that couldn't stand KDE 3 & 4. It used to be that GNOME was the desktop environment you could turn into a Windows or macOS clone, but it looks like that switched with GNOME 3 and KDE 5. I have Plasma Desktop set up[1] to take advantage of my macOS muscle memory when it comes to the GUI and keyboard short cuts, and I couldn't imagine going back. > Linux is rocking the desktop hard, if you haven't tried it in a few years or just maintain a Windows installation to play games-- seriously give it a try. It's wonderful. It's not just developers or power users that Linux shines for, either. I'm of the opinion that if ChromeOS would suit a person's needs, so would a polished distribution like Ubuntu along with a browser like Firefox or Chrome. Ubuntu has an app store-like interface to install Zoom, Slack, and other work apps. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23607374 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23607374

Accacin 6y ago
I finally got fed up with tweaking Arch/DWM and switched to Manjaro with KDE on my main machine, I went through all the versions of Manjaro and all had their problems and I finally settled on KDE. Looks good, allows me some tweaking, runs surprisingly light. Although, still some annoying bugs, the most annoying being when I open an application on my 1440p screen, KDE often opens it on my second monitor for no real reason.
- BRedSox 6y ago
  If you hare looking for a more arch experience again, check out endeavouros. Phil and the Manjaro group have increasingly proved their incompetence.
  - onlydeadheroes 6y ago
    There is funny business going on at manjaro, but by god do they deliver! I run 5 linux computers at home for various ends and I got tired of putting a new Ubuntu on them every now and then. At the time I looked at manjaro, other rolling distros couldn't even survive an update from the latest installation media to current (sidux). Arch is/was a hobby in itself and the opposite of what I was seeking, but it is an excellent foundation. Manjaro has kept these 5 machines for over 5 years through every possible update and it never broke them. Kernel switching is a joy. Driver installing switching is a joy. This is a very tall order. That said I do hope endeavouros or others can fill Manjaro's immense boots.

forgingahead 6y ago

+1 to this -- invested in a desktop earlier this year to tinker more with ML projects, and dual-booted Windows and Linux (Ubuntu 18 LTS) on separate SSDs with separate HDs for data storage for each system. I have spent 95% of my time in Linux, and only get into Windows for a game or two that I haven't bothered to figure out a Windows VM setup for. Definitely recommend Linux for those looking for dev machine alternatives to a Mac. There are certain finiticky things when setting up, and it doesn't have the immense MacOS polish, but I would say it's 80-90% of the way there to a good, intuitive dev machine that gives you a very similar experience to a Mac programming setup. Note, I'm referring to a desktop setup, no idea about how it works with laptop hardware and I have a MBP for my portable needs.

hanklazard 6y ago
re: linux laptops, I'm writing this from one of the new Lenovo Carbon X1 models that comes pre-installed with Ubuntu. I prefer pop!_os (except for the name) so I installed that when I first got the machine, and it's worked with no issues. I've had it for a few weeks and zero complaints. The fingerprint reader even works with linux, which wasn't the case on my previous gen CX1 laptops. Let me also just say that I am basically at the point where I may soon recommend a pop!_os machine to my parents (who are in their late 60's and have limited abilities on computers). Given that I'll personally be on the hook for any and all tech support, take that as a strong vote of confidence!
- mnahkies 6y ago
  I setup Debian on an old desktop for my mum a few years back, and she was able to use it happily with no issues or support from me - for the average person that just wants a web browser and some word processing it works great! When it comes to development I find it immensely better, and found that it has also made me much more confident when I poke around on servers - no context switching between my local environment and remote. The only thing I miss is Adobe lightroom, but I don't do so much photography these days so it's not a deal breaker
  - utxaa 6y ago

pxeboot 6y ago

> Really, most modern Linux distros are pretty god damn nice. This has been my experience recently as well. For laptops at least, as long as you buy a system with known good Linux support, the vast majority of the common complaints I see are not really valid. If you need macOS or Windows to run a specific application exclusive to that platform, great. If your software all runs on Linux, you can gain a lot of freedom and privacy for little effort these days.

rrobukef 6y ago
My last three laptops (3y/laptop) have been bought without consideration for Linux. All three worked splendidly.
jamaicahest 6y ago
> as long as you buy a system with known good Linux support And that is where the problem lies. With Windows I can buy pretty much any laptop and expect it to work with. With Linux I have a limited selection of laptops, if I want it to work fully. I'm a developer and I know my way around Linux pretty well, still I usually run into "missing drivers", "package management is broken", "hardware working mostly but not fully" when I try Ubuntu or Debian.
- sammorrowdrums 6y ago
  I sympathize with this as I had a laptop with Nvidia Optimus and installed Linux on it back before it was really supported, which wasn't fun. However with Dell XPS Linux version, Lenovo has a couple, and also System76 and things you have now hundreds of laptops guaranteed to work and many more that actually still will. Just research them first if you're not sure. These days there is so much info on laptops that work well. The first class supported ones like XPS (which I'm on my second) get firmware updates etc. it gets easier and easier every year.
  - rbanffy 6y ago
    One of the best things of Linux support is that the more mundane the laptop is, the better supported it tends to be. And also cheaper. All I'm doing to have perfect Linux support in all my laptops is to go for the boring models. No RGB keyboard, no bleeding-edge dGPU's, and no dual, or foldable screens.

willhoyle 6y ago

+1 for Nord. I used it everywhere - terminal, vs code, browser theme, gtk theme

simonh 6y ago

In 2018 I ended up calling both Apple and Microsoft for phone support within a few months of each other and, to my surprise, got excellent support from both of them. The Apple issues turned out to require an NvRAM/SMC reset to fix a weird performance issue. The Apple support person was very polite, helpful and knowledgeable. The Microsoft issue was I’d bought a laptop which came with an Office trial, but wanted to enable Office using a license I bought through work. It required uninstalling the trial version, running a power shell command line tool to clean it up, then install the required SKU of Office. The MS rep was also very knowledgeable, logged on remotely with my permission and I watched the whole process. It took a while, but the engineer knew exactly what to do and did a great job. That was the first time I’d had phone support from Apple or Microsoft. I wasn’t too surprised at Apple, I’ve had great support from the stores before so that extending that to over the phone wasn’t too much of a stretch. I was pleasantly surprised at the speed and quality of the support from Microsoft though, I really couldn’t have asked for more. It’s just brain bindingly ridiculous that getting their software, that’s supposedly already on the blasted machine to actually work took such a torturous set of steps to perform. I suppose that’s all incidental to the thread, but anyway. The things that annoy me about Linux are the lack of system upgrade options, you basically have to reinstall from scratch every time, and the awkwardness of system backups. I’m spoiled by a Time Machine I suppose, it’s the thing I miss the most on Windows as well. [EDIT - Looks like I'm missing some options on keeping Linux up to date, thanks for the tips]

wayneftw 6y ago
> The things that annoy me about Linux are the lack of system upgrade options, you basically have to reinstall from scratch every time... Run a rolling release then like Manjaro or another Arch based system. I’ve been running the latest release of my distro for years, never had to reinstall. Also, there are plenty of free backup apps for Linux like Deja Dupe or Back-in-time. I don’t really bother with them though because all of my important stuff goes into git, even my dot files.
f1refly 6y ago
I'm not sure how high your requirement on the "it just werks" factor are, but I can not recommend borgbackup enough for general use. They have a script[0] for local backups one can copy-paste in a cronjob and it takes care of backups reliably from that day on. Saved me from my own stupidity more times than I'm comfortable admitting. [0] https://borgbackup.readthedocs.io/en/stable/deployment/automated-local.html https://borgbackup.readthedocs.io/en/stable/deployment/autom...

imtringued 6y ago

I use Nord in vim. I wasn't aware of the GTK theme. I'll check it out!

whatch 6y ago

> I have the same effective level of support which is to say none-at-all or via the community of volunteers. I find community support for linux much much better (askubuntu, superuser and numerous blogs rather than official ms forums). Not sure if this is because I am software developer and am used to stackoverflow-like kind of support or windows "community support" is a mess.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
Official (free) support from Microsoft is pure garbage, but at least in my experience it is much easier to get support from the Windows community than Linux for a few reasons: 1) no ideological bullshit, 2) there aren't 100 different distros, 3) the way things are done doesn't change drastically every few years.
- whatch 6y ago
  1) I agree, but it is quite easy to ignor. I do not see it often though. 2) Agree, but with popular distributions it is relatively easy to find help. With unpopular ones not so much, but you can always choose more common one. If you need to use some special distro experience can be worse. 3) Sorry, cannot disagree more. For me OS utilities in Ubuntu are dead simple and this works for me quite well. But once upon a time windows 10 decided that for some reason I must have 3 different English laouts (UK, US and Latin or smth like that). I did manage to remove redundant ones by performing some unobvious actions in unobvious settings sections. And extra layouts kept returning after reboots. I had other similarly annoying problems and they were difficult to resolve because solutions posted literally month before had completely different settings layout on screenshots compared to mine. In windows 10 settings do change drastically every few... months? Command-line-based interfaces seem more stable. And most common issues are already have accessible solutions if you use stable release of popular Linux distro. At least in my experience.
bartread 6y ago
I literally dread ever having to Google for help on Windows related issues because the various forums are some of the worst cesspools of crowdsourced ignorance out there[0]. Every question has a dozen or more responses and almost none of them have anything useful to say. Absolutely awful. I suspect the reason the quality of the community support for Linux is so much better is that the community is smaller, self-selecting, and generally more knowledgeable versus the majority of the Windows community. Up until recently it required a certain commitment to run Linux on the desktop and that still bleeds through. Normally when I buy a new computer I just get a Macbook Pro but, with Apple seeming a bit off the rails, and working from home making a desktop machine more viable again, I'm thinking about building my own machine. I'm also seriously considering Linux because Windows 10, I'm afraid, drives me to distraction most days (I have to use it for work unfortunately). [0] The StackExchange sites aren't quite as bad, but the other forums are absolutely grim.

tchelow 6y ago

Personally I'm not a fan of gnome, but If you have a MacOs background Its understandable to prefer it on top of other Desktop-Environments. Do not forget to give a try to other D.E's thou, its always good to check new stuff, I always find delightful stuff effortlessly (: For a long time I tried to make my Linux desktop look similar to my old windows machine, until recently I understood that I was compromising my productivity, so I started to look for new looks for my desktop, its like shopping at a free mall haha, I love it.

MeinBlutIstBlau 6y ago

Linux is an acceptable alternative. In reality, when you have to interact with the "real business world," you need windows.

fomine3 6y ago

> Making apps, or interacting with the OS, is absurdly easy using GTK and Python vs anything Microsoft or Apple have to offer. I strongly doubt Python+GTK is easier option compared to WinForms/WPF. Maybe installing IDE is blocker for you?

mekster 6y ago

Are you saying it's finally the year of Linux desktop? But I can't resist using macOS at this point and their hardware. I'd like to see someone run Linux on the new M1 hardware.