4 ms·

> shocked that there isn't a strong third option for OSes Why when there is no third OS that has even 1% share and all Linux combined is about 3%. And desktop

by TwoBit 6y ago

> shocked that there isn't a strong third option for OSes Why when there is no third OS that has even 1% share and all Linux combined is about 3%. And desktop Linux is bad.

worik 6y ago
Why is desktop Linux bad? I use MacOS (whatever it is called this week) Mint and LXDE Love Mint (typing on it) The Apple OS has a lot of rough corners (e.g. (max/min)imising windows is a world of pain) LXDE is acceptable because it is on my PI and I do not use the desktop much I have not used Windows desktop for about a decade, has it really gotten that much better? I am really happy with desktop Linux
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
  > Why is desktop Linux bad? There are a huge range of reasons. There's no consistency, everything changes every 2 years, the documentation is awful when it exists at all, if software is outside your distro's package repo it's a bitch to install, there are too many different distros, the community is full of pricks, fragmentation is a time-honored pastime, complexity is fetishized... fuck sound still didn't work consistently on the last Linux based media center I built. A cursory search of the internet will turn up innumerable reasons Linux Desktop is bad. Which isn't to say that MacOS and Windows aren't bad (and getting worse), but they're still a damned sight better.
  - chmln 6y ago
    > There's no consistency Just a reminder there's like 7 different context menu styles in Windows 10, not to mention two control panels.
    - pdimitar 6y ago
      This only emphasizes how bad the Linux desktop experience can be. The devs of the Linux DE community could do better but chose to do gang turf wars. And as you say, Windows 10 still sits there having confusing and mediocre system UIs.
  - ori_b 6y ago
    > There's no consistency, everything changes every 2 years, the documentation is awful when it exists at all In the days of electron and web apps, it's clear that the users either don't care or developers are shooting themselves in the foot. In either case, consistency died a while ago.
    - Klonoar 6y ago
      Mmmm, I don't think this is fair when discussing Linux. If Electron didn't exist, there's a good chunk of apps that just wouldn't exist on Linux at all.
      - ori_b 6y ago
        Doesn't change the fact that if people valued consistency, those apps would be flops on all supported platforms.
        AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
        People value tools that do what they need to do over consistency, but that does not mean that they do not value consistency.
        ori_b 6y ago
        Not enough for them to win in the market, apparently.
  - fsflover 6y ago
    > There's no consistency, everything changes every 2 years It all depends on the distribution (hence "too many different distros" is good). Choose Debian XFCE and you will never see any change, everything is rock-solid. Tested with my relatives.
  - bigpeopleareold 6y ago
    It's a matter of perception and need in the end, I think. I am happy with XFCE, but then I don't do much with the desktop environment itself other than manipulating windows, having a nice panel on top and some key bindings. Occasionally, I use a file manager, but most of the time I am just in applications, so they are maximized. With my really simple needs, macOS and Windows is just mostly memory-wasting fluff to me. I switched away from Macs when I realized that what I need and what I can get is cheaper than getting a Mac. ("Cheaper" because I am very sensitive to cost vs. utility. I am typing on thinkpad t430s I found in the trash which I spent just a little to get a better screen, having everything else already that was missing.) That said, sometimes get frustrating, but they don't happen frequently for me.
- stjohnswarts 6y ago
  It's not bad, people get used to windows/macos and think that "everything needs to look the same". I've been perfectly content with Ubuntu and KDE for years now. I also use a windows and macos laptop for work and they're fine too. I just think people have built up these psychological blocks to anything outside their comfort zone and poo poo anything that isn't a clone of their favorite system.
- colmvp 6y ago
  While I loved using Ubuntu, I found it pretty darn frustrating that driver support could be wonky. I had to dig deep into the weeds to fix issues with my Wifi driver, and had it not been for amazing Linux users with similar computers that posted their remedies online, I would've been SOL. In contrast, in all my years of using Apple computers, I've rarely if ever had a driver related issues that wasn't easily solvable by updating my OS.
  - arbol 6y ago
    I had a MacBook 2014 at work and grew pretty quickly to love it after only ever using Windows. However, the updates turned a perfectly reasonable machine into a much slower one. I switched to Linux when I left the company and while I ran into issues installing it on both my PC and laptop (not Mac), the end result works perfectly. I think all the digging around has made me better understand computers. A lot of the Linux command line skills are transferable to Mac.
    - Toutouxc 6y ago
      I have a 2013 MacBook Pro with 4 gigs of RAM that I bought with Mavericks and updated it all the way up to Catalina. My GF is using it pretty happily now and it feels reasonably snappy, certainly not "much slower" than I remember it. (just my data point)
      - mixmastamyk 6y ago
        We have that one too, the keyboard is amazing. I saw the future and paid for 16gb though. Held off on big sur however.
- starky 6y ago
  Linux desktop lacks UI and UX consistency. A GTK and a Qt application look and operate completely differently, and even within those there is no consistency. Windows certainly isn't perfect in this regard either, but it is much rarer that I download a new Windows program and immediately notice how ugly and poorly laid out it is.
- Jemaclus 6y ago
  I'm not the person you responded to, but here are my thoughts... Keep in mind that the context of my original comment was with respect to having "premium" devices. People pay thousands of dollars for a Macbook because the hardware and the software feel very high-end. The UI/UX is generally seamless. Stuff "just works". There are regular updates. Any software written for MacOS will work on any other Mac, because the hardware/software integration is so tightly controlled. Is it perfect? No. Are there things Linux does better? Sure. But taking the entire Apple ecosystem into account, it feels cohesive and thoughtful, and it feels like it's worth the money. Contrast that with Linux. With many Linux distros, it doesn't "just work." The OS itself can change very often. The software ecosystem is fragmented. You have to use apt or yum or some other package manager. Sometimes you need five different package managers to install the software you want! On top of that, you can't necessarily run all Linux software on every distro or any hardware. There's little to no UX/UI consistency. As someone else pointed out, Qt vs GTK apps can and do look totally different and there are no style guides or any enforcement mechanisms to make sure that users enjoy the experience. It's the wild west, which is good in many ways, but in the context of making a device feel like a premium device, a wild west methodology fails that criteria pretty hard. In other words, Linux is fantastic for computer nerds like us who like tinkering with things and don't mind rolling up our sleeves and getting our hands dirty. But it is no way, shape, or form a "premium" experience.
- the__alchemist 6y ago
  I've been wanting to like Linux for a while. So much, I've spent a reasonable attempt at one distro or another every year. It's always had a range of hardware/software compatibility, or UI issues. Error messages, crashes, graphical anomalies, hardware kind-of working. There are often fixes, but how much time are you willing to spend trouble-shooting? When you get a new computer or reformat, will you remember what you had to do? I've experienced this class of issues on a range of hardware and software over 2 decades. My best guess: Too much design-by-committee, and losing track of emergent concepts - like responsiveness, how the overall ecosystem affects performance, and how the various parts (designed by different people and teams) work together. Another potential root cause: The way software dependencies and linking works, and the expectation to compile software on your machine.
Jemaclus 6y ago
I may not understand what you meant, but I think that was my question?

by TwoBit 6y ago

> shocked that there isn't a strong third option for OSes Why when there is no third OS that has even 1% share and all Linux combined is about 3%. And desktop Linux is bad.

worik 6y ago

Why is desktop Linux bad? I use MacOS (whatever it is called this week) Mint and LXDE Love Mint (typing on it) The Apple OS has a lot of rough corners (e.g. (max/min)imising windows is a world of pain) LXDE is acceptable because it is on my PI and I do not use the desktop much I have not used Windows desktop for about a decade, has it really gotten that much better? I am really happy with desktop Linux

AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
> Why is desktop Linux bad? There are a huge range of reasons. There's no consistency, everything changes every 2 years, the documentation is awful when it exists at all, if software is outside your distro's package repo it's a bitch to install, there are too many different distros, the community is full of pricks, fragmentation is a time-honored pastime, complexity is fetishized... fuck sound still didn't work consistently on the last Linux based media center I built. A cursory search of the internet will turn up innumerable reasons Linux Desktop is bad. Which isn't to say that MacOS and Windows aren't bad (and getting worse), but they're still a damned sight better.
- chmln 6y ago
  > There's no consistency Just a reminder there's like 7 different context menu styles in Windows 10, not to mention two control panels.
  - pdimitar 6y ago
    This only emphasizes how bad the Linux desktop experience can be. The devs of the Linux DE community could do better but chose to do gang turf wars. And as you say, Windows 10 still sits there having confusing and mediocre system UIs.
- ori_b 6y ago
  > There's no consistency, everything changes every 2 years, the documentation is awful when it exists at all In the days of electron and web apps, it's clear that the users either don't care or developers are shooting themselves in the foot. In either case, consistency died a while ago.
  - Klonoar 6y ago
    Mmmm, I don't think this is fair when discussing Linux. If Electron didn't exist, there's a good chunk of apps that just wouldn't exist on Linux at all.
    - ori_b 6y ago
      Doesn't change the fact that if people valued consistency, those apps would be flops on all supported platforms.
      - AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
        People value tools that do what they need to do over consistency, but that does not mean that they do not value consistency.
        ori_b 6y ago
        Not enough for them to win in the market, apparently.
- fsflover 6y ago
  > There's no consistency, everything changes every 2 years It all depends on the distribution (hence "too many different distros" is good). Choose Debian XFCE and you will never see any change, everything is rock-solid. Tested with my relatives.
- bigpeopleareold 6y ago
  It's a matter of perception and need in the end, I think. I am happy with XFCE, but then I don't do much with the desktop environment itself other than manipulating windows, having a nice panel on top and some key bindings. Occasionally, I use a file manager, but most of the time I am just in applications, so they are maximized. With my really simple needs, macOS and Windows is just mostly memory-wasting fluff to me. I switched away from Macs when I realized that what I need and what I can get is cheaper than getting a Mac. ("Cheaper" because I am very sensitive to cost vs. utility. I am typing on thinkpad t430s I found in the trash which I spent just a little to get a better screen, having everything else already that was missing.) That said, sometimes get frustrating, but they don't happen frequently for me.
stjohnswarts 6y ago
It's not bad, people get used to windows/macos and think that "everything needs to look the same". I've been perfectly content with Ubuntu and KDE for years now. I also use a windows and macos laptop for work and they're fine too. I just think people have built up these psychological blocks to anything outside their comfort zone and poo poo anything that isn't a clone of their favorite system.
colmvp 6y ago
While I loved using Ubuntu, I found it pretty darn frustrating that driver support could be wonky. I had to dig deep into the weeds to fix issues with my Wifi driver, and had it not been for amazing Linux users with similar computers that posted their remedies online, I would've been SOL. In contrast, in all my years of using Apple computers, I've rarely if ever had a driver related issues that wasn't easily solvable by updating my OS.
- arbol 6y ago
  I had a MacBook 2014 at work and grew pretty quickly to love it after only ever using Windows. However, the updates turned a perfectly reasonable machine into a much slower one. I switched to Linux when I left the company and while I ran into issues installing it on both my PC and laptop (not Mac), the end result works perfectly. I think all the digging around has made me better understand computers. A lot of the Linux command line skills are transferable to Mac.
  - Toutouxc 6y ago
    I have a 2013 MacBook Pro with 4 gigs of RAM that I bought with Mavericks and updated it all the way up to Catalina. My GF is using it pretty happily now and it feels reasonably snappy, certainly not "much slower" than I remember it. (just my data point)
    - mixmastamyk 6y ago
      We have that one too, the keyboard is amazing. I saw the future and paid for 16gb though. Held off on big sur however.
starky 6y ago
Linux desktop lacks UI and UX consistency. A GTK and a Qt application look and operate completely differently, and even within those there is no consistency. Windows certainly isn't perfect in this regard either, but it is much rarer that I download a new Windows program and immediately notice how ugly and poorly laid out it is.
Jemaclus 6y ago
I'm not the person you responded to, but here are my thoughts... Keep in mind that the context of my original comment was with respect to having "premium" devices. People pay thousands of dollars for a Macbook because the hardware and the software feel very high-end. The UI/UX is generally seamless. Stuff "just works". There are regular updates. Any software written for MacOS will work on any other Mac, because the hardware/software integration is so tightly controlled. Is it perfect? No. Are there things Linux does better? Sure. But taking the entire Apple ecosystem into account, it feels cohesive and thoughtful, and it feels like it's worth the money. Contrast that with Linux. With many Linux distros, it doesn't "just work." The OS itself can change very often. The software ecosystem is fragmented. You have to use apt or yum or some other package manager. Sometimes you need five different package managers to install the software you want! On top of that, you can't necessarily run all Linux software on every distro or any hardware. There's little to no UX/UI consistency. As someone else pointed out, Qt vs GTK apps can and do look totally different and there are no style guides or any enforcement mechanisms to make sure that users enjoy the experience. It's the wild west, which is good in many ways, but in the context of making a device feel like a premium device, a wild west methodology fails that criteria pretty hard. In other words, Linux is fantastic for computer nerds like us who like tinkering with things and don't mind rolling up our sleeves and getting our hands dirty. But it is no way, shape, or form a "premium" experience.
the__alchemist 6y ago
I've been wanting to like Linux for a while. So much, I've spent a reasonable attempt at one distro or another every year. It's always had a range of hardware/software compatibility, or UI issues. Error messages, crashes, graphical anomalies, hardware kind-of working. There are often fixes, but how much time are you willing to spend trouble-shooting? When you get a new computer or reformat, will you remember what you had to do? I've experienced this class of issues on a range of hardware and software over 2 decades. My best guess: Too much design-by-committee, and losing track of emergent concepts - like responsiveness, how the overall ecosystem affects performance, and how the various parts (designed by different people and teams) work together. Another potential root cause: The way software dependencies and linking works, and the expectation to compile software on your machine.

Jemaclus 6y ago

I may not understand what you meant, but I think that was my question?