8 ms·

Linux is Not Windows

86 points by lgv 15y ago

j_baker 15y ago
You know, to a certain extent, unfriendliness is what I like about Linux. I like "friendly" systems for browsing the web, email, and watching video. But for hacking, Linux simply can't be beat. I really don't see why Linux needs to be an OS for Joe Internet User. What's wrong with Linux being a server/development OS?
- Goladus 15y ago
  I like orthogonal, compose-able features. I like self-documenting configuration. I like grep. I like multiple desktops. I like managing my configuration using revision control (though the move towards using databases is making this a bit more difficult). I like the thorough and reliable documentation in man pages. I like transparency and the ability to read the source of most any aspect of the system. I like my distribution's massive package repository and the ability to provision entire systems with a few simple commands. I like not having to maintain a repository of license keys and original media to reinstall software in case my system ever crashes, or worry about some sort of online authentication.
  - huge_dong_420 15y ago
    Strangely, my grandmother isn't terribly concerned by these issues. Why are you listing open sourceness and man pages as a reason that Joe Average User should use Linux? Perhaps you need to reacquaint yourself with Joe.
    - jrockway 15y ago
      Here's why the average Joe should use Linux instead of Windows: it's $200 cheaper. If all you are going to do is connect to Wifi and run Chrome... guess what, you don't need a Windows license. After that, it's all details. Windows has spyware. Linux has apt-get. But users don't care.
      - danieldk 15y ago
        Here's why the average Joe should use Linux instead of Windows: it's $200 cheaper. Except that it's not true. We had Windows Vista Home Premium (IIRC) + Works refunded once from Dell, because Ubuntu was used. The refund was 80 Euro. In fact, they say it inflates the price of PCs barely, because the relatively small OEM Windows fee is compensated by installing tons of adware, browser bars, etc. from 3rd party vendors.
        wazoox 15y ago
        > the relatively small OEM Windows fee is compensated by installing tons of adware, browser bars, etc. from 3rd party vendors. Now that is user-friendly; you must spend the best part of a day removing nagwares and spywares from a brand new computer.
        eropple 15y ago
        It takes about twenty minutes on a Dell (which tend to be among the biggest purveyors of nagware). Forty minutes or so if you just saw screw-it and reinstall the OS, plus whatever time it takes for Windows Update to do it's thing. I get that you're a partisan, but can we not be completely hyperbolic?
        Goladus 15y ago
        I really like that when I install the evince pdf viewer, it doesn't try to install the Yahoo search bar browser plugin like Adobe Acrobat. I even use evince on windows.
        Goladus 15y ago
        Right, but you can extend that logic to other software, and in general the tradeoffs are very similar. Photoshop vs GIMP, MS Office vs Libreoffice, Scribus vs InDesign. It adds up after awhile. You don't have to switch to linux to take advantage of free software, but it's usually easier and regardless, many of the Linux issues raised in the original article apply to the FOSS alternatives as well.
    - Goladus 15y ago
      Open-sourceness isn't an unfriendly feature by any measure, and the features I list are useful whether on a server or a desktop, that's the point. Man pages might be the only thing in that list that can genuinely be considered unfriendly, and that's still highly subjective. In contrast, license keys and online software registration are inherently unfriendly features. No subjectivity is required. I didn't make that point explicit only because I didn't want to seem too confrontational, as j_baker's comment was clearly well-intentioned. > Perhaps you need to reacquaint yourself with Joe. I know lots of Windows users. They're each very different, but not stupid and frequently surprise condescending nerds with their capacity to figure things out. The most technophobic person I know, someone who uses their home computer ONLY to browse the web and check email (who probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference between windows XP and gnome) once ranted to me for several months about various productivity hits caused by their office's migration from a terminal-based mainframe system to windows NT workstations. Most windows and mac users I know are particularly proficient with several applications. Whether it's Photoshop or Excel or Matlab or Finale or Final Cut Pro or Revit or ProTools or LaTeX, using the software effectively typically requires a lot more technical knowledge than "Joe Average User" requires to browse the web and check his email. The original linked article covers this issue effectively in section #5, The myth of "user-friendly"
- eropple 15y ago
  It doesn't need to be "friendly," but if it's not going to be such, pushing it on normal people who don't know any better is probably a bad idea. That said, friendliness is not incompatible with "hacker-friendly."
  - j_baker 15y ago
    I agree on both counts. I find Ubuntu to be a good mix of hacker-friendliness and user-friendliness. What I'm getting at is that everyone seems to think Linux has to succeed on the desktop. Perhaps that was a good goal in the Windows XP days, but it's not as big a deal now. I don't see why Linux needs to be a mainstream OS.
- cbf 15y ago
  There is nothing wrong with a Linux distributions being focused on fulfilling server or development roles. That is not the role a Linux distribution like Ubuntu Desktop is attempting to fulfill however. Critiquing Gentoo or Arch or what not against the traditional desktop incumbents is unfair, Ubuntu Desktop, not so much.
- djd 15y ago
  The reason Linux seems to be un friendly is because windows takes care you as a baby,most of the time you are not in control and there is nothing much to worry. So if kids where exposed to Linux first this problem would not arise IMHO
  - eropple 15y ago
    Alternatively, Windows takes care of things that a normal person has no need to, but Linux forces you to do. It's like being forced to think about breathing.
    - rjbond3rd 15y ago
      I disagree. Windows is always interrupting me with things. Updates, virus scans, warnings, malware etc. whereas Linux stays in the background (for me).
      - eropple 15y ago
        I don't remember the last time I was prompted for, literally, any of that, with the exception of Windows Update--which is about as annoying as Ubuntu's nagging updater (that is, not very). But, then, I don't install crap. Most people do, but most people who do also don't care so much about whether they see those popups or not. It doesn't register to them. So, yes, there is an edge case here where you can install crap and then be offended by said crap's tendency to annoy you...but personally, I rarely see it.
        rjbond3rd 15y ago
        Really? You don't get told there's a new version of Java, Acrobat Reader, Flash, updates for whatever security suite, updates for other applications? You change the motherboard after it fails, now Windows needs to re-validate, then if you don't do that right away, Windows Security Essentials starts counting down to when it won't work anymore? And the Windows re-validation process fails for unknown reasons every time, so it keeps telling you "this copy isn't genuine" even though it's a 100% legit retail version (and prompts again each boot). Which I installed to get rid of the -crap- the hardware vendor installed. And then on top of that, the -only- stuff I installed was Java, Flash, Firefox and Reader. That's -it-. I don't even use Windows -- this is my wife's computer. Linux never bothers except for security updates. And in the last year, Windows got infected twice, requiring re-installs when MalwareBytes and AV could not disinfect (hence, perhaps, the validation problem). It takes more effort to keep the Windows machine going than the other 5 Linux boxes in the house (each running a different distro no less).
- wazoox 15y ago
  As the saying goes, "Unix is user-friendly. It just isn't promiscuous about which users it's friendly with." (Rob Pike IIRC). Yes, there is some elite, snob, warm fuzzing feeling about all this, and you know what? I'm elitist, and I think it's all right.
  - shadowfox 15y ago
    This is fairly ok. Except when the elites start ranting about the serfs not getting it :P
Goladus 15y ago
I'd be interested to see a more concise and less sarcastic modern summary of how Linux is Not Windows. This reads more like a rant at how windows people Just Don't Get It more than a genuine attempt to be helpful. edit: Here's an example of a more helpful style, comparing linux and BSD, and he even self-deprecatingly files it under rants: http://www.over-yonder.net/~fullermd/rants/bsd4linux/01 http://www.over-yonder.net/~fullermd/rants/bsd4linux/01
- chrisjsmith 15y ago
  Excellent - thanks for posting that. I ironically moved from FreeBSD to Debian about 10 years ago. Perhaps it's time for another look.
  - chrisjsmith 15y ago
    Replying to my own post. It still sucks for getting shit done.
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
karmafeeder 15y ago
Linux will win the desktop when everything moves to the browser. Programmers want only a good terminal and a good browser. Non-programmers want only a good browser. Linux has a best kernel and will win on that fact alone in the next ~20 years. Though likely, when Linux wins the desktop, no one will notice the difference.
- wvenable 15y ago
  Everything is moving to the browser but the browser now requires a lot of capabilities from the hardware and drivers: 3D acceleration, sound, printing, power management, etc. Effectively all the problem areas for Linux outside of custom hardware (like phones).
  - sorbus 15y ago
    I've never had problems with any of those on Linux. YMMV, of course, and I may just have been lucky. While you might have problems if you build a custom machine or use extremely recent hardware (which doesn't have good drivers), the general implication of browser-as-OS is that people wouldn't be installing this new system on old computers, but instead would buy new computers with it already baked in. Manufacturers, if they wanted to succeed, would be forced to make sure that all the drivers and the system in general worked well.
    - wvenable 15y ago
      I'm pretty sure this link was posted in response to this earlier link on HN: http://batsov.com/Linux/Windows/Rant/2011/06/11/linux-desktop-experience-killing-linux-on-the-desktop.html http://batsov.com/Linux/Windows/Rant/2011/06/11/linux-deskto... Which covers most/all of those things. Reasonably new and innovative hardware (like GPU switching in laptops) just doesn't work, period. There are plenty more examples. The browser makes Linux worse since the only thing you need from your underlying platform is really good driver and power management support.
      - sorbus 15y ago
drivebyacct2 15y ago
The problem that I continue to see is, people have this image of Linux and the "Linux Desktop". That image, that tons of "hacker" types that love OS X seem to have, hasn't changed in years and is extremely out of date. I hear people talk about problems or applications that haven't been standard linux fair for years now, but they haven't tried it and by-golly they're unbelievably attached to those memories they have of how hard it is to use. Aw, already with no explanation? That's fine. Let's play a game. Let's count the number of posts that make it seem completely obvious that Linux is "so wildly unusable". Then let's count the number of posts that actually describe any task that is vastly different or categorically harder to do in Linux. Let's see which count is greater. My phone works as a modem out of the box in Ubuntu. I can do internet connection sharing to my Xbox in less than 5 clicks (it required registry editing and manual editting of UNIX files in use in OS X), and I've yet to get my phone working as a modem in OS X, period.
- fleitz 15y ago
  Getting your phone to work as a modem is not a problem that most people have. Linux solves a whole host of problems that developers have very well, and does a very poor job of solving the problems that most people have. If you tally up a list of possible problems someone might encounter in their entire computing use Linux will definitely solve far more intuitively than Windows, however, when tally up a list of possible problems someone might have and multiply it by the frequency in which they have them the polishes on Windows and OS X to solve those problems are far better. Lets take for example what happens when I plug my projector into my laptop using Windows vs. Ubuntu, on Ubuntu nothing happens, on Windows it starts showing stuff on my projector (once in a while it doesn't and have I have to press Windows+P and move to the projector option, or unplug it and plug it back in again). By any standardized method of testing Linux will excel, when you put people in front of it it's obvious that it's inferior. Hell, my friend happens to have a Sony Xperia, I ask him why the GUI is so sluggish and get some answer about Sony charging his provider for updates, and them not having updates, and not wanting to root his phone, apparently the issue is fixed in some version of Android that he can't update to. When I hear this I think, that sounds like too much of a pain in the ass, I'll stick with my iPhone, when normal people hear this they think, Sony Xperias / Android are broken.
radioact1ve 15y ago
I think we can all agree Linux != Windows, but shit it's 2011. Somethings should just work.
- Dunbar 15y ago
  Who writes the drivers for this software that 'Just Works'? Over and over again I see commercial OS vendors implicitly credited for writing drivers that were actually supplied by the hardware manufacturers themselves. The vast majority of the general population find that their Windows and OS X machines 'Just Work' because they come preconfigured with all of the manufacturer's drivers already installed. Linux can't 'Just Work' in the Desktop space because: 1. It doesn't have majority market share (like Microsoft), so not all hardware manufacturers will make it a priority for their hardware to have good Linux drivers. 2. It doesn't control the hardware platform (like Apple), so it is likely that a significant proportion of users will have machines that have unsupported / badly supported hardware.
  - ugh 15y ago
    Tough luck. Life isn’t fair. Linux has to solve this problem, excuses be damned (and it has become quite good at solving this problem – most hardware just works).
  - adolfojp 15y ago
    That is true but also irrelevant. It places blame and provides an explanation but it doesn't change the result.
  - radioact1ve 15y ago
    Same excuses I've been reading since I first started using Linux around 2001.
- jrockway 15y ago
  What doesn't work for you?
  - radioact1ve 15y ago
afy 15y ago
The problems that the article addresses are not the ones that I would have chosen. I think the main problem that new users to Linux have is the steep learning curve. The author dismisses user friendliness with the implication that the only reason Linux is difficult to learn is because it is different. The analogy given is vi versus a standard Windows word processor. I am not disputing that vi is a much more powerful program, but I am saying that it is much harder to learn than Microsoft Word. Using Word, without knowing the keyboard shortcuts, you can use the toolbars to do what you want and in doing so you learn the shortcuts, most of which are printed next to the menu items. Using vi, without knowing any keyboard shortcuts, you can do exactly nothing. Arguably vi is much better off without toolbars because they take up a lot of screen real estate and would be difficult to implement from a terminal window, but that does not mean there is no such thing as user friendliness. Another problem is the problem of hardware support[1], which the author does not address at all. Having said that, I will agree with his point that since it doesn't really matter much to (with notable exceptions) most developers what features people not already using Linux would like to see, development is centred around people already using Linux and on more gentle slopes of the learning curve. 1. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2643671 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2643671
- cookiecaper 15y ago
  Is vi difficult to learn? I learned the basics immediately and was able to modify and save files and quit the editor (with or without saving) in pretty short order. I don't think it's difficult to learn, you just learn how to use it in a different way, and if you spend a lot of time editing plain text files, that makes a lot of sense. That's the author's point, I think: vi isn't less friendly just because it's written for a different class of people and used in a different way.
- gamble 15y ago
  Desktop Linux doesn't have a learning curve; it has a learning cliff. Linux cribs so much from other operating systems that it's reasonably familiar and easy to use when you first sit down, but the problems start when you need to go beyond using it as a dumb terminal: perhaps you need to set up a printer, or there's an issue with networking or power management. Now you're over the cliff. It can be a nightmare for a engineer like myself to fix problems, even though I've been using Linux since the mid-90s. An unsophisticated user would be finished. An anecdote: I'm mainly an OSX user now, but I bought an eeePC netbook a couple of years ago for travel and tried to install the then-current version of Ubuntu. This was literally one of the most popular laptops on the market, and Ubuntu installed without a functional network device. Getting it working was not easy, involving a couple of reinstallations. Even then, power management was nonfunctional and the netbook got half the battery life as it did under Windows. The real problem with desktop Linux isn't that it's hard to use or different; it's that the average user can expect to struggle with crippling bugs and hardware incompatibilities that are a nightmare to fix.
beloch 15y ago
The biggest problems preventing Linux from gaining mainstream market share have nothing do with the actual software. 1. MS and Apple are both fantastic marketers (although Apple has been doing better than MS as of late) and throw massive amounts of cash at promoting their OS's. Nobody is doing this for Linux. 2. The average customer is more inclined to trust something they saw plastic people hawking on TV than something that's free. People generally don't trust free stuff. If you're walking down the street and some random stranger offers you a sandwich, do you eat it? Most people wouldn't. 3. Inertia. Almost all computers come pre-loaded with an OS other than Linux. Most users will never install an OS on their computers themselves. Most of the stereotypes about Linux are totally false these days. The above problems need solutions that probably aren't coming anytime soon. I find it interesting that a loose amalgamation of volunteer open-source programmers can build such a professional-grade OS and then completely fail to market it. What Linux needs is for open-source marketing to catch up to open-source software.
- pistacchio 15y ago
  no, the biggest problem is that i never got the extra keys (eject, volume mute...) of my dell to work under linux, nor the second earplug output, and it pissed me off because i actually paid for them. also, the day i was like "you know what? i want to compose some music again, maybe i'll regain the interest" i was not able to find a semi-decent audio program for linux. this stands true for the day i was like "the new wacom bamboo tablet is so cool! i want it, who knows what i can do with that and photoshop". i installed windows back and in a day i had all my extra keys, the second plug, photoshop, cubase and my wacom working. i'm on a mac now, and they make the software for the hardware and the hardware for the software and i'm on the rich side of the market so adobe and wacom make software for my os of choice.
losethos 15y ago
LoseThos is not Linux :-) http://www.losethos.com http://www.losethos.com
acabal 15y ago
I'm guessing the X in title of this post is standing for "desktop", since that's what the other post on the front page today was referring to. But I think the problems in this article have nothing to do with the mainstream indifference towards Linux on the desktop. (And before I start, I should say I love Linux and have used it as my primary machine for years--and am still using it now.) I think the problems are: 1. The milestone-release system in most big distros. For Ubuntu, the biggest and supposedly most user-friendly distro, I'm expected to upgrade every 6 months. One could argue that if your system is working OK, then you can stick with one release forever--imagine still using 8.04 in 2011. But what if I want Firefox 4, or a new version of a single program? In Windows, you just go to the website and install, or sometimes the program auto-updates itself. On Ubuntu, I must update the entire system, even if I want just one program to update. That means when I update to Firefox 4, there's a chance my wifi will no longer work (happened to me in 9.04), or that hibernate won't work (happened to me in 11.04) or that my desktop environment will be shockingly different for no reason. All I wanted was Firefox--but to get it, I've got to swallow Unity and any other half-baked software the distro throws at me. My mom ranted at me for 15 minutes because I installed FF4 on her Windows machine and now her "Home" button was on the other side of the address bar and her address bar wasn't on top anymore. Can you imagine if she had been using Ubuntu, clicked "yes" to the upgrade prompt just to get it out of the way, and had been presented with Unity? She would have had a stroke. Yes, you can install PPA's and through various console voodoo upgrade only certain parts of the system, but not every program has a PPA and installing them is beyond a mere mortal's grasp. And, even if you decide to skip a 6-month upgrade, at some point you won't have a choice--security updates will stop coming. Good luck upgrading an Ubuntu system with 2 years of upgrades in a row--you're going to have to flatten and reinstall, again something beyond mere mortals. 2. Quality control--and this is tied in with #1. Again going with Ubuntu (but I think this applies to most other distros as well): every time I upgrade, I'm presented with a literal swamp of fresh bugs and regressions for things that used to work. I've been using the same laptop since 8.04, and with each upgrade something that used to work breaks, something that was broken before gets fixed, and I get new bugs to deal with. Sometimes hibernate doesn't work; sometimes wifi; sometimes the boot splash is corrupt; sometimes this, sometimes that. I know quality control is a hard thing to do considering it's all volunteer-powered and we're fighting against propriety lock-in; but there's just no excuse if you're trying to put Linux on the desktop. If Linux is to beat Windows, it has to be easy to update specific software without updating every damn thing and without regressions. Windows has, more or less, managed to do this. So far Linux hasn't, for whatever reason. Until they do, it'll be relegated to being an enthusiast's OS (and there's nothing wrong with that either).
UniIsland 15y ago
The LEGO argument may make people believe that linux is just a toy and not for production uses. Apart from that, it's quite simple and straight forward. BTW, we do have pre-built, highly customized distributions offered for those who likes things that work out of box.
coffeeaddicted 15y ago
Just some nitpicking: His d5w example ignores the fact that you have to count the words first. Without visual clue - and once you are finished counting you still have to type it in. While the inferior Ctrl-Shift-Right doesn't need any mental work, you just do the counting and selecting in one.
known 15y ago
Lame excuses. Why don't you give what users need?
- wazoox 15y ago
  If users need windows, so be it. My wife, my mother use Linux being hardly aware of it; it surfs the web, read emails and run OpenOffice, that covers 100% of their needs.
deadcyclo 15y ago
It's really interesting how the article reads as a reply to (most of) the comments here on hackernews and not the other way around. I have a feeling that a lot of people commenting here simply read the title and nothing more. Otherwise, why would you put forth an "argument" which is exactly one of the arguments discussed in the article as false? I'm probably going to get heat for posting this, but I feel it's kind of ironic. Normally HN gives me a good extension to the article in question: Other ideas, other points of view and expands on the article. Not so here...
bane 15y ago
Yes yes, Windows users just don't get "it". With "it" apparently a vast blackhole of time suck spent searching endless forums for conflicting advice for why basic hardware on random machine doesn't work right, or why xyz package failed to install or abc driver doesn't work right. No thanks, I still haven't figured out how to get the 3 days of my life back trying to share some files over my home network last year when I installed ubuntu on my old (but perfectly serviceable) computer in my latest attempt at using Linux. What didn't work out of the box? - Mouse (stock Dell USB mouse), never did fix that, tried 3 different mice, dug up an old PS/2 mouse and made do with that, probably some obscure usb issue, but the usb hard drives and keyboard I had connected worked from the beginning - NIC drivers (dunnah, some regular old built in 10/100 part on the mobo), took an entire day of my life to resolve, and it kept dropping connection requiring a reboot every 4-5 hours - Video drivers (nvidia something or other), never did work right - file sharing (I eventually got it to kinda work after hand editing a bunch of files and installing some older version of samba, really, what's the gui there for anyways?) - Stopped seeing one of the hard drives on the second day, a reinstall of ubuntu (and all the other crap I had to do) fixed that - X died for no apparent reason, reinstall again - it refused to sync properly with my perfectly cromulent monitor so I was doing all this at 640x480, which works brilliantly when half of the gui controls are off the screen, I was prepared not to care if I could just get the NIC working and remote in - after getting everything working (kinda, with gum and duct tape), ubuntu did some sort of update that blitzed the whole thing and I just gave up, I hadn't even really gotten to what I wanted to do with it. As much as I really tried to get it to work, and I try one of these about once every year or so since 1996 with whatever is the hot distro of the moment, and I had no illusions that it would be as straight forward as Windows or OS X, I did expect things like actually being able to use the computer enough to fire up a browser and search for solutions to minor configuration issues. Every issue I had was literally a major configuration issue. I spent those 3 days with my MBP sitting next to me so I could look up help in various forums. By comparison, I wiped the drive, installed Windows XP, most of it was spent waiting for the files to copy, I had a thumb drive with 4 drivers on it. After install I clicked setup.exe for each driver, rebooted a handful of times. Clicked each drive I wanted to share and set it to "share" and that system is still up and running...I think I've rebooted it 3 times since then. Total time spent? 90 minutes. So if "it" is wasting a bunch of my time for absolutely nothing in return? I can't think of any other area in my life where I would allow that kind of user experience. Imagine this was a car, and I had to rebuild the engine or the shifter nob or pedals or windshield or whatever just to drive it off the lot, and then I'd find out it wasn't compatible with every road I wanted to go on, unless I patched it with a different windshield, but when I did that the a/c stopped working. And the brake pedal would stop activating the brake system every 6 hours unless I turned the car off and restarted the engine. Bringing in my car for an oil change might make the doors or wheels stop working. I have pretty low expectations of technology. I don't expect things to "just work", but I do expect to have a couple pretty clear lines to resolve any issues, even if I have to get my hands dirty and change the spark plugs myself. So if this is "it", no thanks.
ChuckMcM 15y ago
I found the referenced article sort of jumped the shark as it were at the end there but basically makes some good points for would be Linux adapters. I've always felt that Linux's biggest challenge was a lack of a voice. Linus does a great job of being that voice for the kernel and the closest we come for user land is Canonical. An illustrative example of how that voice might feel to users, if you have a choice between Gnome (MacOS X inspired UI) or KDE (Windows inspired UI) then the set of utilities (calculator, IM client, explorer, etc) might (in a well voiced world) have one implementation and they would change their behavior depending on window system preference. Some do of course, but many don't and it confuses new users when they use the KDE version of a tool on Gnome or vice versa. The concept is that you need one person or group which is speaking toward how things will be done, so that consistency can be achieved across a large number of things. The concept seems somewhat antithetical to some members of the Linux and FOSS communities. Another area where a good leader / communicator would help out would be in things like audio and printing and wireless networks. These things are, to the perspective of someone coming to or trying Linux, horribly horribly broken. They "just work" on Windows or MacOS. Graphics and windows have gotten better in recent years but anything that drops into the 'modify your .Xdefaults file' or 'Xorg configuration' just mortifies someone who just wants to use the machine they don't want to become a 'nerd' just to do something useful. The 'edges' of Linux, especially in places where there are on-going personality of philosophical wars (like the Canonical/Gnome/KDE wars or the Wireless vendors vs the world wars) are really yucky places to have a problem. And there is the point that was made in the article that when you do have a problem you can't really find an answer sometimes. I wish there was the 'redhat for desktop' equivalent one could point those people at. Canonical is closer but having a staff that manages issues rather than a wiki/forums page would make it worth paying for in some circles.
dkarl 15y ago
All the Linux community wants is to create a really good, fully-featured, free operating system. If that results in Linux becoming a hugely popular OS, then that's great. If that results in Linux having the most intuitive, user-friendly interface ever created, then that's great. If that results in Linux becoming the basis of a multi-billion dollar industry, then that's great. It's great, but it's not the point. The point is to make Linux the best OS that the community is capable of making. Not for other people: For itself. The oh-so-common threats of "Linux will never take over the desktop unless it does such-and-such" are simply irrelevant: The Linux community isn't trying to take over the desktop. They really don't care if it gets good enough to make it onto your desktop, so long as it stays good enough to remain on theirs. The highly-vocal MS-haters, pro-Linux zealots, and money-making FOSS purveyors might be loud, but they're still minorities. I believe this still reflects the opinion of the Linux community, but there is a growing public consensus that is entirely opposite: the goal of Linux is to gain market share comparable or superior to the major commercial desktop operating systems, and since the current Linux community itself is a rounding error by comparison, the goals of Linux have nothing to do with the needs of its current users and everything to do with serving the people who so far want nothing to do with it. It seems to me Linux is in the early stages of acting out the cliché sitcom plot where the main character is sidetracked onto a quixotic mission to remake themselves as a popular kid, culminating in a humiliating realization that they aren't any closer to being popular than when they started, they've picked up vices without learning any virtues, they've alienated their friends, and worst of all, in the process of rejecting their identity they've rejected and abandoned their own good qualities. Linux should learn from what the cool kids do well, of course. It should learn to be friendly, approachable, well-groomed, and confident. I'm glad it's doing that. With GNOME, KDE, and Canonical, we have three big projects devoted to making the Linux desktop smooth, polished, and friendly. Linux and all its users are benefiting tremendously from that, just like I (a rather frumpy geek) benefit from periodic attention to upgrading and expanding my wardrobe. However, Linux needs to think just as much about its strengths, and we don't hear enough about that. Linux is a powerful system for sophisticated users. It's got a great command line. It's mostly open-source and has a great community. Linux has two major integrated desktop environments, and inside the integrated environment of your choice, or even from a niche window manager put together by a handful of people, you can run apps from another integrated environment. On one desktop I run KDE, and on my laptop I usually run Awesome. When I want to run a KDE app under Awesome, I just apt-get install it and run it. Isn't that amazing? Not to mention that Linux (like other open sources Unixes) runs on a range of hardware platforms that puts Windows and OSX to shame. When's the last time a Windows user needed to run an OS on a virtual ARM processor on an FPGA, looked in the FPGA manual, and discovered, "Oh good, it supports Windows, so I'll just install that and have a nice familiar environment?" Now, many people who have read this far will wish this was a different kind of forum where they could just quote the last paragraph followed by the picture of Ogre screaming "NERDS!!!!" and be done with it. However, it's ridiculous to dismiss Linux's strength, and in fact everybody's image of Linux is affected by those strengths. Anybody who cares enough about Linux to click to this page cares about its geeky awesomeness. If you truly dismiss those strengths from your mind and see Linux only as a desktop operating system for unsophisticated users, then Linux is just a pathetic third-place OS that only a mother or an open source zealot could love. That would be a tragic crisis of confidence. That's like when the kid who's great at music or math or poetry hits rock bottom and tells him or herself, "None of the things I'm good at matter. Nobody cares about them. Nobody sees me as a kid with this great ability. They judge me the same way they judge each other. They just see me as an ugly kid with mediocre social skills." Of course, that's when the learning starts, and by the end of the sitcom or the Saturday morning special, the kid learns that it's okay to be a little frumpy but her talent is something to treasure, and for her, two hours of doing her hair and applying makeup in the morning (which she hates) is not going to pay off as well as a couple of hours playing the cello or writing code or whatever it is that she really loves and is good at. Linux needs to skip the Saturday morning special trap of defining itself solely by its ability to cater to the mainstream. The Linux community needs to look at itself as users and say, "Damn, Linux rocks my socks off. How can we make it more awesome for us?" Not, "Well, I'm a weirdo, and real users are nothing like me, so it doesn't really matter that I like Linux. I guess from a normal user's perspective I can't think of anything that Linux is especially good at. How can the Linux community make Linux suck less for other people?" Not that the answers to those two questions are entirely disjoint. There's a lot of overlap between them. It's just that the first is an important perspective that is in danger of being lost as we concentrate more and more on the second.

86 points by lgv 15y ago

You know, to a certain extent, unfriendliness is what I like about Linux. I like "friendly" systems for browsing the web, email, and watching video. But for hacking, Linux simply can't be beat. I really don't see why Linux needs to be an OS for Joe Internet User. What's wrong with Linux being a server/development OS?

Goladus 15y ago
I like orthogonal, compose-able features. I like self-documenting configuration. I like grep. I like multiple desktops. I like managing my configuration using revision control (though the move towards using databases is making this a bit more difficult). I like the thorough and reliable documentation in man pages. I like transparency and the ability to read the source of most any aspect of the system. I like my distribution's massive package repository and the ability to provision entire systems with a few simple commands. I like not having to maintain a repository of license keys and original media to reinstall software in case my system ever crashes, or worry about some sort of online authentication.
- huge_dong_420 15y ago
  Strangely, my grandmother isn't terribly concerned by these issues. Why are you listing open sourceness and man pages as a reason that Joe Average User should use Linux? Perhaps you need to reacquaint yourself with Joe.
  - jrockway 15y ago
    Here's why the average Joe should use Linux instead of Windows: it's $200 cheaper. If all you are going to do is connect to Wifi and run Chrome... guess what, you don't need a Windows license. After that, it's all details. Windows has spyware. Linux has apt-get. But users don't care.
    - danieldk 15y ago
      Here's why the average Joe should use Linux instead of Windows: it's $200 cheaper. Except that it's not true. We had Windows Vista Home Premium (IIRC) + Works refunded once from Dell, because Ubuntu was used. The refund was 80 Euro. In fact, they say it inflates the price of PCs barely, because the relatively small OEM Windows fee is compensated by installing tons of adware, browser bars, etc. from 3rd party vendors.
      - wazoox 15y ago
        > the relatively small OEM Windows fee is compensated by installing tons of adware, browser bars, etc. from 3rd party vendors. Now that is user-friendly; you must spend the best part of a day removing nagwares and spywares from a brand new computer.
        eropple 15y ago
        It takes about twenty minutes on a Dell (which tend to be among the biggest purveyors of nagware). Forty minutes or so if you just saw screw-it and reinstall the OS, plus whatever time it takes for Windows Update to do it's thing. I get that you're a partisan, but can we not be completely hyperbolic?
        Goladus 15y ago
        I really like that when I install the evince pdf viewer, it doesn't try to install the Yahoo search bar browser plugin like Adobe Acrobat. I even use evince on windows.
      - Goladus 15y ago
        Right, but you can extend that logic to other software, and in general the tradeoffs are very similar. Photoshop vs GIMP, MS Office vs Libreoffice, Scribus vs InDesign. It adds up after awhile. You don't have to switch to linux to take advantage of free software, but it's usually easier and regardless, many of the Linux issues raised in the original article apply to the FOSS alternatives as well.
  - Goladus 15y ago
    Open-sourceness isn't an unfriendly feature by any measure, and the features I list are useful whether on a server or a desktop, that's the point. Man pages might be the only thing in that list that can genuinely be considered unfriendly, and that's still highly subjective. In contrast, license keys and online software registration are inherently unfriendly features. No subjectivity is required. I didn't make that point explicit only because I didn't want to seem too confrontational, as j_baker's comment was clearly well-intentioned. > Perhaps you need to reacquaint yourself with Joe. I know lots of Windows users. They're each very different, but not stupid and frequently surprise condescending nerds with their capacity to figure things out. The most technophobic person I know, someone who uses their home computer ONLY to browse the web and check email (who probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference between windows XP and gnome) once ranted to me for several months about various productivity hits caused by their office's migration from a terminal-based mainframe system to windows NT workstations. Most windows and mac users I know are particularly proficient with several applications. Whether it's Photoshop or Excel or Matlab or Finale or Final Cut Pro or Revit or ProTools or LaTeX, using the software effectively typically requires a lot more technical knowledge than "Joe Average User" requires to browse the web and check his email. The original linked article covers this issue effectively in section #5, The myth of "user-friendly"
eropple 15y ago
It doesn't need to be "friendly," but if it's not going to be such, pushing it on normal people who don't know any better is probably a bad idea. That said, friendliness is not incompatible with "hacker-friendly."
- j_baker 15y ago
  I agree on both counts. I find Ubuntu to be a good mix of hacker-friendliness and user-friendliness. What I'm getting at is that everyone seems to think Linux has to succeed on the desktop. Perhaps that was a good goal in the Windows XP days, but it's not as big a deal now. I don't see why Linux needs to be a mainstream OS.
cbf 15y ago
There is nothing wrong with a Linux distributions being focused on fulfilling server or development roles. That is not the role a Linux distribution like Ubuntu Desktop is attempting to fulfill however. Critiquing Gentoo or Arch or what not against the traditional desktop incumbents is unfair, Ubuntu Desktop, not so much.
djd 15y ago
The reason Linux seems to be un friendly is because windows takes care you as a baby,most of the time you are not in control and there is nothing much to worry. So if kids where exposed to Linux first this problem would not arise IMHO
- eropple 15y ago
  Alternatively, Windows takes care of things that a normal person has no need to, but Linux forces you to do. It's like being forced to think about breathing.
  - rjbond3rd 15y ago
    I disagree. Windows is always interrupting me with things. Updates, virus scans, warnings, malware etc. whereas Linux stays in the background (for me).
    - eropple 15y ago
      I don't remember the last time I was prompted for, literally, any of that, with the exception of Windows Update--which is about as annoying as Ubuntu's nagging updater (that is, not very). But, then, I don't install crap. Most people do, but most people who do also don't care so much about whether they see those popups or not. It doesn't register to them. So, yes, there is an edge case here where you can install crap and then be offended by said crap's tendency to annoy you...but personally, I rarely see it.
      - rjbond3rd 15y ago
        Really? You don't get told there's a new version of Java, Acrobat Reader, Flash, updates for whatever security suite, updates for other applications? You change the motherboard after it fails, now Windows needs to re-validate, then if you don't do that right away, Windows Security Essentials starts counting down to when it won't work anymore? And the Windows re-validation process fails for unknown reasons every time, so it keeps telling you "this copy isn't genuine" even though it's a 100% legit retail version (and prompts again each boot). Which I installed to get rid of the -crap- the hardware vendor installed. And then on top of that, the -only- stuff I installed was Java, Flash, Firefox and Reader. That's -it-. I don't even use Windows -- this is my wife's computer. Linux never bothers except for security updates. And in the last year, Windows got infected twice, requiring re-installs when MalwareBytes and AV could not disinfect (hence, perhaps, the validation problem). It takes more effort to keep the Windows machine going than the other 5 Linux boxes in the house (each running a different distro no less).
wazoox 15y ago
As the saying goes, "Unix is user-friendly. It just isn't promiscuous about which users it's friendly with." (Rob Pike IIRC). Yes, there is some elite, snob, warm fuzzing feeling about all this, and you know what? I'm elitist, and I think it's all right.
- shadowfox 15y ago
  This is fairly ok. Except when the elites start ranting about the serfs not getting it :P

Goladus 15y ago

I'd be interested to see a more concise and less sarcastic modern summary of how Linux is Not Windows. This reads more like a rant at how windows people Just Don't Get It more than a genuine attempt to be helpful. edit: Here's an example of a more helpful style, comparing linux and BSD, and he even self-deprecatingly files it under rants: http://www.over-yonder.net/~fullermd/rants/bsd4linux/01 http://www.over-yonder.net/~fullermd/rants/bsd4linux/01

chrisjsmith 15y ago
Excellent - thanks for posting that. I ironically moved from FreeBSD to Debian about 10 years ago. Perhaps it's time for another look.
- chrisjsmith 15y ago
  Replying to my own post. It still sucks for getting shit done.

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

karmafeeder 15y ago

Linux will win the desktop when everything moves to the browser. Programmers want only a good terminal and a good browser. Non-programmers want only a good browser. Linux has a best kernel and will win on that fact alone in the next ~20 years. Though likely, when Linux wins the desktop, no one will notice the difference.

wvenable 15y ago
Everything is moving to the browser but the browser now requires a lot of capabilities from the hardware and drivers: 3D acceleration, sound, printing, power management, etc. Effectively all the problem areas for Linux outside of custom hardware (like phones).
- sorbus 15y ago
  I've never had problems with any of those on Linux. YMMV, of course, and I may just have been lucky. While you might have problems if you build a custom machine or use extremely recent hardware (which doesn't have good drivers), the general implication of browser-as-OS is that people wouldn't be installing this new system on old computers, but instead would buy new computers with it already baked in. Manufacturers, if they wanted to succeed, would be forced to make sure that all the drivers and the system in general worked well.
  - wvenable 15y ago
    I'm pretty sure this link was posted in response to this earlier link on HN: http://batsov.com/Linux/Windows/Rant/2011/06/11/linux-desktop-experience-killing-linux-on-the-desktop.html http://batsov.com/Linux/Windows/Rant/2011/06/11/linux-deskto... Which covers most/all of those things. Reasonably new and innovative hardware (like GPU switching in laptops) just doesn't work, period. There are plenty more examples. The browser makes Linux worse since the only thing you need from your underlying platform is really good driver and power management support.
    - sorbus 15y ago

drivebyacct2 15y ago

The problem that I continue to see is, people have this image of Linux and the "Linux Desktop". That image, that tons of "hacker" types that love OS X seem to have, hasn't changed in years and is extremely out of date. I hear people talk about problems or applications that haven't been standard linux fair for years now, but they haven't tried it and by-golly they're unbelievably attached to those memories they have of how hard it is to use. Aw, already with no explanation? That's fine. Let's play a game. Let's count the number of posts that make it seem completely obvious that Linux is "so wildly unusable". Then let's count the number of posts that actually describe any task that is vastly different or categorically harder to do in Linux. Let's see which count is greater. My phone works as a modem out of the box in Ubuntu. I can do internet connection sharing to my Xbox in less than 5 clicks (it required registry editing and manual editting of UNIX files in use in OS X), and I've yet to get my phone working as a modem in OS X, period.

fleitz 15y ago
Getting your phone to work as a modem is not a problem that most people have. Linux solves a whole host of problems that developers have very well, and does a very poor job of solving the problems that most people have. If you tally up a list of possible problems someone might encounter in their entire computing use Linux will definitely solve far more intuitively than Windows, however, when tally up a list of possible problems someone might have and multiply it by the frequency in which they have them the polishes on Windows and OS X to solve those problems are far better. Lets take for example what happens when I plug my projector into my laptop using Windows vs. Ubuntu, on Ubuntu nothing happens, on Windows it starts showing stuff on my projector (once in a while it doesn't and have I have to press Windows+P and move to the projector option, or unplug it and plug it back in again). By any standardized method of testing Linux will excel, when you put people in front of it it's obvious that it's inferior. Hell, my friend happens to have a Sony Xperia, I ask him why the GUI is so sluggish and get some answer about Sony charging his provider for updates, and them not having updates, and not wanting to root his phone, apparently the issue is fixed in some version of Android that he can't update to. When I hear this I think, that sounds like too much of a pain in the ass, I'll stick with my iPhone, when normal people hear this they think, Sony Xperias / Android are broken.

radioact1ve 15y ago

I think we can all agree Linux != Windows, but shit it's 2011. Somethings should just work.

Dunbar 15y ago
Who writes the drivers for this software that 'Just Works'? Over and over again I see commercial OS vendors implicitly credited for writing drivers that were actually supplied by the hardware manufacturers themselves. The vast majority of the general population find that their Windows and OS X machines 'Just Work' because they come preconfigured with all of the manufacturer's drivers already installed. Linux can't 'Just Work' in the Desktop space because: 1. It doesn't have majority market share (like Microsoft), so not all hardware manufacturers will make it a priority for their hardware to have good Linux drivers. 2. It doesn't control the hardware platform (like Apple), so it is likely that a significant proportion of users will have machines that have unsupported / badly supported hardware.
- ugh 15y ago
  Tough luck. Life isn’t fair. Linux has to solve this problem, excuses be damned (and it has become quite good at solving this problem – most hardware just works).
- adolfojp 15y ago
  That is true but also irrelevant. It places blame and provides an explanation but it doesn't change the result.
- radioact1ve 15y ago
  Same excuses I've been reading since I first started using Linux around 2001.
jrockway 15y ago
What doesn't work for you?
- radioact1ve 15y ago

afy 15y ago

The problems that the article addresses are not the ones that I would have chosen. I think the main problem that new users to Linux have is the steep learning curve. The author dismisses user friendliness with the implication that the only reason Linux is difficult to learn is because it is different. The analogy given is vi versus a standard Windows word processor. I am not disputing that vi is a much more powerful program, but I am saying that it is much harder to learn than Microsoft Word. Using Word, without knowing the keyboard shortcuts, you can use the toolbars to do what you want and in doing so you learn the shortcuts, most of which are printed next to the menu items. Using vi, without knowing any keyboard shortcuts, you can do exactly nothing. Arguably vi is much better off without toolbars because they take up a lot of screen real estate and would be difficult to implement from a terminal window, but that does not mean there is no such thing as user friendliness. Another problem is the problem of hardware support[1], which the author does not address at all. Having said that, I will agree with his point that since it doesn't really matter much to (with notable exceptions) most developers what features people not already using Linux would like to see, development is centred around people already using Linux and on more gentle slopes of the learning curve. 1. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2643671 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2643671

cookiecaper 15y ago
Is vi difficult to learn? I learned the basics immediately and was able to modify and save files and quit the editor (with or without saving) in pretty short order. I don't think it's difficult to learn, you just learn how to use it in a different way, and if you spend a lot of time editing plain text files, that makes a lot of sense. That's the author's point, I think: vi isn't less friendly just because it's written for a different class of people and used in a different way.
gamble 15y ago
Desktop Linux doesn't have a learning curve; it has a learning cliff. Linux cribs so much from other operating systems that it's reasonably familiar and easy to use when you first sit down, but the problems start when you need to go beyond using it as a dumb terminal: perhaps you need to set up a printer, or there's an issue with networking or power management. Now you're over the cliff. It can be a nightmare for a engineer like myself to fix problems, even though I've been using Linux since the mid-90s. An unsophisticated user would be finished. An anecdote: I'm mainly an OSX user now, but I bought an eeePC netbook a couple of years ago for travel and tried to install the then-current version of Ubuntu. This was literally one of the most popular laptops on the market, and Ubuntu installed without a functional network device. Getting it working was not easy, involving a couple of reinstallations. Even then, power management was nonfunctional and the netbook got half the battery life as it did under Windows. The real problem with desktop Linux isn't that it's hard to use or different; it's that the average user can expect to struggle with crippling bugs and hardware incompatibilities that are a nightmare to fix.

beloch 15y ago

The biggest problems preventing Linux from gaining mainstream market share have nothing do with the actual software. 1. MS and Apple are both fantastic marketers (although Apple has been doing better than MS as of late) and throw massive amounts of cash at promoting their OS's. Nobody is doing this for Linux. 2. The average customer is more inclined to trust something they saw plastic people hawking on TV than something that's free. People generally don't trust free stuff. If you're walking down the street and some random stranger offers you a sandwich, do you eat it? Most people wouldn't. 3. Inertia. Almost all computers come pre-loaded with an OS other than Linux. Most users will never install an OS on their computers themselves. Most of the stereotypes about Linux are totally false these days. The above problems need solutions that probably aren't coming anytime soon. I find it interesting that a loose amalgamation of volunteer open-source programmers can build such a professional-grade OS and then completely fail to market it. What Linux needs is for open-source marketing to catch up to open-source software.

pistacchio 15y ago
no, the biggest problem is that i never got the extra keys (eject, volume mute...) of my dell to work under linux, nor the second earplug output, and it pissed me off because i actually paid for them. also, the day i was like "you know what? i want to compose some music again, maybe i'll regain the interest" i was not able to find a semi-decent audio program for linux. this stands true for the day i was like "the new wacom bamboo tablet is so cool! i want it, who knows what i can do with that and photoshop". i installed windows back and in a day i had all my extra keys, the second plug, photoshop, cubase and my wacom working. i'm on a mac now, and they make the software for the hardware and the hardware for the software and i'm on the rich side of the market so adobe and wacom make software for my os of choice.

losethos 15y ago

LoseThos is not Linux :-) http://www.losethos.com http://www.losethos.com

acabal 15y ago

I'm guessing the X in title of this post is standing for "desktop", since that's what the other post on the front page today was referring to. But I think the problems in this article have nothing to do with the mainstream indifference towards Linux on the desktop. (And before I start, I should say I love Linux and have used it as my primary machine for years--and am still using it now.) I think the problems are: 1. The milestone-release system in most big distros. For Ubuntu, the biggest and supposedly most user-friendly distro, I'm expected to upgrade every 6 months. One could argue that if your system is working OK, then you can stick with one release forever--imagine still using 8.04 in 2011. But what if I want Firefox 4, or a new version of a single program? In Windows, you just go to the website and install, or sometimes the program auto-updates itself. On Ubuntu, I must update the entire system, even if I want just one program to update. That means when I update to Firefox 4, there's a chance my wifi will no longer work (happened to me in 9.04), or that hibernate won't work (happened to me in 11.04) or that my desktop environment will be shockingly different for no reason. All I wanted was Firefox--but to get it, I've got to swallow Unity and any other half-baked software the distro throws at me. My mom ranted at me for 15 minutes because I installed FF4 on her Windows machine and now her "Home" button was on the other side of the address bar and her address bar wasn't on top anymore. Can you imagine if she had been using Ubuntu, clicked "yes" to the upgrade prompt just to get it out of the way, and had been presented with Unity? She would have had a stroke. Yes, you can install PPA's and through various console voodoo upgrade only certain parts of the system, but not every program has a PPA and installing them is beyond a mere mortal's grasp. And, even if you decide to skip a 6-month upgrade, at some point you won't have a choice--security updates will stop coming. Good luck upgrading an Ubuntu system with 2 years of upgrades in a row--you're going to have to flatten and reinstall, again something beyond mere mortals. 2. Quality control--and this is tied in with #1. Again going with Ubuntu (but I think this applies to most other distros as well): every time I upgrade, I'm presented with a literal swamp of fresh bugs and regressions for things that used to work. I've been using the same laptop since 8.04, and with each upgrade something that used to work breaks, something that was broken before gets fixed, and I get new bugs to deal with. Sometimes hibernate doesn't work; sometimes wifi; sometimes the boot splash is corrupt; sometimes this, sometimes that. I know quality control is a hard thing to do considering it's all volunteer-powered and we're fighting against propriety lock-in; but there's just no excuse if you're trying to put Linux on the desktop. If Linux is to beat Windows, it has to be easy to update specific software without updating every damn thing and without regressions. Windows has, more or less, managed to do this. So far Linux hasn't, for whatever reason. Until they do, it'll be relegated to being an enthusiast's OS (and there's nothing wrong with that either).

UniIsland 15y ago

The LEGO argument may make people believe that linux is just a toy and not for production uses. Apart from that, it's quite simple and straight forward. BTW, we do have pre-built, highly customized distributions offered for those who likes things that work out of box.

coffeeaddicted 15y ago

Just some nitpicking: His d5w example ignores the fact that you have to count the words first. Without visual clue - and once you are finished counting you still have to type it in. While the inferior Ctrl-Shift-Right doesn't need any mental work, you just do the counting and selecting in one.

known 15y ago

Lame excuses. Why don't you give what users need?

wazoox 15y ago
If users need windows, so be it. My wife, my mother use Linux being hardly aware of it; it surfs the web, read emails and run OpenOffice, that covers 100% of their needs.

deadcyclo 15y ago

It's really interesting how the article reads as a reply to (most of) the comments here on hackernews and not the other way around. I have a feeling that a lot of people commenting here simply read the title and nothing more. Otherwise, why would you put forth an "argument" which is exactly one of the arguments discussed in the article as false? I'm probably going to get heat for posting this, but I feel it's kind of ironic. Normally HN gives me a good extension to the article in question: Other ideas, other points of view and expands on the article. Not so here...

bane 15y ago

Yes yes, Windows users just don't get "it". With "it" apparently a vast blackhole of time suck spent searching endless forums for conflicting advice for why basic hardware on random machine doesn't work right, or why xyz package failed to install or abc driver doesn't work right. No thanks, I still haven't figured out how to get the 3 days of my life back trying to share some files over my home network last year when I installed ubuntu on my old (but perfectly serviceable) computer in my latest attempt at using Linux. What didn't work out of the box? - Mouse (stock Dell USB mouse), never did fix that, tried 3 different mice, dug up an old PS/2 mouse and made do with that, probably some obscure usb issue, but the usb hard drives and keyboard I had connected worked from the beginning - NIC drivers (dunnah, some regular old built in 10/100 part on the mobo), took an entire day of my life to resolve, and it kept dropping connection requiring a reboot every 4-5 hours - Video drivers (nvidia something or other), never did work right - file sharing (I eventually got it to kinda work after hand editing a bunch of files and installing some older version of samba, really, what's the gui there for anyways?) - Stopped seeing one of the hard drives on the second day, a reinstall of ubuntu (and all the other crap I had to do) fixed that - X died for no apparent reason, reinstall again - it refused to sync properly with my perfectly cromulent monitor so I was doing all this at 640x480, which works brilliantly when half of the gui controls are off the screen, I was prepared not to care if I could just get the NIC working and remote in - after getting everything working (kinda, with gum and duct tape), ubuntu did some sort of update that blitzed the whole thing and I just gave up, I hadn't even really gotten to what I wanted to do with it. As much as I really tried to get it to work, and I try one of these about once every year or so since 1996 with whatever is the hot distro of the moment, and I had no illusions that it would be as straight forward as Windows or OS X, I did expect things like actually being able to use the computer enough to fire up a browser and search for solutions to minor configuration issues. Every issue I had was literally a major configuration issue. I spent those 3 days with my MBP sitting next to me so I could look up help in various forums. By comparison, I wiped the drive, installed Windows XP, most of it was spent waiting for the files to copy, I had a thumb drive with 4 drivers on it. After install I clicked setup.exe for each driver, rebooted a handful of times. Clicked each drive I wanted to share and set it to "share" and that system is still up and running...I think I've rebooted it 3 times since then. Total time spent? 90 minutes. So if "it" is wasting a bunch of my time for absolutely nothing in return? I can't think of any other area in my life where I would allow that kind of user experience. Imagine this was a car, and I had to rebuild the engine or the shifter nob or pedals or windshield or whatever just to drive it off the lot, and then I'd find out it wasn't compatible with every road I wanted to go on, unless I patched it with a different windshield, but when I did that the a/c stopped working. And the brake pedal would stop activating the brake system every 6 hours unless I turned the car off and restarted the engine. Bringing in my car for an oil change might make the doors or wheels stop working. I have pretty low expectations of technology. I don't expect things to "just work", but I do expect to have a couple pretty clear lines to resolve any issues, even if I have to get my hands dirty and change the spark plugs myself. So if this is "it", no thanks.

ChuckMcM 15y ago

I found the referenced article sort of jumped the shark as it were at the end there but basically makes some good points for would be Linux adapters. I've always felt that Linux's biggest challenge was a lack of a voice. Linus does a great job of being that voice for the kernel and the closest we come for user land is Canonical. An illustrative example of how that voice might feel to users, if you have a choice between Gnome (MacOS X inspired UI) or KDE (Windows inspired UI) then the set of utilities (calculator, IM client, explorer, etc) might (in a well voiced world) have one implementation and they would change their behavior depending on window system preference. Some do of course, but many don't and it confuses new users when they use the KDE version of a tool on Gnome or vice versa. The concept is that you need one person or group which is speaking toward how things will be done, so that consistency can be achieved across a large number of things. The concept seems somewhat antithetical to some members of the Linux and FOSS communities. Another area where a good leader / communicator would help out would be in things like audio and printing and wireless networks. These things are, to the perspective of someone coming to or trying Linux, horribly horribly broken. They "just work" on Windows or MacOS. Graphics and windows have gotten better in recent years but anything that drops into the 'modify your .Xdefaults file' or 'Xorg configuration' just mortifies someone who just wants to use the machine they don't want to become a 'nerd' just to do something useful. The 'edges' of Linux, especially in places where there are on-going personality of philosophical wars (like the Canonical/Gnome/KDE wars or the Wireless vendors vs the world wars) are really yucky places to have a problem. And there is the point that was made in the article that when you do have a problem you can't really find an answer sometimes. I wish there was the 'redhat for desktop' equivalent one could point those people at. Canonical is closer but having a staff that manages issues rather than a wiki/forums page would make it worth paying for in some circles.

dkarl 15y ago

All the Linux community wants is to create a really good, fully-featured, free operating system. If that results in Linux becoming a hugely popular OS, then that's great. If that results in Linux having the most intuitive, user-friendly interface ever created, then that's great. If that results in Linux becoming the basis of a multi-billion dollar industry, then that's great. It's great, but it's not the point. The point is to make Linux the best OS that the community is capable of making. Not for other people: For itself. The oh-so-common threats of "Linux will never take over the desktop unless it does such-and-such" are simply irrelevant: The Linux community isn't trying to take over the desktop. They really don't care if it gets good enough to make it onto your desktop, so long as it stays good enough to remain on theirs. The highly-vocal MS-haters, pro-Linux zealots, and money-making FOSS purveyors might be loud, but they're still minorities. I believe this still reflects the opinion of the Linux community, but there is a growing public consensus that is entirely opposite: the goal of Linux is to gain market share comparable or superior to the major commercial desktop operating systems, and since the current Linux community itself is a rounding error by comparison, the goals of Linux have nothing to do with the needs of its current users and everything to do with serving the people who so far want nothing to do with it. It seems to me Linux is in the early stages of acting out the cliché sitcom plot where the main character is sidetracked onto a quixotic mission to remake themselves as a popular kid, culminating in a humiliating realization that they aren't any closer to being popular than when they started, they've picked up vices without learning any virtues, they've alienated their friends, and worst of all, in the process of rejecting their identity they've rejected and abandoned their own good qualities. Linux should learn from what the cool kids do well, of course. It should learn to be friendly, approachable, well-groomed, and confident. I'm glad it's doing that. With GNOME, KDE, and Canonical, we have three big projects devoted to making the Linux desktop smooth, polished, and friendly. Linux and all its users are benefiting tremendously from that, just like I (a rather frumpy geek) benefit from periodic attention to upgrading and expanding my wardrobe. However, Linux needs to think just as much about its strengths, and we don't hear enough about that. Linux is a powerful system for sophisticated users. It's got a great command line. It's mostly open-source and has a great community. Linux has two major integrated desktop environments, and inside the integrated environment of your choice, or even from a niche window manager put together by a handful of people, you can run apps from another integrated environment. On one desktop I run KDE, and on my laptop I usually run Awesome. When I want to run a KDE app under Awesome, I just apt-get install it and run it. Isn't that amazing? Not to mention that Linux (like other open sources Unixes) runs on a range of hardware platforms that puts Windows and OSX to shame. When's the last time a Windows user needed to run an OS on a virtual ARM processor on an FPGA, looked in the FPGA manual, and discovered, "Oh good, it supports Windows, so I'll just install that and have a nice familiar environment?" Now, many people who have read this far will wish this was a different kind of forum where they could just quote the last paragraph followed by the picture of Ogre screaming "NERDS!!!!" and be done with it. However, it's ridiculous to dismiss Linux's strength, and in fact everybody's image of Linux is affected by those strengths. Anybody who cares enough about Linux to click to this page cares about its geeky awesomeness. If you truly dismiss those strengths from your mind and see Linux only as a desktop operating system for unsophisticated users, then Linux is just a pathetic third-place OS that only a mother or an open source zealot could love. That would be a tragic crisis of confidence. That's like when the kid who's great at music or math or poetry hits rock bottom and tells him or herself, "None of the things I'm good at matter. Nobody cares about them. Nobody sees me as a kid with this great ability. They judge me the same way they judge each other. They just see me as an ugly kid with mediocre social skills." Of course, that's when the learning starts, and by the end of the sitcom or the Saturday morning special, the kid learns that it's okay to be a little frumpy but her talent is something to treasure, and for her, two hours of doing her hair and applying makeup in the morning (which she hates) is not going to pay off as well as a couple of hours playing the cello or writing code or whatever it is that she really loves and is good at. Linux needs to skip the Saturday morning special trap of defining itself solely by its ability to cater to the mainstream. The Linux community needs to look at itself as users and say, "Damn, Linux rocks my socks off. How can we make it more awesome for us?" Not, "Well, I'm a weirdo, and real users are nothing like me, so it doesn't really matter that I like Linux. I guess from a normal user's perspective I can't think of anything that Linux is especially good at. How can the Linux community make Linux suck less for other people?" Not that the answers to those two questions are entirely disjoint. There's a lot of overlap between them. It's just that the first is an important perspective that is in danger of being lost as we concentrate more and more on the second.