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> The whole OS market is pretty rough right now. This is my feeling over the past few years. No OS is in a great spot. But I have hopes for Linux being better

by ziml77 5y ago

> The whole OS market is pretty rough right now. This is my feeling over the past few years. No OS is in a great spot. But I have hopes for Linux being better supported with Valve using it on the Steam Deck. (Not the highest hopes, but more hope than I used to have)

GekkePrutser 5y ago
I don't agree. KDE in particular feels more well rounded than ever before. I use it on FreeBSD but I use Linux on servers and I'm also very happy with that. Windows 10 is stable for me too though I was hit with the eTPM stutter bug (I use my Windows box exclusively for gaming, in particular VR which I didn't feel like figuring out in proton). But the windows dark patterns are surely there and I hate them. But as it's only my gaming machine I can deal with it. And Mac... Well I moved away from it because Apple is locking down too much and I've come to hate opinionated software. Still they seem to be doing nice things with M1..
- hparadiz 5y ago
  I recently got Apex Legends working and it's running perfectly at 144 fps in 2k on a 1080 ti. I've also played FFXIV and Path of Exile extensively in Linux. The only thing left is Adobe products which is honestly a matter of time. Just really takes hammering out some market share until Adobe relents. A lot of the best kernel, driver, and gui shell improvements have only really hit their stride in the past 24 months. Things are coming together rapidly.
  - vanviegen 5y ago
    > A lot of the best kernel, driver, and gui shell improvements have only really hit their stride in the past 24 months. Could you elaborate on that? I've been using desktop Linux almost exclusively for the past 24 years (ouch!), and recent years seem pretty average to me. Things work great, most of the time, like always. Unless you're talking about gaming. I'm not a gamer (or i wouldn't be such a long time Linux user) but I hear there's enormous progress on that front.
    - hef19898 5y ago
      Gaming was what held me back from switching for decades. Steam is doing a great job on that front, most recent (like in max 5 years old) games in my library work like a charm under Ubuntu. And that includes all AAA games. Old games are harder as those are, understandably, not on top of the priority list to convert to Linux. For those, and some rarely used other stuff I haven't bothered to figure out Linux alternatives for, I still use Windows. If Linux based gaming continues on the current trajectory, I could imagine a world in which a great chunk of the consumer market switches from Windows to Linux.
- NeutronStar 5y ago
  I don't even use a desktop environment. Gonna be using a window manager for ever. Most of everything is run on the command line anyway.
  - knighthack 5y ago
    How do you browse the Internet then?
    - xvector 5y ago
      You can use normal applications in a window manager. Window manager ≠ terminal
    - reshie 5y ago
      you can start programs with just X. i use simple WMs but have put kodi in its own dedicated session. its kind of like kiosk mode.
    - aenis 5y ago
      Lynx? Lynx still works for a lot of sites I frequent.
    - hulitu 5y ago
      Seamonkey, Firefox, etc. You do not need a desktop environment to run a webbrowser.
    - lelanthran 5y ago
      > How do you browse the Internet then? I assume by > using a window manager for ever I've used WindowMaker as a Window manager for decades. Only recently did I decide to switch to Mate because I wanted a taskbar at the bottom with useful things like applets to show and switch Wifi/network, volume control and often-used icons/launchers. TBH, if I could get things like tint2 and yabar working with the mate applets, I'd probably switch back to WindowMaker in a heartbeat.
      - anthk 5y ago
- Shared404 5y ago
  KDE on FreeBSD and Linux on servers seems an interesting choice, what was it that brought you to FreeBSD on desktop if you were using Linux on server?
  - GekkePrutser 5y ago
    Mainly that I like the concept of FreeBSD. It's just one OS, has excellent documentation. Some good tech like jails, zfs on root etc. Apparently it's not great at WiFi but I don't use that on my main driver (NUC). On Linux I use docker a lot, and while FreeBSD has its excellent jails, it doesn't have the whole ecosystem around them. So that's why I use Linux on the server side more.
darkwater 5y ago
I don't play videogames and I'm perfectly fine with my Ubuntu install, it does everything I need it to do. Only gamers put videogaming as a must for an operating system.
- hef19898 5y ago
  And that is getting constantly better with Linus as well, thanks to Steam.
Agamus 5y ago
I dropped Windows for Linux with XP. I use Linux for all my computing needs, except a few video games that don't like Wine. For those, I do have a separate Windows machine that gets turned on to play those games (like a console), and turned off when I stop. Both machines are built desktops. I never use the Windows box for anything else. No files, no coding, no internet browsing, no music, etc. No cameras, microphones, bluetooth adapters, etc. are installed. I turn that thing on every few weeks or so. This has worked well, and is a compromise with which I can live. Try it, it's blissful!

by ziml77 5y ago

GekkePrutser 5y ago

I don't agree. KDE in particular feels more well rounded than ever before. I use it on FreeBSD but I use Linux on servers and I'm also very happy with that. Windows 10 is stable for me too though I was hit with the eTPM stutter bug (I use my Windows box exclusively for gaming, in particular VR which I didn't feel like figuring out in proton). But the windows dark patterns are surely there and I hate them. But as it's only my gaming machine I can deal with it. And Mac... Well I moved away from it because Apple is locking down too much and I've come to hate opinionated software. Still they seem to be doing nice things with M1..

hparadiz 5y ago
I recently got Apex Legends working and it's running perfectly at 144 fps in 2k on a 1080 ti. I've also played FFXIV and Path of Exile extensively in Linux. The only thing left is Adobe products which is honestly a matter of time. Just really takes hammering out some market share until Adobe relents. A lot of the best kernel, driver, and gui shell improvements have only really hit their stride in the past 24 months. Things are coming together rapidly.
- vanviegen 5y ago
  > A lot of the best kernel, driver, and gui shell improvements have only really hit their stride in the past 24 months. Could you elaborate on that? I've been using desktop Linux almost exclusively for the past 24 years (ouch!), and recent years seem pretty average to me. Things work great, most of the time, like always. Unless you're talking about gaming. I'm not a gamer (or i wouldn't be such a long time Linux user) but I hear there's enormous progress on that front.
  - hef19898 5y ago
    Gaming was what held me back from switching for decades. Steam is doing a great job on that front, most recent (like in max 5 years old) games in my library work like a charm under Ubuntu. And that includes all AAA games. Old games are harder as those are, understandably, not on top of the priority list to convert to Linux. For those, and some rarely used other stuff I haven't bothered to figure out Linux alternatives for, I still use Windows. If Linux based gaming continues on the current trajectory, I could imagine a world in which a great chunk of the consumer market switches from Windows to Linux.
NeutronStar 5y ago
I don't even use a desktop environment. Gonna be using a window manager for ever. Most of everything is run on the command line anyway.
- knighthack 5y ago
  How do you browse the Internet then?
  - xvector 5y ago
    You can use normal applications in a window manager. Window manager ≠ terminal
  - reshie 5y ago
    you can start programs with just X. i use simple WMs but have put kodi in its own dedicated session. its kind of like kiosk mode.
  - aenis 5y ago
    Lynx? Lynx still works for a lot of sites I frequent.
  - hulitu 5y ago
    Seamonkey, Firefox, etc. You do not need a desktop environment to run a webbrowser.
  - lelanthran 5y ago
    > How do you browse the Internet then? I assume by > using a window manager for ever I've used WindowMaker as a Window manager for decades. Only recently did I decide to switch to Mate because I wanted a taskbar at the bottom with useful things like applets to show and switch Wifi/network, volume control and often-used icons/launchers. TBH, if I could get things like tint2 and yabar working with the mate applets, I'd probably switch back to WindowMaker in a heartbeat.
    - anthk 5y ago
Shared404 5y ago
KDE on FreeBSD and Linux on servers seems an interesting choice, what was it that brought you to FreeBSD on desktop if you were using Linux on server?
- GekkePrutser 5y ago
  Mainly that I like the concept of FreeBSD. It's just one OS, has excellent documentation. Some good tech like jails, zfs on root etc. Apparently it's not great at WiFi but I don't use that on my main driver (NUC). On Linux I use docker a lot, and while FreeBSD has its excellent jails, it doesn't have the whole ecosystem around them. So that's why I use Linux on the server side more.

darkwater 5y ago

I don't play videogames and I'm perfectly fine with my Ubuntu install, it does everything I need it to do. Only gamers put videogaming as a must for an operating system.

hef19898 5y ago
And that is getting constantly better with Linus as well, thanks to Steam.

Agamus 5y ago

I dropped Windows for Linux with XP. I use Linux for all my computing needs, except a few video games that don't like Wine. For those, I do have a separate Windows machine that gets turned on to play those games (like a console), and turned off when I stop. Both machines are built desktops. I never use the Windows box for anything else. No files, no coding, no internet browsing, no music, etc. No cameras, microphones, bluetooth adapters, etc. are installed. I turn that thing on every few weeks or so. This has worked well, and is a compromise with which I can live. Try it, it's blissful!