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An automatic windows 10 install which broke her laptop is what made my partner ditch windows for good and switch to linux. It's massively reduced the amount of

An automatic windows 10 install which broke her laptop is what made my partner ditch windows for good and switch to linux. It's massively reduced the amount of tech support I need to do, and when it does come up, it's much more straightforward for me to deal with.

goodpoint 4y ago
It's amazing how people tolerate the poor usability of windows - including the forced updates making desktop unusable for hour every month. ...and then even claim that Linux requires more effort. For power users, sure, but for basic users it's a different thing. EDIT: no point in dogpiling comments listing your favorite windows-only software. It is entirely besides the point of this comment.
- martin_a 4y ago
  > including the forced updates making desktop unusable for hour every month. Patch day is once a month and takes 15 minutes at worst, sometimes only a reboot after the work day. edit: Not to mention how upgrading Firefox on Linux-based systems through the console forced me to restart my Firefox mid-day, because "it works that way". Never had that on Windows.
  - mysterydip 4y ago
    See how long it takes on a core i3 with 4GB RAM (to pull a cheap new laptop from walmart: https://www.walmart.com/ip/Lenovo-Ideapad-3i-14-FHD-Laptop-Intel-Core-i3-1115G4-4GB-128GB-SSD-Windows-11-in-S-Mode-Platinum-Grey-81X700FGUS/125496557?athbdg=L1100 https://www.walmart.com/ip/Lenovo-Ideapad-3i-14-FHD-Laptop-I... ) Not everyone has top of the line or even mid-range hardware.
    - rajamaka 4y ago
      With those specs I would guarantee the update actually takes less than 15 minutes on average each month. I don't remember an update adding more than 1 or 2 minutes on my i5 8gb to my restart time since Windows 11.
    - martin_a 4y ago
      I got a six year old T460, so I'm not really top of the line either. Nevertheless I don't sit in front of the machine for hours each and every month and watch Windows doing its updates. People like to dramatically exaggerate how long Windows update bind you each month. Probably no Windows users but it's an easy target.
      - jen20 4y ago
        It doesn’t matter how long it takes if it elects to do it when you want to do something else. Computers are our servants not our managers. Choosing to do something which can neither be deferred or cancelled is unforgivable.
        martin_a 4y ago
        > which can neither be deferred or cancelled You can defer it. Update and reboot? Update and shutdown? Reboot/Shutdown without updating now? All three are possible, so it's fine.
        jen20 4y ago
        I have absolutely seen updates which may not be deferred or refused - and indeed the original post this in this thread details one.
        martin_a 4y ago
        Yeah, but I'm not refering to the original post but to complaints that Windows updates will take hours of your productive time each month for nothing. That's simply not true.
        jen20 4y ago
        It doesn't matter whether it is hours or one minute, it's unacceptable. A sibling comment here describes how a Windows update started in the middle of a presentation someone was giving, which indicates quite clearly that Windows Updates take productive time away - not just of the user of the computer, but those who were listening also. Again, computers are our servants, not our managers.
    - marcosdumay 4y ago
      Is that a tricky question? A computer like that could never run Windows 11. The time locked in update is undefined because the first time an update is available, Windows will never terminate downloading and unpacking it.
    - vel0city 4y ago
      My main personal laptop is a cheap Walmart house brand Motile laptop from a few years ago. https://www.walmart.com/ip/MOTILE-14-Performance-Laptop-FHD-AMD-Ryzen-3-Radeon-Vega-Graphics-THX-Spatial-Audio-Tuned-display-4GB-RAM-128GB-SSD-HDMI-Front-720P-HD-IR-Camera-Silv/715635402 https://www.walmart.com/ip/MOTILE-14-Performance-Laptop-FHD-... Installing updates takes less than five minutes once a month.
      - unsafecast 4y ago
        I have the opposite experience. 4GB of ram + i3-4005U + spinning drive, windows update is unbearable. That's on top of anything newer than 2016 being unusable anyway. I don't do media on it, so I've been quite happy running 9front lately.
        vel0city 4y ago
        > spinning drive There's your problem. Even the cheapest of SATA SSD will massively outperform almost any laptop hard disk drive when it comes to random I/O. And it'll probably increase your battery life a smidge as well. I wouldn't put applications on any spinning rust these days, especially laptop 5400 (or worse!) drives. $40 for a 512GB SATA SSD that'll blow the socks off whatever spinning drive you have. https://www.microcenter.com/product/659868/inland-professional-512gb-ssd-3d-tlc-nand-sata-30-6-gbps-25-inch-7mm-internal-solid-state-drive https://www.microcenter.com/product/659868/inland-profession...
        unsafecast 4y ago
        I don't have the budget for that at the immediate moment, but yes, I know. I do think my point still stands though. I don't think it's acceptable for software to run this slow, even on this. I'm talking windows has been idling for hours and basic tasks like clicking on the volume slider are sluggish.
        martin_a 4y ago
        > $40 for a 512GB SATA SSD On a side note: I'm fascinated HOW cheap SSD storage has become. Really looking into changing my backup drives to SSDs instead of good old spinning drives...
- aspyct 4y ago
  We have to tolerate it because some software isn't available on Linux. For example, I can't think of one RAW image processor from the original manufacturer that's available on Linux. Honestly, if there was, it would actually be a good reason to switch to that brand. Also yes, I'm aware of RawTherapee and DarkTable. I use RawTherapee regularly, it's absolutely excellent and I highly recommend it, but it's also absolutely useless for certain use cases. Nowadays I tend to use linux apps on Windows, thanks to WSL. For example, Windows' file browser crashes frequently on my setup, so I use Dolphin instead.
  - Zak 4y ago
    > RAW image processor from the original manufacturer I'm active in a few photography spaces online and I don't think I've talked to a single person who actively uses one of those. Most people use Lightroom or Capture One, which are also not available on Linux. I'm curious as to what value you get from OEM RAW processors.
    - aspyct 4y ago
      > I'm curious as to what value you get from OEM RAW processors. Exactly (or almost) the same render as from SOOC images. I hate it when I deliver SOOC preview images that the customer really likes, but wants some small tweaks (remove a fly from the image, for example), and the colors or contrast on the resulting image is different because I didn't use the same processing engine or color profiles.
    - jstarfish 4y ago
      > I'm curious as to what value you get from OEM RAW processors From what I remember, Nikon RAW files don't retain any changes you made to them in-camera unless you remove them from camera using the OEM app. (Things may be different these days. My knowledge is from 2015.)
  - galangalalgol 4y ago
    You can do the reverse too. Wine or a vm to run the couple things you still need. If valve can get all their AAA game titles to run using proton, you ahould be able to make it work. I had one tool at work, an xml viewer that was enough better than the competition to be worth running in wine. I stopped even noticing it wasn't a linux app.
- unsupp0rted 4y ago
  I thought this comment was going in a different direction: It’s amazing how people tolerate the poor usability of windows and then prefer the poor usability of Linux.
  - myself248 4y ago
    Meh, I loathe both. But after being unable to even _install_ the Win7 downgrade that was promised with my purchase of a Win10-only machine (several years back), I decided Microsoft's obsession with licenses and stuff was just getting in my way. I grabbed Ubuntu and haven't looked back. Linux is awful for its own reasons, not least of which is a flippant glee with which decades-reinforced UI reflexes are jettisoned in favor of someone's new window-management metaphor-of-the-moment. But those seem easy enough to opt out of, I can tweak a few things and I'm largely fine day-to-day. Updates tend to break things in weird ways, but I can always just reinstall, or decide it's time to try a new distro, restore /home/ from backup, and go on with my life. A Windows reinstall is usually a multi-day affair and barely works afterward. My biggest Linux gripe lately, and this might be Ubuntu-specific, is hiding the names of the programs. There's an image viewer apparently just called Image Viewer, and if you think that's fucking obnoxious to search for help about, you're right! Ditto with pretty much all the other default GUI tools. I think the file manager is probably called Nautilus but you can't get it to tell you that, you have to just infer that from googling error messages and finding them mentioned in issue-trackers for something called "nautilus". Aaaaagh.
    - kayodelycaon 4y ago
      Apple loves giving things generic names, i.e. “Music”. The only reason they get away with it is you can search for “macos $APP”, “Apple $APP”, or “$APP.app”.
      - myself248 4y ago
        Thankfully, they gave the Desktop iPhone Backup Program a nice obvious name. Oh no they didn't.
    - 4y ago
- touch_abs 4y ago
  Because even with the low bar set by windows, desktop linux is genuinely less usable. If you need anything outside of a browser and encounter a problem you need substantially more understanding of how the OS works get it fixed, not to mention many common use-cases are either not supported or have an inferior less stable version on linux. For common problems in windows you can find a current guide with pictures in seconds, on linux you are more likely to find a slightly out of date forum. And thats ignoring the complexities of different desktop environments and hardware compatibility.
  - mijoharas 4y ago
    > For common problems in windows you can find a current guide with pictures in seconds, on linux you are more likely to find a slightly out of date forum. And thats ignoring the complexities of different desktop environments and hardware compatibility. This actually isn't my experience. It's possible that I only ever have had less common problems on windows, but invariably whenever I've looked something up for that, I've usually found terrible windows support forums with incorrect information and usually no correct solution at all. For linux, and again I'd consider myself a power user so am familiar with most things, I usually find the information easily and it's quite straightforward. I believe part of this is due to the more technical nature of linux users, and due to there being active stack overflow resources e.t.c. which is far better than windows support forums (both in quality of questions and answers). Obviously this is a very opinion based position, but I find the opposite to what you've asserted.
    - j33zusjuice 4y ago
      It’s not bias, it’s just how it is. If it’s not something bleepingcomputer or tenforums has covered, it’s a nightmare to find an answer for Windows problems. The difference is that most people are scared of the CLI, so they think Linux is harder because of that. When, in actuality, it saves you several seconds of clicking, and gives you far better error reporting. Windows is a fucking joke of an OS, and that’s why nearly no one defends it on its merits. It’s always defended on the stance of compatibility because of things like O365 and Adobe products. It has nothing to do with the quality of Windows as a platform because as a platform, it’s a pile of shit, and everyone knows it. We’re just forced to deal with it if we want to game, edit photos and music, etc., without a ton of config changes and other hassles.
- quietbritishjim 4y ago
  One problem: MS Office. I know that there's LibreOffice but MS Office definitely beats it in reality. Yes, I know there's Wine, but I worry (possibly unfounded) that it won't work, or will stop working with some future Office update.
  - asciimov 4y ago
    Solution: Office 365. Since it runs in the browser Office 365 will work for the average home user of MS Office on Linux. No it's not the full fat versions of office, but for most home users it's fine.
    - hunter-gatherer 4y ago
      How many home users need something in MS Office that doesn't exist in Libre?
      - asciimov 4y ago
        Libre would be fine for most people but brand recognition and file compatibility are the big things that Office 365 has going for it.
      - AlmostAnyone 4y ago
        A lot of them. Have you tried to fill out forms (for stuff like homeowner taxes, personal income tax, etc) prepared by the government office in MS Word using LibreOffice Writer? It doesn't work at all, and if it at least opens, the document as well as output is completely fucked. Anything a tiny bit smarter than your usual document (with scripts and/or macros) won't work too.
        hunter-gatherer 4y ago
        I mean, in the past 3 years I've sold a home, rented a place, and bought a home, and filled out my taxes and other forms from .gov websites and haven't had an issue to be honest.
- Bakary 4y ago
  It's not beside the point. The usability of Windows vs. Linux must factor in the availability of software. I would literally be unable to do my job on Linux
- hardware2win 4y ago
  >including the forced updates making desktop unusable for hour every month. Hours is weird way to spell 5min on pc over half of decade old.
isthisthingon99 4y ago
Ubuntu does updates every week unless you explicitly turn them off. So you have to reboot quite often which sucks.
- loloquwowndueo 4y ago
  You don’t have to reboot for every update - for a server it would be mostly kernel updates that require a reboot. If you enable live patch or subscribe to another live kernel update service you don’t need to reboot for most security patches.
- tgsovlerkhgsel 4y ago
  It suggests that you reboot. You don't have to reboot. It doesn't crash or force-reboot your machine.
  - marcosdumay 4y ago
    A few updates suggest it very hardly. Up to the point of not letting you launch any new application. But yes, it doesn't crash or force-reboot.
  - isthisthingon99 4y ago
    Yes but they suggest it very annoyingly. So I feel bad not rebooting.
- e12e 4y ago
  I don't think I've ever seen a Debian or Ubuntu "stable update" / "patch" (apt-get upgrade, not dist-upgrade - what is enabled by default these days) break anything - I've been using various variations of Debian since around Debian 3(? 1.2/1.3-kernel era). There has been a few (documented!) issues with major upgrades, like lilo-grub transition and Ubuntu changing system group ids. But there are no forced lts-to-lts upgrades - and generally they are quite stable. As sibling comment mentions, canonical even have a live-patch service for kernel updates without reboot (not that I would recommend that - doing a reboot after patch is a nice way to verify that the system still boots ok - which it should - but easier to debug when you know there's just been a patch..).
naikrovek 4y ago
> what made my partner ditch windows for good and switch to linux that's like moving underground because you once got a sunburn.
- mijoharas 4y ago
  I mean switching away from an operating system that has a chance to randomly brick your computer to one that doesn't seems pretty damn reasonable to me? I guess YMMV.
  - trap_goes_hot 4y ago
    Sure, YMMV. I haven't had any issues with Windows, but I recognize that others do, and I treat them as real concerns. After 12 seconds of searching; but many such issues have littered the internet fora. I don't think its unusual for a complex system to have bugs. https://www.reddit.com/r/linux4noobs/comments/fv4c40/bricked_linux_after_upgrade_what_is_the_best_way/ https://www.reddit.com/r/linux4noobs/comments/fv4c40/bricked... https://www.reddit.com/r/Ubuntu/comments/qjn9v1/latest_update_bricked_my_linux_partition/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Ubuntu/comments/qjn9v1/latest_updat... https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=382222 https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=382222 https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=259582 https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=259582
    - mijoharas 4y ago
      It's a very fair point, and it is most _definitely_ possible (and not even particularly hard) to brick a linux system. However, I think the difference is that it's always due to an action you take. I do think this is something qualitatively different to when your machine decides to automatically update to windows 10, when your machine is not compatible with windows 10, and it bricks itself. If you randomly turn on a computer and it says "hold on, I'm updating" and then never turns on again without you ever agreeing to an update, I think you'd quite rightly be somewhat upset with it. Now, I don't even mind windows that much. I prefer other things, but I recognize the strengths of windows and I understand why people like to use it. At the same time, I think it makes sense to recognize the frustrations that windows can sometimes bring to some users.

goodpoint 4y ago

It's amazing how people tolerate the poor usability of windows - including the forced updates making desktop unusable for hour every month. ...and then even claim that Linux requires more effort. For power users, sure, but for basic users it's a different thing. EDIT: no point in dogpiling comments listing your favorite windows-only software. It is entirely besides the point of this comment.

martin_a 4y ago
> including the forced updates making desktop unusable for hour every month. Patch day is once a month and takes 15 minutes at worst, sometimes only a reboot after the work day. edit: Not to mention how upgrading Firefox on Linux-based systems through the console forced me to restart my Firefox mid-day, because "it works that way". Never had that on Windows.
- mysterydip 4y ago
  See how long it takes on a core i3 with 4GB RAM (to pull a cheap new laptop from walmart: https://www.walmart.com/ip/Lenovo-Ideapad-3i-14-FHD-Laptop-Intel-Core-i3-1115G4-4GB-128GB-SSD-Windows-11-in-S-Mode-Platinum-Grey-81X700FGUS/125496557?athbdg=L1100 https://www.walmart.com/ip/Lenovo-Ideapad-3i-14-FHD-Laptop-I... ) Not everyone has top of the line or even mid-range hardware.
  - rajamaka 4y ago
    With those specs I would guarantee the update actually takes less than 15 minutes on average each month. I don't remember an update adding more than 1 or 2 minutes on my i5 8gb to my restart time since Windows 11.
  - martin_a 4y ago
    I got a six year old T460, so I'm not really top of the line either. Nevertheless I don't sit in front of the machine for hours each and every month and watch Windows doing its updates. People like to dramatically exaggerate how long Windows update bind you each month. Probably no Windows users but it's an easy target.
    - jen20 4y ago
      It doesn’t matter how long it takes if it elects to do it when you want to do something else. Computers are our servants not our managers. Choosing to do something which can neither be deferred or cancelled is unforgivable.
      - martin_a 4y ago
        > which can neither be deferred or cancelled You can defer it. Update and reboot? Update and shutdown? Reboot/Shutdown without updating now? All three are possible, so it's fine.
        jen20 4y ago
        I have absolutely seen updates which may not be deferred or refused - and indeed the original post this in this thread details one.
        martin_a 4y ago
        Yeah, but I'm not refering to the original post but to complaints that Windows updates will take hours of your productive time each month for nothing. That's simply not true.
        jen20 4y ago
        It doesn't matter whether it is hours or one minute, it's unacceptable. A sibling comment here describes how a Windows update started in the middle of a presentation someone was giving, which indicates quite clearly that Windows Updates take productive time away - not just of the user of the computer, but those who were listening also. Again, computers are our servants, not our managers.
  - marcosdumay 4y ago
    Is that a tricky question? A computer like that could never run Windows 11. The time locked in update is undefined because the first time an update is available, Windows will never terminate downloading and unpacking it.
  - vel0city 4y ago
    My main personal laptop is a cheap Walmart house brand Motile laptop from a few years ago. https://www.walmart.com/ip/MOTILE-14-Performance-Laptop-FHD-AMD-Ryzen-3-Radeon-Vega-Graphics-THX-Spatial-Audio-Tuned-display-4GB-RAM-128GB-SSD-HDMI-Front-720P-HD-IR-Camera-Silv/715635402 https://www.walmart.com/ip/MOTILE-14-Performance-Laptop-FHD-... Installing updates takes less than five minutes once a month.
    - unsafecast 4y ago
      I have the opposite experience. 4GB of ram + i3-4005U + spinning drive, windows update is unbearable. That's on top of anything newer than 2016 being unusable anyway. I don't do media on it, so I've been quite happy running 9front lately.
      - vel0city 4y ago
        > spinning drive There's your problem. Even the cheapest of SATA SSD will massively outperform almost any laptop hard disk drive when it comes to random I/O. And it'll probably increase your battery life a smidge as well. I wouldn't put applications on any spinning rust these days, especially laptop 5400 (or worse!) drives. $40 for a 512GB SATA SSD that'll blow the socks off whatever spinning drive you have. https://www.microcenter.com/product/659868/inland-professional-512gb-ssd-3d-tlc-nand-sata-30-6-gbps-25-inch-7mm-internal-solid-state-drive https://www.microcenter.com/product/659868/inland-profession...
        unsafecast 4y ago
        I don't have the budget for that at the immediate moment, but yes, I know. I do think my point still stands though. I don't think it's acceptable for software to run this slow, even on this. I'm talking windows has been idling for hours and basic tasks like clicking on the volume slider are sluggish.
        martin_a 4y ago
        > $40 for a 512GB SATA SSD On a side note: I'm fascinated HOW cheap SSD storage has become. Really looking into changing my backup drives to SSDs instead of good old spinning drives...
aspyct 4y ago
We have to tolerate it because some software isn't available on Linux. For example, I can't think of one RAW image processor from the original manufacturer that's available on Linux. Honestly, if there was, it would actually be a good reason to switch to that brand. Also yes, I'm aware of RawTherapee and DarkTable. I use RawTherapee regularly, it's absolutely excellent and I highly recommend it, but it's also absolutely useless for certain use cases. Nowadays I tend to use linux apps on Windows, thanks to WSL. For example, Windows' file browser crashes frequently on my setup, so I use Dolphin instead.
- Zak 4y ago
  > RAW image processor from the original manufacturer I'm active in a few photography spaces online and I don't think I've talked to a single person who actively uses one of those. Most people use Lightroom or Capture One, which are also not available on Linux. I'm curious as to what value you get from OEM RAW processors.
  - aspyct 4y ago
    > I'm curious as to what value you get from OEM RAW processors. Exactly (or almost) the same render as from SOOC images. I hate it when I deliver SOOC preview images that the customer really likes, but wants some small tweaks (remove a fly from the image, for example), and the colors or contrast on the resulting image is different because I didn't use the same processing engine or color profiles.
  - jstarfish 4y ago
    > I'm curious as to what value you get from OEM RAW processors From what I remember, Nikon RAW files don't retain any changes you made to them in-camera unless you remove them from camera using the OEM app. (Things may be different these days. My knowledge is from 2015.)
- galangalalgol 4y ago
  You can do the reverse too. Wine or a vm to run the couple things you still need. If valve can get all their AAA game titles to run using proton, you ahould be able to make it work. I had one tool at work, an xml viewer that was enough better than the competition to be worth running in wine. I stopped even noticing it wasn't a linux app.
unsupp0rted 4y ago
I thought this comment was going in a different direction: It’s amazing how people tolerate the poor usability of windows and then prefer the poor usability of Linux.
- myself248 4y ago
  Meh, I loathe both. But after being unable to even _install_ the Win7 downgrade that was promised with my purchase of a Win10-only machine (several years back), I decided Microsoft's obsession with licenses and stuff was just getting in my way. I grabbed Ubuntu and haven't looked back. Linux is awful for its own reasons, not least of which is a flippant glee with which decades-reinforced UI reflexes are jettisoned in favor of someone's new window-management metaphor-of-the-moment. But those seem easy enough to opt out of, I can tweak a few things and I'm largely fine day-to-day. Updates tend to break things in weird ways, but I can always just reinstall, or decide it's time to try a new distro, restore /home/ from backup, and go on with my life. A Windows reinstall is usually a multi-day affair and barely works afterward. My biggest Linux gripe lately, and this might be Ubuntu-specific, is hiding the names of the programs. There's an image viewer apparently just called Image Viewer, and if you think that's fucking obnoxious to search for help about, you're right! Ditto with pretty much all the other default GUI tools. I think the file manager is probably called Nautilus but you can't get it to tell you that, you have to just infer that from googling error messages and finding them mentioned in issue-trackers for something called "nautilus". Aaaaagh.
  - kayodelycaon 4y ago
    Apple loves giving things generic names, i.e. “Music”. The only reason they get away with it is you can search for “macos $APP”, “Apple $APP”, or “$APP.app”.
    - myself248 4y ago
      Thankfully, they gave the Desktop iPhone Backup Program a nice obvious name. Oh no they didn't.
  - 4y ago
touch_abs 4y ago
Because even with the low bar set by windows, desktop linux is genuinely less usable. If you need anything outside of a browser and encounter a problem you need substantially more understanding of how the OS works get it fixed, not to mention many common use-cases are either not supported or have an inferior less stable version on linux. For common problems in windows you can find a current guide with pictures in seconds, on linux you are more likely to find a slightly out of date forum. And thats ignoring the complexities of different desktop environments and hardware compatibility.
- mijoharas 4y ago
  > For common problems in windows you can find a current guide with pictures in seconds, on linux you are more likely to find a slightly out of date forum. And thats ignoring the complexities of different desktop environments and hardware compatibility. This actually isn't my experience. It's possible that I only ever have had less common problems on windows, but invariably whenever I've looked something up for that, I've usually found terrible windows support forums with incorrect information and usually no correct solution at all. For linux, and again I'd consider myself a power user so am familiar with most things, I usually find the information easily and it's quite straightforward. I believe part of this is due to the more technical nature of linux users, and due to there being active stack overflow resources e.t.c. which is far better than windows support forums (both in quality of questions and answers). Obviously this is a very opinion based position, but I find the opposite to what you've asserted.
  - j33zusjuice 4y ago
    It’s not bias, it’s just how it is. If it’s not something bleepingcomputer or tenforums has covered, it’s a nightmare to find an answer for Windows problems. The difference is that most people are scared of the CLI, so they think Linux is harder because of that. When, in actuality, it saves you several seconds of clicking, and gives you far better error reporting. Windows is a fucking joke of an OS, and that’s why nearly no one defends it on its merits. It’s always defended on the stance of compatibility because of things like O365 and Adobe products. It has nothing to do with the quality of Windows as a platform because as a platform, it’s a pile of shit, and everyone knows it. We’re just forced to deal with it if we want to game, edit photos and music, etc., without a ton of config changes and other hassles.
quietbritishjim 4y ago
One problem: MS Office. I know that there's LibreOffice but MS Office definitely beats it in reality. Yes, I know there's Wine, but I worry (possibly unfounded) that it won't work, or will stop working with some future Office update.
- asciimov 4y ago
  Solution: Office 365. Since it runs in the browser Office 365 will work for the average home user of MS Office on Linux. No it's not the full fat versions of office, but for most home users it's fine.
  - hunter-gatherer 4y ago
    How many home users need something in MS Office that doesn't exist in Libre?
    - asciimov 4y ago
      Libre would be fine for most people but brand recognition and file compatibility are the big things that Office 365 has going for it.
    - AlmostAnyone 4y ago
      A lot of them. Have you tried to fill out forms (for stuff like homeowner taxes, personal income tax, etc) prepared by the government office in MS Word using LibreOffice Writer? It doesn't work at all, and if it at least opens, the document as well as output is completely fucked. Anything a tiny bit smarter than your usual document (with scripts and/or macros) won't work too.
      - hunter-gatherer 4y ago
        I mean, in the past 3 years I've sold a home, rented a place, and bought a home, and filled out my taxes and other forms from .gov websites and haven't had an issue to be honest.
Bakary 4y ago
It's not beside the point. The usability of Windows vs. Linux must factor in the availability of software. I would literally be unable to do my job on Linux
hardware2win 4y ago
>including the forced updates making desktop unusable for hour every month. Hours is weird way to spell 5min on pc over half of decade old.

isthisthingon99 4y ago

Ubuntu does updates every week unless you explicitly turn them off. So you have to reboot quite often which sucks.

loloquwowndueo 4y ago
You don’t have to reboot for every update - for a server it would be mostly kernel updates that require a reboot. If you enable live patch or subscribe to another live kernel update service you don’t need to reboot for most security patches.
tgsovlerkhgsel 4y ago
It suggests that you reboot. You don't have to reboot. It doesn't crash or force-reboot your machine.
- marcosdumay 4y ago
  A few updates suggest it very hardly. Up to the point of not letting you launch any new application. But yes, it doesn't crash or force-reboot.
- isthisthingon99 4y ago
  Yes but they suggest it very annoyingly. So I feel bad not rebooting.
e12e 4y ago
I don't think I've ever seen a Debian or Ubuntu "stable update" / "patch" (apt-get upgrade, not dist-upgrade - what is enabled by default these days) break anything - I've been using various variations of Debian since around Debian 3(? 1.2/1.3-kernel era). There has been a few (documented!) issues with major upgrades, like lilo-grub transition and Ubuntu changing system group ids. But there are no forced lts-to-lts upgrades - and generally they are quite stable. As sibling comment mentions, canonical even have a live-patch service for kernel updates without reboot (not that I would recommend that - doing a reboot after patch is a nice way to verify that the system still boots ok - which it should - but easier to debug when you know there's just been a patch..).

naikrovek 4y ago

> what made my partner ditch windows for good and switch to linux that's like moving underground because you once got a sunburn.

mijoharas 4y ago
I mean switching away from an operating system that has a chance to randomly brick your computer to one that doesn't seems pretty damn reasonable to me? I guess YMMV.
- trap_goes_hot 4y ago
  Sure, YMMV. I haven't had any issues with Windows, but I recognize that others do, and I treat them as real concerns. After 12 seconds of searching; but many such issues have littered the internet fora. I don't think its unusual for a complex system to have bugs. https://www.reddit.com/r/linux4noobs/comments/fv4c40/bricked_linux_after_upgrade_what_is_the_best_way/ https://www.reddit.com/r/linux4noobs/comments/fv4c40/bricked... https://www.reddit.com/r/Ubuntu/comments/qjn9v1/latest_update_bricked_my_linux_partition/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Ubuntu/comments/qjn9v1/latest_updat... https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=382222 https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=382222 https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=259582 https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=259582
  - mijoharas 4y ago
    It's a very fair point, and it is most _definitely_ possible (and not even particularly hard) to brick a linux system. However, I think the difference is that it's always due to an action you take. I do think this is something qualitatively different to when your machine decides to automatically update to windows 10, when your machine is not compatible with windows 10, and it bricks itself. If you randomly turn on a computer and it says "hold on, I'm updating" and then never turns on again without you ever agreeing to an update, I think you'd quite rightly be somewhat upset with it. Now, I don't even mind windows that much. I prefer other things, but I recognize the strengths of windows and I understand why people like to use it. At the same time, I think it makes sense to recognize the frustrations that windows can sometimes bring to some users.