4 ms·

Ah yes, 2003: the year of Linux on the desktop.

dehrmann 4y ago
These days, I'm debating the last time the desktop (or laptop) was relevant. Outside of professional settings, PC use has fallen off a cliff.
- pjmlp 4y ago
  Just go to a coffee shop near a school or a public library and you will see how relevant laptops are.
  - rbanffy 4y ago
    I live in a gentrified part of Dublin, and all laptops I see are MacBooks. And the Intel ones are starting to vanish.
    - pjmlp 4y ago
      It only reinforces the fact that laptops / desktops are relevant, regardless of the income capabilities of the owners.
      - rbanffy 4y ago
        Still, tablets are mostly used for entertainment while laptops are most used for work. Even then, the people writing things rarely use the tablet alone, usually going with a cover with a keyboard (making it a laptop running iOS or Android).
    - dehrmann 4y ago
      The two things stopping me from getting a Macbook are the metal chassis (it's uncomfortable) and lack of a good data recovery story.
  - Nextgrid 4y ago
    To be fair, how much of it is the form factor and physical keyboard, rather than the actual capabilities of a general-purpose OS (which I assume is what is implied when talking about relevance of laptops/desktops)? I bet a lot of these people would be served just fine by a Chromebook or iOS-like experience.
    - pjmlp 4y ago
      Given that Chromebooks are always on sale on German electronic stores until finally someone takes them away, I doubt it. They are pretty much an US phenomenon. In any case, a flagship Chromebook running Crostini is hardly any different from GNU/Linux laptop, other than the fact that GNU/Linux is running on its own container.
  - dehrmann 4y ago
    Aren't most schools on Chromebooks?
    - pjmlp 4y ago
      In US, and it is a laptop anyway.
midasuni 4y ago
Certainly was. As was every year since 2000, at least for me.
- rbanffy 4y ago
  I ditched Windows still in the XP era. By then only my laptop ran Windows and my daily driver was a big honking Mac G3. Surprisingly enough, everything just worked on the laptop.
prmoustache 4y ago
For me it was 1998 because that is the year I turned 18, got to have my own laptop (well, the old family one once my dad upgraded) and realized windows 98 was such a waste of resources and freedom was knocking at the door.
nailer 4y ago
There really was a period of being able to install and run the most well known games (Quake, UT, etc) on Linux that didn’t come back for 20 years until Steamdeck happened.
alex7734 4y ago
Linux came pretty close to being usable for the general public (not gamers) 13-14 years ago. Then Gnome 3 happened and broke everything, then Wayland happened and broke everything again. As much as Linus tries to keep a stable platform, the effort is pretty pointless (for desktop) if the rest of the ecosystem decides to change everything every few years.
- bacchusracine 4y ago
  >Linux came pretty close to being usable for the general public (not gamers) 13-14 years ago. Then Gnome 3 happened and broke everything, then Wayland happened and broke everything again. Funny how that just keeps happening, isn't it?
  - alex7734 4y ago
    I don't think it's deliberate if that's what you implying, but there is a definite lack of care about not breaking the ecosystem (for lack of a better word) that harms the whole "Linux in the desktop" ideal. Which is to be expected given that it's free and people do what is fun to them (and greenfield is always more fun) and all that, but it's still a shame.
  - phendrenad2 4y ago
    I DO think it's deliberate if that's what you implying. There's a lot of money riding on Linux being the go-to server OS. If a bunch of NORMIES start using Linux on the desktop, and get a Linux virus (because those will surely appear, if Linux is ever popular on the desktop), it'll hurt Linux's mystique as "hack-proof".
- oblio 4y ago
  > I'm so totally impressed at this Way New Development Paradigm. Let's call it the "Cascade of Attention-Deficit Teenagers" model, or "CADT" for short. > It hardly seems worth even having a bug system if the frequency of from-scratch rewrites always outstrips the pace of bug fixing. Why not be honest and resign yourself to the fact that version 0.8 is followed by version 0.8, which is then followed by version 0.8? > But that's what happens when there is no incentive for people to do the parts of programming that aren't fun. Fixing bugs isn't fun; going through the bug list isn't fun; but rewriting everything from scratch is fun (because "this time it will be done right", ha ha) and so that's what happens, over and over again. https://www.jwz.org/doc/cadt.html https://www.jwz.org/doc/cadt.html The article is 20 years old, it can vote now (and drink, in most places).

These days, I'm debating the last time the desktop (or laptop) was relevant. Outside of professional settings, PC use has fallen off a cliff.

pjmlp 4y ago
Just go to a coffee shop near a school or a public library and you will see how relevant laptops are.
- rbanffy 4y ago
  I live in a gentrified part of Dublin, and all laptops I see are MacBooks. And the Intel ones are starting to vanish.
  - pjmlp 4y ago
    It only reinforces the fact that laptops / desktops are relevant, regardless of the income capabilities of the owners.
    - rbanffy 4y ago
      Still, tablets are mostly used for entertainment while laptops are most used for work. Even then, the people writing things rarely use the tablet alone, usually going with a cover with a keyboard (making it a laptop running iOS or Android).
  - dehrmann 4y ago
    The two things stopping me from getting a Macbook are the metal chassis (it's uncomfortable) and lack of a good data recovery story.
- Nextgrid 4y ago
  To be fair, how much of it is the form factor and physical keyboard, rather than the actual capabilities of a general-purpose OS (which I assume is what is implied when talking about relevance of laptops/desktops)? I bet a lot of these people would be served just fine by a Chromebook or iOS-like experience.
  - pjmlp 4y ago
    Given that Chromebooks are always on sale on German electronic stores until finally someone takes them away, I doubt it. They are pretty much an US phenomenon. In any case, a flagship Chromebook running Crostini is hardly any different from GNU/Linux laptop, other than the fact that GNU/Linux is running on its own container.
- dehrmann 4y ago
  Aren't most schools on Chromebooks?
  - pjmlp 4y ago
    In US, and it is a laptop anyway.

midasuni 4y ago

Certainly was. As was every year since 2000, at least for me.

rbanffy 4y ago
I ditched Windows still in the XP era. By then only my laptop ran Windows and my daily driver was a big honking Mac G3. Surprisingly enough, everything just worked on the laptop.

prmoustache 4y ago

For me it was 1998 because that is the year I turned 18, got to have my own laptop (well, the old family one once my dad upgraded) and realized windows 98 was such a waste of resources and freedom was knocking at the door.

nailer 4y ago

There really was a period of being able to install and run the most well known games (Quake, UT, etc) on Linux that didn’t come back for 20 years until Steamdeck happened.

alex7734 4y ago

Linux came pretty close to being usable for the general public (not gamers) 13-14 years ago. Then Gnome 3 happened and broke everything, then Wayland happened and broke everything again. As much as Linus tries to keep a stable platform, the effort is pretty pointless (for desktop) if the rest of the ecosystem decides to change everything every few years.

bacchusracine 4y ago
>Linux came pretty close to being usable for the general public (not gamers) 13-14 years ago. Then Gnome 3 happened and broke everything, then Wayland happened and broke everything again. Funny how that just keeps happening, isn't it?
- alex7734 4y ago
  I don't think it's deliberate if that's what you implying, but there is a definite lack of care about not breaking the ecosystem (for lack of a better word) that harms the whole "Linux in the desktop" ideal. Which is to be expected given that it's free and people do what is fun to them (and greenfield is always more fun) and all that, but it's still a shame.
- phendrenad2 4y ago
  I DO think it's deliberate if that's what you implying. There's a lot of money riding on Linux being the go-to server OS. If a bunch of NORMIES start using Linux on the desktop, and get a Linux virus (because those will surely appear, if Linux is ever popular on the desktop), it'll hurt Linux's mystique as "hack-proof".
oblio 4y ago
> I'm so totally impressed at this Way New Development Paradigm. Let's call it the "Cascade of Attention-Deficit Teenagers" model, or "CADT" for short. > It hardly seems worth even having a bug system if the frequency of from-scratch rewrites always outstrips the pace of bug fixing. Why not be honest and resign yourself to the fact that version 0.8 is followed by version 0.8, which is then followed by version 0.8? > But that's what happens when there is no incentive for people to do the parts of programming that aren't fun. Fixing bugs isn't fun; going through the bug list isn't fun; but rewriting everything from scratch is fun (because "this time it will be done right", ha ha) and so that's what happens, over and over again. https://www.jwz.org/doc/cadt.html https://www.jwz.org/doc/cadt.html The article is 20 years old, it can vote now (and drink, in most places).