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Linux is rising from the ground up. Many users are fed up with Redmond's nefarious schemes to pump up their share price like using its user base as A.I. guinea

Linux is rising from the ground up. Many users are fed up with Redmond's nefarious schemes to pump up their share price like using its user base as A.I. guinea pigs. Amazingly it's U.S. users who are taking the lead in installing Linux Mint and other Linux distros. I assume it's because there are few consumer privacy and protection laws and tech companies can abuse their users as they see fit. Many have had enough and are jumping ship towards Linux.

cromka 13d ago
I'm surprised recent MS Office isn't fully supported under Wine yet, given the advantages that LLMs give in reverse engineering stuff. EDIT: Well, should have searched first before posting: https://itsfoss.com/news/bottles-microsoft-365-early-look/ https://itsfoss.com/news/bottles-microsoft-365-early-look/
- Krssst 13d ago
  I generally assume Wine cannot use LLMs considering developers that have been in contact with Windows code cannot contribute and LLMs almost certainly were. Edit: for reference: https://gitlab.winehq.org/wine/wine/-/wikis/Developer-FAQ https://gitlab.winehq.org/wine/wine/-/wikis/Developer-FAQ No such reference to LLMs possibly being trained on Windows code however. Well maybe AI companies were careful to remove problematic data from the training set.
  - EMIRELADERO 13d ago
    That would be a stupid application of the rule, it would mean no developer could use an LLM for anything that already has a proprietary alternative with heavily documented internals or leaked source code.
    - Krssst 13d ago
      Not so sure, if the LLM has been overfitted and can just throw back something equivalent to the original code, then it's no different from a human having seen the code and writing something similar afterwards. On another hand, I'd be curious about Microsoft's reaction if somebody let an agent write a "perfect" Windows emulator/compatibility layer eating away at Windows's market share (assuming that's possible; since it does not exist it's probably not currently). Would not do much for kernel anti-cheats but would help for productivity software. Microsoft could either choose to say this is not a white box implementation and take down the project but it would hurt anything LLM-related since all LLM-based projects could be targeted, or let it live and eat away at Windows (I suspect they'd choose the latter because it's the shiny new thing and would probably not hurt Windows that much).
keithnz 13d ago
Everyone loves to bag on Microsoft, but they are generally quite good at keeping their software patched, they do get it wrong from time to time and everyone jumps on them. I've jumped to Linux as my main OS a while back (though still use windows for work), it's definitely not as seamless as windows is. It's great, I generally love working in linux, and with AI now it's WAY easier to sort out linux issues, but it does not seem anywhere near as polished as windows and I've had to deal with all kinds of niggly little issues with various things (all solvable ish... wayland seems a big source of issues).
- hn_submit 13d ago
  It's not perfect (Linux Mint) but neither is Windows. I mean, there are three or four different UIs in there from different eras. I find Linux far easier to use because you never have to install device drivers. It either works with your hardware or it doesn't.
  - keithnz 12d ago
    not sure what you are trying to say, you don't have to in windows either, it just works, it sorts itself out. Doesn't seem like it has anything to do with "easier to use". Easier to use is like your day to day experience. Windows out of the box is ok, windows with a few tweaks and add ons is really quite good. Linux out of the box is really a starting point for customizing. It's acceptable by default for a bunch of distros, but you do end up having to spend a bunch of time configuring it, then you have the issue with software for different distributions, supported versions, etc. There are various quirks, drivers not quite working right and having to be customized (for instance, I have two separate sounds systems configured because when I play dota2 and discord because one kills the sound in the other for random reasons I could never get to the bottom of, AI couldn't get to the bottom of either, so went with an alternative, and it works fine). I have had so many quirky things happen that I've had to work around. However end result is a system I really love working with, I have customized a lot to match what I like (still have a bunch of things I need to make time to work out how to make it work better). Overall though, I think for the most in most workplaces Linux would be a great default choice these days.

cromka 13d ago

I'm surprised recent MS Office isn't fully supported under Wine yet, given the advantages that LLMs give in reverse engineering stuff. EDIT: Well, should have searched first before posting: https://itsfoss.com/news/bottles-microsoft-365-early-look/ https://itsfoss.com/news/bottles-microsoft-365-early-look/

Krssst 13d ago
I generally assume Wine cannot use LLMs considering developers that have been in contact with Windows code cannot contribute and LLMs almost certainly were. Edit: for reference: https://gitlab.winehq.org/wine/wine/-/wikis/Developer-FAQ https://gitlab.winehq.org/wine/wine/-/wikis/Developer-FAQ No such reference to LLMs possibly being trained on Windows code however. Well maybe AI companies were careful to remove problematic data from the training set.
- EMIRELADERO 13d ago
  That would be a stupid application of the rule, it would mean no developer could use an LLM for anything that already has a proprietary alternative with heavily documented internals or leaked source code.
  - Krssst 13d ago
    Not so sure, if the LLM has been overfitted and can just throw back something equivalent to the original code, then it's no different from a human having seen the code and writing something similar afterwards. On another hand, I'd be curious about Microsoft's reaction if somebody let an agent write a "perfect" Windows emulator/compatibility layer eating away at Windows's market share (assuming that's possible; since it does not exist it's probably not currently). Would not do much for kernel anti-cheats but would help for productivity software. Microsoft could either choose to say this is not a white box implementation and take down the project but it would hurt anything LLM-related since all LLM-based projects could be targeted, or let it live and eat away at Windows (I suspect they'd choose the latter because it's the shiny new thing and would probably not hurt Windows that much).

keithnz 13d ago

Everyone loves to bag on Microsoft, but they are generally quite good at keeping their software patched, they do get it wrong from time to time and everyone jumps on them. I've jumped to Linux as my main OS a while back (though still use windows for work), it's definitely not as seamless as windows is. It's great, I generally love working in linux, and with AI now it's WAY easier to sort out linux issues, but it does not seem anywhere near as polished as windows and I've had to deal with all kinds of niggly little issues with various things (all solvable ish... wayland seems a big source of issues).

hn_submit 13d ago
It's not perfect (Linux Mint) but neither is Windows. I mean, there are three or four different UIs in there from different eras. I find Linux far easier to use because you never have to install device drivers. It either works with your hardware or it doesn't.
- keithnz 12d ago
  not sure what you are trying to say, you don't have to in windows either, it just works, it sorts itself out. Doesn't seem like it has anything to do with "easier to use". Easier to use is like your day to day experience. Windows out of the box is ok, windows with a few tweaks and add ons is really quite good. Linux out of the box is really a starting point for customizing. It's acceptable by default for a bunch of distros, but you do end up having to spend a bunch of time configuring it, then you have the issue with software for different distributions, supported versions, etc. There are various quirks, drivers not quite working right and having to be customized (for instance, I have two separate sounds systems configured because when I play dota2 and discord because one kills the sound in the other for random reasons I could never get to the bottom of, AI couldn't get to the bottom of either, so went with an alternative, and it works fine). I have had so many quirky things happen that I've had to work around. However end result is a system I really love working with, I have customized a lot to match what I like (still have a bunch of things I need to make time to work out how to make it work better). Overall though, I think for the most in most workplaces Linux would be a great default choice these days.