Just thought the same thing. However, Linux on the Desktop (almost) already had its time, and it passed. It was around 2009, Ubuntu was at its pinnacle, it was

Just thought the same thing. However, Linux on the Desktop (almost) already had its time, and it passed. It was around 2009, Ubuntu was at its pinnacle, it was the time of Compiz and Gnome 2 and transparent terminals and themes and whatever. A lot of my (non-technical) friends were suddenly interested in Linux (well, distros of GNU+X11+Desktop Environment+Free/Open Source applications). This was a free alternative to Windows, better than Vista or XP, actually easier to use for many tasks ("I can't believe that it is so easy to install new fonts, I never knew how to do that on Windows"). This was before all of the experimentation (Gnome 3, Unity, ...) that, while in principle a good thing, the way it was executed effectively killed the old lineages (Gnome 2). When it comes to languages: Python 2.7, and on-topic: Perl 5. This was also before all the annoying in-fighting for mostly political reasons (systemd cough but there are many more examples). I don't know whether politics is an issue for Perl. But that there is no golden way of transitioning to a new version in the FOSS world definitely is a problem that is harming so many projects.