“Okay, I switched to Linux, now I’m getting this error message: _______.”
“Install ______.”
“It gives me this error now: ______.”
“You have to update the _____ library first.”
“It won’t let me.”
“You have to use sudo.”
“It tells me to clone the git via the command line, but git says verifying login from command line isn’t supported any more.”
“You’re following seven year old instructions.”
“They’re the only instructions I can find.”
“You should switch to this other flavor of Linux.”
TIHI
I do not prefer apt-based systems, but I’ve installed variations of Ubuntu (e.g. Mint) on systems for geriatric (grand)parents in the past 5 years and have not yet needed to drop into shell to fix something.
If the needs are basic (browsing, email, printing, documents), Linux hasn’t needed wizardry for years. This is mostly thanks to Gnome and KDE’s hard work on GUI admin tools, but if someone is going directly from Windows to i3, they’ve chosen a steep hill to climb.
Switch to Linux and spend way more time making sure everything is updated and having to jump through hoops installing things.
No idea what you mean. I just quickly wanted to update before calling it a night, got a grub update and now it neither boots the default nor the fallback image. I use Arch BTW.
That is not a problem on any of the major distros, so I’m not sure what you’ve been using. Most distros have a GUI package manager that is awesome and you can update with just a few clicks. So what hoops are you jumping through, and how is this such a problem that it’s costing you time?
Lol, this was almost 15 years ago and i was just a dumb impatient kid messing around with CentOS. I mainly stopped using it because I couldn’t game on it and I didn’t have as much spare time at school.
And now you’re grown, right? No longer a dumb impatient kid? But still spouting off an opinion of a dumb impatient kid that is out of date by 15 years?
Seriously getting worked up by a lighthearted joke huh? Lol, you need to calm down buddy. I’m not in the least intimidated or bothered by you and I’m not arguing with someone over something silly like this.
Not sure why you think I’m upset, or that I’m trying to intimidate you… I’m merely confirming your position, in your own words. If you think I’m insulting you by confirming that position, well then, you may want to reflect on it a bit longer. Also, there is nothing to argue about, you’re objectively wrong.
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What on earth? Maintaining my Fedora machine has been a breeze, and most games work out the box whenever you install them on Steam!
Gaming has become the main task I expect my Linux device to do expertly!
I can confirm this as a Fedora user.
All I do is I let the updater run every day. It’s identical to how Windows does it, and it updates and fixes things.
As far as gaming goes, I either install it via Steam directly, or I use Bottles and I have Bottles put a link into Steam for me, and then I launch it from Steam.
My grandma runs Ubuntu and has gotten by fine without the command line
Just use nobara or pop!_OS, makes everything a lot easier
Yeah I’m not sure the last time you used Linux but it’s nothing like that these days. As long as you stick with a well established distribution you’ll be fine. I haven’t had to go in a “fix” an update in a while, even in some of the beta updates they’re fairly stable.
Lol I used CentOS over 10 years ago so I know it’s not the same. At some point I’ll likely mess around with Linux again. It’s amusing seeing how some got my joking around and others seemed to take it seriously. Maybe I should have put /s or something at the end of what I said. Oh well
Gaming on Linux is easier now but these Linux communities love gaslighting people. Go to any SteamDeck/Linux sub and you’ll find tons of people having issues they wouldn’t have in Windows.
And brick your install when you want to use a package made for an older version of your distro. Got Debian 11? Good luck running that utility built for Debian 10! (or Ubuntu 22.04 and utility built for 18.04)
Mostly just when you initially install like most OSes ; browsers, office suits, game launchers, etc… My mother doesn’t even notice fedora automatically installing updates when she turns her PC off. (I enabled automatic updates for her)
Even with my arch Linux install with Hyprland, most of the time I just update before I turn it off. With a terminal command but even that is just
paruand my password orflatpak update. If I had kde or gnome desktop, I could set it up to auto update too.Sometimes I don’t even bother and use the computer without updating it for a couple of months or it automatically updates when I install new software.
I accept this fate.
Lol, I’m not hating. I’ve had Linux before but it took more time then I had at that point learning and I mainly use my personal computers for gaming. Which is less of a headache on windows. That’s just me though.
I’m on windows 10, use my PC for work and gaming. The thing with windows is that it works right out of the box, all major softwares are developed for windows in mind. When shit stops working is when you start messing with stuff that isn’t your typical “start the PC -> download program -> install -> run the program -> shut off” which is what most users do. Updating the os, softwares and GPU drivers are easy tasks.
It’s when you start messing with python or softwares that aren’t too mainstream and require a bit more effort that things have the potential to break. Even then, the os itself won’t break on you unless you really try. I broke windows a few times in 15 years but it’s worth mentioning that I was manually and willingly changing registry keys and messing with a lot of other stuff. Even then most of the time I was able to fix it.
With Linux is different. If you just use the OS for basic stuff like browsing the internet and editing documents you should be fine for the most part (if you choose a user friendly and stable distro like Ubuntu or Mint). The moment you try getting to run niche softwares or something that requires you to manually open the command prompt to change things in order to accomodate what you’re trying to achieve, that’s where it gets tough for most people. That’s how Linux works, it’s the user’s fault though not the machine’s.
I never claimed it wasn’t user error. This was almost 15 years ago and I was just a dumb impatient kid messing around with CentOS.
Might want to try again if you haven’t updated your opinion for 15 years. Updating is so much easier and faster on Linux than windows nowadays. You don’t really need the terminal unless you want to on the easier distros. Everytime I see that Windows update screen at work I remember one of the main reasons I abandoned it at home. The software centers make life so much easier than windows. The software updates on its own so you don’t click on a program and then have to update it. Life, imo, is just better with Linux.
Fair enough. I would never recommend anyone to switch to Linux unless they absolutely need it for certain applications that are not possible on Windows. Linux requires some level of expertise to operate, that’s the truth because the moment something small breaks (could be something as silly as the package manager) and you don’t know how to trace it back or you don’t know basic terminal commands, you essentially stepped on your own foot.
I was running Majaro on my old laptop that I only used for basic tasks (mostly studying and taking notes), until I needed the laptop for a music project I was working on. I couldn’t even find the drivers for my audio interface or get any DAW to properly work on Linux, let alone all the plugins I needed. I had to reinstall Windows.
Now if I ever needed Linux (which I haven’t in a long time) I have a VM set up for it.
For me, it’s the right OS for the job. I use Linux for servers, Windows for gaming/work, and MacOS for gaming/personal. However, Linux Gaming is definitely coming along partly thanks to Proton (Valve).
Ah that’s right I had heard something about that. Hopefully it continues improving so people don’t feel like they have to choose either Linux or gaming and can base it purely on which OS they like better.
You can play the vast majority of games easily on Linux right now.
I’ve been a gamer my whole life, and I currently have a Linux system and I play every game I want to play on there just fine, either through Steam and/or Bottles/Steam.
Fedora. Flatpak. Good experience chheeck.
FUD
I remember I had a date with a girl back in the’10s. We hit it off and got back to her place. Wanted to show her a funny Internet video.
She brought out an ancient laptop that refused to boot and said her Ex had tried to fix it with Linux.
I got it pointed at the right dependencies, she fellated me as it updated.
I think this is my only sexy story that includes Linux.
Well, I guess there was this one time I loaned a lonely neighbor DOS 6 disks.
But, that does not include Linux.
My suspicion is it’s not just your sexy Linux story but the only sexy Linux story.
I mean we all know that recompiling the kernel is practically a replacement for sex
Never been to PenguiCon, I guess.
Is that the furry Linux con?
This is the best blowjob story I’ve read yet lol
Switch to Linux! Then you can have problems with Linux.
The problems are different, and you can fix them in Linux. However, if you like dogshit workflows, a lack of customization, no control or the feeling like your OS is in control instead of you, ads in your OS, and telemetry data being sent, then Windows is the far better option.
I made the switch to linux that time they had three bad patches in a row and nothing was working. Every issue I have had in an issue in linux I am able to fix myself since nothing is obfuscated. I was using x11 rewritten by some Croatian dude as a proof of concept because it was the only thing that allowed torch to address the video card properly. Run into an issue in windows and find out that neither the manufacturer nor microsoft are supporting your product. Nothing i can do about it. Utterly rage inducing.
If you run an office and need your computers to be relatively idiotproof, use Windowss
And lock that damn Windows DOWN. Windows isn’t idiotproof if you can install just about any software you want.
My wife is not tech savvy at all… no problem on Linux.
Or just specific software that is not available on Linux.
i’m sorry, i’ve been out of the loop, and i haven’t used windows on my own machines since XP quit being supported, but, fucking ads in the OS. i don’t know if you’re having me on or not.
It’s ads for other Microsoft products, and some things that will very obviously get ads in the future, like news, but actually don’t and nobody can explain how.
So yes, there are ads, but not the way you probably imagined. (Yet?)
And candy crush, don’t forget the OG!
Imagine playing solitaire and everytime you flip the draw pile a 30 second unskippable online casino ad plays.
I have seen mobile games that are like this.
Some even happen to be popular, so I have no idea what people consider fun.
The ones that make me laugh uncontrollably are those Windows disk encryption issues for which the solution is…wait for it… run Linux from a LiveISO, fix the disk with Linux, then reinstall Windows. Because Windows is incapable of fixing its own issues that it itself caused.
Windows lacking tooling to fix issues caused by its own malfeasance was what made my switch to Linux permanent. I used a LiveCD to fix file system issues that Windows had no tools for unless I wanted to pay thousands for janky third-party tools. Once I did that and recovered most of my lost data, I thought long and hard and just said “fuck it, I’ll use Linux”.
None of my family will run Linux, however, on my recommendation. I can cope with Linux’s … selective set of user friends. They can’t, and I’ll be damned if I turn into free tech support.
As a former computer service technician, we used Ubuntu Live USB and DVDs (yes it was a long ago) a lot.
No, you don’t say “switch to Linux”. This is an opportunity to be free from the shackles of being the go-to IT support person! If they say they are having computer problems, ask “Is it Linux? No? Sorry, can’t help you”
“Let me Bing that for you”
I’ve Binged It On and gotten bonked.
From my experience you wind up just hitting up YouTube or stack exchange or something similar for a tutorial on how to do something that could work out the box on a Windows machine
50% of the time the Microsoft forum help solution for any Windows problem is “Have you tried Re-installing Windows?”
- source, my ass
Or
sfc scannow, absolute classicHey, don’t mock it like that! It actually worked for me once… Out of the 300 times I’ve seen it suggested over the course of my 5 years doing helpdesk.
A non-technical end-user once had a problem with Windows. A technical friend said “SWITCH TO LINUX”. Now they have thousands of problems.
I’ve been a non-stop user of Linux as my primary OS since before Ubuntu was a thing. I do not recommend Linux systems to my non-technical friends.
My Aunt bought a new laptop to run her eBay/Facebook selling business on. She’s not particularly techy but has used Windows machines for admin work for prob 20 years or so. Laptop had no office apps installed and she tracks everything in a spreadsheet. Original plan was to install Libreoffice but it was running some budget version of Windows 10 you can’t install anything on, can’t remember what it’s called. So I installed Fedora. Chromium and Libreoffice Calc open on login, her ancient HP printer works, she’s able to access her camera as USB mass storage when she lists items and unattended upgrades are enabled. That was 2 years ago, no problems since.
Cool story, bro. And for every such cool story you can bring up I can bring you a hundred, probably, of people who got set up on Linux and returned to Windows because it was a horror show from their perspective.
Let me give you the clue: “The Year of the Linux Desktop” has been declared with monotonous regularity since the 1990s. It still hasn’t arrived. There’s a reason for this, and the quicker Linux (and other F/OSS) advocates grasp why this is, the quicker will the year actually arrive.
Until then, Linux is a fringe OS for techies. (And there it excels. As I said, I’ve been a non-stop user of it for ages.)
I totally agree that can happen. My first experience with Linux was installing Slackware from a CD I got with a magazine at 16. Install worked but I couldn’t really do much with it with no internet connection so abandoned it. Also I hosed the Windows partition when trying to set up dual boot so got banned from the family PC for a while.
Mind clarifying?
Windows S can be turned off, but it does require an internet connection.
I don’t because I don’t wanna be that guy.
But in general these days, I’d absolutely recommend it. Anything in the debian family is just as easy to use as windows. As long as you hook them up with some good cron jobs for auto updates and rollbacks on failures and stuff, they’ll be right as rain.
To be clear, I wouldn’t have in like 2015.
I installed Linux to my tech illiterate parents. They are doing fine. No issues in years.
They probably stopped asking you for help and just used their phones.
I tried to install I think Ubuntu for my parents. I failed to find a way to properly allow short/simple passwords after like 2 hours of fiddling with configs. Gave up on it after that.
As long as the distro is stable anyone can use it to use a browser and browse the internet. I had put Ubuntu Linux for my mom on a laptop, back in 2010, she was using just the browser. She had it for 2 years, no problems. She did nothing else with that laptop though, because that was the first time she was using a computer. She was mostly facebooking.
ngl, the “switch to linux” crowd is close to a vibe of complaining that “my car is making some weird sounds” and the response is to “buy a new car!” I mean, it would solve the problem of not having that issue with windows/your car, but it also means you have to intrusively replace your workflow and probably find some entirely new programs to do what you already could, and potentially have many new, less explicable problems, just to not have that one tiny problem that you could live around.
Often it’s worse. It like telling people to move to a different country because the roads are better there.
As a petrol head, that is a very convincing argument to move.
“My ISP, the only ISP available where I live, is terrible and unreliable.”
“You should move.”
That’s the “switch to Linux” energy in a nutshell.
Yeah nah I think of it kinda like the whole custom ROMs thing for Android. Most people could care less until performance drops to the degree that they have to switch over
Car is making some weird sounds -> you slipped a bearing, your head gasket is blown, or something else catastrophic, because you bought a Ford/Kia/etc. -> buy a new car
Ehh
More like someone saying
“Then change the station”
When someone complains
“I don’t like the ads on this radio station that I listen to in my car on the drive home”
There’s no financial loss by doing so, it’s relatively easy, just have to find out which frequency another broadcast you like is playing on
But the other radio doesn’t play the vital radio show you need for work.
You know, I can’t remember the last time that changing the station on my radio required me to sift through thousands of subtly out of date web pages to find clues as to why I just can’t hear that one guitar riff.
Linux will only be the solution when it finally learns to adequately cater to a better class of idiots. Once Linux handles a fool as well as Windows, then we can talk.
Pretty much. I’d absolutely love to run an idiot proof distro. If one existed.
Mint is right there. Very foolproof as far as I’ve tested with family and friends.
It’s what I have installed on my parents computer. Somewhat painful to do any sort of development in it though.
It’s really not primed for development. I’d use Arch, Fedora, openSUSE or Debian for that.
Indeed. I’ve been on Arch for a few years, and it’s great 99% of the time.
But I really hate how sometimes you sit down to work and something broke and you have to tinker to figure out why instead of focusing on what you want to focus.
That’s the reason why I don’t main Arch. I’m already past the point where I have all the patience to tinker the conflicts away.
You’d think so, but like my experience with other distros people suggest as more stable has been even worse. I’ve never tried Debian, but I swear, next time this breaks down I’m going for that one and being happy with my packages from 1997.
Can I use Photoshop/lightroom and all the other software I need for work and play yet?
Gaming through Steam/Proton is easy and performant, but some games have invasive anti-cheat that won’t work on Linux, and some game companies turn Linux support purposely off.
Photoshop and Lightroom both probably work through Wine (or maybe even Proton), but it isn’t guaranteed. Best option is to work with alternatives. I switched from PS to Krita years ago and have been happier than ever with the switch.
There are many resources on Linux software that are alternatives (and often compatible with) windows-only software.
Can you use windows software on Mac or Android? It’s a different OS, tho wine and proton can make Photoshop and Lightroom work, it’s hit or miss tho. Most games work too save anti-cheat ones for some reason.
It wasn’t trying to be snarky, just genuinely asking because I’d love to switch to Linux and check in now and then but until I can safely work with heavy graphics processes on it reliably, I can’t switch. Main tools are DaVinci Resolve, Photoshop+LR, Blender, and Inkscape. For personal I make music with Bitwig (which has a Linux version I know that) and some other stuff, and I game on it now and then (drone simulator on Steam with a radio controller on usb, sometimes a bit of WoW), but these days I mostly game downstairs on the Xbox anyway.
Ubuntu does this well with gnome shell, where it’s more like using a mobile device that a desktop. To be truly idiot proof you just need to prevent actually interesting software from being installed :D
Well… I jokingly told my friend to switch to Linux - that guy switched and I can attest to it that he is much happier now 😁
As someone who has had been around Linux-based people and whenever I have had a single gripe about Windows - it’s this.
I don’t have a hate boner with Linux, I just feel like Linux is a little too much for the average casual user. Everything is fine until they run into a single issue with Linux, if the bewilderment of not having their familiar easy to run programs that they had on Windows wasn’t a turn off for them from the get-go.
I would disagree with “average casual user” or maybe I think about them differently. For me average casual user now is completely fine with Linux distribution like Mint or Ubuntu or similar (or maybe chrome os). And with that they are little bit safer online as they are usual targets and victims of malicious software etc.
I think casual users are type of people completely happy with internet browser, media player, image viewer and just basic software … They are usually satisfied with regular Android phone Wich is enough for everything they do in computer space.
This type of users (like my mother and other members of family) are fine with major Linux distros. They don’t care about OS they use, it means nothing to them.
This is where I draw the line when suggesting Linux to people. If they don’t know and don’t care …Linux is usually fine. If they are aware of what type of os they use or even what version ( talking about Windows) I will suggest Linux only if they are open to it and I’m willing to help and recommend some software alternatives.
This is the way
This is the way
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Thing is, linux is not suitable for general crowd.
How do you play Diablo 4 on Linux again? 4K while we’re at it?
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Given that you need to install non-native hi rez textures to play Diablo 4 in 4k on Windows, that is not a good test for the “general crowd”.
The moment you get into any kind of high end gaming PCs, you’ve already left “general crowd” territory for most computer users.
Then lets scale down to suit the new narrative.
How do normal users play diablo 4 linux in HD like install and play on Windows?
Install Lutris.
Use the battle net install helper for Lutris.
Launch battle net.
Profit.
It’s like one extra step (install Lutris) compared to Windows. Using Linux doesn’t have to be some archaic mystery and the proliferation of the steam deck is doing wonders at improving the ease of use of all this stuff.
Personally, I don’t really mess with battlenet games at all, but my understanding is that you can open Lutris and install battlenet pretty easily. Then just like on Windows, you install Diablo via their installer, and for most people, it works out of the box.
You can also download battlenet directly and add it as a non steam game to steam and then run it using their Proton compatibility option. This also works on the steam deck.
Look, I’ll be the first one to say that gaming on Linux is not as easy as it can be on Windows. But it is definitely not a bad experience, and hard core gaming is not the majority use case for computers. We have billions of PC users in the world. Under 3 million play Diablo 4. That is a fraction of a fraction of a percent.
Tbh I would probably only bother to use a Linux machine for a media server really, Windows isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, computer games, widespread office and engineering support, general purpose software support and the fact that everyone uses it is the big three reasons why it’s still around, just look at how well Android has managed to stick around.
I think the only way for Linux to get ahead would be to offer easy potential alternatives to all these things, even then they’re only just competing
Bird 1: I have some trouble with Linux.
Bird 2: Whistles and flies off…
No, bird 2 then screams at bird 1 for using Ubuntu and recommends <FLAVOR OF THE MONTH HERE> distro that will totally work and is totally easy to use despite the lack of documentation. It’s then bird 1’s fault if they can’t get their niche hipster distro to work.
I am unfortunately guilty of recommending niche “hipster” distros back in the day. Now I know to recommend the basics. Or just nothing at all so I don’t have to be unpaid tech support.
The hardest part is that the solution is often: Use subpar *buntu based distro for a month or 2 then get good enough to use Arch or something based off of it.
I’m really hoping that valve’s public release of Arch based Steam OS is good enough that I can just recommend that to people.
How would you say arch is for software support vs Ubuntu?
Anything that isn’t supported can usually be found either by flatpak or in the Arch User Repository.
