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Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2016 Edition

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Re: Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2016 Edition

#361

Post by jamiesonbecker »

sangnoir wrote: post #201
SEJeff wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not so sure I really disagree. If I had to guess, I'd think there are a lot more people working on the Linux kernel in aggregate than on either the Windows kernel or the OS X kernel.

Aren't a significant chunk of those people "working on the linux kernel" 1-commit wonders? My guess is if we rank by man-hours, Windows would top the list, possibly followed by OS X.

Most committers only review or care about a small area of code, and thus have a lower frequency of commits. That's a good thing, IMO.

Re: Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2016 Edition

#362

Post by JupiterMoon »

peatfreak wrote: post #346
simoncion wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The Lenovo X140e is a ThinkPad. Oh, heh. Derp. Edit: I mean to say: My bad. I overlooked that. :( I see at [0] that the only Ubuntu Certified configuration is with a rather ancient pre-installed version of Ubuntu. Did you get the system in that configuration, or did you purchase it and put Linux on it? [1] Regardless. Why didn't you return it and get something that worked ? Curiosity? Cussedness? > [I]t's simply to…

> I find it reasonable to spend between a couple of days to a week researching the suitability of something that I'll use throughout the day, every single day for next three-to-ten years. Perhaps my opinion is atypical. Aargh, this is precisely the sort of attitude that is causing problems in the first place! Of course some research is necessary prior to any purchase, but the issue here is that clear and correct info…

So just get a laptop with pre-installed Linux then...

Re: Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2016 Edition

#363

Post by sangnoir »

colin_mccabe wrote: post #319
sangnoir wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aren't a significant chunk of those people "working on the linux kernel" 1-commit wonders? My guess is if we rank by man-hours, Windows would top the list, possibly followed by OS X.

The desktop computer market is a pretty small part of the overall kernel developer market. Embedded systems is by far the biggest employer. There are just many more phones and other devices out there than PCs-- a trend that seems set to continue. Linux dominates embedded systems and the server market, so I would expect it to dominate the overall mindshare numbers as well. I would expect OS X to have the least number…

I wasn't sure OS X would be ahead of Linux, that's why I hedged my statement.

Also, while the embedded Linux ecosystem is rather large, what fraction is kernel code that gets upstreamed/mainlined? As an outsider, my guess that it's a minority (some work with is on non-kernel code, and not all through embedded kernel code changes are/will be in the mainline kernel, so I would not count those as actual contributions).

I say this as a Linux desktop user/layman.

Re: Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2016 Edition

#364

Post by unethical_ban »

daave wrote: post #173

When visiting this blog post on my Android phone, the ads (or something) redirect me to a page with popups telling me my phone has a virus and encouraging me to install an app to 'clean' it, using Google branding on some dodgy domain. I seem to get a different one each time. Reported it at https://www.google.com/safebrowsing/report_phish/ but mentioning here so that others don't fall victim to it.

http://sitereview.bluecoat.com/sitereview.jsp#/?search=http%...

The page you want reviewed is http://linuxfonts.narod.ru/

This page is currently categorized as Suspicious

Last Time Rated/Reviewed: > 7 days

This page has a risk level of High

Re: Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2016 Edition

#365

Post by stonemetal »

spoiler wrote: post #327
stonemetal wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Red Hat, Google, IBM and many others And they are all working on desktop\Laptop support right? Linux is great in the data center because it has big guns behind it in the data center. Linux runs well on cell phones because Google put in the effort. As soon as someone is willing and able to put in the effort on desktop Linux, it will be as good as it is in those other areas.

I think everyone can agree that Linux's biggest shortcomings on desktops/laptops are the graphical and audio part. So, even though I agree with "As soon as someone is willing and able to put in the effort on desktop Linux, it will be as good as it is in those other areas." I would replace "someone" with "every vendor". I feel like most vendors (NVIDIA/ATI/Wacom/whatnot) concentrate much more of their effort into supp…

While it is a vendors issue, they don't just randomly support hardware. They go where the big guys are. As you say NVIDIA\ATI contribute to Direct X, but it happens because MS makes it happen. Google dragged the cell vendors into supporting Android. Desktop Linux just needs a backer that is big enough to make them put forth the effort.

Re: Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2016 Edition

#366

Post by aidenn0 »

xorblurb wrote: post #287
Mikeb85 wrote: post #153

Linux users often take the idea of 'self-examination' way too far and it turns into 'self-disparagement'. The fact is, if you vet your hardware and use a major distro (Ubuntu, OpenSUSE, Fedora) you'll wind up with a perfectly functioning Linux desktop or laptop. You think about it, OSX only runs on a few laptops. Linux runs perfectly on more laptops than exist for OSX. Windows run on many laptops, more often than not…

Exactly. A non negligible part of his rant was about proprietary graphic drivers. Free software developers can't do anything about that, and anyway what is the point? Today, if you want to game just use Windows, if you want a fine Linux laptop get one with something like an Haswell with integrated graphics (or maybe Broadwell, still wait a little for Skylakes) And anyway if you look at what the "competition" sells wh…

> A non negligible part of his rant was about proprietary graphic drivers. Free software developers can't do anything about that, and anyway what is the point?

Whether or not it is fixable by the community is unimportant to an end-user that just wants something that works.

Re: Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2016 Edition

#367

Post by zobzu »

ris wrote: post #352
zobzu wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Use Plasma 5 (which is "KDE5" if you will). KDE4 is not even supported anymore on some distros. It fixes most remaining annoyances of KDE4 and has been really stable for me. Even kmail 5.5 is a huge step forward compared to the buggy kmail 4.x

I'm a debian stable user. KDE5 will come to me when it does. Anyway, I'm truly sceptical of KDE's trajectory now I've been burned a bit (and I'm saying this as a sort-of former "KDE person"). It seems like a lot of focus & motivation was lost around the time of the mobile/tablet/vivaldi distraction nonsense. My main problem with kmail2 is that it feels like POP3/local mail support & local filtering is a (very broken)…

ive no experience with the POP3 support even in kmail5 (I stopped using my last POP account a decade ago at least ;-) but the IMAP support in in kmail5 has been pretty good (it used to be terrible).

That said, I still prefer Thunderbird.

By using Debian stable you choose to use 1 or 2year old technology - so you'll have what I have in 2 years. Courage, that's just 24 month to wait ;-)

Re: Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2016 Edition

#368

Post by peatfreak »

JupiterMoon wrote: post #362
peatfreak wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I find it reasonable to spend between a couple of days to a week researching the suitability of something that I'll use throughout the day, every single day for next three-to-ten years. Perhaps my opinion is atypical. Aargh, this is precisely the sort of attitude that is causing problems in the first place! Of course some research is necessary prior to any purchase, but the issue here is that clear and correct info…

So just get a laptop with pre-installed Linux then...

Can you give me a recommendation?

Re: Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2016 Edition

#369

Post by [deleted] »

JupiterMoon wrote: post #362
peatfreak wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I find it reasonable to spend between a couple of days to a week researching the suitability of something that I'll use throughout the day, every single day for next three-to-ten years. Perhaps my opinion is atypical. Aargh, this is precisely the sort of attitude that is causing problems in the first place! Of course some research is necessary prior to any purchase, but the issue here is that clear and correct info…

So just get a laptop with pre-installed Linux then...

[deleted]

Re: Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2016 Edition

#370

Post by ggreer »

simoncion wrote: post #240
ggreer wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why didn't you return it and get -say- a Thinkpad? The Lenovo X140e is a ThinkPad.[1] I didn't blindly trust Ubuntu's certification. I made sure to get a brand that historically has had good Linux support. I also knew about Nvidia graphics and avoided them. Still, I got burned. I don't doubt your checklist is good advice for buying a Linux laptop, but it's simply too time consuming to check all of those things. Eve…

> The Lenovo X140e is a ThinkPad. Oh, heh. Derp. Edit: I mean to say: My bad. I overlooked that. :( I see at [0] that the only Ubuntu Certified configuration is with a rather ancient pre-installed version of Ubuntu. Did you get the system in that configuration, or did you purchase it and put Linux on it? [1] Regardless. Why didn't you return it and get something that worked ? Curiosity? Cussedness? > [I]t's simply to…

> Did you get the system in that configuration, or did you purchase it and put Linux on it?

I tried to get it with Ubuntu preinstalled, but neither Lenovo's website nor their phone support could configure it that way. After about 20 minutes on the phone, I managed to get the exact hardware configuration shown on Ubuntu's certification page: AMD A4-5000, Broadcom BCM43142, etc. In hindsight, I doubt Lenovo ever sold an X140e with Ubuntu preinstalled.

> Regardless. Why didn't you return it and get something that worked? Curiosity? Cussedness?

When I first turned it on, I noticed the X140e had several annoying LEDs. Both "ThinkPad" logos had glowing red dots in their i's. There was also a large green LED near the camera. It glowed whenever wifi was powered-up (pretty much all the time). I found these annoying, so I painted them over. Oops. Next time I'll use nail polish, which can be removed with acetone.

> I find it reasonable to spend between a couple of days to a week researching the suitability of something that I'll use throughout the day, every single day for next three-to-ten years.

Our thoughts on this matter are quite similar. On average, I spend almost 10 hours a day using my primary development machine. I upgrade every 1-2 years, which works out to 5,400 hours of use. That's a lot of time interacting with one piece of hardware. I definitely want to make sure I get the best tool for the job. That 5,400 hours has another implication: Amortized over the life of the machine, even a $3,000 laptop will only cost ≈50 cents per hour. That makes me extremely insensitive to price. I simply want whatever works best.[1]

As peatfreak said, research won't guarantee satisfaction. The only way to really know if a piece of hardware will work for you is to actually use it. That's one huge advantage of Apple (and now Microsoft) products: I can walk into a store and test the hardware/software combo. In just a few minutes, I can tell if the it lacks the annoyances in my list[2]. These details are extremely hard to verify without actually using the machine.

I would be much more open to getting a Linux laptop if I could try it out before buying. Unfortunately, I don't think the market is big enough to make brick-and-mortar stores feasible.

1. I've written about this in more detail at http://geoff.greer.fm/2010/10/30/expensive-computers-are-wor...

2. http://geoff.greer.fm/2015/07/25/laptop-annoyances-or-why-i-...

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