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Why Desktop Linux (Still) Sucks. And What We Can Do To Fix It.

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Re: Why Desktop Linux (Still) Sucks. And What We Can Do To Fix It.

#51

Post by wyclif »

thingie wrote: post #28
richardw wrote: post #15

So much of Linux is designed and modified by committee, so change is slow and painful. Apple managed to get a seriously hot UI onto FreeBSD in a (relatively) short time. Linux has everyone and their dog bartering to make changes, so the UI goes nowhere. Stop copying Windows, already. Start menu sucks. Dump X.

Did you listen to the talk? :) X.org is quite an advanced graphic system mostly doing what you want it to do. Throwing it out and trying to make something new (for what gain?) means wasting so much resources that it's not even nice. (And how is X related to some start menu?)

The problem might be that the parent doesn't know the difference between X.org and XFree86.

Re: Why Desktop Linux (Still) Sucks. And What We Can Do To Fix It.

#52

Post by bad_user »

k-zed wrote: post #46

The major advantage of "Desktop Linux" (that I've been using happily for quite a few years now) is that it's utterly unlike Mac OS X or Windows. We use Linux not because it's free, but because it's more comfortable, the UI is better and friendlier, and developing programs for it is a whole hell of a lot easier. Everything Gnome, Ubuntu and this sort of people do work against these advantages. We use Linux because of…

> We use Linux because of its differences

I don't know who you speak for, but it's not about me ... I use Linux because it's cheap and I'm in control.

Other than that I love having aptitude and a good repository, but every once in a while I really wish there was a click-to-install standard and I also really wish I wouldn't burn my weekend over wireless issues.

> developing programs for it is a whole hell of a lot easier

You're not speaking about desktop applications / games. That's hell-like compared to the alternatives, being partly the reason why companies like Adobe aren't investing in it ... I've worked there and I know the arguments that are flying back and forth.

> By every step these people take, Linux gets more difficult to develop for and less comfortable to use. This needs to stop.

People should and will work on whatever they want, and all "wasted effort" arguments are bullshit. If you think there are better paradigms that should be explored, then jump in and show the world how right you are. Talk is cheap.

Re: Why Desktop Linux (Still) Sucks. And What We Can Do To Fix It.

#53

Post by blasdel »

russell_h wrote: post #38
acon wrote: post #11

I think what Linux really needs is to embrace some way of getting software outside apt/yum. Having to go through the package managers forces you to be an administrator to install software, and the developer and user have no say in which version of the application you get. I think Linux distributions should be platforms which developers can develop applications for which they can distribute however they wish. Then use…

Every binary distro I've ever used (SUSE, Debian, Ubuntu, RHEL and Fedora) came with a little GUI that let you install packages without going through a repository. Just download the .deb/.rpm and double click on it. This is how a lot of projects deliver their latest builds. If you're talking about a unified package format (it doesn't seem like it) then thats a completely different issue. As for 'stand-alone' applicat…

But everything packaged that way still demands to be installed as root, linked against their depgraph of ancient fucked-with libraries, and split apart into pointlessly separate packages.

Re: Why Desktop Linux (Still) Sucks. And What We Can Do To Fix It.

#54

Post by k-zed »

bad_user wrote: post #52
k-zed wrote: post #46

The major advantage of "Desktop Linux" (that I've been using happily for quite a few years now) is that it's utterly unlike Mac OS X or Windows. We use Linux not because it's free, but because it's more comfortable, the UI is better and friendlier, and developing programs for it is a whole hell of a lot easier. Everything Gnome, Ubuntu and this sort of people do work against these advantages. We use Linux because of…

> We use Linux because of its differences I don't know who you speak for, but it's not about me ... I use Linux because it's cheap and I'm in control. Other than that I love having aptitude and a good repository, but every once in a while I really wish there was a click-to-install standard and I also really wish I wouldn't burn my weekend over wireless issues. > developing programs for it is a whole hell of a lot eas…

> You're not speaking about desktop applications / games

Those apps aren't hard to develop because libraries or the environment or whatever; they're hard to develop because their developers want them to be closed, so recompilation and putting them into the real package management system is impossible. Starting with such a handicap makes things complicated :)

> If you think there are better paradigms that should be explored, then jump in and show the world how right you are

The better paradigms have been known and used for 20 years (such as the Unix paradigm of connecting multiple programs, the CLI, and so on). That it doesn't appeal to some end users is not our problem.

(also username post combo, but just kidding :)

Re: Why Desktop Linux (Still) Sucks. And What We Can Do To Fix It.

#55

Post by coffeeaddicted »

cookiecaper wrote: post #45
Maro wrote: post #42

Here's one suggestion: adopt the drag & drop software installation model of OSX.

There's no reason this couldn't be done now, someone just needs to implement that in PackageKit and it would work fine on many distros and package managers. The backend and everything is all there, just make a drag and drop event instead of clicking an "Install" button. That said, installation of software on Linux has been one its shining points for a long time. Package management is awesome and neither OS X or Windo…

Some package management (apt) would be better if it would be easier for 3rd party vendors to get into the sources.list. For now you either have to get users to edit that file by hand (for which they might not even have the rights) or you have to use another installation mechanism which avoids the package management to which they are used and lose the advantages of stuff like upgrade. Maybe there should be a sources.list per user which allows normal users also to install software and distros could be set-up to work with a certain file-type in a way that if you click it on the web, then a default installer goes up which guides you all the way through the installation.

Right now the situation is that if you want anything that's not in the "official" package repositories (probably the majority of software ...) you are getting into a world where installation is harder than in any other OS. And that is true as well for open-source applications (you want newest blender or one that is months behind?) as closed-source applications (which simply don't get into official repositories anyway).

I also tried using one of the binary installers for a while, but when it stopped working with newer distros (my application still worked) I guessed that tar.gz and zip are for the moment simply the best I can really offer and that's still what I'm using for now.

Re: Why Desktop Linux (Still) Sucks. And What We Can Do To Fix It.

#56

Post by davidw »

houseabsolute wrote: post #6

If history is any evidence, nothing. :P

Actually, as someone who has used Linux as desktop software since 1996, I would say the exact opposite: it's making rapid progress compared to where it was once. Perhaps it still hasn't quite caught up, but I'm relatively certain that soonish, it will be 'good enough' for an ever-larger segment of the population. It's already 'good enough' for a lot of people.

Re: Why Desktop Linux (Still) Sucks. And What We Can Do To Fix It.

#57

Post by blub »

k-zed wrote: post #46

The major advantage of "Desktop Linux" (that I've been using happily for quite a few years now) is that it's utterly unlike Mac OS X or Windows. We use Linux not because it's free, but because it's more comfortable, the UI is better and friendlier, and developing programs for it is a whole hell of a lot easier. Everything Gnome, Ubuntu and this sort of people do work against these advantages. We use Linux because of…

Not me. I use Linux (among other OSes) because it's Open and Free, and I think that it's important to have an alternative to proprietary systems.

I don't consider it to have a better UI or to be easier to develop for and I feel more comfortable with Windows.

Re: Why Desktop Linux (Still) Sucks. And What We Can Do To Fix It.

#58

Post by vorador »

colonelxc wrote: post #49
machrider wrote: post #47

The audio situation is a total debacle. n-1 of the sound systems need to be killed so we can focus on making the remaining one work really well. It's really funny that this is his first point, because I ran into it just two days ago... the microphone jack on my laptop, which worked fine in Ubuntu hardy, intrepid, and jaunty, no longer works in karmic thanks to the upgrade to pulseaudio (bug has existed in launchpad s…

It is hard to believe that sound can be so broken, after all these years (and looking at the huge strides other parts of the desktop have made). If Ubuntu wants to be the uber-friendly, runs anywhere (just works!) distro, they need to avoid these types of regressions from one version to the next. I know they're not in charge of all the upstream work, but they are the ones that make the decision on what version of pul…

But it's not that simple : often, the bleeding-edge fixes others annoying bugs and it's really hard to have an estimate of the affected population. Maybe they should add an extra step to their installer that would allow to send anonymously data about your hardware configuration to Canonical ?

Re: Why Desktop Linux (Still) Sucks. And What We Can Do To Fix It.

#59

Post by k-zed »

blub wrote: post #57
k-zed wrote: post #46

The major advantage of "Desktop Linux" (that I've been using happily for quite a few years now) is that it's utterly unlike Mac OS X or Windows. We use Linux not because it's free, but because it's more comfortable, the UI is better and friendlier, and developing programs for it is a whole hell of a lot easier. Everything Gnome, Ubuntu and this sort of people do work against these advantages. We use Linux because of…

Not me. I use Linux (among other OSes) because it's Open and Free, and I think that it's important to have an alternative to proprietary systems. I don't consider it to have a better UI or to be easier to develop for and I feel more comfortable with Windows.

Then you need to try the following things: - vim or emacs - tmux or screen - tiling window managers - zsh

Each of these things result in a massive usability increase.

Re: Why Desktop Linux (Still) Sucks. And What We Can Do To Fix It.

#60

Post by sandGorgon »

sirn wrote: post #30
pyre wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I hear, .DEB is a bitch to do anything outside of the norm, whereas .RPM is much easier and less complex of a package format. That said, I much prefer the apt system on Debian, and Ubuntu. What really needs to happen is to take the best of both worlds and merge it into something of a complete system.

Well, like Arch Linux's Pacman and AUR? :) I found Pacman to be easy and simple--on the same level as APT, and when the binary package doesn't do what you want, packing your own package is really easy. http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Pacman http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Arch_Build_System

upvoted for pacman. I actually have only tried arch at a friend's place, because for some anal reason Arch does not provide livecds. Only a command shell from where you must build your system up, which is quite a pain.

But I have only heard good things about pacman (and it's ultra simple package format). It enables Arch's rolling releases model, which means that you are always up2date without having to go from Beserking Baboon to Chittering Chimpanzee.

It is a much saner model for a stable, usable desktop system. If you can manage to combine this with a kernel update technology like ksplice, you have a super stable, updated Linux desktop without ever having to reboot (which makes the whole splash screen effort quite pointless actually)

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