Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

An Ode to Linux Desktop Users Everywhere

levlaz.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 135 posts

Re: An Ode to Linux Desktop Users Everywhere

#91

Post by listrophy »

fieryskiff wrote: post #85
listrophy wrote: post #77

Flagging as off-topic per "Political Detox Week": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13108404 This "story" does not satisfy "substantive" and qualifies as "ideological." > What Hacker News is: a place for stories that gratify intellectual curiosity and civil, substantive comments. What it is not: a[n]... ideological... battlefield. Don't get me wrong: I do appreciate Linux on the desktop. But we're not allowed to t…

This is the second post I've seen just this morning trying to shut down a post due to it being "political" when it clearly isn't. I'm sad to say that I saw this coming, and it was a big part of why I didn't like the "experiment". Aside: I only really noticed this post because it was initially at the top of the page due to being new. I probably would have otherwise ignored it.

I don't like the "experiment" either, but there are _always_ unintended consequences to actions. It's not my fault they're doing a crappy "experiment."

Re: An Ode to Linux Desktop Users Everywhere

#92

Post by therealjumbo »

antnisp wrote: post #69
greydius wrote: post #56

> How else can you stare at an empty screen and know that you have to blacklist your video card driver? Or sit in silence while tweaking alsamixer on the command line? Or write bash aliases to reload your network driver kernel module each time your laptop resumes from suspension? The good old days! I've been a desktop Linux user for going on a decade. Yes, it used to be a mess. Something only someone with technical a…

I regularly have to $sudo systemctl restart NetworkManager.service after suspend on Ubuntu LTS :(.

16.04 or 14.04? I have to do the same after suspend on 16.04 gnome ubuntu, on my personal laptop. Network manager is such a shame on a system that otherwise gives me no trouble. I stay in the terminal and the web browser the vast majority of the time, so I don't need tons of fancy desktop stuff, but if it stays out of my way? Meh, sure whatever.

At work, I have a RNDIS USB network device I need to connect to (work laptop, not personal) and Network Manager is just insane, I don't even know what its trying to do. It only works if I delete the connection every time it boots, and re-add it. I just wish I could figure out where to add it in a config file and never touch it, but all the documentation seems out of date.

Ubuntu is trying to do so many changes in such a short period of time I guess they were bound to have some difficulties but it does seem like Network Manager is the worst of the bunch, otherwise everything else seems great.

Re: An Ode to Linux Desktop Users Everywhere

#93

Post by [deleted] »

staticelf wrote: post #10

I use desktop linux on my work computer, it barely works and I have some issues. Although it's red hat enterprise which is running a lot of old shit. I think using a friendlier distro like Ubuntu or Fedora would probably be a lot better and give a much better experience.

[deleted]

Re: An Ode to Linux Desktop Users Everywhere

#94

Post by msl09 »

greydius wrote: post #56

> How else can you stare at an empty screen and know that you have to blacklist your video card driver? Or sit in silence while tweaking alsamixer on the command line? Or write bash aliases to reload your network driver kernel module each time your laptop resumes from suspension? The good old days! I've been a desktop Linux user for going on a decade. Yes, it used to be a mess. Something only someone with technical a…

I'm afraid hardware support is still all over the place linux. I also had the same experience that everything just works nowadays, but a lot of that is because I buy laptops from well known hardware manufacturers and my current computer is 7 years old. I was surprised to hear from a friend that he had a lot of trouble getting linux recognize his brand new nvidia video card.

Re: An Ode to Linux Desktop Users Everywhere

#95

Post by Fwirt »

After reading many glowing comments, just chiming in with my own anecdote here. As someone who recently gave the Linux desktop a second (third?) chance, my experience seems to match up well with the author's. From what I've seen, the Linux desktop works very well if you have a very "standard" setup - One monitor of average size, one sound output, a very standard network chipset, etc. In other words, a Thinkpad. If you're trying to get everything to work on, say, a living room HTPC with HDMI sound output and an HiDPI UHD display, good luck.

This is of course anecdotal, but my recent experience went something like this:

  - Install Kubuntu for simplicity my wife can relate to. "Oh wow! Most things are actually working out-of-the-box! Even wireless networking!"
  - "Hmm, everything's a little small... Maybe I can just adjust the dpi..." 6 hours of editing config files and restarting daemons later, Qt applications are mostly behaving, Gtk applications are still popping up with random scaling factors between 1x and 3x.
  - "That's funny, the sound is only coming out of the headphone jack..." 3 hours of tweaking settings later, sound over HDMI is *mostly* working, but if I logout and back in then everything believes my audio device has vaporized.
  - Wife walks in and says, "Just install Windows, please."
I know my experience may be unique, but "Just Works" has never been the case for me. I love the concept and ideology of the Linux desktop, but I always end up spending more time editing config files and tearing my hair out than I do actually working. That being said, I'm glad it works well for some of us...

Re: An Ode to Linux Desktop Users Everywhere

#96

Post by taeric »

qwertyuiop924 wrote: post #74
taeric wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oddly, the number one "I can't believe this doesn't just work category" is printers. It is frustrating that I can just start printing from my ubuntu machine, but have to figure out how to get the right drivers for my other machines. As a standard caveat, I don't actually use that many devices on my network. So, YMMV. A lot.

To contrast, IME, CUPS is a pain. Absolutely awful. Printing Just Works everywhere except Linux. And I'm using an EPSON printer, too.

I'm pretty sure if you are ever at a point where you know the name of a service implementation, it likely forced you to use it in anger.

Which is to say, I had forgotten printing was with CUPS since it has been a long time since I had to mess with it. Hate to hear it went so poorly for you.

Re: An Ode to Linux Desktop Users Everywhere

#97

Post by chrisp_dc »

bfrog wrote: post #57

Linux as a desktop has come a long way. Most things Just Work now. I actually enjoy the experience a great deal more than either Windows or Mac at this point, and I'm no Masochist. Windows, Mac... plug a device in, install the driver through some lame wizard. Linux... plug the device in, it Just Works. Windows, Mac... software is out of date, go through dozens different wizards and CLI tools to update all your stuff.…

I agree on the hardware side. However, more times than not I have to fight with the video playback tearing or dropping frames. I've had least amount of problems with ElementaryOS, but that distro has stability problems that counteract the better video playback.

Re: An Ode to Linux Desktop Users Everywhere

#98

Post by nekopa »

moderation wrote: post #75
k__ wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm using xubuntu for years now, but I have the feeling it got heavier every year. Now I'm searching for a better alternative

Xubuntu user for years also. I still find it pretty zippy and everytime I go out looking at alternatives I always come back.

Same here. But I must confess that I do get a new laptop every 2-3 years, so maybe it is getting heavier, but I don't notice it.

But I was surprised recently when win10 killed my ssd, so I installed Xubuntu on the spinning disk. And it runs as fast as win10 did on the ssd. The only thing that does take longer is booting up, but I always had the feeling that windows was cheating somehow, it would boot to the desktop really quick, but it was not a usable desktop. That still took a while to become responsive.

Re: An Ode to Linux Desktop Users Everywhere

#99

Post by eyko »

bfrog wrote: post #57

Linux as a desktop has come a long way. Most things Just Work now. I actually enjoy the experience a great deal more than either Windows or Mac at this point, and I'm no Masochist. Windows, Mac... plug a device in, install the driver through some lame wizard. Linux... plug the device in, it Just Works. Windows, Mac... software is out of date, go through dozens different wizards and CLI tools to update all your stuff.…

Most things on osx/macOS "Just Work". I still use Linux, and have been a linux desktop user for 15 (ish) years, and to this day I still don't even have any hopes of installing any distribution and having one of the following not being an issue:

- Multiple monitors

- Printers / cups

- Suspend / hibernate

- Mounting USB sticks / drives.

- Breaking my system during an upgrade (I've mostly had this issue in deb/rpm systems though, and gentoo, but not so much in arch). You say "run a yum/apt/pacman/whatever update, everything is good to roll"... I'm not sure if you actually believe this.

Re: An Ode to Linux Desktop Users Everywhere

#100

Post by nogbit »

scandox wrote: post #70

I'm using Arch with the i3 window manager for the last 8 months. I've run pacman -Syu (equivalent of apt-get dist-upgrade) probably once a day that entire time. I've had exactly zero problems. It is amazingly smooth. The setup was a mild chore and yes the laptop is UEFI and I am dual booting. But I can't remember the last time I used Windows, though I do remember it seemed insanely slow. I often find myself doing som…

Same, Arch and i3. I keep my hands on the keyboard, mouse for input is worthless except for games and many web sites.
Post reply on HN