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2022 was the year of Linux on the Desktop?

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Re: 2022 was the year of Linux on the Desktop?

#201

Post by geysersam »

spaceman_2020 wrote: post #39

If I'm honest, Linux is...exhausting. I'm technically proficient, but even the "user-friendly" Ubuntu is a pain to work with. Something as simple as changing the mouse scroll speed requires creating a bash script. Software updates rarely work. There are random crashes that take hours to fix. I'm about to give in the towel and get a Mac. I can get it to work because the terminal doesn't scare me, but there's no way I…

Have the totally opposite experience. Ubuntu has a quite minimal settings panel, that's good.

Windows settings are much more difficult to navigate. The layout / structure has changed a lot between updates. Settings are hidden deep within preferences menus with multiple tabs.

Google for things and you find ad ridden pages with screenshots and pop-ups about clicking here, there, then here.

It's a mess.

Re: 2022 was the year of Linux on the Desktop?

#202

Post by whateveracct »

vbezhenar wrote: post #155
Arbortheus wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In principle I would love to use Linux, as the developer experience isn’t great on Windows, and I would rather not be tied into expensive Apple computers. However, I don’t want to learn about components of my operating system, that is below my pay grade. I’m not trying to spread FUD, I’m speaking firsthand on some of the experiences my colleagues have had with their brand new $3000 business Thinkpads running all mann…

How can learning of your tools being below your pay grade? Ability to use tools properly is a prerequisite for any professional. That sounds very weird to me.

Software development is full of anti-intellectualism and friends. So many "professionals" don't think they should Learn New Things. Said "professionals" tend to be excellent org chart climbers otoh.

Re: 2022 was the year of Linux on the Desktop?

#203

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet »

LarryMullins wrote: post #183
joe_the_user wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but that is a fairly obscure setting that I don't think merits your earlier build-up "Something as simple as..." . On the one hand, I'd certainly admit Linux has "warts". It's GUI is perfectly usable and clear - it's more now what one is doing than the horror that is Windows 11 imo (and I'm working on that occasionally now). But the warts of Linux are accentuated by the OS attracting a certain kind of "OCD" use…

Nah, it's pretty inexcusable for Gnome to not surface such a setting. LXQt's mouse configuration GUI lets you configure it, and LXQt has no more than a handful of people working on it. Gnome has more developer resources and could implement this easily, but they also have an attitude problem and bad priorities.

Yeah, the clear problem here is GNOME and it's arrogant disregard for users... Which I guess really is historically in line with Linux culture, unfortunately.

Re: 2022 was the year of Linux on the Desktop?

#204

Post by Legogris »

spaceman_2020 wrote: post #39

If I'm honest, Linux is...exhausting. I'm technically proficient, but even the "user-friendly" Ubuntu is a pain to work with. Something as simple as changing the mouse scroll speed requires creating a bash script. Software updates rarely work. There are random crashes that take hours to fix. I'm about to give in the towel and get a Mac. I can get it to work because the terminal doesn't scare me, but there's no way I…

> Ubuntu is a pain to work with. Something as simple as changing the mouse scroll speed requires creating a bash script.

This is Ubuntu and GNOME both having adopted unfortunate strategies wrt UX in recent years. They seem to be trying to emulate the Apple "we know best, take it or leave it", removing customization and freezing the UI, but without the resources spent on getting it "perfect" for the majority. They may still be fine choices for some users but they closed the door on being the "just use this" generic options.

KDE has supported changing mouse scroll from the UI for some time. Linux Mint (including its Debian edition) with MATE or Cinnamon, or BudgieWM are other fine choices for non-terminal users. Fedora has been picking up as a general all-round desktop distro as Ubuntu has been falling from grace.

https://www.phoronix.com/news/KDE-Now-Has-Wayland-S-Speed

Re: 2022 was the year of Linux on the Desktop?

#205

Post by whateveracct »

uneekname wrote: post #116
andrewstuart wrote: post #93

I can’t consider Linux desktop until copy and paste is consistent and seamless and lets me use the macOS key combination everywhere. And of course all this should just work, not be a series of cli commands and configs.

because it's usually Ctrl + Shift + C to copy from a terminal? Otherwise I haven't noticed much inconsistency on the distros I've used

It's pretty much just that. People get hooked on the beautiful consistency of the command key and overrate how much value-add it really provides. They'll make arguments about how often they copy-paste and how every bit of complexity fills up their brain and other pseudoscientific stuff.

Re: 2022 was the year of Linux on the Desktop?

#206

Post by sophacles »

spaceman_2020 wrote: post #39

If I'm honest, Linux is...exhausting. I'm technically proficient, but even the "user-friendly" Ubuntu is a pain to work with. Something as simple as changing the mouse scroll speed requires creating a bash script. Software updates rarely work. There are random crashes that take hours to fix. I'm about to give in the towel and get a Mac. I can get it to work because the terminal doesn't scare me, but there's no way I…

Observation:

I started daily driving linux in the 90s. When I switched to a mac around 2010 if found Mac exhausting. It had different usage patterns than I was used to. Some of my most used features weren't there. Having a reasonably usable shell experience required lots of tweaking and macports then brew. When I switched back to linux ~5 years ago there was a while where getting back into the linux groove was exhausting because I wasn't used to it, but not as exhausting as switching to mac because I already knew it, just needed to get back in practice.

Every time i use windows (which is rarely, once a year maybe) i find it exhausting.

I propose that it's not the OS that's the exhausting part - it's the switching to a new environment with different workflows and thought processes around it that is exhausting. Similar to how it's much harder to get familiar with a codebase in a new (to you) language than in a language you are proficient in - but both cases can be taxing.

Re: 2022 was the year of Linux on the Desktop?

#207

Post by rhaway84773 »

spaceman_2020 wrote: post #39

If I'm honest, Linux is...exhausting. I'm technically proficient, but even the "user-friendly" Ubuntu is a pain to work with. Something as simple as changing the mouse scroll speed requires creating a bash script. Software updates rarely work. There are random crashes that take hours to fix. I'm about to give in the towel and get a Mac. I can get it to work because the terminal doesn't scare me, but there's no way I…

On the flip side, Linux is infinitely more useful to me than Windows. My desktop’s motherboard’s onboard graphics card failed but I have an external graphics card. Windows is unable to boot because of the failed onboard card. Ubuntu worked absolutely fine. I had to modify 1-2 lines in a configuration to prevent Ubuntu from loading the onboard graphics at all, otherwise it would start off funky.

And MacOS is just too slow. There’s far too many animations and it’s extremely difficult to multitask in a useful way.

It’s like Apple has basically been creating MacOS features based on 2 criteria’s. Either so they look good in a demo, or they’re a replica of an iOS app.

Re: 2022 was the year of Linux on the Desktop?

#208

Post by whateveracct »

MacOS and Windows treat their users like idiots. Since I have technical proficiency, I like to be able to use it. Using forked software, scripting, low-level config. It's frustrating how much of a pain in the ass that stuff can be on non-Linux desktop environments.

That's my main motivation to using Linux as my daily driver (3 years now).

Re: 2022 was the year of Linux on the Desktop?

#209

Post by Legogris »

AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #203
LarryMullins wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nah, it's pretty inexcusable for Gnome to not surface such a setting. LXQt's mouse configuration GUI lets you configure it, and LXQt has no more than a handful of people working on it. Gnome has more developer resources and could implement this easily, but they also have an attitude problem and bad priorities.

Yeah, the clear problem here is GNOME and it's arrogant disregard for users... Which I guess really is historically in line with Linux culture, unfortunately.

GNOME and Ubuntu are not representative of "Linux culture".

Re: 2022 was the year of Linux on the Desktop?

#210

Post by kibwen »

jerrygenser wrote: post #51

Ironic for me. 2019, 2021 and half of 2022 were the years that I went all in on Ubuntu for desktop. It was an overall awesome experience as a developer.... and then Zoom and Slack started crashing randomly or having weird bugs where I'd needed to restart the app or even the machine in order to get them working again. 2022 is the year I switched back to windows as my development experience with WSL2 + being able to us…

Note that you don't even need apps, you can just use Zoom and Slack from your web browser. (For Zoom especially, nobody should be trusting their native client in the first place after their security debacles. Your browser is a convenient security boundary.) If your browser locks up to the point where it requires you to restart your machine, that sounds like a much more serious problem.
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