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I love Linux, but I can't quit Windows

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Re: I love Linux, but I can't quit Windows

#201

Post by nijave »

MostlyStable wrote: post #9

The idea that Windows doesn't have it's own weird, mysterious, issues is hilarious to me. For months my windows 10 install would take nearly 5 minutes to start up after a full shutdown sequence. This was with the install on a fast SSD. I tried a whole bunch of things and never figured out what the issue was. Then, one day, it just....went away. I'm not trying to make much of a point other than that: anecdotes aren't…

I've had similar issues with Linux. Usually it's either put up with things breaking in mainline but use latest hardware or sit on LTS on older hardware with better stability.

Windows Performance Analyser and Windows Performance Recorder are pretty easy to use to troubleshoot boot performance and have a nice, simple GUI. For fairness, there's also systemd analyze on Linux

I haven't used Windows in ~5 years but at least with XP to 10 it used to be fairly well documented and not terribly hard to troubleshoot assuming you're willing to do some learning and leg work.

I'd say macOS is the worst in that department--things randomly break just like Windows and Linux but it's largely a blackbox.

Re: I love Linux, but I can't quit Windows

#202

Post by nijave »

Moomoomoo309 wrote: post #125
repelsteeltje wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, like key bindings in IntelliJ that might make sense on Windows or Macintosh, but conflict with Linux defaults. I switched to Linux couple of decades ago, but this second class treatment of Linux desktop is one of the reasons I'm still doing most of my work in the terminal.

To be fair, for IntelliJ, just switch the keymap to the gnome or KDE one (yes, it comes with them ootb) and that problem is fixed.

If you're like me and never use the Gnome/KDE shortcuts, just disable/switch those

Re: I love Linux, but I can't quit Windows

#203

Post by nijave »

graceful6800 wrote: post #178
martinald wrote: post #37

Two thoughts (I was in the same situation, constantly trying desktop Linux then pinging back to Windows after hitting issues). 1) Fedora is really worth a try, it's extremely polished. The best thing is the packages in the repo are generally much more up to date that debian based distros, which maeans less random PPAs to work around it, which cause issues. 2) The biggest change is having Claude Code/Codex able to dia…

Genuine question, how is everyone else dealing with giving agents elevated permissions? Obviously the answer is "don't", but some things are pretty harmless, like journalctl and dmesg, and are pretty useful for debugging the system. I guess you could make a new user to run the harness under and give it no-password sudo rights for select commands? That doesn't feel like a great solution but it's the only thing I can c…

I give it passwordless sudo but don't give it permissions to automatically run commands. I just review what it's running before accepting. If it looks questionable, I interrupt and ask it to explain what/why it wants to run the thing

Re: I love Linux, but I can't quit Windows

#204

Post by nijave »

marysol5 wrote: post #119
isityettime wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only a little over 20 years of Linux experience here. A few years ago, I daily drove Windows for work after not touching it for a decade. There were way more unsolvable riddles in that year on Windows than in my lifetime of desktop Linux usage. And no one else at the company really knew how to dig into their Windows systems, either; the mysteries I solved were all things I had to solve myself. IME Windows people actu…

Thank you! This is exactly my position too. I came through with Windows certs, but had always been a Linux guy, and now work entirely with Linux. Windows people don't actually solve problems, hence the joke about "Turn it off and on again", making it into mainstream. You will very rarely see a Windows person open up a debugger, unless they're an actual developer. Meanwhile on Linux you can peek inside the process tha…

>Meanwhile on Linux you can peek inside the process that's hanging and see what it's borked on.

Windows has pretty robust tooling to do the same, even if no one uses it. Process Monitor (procmon) will trivially tell you the same on Windows. Arguably the GUI is easier to use than strace since you can both proactively and retroactively apply filters. Main issue is letting it run too long and eating up a bunch of RAM with the event buffer

Re: I love Linux, but I can't quit Windows

#205

Post by nijave »

isityettime wrote: post #140
marysol5 wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you! This is exactly my position too. I came through with Windows certs, but had always been a Linux guy, and now work entirely with Linux. Windows people don't actually solve problems, hence the joke about "Turn it off and on again", making it into mainstream. You will very rarely see a Windows person open up a debugger, unless they're an actual developer. Meanwhile on Linux you can peek inside the process tha…

Ages ago I was a PC tech intern at a Windows shop, investigating bluescreens on some Dell mini PC, which I'd never really done before. Some time after I installed WinDbg and started downloading some debug symbols, one of the fulltime guys came by and said "just reinstall Windows". I'd just pinpointed the crash to some driver without figuring out more details at that time. I did it, but I was a little bit heartbroken…

Back when I used Windows I prided myself in my install age. Can't remember if I started on XP but at least made it from 7, 8, 8.1, to 10 over many years, repairing issues as they came up.

DISM largely does the same thing as reinstall without nuking all your files/settings assuming you can get it pointed at a valid source if winsxs doesn't have the thing it needs.

Re: I love Linux, but I can't quit Windows

#206

Post by timbit42 »

Kwpolska wrote: post #185
topaz0 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Libreoffice is also pretty good these days if you need to edit office files, impress has the most compat issues but they are rare even there. In many ways it is more capable than office ime.

The UI is still terrible, still on the level of Microsoft Office 97.

Go to Edit > User Interface. There are 7 options including various ribbons like Microsoft Office.

Re: I love Linux, but I can't quit Windows

#207

Post by ryankrage77 »

BAHKA wrote: post #190
ryankrage77 wrote: post #187

I've also experienced vanilla linux installs breaking more often than Windows. When it's stable, it's incredibly stable, but I've been bitten by a completely vanilla install suddenly being bricked after a reboot, before I've even managed to install anything or change any settings, more than once. Windows has a lot of annoyances and quirks, but generally it seems much more reliable that I'll at least be able to log in…

It would be helpful if you specify the exact distro you consider "vanilla linux install". If it was some rolling release, then ok, that's expected. But I highly doubt you will have any issues like that on a stable distro, like RHEL or Debian. Also, Linux administration requires skills, so... :-D

I've had issues with Arch, Ubuntu, Ubuntu server, Debian, Mint, Fedora, Kali and raspberry pi OS, across about as many machines.

I'm using Mint at the moment, and it's locked up twice more since my last comment. In fairness I've narrows this issue down to some software crashing that's taking the system down with it. But can't help but feel if it was crashing on Windows, at least I'd be able to get into task manager, or it would just close, rather than needing to reboot.

Re: I love Linux, but I can't quit Windows

#209

Post by Kwpolska »

topaz0 wrote: post #199
Kwpolska wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The UI is still terrible, still on the level of Microsoft Office 97.

Several years ago they added like 4 new "modern" UI styles that you can choose that are more fashionable. They're definitely innovating here, though I still find I'm most productive in the older style. And the sidebar for detailed properties is a huge improvement over 90s all-menu UI. Theme editing is also more accessible than in the Microsoft versions imo.

Sure, they have a wonky-looking ribbon now, but try doing anything more advanced, and you’re back to Office 97-era UX.

Re: I love Linux, but I can't quit Windows

#210

Post by pull_my_finger »

I feel like Windows 11 was literally JUST in the headlines for bricking PCs with one of their forced updates. I get that *nix is not for everyone, but it is VERY rare that you hit an issue with one of the more popular distros that hasn't already been hit and with a documented answer on a reputable forum with an easy search. When I've had issues with Windows stuff, you have less information to go on usually, just some BSoD or similar and the forum posts seem to be heavily moderated (post chains read like a generic tech support call - have you tried restarting etc etc) and hard to find an answer. Just my anec-data. You usually get a very verbose error message when Linux issues arise and pasting the error message into a search will usually point you right where you need to be.
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