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People keep flocking to Linux, not just to escape Windows

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31–40 of 214 posts

Re: People keep flocking to Linux, not just to escape Windows

#31
No one at Apple or Microsoft seems to care to serve the users. We are at an interesting point in the history of computers.

This failure mode of capitalism should've been easy to anticipate: owners of capital eventually become the customers.

Capitalism is great for technology development. But stable markets don't generate the returns VCs and public company shareholders demand.

I predict a return to simple commerce: pay money for a good or service without third parties. It doesn't need to grow or generate returns.

Re: People keep flocking to Linux, not just to escape Windows

#32
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple could, but this is more or less their tagline[1], as well. Granted, I think Apple has slightly better execution, but that's pretty subjective, I suppose. 1. https://www.apple.com/os/macos/

There a single toggle setting for Apple Intelligence in MacOS (currently toggled as 'off' on my machine)

And I bet Apple doesn't conveniently change settings in favor of data collection on a regular basis. I switched back to Linux after a few decades on Windows for work. Been back on Linux for a few months now, and haven't had any problems. My computer doesn't randomly restart (most updates don't require restart at all). No one is trying to push telemetry, half-assed AI, or OS ads on me either. So much better now on Linux.

Re: People keep flocking to Linux, not just to escape Windows

#33
post #30

I switched to Linux in the past month. First, I installed GNOME based Fedora 43, that was a mistake. I got it working "somewhat" like Windows, with Dash to Panel etc. widgets, but stability was not there after all the hacks. Then I figured I try KDE Plasma, and this is so close to Windows that I made the switch permanent. Even little things like double-clicking on top, or bottom resize handle vertically maximizes the…

My parents run a Windows PC as, from what I can tell, a home for stray botnets. The main uses are checking email and working on Word documents. (They have a laptop and iPad, respectively, which does most of their work, so it's an infrequently consulted machine.)

What Linux build would you recommend that I can fire and forget, that would be compatible with the Windows 10 machine they have running and will likely never replace.

Re: People keep flocking to Linux, not just to escape Windows

#34
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple could, but this is more or less their tagline[1], as well. Granted, I think Apple has slightly better execution, but that's pretty subjective, I suppose. 1. https://www.apple.com/os/macos/

There a single toggle setting for Apple Intelligence in MacOS (currently toggled as 'off' on my machine)

> Apple Intelligence > currently toggled as 'off'

There's a good joke in there somewhere

Re: People keep flocking to Linux, not just to escape Windows

#35
post #30

I switched to Linux in the past month. First, I installed GNOME based Fedora 43, that was a mistake. I got it working "somewhat" like Windows, with Dash to Panel etc. widgets, but stability was not there after all the hacks. Then I figured I try KDE Plasma, and this is so close to Windows that I made the switch permanent. Even little things like double-clicking on top, or bottom resize handle vertically maximizes the…

My parents run a Windows PC as, from what I can tell, a home for stray botnets. The main uses are checking email and working on Word documents. (They have a laptop and iPad, respectively, which does most of their work, so it's an infrequently consulted machine.) What Linux build would you recommend that I can fire and forget, that would be compatible with the Windows 10 machine they have running and will likely never…

Given that I've been using actively this just month, my opinion is bit biased.I run myself basically Fedora 43 KDE version: https://www.fedoraproject.org/kde/

However, for folks who don't want to install some random packages, maybe Atomic version of the distro is better: https://fedoraproject.org/atomic-desktops/kinoite/

Atomic Linux desktops has the neat feature for ability to "rollback" if installation fails. A lot like with ChromeOS, the updates are done in atomic fashion and the flipped over to new version.

Normal Linux distributions are more mutable, atomic are lot more immutable.

Re: People keep flocking to Linux, not just to escape Windows

#36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The great thing about open source is that there’s always at least one person who can take on the job of fixing your obscure hardware problem…you. The terrible thing is that you are probably unqualified to do driver surgery without taking on more work than the problem is worth to you to fix.

Yeah, with two small kids, the last thing I want to spend my spare time doing is playing with drivers. I want things that just work.

Its not about "you must fix your own software", but that "you CAN fix your own software".

Closed source OSes like MS Windows and OSX dont permit you to see, let alone fix things internally.

Re: People keep flocking to Linux, not just to escape Windows

#37
I moved over just to see what it was and one of the coolest things that instantly made me fall inlove was seeing being directed to a system file and finding out it was a text file that I could open and it had instructions explaining what the options were. It felt so inviting, like the computer was showing me how things worked and I could change it if i wanted something different.

Re: People keep flocking to Linux, not just to escape Windows

#38
I've been a Linux user without Windows for longer than I can remember. My biggest worry is Linux dominates the market because a FOSS OS can't dominate the market. A capitalist market won't allow it. Of course though, if say Ubuntu was heavily monetized in some way, then it simply becomes the new Windows and the FOSS community will simply present an alternative. I'm sorry you had to go on this circular journey with me.

Re: People keep flocking to Linux, not just to escape Windows

#39
I have been using Linux for well over a decade now but I still dual boot because of my gaming group. If I didn't play online games there would be absolutely nothing keeping me on Windows. Fedora 43 with Plasma is the closest I have been to being completely satisfied with an OS. My next computer-related purchase for sure will be an AMD GPU, as NVidia is one of the few things that makes Linux a big operational challenge.

Re: People keep flocking to Linux, not just to escape Windows

#40
post #13

Why? I’ve been using Unix workstations since the motif days through gnome whatever, but and every single one has seemed clunky as heck compared to the contemporaneous windows. Win 11 file explorer is 20 years ahead of nautilus. Not to mention all of the other windows perks like HiDPI & multi-monitor scaling polish, rdp, vastly superior accessibility, … And you can run wsl2 if you need to.

Epic ragebait.

> Win11 file picker is years ahead of some random file picker option available on linux

First it would be nice to know why you would think this and maybe provide an example, second there are other file pickers. It should also be noted that you don't need one at all, but if you want one, there are so many options, try nemo

> HiDPI

Wayland

> Multi monitor scaling polish

What did he mean by that? Wayland supports different scaling factors between displays.

> rdp

VNC, ssh + pf

> vastly superior accessibility

Hahahahaha

Some examples of what you mean please, otherwise this is just a lazy shill answer

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