Using Linux as my main os since 2017, I'm neither a gamer nor a total nerd/linux fanboy. Using my laptop as any casuals (except for dev).
Although I do have issues sometimes with it, it's most of the time because I'm trying to do something super specific for my job, and it requires technical knowledges. Otherwise, the way normal people uses a PC nowadays is 1) start the pc, 2) open the browser .
Why Linux is not ready for the desktop, the final edition
311–320 of 472 posts
Re: Why Linux is not ready for the desktop, the final edition
#312Earlier quoted context omitted.
“it's a miracle of modern software engineering and a testament of the power of collaboration and the free software movement that the Linux ecosystem works as well as it does” It can be a miracle, and yet still not be good enough. Even as a business user, knowing that if I build an app and it probably won’t work in 5 years, is all I need to know about this hobbyist toy. Linux is fundamentally not ready for anyone who…
At one time I was a big advocate for Unix/Linux on the desktop, but I think that ship has mostly sailed. But, it seems that FUD about what it is capable of is still actively here, which is good to know. With frameworks and libraries, there is a 0% chance you don't have SOME update for your Windows app in a couple years, forget 5. Now, there are lots of headwinds against Linux -- Windows is a known quantity, everyone…
I would blame Microsoft for that one, since they had the ability to ban crowdstrike and others who have no business being in the NT kernel from the NT kernel, but instead gave them access by giving them code signing certificates.
Apple on the other hand got them to switch to userspace:
https://www.crowdstrike.com/en-us/blog/crowdstrike-supports-...
Re: Why Linux is not ready for the desktop, the final edition
#313Earlier quoted context omitted.
> knowing that if I build an app and it probably won’t work in 5 years Would you say MacOS, Android, and iPhone are also hobbyist toys then? And by the way, if you statically compile your app for Linux it will basically work forever. Linus's mantra: We Do Not Break Userspace. These are userland problems and can all be avoided with a linker flag if it's a priority for you.
You cannot statically compile a lot of stuff. Too many Linux libraries are GPLed, and that only works for open source applications. And then one day the underlying libraries will have security problems. Your statically linked application has just become a gaping hole. And finally, you don't want your statically compiled binary to be hundreds of megabytes and take forever to launch, do you? But seeing how many people…
Not many libraries use the GPL because “that only works for open source applications”.
That said, you can just copy the .so files if you want to run the old binary.
Furthermore, binaries are mmapped, so even if it is very large, it will still launch relatively quickly since only the parts needed to launch are read into memory.
Re: Why Linux is not ready for the desktop, the final edition
#314cant wait for 'the final edition, part 2' next year ...
There won't be one. I've said it all. I was thinking about adding a "Security" section but I wasn't convinced it was necessary. Security in Linux is horrible in general. * People use `sudo` for anything and everything all the time. * `git pull whatever_crap_from_the_web` and run it happily. * Tens of thousands of pieces of malware via NPMs and other frameworks. * No AV of any kind (the one that actually executes code…
Verifying arbitrary code is safe is not possible for AV to do. If you know some way to do what you describe, you can commercialize it and become rich. Many would pay top dollar for such technology.
Re: Why Linux is not ready for the desktop, the final edition
#315- "The vast majority of applications exist only for Windows, and speaking of games, Linux hasn't seen any AAA titles for many years now," The vast majority of AAA titles run seamlessly on Linux. Per protondb[0], ≥80% of the top 10, top 100, and top 1000 are rated "platinum" or "gold" for Linux functioning (by users). [0] https://www.protondb.com/
Because those are ratings are based on consolidated user ratings, some of them are outdated and still marked Gold. Grand Theft Auto V is Gold, but online doesn't work anymore. Yet users are still giving it a thumbs up because singleplayer works. Apex Legends is also still Gold, and completely no longer works since there's no singleplayer
So it's not really ≥80% for top 10 at least.
Re: Why Linux is not ready for the desktop, the final edition
#316For example, Windows or Android software from ten years ago will still work in Windows 11 or Android 15 or whatever their current versions are. For Windows, software compatibility is actually excellent: a lot of 32-bit Windows 95 software still runs perfectly on Windows 11 64 almost 30 years later. Nothing remotely close exists for Linux. I completely disagree. Android applications made for older versions DO NOT work…
I have lots of ten year old Android apps running on my Android 14 without too many issues. In Wine/Windows I run Windows applications from the 90s. In Windows 11 64 you can install and use Office 97. In Linux nothing even close is possible. People do care about old applications. They really do.
This is untrue. You can run old Linux binaries on modern Linux systems if you have the older libraries. You want to set LD_LIBRARY_PATH to point to where the old libraries are located.
By the way, any Android applications using Google’s old messaging APIs no longer work and need to be rewritten to use fire base. I know people who were bitten by that multiple times since Google had to keep reinventing push notifications.
Re: Why Linux is not ready for the desktop, the final edition
#317Earlier quoted context omitted.
DirectX and Win32 are Windows APIs. Are you saying Linux has "games" because it excels at ... emulating them? What's the point of using/running Linux then when you have a much higher chance of running games successfully natively? What about dozens if not hundreds of games that use a kernel level anticheat? Pretty much none of them work in Linux. What's the point of native Linux APIs then? That's weird. Wine + DXVK ar…
Proton does such a good job that it is difficult to justify the cost of porting games when they already run on Linux in Proton. That said, Feral Interactive is still porting games to Linux and they have not gone bankrupt: https://www.feralinteractive.com/en/news/?platform=linux Proton often runs games better than the native ports, so there is not much of a loss if there are fewer native ports. Furthermore, in a numbe…
Another fun one is AMD's Linux drivers support emulated ray tracing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cT6qbcKT7YY . This game won't even start on a newer/faster GTX 1080Ti
Though speaking of a 1080Ti, that's a GPU you don't want to run on Linux because it lacks some Vulkan features for good DX12 translation: https://github.com/HansKristian-Work/vkd3d-proton/issues/465
Re: Why Linux is not ready for the desktop, the final edition
#318> Finally, since drivers in Linux are generally part of the kernel (there are a few exceptions, including NVIDIA), you cannot upgrade them to the latest version or downgrade them to the version that worked for you on the fly. You have to boot into a different kernel. This is extremely inconvenient and not always possible I mean, that's just false. Most drivers are done as kernel modules and you can push/pull them in…
> I mean, that's just false. Most drivers are done as kernel modules and you can push/pull them in without missing a beat. 0.1% of people in the world could that. 0.001% of people in the world would do that. That's not false, your understanding of a decent OS is just lacking. In Windows you can swap drivers however you want given they support your Windows version.
You assume Windows is a decent OS. Many who know better would not.
Re: Why Linux is not ready for the desktop, the final edition
#319> Regressions are introduced all the time because Linux developers spend very little to no time checking that their code changes don't cause regressions or breakages outside of the problems they're trying to fix or features they're implementing. Wow. Such sweeping generalizations make me not want to pay attention to anything this article has to say. But let's entertain the possibility that parts of that statement are…
https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/drm/amd/-/issues Just check this bug tracker. Just this one. Bug report on top of bug report caused by a fix which was caused by another fix. Sadly it's not just one bug tracker, I keep an eye on many of them. Of course in the magical Linux land if "It works for me", then the author is lying. Never mind that the author of this "click-bait" article is a ... Linux kernel bugzilla maintain…
Does that guy seriously maintain bugzilla for the Linux kernel and yet cannot decide whether Linux is an operating system or not:
> Linux is not an operating system
> While Linux is unrivaled on servers and has been the world's most popular operating system for over two decades, the situation on the desktop is quite bleak.
It either is or is not. It is illogical to claim both true and false to be true at the same time, yet that is what he did.
Re: Why Linux is not ready for the desktop, the final edition
#320When I see the articles I believe the title should be "Linux is not Windows so I do not like it". I have used Linux for just shy of 30 years. It is different than Windows and far more powerful. It is just that people do not want to learn different things. Plus Linux has no spyware. These days, you can do anything on Linux that you do on Windows, except for some 3d Gaming. And that is because hardware vendors refuse t…
> When I see the articles I believe the title should be "Linux is not Windows so I do not like it". I've used Linux for as much only I'm a tad more humble. Mentioned more than a dozen times in the kernel git log. Not a big achievement but kinda shows I'm not just a bystander. You've never said how much time you've wasted fixing Linux or making software work. Must be a non-issue I guess.
> I'm a tad more humble. Mentioned more than a dozen times in the kernel git log.
Exceptionally humble, indeed.
> You've never said how much time you've wasted fixing Linux or making software work.
This comes up often and I'm always fascinated by the implied assumption that time isn't wasted fixing Windows or MacOS computers and making software work on those systems. The age-old "No, I will not fix your computer!" is not a Linux meme - in 99% of cases it refers to a Windows machine.
We can trade anecdata until the heat death of the universe, and in fact you've nicely listed many of the pro/con points in your articles. However having read both versions (current/technical and final), I must agree with parent. This is just a rant from someone who likes Windows more.
I also want to call out your "solving linux" section (in the technical article). You've listed basically the entire Ubuntu playbook (which is, btw, a UK company, not an African company). Mark "poached" debian developers (DDs), poured millions of his own money into it, spearheaded many of the desktop-specific innovations (now supplanted by other software, but Ubuntu provided the initial push), created an app store, did an enormous amount of work popularizing Linux specifically for the desktop, was the first to start "officially checked and approved" hardware list, etc.
And the results show even if we don't attribute them to Ubuntu today, and even if we're using alternatives: Linux desktop today is a much smoother experience than 20 years ago.
So, while I can sympathize with many of the points in your technical article (https://itvision.altervista.org/why.linux.is.not.ready.for.t...) even if I do not agree with them, the linked one really seems like distillation to a "I like Windows more" rant.