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2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

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Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#341

Post by vanviegen »

sho_hn wrote: post #59
sylens wrote: post #14

If this wasn’t HN, I would swear that my personal recommendation algorithm has gotten Linux desktop-pilled and that’s why I’m seeing so many posts like these every day. But in reality I think there is a groundswell of momentum happening here, and with component prices rising, I only see this continuing as more people look to breathe new life into older hardware.

KDE's income from individual donations has doubled recently, and many of the comments we get with donations are from recent Windows switchers. As I wrote on HN just yesterday, I've been working on the Linux desktop for 20 years and the momentum has never been higher. 2026 will be fun.

That increase in donations may also be due to more prominent prompting for them. Got me to donate, at least. But I would be pretty sad if the prompting were to get any more in-your-face than it currently already is.

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#342

Post by pjmlp »

asveikau wrote: post #208
cjbgkagh wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The decisions reg UI frameworks are largely due to internal political conflicts, mostly between DevDiv and Windows.

They have a lot of staff turnover too, and each generation of new SDE has less of a clue how the old stuff worked. So when they're tasked with replacing the old stuff, they don't understand what it does, and the rewrite ends up doing less. That was my impression of one of the major problems when I worked there 2008-2011. But I don't think it's just one problem.

I can confirm, the guys still around for WinUI team and related frameworks, always appear clueless when posed questions about Windows features they were supposed to know about.

Just go watch a few recordings on their YouTube channel.

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#343

Post by pjmlp »

nextos wrote: post #268
asveikau wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have a lot of staff turnover too, and each generation of new SDE has less of a clue how the old stuff worked. So when they're tasked with replacing the old stuff, they don't understand what it does, and the rewrite ends up doing less. That was my impression of one of the major problems when I worked there 2008-2011. But I don't think it's just one problem.

I think that because their total compensation is lower than FAANG, especially at senior levels, and they are seen as uncool, they sometimes have issues retaining top-notch talent. It's paradoxical, because MS Research is probably the best PLT organization in the world. But they have failed to move a lot of that know-how into production. Besides, because it's an older company, it might have more organizational entropy…

Because those languages were created at Microsoft Research, not DevDiv nor Windows.

All different business units.

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#344

Post by pjmlp »

easton wrote: post #72
cjbgkagh wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The decisions reg UI frameworks are largely due to internal political conflicts, mostly between DevDiv and Windows.

From the outside looking in one wonders why this is allowed to continue. Microsoft’s old school “developer tools for money” business is slowly dying (because Visual Studio proper is less popular than its ever been since so much is targeting web), you would think they’d reorganize and move .net and GitHub and stuff into their cloud team and yeet whatever toxic leadership is preventing Windows from using Microsoft’s ow…

Longhorn was politics, then Google ate their lunch on mobile with Java and JavaScript userspace, across two platforms.

DevDiv is a "here C++ rules!" silo, even the Rust adoption is being widely embraced at Azure, less so on Windows team.

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#345

Post by chrysoprace »

the_hoser wrote: post #236

For those of us that have been using Linux for a long time (since 1999, here), the improvements have been incremental, and hard to spot over time. But sometimes I encounter something and it just blows my mind how good desktop Linux has become. I just bought a laptop that came with Fedora installed. This isn't anything new, but what really blew me away is that everything... just worked. No tinkering. No alternative mo…

I've made the complete switch recently (been using Linux on and off for years, including WSL as well) after my pleasant experience with the Steam Deck and it's been fantastic, but not without issues. A recurring issue over the years of trying Linux has been WiFi drivers; I really can't afford to have WiFi not work as I can't run an Ethernet cable to my computer room. I get that Linux heavily relies on volunteer work, but a broken WiFi driver due to an update is a big roadblock.

Beside that though, I'm happy to have left Windows behind completely.

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#346

Post by pjmlp »

kombine wrote: post #176
cjbgkagh wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a largely dysfunctional org creating largely dysfunctional software, I.e. Conway law. Dysfunctional orgs tend not to be capable of fixing themselves, especially without external threat. Satya Nadella, like many CEOs, seems mostly interested in impressing his peers and these days that means fancy AI, before that it was Quantum chips. Microsoft has produced some great technology and when I was last there I was def…

Yeah, .NET is actually an impressive piece of tech. They have F# too which is a really solid programming language. And then they chose React of all things to build core OS UI.

Because .NET is under DevDiv, F# came from Microsoft Research, and the OS is under Windows team.

Windows team even refuses to have managed bindings for DirectX, like Apple and Google do on their platforms.

Managed DirectX and XNA were pushed by highly motivated individuals, and lasted only as long as they stayed at Microsoft.

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#347

Post by pjmlp »

blibble wrote: post #201
al_borland wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the reason they keep trying new UI frameworks is that no one really adopts them. Developers know that Microsoft won’t kill off backward compatibility and break all the enterprise apps, so why rewrite? When one framework fails, they start working on the next one. I question if they understand the corner they’ve painted themselves into.

I stopped writing Windows applications back in the early 00s my Windows API knowledge (essentially: just Win32) is still exactly as useful as it was then, having missed the 7 or 8 different UI frameworks in the interim

Win32 is basically frozen on Windows XP.

Since Vista most newer APIs are done in COM, or WinRT nowadays.

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#348

Post by pjmlp »

lawgimenez wrote: post #76
roxolotl wrote: post #4

“start menus made with React Native, control-alt-delete menus that are actually just webviews” Haven’t used windows in five years or so but I’ve kept hearing bad things. This really is the icing on the cake though. Yea the AI stuff is dumb but if a OS manufacturer can’t be bothered to interact with their own UI libraries to build native UIs something has gone horribly wrong.

Microsoft dropped the ball with Universal Windows Platform framework, I worked on one project using this framework and it was one the best. Our codebase run on both phone and desktop Windows 8. This was 2014-ish if I remember, and then Windows phone got killed.

Spot on, .NET Native and C++/CX on top of COM is what .NET 1.0 should have been all about.

Unfortunately it was a big ball of mud in mismanagement.

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#349

Post by [deleted] »

loumf wrote: post #210

I recently switched to Linux for all development. I still use my Mac for everything else. The main reason was to protect my personal data from possible supply chain issues or LLM agent mishaps. I’m 99% in VSCode, a browser, and a terminal. There’s hardly a difference day-to-day.

[deleted]

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#350

Post by SpaceNoodled »

asveikau wrote: post #305
nextos wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that because their total compensation is lower than FAANG, especially at senior levels, and they are seen as uncool, they sometimes have issues retaining top-notch talent. It's paradoxical, because MS Research is probably the best PLT organization in the world. But they have failed to move a lot of that know-how into production. Besides, because it's an older company, it might have more organizational entropy…

Back when I was there, part of my calculus was that cost of living in Seattle was cheaper than the bay. It was about 35% cheaper back then, according to regional CPI data I looked at at the time. Not sure what the difference is today. I believe housing is still substantially cheaper. I think a few years after I left when more Big Tech opened offices in Seattle, competing companies started paying Bay Area salaries for…

Seattle cost of living is still significantly cheaper than the Bay Area. A lower salary goes even farther given the lack of state income tax, too.
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