Doesn’t Zorin Linux already sort of does this?
Convert Linux to Windows
451–459 of 459 posts
Re: Convert Linux to Windows
#452A major problem is that Microsoft fundamentally torpedoed Wine by blocking MsOffice compatibility with Wine for quite a while now.
(ie.: only fairly old versions of MsOffice work on Wine)
Re: Convert Linux to Windows
#453Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thank you very much! I was about to post almost the same thing, so I'll reply to your post instead (and upvote): It's pretty funny to read a critisism of linux s/w distribution along the lines of the dificulty of distributing binaries. This is one of the biggest security vulnerabilities of windows. 3rd parties distributing binary executables. At least in a typical linux distro the binary is built by the distributing…
explain to me why the HELL should i be limited to only running binaries that my distro vendor has deigned to provide, or jump through endless hoops to obtain and build source code (which by the way might not even be obtainable OR buildable). if i have a binary from 5, 10, 15 years ago i should just be able to fucking run it on my fucking computer.
Then run your "fuzzy kitty plays on your desktop" binary executable, downloaded from we-swear-we-wont-hack-you.com, and live with the consequences.
In fact this is the way 3rd party windoze executables are typically distributed.
Nobody's stopping you...
p.s. The above seems like a trolling reply, but I always play the straight man...
Re: Convert Linux to Windows
#454Earlier quoted context omitted.
Win32 is quite extensive for an OS API. It covers the space from low-level stuff like syscalls and page allocation and all the way up to localization, simple media access and GUI. So everything from glibc, libsystemd, libpam to libalsa and egl on Linux side. And it is all stable. Microsoft also provides quite good stability for DirectX and other extension APIs. You can still run old .Net apps without issues as long a…
Sure, win32 contains GUI bits, but modern apps do not use those GUI bits. OpenGL and Vulkan ABIs are also stable on Linux, provided by mesa. The post is pretty focused on the simplicity of win32 though, which is what I'm refuting as being as relevant today for new apps. > As long as they didn't pull a Hyrum's Law on you It is guaranteed that they "pull a Hyrum's Law", the question is just what apparent behavior they…
> Sure, win32 contains GUI bits, but modern apps do not use those GUI bits.
Which is probably why so many "modern apps" look just like "modern" Web pages running on the desktop... i.e, why so many "modern apps" suck. They freaking should use those GUI bits.
Re: Convert Linux to Windows
#455Earlier quoted context omitted.
If Linux userspace had libraries with stable ABI, you could just tar or zip binaries and they would work. You wouldn't need to bundle system layer. This is how you deploy server apps on Windows Server systems. You just unpack and they work. It is not a packaging problem. It is a system design problem. Linux ecosystem simply isn't nice for binary distribution except the kernel, mostly.
Linux feels a bit different since the complete system is not controlled by a single vendor. You have multiple distributions with their own kernel versions, libc versions, library dependencies, etc. Mac OS has solved this but that is obviously a single vendor. FreeBSD has decent backwards compatibility (through the -compat packages), but that is also a single vendor.
> Linux feels a bit different since the complete system is not controlled by a single vendor. You have multiple distributions with their own kernel versions, libc versions, library dependencies, etc.
No, AFAICS that can't be it. The problem is that all those libraries (libc and others?) change all the time, and aren't backwards-compatible with earlier versions of themselves. If they were backwards-compatible, you could just make sure to have the newest one any of your applications needs, and everything would work.
Re: Convert Linux to Windows
#456I have points to burn, so I'll post, because I know this will scratch some folks the wrong way- apologies in advance. I use Windows. In fact, I like Windows. I know lots of (ok, more than 5) greybeards who feel exactly the same way. I don't want Linux to be Windows, but I also don't want Linux on my personal desktop either. I have a Mac Mini M1 on my desk, and I use that for the things it's good for, mainly videoconf…
> sub-par desktop experience. I strongly disagree. Linux (KDE) is a far superior desktop experience these days, compared to Windows 11. Have you even seen the new Win11 taskbar and the shitty Start Menu - they ruined something which they perfected in Win7. The overall UX has taken a deep dive - like with the unwanted removal of classic Control Panel applets like "Window Color and Appearance" (which doesn't have a rep…
> the unwanted removal of classic Control Panel applets like "Window Color and Appearance" (which doesn't have a replacement)
Annoys the fsck out of me too. Hmm... Just occurred to me: What if one copied the correct .cpl file into the C:\Windows\System32 directory of a Win 10/11 box and just ran it (if nothing else, from the command line)?
Probably won't help. :-( AFAICT, the Control Panel applets just put the values you specify into the correct place in the Registry, and the latest versions of Windows just don't care what's there any more. Source: I used to edit the Windows Border Width value directly with RegEdit, but after a while it stopped using that value (and even started setting it back IIRC).
Re: Convert Linux to Windows
#457Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Is it "improper" to maximize profit per their own board's guidelines? From the standpoint of the end user the incentives are improperly aligned. If they had made hammers they would have included licence agreements for their use with specific types of nails and actively prevented users from using competitor's nails. They also would have made sure yesterday's hammer would not be sufficient to hammer in today's nail,…
Worth reading: Unauthorized Bread. https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/01/unauthorized-bread-a-...
> Worth reading
Anything by Cory Doctorow usually is.
Re: Convert Linux to Windows
#458> NOTE: I am not against Apple or Microsoft. They have amazing engineers! I don't think they're being malicious. Rather, I think the incentives for these companies are improperly aligned. Improperly aligned incentives? Who gets to say what that is? Is it "improper" to maximize profit per their own board's guidelines? I have a feeling OP has some predefined notion of nobility they expect people to somehow operate unde…
> Improperly aligned incentives? Who gets to say what that is?
Anyone worth calling human.
> Is it "improper" to maximize profit per their own board's guidelines?
If to the exclusion of all else, then yes, wildly so.
> I have a feeling OP has some predefined notion of nobility they expect people to somehow operate under.
Having a set of values is what separates Man from (most of) the other animals.
HTH!
Re: Convert Linux to Windows
#459Earlier quoted context omitted.
> This purist vision you have of Linux doesn't exist. It does on my computer, and I suspect on a lot of Linux users' computers.
Linux users? That is, people who use a device that runs Linux? Like Android? Or you mean desktop Linux users, though there aren't "a lot" of those. There's the business/corpo/science deployments but I don't think we're talking about that, but rather specifically home use. So we're talking mostly enthusiasts. I'd imagine many of those and perhaps even most at least lightly game and Steam is effectively the default pla…
> > > > Users are expected to either obtain binaries from their distro, or compile them from source.
> > > This purist vision you have of Linux doesn't exist.
> > It does on my computer, and I suspect on a lot of Linux users' computers.
> Linux users? That is, people who use a device that runs Linux? Like Android?
I'm fairly sure the overwhelming majority of Android users only use binaries from "their distro", i.e. from the Play Store.
> The software repository+compile from source paradigm isn't "Linux", it's not even "desktop Linux".
Hey, you were the first to drag Android into this. By your own measure, the overwhelming majority of "Linux" users follow exactly "the software repository+compile from source paradigm" (albeit the "+compile from source" term equals zero in their equation).