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Linux on the Desktop as a Web Developer

nolanlawson.com

71–78 of 78 posts

Re: Linux on the Desktop as a Web Developer

#71

I've worked as a web dev on Linux for nearly 15 years (most of it Ubuntu). My day job requires that I work on Windows 10 and I'm sorry to say this, but from a developer's perspective it does feel like an inferior user experience. To cope I've tried the WLS, but it didn't really do it, then I was able to somewhat cope a bit with Cygwin. Still it's not the same. I miss the extra desktops. I miss the ability to install…

> ..job requires that I work on Windows 10.. how I miss the shell

I recently discovered Multipass, made by Canonical, which provides a simple and cross-platform command-line interface to manage Ubuntu VMs. Not sure if it would fit your use case, but wanted to mention it as an option.

https://multipass.run/

It's been super useful for me, to be able to spin up new VMs for learning and testing stuff, as well as a couple larger persistent ones with mounted volumes for local web development. For what it does, it performs better than Docker, at least in my experience. It's even possible run an X Window client/server as a GUI to the VM.

Re: Linux on the Desktop as a Web Developer

#72

I've worked as a web dev on Linux for nearly 15 years (most of it Ubuntu). My day job requires that I work on Windows 10 and I'm sorry to say this, but from a developer's perspective it does feel like an inferior user experience. To cope I've tried the WLS, but it didn't really do it, then I was able to somewhat cope a bit with Cygwin. Still it's not the same. I miss the extra desktops. I miss the ability to install…

You can just run i3 (or any other desktop environment) inside WSL with X server integration. That's similar to what I do.

Re: Linux on the Desktop as a Web Developer

#73
post #57
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a large amount of developers making shitty enterprise tools on Windows. Usually done with the whole VS/C# stack. Anyone making anything for the web or doing anything cross platform is likely using MacOS or Linux.

Just loved your attitude. /s I worked with plenty of Linux developers, and pretty much any piece of Bash scripts was full of remote code execution vulnerabilities. That strange love with shell scripts is so common among majority of *nixoids, it is impressive you call enterprise tools shitty in comparison.

Bad codes and developers are found in both Windows and Linux.

Re: Linux on the Desktop as a Web Developer

#74

I run Linux (Arch) on my personal Dell XPS13. I run Ubuntu 20.04 in a VM at work to do NodeJs/Springboot (backend) development and even in a VM, especially for node, the experience is better than colleagues running bare metal Windows. Going back to the XPS13 the Linux experience is not perfect. * the mess with the HiDpi support and font systems. I often go from the laptop docked to a Usb-C hub to using my laptop on m…

I use bluetooth audio on Linux and I don't have problems with it, but I do not use a laptop. I do not often suspend, resume my system. I guess most of your problems may be coming from ACPI (power management). Linux software under WSL would consume even more battery life.

Linux apps on WSL1 shouldn't consume such battery life.

Re: Linux on the Desktop as a Web Developer

#75
post #73
post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just loved your attitude. /s I worked with plenty of Linux developers, and pretty much any piece of Bash scripts was full of remote code execution vulnerabilities. That strange love with shell scripts is so common among majority of *nixoids, it is impressive you call enterprise tools shitty in comparison.

Bad codes and developers are found in both Windows and Linux.

Yes! I was hoping the point will strike parent harder in the likely case he did his part of shell scripting.

Re: Linux on the Desktop as a Web Developer

#76

I run Linux (Arch) on my personal Dell XPS13. I run Ubuntu 20.04 in a VM at work to do NodeJs/Springboot (backend) development and even in a VM, especially for node, the experience is better than colleagues running bare metal Windows. Going back to the XPS13 the Linux experience is not perfect. * the mess with the HiDpi support and font systems. I often go from the laptop docked to a Usb-C hub to using my laptop on m…

> lack of off-the-shelf hardware accelerated video decoder in the browsers on Linux

Firefox has support for VAAPI decoding on Wayland, but when I tried it a month or two ago it was still a little rough (and only supported h264). Its also not enabled by default.

An easier way to get hardware decoding that isnt buggy and supports all the accelerated codecs your hardware does is to use mpv. It has native support for youtube URLs if you have youtube-dl installed. Just make sure to use --hwdec=vaapi or set it in your mpv config.

Re: Linux on the Desktop as a Web Developer

#77

I've been using a Dell 13" Ubuntu 4K laptop hooked to a 43" monitor as my main work web development system for a year and a half. All of my co-workers use Macs. Pros: compared to Macs using Docker is very performant especially when sharing the host file system for development and once I found Regolith ( https://regolith-linux.org/ ) I don't think I could go back to a normal windowing system. Cons: non-Electron cross-…

Do you mind to share the model of your 43" monitor? I'm looking for a setup like yours, but I'm not really sure which monitor fits the purpose. Thank you!

I should have been more precise. It is a 43" 4K TV acting as a monitor. Its a cheap Vizio I bought a few years ago after a bit of research and luck showed that the model that my local warehouse store (BJs) had in stock offered 1 out of the 5 HDMI ports as "raw" (it bypassed the internal image processing system in the TV). Its been great - its flicker free and doesn't have weird artifacts I've heard other 4K TVs have (had?) when used as a monitor.

Honestly though, 43" is too big. I think somewhere around 36" would be ideal to limit the amount of head swivel. I use Regolith with a good deal of padding between tiled windows mostly to bring the windows out of the top corners of the screen so that my days don't feel like I'm at a tennis match.

Re: Linux on the Desktop as a Web Developer

#78
I can't recommend Manjaro Linux enough. It's the desktop system that got me off of Windows due to the sheer ease of installing software and maintaining a stable system, which I've done now for 2 years on 3 different boxes.

I've been trying out Linux desktops since the late 90s and this is honestly the first system that didn't eat itself after an update.

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