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2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

xeiaso.net

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Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#81

Post by zozbot234 »

Johanx64 wrote: post #37
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.

>OS manufacturer can’t be bothered to interact with their own UI libraries to build native UIs something has gone horribly wrong. I honestly think that has way less to do with Microsoft, more of a representation of "software engineering" practices these days. For example, Gnome shell has bunch of javascript in it, GTK has layout and styling defined in some flavour of CSS, etc. I'm of opinion if you start writing OS u…

Cosmic (from the PopOS folks) is getting rid of the crappy javascript from GNOME Shell. And the CSS in GTK+ themes is just for the sake of syntactic convenience.

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#82

Post by temp0826 »

markus_zhang wrote: post #17
7e wrote: post #6

They're going from Microsoft to... Linux. From bad to worse. Just use macOS and get on with your life.

Can’t stand the MacOS UI philosophy and built in software. Gotta skip. The hardware is pretty good though.

This is the biggest pickle for me. Mx Macbook Airs are pretty amazing, but Asahi is just not there, and I don't think it will ever be without Apple playing ball a little bit unfortunately. (I'm currently on a t2/intel macbook and it's got more quirks that I care to deal with...but it was free so gotta do what I gotta do)

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#83

Post by memoriuaysj »

trueismywork wrote: post #77
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.

Long time ago, I read a blog about how the user must absolutely trust the dialog boxes for Ctrl+Alt+Delete and Adminstrator passwords and why they were tricky to get right.. Then I hear that now ctrl alt delete is a webview. Its difficult to believe. Do you have a reference?

the thing you need to trust is that pressing that combination shows the legit OS stuff, that it can't be intercepted (Secure Attention Key).

how the OS implements what is displayed is irrelevant

windows has all kinds of virtualizations today, it can literally run web views in separate (invisible) VMs for security purposes

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#84

Post by jsheard »

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.

Typing "Visual Studio" into the new start menu may randomly trigger a Bing search for "Visual Studio" instead of running it, but on the other hand that makes Bings KPIs go up so it's impossible to say if it's bad or not.

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#85

Post by dspillett »

xattt wrote: post #5

I’d love to be a fly on the wall at Microsoft right now, to see if they are in red alert to get users back, planning subterfuge by breaking APIs used by Wine or what have you, or if they are taking it as a loss. I recently jumped to Debian/KDE as a daily driver, and it feels great. I am coming after many years of running Linux via cli on my home server. I am also unironically enjoying wobbly windows.

> to see if they are in red alert to get users back

I don't think they much care, long gone are the days of consumer Windows being a cash-cow. And if you buy a machine with Windows on and put Linux over the top, they still have that little bit of money from you via the manufacturer. Adverts on the start menu and such, is not an action that would be taken by a company with any real pride in their OS.

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#87

Post by lanthissa »

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.

i think its just that its new year and year of the linux desktop is a meme (in the actual definition of the word kind of way) and the meme is growing over time

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#88

Post by zamalek »

Havoc wrote: post #56

This rings true...outside of users that play competitive FPS...the anticheat continues to be a challenge As a side note - if you're in that venn diagram overlap group of linux and gaming...check out "beyond all reason" RTS if you haven't. High chance it'll tickle you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wxwIxz4PaY edit: not affiliate to linked yt - organic enthusiastism

BAR is definitely one of the stars of OSS game dev.

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#89

Post by yunnpp »

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.

I still have my Nokia Lumia around. Best phone I ever had.

And I say this hating everything about Microsoft and Windows. That phone clicked just right with the tile design and overall usability. Of course, MS having pulled the plug, it's basically a DRM brick now.

Re: 2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop

#90

Post by themafia »

xattt wrote: post #5

I’d love to be a fly on the wall at Microsoft right now, to see if they are in red alert to get users back, planning subterfuge by breaking APIs used by Wine or what have you, or if they are taking it as a loss. I recently jumped to Debian/KDE as a daily driver, and it feels great. I am coming after many years of running Linux via cli on my home server. I am also unironically enjoying wobbly windows.

Europe has shown themselves to be completely unwilling or unable to regulate the giant. So they stopped caring. They crank out cheap crap and charge top dollar because no one can stop them.
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