No it isn’t, Windows has got a ton of developers making sure non technical users don’t get stuck easily, and it mostly just works. The linux desktop is just of inferior quality, and fragmented like hell.
“Linux” doesn’t even exist when you talk about the desktop, which of the hundreds of distros are you talking about? each with their own undocumented annoyances and problems regular users will just get stuck on. A nightmarish landscape of package managers, or just installing packages.
For all the correct annoyances about apple/windows walled gardens, they got one thing right: if it says it runs on windows/mac, it’s extremely likely to just work for you. If it says it runs on linux, is it on the package manager your distro uses? who knows. If you can just download the package, will it work? who knows.
You know what i don’t have to worry about if i find a windows app? If it will run on windows. Maybe with truly ancient apps it can be an issue, but even there the backwards compatibility they offer is pretty insane.
You can live in your imaginary world where “Linux is awesome”. But i see myself, and colleagues who’ve grown up with computers (millenials, so the generation that actually had to use them), that give linux a try, and it’s just a freaking nightmare. From endless distro choices that boil down to “pick your poison”, as there will always be something bad about them, and things you really want that don’t work, to all kinds of silly & annoying issues. (a colleague that’s really technical now had the privilege of encountering an issue with fedora based distros that for some reason fails to properly install grub. So you run through the entire installer, and at the end you have a pc that doesn’t boot. It’s a known issue on certain configurations, they haven’t fixed it yet. You know what doesn’t happen with Windows/Mac? such things)
I have 7 devices running various distros right now. 4 Pi’s, 2 PCs and a laptop.
#1 reason linux isn’t my daily desktop. Want to install [thing]. Thing doesn’t work. Doesn’t (build, install, configure, make, whatever). “MAKE” not installed. What? Install MAKE. Still doesn’t work. Wrong permissions. Doesn’t offer error messages so you know why it doesn’t work. Missing dependency. Install dependency. Still doesn’t work. No documentation other than forums full of other users with the same problem and the solutions are: 5 different ways to do the same thing that don’t apply to your distro or version which has changed 5 major versions since the answer was valid. Gave up and installed a different distro. A long set of instructions that, even when followed precisely, only works 20% of the time. Don’t use SUDO to install? but SUDO is the only way it works! Software has no GUI, command line only. Doesn’t work on your distro even though documentation says it does. Even if it’s available in a package manager in the distro you have doesn’t mean it will work. Spend hours chasing down ways to make it work and finally give up.
I love linux and the ability to get under the hood and do whatever I want with it. When it works. But it ABSOLUTELY is not for everyone.
Same here, i’ve got plenty of devices running linux, and i might give it a chance again for my daily driver, but i know it will be a complete pain in the ass, and waste a lot of my time…
Still, it is okay for a big channel to avoid inciting fomo. Being a late adopter is also okay. Linux has enough media coverage to be found once you are ready for change.
Linux is more for everyone than Windoze is.
No it isn’t, Windows has got a ton of developers making sure non technical users don’t get stuck easily, and it mostly just works. The linux desktop is just of inferior quality, and fragmented like hell. “Linux” doesn’t even exist when you talk about the desktop, which of the hundreds of distros are you talking about? each with their own undocumented annoyances and problems regular users will just get stuck on. A nightmarish landscape of package managers, or just installing packages. For all the correct annoyances about apple/windows walled gardens, they got one thing right: if it says it runs on windows/mac, it’s extremely likely to just work for you. If it says it runs on linux, is it on the package manager your distro uses? who knows. If you can just download the package, will it work? who knows. You know what i don’t have to worry about if i find a windows app? If it will run on windows. Maybe with truly ancient apps it can be an issue, but even there the backwards compatibility they offer is pretty insane.
You can live in your imaginary world where “Linux is awesome”. But i see myself, and colleagues who’ve grown up with computers (millenials, so the generation that actually had to use them), that give linux a try, and it’s just a freaking nightmare. From endless distro choices that boil down to “pick your poison”, as there will always be something bad about them, and things you really want that don’t work, to all kinds of silly & annoying issues. (a colleague that’s really technical now had the privilege of encountering an issue with fedora based distros that for some reason fails to properly install grub. So you run through the entire installer, and at the end you have a pc that doesn’t boot. It’s a known issue on certain configurations, they haven’t fixed it yet. You know what doesn’t happen with Windows/Mac? such things)
I have 7 devices running various distros right now. 4 Pi’s, 2 PCs and a laptop.
#1 reason linux isn’t my daily desktop. Want to install [thing]. Thing doesn’t work. Doesn’t (build, install, configure, make, whatever). “MAKE” not installed. What? Install MAKE. Still doesn’t work. Wrong permissions. Doesn’t offer error messages so you know why it doesn’t work. Missing dependency. Install dependency. Still doesn’t work. No documentation other than forums full of other users with the same problem and the solutions are: 5 different ways to do the same thing that don’t apply to your distro or version which has changed 5 major versions since the answer was valid. Gave up and installed a different distro. A long set of instructions that, even when followed precisely, only works 20% of the time. Don’t use SUDO to install? but SUDO is the only way it works! Software has no GUI, command line only. Doesn’t work on your distro even though documentation says it does. Even if it’s available in a package manager in the distro you have doesn’t mean it will work. Spend hours chasing down ways to make it work and finally give up.
I love linux and the ability to get under the hood and do whatever I want with it. When it works. But it ABSOLUTELY is not for everyone.
Same here, i’ve got plenty of devices running linux, and i might give it a chance again for my daily driver, but i know it will be a complete pain in the ass, and waste a lot of my time…
Still, it is okay for a big channel to avoid inciting fomo. Being a late adopter is also okay. Linux has enough media coverage to be found once you are ready for change.
Nothing personal, but the hell it does.