Google is already bad enough at government collusion, divulging data, as are other infrastructure providers.
Best-case is gutting Alphabet and breaking it up to the effect of decentralization of its pieces.
I think if anything regulating the current instruments would just harden their social/political position which furthers their interests more than anything.
Deregulation is the solution here- get rid of DMCA and all the other laws that are used to bankrupt any competitor to YouTube, so that instead of a single video hosting site, we have tens, hundreds or thousands.
The dream of the early web was that everything would be resistant to censorship and centralized control because it was a true network of many independent hosts, globally distributed, independent from the whims of any government. Then we let a few billionaire copyright holders and authoritarians who want to control what is published and seen gradually strangle the open web and replace it with a handful of corporate sites that can be controlled.
But they are in private hands, aren't they ? Welcome to capitalism my friend. And don't forget to vote on the next election.
I use it since 2021 on my gaming PC. Zero problems, it’s a trimmed down Win 10 with most of the bloatware removed
Win 11 has a similar trimmed down LTSC version
Just install it, MS doesn’t care about piracy
When it comes to gaming, for example Windows Mixed Reality is not included and cannot be installed afterwards (but then again, Microsoft dropped it from Windows 11 too, so no loss there).
Only way to keep it is staying with consumer Windows 10 or use 3rd party software like Oasis.
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/whats-new/extended...
This isn't to say it's a good idea but that it can be done.
If you plan on running win 10 anyway Ask Leo has a video called "how to keep using windows 10 safely after support ends" with some solid advice
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpAIOcYPYgo&list=TLPQMjkxMDI...
I would suggest just switching to Linux and using a VM for things that NEED to be Windows. Games that run kernel level Anti-Cheat won't run, but tbh nothing I would suggest installing anyway.
The big two that spring to mind are online games and Adobe softwares. I don't think a VM can usually meet the performance needed for either.
I do wish more artists would take a chance on open source softwares, but most of the ones I know are still insistent that nothing can ever come close to Adobe. But that's a rant for another time.
Although it seems there are people still Frankensteining Win7, and even patching DLLs to make the newest browsers/apps still run on it.
Famously MS Teams was really screwed up, but I had to use it for work..
Firefox outright refuses to install on older Windows versions for a couple of years now. Very lazy and negligent move on Mozilla's part.
And a GitHub repo: https://github.com/BrowserBox/windows-dosbox-x
I tried different AIs to make the scripts to automate installs in DosBox-X as long as you have a product key and ISO or other media.
Most interesting to me was the different quirks between OSeS. NT was the most tricky in getting to work on DosBox-X and syncing up internet, IIRC. But overall a very fun project. Brings back nostalgia of 3.5" disks and seeing those install screen. Very cool times in the 90s ha! :)
Please read the Linux Advocacy HOW-TO.
Shitting on Windows and MacOS does not make you look authoritative, honest, or credible. It makes you look like you have a very strong opinion and shut off from anything that does not conform to your opinion.
shitting on them makes anything you say about a competing operating system appear like fully biased opinion, rather than fact. if you want people who you have not already captured to listen to you, you must do your best to appear unbiased. shitting on anything is 100% bias. and if you have opinions like that, how can someone you're trying to win over trust that the positive things you're saying about this other thing aren't also 100% opinion?
Stick to the facts if you want to ever hope to do anything other than make Linux fans appear like they are rabid dogs who attack anything they don't like on sight.
You can do that if you want, I don't care. But I don't go to rabid dogs for their opinions when it comes to choosing things, and no one else does either.
You say things like this to get a mob going, and I want you to admit that. you all shit on things you don't like because you want to feel heard by others who also shit on those same things. but people who aren't like that come here and they read this stuff, too. And you're shitting on them in the process.
AFAIK an apple account isn't strictly required, but a lot of MacOS won't be functional without one.
How is a Macbook better than Windows in these senses?
asahi development slowed down and is getting further away as apple releases new malcs yearly.
i don't think this is a good bet for those who want to use linux.
I would rather be subjected to fingernail torture than deal with the productivity implosion that is using macOS. It isn't meant for users who do more than stare at webpages. And the workaround apps to give it more productivity such as actually useful taskbars are buggy as hell fighting Apple's trash.
Linux or Windows or bust.
I'd rather install Win 11 on my laptop than buy another Apple computer. Did so once and it was the worst experience I ever had. Never again.
"You don't need windows for gaming, 90% of games work on linux!" -- except the 10% that DON'T are all of the new, massive titles that people want to play. It's like saying "90% of the gears in the car work fine, just not 1st gear".
"There are 0 driver problems" -- obviously not true as some hardware only ships with windows hardware. Yes it's true your new network card or mouse won't have issues, but a lot of hardware simply doesn't have support, and a lot might be supported if you spend enough time fanagling.
"it's just as easy use as windows or mac" -- until you need to change one of many settings that hasn't been included in a control panel, because linux users have been more than happy to drop to config files and cli usages to tweak things (i.e. lots of stuff left out of system GUIs)
I don't know why people do this. Especially in communities that are technical (and thus tend to be "technically correct" about things), why people essentially lying (by omission, if nothing else) about Linux?
That's not true? Arc Raiders, arguably the most-hyped game of 2025, is day-one compatible with Linux devices. I played the Server Slam free weekend on my NixOS machine, clearly not all of the new massive titles are broken.
You can't abuse hyperbole like this while accusing other people of lying.
But yeah, I run Windows as my daily-driver for pretty much the reasons you give.
Linux is not a 100% replacement for Windows, and the reverse is equally true. LibreOffice is not MS Office except for being open-source. Your pocket tool is not functionally equivalent to a full toolbox. A turducken is not a pheasant. Etc.
Virtual reality headsets with dual 4K screens running at 75Hz+ perform well on a Windows VM done that way. A normal flatscreen game is going to be just fine.
Let them go; they're on a roll.
Are you sure? Senator Ron Wyden claimed that the US uses the Push Notification system for surveillance, and Apple never denied it: https://www.macrumors.com/2023/12/06/apple-governments-surve...
"In this case, the federal government prohibited us from sharing any information," the company said in a statement. "Now that this method has become public we are updating our transparency reporting to detail these kinds of requests."
You can't download anything from the App Store without signing into it. For that, an Apple ID is required.
- Glue'd in batteries on Laptops. I had a Mac Pro with a glue'd in battery. I could have done it myself, however I ended up opting to get someone who knows what they are doing to replace it. Labour and battery replacement cost me about £250.
- Official charger made the power lines toast. Another £250 to get it repaired.
- iOS Safari browser sometimes stops videos / audio when the screen locks or you switch apps. It is really annoying. Doesn't happen on Graphene OS or Android.
- iCloud is kinda required if you use an iPhone even though I don't use it for backups.
- Upgrades just aren't possible. Every single on of my laptops I have, I have upgraded ram, disk and even processor on some of the older models I have. I changed an intel Mac Mini drive to an SSD, it was a fiddly to say the least. On other SFF machines it is often a 5 minute job.
- MacOS is kinda just weird. While it is a Unix, it does everything it can to hide it. As someone that used both Linux/BSD. MacOS feels like running a weird Linux distro. Brew was kinda weird after coming from Linux world. I would have just preferred to run Linux.
- The online account stuff with Apple is somehow worse than Microsoft.
These days I buy refurb Business Laptop from Dell or Lenovo. Literally 10% of the price, Linux almost always works and if breaks, I can buy another one cheap for the same price as repairing an Apple machine. I get it, they are not as nice but for me they work fine and are much cheaper.
Ultimately, Linux is a development environment for Linux, and by extension the most developer friendly OS imo.
One thing that drives me nuts about Linux is that application support generally isn’t as good as Mac. For example, there is no Claude Desktop app for Linux nor an Apple Music desktop app. If you need those, you’re using somebody’s hacked together project that half works, a web version with limited features, or paying for a third party app.
Chrome dropped support two years ago or so.
That's a version from over 2 years ago.
CMD will open
Type (no quotes) “net user Prefferedusername /add” (replacing Prefferedusername with the user name you wish to use) and press enter.
Next type “net localgroup administrators Prefferedusername /add” and press enter.
Next type “net user Prefferedusername /active:yes” and press enter.
Next type “net user Prefferedusername /expires:never” and press enter.
Next type “net user administrator /active:no” and press enter.
Next type “net user defaultUser0 /delete” (this is case sensitive make sure the "U" is capitalized) and press enter.
Next type "regedit" and press enter.
This opens registry editor, navigate to "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\OOBE"
Delete "DefaultAccountAction", "DefaultAccountSAMName", and "DefaultAccountSID"
Right click on "LaunchUserOOBE" and rename it to "SkipMachineOOBE" and make sure the value is set to "1".
Close registry editor and type "shutdown /r /t 0"
Says a lot about what is broken, incentive-wise, about the modern Internet.
Definitely says something about your age though complaining about video versions of anything. Kids today don't even know what Google's search page looks like. They search in YouTube, TikTok type apps first. Since the location bar has also become the search bar while theGoogs pays browsers to be the default search, lots of people are not even aware they are doing a google search.
Also, some people will try things that are technically above their abilities normally. Having a video typing the commands in can be easier for them to replicate as it'll look just like the video. Text only from some webpage won't have those visual clues.
I much prefer text for this stuff too, but at least I can understand why something else is preferred by someone not me. I might be elder, but I'm not obstinate
I've always hated the trend of moving towards video as well. But if my desktop was currently in the process of installing the operating system, leaving me without a web browser, and all I have is my phone as a secondary device ... I might actually prefer watching a quick video over trying to read text on a tiny screen and having to pinch zoom and horizontal scroll. Of course this depends a lot on how the text is presented, but in general I think video is easier to absorb on a phone and text is easier to skim / read / zoom / copy-paste on a desktop.
Not so much about the best way to communicate as much as the creators see it as their best option, for them.
I've seen a lot of tutorials that really just seem to be infotainment / social media news. Often forgetting critical steps and describing why you do a thing incorrectly. It's frustrating.
For the creator: videos can be monetized trivially
For the search: YouTube results are often highlighted top of the page on Google search results.
At least with a recent video you can see what they click, it's probably up to date and you see all the stuff they do and you can see if it actually works.
I was trying to install jupyter notebook a few months ago and all the how tos failed because macos had updated some nonsense. At least with youtube you can try to find a recent one where they mention that.
But that aside I appreciate the compliment (or at least I'm going to take it as a compliment).
text with images is a pain to scroll, and in video form you have one more channel of info - sound.
the visuals are there to tell you where it is you find the different things, or so you dont go hunting for a button that doesnt actually exist on a gui, but also so you can match the confirmation, and get an idea on if its running at about the right speed
I don't know why this is being put in this "I guess I'm old" bucket. Its just another form of content and a different way of following something. Perhaps if they put the text commands in the video description you would get the best of both worlds.
I like both, but following along watching someone else is helpful. YouTube tutorials on how to do things are extremely helpful.
If you find the video an inconvenience, just don't use it.
Because a bucketload of people only interact with the Internet using a device with a tiny-ass screen and super-shitty keyboard.
So, what you are actually asking is "Why the hell are people using phones to look this shit up instead of a laptop?"
Which, to be fair, is a valid question.
It is because "modern" search engines will retrieve only links to SEO spam. The only thing that, somehow, works (50% of the time) is youtube search.
Enshitification.
Or if those malicious videos were posted and reported, then I can see why a fairly dumb AI system would see the similar legitimate ones as the same thing. Probably a particularly bad scenario for automated moderation.
Are you just playing devils advocate or do you actually believe this?
I thought Windows was the "user friendly" choice
Those sort of thing always make me nervous however because it's not easy for the average user to tell if its running any sort of malicious scripts in the process. This one seems to be safe and I'm going to give it a try to see what happens.
The article also suggests that
"reg add HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\OOBE /v BypassNRO /t REG_DWORD /d 1"
still works as well which would be even better because thats local and easier to verify its integrity. that being said I think these are both valid suggestions if they work and I'm going to give them a try.
Except, then Microsoft adjusted their account infrastructure, and now it's also an Xbox Live account. Then it became also a Windows Messenger account. Then it was required to login to Visual Studio. Then it ate my perfectly working Mojang account. Now I need it to install stuff from the Windows store like the damn Windows debugger you use to analyze BSOD dump files
I do not want my computer preferences saved across machines. I want to set up each computer separately. I do not want cortana. I do not want to connect my local computer to my account.
I gain nothing by using my microsoft account to log in to my local computer.
The singular goal is that I just want to use my damn computer, to do local computer things.
Download .iso of LTSC version of Win. Make bootable install disk via Rufus and tick options to create local account during install. Install Win from created bootable device. Done.
> Next type “net user defaultUser0 /delete” (this is case sensitive make sure the "U" is capitalized) and press enter.
Why do we have to delete them?
präferiert (dt.) is often pronounced praefferiert in my head, too, but it is always written with only one f, in german and in english.
I originally had “ net user Prefferedusername/active:yes” but there should have been no space before "net" and I should have put a space before the "/" after prefferedusername.
so the corrected instructions are below. (hopefully without typos this time)
at the first setup screen instead of answering any of the questions press Shift + F10
CMD will open
Type (no quotes) “net user Prefferedusername /add” (replacing Prefferedusername with the user name you wish to use) and press enter.
Next type “net localgroup administrators Prefferedusername /add” and press enter.
Next type “net user Prefferedusername /active:yes” and press enter.
Next type “net user Prefferedusername /expires:never” and press enter.
Next type “net user administrator /active:no” and press enter.
Next type “net user defaultUser0 /delete” (this is case sensitive make sure the "U" is capitalized) and press enter.
Next type "regedit" and press enter.
This opens registry editor, navigate to "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\OOBE"
Delete "DefaultAccountAction", "DefaultAccountSAMName", and "DefaultAccountSID"
Right click on "LaunchUserOOBE" and rename it to "SkipMachineOOBE" and make sure the value is set to "1".
Close registry editor and type "shutdown /r /t 0"
90% of Windows games run on Linux: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45736925
LibreOffice is an okay office suite (good enough for my purposes): https://www.libreoffice.org/
GIMP is a good image editor: https://www.gimp.org/
VLC is a good media player: https://www.videolan.org/vlc/
I’ve tried emulators but performance is abysmal for these apps. There are also all sorts of weird networking things that don’t work.
And generally when you work with a new team which has a different tech stack, there just isn’t time within the context of a race weekend to faff.
I’m unfortunately locked in.
https://www.howtogeek.com/heres-how-i-made-linux-feel-more-l...
1. Needs to fix keybindings, including setting readline shortcuts across all gui textfields. May be effectively impossible with so many gui toolkits floating around. 2. Needs a gui to manage configuration of startup items, login items. 3. Portable application distribution rather than futzing with installing a third party package source (may be effectively impossible for gui apps). 4. Cleaner systemd configuration tooling and especially documentation, even if it can't be expressed via a gui. 5. Cleaner process management. 6. Cleaner user management via GUI.
The look and feel mostly doesn't matter tbh; you'll just end up with something that looks like macos but still mostly functions like windows but without consistent keybindings or behavior or system management.
But I appreciate the share!
So I would assume, if there is a way you can temporarily disable networking (e.g. in BIOS), then that would be the easiest way to avoid creating a Microsoft account.
Step 2: Install W11 with the autounattend.xml.
Step 3: Powershell as admin -> irm https://get.activated.win | iex
Mirroring "the unix way" it is often a collection of single-purpose tools composed together to achieve the desired goal. Samba is quite powerful these days, it does more than just SMB sharing. FreeIPA is another software tool that I believe is more common in Red Hat deployments.
Time for something new. No idea what, but we need a way for people to share with people... That's what made usenet, then the web so awesome. Both were mostly wrecked by the same commercialization.
Nowadays, I feel many problems are emergent from economic and legal structures, and a new software project is often just temporarily treating a symptom.
How should that look like and what could one make differently?
What we currently have could easily used to share with people (like it was years ago). Nothing really changed but people use it differntly now...
Another huge segment is people who just use whatever their work provides.
Laptop users who 1. care enough, 2. have the means, and 3. have the inclination to even get a personal laptop are a solid minority. Which coincidentally is how Microsoft gets away with the disaster that Windows 11 is. They have about _no_ user-customers left.
I know plenty of PC-hardliners that have switched from Windows to a Mac in recent years. And exactly nobody who has switched in the opposite direction.
I'm also pretty sure that most people who have personal laptops keep them around for 5+ years before upgrading. I myself had a 2015 15" MacBook Pro that lasted me until 2022 when Ventura support was cut off. I only upgraded it in 2023 when Apple launched Advanced Data Protection, which I was very keen to use, and had to make a choice between logging out of iCloud or buying a new MacBook. So seeing that the 2015 model had indeed reached it's useful life for me, I got myself a M2 Max 16", which I also fully expect will last me 7+ years.
So as long as IT procurement in most companies will keep buying whatever cheap PC laptops they can by weight, PC market share is safe, and Microsoft is doing the best they can to keep it that way. Apple can only compete for users who have the will and the choice. And the $699 MacBook will quite likely capture a few of them.
Additionally - I have a PC too. All it does is it runs videogames. In fact I use my personal PC a lot more often than I use my personal MacBook.
VLC walked so MPV could run.
writer, perhaps. calc, not even close - google sheets is unfortunately better in almost every way, and google sheets aren't great either.
This really depends on your needs. I'm sure it's not enough for someone who does Excel wizardry for living. But I use it for tracking personal finances and other simple tasks and graphs, and it is completely sufficient.
This in my book easily earns it the "okay office suite" badge. To be honest all office suites in the last 20 years have been good enough for most small scale needs, including OpenOffice back in the early days.
CSV import in Excel sucks. LibreOffice Calc is far better there.
Best feature of all in LibreOffice Calc: highlight current row/column, so you have a cross-like cursor.
Easier and better embedding of Python and other languages, not the "Python in the Cloud" crap that Excel does.
Less crappy conversions like "oh, that surely looks like a date, let's mess up your data"...
> writer, perhaps. calc, not even close
For what I see 99% of people do in excel (make a table, then sort it and draw some charts), calc would support all their uses just fine.
For those using it for actual accounting/financial stuff with equations in the cells, and custom macros, etc ... then no, calc won't be sufficient.
excel runs the world, and I mean that unironically.
The Linux answer is often repeated but unfortunately, some users depend on various Windows software that only runs properly on Windows. E.g. CAD/CAM, Quicken finance, sewing embroidery, etc can't run in a Linux WINE emulator nor QEMU/KVM virtual machine. And avoiding the WINE/KVM incompatibilities by switching to "Linux-native" software such as Gimp often means having less features and/or not having ability to open old files because they use different formats.
Sure, there's the idea that "90% of users just use email and surf the web so they can just get by with a Chromebook" ... true, but there's still a lot of users who can't because they use other productivity software.
For me, there's always some unexpected situation that requires a working Windows computer. Last year, I had to do an unplanned firmware update on a digital audio interface via a USB cable. There was no Linux updater. They had a firmware updater for macOS but it didn't work. Based on the tech support forums, I had to download the firmware updater for Windows platform and that finally worked.
reply to: >What software do you have that doesn't work in a VM?
Example would be software that use hardware USB dongles for DRM. E.g. embroidery software for sewing machines. The passthrough USB emulation to the vm is not invisible enough to fool the software searching for hardware dongles. Another example was Trimble software for LIDAR that depended on DirectX which crashed in a vm.
reply to: >A good-enough compromise is a dual boot with a tiny Windows partition for the rare cases
That is a very techie solution that's not practical for "normies". Dual-boot creates the "2 os file systems" issue instead of having a single unified disk mount. Windows doesn't have a built-in way to read Linux ext4 file system. Linux doesn't have a bulletproof reliable way to read/Write NTFS partition (various tech forums mention data corruption). Unless one goes external with external NAS hardware and store all documents on an SMB mount -- but that also layers on more technical issues and doesn't work for laptops on-the-go being disconnected from the NAS.
What kind of software isn't working?
Modern GIMP doesn't have the features that Photoshop 6.0 had 25 years ago, and GIMP had a 5 year head-start on it.
Unfortunately, the authoritarian PIAs that develop GIMP have a rigid and inflexible mindset that stop GIMP becoming the default for millions of Photoshop users and or those who cannot afford Adobe's outrageous prices, and those who can no longer accept its draconian licensing terms.
In short, millions would switch to GIMP on Linux if it worked 'properly'.
I don't know why the Linux community doesn't put more pressure on GIMP's developers to comform. The percentage of Linux desktop users would increase considerably if they would.
Look at it this way: here's just one GIMP issue that turns away Photoshop users: why did GIMP's developers remove the perfectly functioning Fade feature in GIMP?
Yes, I know their stated reason and I also know the workaround but it's a damned nuisance to use.
By removing the Fade feature GIMP's 'high minded' developers have effectively done what mathematical types tried to do with the calculator when they introduced RPN/Reverse Polish Notation in place of the standard way of entering data.
Except for mathematicians, engineers, etc. RPN failed spectacularly—sure it is better but just too hard for mere mortals to grasp.
The bloodymindedness of GIMP's developers are deliberately holding back GIMP's adoption. They could have easily left Fade in place and just added their fancy sophisticated option for their propeller-head brethren to use.
Fixing some of GIMP's problems seems so obvious I sometimes think Adobe has placed a Trojan on GIMP's team to thwart competition.
Players like mpv are way better unless you want to use nightly build of v4
I really appreciate VLC for how it can play just about anything, but it's a "player of last resort" for me.
I have always preferred pinta for normal usage editing and although this might be shunned but idrc, but sometimes photopea can be also good software.
Regarding desktop environmnents, Just try anything you find interesting, KDE,XFCE,Cinnamon etc., you would be shocked by how snappy/minimalist somethings like XFCE are.
Personally I am on hyprland in cachy os.
And VLC is a superb media player, I use it on all platforms for like 10 years, nothing even compares to it.
that is never the solution. that is the workaround. workarounds are not solutions.
There is enough issues running games on Linux that there are specific distros created for running games because everything from the kernel version, X/Wayland, Compositor and the pipewire version can affect immensely how well the game runs.
If you play single player games with no or limited online features you'll be fine in 99% of the cases (number pulled from my ass).
VLC is a broken mess and has always been a broken mess.
Well, I am certainly chuckling now. That is a joke I have never heard before, but I get it! How witty you are.
Tee hee.
In general, unless you need advanced Excel features, you can switch to linux.
[0] e.g. https://www.neowin.net/news/microsoft-cant-help-break-window... and couple others
Or maybe you're talking about needing Exchange integration? I don't know what the state of that is on Linux these days.
It is the poster child for enshittification.
It is really not the limiting factor in Linux desktop adoption. The inherent fragmentation and HW compatibility issues are much more pertinent.
Buy the wrong laptop, and you have to fight with X, wayland and Nvidia graphics like a terminally inclined caveman in danger
As for GIMP, while I understand it can do many things as Photoshop, it is not close in terms of features and the UX is unfortunately terrible.
Read this: https://gist.github.com/stdNullPtr/2998eacb71ae925515360410a...
People who work with Photoshop have never worked with any other thing. The way they learned to edit bitmaps was through Photoshop. They can't separate the act and the product in their heads. Thank god for Affinity getting into the mix.
One just has to deal with GIMP as it is, and stop trying to project Photoshop paradigms onto it. People just need to stop thinking of FOSS as the generic, off-brand or ersatz versions that pass or fail due to their degree of imitation of some other product.
IMO, every step GIMP takes towards Photoshop UI is a regression. GIMP's problems have been technical, such as color management and non-destructive editing, and they're gradually falling away.
Really liking Linux doesn't make Windows worse, and it doesn't make Linux better.
Watch someone who is not familiar with Linux and how it works attempt to install it and use it. Do not intervene. Now do that with a dozen different people on a dozen different machines which you do not preselect.
On Windows it is a much smoother experience.
I am making zero statements about any application compatibility or application comparisons between platforms. I am talking only about UX, UI, and installation.
Linux still has so, so very far to go.
And, honestly, there is no operating system which a complete newbie can start using without help in some form. Linux is not some golden child, here.
You like Linux on the desktop, and that's fine. Keep enjoying it. Just be aware that your experiences color your viewpoints, sometimes completely.
I am not a fan of Microsoft, I use Windows about once a month these days, but the UX difference between Linux and Windows is still very large. Very large.
Also installing is way easier for beginners with Windows. I’m happy that Linux installation now at least reached the level of Windows 98, but I still need to search for things every single time, even when I do it about every other years for several decades now. Just because somebody thought that it’s so important to ask simple users about an implementation detail which almost nobody care about. And this is before bugs… which I encounter quite frequently.
It’s getting better, but by not much. It could be a very stable OS with the right hardware even 20 years ago. That didn’t change, you still need to be very careful if you want a good experience with Linux and a GUI. I had no laptop or PC in the past 30 years on which I could install Linux without serious hiccups if I wanted anything more than terminal. I could almost always make it usable (it was impossible with one laptop), but I always had to give up something, like battery life, game performance, my headset at the time, etc. And of course a ton of time.
What a dumb analogy. My mother can use Windows very well, it doesn't mean she could also install it. The same rule applies to most Windows users. That's why it comes preinstalled, and not with an attached bootable USB stick.
UX of recent Windows versions is crap. The bearish tendency started with 8 and have never recovered, with Windows 11 being the cherry on top of the crap. Telling that as a user of almost every Windows version since 3.11. Microsoft completely changes user interface with every recent version, this is an anti-pattern in UX world. How is that I can smoothly switch between Debian and macOS major updates, and when Windows does the same it is a nightmare? "Oh no, where are the network settings again..."
Have you done this, or is this just a science fiction story? Have you watched a dozen people install Windows on a dozen different machines?
The reason people sorta know Windows is because they've already used it, not because it is good. And if you don't give them something straightforward like MATE or Cinnamon as a Linux desktop, you might as well compare it to new Vista users, not Win11 users.
You don't have to convince me that Gnome is bad. But everything else now pretty much follows the WinXP paradigm that we're all used to.
When you're looking at consumer usage of a PC for anything that remotely makes sense to do on that platform I think windows has the advantage of decades of a different software ecosystem. Cumulatively there's a huge broad library of software that linux can't touch, or gets partway there but falls short. For example I can tag music files on linux, but it's painful compared to something like Mp3tag (which has been going for about 17 years). Or if I want fan control on my 9 year old intel platform I need to learn about and add a kernel parameter and manually detect sensors before I get started whereas it's straightforward on software available on windows.
Every time I see a gnome app without a menubar I can't help but feel like Linux shoots itself in the foot just because Windows has two feet.
Linux people (myself included) are utterly blind to the rough edges on Linux. Even something like Mint, which is probably the best starting place for someone coming from Windows, can have weird issues depending on your hardware.
On the other hand, Windows users are hilariously misinformed about the state of the Linux Desktop. To hear them talk you'd think we're still back in 1997.
All of that said, for anyone curious, it is 100% worth trying out. Linux has come a LONG way. Mint is great for general usage, Bazzite is a good choice for gaming. Unless you're playing competitive shooters it's basically a guarantee the games you want to play run on Linux. There will be some rough edges and stuff to get use to, but IMO it's worth a try at least.
Presumably the it here is Linux? That’s not what I would have said. The terminal makes maintaining your own systems much easier because it’s all text. Opposed to having to mix screen shots and instructions. Which is to say, I don’t imagine people who can’t handle the terminal (and are on Windoz) are doing any maintenance or configuration beyond a few GRRR items they’ve convinced themselves is ultimately intolerable.
From a small business I’d say what keeps the accounting office on Windoz is software (ie. quickbooks, excel). But a close second would be tighter integration of file management and core office apps (ie email). It’s very easy to rename, move, copy, files on windows. You can perform many of these file management tasks inside an app experience (ie saveas dialog box). Apple has the mindset with their suite of Apple productivity apps, Chromebooks are very easy for general users to get their head around. If Linux could roll up a Chromebook environment with a QB clone into an expert system (e.g. no. We don’t need pictures, videos or games folders), I think our firm would consider the switch. It would certainly have the appearance of stability productivity, and simplicity which is always a plus when your job is not maintaining IT systems. (Now we just need to find new outsource IT for troubleshooting)
When I upgraded to 7 I tried Linux and I simply hated that I had to deal with the terminal and install strange third-party programs from strange forums to get anything working. Then I had to upgrade to 11 and I had to run strange terminal programs to install it without without creating a Microsoft account, and everyone recommends using some third-party Windows power tools to fix what Microsoft did to Windows. I could not believe it. IT IS THE SAME THING!
Now I'm using Linux, and I don't like it, but least it isn't spyware.
Most Linux distros have come a long way in the last decade and a half. Windows is worse, yes, but Linux is also better.
A time will come when the easiest way to run these beasts is in a docker container running wine, and I don't think it will be long.
New features are few and far between, but that doesn't mean that they're not doing a good job. The current state of the industry is not a reflection of the developers working on it today, it's a decades long legacy.
At what level of motorsports are you working? It sounds like you both semi-regularly work with new teams. And are you working with them as a programmer? I'd be curious to know what kind of applications you're then working on, if so.
With a small team of software engineers and data scientists, I'm building a cloud based motorsports data analysis platform which eliminates the friction involved in handling motorsports data and the differences between different manufacturers' software systems, and quickly gives drivers & coaches insights on how to improve their driving. So this involves getting into the weeds of a lot of this legacy software.
There are a few teams I work more closely with where I've set up their entire trackside network/tech stack, although nowadays I'm more focused on the software. Over the years I've done a bit of everything at the track, up to and including physically laying cables in a bare garage or setting up the systems on the car, although I don't do anything related to vehicle dynamics.
This is an open source reimplementation of winxp. I think they can even run drivers made for windows now.
If you can't read normal text on a phone screen, consider corrective lenses.
2. KDE Autostart
3. KDE Discover. Supports flatpak for example: https://flathub.org/en
4. SysD Manager (https://github.com/plrigaux/sysd-manager). Can be installed from Flathub. SystemdGenie is another one.
5. KDE Plasma System Monitor
6. KDE User Manager
This might be an issue with your optics. I personally know at least 4 people who left MacOS for Linux in the past decade, 5 if you include myself. 2 of those people aren't even programmers, they're just sick and tired of macOS turning into Windows.
The $699 Macbook will not capture any users that missed out on the M1 Macbook Air. It just won't. We already saw Apple try pushing the whole 12" Macbook vs 13" Air shtick, not only did it fail commercially but it gave people a terrible impression of the ecosystem. I cannot imagine any world in which "quite a few" people switch from Windows to a Fischer Price operating system.
mpv is a fork of mplayer, which preceded VLC by a year or two.
The real issue is familiarity and importing, but if you start fresh, LibreCalc is better for me.
Another example (which is not licensed, and easier to test for) is Jw_cad https://www.jwcad.net/download.htm which actually installs and runs, it's just that it doesn't run well. Some stuff works, but it's not enough to make it usable.
I've written docs at work intended for non (or less) technical people and it's a pain in the ass to try and get screenshots of expected inputs/outputs, try to predict every question or misunderstanding and make the writing clear. There has been more than a few times I wished I could just record a video.
On Windows they are mostly off the beaten path. I have a Windows PC setup as my media computer because my wife doesn't want to deal with Linux, and I've never once had an issue with the audio or Bluetooth.
On my Fedora desktop and Arch laptop I have audio/Bluetooth issues at least every couple of weeks.
In addition, my wife needs access to Adobe products, my brother needs access to Office. Those are non-negotiable for them because in both cases it's for work.
I'm a Linux fan, I don't even want to go back to Windows for my personal computer, but Windows is still a smoother experience for the majority of people.
No, I wouldn't; because I'm still annoyed and my frustration goes deeper than just GIMP and its developers, my issue is that the problems that plague GIMP also plague much open source software and we need to find solutions.
First, I'm a vehement supporter of FOSS and the need for more choice in the marketplace even if that means having more commercial software to choose from. As I see it, much of the key software (Windows, Android, MS Office, Photoshop, etc.) that monopolizes market now does so because of Big Tech's market domination—not necessarily because it's the best available.
It's the sheer domination of the software ecosystem by Big Tech that's the problem, thus good open source products such as Linux, GIMP, LibreOffice, etc. all struggle to get a mainstream airing irrespective of quality.
It's clear to me there are several important reasons why open source has not achieved a wider penetration amongst more general/less technical users. From that perspective FOSS software suffers from a fundamental and systemic problem which is it's principally developed by people who like developing code for its own sake who then open-source it for free.
Without the monetary incentive one doesn't have the right to demand of them the form software should take. Dictating how software should work and or what features it must have would serve little or no purpose, if they'd disagree they'd either ignore you or just pack up and leave the project.
The problem is obvious, FOSS developers are skilled and it's that skill that directs the way they'll tackle a project—thus the software ends up working their way and with features they reckon it should have—and more often than not this is in direct conflict with the way ordinary nontechnical users want it to work.
Despite my narky comments about GIMP's developers, I understand that in their technical judgment they had good reason why they omitted the Fade feature and I accept they are under no obligation to include a feature that from their perspective is out of place and does not logically dovetail with other features. Given also they're offering their time for free then there's really not much one can object to in the circumstances.
Nevertheless, that FOSS developers first and foremost develop software as they see fit and from their perspective and that that view often clashes with the requirements of nontechnical users poses a serious conundrum for open source software. The upshot clear: if ordinary users see no real advantage and or find it too difficult to convert to FOSS then it won't attract the number of users it deserves.
With commercial software user requirements are often determined by marketing based on user demand and programmers are obliged to program accordingly. When Microsoft says "we're about to start on yet another GUI for the next version of Windows" the choice is stark—knuckle down or leave. Without the monetary incentive, FOSS is at a significant disadvantage.
Let me offer my own perspective here. I am an IT professional and have been for decades. Moreover, I've headed an IT department where help-desk was a key service and from experience I know how difficult it is to get users to adopt new software packages, especially so when the replacement package offers essentially the same features, for example, replacing MSO with LibreOffice often meets with stubborn resistance.
Even I get annoyed when I have to change software and I find the UI and or features are noticeably different to what I'm used to. I'm an Arch user so I'm used to tweaking Linux et al but I deal with hundreds of different packages on Linux, Android, Windows and other setups and it's dead easy to forget the idiosyncrasies of a package that one hasn't worked with for several months. Having to relearn its features and quirks because its so different to what one was working on only moments before is not only time consuming but also a damn nuisance.
So from my perspective standardization is just about everything. Trouble is programmers all to often consider themselves 'artists' and unnecessarily keep reinventing the wheel. Look at the outrageous plethora of Windows GUIs. MS started out well by adopting IBM's well thought out CUA (Common User Access)† then essentially abandoned it for others that were often grossly inferior—think Metro for instance. And what about MSO's 'Ribbon'? The heretic(s) who devised that should have been condemned to time in the stocks. The unmitigated fucking hide of them to force millions of users to waste millions of manhours relearning functions that didn't need to be relearned. What is so outrageous was that after mandating the change to the 'Ribbon' those authoritarian shits at Microsoft could easily have left the old GUI there as a fallback option—but they didn't!
Who paid for those millions of wasted hours? Right, it certainly wasn't Microsoft.
This kind of outrageous and unacceptable behavior is why it's so important that FOSS be easy to convert to and be as compatible with the commercial product as is possible. With its Windows monopoly MS can afford to experiment with GUIs and weather the changes when they fail and still survive unscathed but I'd contend that in this regard FOSS is much more vulnerable.
In this regard we've witnessed a long lineage of failures in converting Windows users to Linux due to compatibility issues, despite the Linux brotherhood praising its simplicity the fact is that Linux is just too different to Windows for millions to make the leap. The problem is further compounded with the myriad of Linux distros available—and I'd venture that most Linux diehards have no idea the fear that that number of distros generates in newbies. FOSS developers should heed the message.
I am firmly convinced that the lack of consistency across FOSS development and its failure to adhere to uniform standards in the many instances where it's possible and logical to be consistent is a major impediment to its widespread adoption.
The other impediment slowing down FOSS adoption harks back to the fact that open source is free and without monetary incentives is that there are no guarantees that a FOSS project won't end up as abandonedware. I've long advocated a halfway revenue-neutral measure where certain FOSS projects only offer the source for free and charge a small nominal amount for binaries with licenses stipulating that one's only allowed to compile the source for one's own use—distribution thereof is prohibited. It seems to me most users would prefer to pay a small nominal amount of say $10 or $20 for the binaries. That way, developers could receive some recompense for their work, then they would have both the incentive to remain with the project and also likely to be more responsive to users' requirements.
I know I'm not alone in coming to these ideas, after I posted the above comment I came across this HN story that addresses very similar issues:
"Free software scares normal people" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45760878
I'd urge you to read it.
___
> Linux shoots itself in the foot just because Windows has two feet
This is exactly the opinion that everyone who is not accustomed to all of the GNOME nonsense gets after using GNOME. And GNOME fans are far too used to things to even hear that it is imperfect.
Modern social media has only succeeded by moving away from text, and meeting the masses where they already are. They mostly don't want to read.
But I think there is a discoverability dynamic at play as well. Finding a blog post that isn’t garbage can be harder than finding a decent video on any given topic. This is clearly a feedback loop towards video but I think partly this is because up until now you couldn’t just create a spam video channel with the same ease that you could a spam blog.
I don't see an issue with there being multiple ways to learn how to do something, whether it be textual, images or video.
For this type of thing having a video running in the background while I punch in the commands makes sense, I can perform the actions at the same time the video does.
So it's both content and communication preferences. HN is a self-selecting group of a certain type, but not everyone on the planet thinks like the average HN dude
Not knocking it I’m sure it has value to developers who want a more turnkey setup for common dev setups.
winget install -e --id Mozilla.Firefox[0] https://itsfoss.gitlab.io/post/microsoft-office-365-declared...
The integration to Exchange is key as well, I need to have access to rooms, PSTs etc.
The first is Linux.
The only reason Microsoft can afford to treat Windows with such disdain is that desktop operating systems became an afterthought.
I once tried to play Trackmania Nations (not Forever or United Forever, the ESWC one) because that was the first entry of this series I played. I still have all the files from back then so I thought it would be as simple as installing it and running it. Other games such as Trackmania Sunrise came with the nasty SecureROM DRM that will break your current installs, but ESWC was always free to play and without DRM.
Well, after install, I played a lot in my first sitting. A few days later, my Windows install was broken. I used a restore point before installing Trackmania, everything was back to stable. A few weeks later I tried again, same situation, a day or two after install, my Windows would break.
I thought it was a general system instability, maybe some weird configuration and the game only triggers that specific bug. So I did a full clean reinstall. And installed the game a few days later. Who would've thought, my Windows breaks yet again.
What I'm trying to say is: I've been running Fedora on my main PC for 2 years now and the game has been installed via Proton for 1 year. It never broke, it always just worked.
I think you will really like this content.
Not an argument. It's an explanation. Stop with the antagonism.
Some people like blue, some people like red. Some people like audiobooks, some prefer reading actual books. Some people like to go to movie theaters, some prefer to wait for the movie to watch at home. Some people like cilantro.
The internet is a big place. There's room for multiple ways of skinning the cat without preventing any of the other ways.
I can get the same information only without the ads and parasocial relationships with content creators. Not making anyone money!
No one reached directly for kernel-level anti-cheat. It was the result of an escalation of the sophistication of cheating solutions.
While email is asynchronous and I can live with not seeing it all the time (I check it occasionally anyway), the calendar feature is a must, and specifically the reminders. This is why I cannot live without Outlook launched, and it reminds me of meetings I would miss otherwise.
Yes, because as you said these applications only run on Windows. How else would you get around it, if not by running some form of Windows? At least this way, the core system (and 90% of general purpose applications) could remain on Linux.
> I don't have a Windows license either so I expect I wouldn't be able to anyway.
You can just use the install unlicensed, or, if your computer came with a Windows license (as most do), you can extract it from the motherboard and use it to activate the VM. Not sure if that's allowed in Microsoft's ToS though.
In any case, I'm not going to try to set up a Windows VM on my Linux computer, I don't have the room or if I had it would be better used for other things. And I just abhor using Windows, whenever I have to use the wife's PC it's hell. For her, too.. she can't find anything after she's saved something, for example. And I don't have a Windows license, never had, my computers are all bare when new. In any case, it defies the whole purpose of not having to run Windows. Now, with Windows 11, it seems to be even worse. And I have zero idea on how to install Windows from scratch anyway - in my case I would probably even have to install a Japanese version, as is installed on my wife's PC. Well, not going to happen.
Epic Games bought out rocket league and turned off a native linux build and faced no repercussions. Instead they made plenty of money.
That's the bar.
...but everyone uses a different 10%.
Something that's useless to you might be a dealbreaker to someone else.
I would guess reliance on excel is declining
In some places, yes, especially where certain online options are good enough.
Definitely not in financial services, and many offices I could mention. Even for me: Excel is the reason I haven't completely binned MS Office. For the subset of features I use⁰ it is better all round¹ than other things I've tried.
I'll miss it significantly when the last Windows machine that I operate away from DayJob is no more.
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[0] Probably less than that 10%
[1] There are many tasks for which there is something better, but the something is different in each case. Excel is a very good jack-of-all-trades.
It's in the sweet spot of "already installed" and "kinda-sorta database" and "kinda-sorta programming environment" where industrious people can build massive tooling over the years on top of an Excel sheet.
Yes, it could be an Actual Application, but then Legal gets involved (where is the data stored, what's the contract with the supplier), then you need to talk to Finance (Who's paying for this? Justify the cost!), IT (Managing the installations and licenses) and Security (Is the provider following good practices, is the application audited).
...then you decide "fuck that" and just use Excel, it's good enough.
Anecdote:
A programmer friend got promoted a few steps upward quickly and got into the "provide us with reports" level of employment. Their predecessor (a career manager) had spent multiple days each month manually doing the reports.
But a programmer's mind isn't built like that so they used the fact that Excel can pull stuff from HTTP APIs and now the report takes about 15 minutes to build automatically.
Frankly, calc is just as full featured as excel is, it's just different. About the only issue calc has is correctly parsing excel docs is notoriously difficult.
This is a familiarity problem, not a calc problem.
> There are no uploads. Photopea runs on your device, using your CPU and your GPU. All files open instantly, and never leave your device.
It's developed by a single guy, which I think is very impressive given how much of Photoshop's functionality it has. I just really wish it were open source (and not a web app).
Not sure what you mean by this exactly, but I work in banking with a lot of "financial professionals", and the general opinion is that Excel is not good because it screws with numbers, whether its scientific notation (Why? Its just as long as the original number), rounding of numbers (had that with a large list of account numbers just last week where half the account numbers lost the last 3 digits) and there is no easy way of saying "just treat these as entered".
Even setting fields to text doesn't stop Excel from fucking around and overriding them to be date formatted if it feels like the balance could be.
The main issue is that Excel comes with Office and you aren't allowed to install other software so it forces you to use it and get used to it. It really wouldn't take much to be better than Excel.
Both xlsx can be exported and imported. It is just harder
It's not the case that calc is lacking any features which excel has in a finance situation.
mac - if you need battery
Not on Android yet though.
Just how new does the new stuff have to be? I use VLC daily (because even though we have 4x streaming services, when I want to watch 3rd Rock from the Sun, it's not on any of them.
Some of the very new movies are also not on any of the streaming services, so I am left wondering, if I downloaded a movie that was only torrented a few days ago, just how new does the movie have to be to be unsupported by VLC?
I'm going through a project at the moment where all the data is held in spreadsheets, and every time anyone opens them Excel fucks the numbers to be "scientific notation" despite there being space to display the full number and no way to disable this anti-feature. The amount of times I've had to restore the spreadsheet from a backed up CSV because of data loss is frustrating. I wish I could stop using Excel.
It sounds like the problem in this case is that you don't know how to use basic Excel features.
It isn't rounding or truncating while you are actively using the workbook or saving in its native formats, but it does when saving back out to CSV or certain other formats.
As much as I like Excel for many things, it is sometimes the bane of my existence wrt people using it to manipulate tabular data that isn't in its native formats and causing accidental corruption.
One of the many projects on my list of “things I'll never get around to” is a good⃰ CSV (or other text-based tabular data) editor.
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[*] There are actually quite a few that look good, but don't have some of the features behaviours I want, or in some cases are not available on an appropriate platform (there are a couple of Mac only options for instance), or are paid proprietary apps that are surprisingly expensive (I could justify it and get work to pay in DayJob, but not for my own use).
You just are mixing up two different problems I've listed into one problem and then made the arrogant assumption that I don't know how to use Excel.
Excel has definitely truncated numbers.
In 2020, scientists decided just to rework the alphanumeric symbols they used to represent genes rather than try to deal with an Excel feature that was interpreting their names as dates and (un)helpfully reformatting them automatically. Yesterday, a member of the Excel team posted that the company is rolling out an update on Windows and macOS to fix that.
https://www.theverge.com/2023/10/21/23926585/microsoft-excel...
Also it drops leading zeros which is annoying when a column is zip codes and it should be imported as string and not number
I agree excel gives ways around these and maybe that's considered basic knowledge but it definitely has poor data-mangling defaults
Also, the extent to which windows is needed to accommodate uneducated operators is overstated. A lot of industrial equipment runs other oddball operating systems configured by the manufacturer and machine operators don't need to know the difference because they just know which buttons to press to get the job done.
- Some machines use embedded MCUs with no operating systems. I haven't seen one of these in the last 15 years. The last DNA extraction machine we got (a glorified sample shaker with 2 stepper motors) runs Win10! It has no keyboard, no network, and absolutely no ports of any kind (or at least not accessible without dissasembling the machine). A 8051 could do the job and still have memory left for Pong. [1]
- Very old machines run MSDOS and a proprietary software that directly talks to hardware ISA boards via I/O ports - no drivers. That software can't be ported to Windows2000+ because of the same reasons DOS games can't run in Win2000 - the kernel won't allow direct hardware access. Linux doens't allow it either.
- Newer machines run Windows 2000/XP/7/10, many of them offline. Some of them were updated to run Win10 from older versions, with the same app version (just Windows updated).
- Since Win10 can no longer be bought, newer machines run Win11 with permanent internet connection and they are minimally customized - the vendors left all ads, Copilot, Store and the kitchen sink installed. It's atrocious to work with those, but nobody cares. The management that make the decisions to buy the machines never ever touch them or even see them, and they don't take advice or feedback from us (or anyone else but accounting).
Are you perhaps not aware of the millions of embedded Linux installations that never see the internet?
Windows owns the industrial space for historical reasons, mostly to do with OPC being Windows-only and software for doing maintenance on field devices originally running on DOS. It quickly became a chicken-and-egg situation - everyone wrote their software for Windows because everyone else wrote their software for Windows. SCO owned a decent chunk of the field before that, but we know how that worked out.
We're seeing some change now that OPC is being phased out. Ignition now has feature parity between Linux and Windows (barring OPC, of course). Windows won't go away any time soon (if ever), but you can now have a fully functioning SCADA system with no Windows at all.
Your go/no-go decision tree
1) If your MacBook Pro is Apple Silicon (M1/M2/M3): Running Split Second in Parallels with Windows 11 ARM is a no-go because the Sentinel/HASP hardware key that Split Second uses is not supported on Windows ARM. Thales (the dongle vendor) is explicit: “Sentinel HASP keys … are not supported” on Windows ARM; LDK works via emulation but not the HASP/HASP-HL USB keys you plug in.
You can feed it the output from Kicad, and if you include the ipc netlist it’ll even generate models. Great for doing a check before manufacturing, especially if the viewer matches what you see in Kicad.
Unfortunately I’ve never gotten it to run in wine.
Also, unless you're talking about desktop motherboards that you bought directly from the manufacturer, any laptops you have almost certainly have an embedded OEM Windows license key burned into them from the factory (and that's obviously without getting into any massgrave chicanery).
I suppose the difference in our views is pragmatic versus philosophical. I don't care whether something is running through a translation layer on Linux or technically "on Windows" in a stripped-down VM with telemetry removed, so long as my core system remains Linux and I can minimize my exposure to Windows without any application support hurdles.
GIMP also has an excellent print interface. Krita doesn't have one at all.
Krita has them both destructively, and non-destructively as transform layers. What is it you're missing?
Adjust levels in photos.
They are all available as non-destructive filter layers, by the way, and Krita users had access to this way before GIMP 3.0 was released with non-destructive filters.
[1] https://docs.krita.org/en/reference_manual/filters/adjust.ht...
OnlyOffice is made by a Russian company that doesn't condemn war of aggression that Russia wages against Ukraine.
https://old.reddit.com/r/BuyFromEU/comments/1j7zlf2/onlyoffi...
The poster upthread asserted it doesn't happen; I'm saying it does. I didn't propose a solution, and your proposal is clearly not acceptable.
There are also other issues around how well those games work. Some games will work perfectly fine. I am not disputing that. It is a bit of a lottery though e.g. I had annoying sound issues with Hell Divers 2 that was only fixed with an update to pipewire. Performance issues were solved by upgrading to Kernel 6.16.
On Windows I had to do literally nothing for the game to work perfectly (also don't believe some of YouTubers that are complaining HD2, their PCs were actually broken!).
Generally on Windows I have to do very little to get a game to work, outside of extremely old games from the late 90s/early 2000s.
It really seems like you aren't reading what I said. I accept that old games will often work fine, provided they are on a store like GoG or Steam. Big budget releases are often what people want to play.
> If those are the games you really want to play then Windows is the answer, have fun ponying up your drivers license to Microsoft for the privilege of getting root kitted by those games.
It isn't about what I want. It is about what is the reality for the vast majority of people. I would rather everyone play games that work on Linux. Unfortunately many of the people I play games like playing new titles, often they only work well on Windows. There is a social aspect of this that many people on here ignore.
> Literally everything else just works on Linux, one click install and play through steam, no bullshit fiddling around.
They don't though. There are always odd issues with games e.g. borderless window doesn't work in a lot of games, because the mouse will get lost. Having that happen mid-match sucks, having fullscreen window has it own draw backs. I won't get into performance and sound issues as I've already explained the issues there.
Is there much value there for users or the linux platform? Some definitely, but it's not going to move the dial much compared to if say valve, codeweavers, or someone else could work with EA to get an agreeable solution that lets Battlefield6 work on linux, as an example with a large audience that's locked into windows to play what they want.
I live fine without a console, so I live fine without a Windows gaming PC too. I don't think the AAA chasers have more fun than me when it comes down to it, dealing with these companies seems to be an aggravating affair even if you do everything the way they want.
I run into more problems with Linux than I do typically with Windows. I've been using Linux on and off since 2002. I don't particularly mind it, but I also don't pretend it is for everyone.
Honestly, I did not know that these existed in Krita (when I used Krita, I did not find them).
However, I still stubbornly maintain that I answered the question sufficiently, which used the qualifier "with a better UI".
Taking a leaf out of my wife's book "Even when I'm wrong, I'm right!* :-)
(Yeah yeah, I know I was wrong)
Things that challenge accessibility plugins challenge any plugins. Steps away from accessibility are always steps towards lock-in.
> The inherent fragmentation and HW compatibility issues are much more pertinent.
But you seem to desire this. Don't buy the wrong laptop if you like lock-in; Apple and MS aren't making their OS compatible with your every hardware whim. Or learn how to reverse-engineer and write drivers.
Spoken like a true techbro. This attitude is so incredibly destructive. Technology is how we mediate our lives, cutting a very large number of citizens out of that is simply wrong, even if 'the numbers just aren't there' (and they are!).
But surely there can be a point in which there are larger problems than that Linux reached 5% adoption this year in the US:
https://ostechnix.com/linux-reaches-5-desktop-market-share-i...
That's better than what it was. It's also not a whole lot. But you must understand, the more people use Linux, the better it becomes. Even if value accessibility over other matters, increasing the market share surely will increase the amount of people working on accessibility too.
Anyway, I think the CLI approach of Linux is way more accessible than the more GUI oriented approach of Windows/MacOS.
Did I advocate for lack of accessibility features ? I just pointed out that in this context there are things far higher in the priority list. Especially given the fact that there are accessibility features, just not on par with windows.
Do you seriously believe that improving accessibility would have a higher impact in Linux adoption than improving robustness and hardware compatibility ?
Yes, absolutely. Linux is plenty robust and has lots of hardware that you can use today. The reasons people end up not using it are:
- Microsoft
- Lack of favorite application 'x' (see: Microsoft)
- Difficult to use (unfamiliarity plays a role here)
So yes, accessibility is a key factor, and not just for the people that have challenging bodies.
That said, devices like the SteamDeck run games on Linux (and that's without considering that every Android game ever is technically running on Linux too).
Let's face it though, PC gaming is already small enough these vs the consoles, that further splitting the marked isn't going to make sense for a lot of companies.
No. All the articles and testimony of game devs abandoning native Linux versions is from well before Proton was a thing, including Epic Games buying Rocket League and preventing you from playing the Native Linux build they had.
It also was not related to anti-cheat or underlying engine limitations or anything. Developers were clear that the problem was the massive lack of uptake mixed with a weirdly entitled community.
The last 10 years of AAA gaming have been an absolute shit show. The only people who seem to be even trying are Nintendo. Everyone else releases stuff that's buggy as hell and about as fun as a dental cleaning.
It's one thing to choose not to develop a new game for Linux. It's another to take a game that already runs on Linux and intentionally break it. You're guaranteed to alienate SOME people who are already fans of the game.
Not bad for me, was actually great for me because now I just main Linux; but powershell, while I get it... don't do that to people.
It's only the absolute shitfest that Win 10/11 ended up being that you have to conjure 300 arcane powershell commands just to get the OS to resemble a productive environment.
Especially true since they ended the service pack model. Continuous updates and hostile feature pushing is absolute cancer.
They do? How else does one use Linux if not via CLI? You mean those kiddies that like GNOME/KDE? pfffft, they're not "using" Linux. They're just using Linux to run other apps no different than using a ChromeBook
i thought i used Linux all these years, but i guess i dont.
> including how to install Windows 11 without logging into a Microsoft account and how to install Windows 11 on unsupported hardware.
Clearly. You're not supposed to own your computer, you're supposed to be a docile loyal rentoid.
That's not really the use-case for this. It's not possible anymore to use Windows with a local account (for a long time), the official UI only lets you login with a Microsoft Account. These commands are not used to install Windows on an unsupported PC, they're being used to create a local-only account.
I for one still got a Windows boot partition next to my Linux, but I refuse to create an account for it. The only way I can install Windows on my supported PC with a local account is by using these commands.
You used to be able to just press a small button. Then you had to disconnect the LAN cable and not connect a WLAN to create a local account. Then you had to open the Commandline and execute a single command. Now we're at the point where you have to execute multiple commands.
If they actually manage to make it impossible to use Windows local-only, that will truly be the nail in the coffin for me. Currently use Windows to play games which aren't supported on Linux, but this will turn into a hate_for_online_forcing > appreciation_for_kernel_level_anticheat_shitgames.
It is flooded by complaints about HW incompatibilities, HW acceleration not working etc. Haven't been able to find complaints about accessibility.
Furthermore, what is the percentage of visually impaired people in the US and what is the percentage of linux desktop users ? The numbers speak for themselves.
These things are mass market slop which are engineered to be bland and predictable to make the most reliable returns for institutional investors. Discerning consumers know better and don't go by what's popular.
There are plenty of popular franchises that I've liked in the past. There are plenty of "slop" movies that I enjoy, I really like Mission Impossible movies, Fast and Furious movies. I've also liked some of the Call of Duty games. There is room for both.
I was writing assembly before you were alive buddy ;)
* Doesn't condemn war (understandable in their position)
* Has dev team in Russia
* Pays taxes to Russia, which directly fuel war
* Does not support UAF or donate to Ukraine (also understandable)
* Keeps selling their software in Russia, which might have links to military and administration
Am I missing something here?
The fact that all of the above is being presented as an exclusively Russian strategy. When almost all companies mentioned on this website are proudly and directly tied to non-Russian war industries. The tendency to omit pointing out non-Russian examples almost always indicates endorsement of their actions.
And let me beat you to this that I condemn all offensive war industries no matter the country of origin. Unlike those who believe it is ok to side with one and not the other even if they do the exact same.
Where did I ever present those as exclusively Russian strategy?
> When almost all companies mentioned on this website are proudly and directly tied to non-Russian war industries.
So?
There is no ethical consumption under capitalism, none of our hands are clean. We all deal with our complicity in various ways, and draw our lines in the sand where we will, but at the end of the day survival in this world forces us all to be hypocrites.
And hardware compatibility issues are? The fact that orders of magnitude more people don't use Linux at all, disabled or not, because of lacking features or usability is optional?
If 5% of people is an insane number of people, surely usability for them all is more important than for a fraction of that? And again, this is not a product sold by a corporation. Leave features behind and adoption goes down, then you get no accessibility features at all. If you want more accessibility features, you want more developers. For that you want more usage.
Since you're such a noble white knight, why don't you code up those accessibility features you think are the most important missing part ? I'll wait.
And this whole falsely applied narrative is unironically a very frequent laundering tactic of their proponents.
And btw I don't even think most are really willing to accept the accusations of the American companies, as they've been told for centuries that these are the good guys.
I'm not drawing an equivalency between consumer and producer, I'm pointing out a relationship which, while unequal, still exists and needs to be acknowledged. I'm not attempting to derail or minimize anything. You claim you "condemn all offensive war industries no matter the country of origin," and that's fine, but in any practical sense it's meaningless moral posturing. Unless you run off into the woods to live off the grid, you're still a part of the problem, it's unavoidable.
It seems like you're holding onto your initial position, applying the factually true statement:
no ethical (as in a way of not contributing to others' exploitation) consumption is currently possible
Instead of talking about the way it's currently shaped to be ran by those who are profit-driven, violently steal resources and contribute to exhaustion of all peoples around the world, you're simplistically reducing it to a matter of entire groups of people, ignoring their standing in the social strata, having to either choose primitivism or accept they're just as bad as their rulers. Even if you've disclaimed that you're not concealing any motives and the responsibility is unequally distributed, your adherence on shifting away from those in charge of the means of production, which is how you've chosen to initiate this very exchange, enables an interpretation of you implicitly defending them, and I believe that's also what anyone with an ounce of critical thinking ability would make of. I would be less critical if you at least suggested organization against the existing way the global socioeconomical system as an alternative, but the appeal to the adherence to an archaic lifestyle suggests this is not something you'd probably approve of. A positive surprise would be taking this for granted and you just condemning those willing to comply all along I suppose?
And throughout the entire history, it has been shown that these are the exact same accusations that have insidiously been made by whoever is directly behind exploitative administrations. They put the blame on those who are always barred from having any say/questioning the way their labor is being used, divide them, deject their protests and prevent overthrowing.
> You claim you "condemn all offensive war industries no matter the country of origin," and that's fine, but in any practical sense it's meaningless moral posturing. Unless you run off into the woods to live off the grid, you're still a part of the problem, it's unavoidable.
This whole narrative here really boils down to the Oh you like music? name every song meme.
P.S. I'd advise refraining from appealing to imaginary emotional reactions on behalf of the other party. It usually demonstrates inability to defend a particular view and deflects from meaningful dialogue.