2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault
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@blakeyrat And this is why every year for the last twenty years has been the year of Linux on the desktop: they're too busy infighting and declaring that their own private snowflake way of doing things is the best, so that none of them are ever going to be even remotely close.
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@blakeyrat said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
Spend 500 hours of developer time making themes 100% configurable. Then at least another 500 hours QAing all the edge-cases you just created.
Or spend 100 hours of designer + developer time to create one nice theme that works out of the box.That second paragraph sounds a lot harder than the first one. Developer hours is the one resource they have more than enough of.
But what I'm complaining about is that they already had done the developer time, and decided to throw it away.
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@buddy except it isn't really what they have a surplus of.
They have 500 hours divided into at least 5 groups, all of whom assert that their vision is the one true vision. If they really had 500 dev hours not split too many ways, I'd be inclined to agree they have a surplus, but in reality they have fewer hours on each actual project because they're too busy asserting their way is the best way and no-one else is right. cf KDE vs Gnome vs Xfce vs CDE vs Motif vs whatever other environments there have been.
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@blakeyrat said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
BTW, completely off-topic, but the Wiki page for Segoe UI contains a little glimpse into how much the EU hates Microsoft for no reason:
In 2004, Microsoft registered certain Segoe and Segoe Italic fonts as original font designs with the European Union trademark and design office. The German font foundry Linotype protested, citing Segoe UI's similarity to its licensed Frutiger family of typefaces. In its submission to the EU, Microsoft claimed that Linotype had failed to prove that it had been selling Frutiger and Frutiger Next prior to 2004.
The EU rejected these claims, and in February 2006 the EU revoked Microsoft's registration.[2] Microsoft did not appeal the decision. Microsoft still holds United States design patents to various Segoe based fonts.Fuck you too, Europe.
Fuck Frutiger. Overcomplicated font family from hell.
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@arantor said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
They have 500 hours divided into at least 5 groups, all of whom assert that their vision is the one true vision.
Good. Competition is good.
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@wharrgarbl not if it ends up with a multitude of half assed, half baked, half finished eternal twilight projects that never achieve anything beyond occasional acceptance and the lofty goals of mediocrity.
See: Gnome, KDE, et al
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@arantor Unity has been good enough to me. I think I liked gnome 2 better though.
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@atazhaia said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
And yet as of currently I find the UX of Cinnamon vastly preferable to the clusterfuck that is the Windows 10 UX.
And assward hoard mentality of OSX with stupid unnatural direction.
Cinnamon is greatFinding my way around Windows has turned into a chore whenever I need to do something more advanced than starting a program
Trying to find the LAN settings because some people want to enter static IP addresses or create a bridge. It is only accessible through searching in Cortana, if it is not hange
(and even that can occasionally fuck up)
Speaking of Cortana hanged, or some process it depends on. You search app, it shows it but when you run it nothing happens! There is a process you will have to kill, bug not solved since forever
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@arantor if everyone in OSS land put their heads together and came up with a single design, would it still be any good?
MS had billions of dollars at their disposal, and they had Win8.
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@dse I'm so happy Cortana doesn't know Swedish so I can't even enable her. And yeah, searching for system settings is "fun". I can search for anything in the new settings app and go directly there. If the setting is in the old control panel? Fuck you, no direct link for you. I can't understand why Microsoft just couldn't convert everything to the new settings app if they love it so much, or make the control panel searchable by Windows too.
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@atazhaia I do not enable the bug-ridden thing either. Hit win and enter an application name, it is the fucking Cortana that is finding it and perhaps indexing in the background.
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@bb36e said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
if everyone in OSS land put their heads together and came up with a single design, would it still be any good?
We'll all never agree on what's "good design" anyways. The fractured nature of Linux means that it will never be a dominant desktop thing, but so what?
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@wharrgarbl said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
best windows that is 7
Unfortunately, your "best version" of Windows doesn't have exactly what you needed
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@dse said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
Trying to find the LAN settings because some people want to enter static IP addresses or create a bridge. It is only accessible through searching in Cortana
Or you right click the network icon, network and sharing center, click the network link thing, properties? Just like in 7?
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@kt_ said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
I do agree with you, but I think that more people would be interested in Linux if they were able to get a few things right. If it was stable and easy-to-use, you might want to install it on your parents' PC they could still use, but which can't successfully run Windows. I have such a machine, I use it to play videos and sometimes browse the web. It can't work with W7/10, but it'll happily churn away under elementary OS.
Meh. Yes, that might be a reason. But somehow, I suspect that 1) this scenario isn't so common and 2) once you've added all the applications (such as browsing a site running that eats all CPU), your out-of-date hardware will still not run nicely, independently of whether it runs on Linux or Windows.
Plus, nowadays a new machine is getting cheap. Big stores almost always have promotions with laptops at a few hundred $. Sure, for many people this is still a lot of dough, but not that much compared to other things: look at how much people are ready to spend on a new phone, and you'll tell me that these people wouldn't be able to spend a similar, or very often smaller, amount on money on getting a new laptop? And instead would go through the effort of wiping the OS on their computers to install a different OS?
My mom has a computer she likes and she doesn't want to buy a new one, but she'll need to soon, because the hardware is deteriorating and there's no Linux distro I'd feel comfortable providing her with.
You're kind of undermining your own argument here. You first say that Linux could be used as a lightweight OS on old hardware, and then you add that the hardware is failing anyway...
Also, even assuming the hardware still holds, you are also falling into the trap of believing that you must, necessarily and always, update your machine. Yes, I know, viruses and so on. But that can be handled even on old stuff. Yes, forced updates, but I'm pretty sure that e.g. W10 will not try to install itself if it detects that you are running an underpowered machine. So what? Your old mom will stay on XP for a few years, until the hardware actually gives up? If you've setup the machine with some correct antivirus and stuff, and she doesn't do dumb things, she'll be fine for a few more years (I'm not saying 10 more years, but statistically the hardware won't last that long anyway) -- and if she does dumb things, W10 will not prevent her from getting malware...
Anyway, @blakeyrat is asking the right question (which I was alluding to in my previous posts), why would you want to switch? If the only answer is "to run on outdated hardware", well, that doesn't make for a huge market share...
Old hardware could be the first step into the normal Joe's world. Not a great first step, but a first step.
And then what? As I said before, people don't care about the OS. They would get Linux on their old machine. And then they would buy a new machine and... what would be their reason to go trough the effort of putting Linux there as well? Is there anything on the new one that wouldn't work with whatever OS is has initially (which could be Linux, but could as well be Windows or MacOS)?
With how things look now, it can only be a dev OS for the adventurous.
And why isn't that OK? I mean, in almost any domain there are specialized tools for specialized uses. A truck has some mechanical devices that are not found on a regular car. A dev has different needs from a normal user, so he would use a different OS. Why does Linux need to be the year of the desktop? (yeah, that sentence doesn't make sense)
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@kt_ said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
My mom has a computer she likes and she doesn't want to buy a new one, but she'll need to soon
That has me wondering: What about the computer does she like that’s making her want to keep it? I bet it’s not the Pentium 4 chip or the dust-filled RS-232 port. Most likely it’s the way the windows etc. look on the screen, because they’re familiar, and you’ll never get those right except by using the OS she is now (Windows XP?). Best-case scenario is that she’s used to the keyboard, mouse, and monitor and doesn’t want different ones — in which case you buy a new PC and hook up the old peripherals.
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@gurth said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
@kt_ said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
My mom has a computer she likes and she doesn't want to buy a new one, but she'll need to soon
That has me wondering: What about the computer does she like that’s making her want to keep it? I bet it’s not the Pentium 4 chip or the dust-filled RS-232 port. Most likely it’s the way the windows etc. look on the screen, because they’re familiar, and you’ll never get those right except by using the OS she is now (Windows XP?). Best-case scenario is that she’s used to the keyboard, mouse, and monitor and doesn’t want different ones — in which case you buy a new PC and hook up the old peripherals.
Nah, I think she just got used to it and doesn't want to shell out money for a new one. It's a laptop, so these are not the peripherals.
Dunno, this thread got me thinking that Linux might be a lost cause.
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@kt_ said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
Dunno, this thread got me thinking that Linux might be a lost cause.
I believe that Linux on desktop (for the general public, mind you, not for devs etc.) is a lost cause. I am somewhat saddened that a lot of people seem to think that this is an issue and that it should absolutely be solved (or even that this is the only way on which Linux success should be judged), rather than focus on the areas where Linux is already a great tool, and can remain one (for devs, for servers, for embedded stuff...).
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@remi The thing is that 25 years after it's inception linux has conquered every market imaginable. Except the one it was originally intended for.
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@pleegwat Maybe. But even so, Einstein had no idea relativity would be used for GPS. Things get invented with something in mind, are applied to something different. OK. Cool. Can we move on now?
(the internet was still in its infancy when Linux started, and embedded/mobile stuff was still pure dreams -- plus, most users at the time were way closer to what we would now describe as devs)
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@atazhaia They've been working on it little by little, and until they succeed, they will never remove the old control panel. That seems like a reasonable way to do it.
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@remi said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
for devs, for servers,
I still don't get the idea that Linux is good for developers.
It's only good for developers who still work like it's the 1970s, because those are the people who built Linux. Most open source/Linux development tools still don't even have decent debuggers.
Developers who want to exist here in the 21st century get far better tools on macOS or Windows, and as an added bonus can still work like it's the 1970s if they want to.
I don't really get "servers" either. Linux is better at Windows Server for exactly one reason: it's cheaper. It's certainly not better at being a file server, an email server, or a directory-services server, or even a print/fax server. All of that stuff Windows does far better. Linux might make for a better database server? Maybe? I dunno. Seems questionable there, too.
Any OS is equally good at being a web server, and I'd say as far as web servers go IIS is ahead by a lot of metrics, except the metric "number of shitty open source technologies that integrate well with it".
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@blakeyrat hate to say it but there is one metric IIS isn't winning at: it's not been the dominant web server for a while, but I ascribe that to cost rather than quality.
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@blakeyrat said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
It's certainly not better at being a file server, an email server, or a directory-services server, or even a print/fax server. All of that stuff Windows does far better.
Your pulling numbers from your ass ?
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@sloosecannon said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
@dse said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
Trying to find the LAN settings because some people want to enter static IP addresses or create a bridge. It is only accessible through searching in Cortana
Or you right click the network icon, network and sharing center, click the network link thing, properties? Just like in 7?
There is a "network & internet settings" then "change adapter options". I just discovered this! Again, until it is changed again.
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@blakeyrat I kind of agree. with the new Windows Subsystem for Linux and Ubuntu16 on Windows, Windows can be once again the best development environment.
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@timebandit said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
Your pulling numbers from your ass ?
Linux file servers are based on a reverse-engineered Windows file sharing protocol. AFAIK, Linux's never bothered to make its own that supports everything Windows' supports.
It shouldn't come as a surprise that Active Directory is far better than the conglomeration of shit you need to turn a Linux server into a directory-services server. And, again, half the protocols involved were reverse-engineered from Microsoft's or Novell's anyway.
I didn't mention groupware, but ditto the above but with Exchange instead of the conglomeration of shit you'd need on a Linux server to kind of make something that slightly resembles Exchange but is far worse.
The print/fax server thing might be wrong, I dunno. I've just never even seen anybody even attempt to use Linux in that role.
I think when people say "Linux is good on servers" they really only mean "web servers". Everybody's got all HTTP-in-the-head, they forget the rest of the world still exists.
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@blakeyrat said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
Linux file servers are based on a reverse-engineered Windows file sharing protocol.
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@timebandit Blah blah, the point is Linux never bothered to make their own shit. The only reason Linux can be used as file servers at all is because Microsoft (and Novell) did the leg-work and Linux copied them.
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@blakeyrat said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
The only reason Linux can be used as file servers at all is because Microsoft (and Novell) did the leg-work and Linux copied them.
Barry Feigenbaum originally designed SMB at IBM
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@blakeyrat said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
The only reason Linux can be used as file servers at all is because Microsoft (and Novell) did the leg-work and Linux copied them.
You can use SFTP to make a Linux file server, what does Microsoft have to do with that?
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@adynathos said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
You can use SFTP to make a Linux file server,
Can you? Are you sure? News to me.
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@blakeyrat I am not sure what you mean by "file server".
With SFTP you can mount a remote server's filesystem in your local filesystem, and transfer files.
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@adynathos said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
I am not sure what you mean by "file server".
Kids these days.
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@adynathos said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
With SFTP you can mount a remote server's filesystem in your local filesystem, and transfer files.
And NFS wasn't invented by Microsoft either.
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@adynathos said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
@blakeyrat said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
The only reason Linux can be used as file servers at all is because Microsoft (and Novell) did the leg-work and Linux copied them.
You can use SFTP to make a Linux file server, what does Microsoft have to do with that?
Is that the same as sshfs?
Also, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_File_System
Edit: Argh,
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@adynathos said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
I am not sure what you mean by "file server"
It sounds like his definition is "SMB server"...
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@sloosecannon said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
It sounds like his definition is "SMB server"...
There's one thing for sure-- I've NEVER seen the amount of problems with a Windows file server that I've seen, constantly, from NFS and GlusterFS services. More importantly, there are no good NFS or GlusterFS clients for Windows, which is where the clients are.
I think when Blakey says file server, he's speaking of services for end users, vice services that distribute data among servers.
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@heterodox said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
vice services that distribute data
bit torrent??
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@blakeyrat said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
The print/fax server thing might be wrong, I dunno. I've just never even seen anybody even attempt to use Linux in that role.
Well, the Linux print server is being developed by Apple. And I use it in my work, so...
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@atazhaia Oh so Apple had to take over because they couldn't rely on the fuck-ups in the open source community to made software that isn't ass.
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@blakeyrat said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
@atazhaia Oh so Apple had to take over because they couldn't rely on the fuck-ups in the open source community to made software that isn't ass.
Well I'm not sure if it's cups or drivers, but every MacOS version update makes me have to reinstall all network printers because they otherwise fail silently. Doesn't give me much trust in Apple on the print server front.
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@atazhaia said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
Well, the Linux print server is being developed by Apple.
CUPS is the standards-based, open source printing system developed by Apple Inc. for macOS® and other UNIX®-like operating systems.
No wonder installing my network printer was dead easy and very un-Linux-like in Linux.
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@blakeyrat You do know CUPS was created and developed by an actual company before being purchased by Apple, right? It's not a product of the OSS community. (Even if CUPS itself is FOSS software.)
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@blakeyrat said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
@adynathos said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
You can use SFTP to make a Linux file server,
Can you? Are you sure? News to me.
From wikipedia:
SSH File Transfer Protocol (also Secure File Transfer Protocol, or SFTP) is a network protocol that provides file access, file transfer, and file management over any reliable data stream. It was designed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) as an extension of the Secure Shell protocol (SSH) version 2.0 to provide secure file transfer capabilities.
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@atazhaia said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
@blakeyrat You do know CUPS was created and developed by an actual company before being purchased by Apple, right? It's not a product of the OSS community. (Even if CUPS itself is FOSS software.)
It doesn't matter to him. No matter how good CUPS was, as soon as it became OSS, it instantly became a piece of shit
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@blakeyrat I'm not sure why you think an open source project can't be run by a large company. In fact, very few large open source projects are completely community-run.
"Open source" simply means the barrier to getting the source code is the same as the barrier to getting the software itself. Maybe you mean something else when you say that, but I'm not telepathic.
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@timebandit Iirc, CUPS itself has always been FOSS. The company behind it made money by selling a nice GUI frontend for it.
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@ben_lubar said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
@blakeyrat I'm not sure why you think an open source project can't be run by a large company. In fact, very few large open source projects are completely community-run.
He doesn't think that. He has stated loads of times that when he bashes open source software he doesn't mean software that is open source, but software that is developed using open source development practices. These are practices which are most common in open source projects, but can be sometimes encountered in commercial software, too.
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@ben_lubar said in 2018 won't be the year of Linux on desktop and it's @boomzilla's fault:
I'm not sure why you think an open source project can't be run by a large company.
Who said I did? Wasn't me. Go ask them.