So, I can't directly disagree with most of what you said on point, except for sleep/hibernate/suspend. Especially in the last decade, it often works without any low-level tweaking, and I can get it going in MOST cases without too much fuss.
In the last 10+ years, my wifi experience on Linux has been very solid, often more solid than my OSX-using co-workers.
But this is all anecdata.
Though Ubuntu (and to a much lesser extent, some others) have come light-years toward producing a consistent, coherent Linux desktop experience, it still lags painfully behind OSX and Windows.
With all of these disadvantages, though, the 'all the way down' reliability and no-bullshit you get from a Linux desktop (or server) is worth its weight in gold. It's just that the entry fee is still too high.
That beings said, the vast majority of consumers, and I suspect the vast majority of developers, do not rely on such applications (or their equivalent w/r/t Windows).
Agreed in a sense. All OSes have their issues. They're just different issues.
> Linux on the desktop is nowhere near macOS.
And that's because it's a different OS. It's not trying to be MacOS. And I'm glad it isn't. Because if I wanted MacOS I'd run that, don't you think?
> Sleep absolutely definitely will never work, unless you muck around in the kernel for a bit. Then it works but your wifi cuts off when you're playing music.
I've yet to experience any issues like this on any of my hardware, but I've been shopping around from Linux-friendly OEMs like Dell XPS laptops and Lenovo ThinkPads. So maybe that's just you being unlucky about your hardware? Hard to tell over an internet comment.
But let's be real here: Linux as a general purpose desktop OS mostly works on pretty much any hardware you throw at it. OSX works on maybe 3 models made by 1 vendor.
Trying to arrest Linux for poor hardware-support in this scenario is a pretty weak hand to play, honestly. Because out of the three big OSes, MacOS is clearly the general purpose operating system with the weakest hardware support of them all. Its hardware support is piss poor.
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The only issue so far is that when I unplug an external display, it sometimes fails to shrink my desktop accordingly. I've seen issues of a similar level of annoyance on macs as well.
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There are the other standard linux things (every piece of software is configured differently &c.) but as we are talking about someone who uses linux on the server already, I didn't consider that apropos.
Try updating your firmware. My Skylake laptop gets 10 hours or so. If a Macbook got 20, I'd be quite impressed. :)
Straight up FUD. This isn't the experience at all. Linux had these issues in the mid 2000s, that hasn't been my experience in years.
I agree with the "inconsistency" but I see the same "inconsistency" when I open matplotlib windows (wxgtk I suppose) and they look different, only closing the window fails randomly on OS X and leaves Python interpreter running while I've yet to experience that on Linux.
Then, I'd try to kill the non-responding app, and kill works on Linux, but on macOS, it is inconsistent. And that wasn't ten years ago, that was may be two or three days ago.
You didn't ask for advice, but if I had any, it would be to avoid Ubuntu. Most of the poorly functioning and randomly crashing processes I've seen on Linux was on Ubuntu machines.
Since Windows is not an option for me, I switched to a Mac.
I don't recommend gentoo for everyone although it really isn't that bad--if you can develop a web app, I'm sure you're definitely capable enough to use a supposedly "advanced" distro like arch or gentoo, but Ubuntu isn't that sterling of a system in my experience especially when you need something beyond the defaults.
I also enjoy pacman a lot more than apt.
Hate that Ubuntu == Linux for many people.
I've toyed with Arch during Windows 7 times - after hearing how linux is more stable than windoze/windblowz - and then nVidia drivers crashed, X server crashed, aaand upon starting X - all GUI applications were closed.
Are. You. Friggin. Kidding me? People were talking about stability when such things happened? Linux stability compared to Windows 7 - zero. At that time.
Has it changed?
This is an often repeated myth that just isn't true, (unless you have [testing] enabled). I had a single Arch install survive for 3 years without any problems and that involved switching over to a new init system.
I only had to install Windows back on the machine because I went on to sell it and get a new one.
(Performance is another matter, of course, but for regular desktop use, it does not matter that much.)
I personally haven't had the video driver crash on me, but even so, I think a video driver is not the OS, so not sure what you're talking about.
Kernel panics would be more understandable comparison.
Is it as refined as MacOS? No. Does it have the same polished application selection? No. Does it need both of those to be useful? Up to you, and you can help mold it and become part of the community
This is a problem. I want a desktop, not a job with "feeling good" salary.
That's why I said you can do it, the days when you had to do it are long gone.
Seriously, I think two of the biggest problems facing desktop Linux are:
- people having outdated experiences - equating Ubuntu, (not that great), with Linux and thinking that Ubuntu problems are Linux problems.
There is no Linux desktop experience that is consistent, or coherent. You'll frequently want to use software that happens to be made for the other window manager, and suddenly you have different keyboard layouts depending on the window that's active. Toolbars are sometimes on top, sometimes in the window. Sleep absolutely definitely will never work, unless you muck around in the kernel for a bit. Then it works but your wifi cuts off when you're playing music.
Most of design is either created by people who want to punish you for leaving the command line, or these people who put blinking, nascar-style ornaments into their water-cooled, wall-mounted, intel-inside-stickered towers.
Oh, and battery life on Skylake is about half of what a Macbook gets.