Lots of things. They're basically the same walled garden you get from Apple, Google, or Microsoft, only with a different gardener. They're also ludicrously inflexible in that they don't allow multiple versions of the same application to be installed, install applications to different disks, or often even get timely updates when a developer makes a change.

I agree that "installers" are not a good paradigm either, but a lot of Windows software can be had in portable (or at least non-installer) form.

> They're also ludicrously inflexible in that they don't allow multiple versions of the same application to be installed

They actually do allow multiple versions of the same application to be installed. It's just difficult to get it to work.

The package itself will install to (for example) /usr/bin. A new version of the package will have the same file names, so they get overwritten.

Most well-built packages will allow you to override the installation path though. This is perfect in case you want to install to your home directory (instead of globally) or some versioned directory.

For example you can relocate RPM installations given an example.rpm file:

    rpm -i --relocate=/=/home/myuser example.rpm

Correct me if I'm wrong, but won't all of the dependencies also need to be installed to the same prefix? So I could end up with half the OS on there for one application?

When you stray from the beaten PATH (and LD_LIBRARY_PATH) then yes you can start encountering trouble. Most good tools provide the options for you to do that. If you want to start building from scratch then `configure` and `make` often have PREFIX (and flavors such as BINPREFIX, LIBPREFIX, etc). `cmake` has similar variables to control where it looks for dependencies. Other languages' tools undoubtedly do too. I highly recommend you to read the documentation of the tools you use.

And when all else fails, there's docker.

In other words, I can get what I want, which is very simple on Windows and Mac, in Linux by compiling things from source or otherwise jumping through a bunch of containerization hoops.

No thanks.

But I can't do these things on Windows 10 either, I tried to put all my installed software on D: and when I had an update I was unable to install it because Windows couldn't work out where my stuff was which required a reinstall to install the update. Now I have to manually enter 'D' prefix on all installations, and that's for software that actually lets me!

The Linux package managers aren't perfect, but overall offer more flexibility for what I personally need.

Unfortunately Microsoft has embraced hardcoding paths for their own software. However, I've found that the vast majority of Windows applications already are or can easily be made portable. Updating them is a bit more manual, but that's a tradeoff I'll make every time. After all, you never know when an update to your mail client will suddenly introduce ads.

Unfortunately for now :)

One of the awesome things about Linux and it being open source is that if you don't like it then you can work to improve it.

Theoretically, yes, realistically, not really. For all its talk of openness and freedom for the user, the Linux community has a remarkable amount of disdain for anyone who isn't a C greybeard.

AppImage has already pretty much solved everything I want as far as application distribution. It is at least the third such implementation that has.

However, the community refuses to embrace it and so very little software is distributed that way, just like the last two times.

> the Linux community has a remarkable amount of disdain for anyone who isn't a C greybeard

I feel like you're the one providing disdain simply by saying "greybeard". Please don't disrespect people who have lots of C experience.

I've found plenty of non-C applications in Ubuntu's and Fedora's repositories though. I've found Python, Ruby, and Perl applications and developer tools (in addition to the obvious C and C++ ones). That's just off the top of my head. Erlang, Ocaml, R, and (maybe?) D also exist. Of course there's also the package-building tools.

Mailing lists and bug reports are usually open to the public too. And there's usually policies around offensive behavior. If you see a problem that hasn't been addressed satisfactorily then I highly encourage you to bring it forward to the maintainers.

> AppImage has already pretty much solved everything I want as far as application distribution. It is at least the third such implementation that has.

Search engine brought me here: https://appimage.org/

It looks like it supports every major Linux distribution I've come across. Then what's stopping you from using it?

> the community refuses to embrace it and so very little software is distributed that way, just like the last two times.

This sounds like you need to get application developers on board. Get software developers to provide an AppImage of their application.

Make sure to include source code for distributions to build their own version of the AppImage -- including any patches which might be necessary to tweak and support the distributions' different and unique environments.

> I've found plenty of non-C applications in Ubuntu's and Fedora's repositories though. [etc.]

You've missed the point. I could go on for quite a while about what the point was, but ultimately it comes down to this: "You can fix it yourself!" isn't really true. Professional programmers who work on Linux for a living haven't even managed to fix a lot of its problems.

> It looks like it supports every major Linux distribution I've come across. Then what's stopping you from using it?

Nothing, except that hardly any applications are available as AppImages and they're a 3rd class citizen at best on all major distributions.

> Make sure to include source code for distributions to build their own version of the AppImage -- including any patches which might be necessary to tweak and support the distributions' different and unique environments.

The whole point of AppImage is that that's completely unnecessary. The only thing that really aught to be done is that file managers should display AppImage icons and not harass the user about double clicking one to run it. My point isn't that such things are holding me back, it's that such things are indicative of the community's attitude towards AppImage.

> You've missed the point.

Maybe.

> ultimately it comes down to this: "You can fix it yourself!" isn't really true. Professional programmers who work on Linux for a living haven't even managed to fix a lot of its problems.

I could say the same thing about every OS.

> The whole point of AppImage is that that's completely unnecessary.

Unnecessary to you perhaps. Being able to see the source code of applications I run is important to many Linux users.

> The only thing that really aught to be done is that file managers should display AppImage icons and not harass the user about double clicking one to run it.

I don't see why AppImage should be treated any differently than any other executable -- trusted or not. If that's not how it is now then you definitely have a point.

Have you built any AppImage-based programs?