The thing is that indeed one of the very valid benefits is that with open source the solution is almost never "just reinstall". Because at least you have the tools to investigate and fix the problem right to the deepest level.

E.g. I have an issue where Thunderbolt ports suddenly stop working -- the symptom is that I hear the device connected chime immediately followed by the device unconnected chime. Event log is empty. Impossible to debug -- there's nothing else to tinker with. System restore worked.

Linux -- there is a kernel flag that forces the BIOS to power on the controller and whatever. Ohmygosh I had to open a terminal, but at least I didn't had to reinstall.

And please don't come with "given the choice of opening a shell and digging in or just reinstall, I would choose reinstalling 100% of the time", because then it answers the question of the OP.

In a similar example that is closer to the topic at hand, I recently had an issue where if I turned on a certain setting it would cause my ç key to become a ć instead, as an unwanted side-effect. Since everything on Linux is free and open source, I was able to find and read the source code that was responsible for my problem, which allowed me to figure out how to workaround the issue for now, and to file a bug report with the upstream developers.

That's a lot of effort when you just. Need. To. Send. An. Email...

This bug only affects a very very small number of people so I went through the effort because if I didn't I doubt anyone else would even notice it:)

That piques my interest. Care to share the ticket?

Good job! Kudos

In my experience, the documentation of how any given system in a Linux Desktop is actually put together and actually gets anything done is so lacking that you've spent hours pulling apart a tangled mess of awful before you can even begin to see what the issue really is.

I'll grant, however, that modern Windows often manages to be even more convoluted than that.

I don't disagree, but the point is that you can. With closed source, it's not about convoluted or not. There's a point in which you just cannot proceed debugging.

The other gem is suggesting you pull the repo and code up a fix/feature for the problem yourself ... I can't see my mum getting very far with that when trying to print out a recipe for sponge cake!

Has it already been the year of Linux on the desktop, or is that "next" year - I forget?

</sarcasm> ;)

Having used Linux in various roles for nearly 20 years, I have to agree. Supporting Windows is hard enough when you have to tell the customer over the phone to click on the circle or flag thingy in the bottom left corner, because they haven't heard of the "start" menu, and have to hunt through Windows 10's old and new control panels. This is nothing compared to the differences between two contemporary distributions of Linux, with a choice of package managers, system init, and window managers. The dimensions of brokenness possible on Linux are generally unseen on Windows.

yeah, the "switch to linux" crowd aren't helpful, either. linux is the right tool for many jobs, but at this point, all (edit: mainstream) desktop OS' are going to be extremely complicated and complex. although i personally prefer it, macOS is no different in this regard, example in [0].

[0] https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/136248/disable-sto...

I think I would have to disagree. It seems like most issues I have, someone else has already had them, and the probability that they are knowledgeable enough to have worked it out and posted the solution already is higher.

I have also often had issues that turn out to be driver issues, where a bug was already opened for the issue on some bug tracker, and the driver developers have already provided solutions in the comments. That kind of thing doesn't really happen on Windows.

Which paid distro/paid support are you talking about?