Then you are an absolute god of IT and have a very skewed perception of things as a result; alternatively you've made up your own definition of the word "usability" that absolutely no one else uses.
I think Linux is great. I love the customizability it brings to the table and get a lot out of it. The time and effort invested to get here has been significant though. The manpages are dense. Commands are arcane. Error messages are very often inscrutable.
The major distros do a reasonable job as long as everything is working and there happens to be a well maintained program in the preconfigured repos that works well for whatever task it is you're trying to accomplish right then. I've set up Ubuntu for relatives who aren't tech savvy to do basic office work and everything is flawless.
The user experience just isn't on the same level as the proprietary OSes though. There are far fewer well polished apps. Many vendors don't provide compatible versions of their software. The latest gadget you bought probably requires Windows or iOS to sync or whatever it is you need it to do. Leave the well trodden path for whatever reason - something breaks, your new device isn't recognized, something else - and things aren't pretty.
It's not really the OS's fault. FOSS apps are largely written and maintained by volunteers instead of highly paid teams. All modern systems have a staggering amount of complexity under the hood and Linux distros intentionally give you access to it. But if you want or are forced to tinker then you're going to have to contend with it one way or another.
Of course I will caveat this by saying "overall" usability. Clearly with training CLI's can be superior to GUIs. But most people won't be willing to do this, so ONLY from an overall perspective CLIs are worse.
The most common interface is bash (or alternative bash-like languages). Which is pretty much required if your a hardcore linux user. Applications push users towards command line interfaces. This is NOT easy to decipher. You are lying to yourself.
>Of course, usability always depends on the specific task you have to do in a given context. It's possible that for the specific software you have to run for that task, that Windows or Apple software has the better usability. But that's far from the norm.
How about the entire gaming library. The entire CAD field. What about 3D modelling or graphics programs like Photoshop. Or how about Audio production? Open Source choices are lacking while industry standards Don't even run on linux. These are huge and NORMAL aspects of computing that are inferior in a major way.
>Compatibility Linux wins though in general, it supports way more hardware and software. If you think proprietary software is better there: Get out of your bubble :)
Have you tried steam on linux? I've had Linux supported games fail to even start for me. I've had my computer restart on linux games. Not even getting into the steam compatibility layer here.
These are huge issues. A crashing OS is just something that rarely happens with Windows or OSX and I have to say that I've hit this on the regular with Linux on many many different pieces of hardware. This isn't a bubble, I believe the opposite is happening here. I'm a hardcore linux user who's realistic and you're the one deluding yourself into thinking FOSS is superior in every way (It's not).
I am not SMEARING FOSS. That is a dishonest AND personal accusation. There is a huge difference between SMEARING and just stating my opinion.
Look at my original post. There are aspects of FOSS that are SUPERIOR to closed source, but FOSS in general is INFERIOR from a usability and compatibility perspective.
What you are doing here by accusing me of smearing FOSS is starting a witch hunt. Likely you're unaware of the gravity of what you're doing and you just have a biased mob mentality right now. Read your own post, is there anything.. anything at all said that is negative about linux? You are not able to approach this from a fair and balanced perspective. Windows and OSX and Linux are three pillars in the OS world and failing to mention even one positive for Windows and OSX is pretty biased.
What's your distro of choice? I use NixOS, prior to that I was into Arch, and prior to that ubuntu and mint. So I have a very good view of the ecosystem.
You are just wrong about the usability and compatibility. Especially compatibility is the strong suit of FOSS software in general and Linux specifically. There is broader hardware and software support. It's a fact, get over it. Usability always depends on the context and task, your general statement is bs - and it clashes with the comments you got of novice users working very well with Linux. Usability is defined in a DIN ISO norm, have a look at that before using it for arguments.
Your comment is too long to go into the details, but I'll response in short to the main points:
1. No, Bash is not the most common interface, though I like it. It has to be used for the rare edge case, everything else can be done with GUIs. If your impression is otherwise you are not using mainstream distros nor are you doing regular tasks. Use Gnome or KDE on Ubuntu and stop distro hopping.
2. I'm playing exclusively on Linux since Proton got introduced, though I even used Linux for games before that. I'm okay with the occasional game not working, as Windows was vastly more cumbersome to keep in a working state, plus the many games that did not work there will also not be forgotten by me.
3. Void Linux is my current choice. I was a supporter in a Ubuntu forum and used that for many years, and still for the dayjob. I did use Funtoo for a while in between.
If it's not targeting me. Who is it targeting, "Mate?" Clearly it was targeting me, as you're REPLYING to me. Let's be honest here, You were attempting to "smear" me, but now you're back pedaling. Play it safe, don't even use the word "smear." No one is doing that here, it's just opinions and discussion. Keep it that way.
>You are just wrong about the usability and compatibility. Especially compatibility is the strong suit of FOSS software in general and Linux specifically. There is broader hardware and software support. It's a fact, get over it.
Nah I'm totally right. FOSS is less compatible with most hardware. The "official broad support" isn't even the the measuring stick here. It's actual hardware crashes and bugs.
>1. No, Bash is not the most common interface, though I like it. It has to be used for the rare edge case, everything else can be done with GUIs. If your impression is otherwise you are not using mainstream distros nor are you doing regular tasks. Use Gnome or KDE on Ubuntu and stop distro hopping.
"Mate," my impression encompasses gnome and KDE on Ubuntu as well as non mainstream distros, so I know my shit. Bash is 100% the most common interface, even on ubuntu. Any time you want to configure your operating system you will touch the CLI. Applications promote it, tutorials promote it, if you aren't using it I'm not sure what reality you're living in.
If you're thinking of the world as if it's Grandmas using the browser vs. Programmers, then yes, grandmas using the browser have everything they need with ubuntu without touching the CLI. However, there are advanced users of computing outside of the programming world. 3D modelling software, audio production, Network Administration... to get even these things to work right most of these people will indeed touch the CLI.
>2. I'm playing exclusively on Linux since Proton got introduced, though I even used Linux for games before that. I'm okay with the occasional game not working, as Windows was vastly more cumbersome to keep in a working state, plus the many games that did not work there will also not be forgotten by me.
I'm a hardcore gamer so I have over 100 games in my steam library. I have a linux dell laptop with a quadro card. Only low fidelity games work; and certain games trigger the OS to restart. Running windows this never happens. Not even referring to proton. Just talking about games compiled to target linux.
>3. Void Linux is my current choice. I was a supporter in a Ubuntu forum and used that for many years, and still for the dayjob. I did use Funtoo for a while in between.
Try tinkering with NixOS or arch. You will have a better view of compatibility issues that linux suffers from. Ironically the fact that "choices" for distros exist and the fact that you have to pick the "right" OS for the right perspective is a big usability issue in itself.
> I'm a hardcore gamer so I have over 100 games in my steam library.
How hardcore^^ 358 are in mine, + many more GOG and Humble Bundle games + hundreds on CD/DVD I probably will never play again.
> Only low fidelity games work; and certain games trigger the OS to restart.
Linux is around equally strong in gpu driver performance. There are differences ofc, but if game performance is vastly different for you, then your Dell laptop might not be using the Nvidia gpu. Proton is not a factor here, its performance impact is minimal (and it can be faster to run the Windows versions of games with Proton than the Linux version natively).
> Try tinkering with NixOS or arch.
If you tinker don't be surprised if the result is tinkery.
> the fact that you have to pick the "right" OS for the right perspective is a big usability issue in itself.
It's not. You do not know what usability is.
Your initial comment accused me of smearing FOSS. It's inconsiderate and a literal lie. I would say that's the most inappropriate thing that's occurred in this thread.
>How hardcore^^ 358 are in mine, + many more GOG and Humble Bundle games + hundreds on CD/DVD I probably will never play again.
365. and Gog. We're pretty much the same in terms of amount of games. If you have that many games you should know absolutely there are problems. Maybe your hardware configuration just happens to be common and compatible. I use a quadro nvidia card which is not the traditional GeForce stuff. Both of our use cases are valid but you have to combine our use cases to form a holistic broad spectrum view. My use case is an indication of compatibility problems, likely with quadro. This doesn't happen with windows.
>If you tinker don't be surprised if the result is tinkery.
When you tinker you understand the internals more. When you understand the internals more you better understand the issues. I've used ubuntu AND tinkered with NixOS. So I have broader experience than you.
>It's not. You do not know what usability is.
Part of my Job description is UI design. I'm a full stack engineer from the front (browser based UI's and product design) all the way to C++ and embedded systems on the back end. Usability is my Job but also hardcore systems development. Most full stack devs stop at the application layer so I would say because someone pays me to know what usability is, I pretty much know it quite well. Lack of choice is a usability feature, Apple employs this aspect heavily by restricting hardware options; it's a big part of why apple software is perceived to be very robust.
Another big part of usability is also perception. The actual capability of a product contributes less to usability than the perception of the capability of the product. Apple again uses this strategy big time.
CLI? Absolutely.
Desktop interfaces are an inconsistent mess.
But that's besides the point. CLIs in itself are harder to use than GUI and the entire FOSS ecosystem biases itself towards CLI. So that in itself is a marker for inferior usability.
With training a CLI can be made superior in many aspects to a GUI. But it takes training and mostly only people in IT are willing to go through this training. Overall from a common users' standpoint, GUIs are superior.
If you want to branch out to less popular DEs then of course you should be prepared for it being less polished, but does any Linux newbie really expect dozens of super polished DEs?
This is muscle memory. No shortcuts are not an alternative, merely a workaround. The underlying issue would still be there.
Unfortunately Android has taken over this inconsistency, probably because there is nobody that enforces it. "Mark as read" and "Reply" in the notifications are sometimes left/right, sometimes reversed. Yes/no questions are sometimes left, sometimes right. Snooze vs. alarm cancel too. What a disaster.
I feel like this is true only sometimes and even then probably from a particular point of view. For example, i use XFCE for my desktop computers with DEB based distros.
Most of the time, things just work, do so pretty fast and not in a too resource intensive way (which would be a different story with GNOME, Cinnamon or KDE, all of which come close to the Windows desktop resource usage in some cases). However, there is also a lot of software out there, that relies on configuration files instead of UI configuration to get things done.
Take Redshift (a bit like f.lux) as an example, in which you can't edit the screen colors at the different times of day through the UI, but rather have to look up how and where to create a configuration file with the values that you need.
Furthermore, there is also a lot of software out there for *nix that doesn't have GUI front ends in the first place (unless someone has written one) or need to be installed from PPAs and such, or even necessitate messing around with AppImage or Flatpak ways of installation - all of those have their own reasons for existing, be it historical reasons or having to support a variety of system configurations, unlike just packaging an .exe file with some sort of an installer, but the bottom line is that this hinders usability for the common folk out there.
> Of course, usability always depends on the specific task you have to do in a given context.
Of course, the situation with drivers can also be somewhat challenging at times, unless you use the proprietary ones and even then you sometimes have to rely on solutions such as Wine (or Proton, but only for select games) to be able to enjoy games and some other interactive content. There is the upside of being able to use Mono to also run some of the .NET software and honestly the cross-OS interoperability of at least some software feels amazing just because it even exists in the first place, but admittedly there is too much Windows centric software out there that people will have to give up when moving to Linux distros.
This definitely cannot be ignored, since many workflows out there are built around particular tools and their interfaces as well, which won't always be ported, given that they're proprietary. Actually, if Linux had a bigger market share, it'd get more attention, but sadly it's only dominant in the server space and has largely gone under the radar for desktop software. It seems to be changing, but slowly.
To sum up: in my opinion, there are definitely plenty of challenges and thorns that make Linux harder to use. Many are not due to any fault of its own, but rather the historic market conditions. That said, i'm glad that it's even a viable option for desktop computing nowadays and things do seem to be getting better!
Of course, usability always depends on the specific task you have to do in a given context. It's possible that for the specific software you have to run for that task, that Windows or Apple software has the better usability. But that's far from the norm.
Compatibility Linux wins though in general, it supports way more hardware and software. If you think proprietary software is better there: Get out of your bubble :)
To get a bit away from this OT discussion: The PinePhone is just a very early project. It's also cheap. Of course it has issues, and they should be made clear to potential buyers. But to try to use that to smear FOSS software in general is dishonest trolling.