> I mean, I’m not dismissing Linux though.

> But Linux on the desktop, sorry. It’s not going to happen.

I mean this seems like a dismissal to me. I am specifically talking about the desktop. I don't think the impact that the Linux kernel has had on the server or mobile spaces is up for debate - as you say it's pretty massive.

The issue I have is the certainty with which you can dismiss the viability of Linux desktop. I've seen you mention Proton, but I don't think I've seen you consider or weigh up whether you think that Proton will or will not have an impact on viability of Linux on the desktop. What about EAC and Battleye anti-cheat? The fact that in the last 10 years we've transitioned from Flash to HTML5 and other cross-platform codecs.

I just can't see how you could wave all that off as 'sorry not going to happen'. Like, there has been improvement. There just has! (Going to use your own debating tactic there...). That isn't to say that Linux on the desktop is happening or that it has happened. I am saying that it could happen, and that is in stark contrast to how dismissive you are being about it.

> > I mean, I’m not dismissing Linux though.

> > But Linux on the desktop, sorry. It’s not going to happen.

> I mean this seems like a dismissal to me. I am specifically talking about the desktop. I don't think the impact that the Linux kernel has had on the server or mobile spaces is up for debate - as you say it's pretty massive.

There's never been on a ‘year of the Mac desktop’ in the way that people typically discuss a potential ‘year of the Linux desktop’, and instigating one is pretty obviously not part of Apple's strategy. Imo it's easy to imagine Linux desktops carving out a more secure place in society and ‘the market’ which doesn't involve any kind of mass adoption, meaning that it's safer to assume compatibility or other measures to accommodate desktop Linux users (from vendors, from governments, from social clubs, whatever).

I’ll put it this way, I think that a successful Linux on the desktop would not be something a lot of the people that advocate and love Linux on the desktop would embrace. It would be a lot more like Chrome OS (and Google is writing their own kernel, which just blurs a lot of the lines even more), meaning purposefully obfuscating the Linux bits, using custom or highly-customized desktop environments, being tightly configured with close-sourced backend cloud services, and being very difficult to use custom libraries or app repositories. I think Proton is a good example of this, actually. Valve has done some great work with compatibility and its great to see the work they have done to improve the gaming situation (tho people who claim that Windows and Linux are equivalent in gaming, as far as the desktop goes, are being disingenuous imho) and desktop Linux as a gaming platform is certainly superior to Mac, in terms of library. But Valve’s primary motive is to create a front end for their storefront and to do it in a way so that Valve can avoid paying various licensing fees. Gabe has been very upfront about that from the beginning. Steam Machines were a massive failure (I was at the launch party in Las Vegas the CES they were unveiled) and although I personally preordered a Steam Deck, I don’t think we really know what the actual market is for that kind of device. It could be on-par with consoles or it could be a lot less. But everything we’ve seen from that shows that the experience is very much designed to mimic a console experience — albeit with a lot more freedom for nerds like us. I don’t think that is at all the same thing as Linux Mint or even Ubuntu being the primary desktop OS for end users. Or that if Steam Deck is successful, that we will see computers sold with traditional Linux distros pre-installed at Best Buy (and the developer edition XPS and Lenovo machines aren’t what I’m talking about).

And that doesn’t touch on the still existing consumer software issues on Linux — getting developers like Serif (makers of Affinity) to target the Linux desktop (I’m not even going to try for Adobe) or for existing commercial software to come over.

Now, some of this ceases to matter because the web won and the web runs everywhere. But keep in mind that you’ll need to use that proprietary version of Chrome on your Linux desktop to watch HD Netflix or other DRM content and to access other stuff. The web winning doesn’t mean that software freedom has won.

As I said in my OP, I’m a diehard macOS user and I certainly appreciate the POSIX underpinnings and the fact that the OS has some BSD roots. In fact, it’s a huge part of the appeal for me (like many nerds in their late 30s, I embraced Mac OS X in the early 2000s because it was kind of like Linux but pretty and had Photoshop). But most Unix purists I know don’t like macOS (especially these days) for a variety of reasons and would rather use OpenBSD or pine for the days of Sun OS or Solaris.

So yes, despite the many notable efforts that have been made, no, I don’t think the Linux desktop as I think you define it will happen. If it were to happen, it would look and act a lot more like Windows and macOS with everything good and bad that that entails.

Well that's definitely the answer I was looking for. Thank you for this. I will concede that I agree with your points.

Nothing further to add, your honour.

Hey, thanks for the very nice back and forth. I really enjoyed the discussion!

As a peaceful bystander, I enjoyed it, too! Many good points. And specifically, things to address, like the DRM situation that is unhealthy. Also the browser ecosystem is a concern: if web app developers start to ignore Firefox and encourage macOS users to use Chrome instead of Safari, the user experience on Linux will face another serious problem that we already went through in the early 2000s. Many other things will need to be solved - but what makes me very happy is that we are actually solving issues one by one, and the situation of Linux users in 2022 will be incomparable to what they needed to go through twenty years ago.