Let's see. I've added a reminder in my calendar with a link to this comment.
> Because they never choosed a DE...
But they created a Desktop Standard which allows every DE to behave the same where it matters. This unified a lot of things. So every DE is a shell and workflow with same underlying principles underside. Much like POSIX.
Sure. Except the end user won't care. As end user I don't see it implements DS.
I see that KDE has bug A and Gnome has bug B. Or KDE has feature C that Gnome doesn't have, and vice versa. All in all as user. No DE fits me because bugs and features are scattered around.
E.g. Haiku did it right. You don't get to choose. It's baked into the OS
This is a "grass is greener over the fence" perspective. You can install apps for missing functionality or report bugs for the things you don't like.
Except, Windows and macOS doesn't care about your bug reports, and some of the applications are not implemented on these systems because there's no financial incentive, and open source tools for these platforms are low quality.
On the other hand, this modularity and composability does wonders in the Linux side.
Linux DEs have feature levels. from LXDE to E17/XFCE to GNOME/KDE. People try, change, select and settle. Their most important settings are carried around. BTW, Qt/KDE guys allows amazing interoperability between GTK and Qt, regardless of your primary choice.
So, after some time it's borderline nitpicking IMHO.
Not really. Just because neighbors grass is greener, doesn't mean Linux grass isn't a black wilting mess.
> So, after some time it's borderline nitpicking IMHO.
Example of "nitpicking" I/colleagues ran into: Multi monitor support, HDR, DE bricking after update.
And due to Linux fractious nature even if one distro fixed it, another would still have that issue.
Stuff that never happened to me with Windows/MacOS.
Linux's grass was a much darker green in the past, but wasn't black, neither back then, nor now.
> Multi monitor support
Just plugged a secondary monitor into one of my colleagues Linux box a week ago, a second desktop appeared three seconds later. Used two monitors for 6 years, until 6 years ago. It was working fine, then.
> HDR
Don't have an HDR panel, can't say a word about it, but VLC handles HDR-SDR conversion just fine.
> DE bricking after update.
My current MacBook Pro bricked after an OS update, because of a bug in an OpenVPN client's OS integration. No, the tool is paid, and no, macOS has no OpenVPN client embedded in it. Maybe I shouldn't have installed a paid, premium OpenVPN client, who knows. Anyway, I wiped and reinstalled the thing as a result.
The symptom? A frozen progress bar under the Apple logo. No time remaining, no error, nothing. Can I have the logs please? "Haha, of course not, you peasant."
And I only wiped and re-installed a Linux distro once, 15 years ago, because I did something the tool warned me to not to do.
And Windows somehow succeeds to corrupt my older computer's BIOS after installing updates and reboots. Sometimes it hangs all fans blazing during the restart. No, it's not the battery. That also never happened with Linux.
So, I arguably have a much better experience with Linux w.r.t. macOS and Windows in the last 15 years.
Sure. And I had encountered it - from just not registering, it being "there" despite being unplugged. And it randomizing windows on plugging in.
Using Linux always feels like fighting uphill battle with gremlins.
> Don't have an HDR panel, can't say a word about it, but VLC handles HDR-SDR conversion just fine.
Pity, really.
Neither Weyland nor X.org support it. Amazing, another fork in the road.
> My current MacBook Pro bricked after an OS update, because of a bug in an OpenVPN
That's different. This was post install update. Clean machine.
I ran into similar issue that bit Linus from. Linus Tech Tips.
I updated pop_OS! on fresh install and bang! Welcome console my old friend.
I remember Linux 15 years ago and it was even worse. But just because it got better doesn't mean it's good.
Can exactly the same not be said for Windows or MacOS? The difference being that you're basically locked into your choice with Windows/MacOS.
But who is "they", Linux the OS doesn't exist as Linux is just a kernel. There are countless distributions that assemble operating systems from parts, throwing GNU userland on top of Linux kernel and other bits of software on top of the GNU userland and the kernel.
FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD are operating systems, the developers do both the kernel and the userland.
In the early days of PC BSD I've tried to kickstart a new DE, just for PC BSD to break free from the rest of open source operating systems, and to have an UI that only work on PC BSD, is consistent - the same way Windows and macOS have their UI layers. And I failed at it, because I am human and I need to earn a living.
People that wrote if not the original kernel. So l guess Linus and co.
If an OS is to "win" desktop, or mobile, or whatever, it needs to minimize forking between its libs. Go for one way to do it, rather than a muriad of related ways
I'm referring to Lisp Curse. http://www.winestockwebdesign.com/Essays/Lisp_Curse.html
In summary: Because Lisp was easy to fork, any time two nerds disagreed it was forked. And because they weren't working on same database you got Lisps with patchworks of functionality/bugs that each on their own couldn't compare to more or less monolith language like C/C++ or Java.
Same dynamic in Linux land.
So instead of having 1000 developers on one codebase we have 100 on ten different DE, windowing system, etc.
Rather than having one sound system we have a dozen... It doesn't work on PulseAudio, try OpenSound, no wait OSSBlasterMaster...
>s that each on their own couldn't compare to more or less monolith language like C/C++ or Java.
Good joke. On C++, Boost. Try to compile older C++ code from 2006 today, it may fail spectacularly.
A lot of older C++ games from 2006 will be damn difficult to compile today.
On Java, heh. Different and incompatible JRE's. Software tied to a single JRE where it crashes on the newer ones.
Should I go on?
Meanwhile, 20 yo Elisp code still runs today as-is.
I'm willing to take it, but only because I think there won't be a Linux in 15 years.
And yeah. Android doesn't count. It's essentially an enclave that runs Dalvik programs.
Linux basic assumptions about hardware don't hold on mobile.
I think Linux is suffering from the Lisp curse. Because they never choosed a DE, there is endless splintering and re-invention of the wheel.