I don't think I could use Linux if it weren't for Linux Mint/Cinnamon specifically, as I haven't had good experiences with other desktop enviroments. It has one or two quirks, but at this point it's far less quirks than a fresh Windows install and the list of config options I had to change/the .reg file I started accumulating
Usability conventions between GUI applications. Keyboardability. GUI automation à la AutoHotKey. Font rendering. X vs. Wayland.
Honestly, no more or less problems than Windows. But I've found it so much easier to debug by having readily available logs and man pages. I think this might just be my use cases though.
On any Linux DE, you have native configurable key shortcuts (binding commands to keystrokes).
On KDE, Win+right-click for resizing a window from anywhere in the window (no need to click the edges) is awesome. Win+left-click for moving a window from anywhere in the window (no need to click the title bar) is awesome. Ctrl+Alt+Esc to turn your cursor into a little skull and crossbones and instantly kill whatever program you click the window of is awesome. Dolphin is amazing compared to Explorer (tabs, split views, rich file metadata displayed right below filenames).
Windows UX has nothing on KDE's UX, and I never wanna go back to an OS that can't translate billions of dollars to features I can get for free because it treats me as a dataminable cost center.
Microsoft’s cloudification strategy may become another factor.
Can't say I've had any problems.
I like having the super key bound to a single quick animation that: 1. Let's me see all my windows in context 2. allows me to quickly access files and applications via the keyboard by typing their name
Like, it's barebones, but I can keep it very uncluttered. At first I was bothered by the lack of desktop icons, but came to really like it. It works super well for switching between local work and remote environments (via remmina). Over the years I've run Mate, Cinnamon, KDE, and Unity among others, and I really fail to understand the Gnome hate.
I see choice. My choice may not be the same as yours. Most major desktop projects allows you to have a clean and powerful desktop whose ergonomy is superior to those provided by current proprietary OSes.
Every now and then I look at someone using a Windows computer, and I am flummoxed how people put up with the slow, sloppy and ad-ridden Start menu experience. You can't even type "shut down" to get the shut down option, instead it offers to search the App Store. In addition to the Store, there are Weather widgets, a MS account, and Cortana shoved up your throat, Alt+Tab cycling through Edge tabs, when you have Ctrl+Tab... ugh.
I use dmenu, and all my apps are searchable and launchable instantly; no bullshit spinning circles while it phones home halfway across the globe.
Cortana interrupting
Ads for Games on the start menu
Rage Bait news in the start menu.
Insistence on using Edge
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No you can't uninstall these and make the problem go away. It requires linux tier skills to figure out how to uninstall edge. But worse than linux tier, you must keep disabling things in the registry since the updates reenable.
Not to mention any later compatibility issues you may need to diagnose, particularly with gaming. Not everything works with Proton and there are other stores than just Steam.
A debloated Windows is still Windows. Bundle this with a "use these debloat settings for gaming" and it could be just clicking a couple of buttons for the majority of users.
So not really sure I would specifically hold that against Windows. However I do agree that Windows turning on a feature with Updates is particularly annoying.
Personally the only time I have had that issue on my or my partners computer (at least in the last 10ish years) was when I updated my Nvidia driver and the installer didn't clean up the old one properly. While that is partially Windows fault I struggle to blame Windows specifically for a poor installer.
SWIM set himself up as an official IoT OEM to get legitimate licenses for his own use, but most people will have to pirate it. This is nobody's fault but Microsoft's.
To the extent that's true, I think the blame is shared.
But that's just a footnote. I hold deep antipathy to Microsoft employees who made Windows into user-hostile spyware.
Windows has it's own set of problems. However, it's intuitive enough that Grandma can pick it up reasonably quickly. There's something to be said about that.
I regret not doing it sooner, my development life has become more focused and easier.
The reality is Windows 95 more or less nailed the last paradigm we needed in desktop computing, and everything else is minor refinements.
Cinnamon apes that very sensibly.
There is nothing demonic about happily gaming on the supported software platform. I have Windows because I play games built for Windows.
I have Fedora on my laptop.
There are still a lot of issues playing games outside of Steam, and not every game is available in steam.
As someone else said there are some issues with anticheat (but some do work).
It is also not unheard of for a game to have an update and it break the proton compatibility. Meaning anyone who wants to play the game has to wait for proton to update with a fix.
But also, not every game on Steam works either.
That said, it does support _a lot_.
Windows is inconvenient at times but if I have to choose between inconvenience and not being able to use my programs... what's the point of having a computer if it can't run your programs?
The point of having a computer is to be able to program it actually. This is not a TV appliance. So I would say the correct answer is port your programs to a better OS.
You'll need to play tech support every now and then ("I have a new printer, and...") and you'll need to teach people the basics, but a lot of occasional computer users will be happy with modern Linux.
However, if you use your computer for your job, you'll either have an interest in learning how to accomplish it, or you'll have an awful time using Linux. Microsoft Office still has an edge over any open source product out there. Games work (sort of) through Steam, but if your games come from Epic you'll need to dive into the world of alternative launchers and compatibility layers to play them (if they even work at all). VPN/RDP software can usually work, if you put in the effort to learn about how they work under the hood and what configuration files you need to edit.
This leads to a pretty wacky parabolic usability graph, where Linux is great for the people with the least amount of interest and knowledge about computers and for computer experts, but bad to unusable for those in the middle between the two.
Desktop Linux has been bridging the gap, with more and better GUIs and better defaults, but as long as we'll have loud, hardcore "everybody needs to know the terminal or they shouldn't use Linux at all" Linux users I'm afraid ChromeOS will eat Linux's lunch before anyone even notices.
Otherwise, I doubt she noticed the difference from her prior Windows usage.
No need to be snarky for a cheap shot at windows users who never bothered you with anything, not everyone is trying to avoid jumping or trying to jump.
Get out of your (tech) bubble and touch some grass, plenty of Average Joe users are contempt using what's familiar and works for them out of the box with their Lenovo/Asus laptop, and use their free time for other things instead of learning about new GNU/Linux operating systems, because they have other hobbies and uses for their time, so no need to talk down on them off your IT high-horse.
The group of people who can't go 5 minutes without bashing Windows 11, are just a loud minority (who don't use Windows 11 anyway lol) that goes unheard of in the "real world" where people have other stuff on their mind than worrying about their OS.
Just live and let live, and use the energy you put in bashing Windows 11 online, towards something actually productive. Windows 11 users who are really unhappy will seek the change themselves.
I read it as simply asserting that the levels of effort were closer than some Windows users realize.
And the ones who do seek out debloating tools it's because they need/prefer Windows over Linux mint.
I'll keep repeating this. I've been doing "installing operating systems and intro to IT courses" for well over a decade now, for many different types of users at many skill levels.
Out of the box Linux (e.g. Mint) is an across the board better operating system for anyone who doesn't need anything specifically tied to Windows. It's easier, it just works.
I admit that it's not all "Linux people are awesome" as much as I would like -- it's "most everything most people need is available on the Web," which Linux is very good at.
The Linux experience is roughly equal to the Mac experience, and Windows is third. Inertia is presently Windows Desktop only advantage.
This is the elephant in the room.
(Office 365 may be changing that, though.)
E.g. Yes, even my workplace requires crappy Outlook email, but the web is just as bad-slash-good.
Linux is for work. Win11 is for gaming
For day-to-day tasks as a technical user I use a Mac but wouldn't find it to be an issue to use linux for most of my work.
However, my strictly-gaming PC runs Windows. It's by-far the easiest, least-effort, and overwhelmingly the most supported choice. I'm not wanting to put on the sysadmin hat when wanting to decompress after work.
As a Windows user, I need and want Windows. Not a free knockoff that will have me messing with the computer just so I can maybe do something with it.
Forget gaming, 90% of what I use my personal computer for is described above, I don’t find it fun to spend an afternoon trying to wrangle syncthing or spider sync into something that it wasn’t meant to be just to get a workflow that is first class in windows.
Couple that with Dropbox (which has version history for files on its paid plan), and you're good to go. Dolphin, the best file manager, also integrates with Dropbox nicely.
I don't know why anyone Linux-literate would recommend Mint though. Try KDE instead. I recommend Manjaro, which is a managed rolling release that always has brand new software. KDE is the best desktop environment on Linux, the most powerfully customizable and feature-rich as well as the most Windows-like. (Mint uses Cinnamon, which is much worse, fringe, and crashy than KDE. Linux Mint is what children use as their first distro lol.)
Additionally, if Dropbox version history works the same way it did with MS365, I don’t need it in my life. We had that at work, there were constantly different versions of the same doc being created, and it was never clear which was the latest.
Also the fact that there is a “best” file manager and it’s not the one that comes with the OS means this isn’t for me. I don’t enjoy spending every other weekend tweaking my tools to be just so, I just want sane defaults so I can do the thing I want with the tool. I know some people really enjoy the tweaking and for them, that’s the main reason to even have the tool, but for me, I like my tools to just work.
Let me know when Linux is running games that have Easy Anti Cheat or stuff from Blizzard. It's the day I will ditch my windows gaming rig. Until then, kindly STFU.
If you have a video card... It takes a few hours to figure it out.
But yes, then you are free from Microsoft's hold.
I'm a software developer. Some reasons I'm on Windows.
1. Font rendering
Programmers, admins, devops, people in tech basically stare at text all day long. Some people seem to be oblivious to font rendering issues on Linux. If you're one of them, lucky you! I'm not looking for imperfections just to pick on them, my eyes do notice them though.
1.1 Subpixel smoothing.
Was not a thing for a long time. I'm perfectly aware it wasn't due to technical reasons but because of patents on the technology. Withholding my judgment on the patent system overall, I'll just say knowing the reason didn't make it any easier on my eyes.
Yes, you could rebuild libfreetype with `#define FT_CONFIG_OPTION_SUBPIXEL_RENDERING` or hunt down and install an Infinality package. If you were on a distro with libfreetype compiled without that `#define` (as in almost all of them except Ubuntu), the very next thing you'd be faced with is the fact that packages relying on libfreetype check `ftoption.h` for the flag at compile time. Which makes sense -- how else would you check for a `define`? The result of this was that Firefox, KDE, Qt, and GTK apps wouldn't take advantage of subpixel rendering in libfreetype, unless you set out recompile all of them too (as I used to do). So much for the model of only single copy of a shared library in the system, I guess...
But that has finally changed for the better 3 or 4(?) years ago. Now `FT_CONFIG_OPTION_SUBPIXEL_RENDERING` is defined by default in all major distros, afaik.
Alas, my eyes still can't stand Linux font rendering, which brings us to
1.2 Font kerning
It's simple really, the spacing between letters looks uneven. Apart from making rendered text look ugly, it makes reading harder by breaking the visual rhythm of the text. I feel, it increases eye strain too.
Head to this page for a visual illustration of what I'm going on about: https://pandasauce.org/post/linux-fonts/#the-ugliest-part
Let me take a moment to remind you, our jobs involve staring at text all day long. Don't know about you, but to me good font rendering is a huge deal.
1.3 Config files
Let's see, this Arch wiki page[^1] lists how many configuration files related to fonts? There's the fontconfig library with user configuration files in `~/.fonts.conf.d/`, there is XOrg's `~/.Xresources` for apps that don't support fontconfig, and then there is the gnome-tweaks, and xsettingsd utilities. This list is likely not exhaustive either.
And it's not like you can ignore some of this configs and utilities, if you want consistent font rendering across the system, you'll have to futz around with most of them. A nice bonus, font rendering of Qt apps can and does break if run them in GNOME. Font rendering of GTK apps can and does break if you happen to start one in KDE. As they say, in Linux you can configure everything, and you will be configuring everything.
But you're learning how your OS works under the hood? Yeah, no, not really.
Learning how hardware works is interesting and potentially beneficial for your career prospects, same with learning how a kernel works, or, you know, even learning the fundamentals of font rendering can make you a better programmer.
Learning to handle a bunch of config files scattered all over the place just to get fonts render half-decently is nothing but a waste of time. And I shudder to think just how much I personally wasted.
That's it on fonts, but there's more on Linux.
2. Drivers
Linus made an intentional, strategic decision early on: the kernel is not going to maintain backward-compatible ABI for drivers (don't confuse this with user-space backward-compatibility though). The idea was to put pressure on hardware vendors to make their drives open-source and add them to the kernel's source tree.
The year is 2023, and it seems that decision back-fired just a little bit, at least for Desktop systems. But who knows, let's have a bit of patience, because important change doesn't come easy and fast. That said, while I don't care much about 3D acceleration, I really enjoy my laptop's touch-pad just working and its battery not draining because the discrete and integrated GPUs have no problems working in "hybrid" mode under Windows.
That's probably it for the list of "global" things that are broken (just my opinion) in Linux. Mind you, not for the lack of material, I'm just out of steam by now. Just one thing to add about Mint in particular.
3. Linux Mint distro user-friendliness
Last I checked, Mint had updates grouped into five categories numbered from 1 to 5. 1 being the least risky, 5 labeled Dangerous and colored red. The funny part is, many security updates would land in "5 - Dangerous". So, there you're having a security hole in your system, but it's dangerous to install an update patching it. Does it sound user-friendly to you? There was even a bit of drama around this subject back at the time[^2].
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[^1]: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/font_configuration
[^2]: https://web.archive.org/web/20131206095859/https://lists.ubu...