Linux

I've been screaming about this since I found out Re:CAPTCHA was using us to train AI. We should definitely be compensated.

Too bad he didn't touch the real issue with Linux for most people: lack of their industry favorite proprietary software.

I'm not ok with data mining under literally any circumstances. There are some things which just shouldn't be done.

It's worth noting that the same applies when installing Windows.

Most people never do that either because it's already ~~bloated with malware~~ installed on the PC they buy.

Same with macOS, you buy the hardware with preinstalled software.

That is why Microsoft spent a total of gazillion dollars to have its OS pre-installed on all PCs. We need more PCs with Linux pre-installed. This should be an antitrust issue but I am not knowledgeable enough to say how.

Agreed. All those things in your list are the hardest part of modern linux, if someone gets past the UEFI, BIOS secureboot hurdle the modern GUI experiemce is superior to Windows

Who needs to know their flash drive model?

Yes.

Really the hardest part of desktop linux for a regular, so called "internet user", in the installation.

They don't have no clue how to install an operating system, even windows.

I once installed CentOS workstation for my father on his ThinkPad. Firefox and Libreoffice is all he needs. Automatic updates in the background make sure all the latest security patches are applied. There have been few time when, after the update, the laptop hangs at boot. I've since told him to choose the second-to-last boot option from the "start-up menu" until the fix for the bug has been deployed (usually in within a 24h).

So really using Linux isn't the hard part. Back in 2004 (ish) I went the painful route of installing my first Linux - Gentoo. But boy I learned a lot from it. Yes, I had a helping friend to get me over the hardest parts.

it really is crazy how different it feels to use a linux pc after being conditioned to think that windows is just how using a computer is. the way i relate it to my friends is that using windows feels like i'm constantly compromising with the computer, but using linux i own my computer and it works for me - not the other way around.

If you're running btrfs, you can send live snapshots to another btrfs volume on another drive, or use Timeshift which will do it for you amd keep track of expiring old copies. Clonezilla is OK for when you are able to take the system down entirely.

It’s always a good idea to take regular images if you have the capacity for it. Clonezilla is what I like to use since it’s free and has good support

But this man still thinks Linux is difficult and not easy to use

He explicitly said that it was incredibly easy to get set up on old hardware and that everything he did just worked.

All of his reasons why Linux is hard to use he specifically framed in the context of "historically speaking Linux was bad but now Linux is good"

Were you even paying attention?

That said, if you've ever tried to pair a controller with Linux that isn't a PS5 or Xbox controller it will be rough. Had to use the CLI to change Bluetooth configs and install non standard drivers to support it on Mint

Linux is easier than Linux ?

I've come to realize the Linux basics are actually a lot easier to learn compared to Windows and MacOS, the hard part is un-learning the old ways and habits of doing things. Like if one day everyone on earth forgot how to use operating systems, I'd bet Linux would probably be the one that catches on. It's only because we're so used to the idiosyncrasies of stuff like Windows that it feels more natural.

I've tried to install Arch on my spare Dell laptop a week or two ago, and failed spectacularly twice in quick succession. I was using the arch wiki, assisted by GPT4 on things that were not clear to me. Just kept running into issue after issue after issue until five hours later I gave up.

I'll try again when I have the time.

Or buy the full version, which is a one-time purchase and solves the license issue AFAIK

Talk about yourself brother. Im moving that % on pure will alone

You can still play online games. Not all of them, but more than not.

I've got plenty of old software here under Linux that still runs fine to this day across a number of PC's and even a Raspberry Pi that I use as a backup desktop. I honestly can't see backwards compatibility being any more of an issue than it is under Windows - There's a number of accounting packages released under Windows 7 that won't run under Windows 10, the latest version of most popular browsers won't run under Windows 7. Likewise, the latest version of MS Office 365 won't run under Windows 8.

Manual installation is one thing, but by far the biggest reason is OEM preinstalls. 98% of the people never install any operating system themselves, the devices just come with one and that's the one that'll be used.

To allow modern windows to run legacy applications a lot of caution is given to updating libraries or fully new ones are given while keeping the older ones. Also static builds are more common on Windows, or come bundled with a copy of the required libraries as .dll files.

• Let's say an application requires libexample1. It works, the library is available too.
• Eventually the application gets abandoned, but still works.
• But eventually a libexample2 gets released that drastically changes how the library works. The program doesn't work on this version. The older release of the library then get's abandoned.
• Distributions now start removing the package from the repositories as the older library is slowly requiring no longer supported releases of its own dependency.
• Now application is borked

Aplication could have still worked if it came bundled with its own copy of libexample1 and of its dependencies, or was statically linked.

An example of this is Nero, a software kit for managing CD/DVD disc media. They made a build of some of their tools for Linux, meant to run on Debian 7. This builds were an experiment and got abandoned because of the very few users it had. Yet, these tools still work perfectly fine on Debian 12 despite being based on ancient libraries because it bundles all its requirements as a copy in its own proprietary blob.

I talked about caution on updating libraries on Windows. You can find many deprecated methods in any native Windows library that will likely never be removed from the library binaries, as many applications require it. The new, better and more feature rich method is given a different name instead, and is pointed out in the documentation for the older method.

Projects like FUSE are very nice for this, where an AppImave bundle of prebuilt binaries is given and can potencially not only be ran everywhere that can run FUSE but also in the future too.