" “things that just work”.

That certainly not how I will explain the Linux desktop experience.

When I’ve thought about this is in the past I’ve concluded that my expectations of Linux are actually higher than Windows or Mac. It’s given me the expectation that if something doesn’t work the way I want it then it will be possible to make it do that, whereas with other operating systems I have been more inclined to just accept a limitation and move on.

As a person with a full time job, a significant other, and several hobbies, I just don’t have time to invest in learning a new operating system. I grew up with windows (95, 98, xp, 7, 10), so that’s what I’m familiar with. I recently switched to linux (mint), and it’s fine. Just getting started though is something that was rather involved, and I would never expect a normie to be able to figure out. If microsoft wasn’t insisting on making win11 a dumpster fire, I wouldn’t have bothered. Now that things are running smoothly, there’s some minor annoyances that I’d really like to change, and the prevailing sentiment from the linux community is “that’s just how linux is” or sometimes “here’s a hacky workaround that barely works in only certain controlled cases”. It’s better than it was 10 years ago, so there is that.

I’ve used DOS, 3.11 to all the way to 11. Switched to Linux as main driver around 2009. Used MacOS at work for over a year now. I occasionally boot into windows for rare game that uses some anti cheat that doesn’t play well with wine.

I’m old enough that I just want things to work. I don’t care for any fanboyism. These are my opinions:

• Windows is a mess. It has different UI from different decades, depending on what and where. NT kernel is ancient. The registry is a horror show. The only edge it has, is third party software, like propriatery drivers. that’s it. And that’s isn’t a merit of windows, but rather market share.

• MacOS is inconsistent at every turn. It’s frustrating to use, and riddled with UX bugs, and seemingly deliberate lack of functionality. The core tooling, like the file manager, is absolute garbage. The only good thing it has going it, is that the Unix core is solid. In that year, I’ve experienced a soft brick once, that almost was a hard brick, and the reason was having set the display refresh rate from 120 to 60 Hz. Something I changed BTW, because certain animation transitions in MacOS took twice as long on 120 Hz… Yeah, top notch QA there Apple.

• Linux. It has its own flaws. For sure. But as for “just works”, it happens so often, that it’s exactly why Windows and MacOS feels so frustrating. I’d have my grandmother use Linux.

And, I’m not just saying this. When I upgraded components on windows, I spent 2 hours debugging problems. One of the problems was also that it reverted a GPU driver, where every single version information was unmistakably older. It also made it not work.

I’ve also experienced that the WiFi network adapter also doesn’t work until I download some proprietary software over ethernet cable.

On Linux? I didn’t need to do a single thing in either case. It for sure didn’t use to be this way. In 2009 I was hunting WiFi drivers for fedora over ethernet. But in the last, say 5 years, on Arch, it’s been amazing. Did I mention that I use arch?

Ps: The last 4 times I’ve had problems on Linux have been:

• 1. A Windows update fucks up grub.
• 2. Reboot from windows doesn’t release hardware claim on WiFi adapter, so it doesn’t work on Linux.
• 3. The system clock is wrong, which was easy to notice because of 2. leading to a lack of remote sync. This is due to Windows storing system time as local time, and not UTC. If you do software development, you’d know how dumb the former is.
• 4. Raid partition destroyed because a windows 7 install decided to, unprompted, write a boot partition on a disk with “unknown” file system.

Like anything else, can be, depending on your needs.

Exactly. I give more credits to linux, and it deserves this. I like your garden metaphor, yes my linux pc is like my garden and linux behaves to be, unlike windows.

You make an excellent point. I have a lot more patience for something I can understand, control, and most importantly, modify to my needs. Compared to an iThing (when it’s interacting with other iThings anyway) Linux is typically embarrassingly user hostile.

If course, if you want your iThing to do something Apple hasn’t decided you should want to do, it’s a Total Fucking Nightmare to get working, so you use the OS that supports your priorities.

Still, I really appreciate the Free software that goes out of its way to make things easy, and it’s something I prioritise in my own Free software offerings.

Just this morning I tried to make Outlook on my work laptop to open on startup. I have to find and add a shortcut of Outlook, buried somewhere in the machine, to the startup folder, buried somewhere else in the machine. The startup apps settings menu was just an eclectic list of programs and is of no use at all.

With Mint on my home machine I just go to startup programs settings menu and I can add whatever I want just by pointing it to the right program. It just works.

I use mint btw

Is Linux As Good As We Think It Is?

No, it’s better.

Seriously, when something that I paid for it doesn’t work is annoying when something that I choose to use doesn’t work is somewhat my fault, I think that’s the difference.

After all, Linux is mine. I care for it. Grow it like a garden.

We live in a world where the idea of community has been destroyed by rampant capitalism and the death of third spaces.

While there is indeed a lot to be said for something that “just works,” that “just works” demand is borne from a capitalist/consumer process that is literally in the process of going off the rails.

Why do we get so mad at Windows? Because it isn’t ours. Microsoft grows it like a weed on our property. Its roots begin sticking out new places all the time (“hey what’s that new bullshit on my taskbar?”) and has zero respect for your needs as opposed to its needs. Windows only cares for Microsoft’s needs, and it makes that readily evident in how you’re forced to use it.

Linux is the communal kibbutz, Windows is the corporate city.

In other words, Linux is better than we think it is.

It’s an operating system. It’s not supposed to be noticed as good or bad. It should stay out of your way. If you ever notice it, it’s doing something wrong.

Well, I don’t use a DE so your scenario of the new display not switching over right away is basically my life every time autorandr decides not to run on startup.

Things don’t just work on any operating system.

With Windows, you have to hope there’s a solution that you can implement that doesn’t require rooting around in the insanely-outmoded registry and doesn’t require uninstalling some specific KB12345678 update.

With MacOS, you will do as Apple says, and you will like it. Otherwise, enjoy the $3000 doorstop. Granted, there is plenty you can tweak, but when there is a problem, and you find some Apple Communities post with a copy/paste official reply that has steps to take, none of which ever actually solve the problem, you will be treated with a cheeseburger on your way to the insane asylum. Full disclosure: a MacBook Air is my daily work driver.

With Linux, you are in charge — for better and for worse. This means that when there is a problem, while there is likely a solution, it will depend on many, many factors such as hardware configuration, kernel version, desktop environment, graphics card, display manager, etc. But, you can fix it with research and perseverance with no company getting in the way.

The main difference with Linux, is that you are given the freedom to deal with problems as you see fit.

So, yes, to me, Linux is as good as I think it is — not because it’s better or more stable (though subjectively I would say it is), but because it respects us by keeping the ownership and power where it belongs.

But that aside, do we give Linux too much benefit of the doubt relative to the “things that just work”.

No, I don’t think so. There should be an expected difference between Windows (for example) and Linux as far as “it just works” goes, simply by virtue of the fact that one is actively developed by a company with eleventy-bajillion dollars and the other is developed by lots of hobbyists and a handful of profitable companies.

If Windows doesn’t work, it’s not unreasonable to expect that it should. If Linux doesn’t work, it is unreasonable to expect that it always will.