How do you know Linux is gaining steam outside of the usual circles? When you see writers like Jason Evangelho from Forbes switching over to Linux and writing about his experience.
He's been writing about Linux since early July, his reasoning for trying out Linux I'm sure will sound familiar to anyone who has used Windows often:
A few weeks ago during a time-sensitive 350GB file transfer, Windows 10 rebooted without warning. When the OS restarted I was greeted with an infuriating blue screen that had become all too familiar. No, not that infuriating blue screen. The one that declares "Working On Updates." It was, as they say, the last straw. After two decades of relying on Windows I finally decided it was time for the nuclear option.
He continues on to talk a little about his experience, including Linux Mint having an off day not finding a drive to install on. However, that didn't stop him, whereas I'm sure other writers would have then gone off on a rant he simply picked a different distribution (Ubuntu). Usually, when I see such writers on major news websites writing about Linux, it ends up coming across as a pretty disappointing read as if they've set themselves up not to like it. So it was incredibly refreshing to see him have a little patience to push through it. It's the same for anything that's new to you, if you're not prepared to learn a little—you will probably fail.
The latest article, titled Gaming On Linux: 2 Ridiculous Myths And 2 Brutal Truths, features yours truly after we had a bit of a chat. We went over the usual points, most of which will be well-known to our regular readers and people who've been using Linux for a long time. Still, some of it felt important to actually get across to a wider audience. This is why I appreciate Evangelho's writing, because he reached out to people in the community for feedback and help. To make sure he actually understood various upsides and downsides of using Linux for work and play. Although, it's slightly amusing how I mentioned Wine a little and then along comes Valve with Steam Play.
It's really fantastic to see more people on major websites actually try Linux for themselves and have a positive experience. More like this please.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Quoting: SalvatosWell that's refreshing indeed - also Ubuntu has changed more than I knew since I last used it.Hmm... I do not think this screen is that bad of a way to ask.
But the fact that it lets you opt out of data collection at first launch instead of asking you to opt in still doesn't feel right. It's not the Linux way, if I have any authority to say so myself.
Very cool that Forbes is writing about Linux.
There is no doubt that Linux has come a long way in the last ten years, and I am glad to see that people like Jason are recognizing this and enjoying it, but I can't help but feel that it often does not get enough credit for what is has been doing well for decades.
Quoting: MadeanaccounttocommentWell, improvements to Wine don't just apply to games . . . and for everything short of rendering video, productivity applications generally make a lot less demands in terms of speed than games. Nobody's going to be worried if Acrobat is a few frames per second slower in Linux . . .Quoting: Mountain ManMy wife recently bought a new laptop with Windows preinstalled. I spent a couple of hours uninstalling all the junk software that it came with and configuring the OS so that she could use it.
I had another older computer that needed a fresh OS install, so I put KDE Neon on it. The whole process from start to finish took about 30-minutes, and it "just worked".
I hate Windows.
Couldn't you have just wiped the computer and installed Windows from scratch? The fresh installs don't have any of the manufacturers bloatware. I personally dislike the invasive data collection, having antivirus software, and miss the linux command line when I use Windows but it's stuff all non-linux users are completely accustomed with.
Anyway, the stuff Windows has historically beaten linux hands down on are actively being worked on so hopefully the linux desktop will eventually catch on. Honestly, the last things linux needs to really take off are more OEM's willing to preload it, support for apps that keep people constrained to windows like Office and the adobe suite, and maybe its own exclusive killer apps.
Chronarius Sep 5, 2018
Quoting: dodrianInstead, what I try and share with people about Linux is the freedom it offers - I'm in full control of what's on my computer, and it's never going to do anything like what the author mentions and force an update at an inconvenient time (and if for some reason any distro tries that, you can all but guarantee there will be a fork that doesn't within days).
Never say Never! I was shocked as I restarted Ubuntu 18.04 and it wanted to install "Unattended Updates" in Windowssytle. You know if you shutdown or reboot your Windows-PC, and Windows begins installing Updates. WTH?!?!
https://wiki.debian.org/UnattendedUpgrades
https://help.ubuntu.com/lts/serverguide/automatic-updates.html
Chronarius Sep 5, 2018
Quoting: SalvatosWell that's refreshing indeed - also Ubuntu has changed more than I knew since I last used it.
But the fact that it lets you opt out of data collection at first launch instead of asking you to opt in still doesn't feel right. It's not the Linux way, if I have any authority to say so myself.
Absolutely! That isn't the Linux way. But IMHO Canonical does a good job in explaining and documenting. The used Tools are open sourced, you get informed about it. 100% transparent. Only an Opt Out would be nice! A lot better then that what Microsoft does.
Then we also have (open)Suse which doesn't even mention that they are collection statistics. That it is all you get about it from opensuse: https://en.opensuse.org/openSUSE:Statistics
IMHO I have no problem with selecting telemetrics to get a clear picture about what installation base we really have. So far we relying on some magically generated "web based" statistics. Which gave an estimated market share from 0,5% up to 4%
But I want to be informed about it, and I want an option which lets me Opt-In. I think in 18.04.1 they added an "agreement" page which you have to accept before data will be submitted. For more details see here: https://github.com/ubuntu/ubuntu-report/#send-data-to-server I think I kinda can live with that. Can't say for sure as it seems the report is not generated and sent on other Ubuntu Flavours (e.g. XFCE & Budgie) yet.
Last edited by Chronarius on 5 September 2018 at 9:22 am UTC
Chronarius Sep 5, 2018
Quoting: Mountain ManMy wife recently bought a new laptop with Windows preinstalled. I spent a couple of hours uninstalling all the junk software that it came with and configuring the OS so that she could use it.
I had another older computer that needed a fresh OS install, so I put KDE Neon on it. The whole process from start to finish took about 30-minutes, and it "just worked".
I hate Windows.
Same here esp. Windows 10. Best is to buy it with the hardware otherwise you will run in lots of issues. Beginning with creating an Installation medium. Took me a while to figure that out. To get Linux on an USB-Stick I need only dd, but for Windows you need an extra Tool. It seems they haven't heard about hybrid installation images yet.
The Installer told me several times that he can not install Windows 10 on several systems, because it might not be able to boot afterwards from that partition. WHAT?!?!. Not to mention that the Installer still looks like from the 90s.
Finally I got installed it on my wife's laptop, but with a hell lots driver missing. No WiFi, no Bluetooth, no graphics card, and so on. WTH?!?!? Every Linux Distribution takes about 15-30 Minutes to install and runs fine on it. But that is the point where I gave up. The Laptop Vendor doesn't offer Windows 10 support, so no drivers on his website. Sorry, times are long gone that I start looking for drivers on the Internet esp. if Linux does meanwhile a hell lot better then Windows.
It is running now, where it belongs. In a Window.
Chronarius Sep 5, 2018
Quoting: KristianAside from gaming what are the most cited missing applications? MS Office? Visual Studio? Autocad? Adobe's suite of software? Anything else?
You can remove Visual Studio from that list!
https://code.visualstudio.com/Download
Quoting: GustyGhostI always bring up freedom and security first. In fact, I don't sell it on what Linux does do, but what it doesn't do.Except when it comes to games? Games are still software, and when it comes to many of them, they do collect massive amounts of telemetry and contain DRM. And when it comes to security, Xorg is not designed with separation in mind, so a game installed on your system could easily snoop on what you're doing, including passwords.
Linux does not backdoor its disk encryption.
Linux does not forcibly impose system changes.
Linux does not gather massive amounts of telemetry data.
Linux does not censor apps from its repositories.
Linux does not have a universal backdoor.
etc, etc
I wouldn't care if only ten crummy games ever existed for Linux, I would still choose it as my gaming platform because I refuse to let proprietary software make me it's bitch.
I'm a pragmatist myself, and I play proprietary games including on Windows, but unlike many Linux users I don't go around preaching free software while carving out exceptions for myself, like running old or new proprietary games natively or in emulators or compatibility layers which often come with issues.
If anything, I think it's more sympathetic to use proprietary software for work because it's the best tool for the job than willingly choosing to use proprietary software for non-essential entertainment.
In other words, yeah be pragmatic, but don't act so high and mighty at the same time.
(BTW I did not mean to point the finger at you specifically, but the Linux community in general.)
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