For Linux to be a considerable contender for the average user, they need to make it more simple and like a Windows or Mac os.
I used Windows my whole life pretty much. Switching to Mac for a 5 year period was easy. Switching to Linux was easy. Using it was not. Installing a different distro was easy, using it was not. Rinse and repeat 3 more times and hello windows 11, looks like I’m using spyware. Because it just works.
I switched to fedora (with no nvidia or however you spell the company I avoid) and everything mostly worked as it should, and when I had questions about how to do X or Y I could actually find answers online like I could on old windows (after like 7 it became “reinstall for every little issue” any time I searched for windows help. Great.) Did I have to learn how to access my com ports to use CHIRP to program a baofeng? Sure, but now that I know my user needs to be added to the dialout group, I’ve both learned something and solved the issue within 10min. Did I also have to figure out how to install the drivers for the CP210X to UART bridge on windows? Yes, and Fedora came with them (or somehow didn’t need them.) And don’t even get me started on fixing a broken flash drive with Diskpart instead of gparted or KDE partition manager, ugh. At least windows is insecure and let me mount my drive bypassing my windows pin through a live booted linux distro to save my data when w10 decided it can’t get past the login screen anymore, so that’s something!
Ymmv, but your experience isn’t universal (nor is mine) and windows can also come with it’s own headaches (and spyware, and resource hogging to run said spyware…)
My hill is that whatever os you’re already familiar with, will always feel easiest. Everything that does something differently, will feel more difficult no matter which one is easier for someone who has no prior experience of either one.
I could tell you how painfull it was when I had to start using windows at work knowing pretty much only Linux beforehand, but that too would be just an useless anecdote.
I think the most effective approach to increasing Linux userbase would be to adopt the same strategy Microsoft is using: Push for using Linux in schools, so that it would be the familiar OS for new generations.
Maybe. But switching from Windows to Mac, and again the opposite wasn’t an issue. The learning curve was just changing the way my hands work with keyboard shortcuts. Functionality was so similar. Until Linux can get away from using terminal it’ll be an issue. It may be anecdotal, but my anecdote is significantly more common than yours when you reach past Lemmy. Everything about Linux is awesome, except for the user experience itself and ease of use and it won’t be mainstream until its structured in a way that makes it so. I’m very much pro FOSS and pro decentralization but I also only have so many hours in the day to be Sisyphus, pushing the rock up the hill of trying to understand Linux only to be in the same position and more frustrated than when I started.
And putting Linux as it is right now in schools will do no good. Kids are on phones. Right now, more than ever. They are used to and demand the easy os/app/website/etc.
Switching back to Windows shouldn’t be an issue. Going in the first time is horrible. Whatever the many papercuts of a given os are, you won’t even notice them if you’re used to working around them.
As for the kids, they’ll get their first experience sooner or later, depending on The curriculum of your country. But he same principle applies no matter wether it happens in university or elementary school.
The problem has been that Intel and Microsoft engaged in anticompetitive strategic execution to ensure that each would be a winner over the course of most of our lifetimes. That’s why “Wintel” became a household term over the late 90s.
Now, if you’re building any sort of hardware, why would you pay developers to write drivers for Linux, a hobbyist operating system that had no money flowing around it? Absolute saints cobbled together drivers for video, audio, modem, and other hardware just to make things barely usable, often with buggy behavior. Without insider knowledge of the hardware and firmware design, nor the sheer manpower to do development, Linux floundered in graphical user environments for a long time.
There were proprietary codecs, browser plugins, winmodems, and all sorts of things tailored to Windows user environments that were difficult or impossible to get working on Linux. Linux experts became surly and inaccessible due to the heavy burden of helping newbies just get the system booted and their VGA settings properly set. And so, Linux remained a hobbyist operating system for a long time. User groups finally got companies like NVIDIA to help write drivers for their hardware, and now, getting to a working Ubuntu desktop is arguably simpler than Windows 11.
IMO the problem remains collaboration, engineering, and gaming. The new Winmodem is AutoCAD, Microsoft Office, and BG3. Until the Linux user base grows to a point that it can’t be ignored by the companies developing these products, it’ll remain a very niche OS.
For Linux to be a considerable contender for the average user, they need to make it more simple and like a Windows or Mac os.
I used Windows my whole life pretty much. Switching to Mac for a 5 year period was easy. Switching to Linux was easy. Using it was not. Installing a different distro was easy, using it was not. Rinse and repeat 3 more times and hello windows 11, looks like I’m using spyware. Because it just works.
I switched to fedora (with no nvidia or however you spell the company I avoid) and everything mostly worked as it should, and when I had questions about how to do X or Y I could actually find answers online like I could on old windows (after like 7 it became “reinstall for every little issue” any time I searched for windows help. Great.) Did I have to learn how to access my com ports to use CHIRP to program a baofeng? Sure, but now that I know my user needs to be added to the dialout group, I’ve both learned something and solved the issue within 10min. Did I also have to figure out how to install the drivers for the CP210X to UART bridge on windows? Yes, and Fedora came with them (or somehow didn’t need them.) And don’t even get me started on fixing a broken flash drive with Diskpart instead of gparted or KDE partition manager, ugh. At least windows is insecure and let me mount my drive bypassing my windows pin through a live booted linux distro to save my data when w10 decided it can’t get past the login screen anymore, so that’s something!
Ymmv, but your experience isn’t universal (nor is mine) and windows can also come with it’s own headaches (and spyware, and resource hogging to run said spyware…)
My hill is that whatever os you’re already familiar with, will always feel easiest. Everything that does something differently, will feel more difficult no matter which one is easier for someone who has no prior experience of either one.
I could tell you how painfull it was when I had to start using windows at work knowing pretty much only Linux beforehand, but that too would be just an useless anecdote.
I think the most effective approach to increasing Linux userbase would be to adopt the same strategy Microsoft is using: Push for using Linux in schools, so that it would be the familiar OS for new generations.
Maybe. But switching from Windows to Mac, and again the opposite wasn’t an issue. The learning curve was just changing the way my hands work with keyboard shortcuts. Functionality was so similar. Until Linux can get away from using terminal it’ll be an issue. It may be anecdotal, but my anecdote is significantly more common than yours when you reach past Lemmy. Everything about Linux is awesome, except for the user experience itself and ease of use and it won’t be mainstream until its structured in a way that makes it so. I’m very much pro FOSS and pro decentralization but I also only have so many hours in the day to be Sisyphus, pushing the rock up the hill of trying to understand Linux only to be in the same position and more frustrated than when I started.
And putting Linux as it is right now in schools will do no good. Kids are on phones. Right now, more than ever. They are used to and demand the easy os/app/website/etc.
Switching back to Windows shouldn’t be an issue. Going in the first time is horrible. Whatever the many papercuts of a given os are, you won’t even notice them if you’re used to working around them.
As for the kids, they’ll get their first experience sooner or later, depending on The curriculum of your country. But he same principle applies no matter wether it happens in university or elementary school.
Oh, man, as the network admin for several hundred machines, “Windows” and “works” in the same sentence is hilarious.
Yeah, that’s fair haha. I’m talking home use for sure
The problem has been that Intel and Microsoft engaged in anticompetitive strategic execution to ensure that each would be a winner over the course of most of our lifetimes. That’s why “Wintel” became a household term over the late 90s.
Now, if you’re building any sort of hardware, why would you pay developers to write drivers for Linux, a hobbyist operating system that had no money flowing around it? Absolute saints cobbled together drivers for video, audio, modem, and other hardware just to make things barely usable, often with buggy behavior. Without insider knowledge of the hardware and firmware design, nor the sheer manpower to do development, Linux floundered in graphical user environments for a long time.
There were proprietary codecs, browser plugins, winmodems, and all sorts of things tailored to Windows user environments that were difficult or impossible to get working on Linux. Linux experts became surly and inaccessible due to the heavy burden of helping newbies just get the system booted and their VGA settings properly set. And so, Linux remained a hobbyist operating system for a long time. User groups finally got companies like NVIDIA to help write drivers for their hardware, and now, getting to a working Ubuntu desktop is arguably simpler than Windows 11.
IMO the problem remains collaboration, engineering, and gaming. The new Winmodem is AutoCAD, Microsoft Office, and BG3. Until the Linux user base grows to a point that it can’t be ignored by the companies developing these products, it’ll remain a very niche OS.