The latest Windows 11 preview build in the Beta Channel delivers a rather odd change to the Start menu. For some reason, the "Sign out" button is hidden behind a Microsoft 365 ad and other banners.
Every generation has this moment, where they learn to hate Microsoft (or Micro$oft). Then, 4% install Linux, 6% buy a Mac with half the RAM for twice the price; and everyone else to keeps complaining.
MS has done shady things but Netscape’s own top employees have written about how Netscape destroyed itself with the version 4 rewrite. Joel Spolsky has also written about how complete rewrites are always a mistake.
Their corporate side failed too. If you weren’t fortune 500, Netscape wouldn’t talk to you. I was spending $50k a year with Netscape and they wouldn’t fix a bug unless I paid for an additional $75k a year support tier. ( The bug was Netscape 4 didn’t support dialing with area codes! )
Meanwhile during the late 90’s Microsoft devs put their personal emails in the readme.txts and would quickly patch any bugs or add features if you emailed them.
All the small isp’s (which were over 50% of the market) gave up on Netscape because of this.
Well maybe if desktop Linux didn’t require forums and command line and tinkering and file-verifiers to get Mint installed safely, and sound and printers and other hardware and software working, maybe it would become mainstream. And remember, folks, “mainstream” means everyone. Or at least everyone who already uses Windows, capiche? Your grandma too.
Windows does manage it quite well with the OOBE to be fully functional with regular hardware. Only special stuff like (d)GPUs and external stuff might require special drivers.
Basic sound, networking, (multi-monitor) video and peripheral support works very good.
Desktop Linux requires buying a USB / DVD, inserting it into your machine, and hitting OK several times. If you can’t do that, you also can’t install Windows.
It told me to verify my download. It gave me instructions on how to do it. I needed command line. The instructions were actually more confusing than they should have been, too. I searched for an easier way to verify. There was a verifying program. The instructions for that told me to use command line to verify the verifying program, so I said “eff it, I’m not verifying”.
Then it turned out I couldn’t make a bootable of Linux because my flash drive was too big. I had to find a 32gb one instead. Then it turned out I couldn’t make the bootable because it was the wrong format. And Windows couldn’t create that format. I had to use a third tool. Then the media creator somehow turned that flash drive into smaller and smaller partitions and Windows couldn’t fix it, either. I don’t remember how I solved that one. I also almost bricked my flash drive due to the formatting pop-up that Windows created when I was creating the Linux install media, but luckily the media tool could fix it when Windows couldn’t. I had to do research to discover and fix all these things, and none of it was stuff I knew about.
The guide didn’t tell me the difference between GRUB and the other bootloader. I tried to research it. I found nothing. I wanted a bootloader that looked nice, and GRUB wasn’t it. But I didn’t know if the other one was it either. Furthermore, the Multi-Boot page for Mint installation guide only had two topics: Install Windows first, and what to do if Windows overrides your bootloader. Nothing else. So I had no idea what to do, and I wasn’t going to break it. I was done attempting to install Linux. Windows installation works, no bullshit.
If you want to say “well duh, you should have done this”, then eff off. Because you’re not allowed to lord your non-obvious knowledge over people who don’t have that knowledge even after attempting research, and then say “it’s so easy, so it’s the year of Linux on the desktop”!
And you know what happened last time I had Linux on one of my machines? It was Ubuntu, on my mainstream hardware, and I had it for weeks. I literally could never get sound working, at all. Not a peep.
Verification is optional, but recommended. This is true for all OSs. Don’t do it if you can’t.
Note that I said to buy a USB or DVD with Linux. Burning your own is easy on Linux, but Windows puts up a lot of roadblocks. (One wonders why.)
GRUB works fine, but again, you only have to deal with it if you want to dual-boot.
Some sound cards used to not have first-party Linux drivers, so you’d have to find some third-party workaround. This is the only real problem among the ones you listed, but even this is pretty rare nowadays.
That’s all fair advice. It doesn’t change that installation instructions should have been a lot more thorough though.
Once I get a third (or bigger primary) SSD, I’ll dual-boot Mint. I still want to try it. Regardless of my issues with it, I do know Linux is getting better. And we can see how ready I am for it now (and that’s partially up to the software).
Fair. I guess asking users to verify the ISO is just to avoid lawsuits. Buying USBs is more beginner-friendly than burning your own, but it would be very difficult to maintain an up to date list of sellers. They definitely need to explain GRUB and dual-booting better, as well as make it easier to repair / avoid the Windows overwriting GRUB issue.
I had Pop OS installed for an hour just now and I gave up. Once again, dozens of ridiculous problems, too many to remember. The nail in the coffin was I changed the icon sets between defaults-- from Adwaita to HIcolor-- in Gnome Tweaks, and it just crashed. Cursor moves, nothing else did anything. I didn’t do any command line, I didn’t edit any text, I didn’t do anything weird. Fresh install, had it for an hour. In contrast, I have not crashed Windows in over a decade, ever since I adopted 10 almost immediately. Except when I was undervolting. I don’t have time for this shit, I have things to do, it’s not the client’s job to fix Linux’s crap.
Also it turns out there is zero support for three-finger taps. I literally don’t have middle-click on my laptop. At all. Wonderful.
Linux “just works” as well as Bethesda does, and it hasn’t changed since I was trying out Ubuntu 14. I hate it, I hate the fanbase, I hate the cult, I’m done. Also, holy shit is it hard to find and learn to install full and proper light themes. Why the hell can I use a light theme on any distro and it still make the docks and title bars brown, black, or dark grey? That’s all I was trying to fix, because it hurt to look at.
Done with Linux forever, because this keeps happening. The messy and confusing installation, the lack of basic features, the ridiculous amount of research and learning curve to accomplish anything, the crashing, the ugly and unpolished interfaces, everything. Bye.
Update: Going to try again, but for the sake of my health not take Linux seriously. Nobody should take Linux seriously.
Update #2: I gave up forever again. Proton VPN forgot to provide download links for Linux, I had to find them on a message board. Then it’s a nightmare to auto-mount my NAS drives. I worked on Linux for many hours today and didn’t make much progress. I don’t have time for this.
I don’t use pop os or gnome personally and I’m not part of any cult or whatever.
I found a accessibility setting that changes stuff to be white but I don’t think I got what you wanted 🥀
I know kde plasma has a white general look, and can be themed much more than gnome in pop os seems to be.
it also has 3 finger click in its setting under the touchpad option
Also, try Fedora 39 kde spin https://fedoraproject.org/spins/kde/
I mention this because fedora has the new linux tech in it so your laptop might behave better with this os.
Oh, thank god. Plasma looks good for me. Easy to look at and professional. Assuming I understand how it works, which popular distros can use Plasma? Update: After some quick research, I think I want to use Kubuntu? Does that sound like a good idea?
I ended up giving up on it after first spending 2 hours trying to learn to set up ProtonVPN (it turned out the info I was missing was that there is missing an actual download button on their site, had to accidentally find a download for ProtonVPN via a Reddit where someone else complained, then use command line a few times to actually get it working. This after how-to videos and other message boards led me nowhere). Then spending a few more trying to learn things about my NAS I couldn’t figure out, so I could try to connect it to Kubuntu and have it mount automatically. It was overwhelming, I gave up pretty fast. Nobody has time for this. I’m probably done with Linux forever. Kubuntu’s not half bad though, but Linux sure is.
Every generation has this moment, where they learn to hate Microsoft (or Micro$oft). Then, 4% install Linux, 6% buy a Mac with half the RAM for twice the price; and everyone else to keeps complaining.
With me it was when they killed off my favorite browser. I’m now using the reanimated bushy red corpse of it.
Netscape?
MS has done shady things but Netscape’s own top employees have written about how Netscape destroyed itself with the version 4 rewrite. Joel Spolsky has also written about how complete rewrites are always a mistake.
Their corporate side failed too. If you weren’t fortune 500, Netscape wouldn’t talk to you. I was spending $50k a year with Netscape and they wouldn’t fix a bug unless I paid for an additional $75k a year support tier. ( The bug was Netscape 4 didn’t support dialing with area codes! )
Meanwhile during the late 90’s Microsoft devs put their personal emails in the readme.txts and would quickly patch any bugs or add features if you emailed them.
All the small isp’s (which were over 50% of the market) gave up on Netscape because of this.
What was your favorite browser?
This is the way
Well maybe if desktop Linux didn’t require forums and command line and tinkering and file-verifiers to get Mint installed safely, and sound and printers and other hardware and software working, maybe it would become mainstream. And remember, folks, “mainstream” means everyone. Or at least everyone who already uses Windows, capiche? Your grandma too.
I feel like you’re describing Windows here lol
Windows does manage it quite well with the OOBE to be fully functional with regular hardware. Only special stuff like (d)GPUs and external stuff might require special drivers.
Basic sound, networking, (multi-monitor) video and peripheral support works very good.
As does practically every Linux distro. I install it, it just works. Don’t even need to hunt for GPU or printer drivers like I do for windows.
That was the status quo when I tried Linux ~5 years ago. Nowadays, Linux is much more plug and play (and I’m specifically referring to Pop OS).
Cool, but didn’t everyone tell me I should use Mint, for a bunch of reasons including “it’s arguably the most beginner-friendly”?
From what I read, Mint is better for lower-end PC specs, but otherwise, I’d strongly recommend PopOS.
I see. I’ll look into it, thanks.
Desktop Linux requires buying a USB / DVD, inserting it into your machine, and hitting OK several times. If you can’t do that, you also can’t install Windows.
Like, who are you trying to lie to? All the people who’ve installed Windows?
No, actually, you’re trying to say this doesn’t exist: https://linuxmint-installation-guide.readthedocs.io/en/latest/
It told me to verify my download. It gave me instructions on how to do it. I needed command line. The instructions were actually more confusing than they should have been, too. I searched for an easier way to verify. There was a verifying program. The instructions for that told me to use command line to verify the verifying program, so I said “eff it, I’m not verifying”.
Then it turned out I couldn’t make a bootable of Linux because my flash drive was too big. I had to find a 32gb one instead. Then it turned out I couldn’t make the bootable because it was the wrong format. And Windows couldn’t create that format. I had to use a third tool. Then the media creator somehow turned that flash drive into smaller and smaller partitions and Windows couldn’t fix it, either. I don’t remember how I solved that one. I also almost bricked my flash drive due to the formatting pop-up that Windows created when I was creating the Linux install media, but luckily the media tool could fix it when Windows couldn’t. I had to do research to discover and fix all these things, and none of it was stuff I knew about.
The guide didn’t tell me the difference between GRUB and the other bootloader. I tried to research it. I found nothing. I wanted a bootloader that looked nice, and GRUB wasn’t it. But I didn’t know if the other one was it either. Furthermore, the Multi-Boot page for Mint installation guide only had two topics: Install Windows first, and what to do if Windows overrides your bootloader. Nothing else. So I had no idea what to do, and I wasn’t going to break it. I was done attempting to install Linux. Windows installation works, no bullshit.
If you want to say “well duh, you should have done this”, then eff off. Because you’re not allowed to lord your non-obvious knowledge over people who don’t have that knowledge even after attempting research, and then say “it’s so easy, so it’s the year of Linux on the desktop”!
And you know what happened last time I had Linux on one of my machines? It was Ubuntu, on my mainstream hardware, and I had it for weeks. I literally could never get sound working, at all. Not a peep.
Verification is optional, but recommended. This is true for all OSs. Don’t do it if you can’t.
Note that I said to buy a USB or DVD with Linux. Burning your own is easy on Linux, but Windows puts up a lot of roadblocks. (One wonders why.)
GRUB works fine, but again, you only have to deal with it if you want to dual-boot.
Some sound cards used to not have first-party Linux drivers, so you’d have to find some third-party workaround. This is the only real problem among the ones you listed, but even this is pretty rare nowadays.
That’s all fair advice. It doesn’t change that installation instructions should have been a lot more thorough though. Once I get a third (or bigger primary) SSD, I’ll dual-boot Mint. I still want to try it. Regardless of my issues with it, I do know Linux is getting better. And we can see how ready I am for it now (and that’s partially up to the software).
Fair. I guess asking users to verify the ISO is just to avoid lawsuits. Buying USBs is more beginner-friendly than burning your own, but it would be very difficult to maintain an up to date list of sellers. They definitely need to explain GRUB and dual-booting better, as well as make it easier to repair / avoid the Windows overwriting GRUB issue.
Burning an iso with stuff like rufus is so stupid easy it should be illegal.
Linux mint user here.
Sound works even better then windows, Printers needed terminal work to install, but forums were very helpful. https://safereddit.com/r/linux/comments/rpgn28/my_grandma_called_and_thanked_me_for_installing/
I had Pop OS installed for an hour just now and I gave up. Once again, dozens of ridiculous problems, too many to remember. The nail in the coffin was I changed the icon sets between defaults-- from Adwaita to HIcolor-- in Gnome Tweaks, and it just crashed. Cursor moves, nothing else did anything. I didn’t do any command line, I didn’t edit any text, I didn’t do anything weird. Fresh install, had it for an hour. In contrast, I have not crashed Windows in over a decade, ever since I adopted 10 almost immediately. Except when I was undervolting. I don’t have time for this shit, I have things to do, it’s not the client’s job to fix Linux’s crap.
Also it turns out there is zero support for three-finger taps. I literally don’t have middle-click on my laptop. At all. Wonderful.
Linux “just works” as well as Bethesda does, and it hasn’t changed since I was trying out Ubuntu 14. I hate it, I hate the fanbase, I hate the cult, I’m done. Also, holy shit is it hard to find and learn to install full and proper light themes. Why the hell can I use a light theme on any distro and it still make the docks and title bars brown, black, or dark grey? That’s all I was trying to fix, because it hurt to look at.
Done with Linux forever, because this keeps happening. The messy and confusing installation, the lack of basic features, the ridiculous amount of research and learning curve to accomplish anything, the crashing, the ugly and unpolished interfaces, everything. Bye.
Update: Going to try again, but for the sake of my health not take Linux seriously. Nobody should take Linux seriously.
Update #2: I gave up forever again. Proton VPN forgot to provide download links for Linux, I had to find them on a message board. Then it’s a nightmare to auto-mount my NAS drives. I worked on Linux for many hours today and didn’t make much progress. I don’t have time for this.
Thanks for trying linux!
I don’t use pop os or gnome personally and I’m not part of any cult or whatever.
I know kde plasma has a white general look, and can be themed much more than gnome in pop os seems to be.
it also has 3 finger click in its setting under the touchpad option
Also, try Fedora 39 kde spin https://fedoraproject.org/spins/kde/ I mention this because fedora has the new linux tech in it so your laptop might behave better with this os.
Oh, thank god. Plasma looks good for me. Easy to look at and professional. Assuming I understand how it works, which popular distros can use Plasma? Update: After some quick research, I think I want to use Kubuntu? Does that sound like a good idea?
Sounds good to me, never used kubuntu myself though.
I ended up giving up on it after first spending 2 hours trying to learn to set up ProtonVPN (it turned out the info I was missing was that there is missing an actual download button on their site, had to accidentally find a download for ProtonVPN via a Reddit where someone else complained, then use command line a few times to actually get it working. This after how-to videos and other message boards led me nowhere). Then spending a few more trying to learn things about my NAS I couldn’t figure out, so I could try to connect it to Kubuntu and have it mount automatically. It was overwhelming, I gave up pretty fast. Nobody has time for this. I’m probably done with Linux forever. Kubuntu’s not half bad though, but Linux sure is.