Coulnd't disagree more. Hardware support is excellent as long as you care for "open minded" products.
I use Linux since 20 years with different distros and always was able to re-use my existing home-folder. Never had to re-configure the same software. System backups enabled me to copy the system to a new machine within minutes if necessary. File backups were easy to do, never lost something important (or unimportant)...
But you are right: this thread turns into the well known discussion with the same arguments as ever 😉 And that's also my fault...
I use Linux since 20 years with different distros and always was able to re-use my existing home-folder. Never had to re-configure the same software. System backups enabled me to copy the system to a new machine within minutes if necessary. File backups were easy to do, never lost something important (or unimportant)...
But you are right: this thread turns into the well known discussion with the same arguments as ever 😉 And that's also my fault...
Hardware support is excellent only when it is. Again, this is mostly driven by the business/server side. If you go on the client side things are terrible. I mean, again, we don't even have basic stuff like hardware acceleration on the big browsers. And again if you get off the beaten path you are on your own against the wild west.
But fair enough, this is an endless discussion 🙂 Where are my soldering irons 😀
But fair enough, this is an endless discussion 🙂 Where are my soldering irons 😀
Hardware acceleration has existed in browsers in linux for years, and almost everything just works out of the box now. When was the last time you ran a modern desktop? Been running Linux on the desktop for 15 years, and the first time I used it as a servber, it still used libc5.
You don't even need to do any workarounds to watch Netflix on Linux anymore, Flash is dead so no need to screw around with Pepper anymore, and thanks to Valve and their work on their WINE version called Proton, most games run on Linux now, too.
The only thing that's slightly annoying is having to know the syntax for different systems
To install a package from the CLI on Debian-based systems it's "sudo apt-get install", on Arch-based systems, it's "sudo pacman -S", and on Fedora it's "sudo dnf install".
Moving from Ubuntu to Manjaro was just a matter of learning those subtle sifferences.
You don't even need to do any workarounds to watch Netflix on Linux anymore, Flash is dead so no need to screw around with Pepper anymore, and thanks to Valve and their work on their WINE version called Proton, most games run on Linux now, too.
The only thing that's slightly annoying is having to know the syntax for different systems
To install a package from the CLI on Debian-based systems it's "sudo apt-get install", on Arch-based systems, it's "sudo pacman -S", and on Fedora it's "sudo dnf install".
Moving from Ubuntu to Manjaro was just a matter of learning those subtle sifferences.
Nope. For example on Chrome that I use, it was released with the main software last year, but it's off by default. And it's highly-experimental to say the least. You had options up until then too, but they were even more experimental and had even more problems with DRM. It still has various levels of crappyness in video quality and CPU usage depending on your hardware. And if you were unlucky enough to have a nvidia card, you are double-screwed. Talking about video decoding btw, just to avoid any confusion.
Last month. And it was about 6-months or so ago that I cared enough to research about it
The workarounds I do remember had to do with codecs and DRM. These are still a thing if you try using Chromium for example (tried about 3-4 months ago on debian and kde). Proton and dxvk has been a God-sent for linux desktop. And good thing that you can add even your own games outside of steam's library. They might single-handedly make linux desktop happen. Still, now that I play the games on W10 again, I understand that DXVK rendering is still not in parity with native DX. That's perhaps why we get some more fps on linux. Lutris tried, but failed imho.
That's the least of your problems on linux.
Being able to do so in the first place has to be more than just good.
A programming endeavour might aspire to have functionality tiers. A road system which can be driven on by anyone driving any car, and userland doesn't have to concern itself with the underlying construction and general maintenance.
Otherwise look at the way ms started out without extensibility for its system libraries. Programs were more integrated than they should have been. Looks like someone was in a rush to get it done and it took a long time to rectify, and it created a multitude of extra problems and limitations in that time.
Anecdote: I just received a laptop that I had purchased on Ebay. It's a current HP model with a Ryzen 5, 6 core processor. I will be using this to operate my system at upcoming DIY audio events. I use a Gstreamer based app for DSP processing and it is better to use a laptop when traveling for various reasons. I was previously using a very antiquated one, but it was time to update. Anyway...
After unpacking the laptop I did a "try Ubuntu" from a bootable USB stick that I made when 22.04 was released back in April. I could test out the hardware compatibility without making any actual changes to the OS on the computer. All looked good, so I proceeded to install Ubuntu 22.04. I probably have installed Ubuntu 20 times now on various hardware (Intel, ARM, etc.) and I have never had a problem or compatibility issue. Maybe I just do not use anything too exotic or unsupported, mostly USB pro audio interfaces. Not all are supported, but I am able to check into that first. One nice plus is that Ubuntu now supports UEFI Bioses, so there was no need resort to Legacy mode. I am very happy with the OS on my new machine.
I still use a Windows 8 machine for my daily driver. It's mostly because I have many design tools written in Excel that do not port well to e.g. LibreOffice, etc. I also have some older Excel spreadsheets written by others that I can no longer fully use because they were written under Excel 2003 and some of the VBA was broken after the upgrade to a later Office version. Now I am seriously considering moving that machine to Ubuntu and installing Windows under a VM in order to run Excel if/when I need to. I can pick and choose the OS and Excel version in a VM, so this might solve these problems for me.
YMMV
After unpacking the laptop I did a "try Ubuntu" from a bootable USB stick that I made when 22.04 was released back in April. I could test out the hardware compatibility without making any actual changes to the OS on the computer. All looked good, so I proceeded to install Ubuntu 22.04. I probably have installed Ubuntu 20 times now on various hardware (Intel, ARM, etc.) and I have never had a problem or compatibility issue. Maybe I just do not use anything too exotic or unsupported, mostly USB pro audio interfaces. Not all are supported, but I am able to check into that first. One nice plus is that Ubuntu now supports UEFI Bioses, so there was no need resort to Legacy mode. I am very happy with the OS on my new machine.
I still use a Windows 8 machine for my daily driver. It's mostly because I have many design tools written in Excel that do not port well to e.g. LibreOffice, etc. I also have some older Excel spreadsheets written by others that I can no longer fully use because they were written under Excel 2003 and some of the VBA was broken after the upgrade to a later Office version. Now I am seriously considering moving that machine to Ubuntu and installing Windows under a VM in order to run Excel if/when I need to. I can pick and choose the OS and Excel version in a VM, so this might solve these problems for me.
YMMV
So there is only black or white, left or right?
My opinion is that both ways are equally crappy. Just crappy on different ways, but it is crappy nonetheless.
The most frustrating is that in both cases it is absolutely unnecessary.
Linux always has been a free for all anarchy with no vision and no goal.
The main focus from an higher level was always de kernel itself, never desktops (those are even Linus Torvalds words)
The irony is that it also operates almost like a big cooperation.
When users have problems they are either being called dumb and stupid (often quite literally), or being sent from pillar to post, exactly like a big cooperation.
Every day practical problems are rarely being taking care of, like a big cooperation.
Most distros mostly care and especially brag about the fancy eye candy and looks, like a big cooperation.
Like I said before, the only difference is when there is actually focus, like servers.
Or when you just want to start bare-bone and want to make something tailor made, like embedded systems.
The problems always start appearing when people get things too far. And that includes anarchy and no vision.
My biggest gripe is that the foundation or at least the big distros should have agreed on some architectural guidelines. So that people can work on software that can collaborate instead of stepping on each other's toes
My biggest gripe is that the foundation or at least the big distros should have agreed on some architectural guidelines. So that people can work on software that can collaborate instead of stepping on each other's toes
I think of Rolls Royce's business, golden years before WWII. They were fine mechanics and made the chassis. Other workers were fine coachbuilders and RR shipped your chassis to the coachbuilder of your choice for a body and interior. Ferrari often got coachbuilt at Pininfarina. Before WWII, Jaguar was Swallow Coachbuilding Company working on Austin under-parts.
One could, if one were bored, compile a list of doors, hinges, seat brackets, cow-hides, boot, roofing..... but the coachbuilders normally took care of the small stuff like they wanted the business. Of course it also became a thing to pre-order popular frame and body combinations to have a ready-to-buy car, but it was a 2-part industry.
So Torvalds oversees the mechanicals, hundreds of "distros" dress it up for use. Rolls-Royces have been used as trucks (Phantom IV 4AF4 P2A), minimal coachwork, and a professionally managed server likewise has no decoration or frills.
I've been with unix since there were no "distros". It was little more than a kernel, a shell, and many serial port drivers. My school didn't get into compilers until the second semester, games the next year. No troff until they leased a phototypesetter (so then Kernighan's new troff), tho I did abuse nroff a bit.
"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder!" I'm sure each one make their decisions for good reasons and at the end of the day is that we have options. In my case, time had come for Linux. I had to try some things but I don't feel it took more than customizing any system. The latest 22.04 LTS release for every distro from Ubuntu to Debian invariably didn't work for me. I settled to the previous 20.04 and Kubuntu had everything I needed. The printer works with the driver linked earlier in this thread, and the keyboard language is set from the task bar without having to restart the app, which is priceless, I really needed this.👍 It was also easier to integrate Winehq, and Diptrace is finally installed! I'll have a look at Virtual box later. And kiCad as well. Anyway, all this made me realize that for a long time I'm used to Linux apps that were working on Windows. Firefox, VLC, Audacity, Gimp, Handbrake and not least Megaglest! I already had my first encounter with Amazones in Linux fields.🙂 So, now I have a desktop that is very close to what I've been using for many years. If it holds together when upgrade time comes, then I have no reason to look elsewhere.
