Agree with everthing @ericbuijs@lemmy.ml said below. That windows and macOS comes pre-installed on every purchasable computer is 99.9% of the reason that the linux desktop isn’t more popular. Everything else in this article were concerns that don’t affect most people using computers:
Lack of Testers and Reporters
Linux OS’s have more testers and reporters than windows, having a larger number of power users to report issues. This has lead to some very stable distros: watch those videos of some older non-savvy computer people trying to use windows vs some clean linux distros.
Lack of Code Contributors, Developers and Maintainers
Linux has probably 10x the code contributers that windows does. Also M$ and Apple are closed source, so that’s not even something they can compete on.
Toxicity
Exists on windows and mac forums and communities just as much if not moreso.
GNOME “Vs.” KDE/Plasma
Non-issue that people don’t have to care about after they install an OS.
Package Managers
Much easier to use than windows, and one of the main reasons to switch to linux!
There are many reasons the Linux desktop isn’t very popular, they lead to lower adoption which creates lower investment and prevents these problem from being solved, If linux would have been such an attractive platform for the casual users business people will recognize the opportunity and will bundle it more and more in preinstalled computers (and as it was said they are preinstalled, they just not selling as well as windows or mac preinstalls).
I might get crucified for saying this but i think part of the problem is there isn’t really an organisation or project “leader” who is really great at building what people want, Say what you want about google ethically but if you will go to statcounter and chart a graph of chrome os growth in usage you will see pretty consistent growth , Linux also seems to be moving up, I am hoping linux mint and maybe pop os will be the next leader in this domain but according to my calculations chrome os is growing about twice as fast as Linux so that’s another thing to ponder.
The ChromeOS growth is basically 100% because it comes pre-installed on cheap hardware. I have actually never heard of anyone installing it themselves on a regular x86 laptop, even though I think that is possible.
If linux would have been an attractive platform, they would have created a commercial os for laptops and mobile phones… which they did.
Computers are really not rocket science and 99% of what people do would be covered by a browser, a word processor and a spreadsheet (plus games I guess…).
You can have all there things for free with a linux desktop and more. The stuff my non-linux family and friends tell me about they will be missing is basically just the marketing messages around “ease of use, security, stability”.
I’m using Windows at work, Mac on my partner’s laptop. None of those pieces can be called stable or secure. My work laptop has a user friendly half-life of about two weeks, after which the true Windows customers (work admins) make sure it is about as fast as a mechanical type writer.
Mac’s principle of “having to buy into the platform” is utterly insane and can only work if you sort of start glorifying the source. The laptop stops working fault free after about 6 months.
On the Linux side, I had linux desktops not shutting down for years without fault. Make no mistake, I don’t attribute this to higher quality as such, but just lack of breaking shit to make another dollar.
I never heard of specific examples of why a linux desktop would be problematic for users. I do can think of examples of why it would be bad for corporate. I think the latter is the main reason for linux’s low adoption when compared to some billion dollar corporations…
I used a work laptop with windows before, it worked fine for me, this sounds like more of some configuration problem.
Linux still has it’s problems, i still get screen tearing on firefox when running videos (This is 2021 , this should not happen), KDE wayland tech should solve this but it’s not yet production ready. I still get bugs and glitches which can be annoying to fix (KDE “Move to Trash” being extremely slow is one of them). the whole “different packages for different distros” concept can be confusing and flatpak needing to download gigabytes to work can also be off putting. I don’t think i ever encountered a user facing bug in facebook or google products.
The Windows issue is clearly related to the organisation I’m working at since everyone has the same issues. But this is just an example that Windows doesn’t target you as the user, it targets organisations!
Besides this, I have installed Linux on probably more than a dozen privately used machines and not once had screen tearing! What machine are you using?
Re packaging: use the package manager of your distro. The availability of packages is probably what helps you select your distro. Otherwise flatpack or snap is a convenient workaround where available. Debian is known for a really wide selection of packages that should cater most needs.
On Windows, package problems were probably related to my organisations admin practices. However I’d like to note that stuff like flatpack / snap, i.e. portable applications, doesn’t really exist on Windows. So there’s another limitation
Besides this, I have installed Linux on probably more than a dozen privately used machines and not once had screen tearing! What machine are you using?
Kubuntu 20.04 on intel graphics, but it’s not surprising there is screen tearing (That’s one of the problems wayland is supposed to solve), there is even an open bug, they probably just havent migrated to DRI3 because i got no tearing when opening the same video using VLC, I actually also helped convert someone to Linux and he also got screen tearing and at some point the OS just failed and we had to do a reinstall (Linux mint) and he eventually went back to windows (due to lack of software availability IIRC).
Re packaging: use the package manager of your distro. The availability of packages is probably what helps you select your distro. Otherwise flatpack or snap is a convenient workaround where available. Debian is known for a really wide selection of packages that should cater most needs.
Debian is unfit for most casual users IMO, There is Ubuntu which is OK but you either have to use a LTS which has dated packages or the latest version which could be more buggy (IMO most users don’t need to upgrade the OS more then every two years), snap is proprietary and flatpak as i mentioned is still not very convenient.
I’d be interested why you think Debian isn’t suitable for the casual user? I had the least trouble with it and it always seemed to work when other distros had issues.
I think you just need more information to use it, and might not fit for a “I don’t care just work” kind of users, you need to select a DE which might be confusing (basically choice overload), by default you get to install a version with an older kernel which might cause problems with hardware compatibility, It also provides an image without non free firmware which can cause unexplained hardware problems (the download page mentions its but starts the download immediately so that could be easy to miss).
That’s just my impression as someone who never really tried it seriously, If you got someone knowledgeable installing it you can move around these problems and debian stability could be great for a casual users (assuming installing updates using the GUI is OK and KDE discover is no longer a mess).
I agree that the install might be a tad off-putting to casual users. It does look pretty techy.
However for newbies, I’d say you’d have to do two things:
enable non-free repositories which will fix hardware compatibility
choose a DE
Once this is done, I don’t think there is a more stable, compatible distribution around. I tried (and often liked) OpenSUSE, Arch, Ubuntu, various downstream versions of those, and Debian is just by far the most easiest to run. I generally run “testing” which makes it a rolling distro, and might be another thing that should be done for casual users (or for them to be guided through). “testing” therefore means that you never to have to go through an install again (until you go distro hopping…)
So three things to guide casual users to Linux happiness! I say that’s possible…
As a way of better understanding which system average or non tech savvy users prefer, I have asked many relatives, that fall into that category, whether they prefer installing apps on their phones or installing programs on their computers. None chose the latter.
It is true, package managers are a really nice way to get your software. All Linux distros use package managing essentially, and all of them have both CLIs and GUIs, often times multiple flavours of them too. There should be a fit for everyone.
Agree with everthing @ericbuijs@lemmy.ml said below. That windows and macOS comes pre-installed on every purchasable computer is 99.9% of the reason that the linux desktop isn’t more popular. Everything else in this article were concerns that don’t affect most people using computers:
Linux OS’s have more testers and reporters than windows, having a larger number of power users to report issues. This has lead to some very stable distros: watch those videos of some older non-savvy computer people trying to use windows vs some clean linux distros.
Linux has probably 10x the code contributers that windows does. Also M$ and Apple are closed source, so that’s not even something they can compete on.
Exists on windows and mac forums and communities just as much if not moreso.
Non-issue that people don’t have to care about after they install an OS.
Much easier to use than windows, and one of the main reasons to switch to linux!
There are many reasons the Linux desktop isn’t very popular, they lead to lower adoption which creates lower investment and prevents these problem from being solved, If linux would have been such an attractive platform for the casual users business people will recognize the opportunity and will bundle it more and more in preinstalled computers (and as it was said they are preinstalled, they just not selling as well as windows or mac preinstalls).
I might get crucified for saying this but i think part of the problem is there isn’t really an organisation or project “leader” who is really great at building what people want, Say what you want about google ethically but if you will go to statcounter and chart a graph of chrome os growth in usage you will see pretty consistent growth , Linux also seems to be moving up, I am hoping linux mint and maybe pop os will be the next leader in this domain but according to my calculations chrome os is growing about twice as fast as Linux so that’s another thing to ponder.
The ChromeOS growth is basically 100% because it comes pre-installed on cheap hardware. I have actually never heard of anyone installing it themselves on a regular x86 laptop, even though I think that is possible.
Nothing prevents the installation of Linux on cheap laptops, IIRC there was already an attempt to do that (see Ubuntu Netbook Edition).
If linux would have been an attractive platform, they would have created a commercial os for laptops and mobile phones… which they did.
Computers are really not rocket science and 99% of what people do would be covered by a browser, a word processor and a spreadsheet (plus games I guess…).
You can have all there things for free with a linux desktop and more. The stuff my non-linux family and friends tell me about they will be missing is basically just the marketing messages around “ease of use, security, stability”.
I’m using Windows at work, Mac on my partner’s laptop. None of those pieces can be called stable or secure. My work laptop has a user friendly half-life of about two weeks, after which the true Windows customers (work admins) make sure it is about as fast as a mechanical type writer.
Mac’s principle of “having to buy into the platform” is utterly insane and can only work if you sort of start glorifying the source. The laptop stops working fault free after about 6 months.
On the Linux side, I had linux desktops not shutting down for years without fault. Make no mistake, I don’t attribute this to higher quality as such, but just lack of breaking shit to make another dollar.
I never heard of specific examples of why a linux desktop would be problematic for users. I do can think of examples of why it would be bad for corporate. I think the latter is the main reason for linux’s low adoption when compared to some billion dollar corporations…
I used a work laptop with windows before, it worked fine for me, this sounds like more of some configuration problem.
Linux still has it’s problems, i still get screen tearing on firefox when running videos (This is 2021 , this should not happen), KDE wayland tech should solve this but it’s not yet production ready. I still get bugs and glitches which can be annoying to fix (KDE “Move to Trash” being extremely slow is one of them). the whole “different packages for different distros” concept can be confusing and flatpak needing to download gigabytes to work can also be off putting. I don’t think i ever encountered a user facing bug in facebook or google products.
The package thing can be abstracted away for casual users by a GUI manager, which people are familiarized with because of mobile app stores.
The Windows issue is clearly related to the organisation I’m working at since everyone has the same issues. But this is just an example that Windows doesn’t target you as the user, it targets organisations!
Besides this, I have installed Linux on probably more than a dozen privately used machines and not once had screen tearing! What machine are you using?
Re packaging: use the package manager of your distro. The availability of packages is probably what helps you select your distro. Otherwise flatpack or snap is a convenient workaround where available. Debian is known for a really wide selection of packages that should cater most needs.
On Windows, package problems were probably related to my organisations admin practices. However I’d like to note that stuff like flatpack / snap, i.e. portable applications, doesn’t really exist on Windows. So there’s another limitation
Kubuntu 20.04 on intel graphics, but it’s not surprising there is screen tearing (That’s one of the problems wayland is supposed to solve), there is even an open bug, they probably just havent migrated to DRI3 because i got no tearing when opening the same video using VLC, I actually also helped convert someone to Linux and he also got screen tearing and at some point the OS just failed and we had to do a reinstall (Linux mint) and he eventually went back to windows (due to lack of software availability IIRC).
Debian is unfit for most casual users IMO, There is Ubuntu which is OK but you either have to use a LTS which has dated packages or the latest version which could be more buggy (IMO most users don’t need to upgrade the OS more then every two years), snap is proprietary and flatpak as i mentioned is still not very convenient.
Appreciate the reply.
I’d be interested why you think Debian isn’t suitable for the casual user? I had the least trouble with it and it always seemed to work when other distros had issues.
I think you just need more information to use it, and might not fit for a “I don’t care just work” kind of users, you need to select a DE which might be confusing (basically choice overload), by default you get to install a version with an older kernel which might cause problems with hardware compatibility, It also provides an image without non free firmware which can cause unexplained hardware problems (the download page mentions its but starts the download immediately so that could be easy to miss).
That’s just my impression as someone who never really tried it seriously, If you got someone knowledgeable installing it you can move around these problems and debian stability could be great for a casual users (assuming installing updates using the GUI is OK and KDE discover is no longer a mess).
I agree that the install might be a tad off-putting to casual users. It does look pretty techy.
However for newbies, I’d say you’d have to do two things:
Once this is done, I don’t think there is a more stable, compatible distribution around. I tried (and often liked) OpenSUSE, Arch, Ubuntu, various downstream versions of those, and Debian is just by far the most easiest to run. I generally run “testing” which makes it a rolling distro, and might be another thing that should be done for casual users (or for them to be guided through). “testing” therefore means that you never to have to go through an install again (until you go distro hopping…)
So three things to guide casual users to Linux happiness! I say that’s possible…
:)
Yes! Package managers are great!
As a way of better understanding which system average or non tech savvy users prefer, I have asked many relatives, that fall into that category, whether they prefer installing apps on their phones or installing programs on their computers. None chose the latter.
It is true, package managers are a really nice way to get your software. All Linux distros use package managing essentially, and all of them have both CLIs and GUIs, often times multiple flavours of them too. There should be a fit for everyone.