Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by imzadi 364 days ago
Like it or not, Linux is still not really user friendly compared to a windows computer. Users still have to do command line stuff, and the software you are used to is not available. The equivalents are not as shiny as the windows versions. Macs might be too expensive for some people who are still running on old hardware.
4 comments
JohnFen 364 days ago
> Users still have to do command line stuff

Not really, unless they're doing something special. But if they're doing something special, they're not average users.

link
TremendousJudge 364 days ago
> unless they're doing something special

In my experience with Linux desktop, this could be "have the touchpad work the same as it did on Windows", "plug in an extra monitor and have it behave somewhat normally", or "play this game". But yeah, I guess that as long as we only expect "average users" to only use a web browser to look at Youtube, it's fine.

link
dismalaf 364 days ago
> have the touchpad work the same as it did on Windows", "plug in an extra monitor and have it behave somewhat normally", or "play this game".

I have no idea how touchpads behave on Windows, but in, say, Gnome or KDE, you can adjust it through the GUI. Extra monitors work fine on Gnome. Steam works fine in general, across distros.

link
bigyabai 364 days ago
GNOME and KDE both have the same touchpad gestures as Windows 10/11, and the monitor extension logic is basically identical too (GNOME even has a Win+P accelerator). Game variety hasn't really been an issue since the Steam Deck came out, with apologies to League of Legends addicts that probably ought to move on with their lives anyways.

Like, I understand that my MRI operator can't just install Linux on their PC. But the majority of people are usually not dependent on Windows-exclusive software, especially in the smartphone era.

link
marcodiego 364 days ago
Everytime I tried touchpad on windows laptops I disered it worked as well as in Linux.

I know things have improved a bit after 10, but I used to say that it is easy to see who is using windows because they always brought their mice with their laptops.

link
burnt-resistor 364 days ago
Not Ubuntu, but we need a Linux that's pretty, standardized, simple, fail-safe, developed as an immutable whole, consistent, and integrated as macOS and long-term compatible similar to Windows without the M+MAANG corporate bullshit of either, perhaps through a non-profit, employee-owned co-op social venture.

Perhaps a far more polished and documented version of Qubes with various btrfs trees selectively presented cleanly to appropriate VM containers. Focus on the user UX meets the dev/ops UX but without gimmicks, not-invented-here, or fragility. All of the various desktop-laptop things need to work without surprises and be easily configurable with a UI. For fleet management, a desktop OS really needs simple, programmatic/declarative/imperative MDM- and/or chef-like configuration agent or hooks.

link
ethbr1 364 days ago
The philosophical problem with this is it would require a huge number of volunteers to standardize.

That's something you can make happen if you're paying people... but it's pretty hard when you aren't.

Why should someone work on something they're not thrilled about? (from their perspective)

link
const_cast 363 days ago
Linux is significantly more user-friendly than Windows, the problem is it's unfamiliar. Windows is cryptic, roundabout, and very much the black sheep of modern operating systems. Nothing makes sense, there's a dozen settings panels, everything is everywhere, and the OS just breaks seemingly randomly if you leave it alone for long enough.

But we, consumers, have gotten so accustomed to the jank of Windows that we perceive it as intuitiveness. But is it really so? Just consider: what would Grandma have an easier time using? Elementary OS, or Windows 11? To me, the answer seems obvious. But we don't optimize for Grandma.

link
dismalaf 364 days ago
> Users still have to do command line stuff

You absolutely don't have to. There's no reason for normal users to ever touch the command line, every essential task (installing stuff, updating) can be done through the GUI on most distros. Certainly the main ones like Ubuntu, Fedora and openSuse.

> the software you are used to is not available

This is the main issue. The average user has a meltdown if a single button moves. I still remember the Office ribbon fiasco, Windows 8 fiasco, etc...

link