[ipdashc]

> medium-technical non-programmer friend completely installed set up Linux without my help using Claude

I mean, not to do the HN thing, but I feel like if anything that's a bad sign for Linux that Claude was needed? Basically any desktop distro from the last decade has a simple GUI installer, if anything it's genuinely easier than installing Windows. I'd expect a medium-technical person to be able to handle it just fine, what did Claude help them with?

I do use LLMs for random debugging questions (most recently laptop dual graphics for instance) but the base install has always worked fine for me

[mwwaters]

The Windows 11 ISO on a two year old Lenovo laptop did not have the Ethernet or WiFi driver. “Have Disk” also did not work for whatever reason when I downloaded the driver to a USB drive. I had to open up a command prompt within the Windows installer and run the GUI driver installer.

In Linux, I now have a custom Arch install which Gemini did help with a lot. It helped unblock significantly where I wanted to get fundamental understanding. A Debian installer will just work though (ironically, some years ago, I had issues with Ubuntu working out of the box but not Debian).

[jcastro]

> what did Claude help them with?

https://askubuntu.com/

There's decades of this stuff.

[pletnes]

Conversely, my windows 11 has fundamental issues that neither google nor claude can find solutions to.

[lostlogin]

I wonder if AI recommends regular full reinstalls?