Installing OS, 10 years ago:
Windows: click a couple of buttons enter username and password
Linux: Terminal hacking, downloading shell scripts from github
Installing OS today:
Linux: click a couple of buttons, enter username and password
Windows: Terminal hacking, downloading shell scripts from github.
Link to video: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qKRmYW1D0S0
I remember 2014 being pretty easy to install Linux. Windows 7 and 10 were also pretty easy then.
Haha, you’re so silly! The meme says 10 years ago and not— …
My god, it really has been ten years since 2014, hasn’t it?
If Back to the Future was made today, Marty would have traveled back to 1994.
Idk, installing Linux was pretty easy 10 years ago too. Can’t comment about anything earlier than that though.
Even 20 years ago Linux was easier to install then Windows.
Last time I recall Linux being tricky was like late 90s.
They are probably like me, thinking that the year 2000 was 10 years ago.
And I don’t think GitHub existed in 2000. Probably even git.
Git was released in ‘05, GitHub ‘08.
Yeah, it was SourceForge and SVN.
thinking that the year 2000 was 10 years ago.
This is patently absurd, 10 years ago was 1994.
You don’t download shell scripts from github for windows. You download batch scripts and exes from random file hosting sites, and they don’t even fix your problem.
some random .exe from mediafire to install drivers
or one of those shady ones with tons of ads and slow ass downloads.
CMD is a shell, homes.
Talking here about regular x64 OS install not ARM though, have not played with that myself.
Not really, it is usually PowerShell scripts from trusted blogs or in case of local account creation, you run a batch file that is built in installer (oobe\bypassnro) that adds a single registry value. Not sure I would call this hacking. Then again I don’t think Linux 10 years again had problems with account creation as well.
Would be nicer if you could create local account out of the box? Sure. Do some prefer MS account? Also true.
You’ll be lucky if it’s even hosted on random hosting sites and not some discord channel.
iTs iN tHe PiNnEd cOmMeNtS bRo
To be entirely unbiased here, this covers user friendly distros that pretty much blow windows away for “default experience”.
Windows has adware and scareware - more so it has config-cluster-fuckification (I believe this is the academic term for it?). This is where windows lost me - when it started bundling basic config options together to force you to relinquish your privacy. Now it’s “edit the registry or gtfo”…
Related, I predict Windows on ARM will be a massive failure, again.
Windows is Windows because a critical mass of their market is terrified of being vaguely incompatible with any software they use today. Wine will never give them enough confidence just like ARM emulation of x86 will never give them confidence.
Extra bizarre, from what I’ve seen the Windows devices vendors are treating the ARM variants as a premium model and charging more for them, despite having no real compelling story for the customers. You can either have an x86 offering that’s from all appearances just as overall capable and absolutely able to run your software today, on an ARM offering that is more expensive and maybe a bit less compatible, with maybe better battery life (either sincerely or at least a belief).
Mac is able to force the issue because the hardware and software all wanted to make ARM happen and forced it, but with Windows on ARM, only Qualcomm really cares, Microsoft and all the device vendors would prefer to hedge their bets, which in this case tie goes to the incumbent.
I think the biggest shift in the last 20 years is troubleshooting in Linux and windows.
20 years ago and I had to troubleshoot issues and Linux. It genuinely required a good bit of computer knowledge to get it done. Sometimes hours of work to figure out how to get a webcam to work Or how to fix grub?
Windows back then used to be so easy. And there was usually something that would do a quick fix.
However, now and I run across a windows issue. It’s a nightmare. I can put hours of work into trying to fix a driver issue or an issue with updates and get nowhere. Then go to reinstall the operating system and have to spend more hours just to get it installed.
Now in Linux, not only do I rarely have issues but also fixing those issues are pretty straightforward. And if I can’t fix it a reinstall takes minutes and I’m back up and running in no time.
I feel like Linux respects me as the user. Like, I don’t know why this broke, but you get to keep both pieces. We believe in you. Good luck!
Windows tries to obfuscate any useful information while Linux tries to give logs and man entries to walk the user through what went wrong.
When the BSOD code has nothing to do with your actual problem
Well OBVIOUSLY you need to set HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session\Windows\Microsoft\Win10\MSWindows\CockNBalls\BSODWord to 0 then restart your computer.
Sorry, that was before KB1103995. The new method requires you to check a box in your OneDrive account first before the entry is respected.
Except you already have that update installed, the box is not checked and the entry is still respected, nobody could possibly tell you why because that’s not how it’s supposed to work and everyone else works as stated! And now you have to live with the knowledge that your system is in some unobserved quantum superposition with a critical fix in place which may stop working at any moment for any reason and nobody can tell you how you even managed to get into this situation…
Maybe Linux is 10 years ahead. Let’s give our windows users some insight about their future:
Don’t remove the French language pack with sudo!
This took me a minute to figure out 😝
I don’t get it.
sudo rm -fr /Add
—no-preserve-rootif you really want to make sure it’s gone! /jI know just enough about Linux to know that’s problematic. I don’t know anything about language packs to know why someone try to remove one this way though. Just seems wrong from the get go.
It’s an old joke:
sudo = admin rights
rm = remove
fr = force recursive (the more popular syntax is
“rf” but for the joke its “fr” which looks like a short form for French)
/ * = C:\
It doesn’t remove the French language pack, it removes the entire harddrive.
Tbf it does remove the french language pack.
And then some more.
Windows is only for games; macOS and Linux are for work. Once they catch up, it will be bye-bye Windows.
Games have largely caught up. Fifteen years ago, you couldn’t run anything other than shitty FOSS games or the occasional Platinum AppDB rated game like World of Warcraft on Linux, and even for the latter the install instructions were convoluted. With WoW, you had to manually copy the files from each CD, save them locally and then run the installer because otherwise the installer would shit the bed and fail halfway through Discs 2 or 3.
The final hurdle for gaming on Linux is anti-cheat and that’s going to be a mountain to overcome. Only two solutions (to my knowledge) currently have native Linux support and those are Easy Anti Cheat (EAC) and Valve Anti Cheat (VAC.) You’re not gonna get anything requiring Ring 0 access (like Vanguard) running on Linux anytime soon.
Games is mostly (say 90+95%) there. Windows won’t go bye bye though, MS ensured customers by making government’s and companies sign contracts that will be a bitch to get out of. Expect windows to be around for a long time.
Microsoft has shit developers, but they have great marketing people and lawyers, so many lawyers…
Linux is honestly great, literally the only things holding it back is programs supporting it. I’m painfully tied to a select few windows programs for work and hobbies, Wine tries its best but programs need to start supporting linux before proper adoption can kick off.
Lots more is holding it back, but I’d agree apps is a huge issue.
It’s still has significant issues with being end-user friendly. Needing to use command line for some things that should be a right click, not supporting right click, ambiguities galore when looking at a package repository, odd defaults in packages that one really wouldn’t expect to have to check (e.g. Selecting RDP connection in a Remote app, but it defaults the security to something other than RDP?)
As for apps, there’s problems like Libre Office devs refusing to support tables in the spreadsheet app, saying data management should be done with a database tool. While they’re not wrong, it takes a LOT more effort to setup a DB than to simply click “make table” in excel, which millions of people are familiar with. I create tables every day for run-of-the-mill stuff that simply doesn’t need a database. No one has time for that.
Or you plug in the most prolific wireless mouse on the planet, that’s been around since 2000 (Logitech), and it doesn’t work. Now pick any random piece of hardware and this is the stuff you run into. You go down the rabbit hole of searching for a solution
Or CAD (which falls in your app argument).
Linux is great for many things (things I run, UnRAID, TrueNAS, Proxmox, etc), it’s just not a great general purpose desktop for the average user, yet.
Needing to use command line for some things that should be a right click, not supporting right click, ambiguities galore when looking at a package repository, odd defaults in packages that one really wouldn’t expect to have to check (e.g. Selecting RDP connection in a Remote app, but it defaults the security to something other than RDP?)
Sounds like you’re using a GNOME Desktop. You should give KDE Plasma a try instead. KDE Plasma basically gives you a Windows-esq experience without trying to install something like GNOME extensions.
For a regular user there’s not much point into going into the command-line anymore.
there’s problems like Libre Office devs …
Sure but there’s also alternatives. LibreOffice doesn’t try to emulate Microsoft Office and they never really have. They won’t even try to be compatible with MS Office but rather they do with OOXML which Microsoft created for other Office suites to be compatible with it but then just never supported it very well. Some alternatives do however. WPS Office is perhaps the most popular alternative for this that does try to be compatible with MS Office and emulate its feel and features but ONLYOFFICE is also a contender.
I understand the face value of it, but I really hate the argument of (basically) “Linux isnt going to take off until it just becomes Windows (or emulates it perfectly click for click)”
People always act like Linux is less buttery smooth two click accessible as a style choice, but cranking out a system like that and keeping it up costs money. If Linux dedicated to supporting every dongle on the planet themselves and all this other shiz, they’d have to monetize too.
So much less now needs the terminal. Personally, I don’t get why people don’t mind doing a search to find where windows hid some particular setting 3 submenus deep, but lose their fucking mind over the thought of doing a search to double check which command they need.
Linux doesn’t need to change, people’s priorities need to shift. This obsession with free services and not having to know shit about how shit works is how we got here, and shaking that is the only way out. For example, People will recognize that google is bad but if you point out you can get a domain and basic email hosting for $20/yr or whatever, its always “sucks teeth yeaaaaa but i dont have $20 for something like that and idk how stuff works” conveniently, you dont need to “yeaaaaa, but nooooooo”
Like, I hate cars, but I can’t imagine not knowing how to change a tire or my oil, etc basic stuff, but there are people who call AAA when they get a flat. Its nuts to me.
Linux wont take off until the friction for new users is low enough that the layman can resolve issues without resorting to techniques outside of their understanding and patience. Even as someone who uses linux, there are a ton of things that should have a GUI / just be a context menu entry. If you can get the same amount of work done with a button click rather than typing out a complicated command line string, you might as well use the GUI, right click menu, etc. and make it easier for the typical person. People these days can barely use tablets, and those already dumb things down to icons you tap. Unfortunately, making it accessible to the lowest common denominator is
what makes things populara major factor in making things popularBut you can do nearly everything with the GUI in Linux for a while now. The level of stuff you would need to use the terminal for is the same level on Windows you would need the command-line for, or (SHUDDER) the registry.
In fact, I would argue that doing things in Linux via the GUI is easier than even on Windows. I’m speaking as a user of KDE Plasma. I personally dislike Gnome.
Needing to use command line for some things that should be a right click
Right click where? All major DE’s/WM’s implement stuff in their own way. The problem here is we don’t (and won’t) have a unified GUI that everyone uses, unlike the other two main OS’s. (Note: I don’t see this as a problem, more as a result of the FLOSS ecosystem being such a rich soil to build stuff on.)
I think Neal Stephenson’s In the Beginning was the Command Line has some valid points even today.
there’s problems like Libre Office
A very simple problem that I absolutely hate in LibreOffice that I can’t find a solution for. When typing in a formula in a spreadsheet and then trying to autocomplete it, you cannot use ‘Tab’. If you want to do a vlookup and start typing “=vloo” and then hit ‘Tab’ it just changes to the next column. Working in Excel at work and then switching to Calc at home is jarring and terrible. That option can’t be changed as far as I know. It’s a complete dealbreaker for me between the two. Luckily I don’t need to do much in my personal life on spreadsheets anymore or need to use my home PC for work like I used to.
