And this is exactly why Microsoft can get away with a buggy mess of a user hostile operating system.
They only have an incentive to make a good OS if people are willing to leave when it’s a bad one.
meandmycode 2 hours ago [-]
I will say, for anybody reading and finds it in any way uplifting, I have been a Windows user for 30 years, been a .net developer for 5 years at one point, groaned at how bad the 'Linux desktop' always was, but this year I finally switched to using Linux instead of Windows and I think it's because the inflexion point is starting to hit more of the masses.
int_19h 1 hours ago [-]
AI is the best thing that happened to desktop Linux!
digiown 42 minutes ago [-]
This actually. AI is dramatically better at helping users deal with perennial issues that Linux gets, and using the command line to fix them, compared to Microsoft's fresh new bug introduced last Tuesday or navigating anti-user GUI.
wookmaster 34 minutes ago [-]
You’re absolutely correct what used to take me hours reading docs and googling now takes minutes to find an answer to. Just this week my new beelink I couldnt get hardware acceleration working for transcoding. A couple prompts lead me to the fact the gpu was new and I needed a newer Linux kernel. I probably would have spent hours and hours fiddling with device drivers and configs in the past.
therein 33 minutes ago [-]
That is true but I believe he meant it as Microsoft shoving AI down your throat in every part of Windows driving people away into Linux.
BadBadJellyBean 8 hours ago [-]
I think saying "I'm a _______ guy" with any brand or company filling that blank can be a big problem. Most companies are there to make money and loyalty is often a one way street.
From my view it is more productive to find out what you like about something and always be open to maybe finding someone else who can deliver on that. And sometimes things that we thought were essential are not. You might even find something new to like.
arcologies1985 4 hours ago [-]
What about "I'm a Linux guy?" I don't pay any company for my Linux OSes. My favorites are nonprofits and mostly interchangeable.
II2II 3 hours ago [-]
> My favorites are [...] mostly interchangeable.
Those are the key words. You have the option to walk away from one distribution to use another if things start getting bad. Such has happened in the past, either because of distribution maintainers making decisions that certain users don't like (think Ubuntu from Unity onward) or because of distribution makers maintainers making decisions that put them ahead of the pack (think early Ubuntu). Overall, it has resulted in a competitive marketplace.
And if things got really bad, people can either fork the offending software or (if they use Linux as a more traditional Unix environment) there are various versions of BSD. If you use Linux for desktop applications, there is even the option of switching to Macintosh or Windows since open source applications tend to be multi-platform.
Being a Windows guy is a bit different. They are sticking all of their eggs in one basket. There isn't a viable Windows-like alternative to Windows if Microsoft messes up. Heck, it is growing increasingly difficult to stick with versions of Windows that are out of support. While I won't go as far as calling this brand loyalty, it means one is pretty much at the whim of the brand.
stavros 4 hours ago [-]
No. It's not your identity, it's a piece of software. "I use ____ for as long as the benefits outweigh the drawbacks" is what you should be thinking.
estimator7292 3 hours ago [-]
Being a "linux guy" is more like saying you're a "computer guy" at this point.
The better example is being an "Arch guy". That's the same kind of problematic as being a "Mac guy".
deaux 2 hours ago [-]
Linux isn't a company and I wouldn't call it a brand either, in the same way that "death metal" isn't a brand. So it doesn't fit in the blank in the first place.
BLKNSLVR 4 hours ago [-]
I'm a Linux guy, but I've always had a little bit of FreeBSD on the side.
(I'm also forced to use Windows at work)
Waterluvian 52 minutes ago [-]
I’m a Ryobi guy.
wrs 8 hours ago [-]
"I'm still a _______ guy, and I always will be."
No matter what trademark you put in the blank, this is not a healthy thing to say.
switchbak 1 hours ago [-]
This is especially bad when “GUI only” goes in the blank. In the early days I mostly worked with folks that were terrified of CLIs. Windows shops typically.
I still run across it sometimes, and it’s such a limiting form of identity.
embedding-shape 8 hours ago [-]
Yeah, not sure how people form almost "relationships" with their tools and refuse sometimes to even explore options. I'm always open to switching almost anything. I never end up doing, because things are usually not better, but maybe 1/100 times something is better, and then I switch. Initially did that around Ubuntu 9.10 before, and I'll switch away from Arch in a heartbeat if anything better comes around.
Edit: I realize now that the article author, the person in the video and the quoted tweet are all the same person, and they seem to work/run windowscentral.com, so I guess that kind of explains the motivation.
expedition32 7 hours ago [-]
Honestly as a deeply antisocial person the Linux cult has always rubbed me the wrong way. Same reason why I don't have an iPhone.
loloquwowndueo 5 hours ago [-]
What do you use then?
DetroitThrow 4 hours ago [-]
The biggest non-Linux non-iOS phone operating system is HarmonyOS, so I would assume he means that.
Archelaos 5 hours ago [-]
What about "Linux"? It is also a registered trademark.
charlesabarnes 5 hours ago [-]
For Linux as well. In my opinion you shouldn't remain blind to the benefits of other operating systems
qq66 3 hours ago [-]
I was a "Windows guy" from Windows 2.0 to Windows 10. Now I'm a "Mac guy."
These operating systems aren't my family members -- I'll ditch them if I believe that switching is worth getting over the learning curve of a new environment.
ScoobleDoodle 2 hours ago [-]
Right. My current computer has Windows OS at the moment.
therein 31 minutes ago [-]
I wonder when they'll rebrand it as Copilot Agentic OS. It seems no brand of theirs is sacred enough to not be replaced with Copilot.
layer8 4 hours ago [-]
It likely just means they will always prefer certain classic aspects of Windows over how other desktop OSs do things. I’m largely in that boat as well. Of course Windows could get so bad in the future that another OS will be the lesser evil. Or another OS could adopt those preferred Windows things. But it won’t change the mentioned preferences, hence “always”.
john01dav 7 hours ago [-]
Apple has an even bigger loyalty problem. For them and Microsoft it's arguably good, but it's bad for users, even the loyal ones. It might even be bad for Apple and Microsoft long term.
Quothling 5 hours ago [-]
I'm not saying Apple can't go the way of Microsoft, but if you've used macOS and Windows through the previous 5 years there isn't much of a comparison. Windows has gone from something I tolerated to something I absolutely dislike using. It's so bad that if it wasn't for WSL then I would consider finding a place to work where they didn't force me to use Windows. MacOS on the other hand hasn't really changed.
The moment someone makes a non macbook air, that does the same as a macbook air in terms of being cold to touch, battery life and no-noise I'm leaving for Linux though.
cosmic_cheese 4 hours ago [-]
> The moment someone makes a non macbook air, that does the same as a macbook air in terms of being cold to touch, battery life and no-noise I'm leaving for Linux though.
I think a lot of people are waiting for a non-Apple Macbook, but we unfortunately might be waiting for a while. It seems to pain other manufacturers to not cut corners in some critical area or another…
switchbak 1 hours ago [-]
I have a framework laptop, and when it works it’s just ok. It looks just enough like a Mac to have me feel frustrated when I use it.
In theory we may be able to run Linux (reliably, not in the bleeding edge) on Apple hardware eventually. But you still pay the Apple tax, which is pretty bonkers these days. But dang those machines are nice.
macOS has gotten subtly worse in a "death by a thousand cuts" kind of way. But, nothing like Windows's speed-run to Awful.
Neither OS is empowering me to do what I want to do on my computer anymore. Instead they're constantly nudging me towards doing things Microsoft and Apple want me to do.
Don't you want a Microsoft account? You really should make a Microsoft account. Please make a Microsoft account. We're going to pop up the Microsoft account at you until you say yes. OK, fucker, now you have to make a Microsoft account in order to use your computer.
Sync your stuff to the iCloud! No, really, you're forgetting to use iCloud. Come on, don't you want to use iCloud? We're going to make iCloud the default for saved documents now.
Go ahead and install that app. OK, now go ahead and install it but we're going to warn you that it's from the scary internet. Now, when you install the app, we're going to put a scary dialog if it's not from a developer we're OK with. Now, when you install the app, we're not going to let you even run it until you go into settings and confirm a scary dialog deep in Settings.
I'm not really in the driver's seat anymore. I'm kind of a passenger with limited access to the steering wheel. These are just a few examples but there are plenty of other cases where both Microsoft and Apple are inserting themselves between me and my computer, gatekeeping what I can do on them and treating me like some kind of attacker towards my own computer.
replooda 36 minutes ago [-]
What an odd attitude! It's almost as if you felt you should have control over devices you pay for.
pavel_lishin 5 hours ago [-]
> I'm still a Windows guy, and I always will be.
There's a semi-common saying that it takes seven attempts for someone to successfully leave an abusive partner. Give him time, I guess.
1 hours ago [-]
guidedlight 5 hours ago [-]
I’m my experience, unwavering Windows folk are simply power users who find *nix shells burdensome.
Spooky23 5 hours ago [-]
More like people who won’t bite the hand the feeds them.
wesammikhail 5 hours ago [-]
I deploy all my code on linux and have been thinking about switching from windows to linux for my daily driver. But even I dread that. It´s as if linux has tried as hard as possible to make every single little thing as complicated as possible.
imho, user experience is nowhere to be found in the linux landscape. There is very little focus on that. People will tell you try this or that distro. But once you run into a simple problem, it´s often a rabbit hole of a gazilling cli commands to fix it. In the mean time you´re praying to god to not brick something that used to work before.
conception 5 hours ago [-]
Lucky now you can just ask an LLM to diagnose and offer ways to fix it. Takes 99% of the trouble away.
nixosbestos 4 hours ago [-]
If I could wave a wand and ban a single class of comments on HN, it would be this. Rambling, non-specific handwaving useless text.
> user experience is nowhere to be found in the linux landscape.
It's ignorant, and its insulting, and it's stupid. You can read one or two KDE blog posts, look at the roadmap for Cosmic, look at the attention Valve has put into Linux and know that sentence is just rude. It's just so frustrating.
> People will tell you try this or that distro.
Dumbasses on reddit will. No one that has a single clue encourages distro-hopping.
bloqs 2 hours ago [-]
and I would ban fanboying such as your username
I agree with you, that it is irritating when people make sweeping statements that casually dismiss a lot of things as not existing when they do, but it's an endless arguement. Operating systems are not the problem, support is. Just making a good operating system isn't what drives adoption.
reducing _pain_ does. Nerds arent good at empathy, so the response is normally "just read x and use y" and call people stupid if they still cant figure it how to use it
wesammikhail 2 hours ago [-]
[flagged]
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5 hours ago [-]
lousken 8 hours ago [-]
exactly, he's part of a problem
billy99k 8 hours ago [-]
I could also say the Linux desktop creators are the problem as well. It's so buggy, it makes it impossible for me to switch.
prmoustache 7 hours ago [-]
This doesn't make any sense as there is not a linux desktop but multiples and the major ones have been less buggy than windows for the most part of the last 20 years.
Hardware support is where Linux used to struggle. Nowadays things aren't perfect but much better. Basically it means you need to figure out which hardware to buy based on available support, before making the purchase.
pluralmonad 1 hours ago [-]
I am willing to concede this might be true, but I personally have never checked Linux support before through 3 generations of desktops. Intel/Nvidia twice and then AMD/AMD.
hparadiz 58 minutes ago [-]
All of them will work. What "support". What is this nonsense. Seriously.
nik282000 57 minutes ago [-]
Debian, Ubuntu, Suse, and Fedora have had a bug free desktop experience for years. If you stick to the default repositories and use last year's hardware everything just works.
lousken 6 hours ago [-]
What desktop and which distro? In the past, there have been times where a bug showed up for me over the years, especially before 2018. Currently tho, Debian 13 + KDE - zero issues.
hparadiz 3 hours ago [-]
> I've tried nothing and I'm all out of ideas
Spooky23 4 hours ago [-]
Honestly, that’s a 2016 argument. I flipped a few contact centers over to Linux desktops and had very few issues. If anything we probably spent 5x the resources getting Windows 11 certified internally.
Microsoft knows it, but they don’t care about windows. When IBM started offering Macs to employees, they figured out that the support burden was very low, significantly lower than windows, even with users having years of windows experience.
Intune was supposed to be the answer to that, making Windows management MDM like. But for their most entrenched enterprise customers, they can’t really switch without co-managing with Configuration Manager. Most of the people behind that product are laid off or otherwise attrited, as there’s no path to a subscription service.
bdavbdav 6 hours ago [-]
Who are these “creators”? Can you point to them? Is there a legal entity?
xigoi 6 hours ago [-]
Which “the” Linux desktop? GNOME? KDE? xfce? Cinnamon? COSMIC?
xeromal 5 hours ago [-]
This question reinforces the point IMO
amlib 3 hours ago [-]
That linux has an awesome rich and diverse range of desktop experiences?
Aloha 6 hours ago [-]
Who is better?
monooso 5 hours ago [-]
I think you're missing the point.
If a friend stated that they will stay with their partner regardless of how deceptive or abusive said partner's behaviour becomes, you would rightly question the wisdom of that choice.
Stating that you will remain loyal to a company come what may is even worse. It's an entity with no interest in your wellbeing. It exists to extract as much money or information from you as possible.
Quite apart from everything else, such a statement eliminates the prospect of ever finding something better.
navigate8310 4 hours ago [-]
For folks that still like the win32 ecosystem, they should pirate the heck out of LTSC. just as Microsoft don't have interest in them, they shouldn't give a damn about it and enjoy a dramatically polished Windows experience.
bsder 4 hours ago [-]
Agreed. I had the version of Notepad++ that got popped and was being nagged by Fusion 360, so I decided to burn everything down, get a new SSD, and install a copy of Windows 11.
Holy sh*t! I haven't had this bad a Windows install experience since Windows 95.
The first big obstacle is getting all the Secure Boot/TPM 2.0 BIOS settings right. When you don't, you simply get "Can't install Windows". No debugging information. No clarification. No details. Shades of the day of having to blindly set the I/O interrupts and addresses on Windows. Tweak, Install, Waiiiiiiit, Fail. Tweak, Install, Waiiiiiit, Fail. etc.
Then the second obstacle is getting a local account installed. The solution was obscure, but straightforward. Finding that solution on the glop that has become the Internet? Bleaaaaagh. Everything has to be a bloody video for something that's one stupid command. And all the AI systems aren't useful because their horizon is too old and Microslop keeps changing the command; presumably because too many people are using it (How dare they not make cloud number go up! Brrrrrrrrr!) After all was said and done, I got "lucky" because I actually bought a retail copy of Windows 11 from Best Buy--it has physical media and the image was "old" enough that the "old" way of doing the install still worked (Shift F10 to prompt -> OOBE\BYPASSNRO -> reboot for those who want to know)
At last, after almost 90 minutes of farting around, Windows starts to install. And install. And install. And install ... FOR HOURS! WTF IS IT DOING! The target machine is a smoking AMD desktop with SSD and a gigantic amount of pre-shortage RAM on fibre. How in the name of all that is holy and unholy do you install that slowly on that powerful a machine?
Finally, everything gets installed. And I reboot ... to no video. Oh, no, I bet it scrambled the drivers. Sure enough, I move the HDMI from my AMD card to the AMD integrated video ... yep, there it is. Sigh. Let's go get DDU and uninstall the dumbass driver that Windows Install dumped on there. Download, download, install, reboot to safe mode, clean, install proper driver, reboot. Back on my main card, now.
Finally, let's dump a recovery image because I sure don't want to have to go through this gigantic PITA again if something goes wrong. Plug in the drive, can't find it ... ah, had a Linux image that needs to be wiped out, my fault ... need the Windows partition editor, so launch and erase ... wait, why can't I edit anything? ... oh, right, dumbass, you need to launch it as Administrator ... close ... open the menu, there's the app, right click menu ...
WTF! There's no "Run as Administrator" so I can't edit the partitions! Right click a couple of other programs ... some of them have the "Run as Administrator" but some of them DON'T. And there doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to which is which. Curse. Swear. FINE! Plug drive into my Linux laptop, kill the partitions there, and eject. Plug into Windows ... which now sees the drive and creates a recovery disk ... happy happy joy joy <rolls eyes>.
4+ hours! Not even exaggerating. <cries>
And because I'm a glutton for punishment, I decided I'd put Linux on the old reformatted SSD. Since I used Windows for gaming about as much as Fusion 360, I figured I'd go for something Linux but gaming-optimized and snag Bazzite which I'd never used before. Download, install, login, connect to Steam, run game.
Total time: no more than 20 minutes.
No fighting about cloud login. No video card problem. Games are running fine.
Anyone still using Windows as an individual nowadays is completely and utterly daft.
(And, as a side note, this is having a knockon effect--I finally went looking for an alternative to Fusion 360 and signed up for OnShape just so I can dump Windows permanently)
rafaelm 2 hours ago [-]
I'm no windows fanboy and I don't doubt your experience, but I honestly don't understand how this can happen. I recently did three clean Win 11 reinstalls and I was done in an hour. Maybe because I did it on slightly older hardware...
bsder 1 hours ago [-]
How? The install was just sitting there and there was literally nothing I could do while it just ground and ground.
I'd love to know what to do differently in case I have to do this again.
toss1 2 hours ago [-]
All that very justifiable work to avoid a cloud-connected OS . . . and then switch to OnShape which (afaict) has zero local option and requires a full cloud connection to run at all?
Seems like walking a tightrope across the river to avoid soaking your suit, then jumping in from the dock once you successfully get to the other side?
bsder 1 hours ago [-]
Fusion is cloud-only, as well, annoyingly.
I'd love to have a Linux-based 3D CAD program, but the open source ones just aren't up to scratch.
I've tried using FreeCAD, but it still scrambles things topologically (for example: adjust an underlying object and your fillets may get totally hosed).
Fusion is especially frustrating as they have a macOS version. A Linux version really shouldn't be much different.
dist-epoch 7 hours ago [-]
Goes the other way around too: Linux will only have a good desktop environment when it's users will be willing to leave it.
wolvoleo 5 hours ago [-]
Linux desktop environments are developed by its users wanting the best experience possible.
Windows is designed by a committee that tries to do as little as possible and has ulterior motives higher on the priority scale than UX. Like marketing copilot and other Microsoft subscription services. Microsoft software is always aimed to be just good enough for the users to not choose something better. They love just coasting on their marketshare without doing much to improve. Like they did with internet explorer and now do with office.
blibble 4 hours ago [-]
> Linux desktop environments are developed by its users wanting the best experience possible.
have you used GNOME?
nik282000 54 minutes ago [-]
GNOME is easy. Press the super key, type the first 1 to 4 characters of your application's name, press enter.
I haven't been in the GNOME settings for years.
innocentoldguy 14 minutes ago [-]
I'm currently using Niri+Noctalia just to try them out, but I typically use Gnome and like it quite a bit for its simple, clean interface.
I use macOS and Linux, and the way GNOME works makes switching between them easier for me than when I run KDE, for instance (I'm sure others have a different experience, and that's what is so great about Linux).
amlib 3 hours ago [-]
GNOME devs operates more like benevolent dictators. It sure is oppressive and you better be glad for what you are getting, but what they put out with so few resources is leagues above what microsoft can do nowadays.
pxc 4 hours ago [-]
I'm a lifelong KDE person but it's still clear to me that GNOME is crafted with care, and I find it pretty usable.
Mordisquitos 5 hours ago [-]
> Linux will only have a good desktop environment when it's users will be willing to leave it.
Putting aside the debate as to the quality of desktop environments, I honestly hope you're being intentionally nonsensical as a joke. What you describe can only make sense under the grossly misinformed belief that "Linux" is a monolithic entity incentivised to stop its users from "leaving it", and that this mythical "Linux" would have the agency to decide it needed "a good desktop environment" in order to avoid that from happening.
xigoi 6 hours ago [-]
I recently started using COSMIC and I would definitely call it good, even if it has a few rough edges due to just recently coming out of beta.
bigstrat2003 5 hours ago [-]
I mean, from my perspective Linux has multiple good desktop environments. I've used both Cinnamon and KDE for years and have found both perfectly pleasant to use.
ErroneousBosh 5 hours ago [-]
Linux has had several good desktop environments for well over 20 years.
When is Windows going to get a good desktop environment?
bdavbdav 6 hours ago [-]
Came here to post this, what an asinine thing to say.
YesBox 37 minutes ago [-]
Reading the comments made me want to check the Steam Hardware Survey [0].
I cannot see myself installing Windows 11, it's sad, I've been primarily a windows guy for my home computer since W95 and I'll miss it. Windows 10 (LTSC) has been the best operating system experience of my life, once I disabled updates and all the nag screens it's been rock solid for me for many years. It's so important to be able to trust that your computer works the same way tomorrow as it does today.
I hope that there's enough people like me that the combined community will keep it alive for a few years longer, but I know eventually something will force me to upgrade to Linux.
htx80nerd 4 hours ago [-]
I started on Win 3.1. Win95 and 98 were so cool. Then I thought Win2k Pro was the best thing that even happened. WinXP was probably the last time I cared a lot about Windows. Vista looked cool. Then things just got worse and worse.
I have a medium-range gaming laptop running Windows 11. Dedicated GPU, extra RAM, etc. It "boots to ready" worlds slower than any of my low end Linux laptops. Windows is just so ungodly slow.
Somewhere around 2020 I changed my work laptop to use Linux only, no dual boot. MS was pushing 20GB patches, which is unreal. At the time I had AT&T DSL.
I had been using Linux on and off since the early 2000s. But the 20GB patches and 'ransom-ware' pushed me to Linux full time.
There are no apps I use that are 'windows only' so Im free. Windows is made by a mega-corp and it's just gotten out of control. "Update and shutdown" always just reboots. You can spend ~1hr doing an OS update with multiple reboots. I can install Linux + LibreOffice in ~15mins or less. A full Linux updated is like ~5min to ~10min, or less.
thot_experiment 2 hours ago [-]
Yeah, this is the chief issue with Windows, LTSC helps but I've gone further and only let this system update about 3 times in the last 5 years. That plus disabling all signature enforcement, zone.identifiers and other nonsense "security" stuff makes Windows pretty great. I have never lost time to a random windows update since the first time it happened to me, it's just an unacceptable UX, I would have swapped to linux long ago if I wasn't able to disable it.
duxup 7 hours ago [-]
I was a windows guy for a long time. I went to macOS. Despite the complaints I've seen on the internet I've been very happy in macOS land. Someone mentioned that while macOS has "never been worse" the difference between windows and macOS "has never been greater".
Granted things like gaming might influence someone to not make that move.
thot_experiment 2 hours ago [-]
macOS seems cool in theory, but in practice it's not a "you own your computer" operating system so it's just a no go off the bat for me, i get it for people that just kinda stay in the center of the bell curve when it comes to computer use, but there's a 100% chance i'd end up in some situation where i'm fighting against apple's locked-down ness in approx 20minutes of owning a mac.
i'm fundamentally never going to accept a UX where i'm not absolute god of my computer, if i want to delete files crucial to my system's ability to function or run something with kernel level access to all my memory that's MY prerogative, i cannot imagine using a computer that doesn't listen to me
abawany 1 hours ago [-]
macos has gotten worse about this in recent releases - I was astounded when I learnt that apple news, apple books, and apple music are uninstallable; these are still removable on ios but not on macos for some reason.
kayodelycaon 1 hours ago [-]
That's because the applications in macOS are in the sealed volume as part of the operating system.
On iOS, apps are managed by the operating system. On macOS, they're files.
baal80spam 7 hours ago [-]
Are you me?
Well, technically from 3.1 but everything else checks out.
dgxyz 4 hours ago [-]
My one remaining windows machine is on 2021 LTSC and has no route to the internet. I am slowly working my way off it. This was onto macOS but that has gone down the shitter too. So it’s Debian. Hopefully be end of Q1 this year.
I honestly can’t believe what these vendors are doing. I don’t know anyone who approves of any of this.
wishfish 8 hours ago [-]
Author implies he was using a local account at the time of the error. Which answers an important question. I'd heard of people with Microsoft accounts getting locked out of their own computers, but that's a first I've heard of basic apps failing with a local account.
lconnell962 4 hours ago [-]
Comment threads on the Closed Source OS topics like this regularly remind me about the large disconnect between skilled technical users and the "average" user. That average probably isn't your (great) grandparent who never learned how to type suddenly needing to learn the rapidly evolving early-days internet, but it's still just as dangerous to suggest "Use Linux" as the solution for everyone when plenty of "Average" users still don't know enough to be doing things safely in the console.
The "sudo rm -rf" and equivilant horror stories get told all too often as mistakes even made by "skilled users" who were in a hurry, and while that particular problem is becoming less common there is still a minefield out there. Wider use case where we need IT support is worse since there are plenty of Microsoft and Mac favoring restrictions and lockdowns required in the name of corporate level security requirements and certifications add to the mess and "security concerns" you can't get corporate to move away from.
I'm a daily Linux user who has had to put years of a software developer career's time into learning the easier system administration aspects and working with those who handle the harder issues, but doing this in my career I have had to step back every time someone comes to me with a problem. Once I understand the problem then go on to ask "at a guess, how much time will diagnosing this even take?" with the estimates varying based on how standard the OS install or deployment is.
Time and a relatively small amount of training is the problem with switching users from Windows to Mac or the reverse. Switching to Linux is training and introducing a technical mindset into a person. Idiot-proofing the system is a major issue Linux hasn't solved yet. VDI systems and the like might be a step in the right direction, but as soon as your use case for Linux requires a "average user" to open a terminal the problems will pile up and the minefield is exposed.
Years removed from using a Mac I still think of it as the most "child-proofed" OS. Windows being less restrictive but still doing a good-enough job of locking up the more dangerous things while also not drawing attention to them on a regular basis. Linux is like seeing the dangers left out in the open with few useful warning signs beyond some generic unspecified danger signs around the worksite.
flomo 4 hours ago [-]
imo, the 'grandparent' type user should really be on an ipad or chromebook etc. (unless they have some specific software needs). Too easy to get unwanted stuff running on windows and it needs admin.
lconnell962 3 hours ago [-]
Windows has made improvements in that area in the last decade, but I don't disagree much. It could be the bias of having dealt with IT related issues for long enough, but I do think the "average" user might be regressing closer to that grandparent level as far as (needing, if not wanting to admit) that child-proofing the OS is needed. Chromebook and tablet PC stuff will probably continue to draw more entry level users in. As that marketshare grows we will have to wait and see how malicious programming evolves with it...
Same general guesswork, but everyone on here can make reasonably educated guesses at what the AI evolution process will do to the tech landscape. Nobody knows enough yet to have anything in cement, but it's out there, and the small changes of the last few years make it seem that we are going to regress rather than improve the level of technical knowlege needed to be "average" when working on a computer.
smackeyacky 7 hours ago [-]
There are two technologies propped up by having to earn a living: windows and the iPhone.
No matter the android phone, trying to get your MFA experience working with the umpteen stupid MFA apps is painful because all the dev work went into the iPhone versions. I hate it but yep I ended up buying an iPhone although I never buy them new.
Windows is the other one and again it’s security related. More and more places simply rely on Active Directory/Entra and try telling the bank you’re working for that you have to have a Linux notebook. You’ll get laughed right out of a job.
I’d agree for a home computer Linux or macOS are the only sane choices now. But whatever is installed on my work provided computer is what I’m using and that’s windows.
bdavbdav 6 hours ago [-]
I use an iPhone (out of choice) but what MFA doesn’t work on android?
fruitworks 4 hours ago [-]
I just use Mauth, its on fdroid. Pretty much everything is that common OTP standard. Same with OTPclient on gnu/linux
My only bad experience is duo mobile, but I expect it is equally bad on iOS
Quothling 5 hours ago [-]
> Entra and try telling the bank you’re working for that you have to have a Linux notebook. You’ll get laughed right out of a job.
Entra id private access will cover that (and it frankly can't become the norm soon enough). For an extra $5 per license. I wouldn't worry too much about that part of Microsoft though. They always knew how to sell stuff to enterprise. You gotta wonder what their Windows division is doing though, but maybe they just don't want private customers.
cheeze 1 hours ago [-]
> I’d agree for a home computer Linux or macOS are the only sane choices now.
Unless you care about gaming at all. Sure you have the Linux evangelists who talk about how much better support has gotten (it has!) but there are still huge glaring holes.
I run MacOS for everything except gaming. I'm not even that big of a gamer but it's the only sane option there.
sophrosyne42 32 minutes ago [-]
For quite a few years, it has gone from "unless you care about gaming at all" to "unless you care about an extremely specific type of game". You don't have to be an evangelist to see the value linux has for gaming now.
lousken 8 hours ago [-]
Switch to linux, don't look back
trinix912 7 hours ago [-]
Unless you work a job where you're not in control of the OS you're using, which just happens to be most of the non-dev office jobs out there. Dismissing Windows problems with "just switch to Linux bro" doesn't really help.
compass_copium 7 hours ago [-]
I have to use Windows at work and I will never have weird cloud authentication issues because I'm required to use a work-provided MS account on the computer. The author says he's a Windows guy, and always will be. This article, and these types of complaints, are really only relevant if you're using it on your personal PC.
lousken 6 hours ago [-]
I did think about personal devices, but it is a valid point, though many companies I know do support at least windows+mac if not linux. Supporting Linux desktop for a company is more difficult due to lack of anything resembling GPOs (and no ansible-pull isn't that). It is definitely a thing systemd should implement.
xigoi 6 hours ago [-]
If you’re not in control of the OS, then you’re not responsible for problems caused by the choice of OS. Tell your boss that Windows is not allowing you to use basic features and let them choke on it.
hluska 5 hours ago [-]
You don’t sound very mature.
p_j_w 3 hours ago [-]
Why is it immature to hold decision makers responsible for their decisions?
hagbard_c 7 hours ago [-]
If you're in a Windows-only job and you've got proof that Windows is getting in the way of doing your job you might just be able to convince those who decided to make it a Windows-only workplace to change their stance.
drnick1 7 hours ago [-]
Came here to say this.
havaloc 8 hours ago [-]
I work in academia and I've gotten most of my people to switch to Macs and no, Linux is not an option here.
I have about eight Windows PCs against about sixty MacBook Airs and guess which platform causes me the most work? 1:20 issue ratio. Even simple things like SMB in Windows 11 are hopelessly broken.
leoedin 7 hours ago [-]
What makes Linux not an option? Is there specific apps you need to use? Or IT policies? Or something else?
The company I work for got bought by a big conglomerate, and I managed to stubbornly hold out using Linux for a really long time. It turns out if your workplace has adopted “Bring your own device” type policies, that often means you can auth with enough services that working on Linux is feasible.
Spooky23 4 hours ago [-]
The issue isn’t the technology, it’s that there’s more than one way to do everything and people tend to scratch their itches.
If you started a company today, you can immediately and cheaply hire people or an MSP to manage Windows PCs. I hire entry Windows techs for $70k. M365 E-whatever is $30-60/mo.
Apple fully aligned their products, so the guys running the iPhone fleet can run the Macs. They may need some higher level assistance to setup the configurations. Unless you have a lot of compliance work, enroll in MDM, done.
With Linux, other than Chrome, there’s no standard. You’re gonna need a smart/expensive person to setup things and you’re going to need smart/expensive people to operate. If you have compliance requirements appear, you’ll need to buy RHEL or something and rework stuff, which is more expensive than windows.
havaloc 15 minutes ago [-]
Linux is good for a lot of things, but the end user has to be comfortable too. They've heard of a Mac, but a Dell with Mint or whatnot is a harder sell.
trinix912 7 hours ago [-]
It's much harder for non-dev jobs where the management won't let you BYOD for whatever reasons, which could range from IT being too stubborn to allow you to keep company data on your own laptop that's not centrally managed, to everything including licenses for random 3rd party software the company is using being tied to the ActiveDirectory fleet of computers with centralized storage.
This is the reality of IT equipment in big parts of the non-dev world, and you'll have a hard time convincing the IT dept to take on extra hassle just for you to use Linux out of all hundreds of employees who're just fine with Windows.
Gibbon1 6 hours ago [-]
I have a friend that worked for a big corp back 15 years ago managing Macs. At one point they told him they were going to can him and switch the Mac uses to Windows. Didn't go anywhere when he pointed out he was managing all their Mac users. And he was managing 5 times as many Macs as his coworkers were managing Window Boxes.
chrisjj 8 hours ago [-]
> I couldn't open Notepad ... an error (0x803f8001) with Microsoft Store's licensing service stopped me
I wonder if it works at all when no online connection to that store.
mysterydip 7 hours ago [-]
“But what if people used notepad without our permission?!” -dev/boss somewhere
chrisjj 6 hours ago [-]
"But I bought it!" - naïve customer somewhere
journal 1 hours ago [-]
thin clients are not personal computing.
cadamsdotcom 6 hours ago [-]
Microsoft is really shooting themselves in your foot.
It might be time to look at other options.
vhalan 8 hours ago [-]
I only use my windows machine because I can swap out parts stuff and is more hackable but macos is so much more beautifully designed.
Sometimes I prefer one machine over the other I rarely wish for anything other than sometimes being unable to transfer data between the two systems.
josephcsible 8 hours ago [-]
> I only use my windows machine because I can swap out parts stuff and is more hackable but macos is so much more beautifully designed.
That's definitely a good reason to use a PC instead of a Mac, but why not run Linux on it? Then you'd get the best of both worlds.
mh- 8 hours ago [-]
I would not describe the Linux desktop experience as the best of both Mac and Windows.
Let's go with different, a different world.
chrisjj 8 hours ago [-]
> I couldn't open Notepad ... an error (0x803f8001) with Microsoft Store's licensing service stopped me
I wonder if it works at all with no online connection to that store.
Imagine if Fedora locked you out of vi because your Red Hat account had an issue.
The unsettling part of stories like this isn’t “Microsoft bad,” it’s the growing assumption that local tools should be downstream of remote identity systems. A text editor is about as offline and fundamental as software gets, yet it’s now possible for account state, sync bugs, or policy enforcement to make it inaccessible on your own machine.
This is where non-macOS UNIX and Linux systems draw the line - if it’s installed locally and you have permission, it runs. Cloud services can enhance that experience (backups, sync, collaboration) but they don’t get veto power over whether vi opens.
When that boundary erodes, we start to see our systems as thin clients, instead of full local OSes, as the author mentions.
p_ing 2 hours ago [-]
> if it’s installed locally and you have permission, it runs
On macOS, only after you've run xattr -c to remove the Gatekeeper block on non-Apple approved apps.
idatum 4 hours ago [-]
I didn't even notice the Copilot button in Notepad until it was mentioned, "Even Notepad has a Copilot button."
trvz 4 hours ago [-]
Masochism is a choice when it comes to software.
James_K 8 hours ago [-]
The renaming of “my computer” to “this PC” was quite telling.
nipperkinfeet 7 hours ago [-]
Most of all, first-party apps from Microsoft have been ruined by them. Use alternatives when possible.
Aloha 8 hours ago [-]
I believe this is related to known issues with KB5074109
It hit Both Win11 24H2 and 25H2.
jakub_g 7 hours ago [-]
With Macbooks Air M4 starting at $1k/€1.1k, and apparently soon some even cheaper Macbooks coming up, it's really difficult to justify buying a Windows laptop those days and having to deal with all Microsoft bs, unless you have specific needs and being locked in.
The difference of "value for money" in terms of build quality, battery life, screen, touchpad, OS stability, OS upgrades experience, and overall polish and level of user (non-)hostility is immense.
A Windows guy for two decades, got an MBP for work, and while I miss some Windows software and I don't like some Mac things (e.g. no real write-to-disk hibernation; pricey upgrades from base models etc.), but there's no way I'm going back.
userbinator 8 hours ago [-]
To be clear, this is the horrible "new" Notepad "app" that I absolutely hated and instantly removed when it was forced upon everyone. I doubt the old "edit field in a wrapper" one which has been nearly the same since Win95 has this problem.
(My newest machine is now running Linux.)
AviationAtom 8 hours ago [-]
Markdown support and the like are useful but their need to cram AI and account sign-in into it definitely seemed over the top. When they got rid of Wordpad I kind of anticipated them trying to pivot Notepad more in that direction.
ale42 8 hours ago [-]
For what it matters, Windows Server 2025 still has the edit field in a wrapper.
userbinator 7 hours ago [-]
They all still do, just like the old Explorer context menu. It's what you get when you remove the new abomination.
accrual 3 hours ago [-]
Yes, I was pleased to see our new Windows Server boxes still have regular Notepad and Explorer.
chrisjj 6 hours ago [-]
Is that old still provided?
layer8 4 hours ago [-]
Yes, it’s still under C:\Windows\notepad.exe, probably for backwards compatibility.
Barrin92 8 hours ago [-]
>I don't want people to switch away from Windows; I want Microsoft to treat its premier operating system like it used to.[...] and Windows 12 is ultimately an agentic AI OS, I wouldn't be surprised if more people stick with a debloated Windows 11, just as others did with Windows 10
Is there any justification for the first part other than that the authors job at windowscentral.com depends on it? Because I'm not seeing it in the article which amounts to the digital version of Stockholm syndrome. If even the author is predicting that this is what the next windows will look like, why aren't you running for the hills
AlienRobot 5 hours ago [-]
If Microsoft wanted, it could make Windows good.
On the other hand, no matter how much time or money the Linux community gets, the desktop experience will never be good.
This means that our only hope at having a good desktop OS is Microsoft changing course.
plagiarist 8 hours ago [-]
The subscription to his own machine had bugs that prevented him from using a basic windowed text editor and that isn't the last straw?
kgwxd 6 hours ago [-]
In just about every aspect of life, the race to the bottom seems to be on the last lap, and all the players have that almost-there energy.
BLKNSLVR 3 hours ago [-]
It certainly feels that Microsoft is accelerating in this race. There have been almost weekly 'a new reason' that Windows 11 sucks and is user hostile. Previously it would be only once a month.
sandworm101 8 hours ago [-]
Every horrible windows story is yet another glorious day for linux.
Fyi, in Mint if you search application for "notepad", "Text Editor" is the first result. That is curated search done right. Search for notepad on windows and you probably get an ad for a travel website.
trinix912 7 hours ago [-]
> Fyi, in Mint if you search application for "notepad", "Text Editor" is the first result. That is curated search done right. Search for notepad on windows and you probably get an ad for a travel website.
So it was with Windows Vista, Windows 7, even Windows 8. It's not an impossible ask for Windows either.
wolvoleo 5 hours ago [-]
It's not but when you're asking Microsoft you're not asking developers. You're asking marketers who are trying to pimp stuff like bing and Copilot. What you're getting is exactly what they want you to get.
AviationAtom 8 hours ago [-]
Cinnamon is cool and all but I prefer KDE Plasma. It seems to eliminate all the pain points Linux desktop environments typically have and everything just works. Pair it with Debian and you got a solid system.
avtar 7 hours ago [-]
> Pair it with Debian
A KDE dev mentioned on a podcast that issues related to Debian Stable get closed automatically on their bug tracker because fixes don't get backported :/
My wife was complaining about Windows issues so I ended up installing Fedora with KDE on her laptop. I would have preferred Debian but using Testing (as suggested by the dev) doesn't some ideal.
aruggirello 7 hours ago [-]
Debian Testing isn't really unstable - the dev wasn't exaggerating. But I'd also suggest Kubuntu (you can remove snap and all of its packages, and install Firefox and Thunderbird .deb's from the Mozilla repo)
hparadiz 56 minutes ago [-]
Debian testing is rolling release. More akin to Arch or Gentoo really.
aruggirello 7 hours ago [-]
> That is curated search done right.
Adding keywords in the relevant .desktop files should be enough to make this work in other DE's too. I just tried it in KDE (by adding a 'comment=... (like notepad)' line in ~/.local/share/applications/org.kde.kwrite.desktop), it works as expected
accrual 3 hours ago [-]
New to KDE and .desktop shortcuts were something I really liked coming from Windows. I can enter in whatever terms I want to use for an item to appear in search, no relying on filename.
hparadiz 55 minutes ago [-]
I'm betting someone included the desktop file in the upstream and it has nothing to do with the distro.
plagiarist 8 hours ago [-]
It just makes sense to show travel deals. Why would an OS show text editors when searching for text editors? Obviously it can show something far more lucrative by matching what it knows from spyware AI taking screenshots of your every action.
hparadiz 2 hours ago [-]
Please don't recommend Mint. It's slow to merge upstream and I find noobs installing it all the time then complaining about features missing that were already in upstream for two years.
throw_a_grenade 7 hours ago [-]
If I had such a problem with my OS, I would have changed the distribution.
Animats 8 hours ago [-]
How can Microsoft legally do that? Notepad++ is GPL-licensed open source. It's on Github.[1]
Edit has not shipped with Windows since Win9x -- which is to say, it hasn't shipped since Windows required DOS -- and what you linked is an homage project, not the same program.
And you know what else was included in versions of MS-DOS that shipped with Win9x? Edlin. The editor so basic most people can't figure out how to use it.
charcircuit 1 hours ago [-]
Edit, what I linked, is shipping with Windows right now. This HN thread is about the current version of Windows. We are not talking about Windows XP.
And this is exactly why Microsoft can get away with a buggy mess of a user hostile operating system.
They only have an incentive to make a good OS if people are willing to leave when it’s a bad one.
From my view it is more productive to find out what you like about something and always be open to maybe finding someone else who can deliver on that. And sometimes things that we thought were essential are not. You might even find something new to like.
Those are the key words. You have the option to walk away from one distribution to use another if things start getting bad. Such has happened in the past, either because of distribution maintainers making decisions that certain users don't like (think Ubuntu from Unity onward) or because of distribution makers maintainers making decisions that put them ahead of the pack (think early Ubuntu). Overall, it has resulted in a competitive marketplace.
And if things got really bad, people can either fork the offending software or (if they use Linux as a more traditional Unix environment) there are various versions of BSD. If you use Linux for desktop applications, there is even the option of switching to Macintosh or Windows since open source applications tend to be multi-platform.
Being a Windows guy is a bit different. They are sticking all of their eggs in one basket. There isn't a viable Windows-like alternative to Windows if Microsoft messes up. Heck, it is growing increasingly difficult to stick with versions of Windows that are out of support. While I won't go as far as calling this brand loyalty, it means one is pretty much at the whim of the brand.
The better example is being an "Arch guy". That's the same kind of problematic as being a "Mac guy".
(I'm also forced to use Windows at work)
No matter what trademark you put in the blank, this is not a healthy thing to say.
I still run across it sometimes, and it’s such a limiting form of identity.
Edit: I realize now that the article author, the person in the video and the quoted tweet are all the same person, and they seem to work/run windowscentral.com, so I guess that kind of explains the motivation.
These operating systems aren't my family members -- I'll ditch them if I believe that switching is worth getting over the learning curve of a new environment.
The moment someone makes a non macbook air, that does the same as a macbook air in terms of being cold to touch, battery life and no-noise I'm leaving for Linux though.
I think a lot of people are waiting for a non-Apple Macbook, but we unfortunately might be waiting for a while. It seems to pain other manufacturers to not cut corners in some critical area or another…
In theory we may be able to run Linux (reliably, not in the bleeding edge) on Apple hardware eventually. But you still pay the Apple tax, which is pretty bonkers these days. But dang those machines are nice.
Neither OS is empowering me to do what I want to do on my computer anymore. Instead they're constantly nudging me towards doing things Microsoft and Apple want me to do.
Don't you want a Microsoft account? You really should make a Microsoft account. Please make a Microsoft account. We're going to pop up the Microsoft account at you until you say yes. OK, fucker, now you have to make a Microsoft account in order to use your computer.
Sync your stuff to the iCloud! No, really, you're forgetting to use iCloud. Come on, don't you want to use iCloud? We're going to make iCloud the default for saved documents now.
Go ahead and install that app. OK, now go ahead and install it but we're going to warn you that it's from the scary internet. Now, when you install the app, we're going to put a scary dialog if it's not from a developer we're OK with. Now, when you install the app, we're not going to let you even run it until you go into settings and confirm a scary dialog deep in Settings.
I'm not really in the driver's seat anymore. I'm kind of a passenger with limited access to the steering wheel. These are just a few examples but there are plenty of other cases where both Microsoft and Apple are inserting themselves between me and my computer, gatekeeping what I can do on them and treating me like some kind of attacker towards my own computer.
There's a semi-common saying that it takes seven attempts for someone to successfully leave an abusive partner. Give him time, I guess.
imho, user experience is nowhere to be found in the linux landscape. There is very little focus on that. People will tell you try this or that distro. But once you run into a simple problem, it´s often a rabbit hole of a gazilling cli commands to fix it. In the mean time you´re praying to god to not brick something that used to work before.
> user experience is nowhere to be found in the linux landscape.
It's ignorant, and its insulting, and it's stupid. You can read one or two KDE blog posts, look at the roadmap for Cosmic, look at the attention Valve has put into Linux and know that sentence is just rude. It's just so frustrating.
> People will tell you try this or that distro.
Dumbasses on reddit will. No one that has a single clue encourages distro-hopping.
I agree with you, that it is irritating when people make sweeping statements that casually dismiss a lot of things as not existing when they do, but it's an endless arguement. Operating systems are not the problem, support is. Just making a good operating system isn't what drives adoption.
reducing _pain_ does. Nerds arent good at empathy, so the response is normally "just read x and use y" and call people stupid if they still cant figure it how to use it
Hardware support is where Linux used to struggle. Nowadays things aren't perfect but much better. Basically it means you need to figure out which hardware to buy based on available support, before making the purchase.
Microsoft knows it, but they don’t care about windows. When IBM started offering Macs to employees, they figured out that the support burden was very low, significantly lower than windows, even with users having years of windows experience.
Intune was supposed to be the answer to that, making Windows management MDM like. But for their most entrenched enterprise customers, they can’t really switch without co-managing with Configuration Manager. Most of the people behind that product are laid off or otherwise attrited, as there’s no path to a subscription service.
If a friend stated that they will stay with their partner regardless of how deceptive or abusive said partner's behaviour becomes, you would rightly question the wisdom of that choice.
Stating that you will remain loyal to a company come what may is even worse. It's an entity with no interest in your wellbeing. It exists to extract as much money or information from you as possible.
Quite apart from everything else, such a statement eliminates the prospect of ever finding something better.
Holy sh*t! I haven't had this bad a Windows install experience since Windows 95.
The first big obstacle is getting all the Secure Boot/TPM 2.0 BIOS settings right. When you don't, you simply get "Can't install Windows". No debugging information. No clarification. No details. Shades of the day of having to blindly set the I/O interrupts and addresses on Windows. Tweak, Install, Waiiiiiiit, Fail. Tweak, Install, Waiiiiiit, Fail. etc.
Then the second obstacle is getting a local account installed. The solution was obscure, but straightforward. Finding that solution on the glop that has become the Internet? Bleaaaaagh. Everything has to be a bloody video for something that's one stupid command. And all the AI systems aren't useful because their horizon is too old and Microslop keeps changing the command; presumably because too many people are using it (How dare they not make cloud number go up! Brrrrrrrrr!) After all was said and done, I got "lucky" because I actually bought a retail copy of Windows 11 from Best Buy--it has physical media and the image was "old" enough that the "old" way of doing the install still worked (Shift F10 to prompt -> OOBE\BYPASSNRO -> reboot for those who want to know)
At last, after almost 90 minutes of farting around, Windows starts to install. And install. And install. And install ... FOR HOURS! WTF IS IT DOING! The target machine is a smoking AMD desktop with SSD and a gigantic amount of pre-shortage RAM on fibre. How in the name of all that is holy and unholy do you install that slowly on that powerful a machine?
Finally, everything gets installed. And I reboot ... to no video. Oh, no, I bet it scrambled the drivers. Sure enough, I move the HDMI from my AMD card to the AMD integrated video ... yep, there it is. Sigh. Let's go get DDU and uninstall the dumbass driver that Windows Install dumped on there. Download, download, install, reboot to safe mode, clean, install proper driver, reboot. Back on my main card, now.
Finally, let's dump a recovery image because I sure don't want to have to go through this gigantic PITA again if something goes wrong. Plug in the drive, can't find it ... ah, had a Linux image that needs to be wiped out, my fault ... need the Windows partition editor, so launch and erase ... wait, why can't I edit anything? ... oh, right, dumbass, you need to launch it as Administrator ... close ... open the menu, there's the app, right click menu ...
WTF! There's no "Run as Administrator" so I can't edit the partitions! Right click a couple of other programs ... some of them have the "Run as Administrator" but some of them DON'T. And there doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to which is which. Curse. Swear. FINE! Plug drive into my Linux laptop, kill the partitions there, and eject. Plug into Windows ... which now sees the drive and creates a recovery disk ... happy happy joy joy <rolls eyes>.
4+ hours! Not even exaggerating. <cries>
And because I'm a glutton for punishment, I decided I'd put Linux on the old reformatted SSD. Since I used Windows for gaming about as much as Fusion 360, I figured I'd go for something Linux but gaming-optimized and snag Bazzite which I'd never used before. Download, install, login, connect to Steam, run game.
Total time: no more than 20 minutes.
No fighting about cloud login. No video card problem. Games are running fine.
Anyone still using Windows as an individual nowadays is completely and utterly daft.
(And, as a side note, this is having a knockon effect--I finally went looking for an alternative to Fusion 360 and signed up for OnShape just so I can dump Windows permanently)
I'd love to know what to do differently in case I have to do this again.
Seems like walking a tightrope across the river to avoid soaking your suit, then jumping in from the dock once you successfully get to the other side?
I'd love to have a Linux-based 3D CAD program, but the open source ones just aren't up to scratch.
I've tried using FreeCAD, but it still scrambles things topologically (for example: adjust an underlying object and your fillets may get totally hosed).
Fusion is especially frustrating as they have a macOS version. A Linux version really shouldn't be much different.
Windows is designed by a committee that tries to do as little as possible and has ulterior motives higher on the priority scale than UX. Like marketing copilot and other Microsoft subscription services. Microsoft software is always aimed to be just good enough for the users to not choose something better. They love just coasting on their marketshare without doing much to improve. Like they did with internet explorer and now do with office.
have you used GNOME?
I haven't been in the GNOME settings for years.
I use macOS and Linux, and the way GNOME works makes switching between them easier for me than when I run KDE, for instance (I'm sure others have a different experience, and that's what is so great about Linux).
Putting aside the debate as to the quality of desktop environments, I honestly hope you're being intentionally nonsensical as a joke. What you describe can only make sense under the grossly misinformed belief that "Linux" is a monolithic entity incentivised to stop its users from "leaving it", and that this mythical "Linux" would have the agency to decide it needed "a good desktop environment" in order to avoid that from happening.
When is Windows going to get a good desktop environment?
Some quick facts (Dec 2025 -> Jan 2026):
- Windows 10 gained more users than Windows 11 :D
- Linux lost users :(
[0] https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey
I hope that there's enough people like me that the combined community will keep it alive for a few years longer, but I know eventually something will force me to upgrade to Linux.
I have a medium-range gaming laptop running Windows 11. Dedicated GPU, extra RAM, etc. It "boots to ready" worlds slower than any of my low end Linux laptops. Windows is just so ungodly slow.
Somewhere around 2020 I changed my work laptop to use Linux only, no dual boot. MS was pushing 20GB patches, which is unreal. At the time I had AT&T DSL.
I had been using Linux on and off since the early 2000s. But the 20GB patches and 'ransom-ware' pushed me to Linux full time.
There are no apps I use that are 'windows only' so Im free. Windows is made by a mega-corp and it's just gotten out of control. "Update and shutdown" always just reboots. You can spend ~1hr doing an OS update with multiple reboots. I can install Linux + LibreOffice in ~15mins or less. A full Linux updated is like ~5min to ~10min, or less.
Granted things like gaming might influence someone to not make that move.
i'm fundamentally never going to accept a UX where i'm not absolute god of my computer, if i want to delete files crucial to my system's ability to function or run something with kernel level access to all my memory that's MY prerogative, i cannot imagine using a computer that doesn't listen to me
On iOS, apps are managed by the operating system. On macOS, they're files.
Well, technically from 3.1 but everything else checks out.
I honestly can’t believe what these vendors are doing. I don’t know anyone who approves of any of this.
The "sudo rm -rf" and equivilant horror stories get told all too often as mistakes even made by "skilled users" who were in a hurry, and while that particular problem is becoming less common there is still a minefield out there. Wider use case where we need IT support is worse since there are plenty of Microsoft and Mac favoring restrictions and lockdowns required in the name of corporate level security requirements and certifications add to the mess and "security concerns" you can't get corporate to move away from.
I'm a daily Linux user who has had to put years of a software developer career's time into learning the easier system administration aspects and working with those who handle the harder issues, but doing this in my career I have had to step back every time someone comes to me with a problem. Once I understand the problem then go on to ask "at a guess, how much time will diagnosing this even take?" with the estimates varying based on how standard the OS install or deployment is.
Time and a relatively small amount of training is the problem with switching users from Windows to Mac or the reverse. Switching to Linux is training and introducing a technical mindset into a person. Idiot-proofing the system is a major issue Linux hasn't solved yet. VDI systems and the like might be a step in the right direction, but as soon as your use case for Linux requires a "average user" to open a terminal the problems will pile up and the minefield is exposed.
Years removed from using a Mac I still think of it as the most "child-proofed" OS. Windows being less restrictive but still doing a good-enough job of locking up the more dangerous things while also not drawing attention to them on a regular basis. Linux is like seeing the dangers left out in the open with few useful warning signs beyond some generic unspecified danger signs around the worksite.
Same general guesswork, but everyone on here can make reasonably educated guesses at what the AI evolution process will do to the tech landscape. Nobody knows enough yet to have anything in cement, but it's out there, and the small changes of the last few years make it seem that we are going to regress rather than improve the level of technical knowlege needed to be "average" when working on a computer.
No matter the android phone, trying to get your MFA experience working with the umpteen stupid MFA apps is painful because all the dev work went into the iPhone versions. I hate it but yep I ended up buying an iPhone although I never buy them new.
Windows is the other one and again it’s security related. More and more places simply rely on Active Directory/Entra and try telling the bank you’re working for that you have to have a Linux notebook. You’ll get laughed right out of a job.
I’d agree for a home computer Linux or macOS are the only sane choices now. But whatever is installed on my work provided computer is what I’m using and that’s windows.
My only bad experience is duo mobile, but I expect it is equally bad on iOS
Entra id private access will cover that (and it frankly can't become the norm soon enough). For an extra $5 per license. I wouldn't worry too much about that part of Microsoft though. They always knew how to sell stuff to enterprise. You gotta wonder what their Windows division is doing though, but maybe they just don't want private customers.
Unless you care about gaming at all. Sure you have the Linux evangelists who talk about how much better support has gotten (it has!) but there are still huge glaring holes.
I run MacOS for everything except gaming. I'm not even that big of a gamer but it's the only sane option there.
I have about eight Windows PCs against about sixty MacBook Airs and guess which platform causes me the most work? 1:20 issue ratio. Even simple things like SMB in Windows 11 are hopelessly broken.
The company I work for got bought by a big conglomerate, and I managed to stubbornly hold out using Linux for a really long time. It turns out if your workplace has adopted “Bring your own device” type policies, that often means you can auth with enough services that working on Linux is feasible.
If you started a company today, you can immediately and cheaply hire people or an MSP to manage Windows PCs. I hire entry Windows techs for $70k. M365 E-whatever is $30-60/mo.
Apple fully aligned their products, so the guys running the iPhone fleet can run the Macs. They may need some higher level assistance to setup the configurations. Unless you have a lot of compliance work, enroll in MDM, done.
With Linux, other than Chrome, there’s no standard. You’re gonna need a smart/expensive person to setup things and you’re going to need smart/expensive people to operate. If you have compliance requirements appear, you’ll need to buy RHEL or something and rework stuff, which is more expensive than windows.
This is the reality of IT equipment in big parts of the non-dev world, and you'll have a hard time convincing the IT dept to take on extra hassle just for you to use Linux out of all hundreds of employees who're just fine with Windows.
I wonder if it works at all when no online connection to that store.
It might be time to look at other options.
Sometimes I prefer one machine over the other I rarely wish for anything other than sometimes being unable to transfer data between the two systems.
That's definitely a good reason to use a PC instead of a Mac, but why not run Linux on it? Then you'd get the best of both worlds.
Let's go with different, a different world.
I wonder if it works at all with no online connection to that store.
The unsettling part of stories like this isn’t “Microsoft bad,” it’s the growing assumption that local tools should be downstream of remote identity systems. A text editor is about as offline and fundamental as software gets, yet it’s now possible for account state, sync bugs, or policy enforcement to make it inaccessible on your own machine.
This is where non-macOS UNIX and Linux systems draw the line - if it’s installed locally and you have permission, it runs. Cloud services can enhance that experience (backups, sync, collaboration) but they don’t get veto power over whether vi opens.
When that boundary erodes, we start to see our systems as thin clients, instead of full local OSes, as the author mentions.
On macOS, only after you've run xattr -c to remove the Gatekeeper block on non-Apple approved apps.
It hit Both Win11 24H2 and 25H2.
The difference of "value for money" in terms of build quality, battery life, screen, touchpad, OS stability, OS upgrades experience, and overall polish and level of user (non-)hostility is immense.
A Windows guy for two decades, got an MBP for work, and while I miss some Windows software and I don't like some Mac things (e.g. no real write-to-disk hibernation; pricey upgrades from base models etc.), but there's no way I'm going back.
(My newest machine is now running Linux.)
Is there any justification for the first part other than that the authors job at windowscentral.com depends on it? Because I'm not seeing it in the article which amounts to the digital version of Stockholm syndrome. If even the author is predicting that this is what the next windows will look like, why aren't you running for the hills
On the other hand, no matter how much time or money the Linux community gets, the desktop experience will never be good.
This means that our only hope at having a good desktop OS is Microsoft changing course.
Fyi, in Mint if you search application for "notepad", "Text Editor" is the first result. That is curated search done right. Search for notepad on windows and you probably get an ad for a travel website.
So it was with Windows Vista, Windows 7, even Windows 8. It's not an impossible ask for Windows either.
A KDE dev mentioned on a podcast that issues related to Debian Stable get closed automatically on their bug tracker because fixes don't get backported :/
https://old.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/1pneqp4/kde_dev_do_n...
My wife was complaining about Windows issues so I ended up installing Fedora with KDE on her laptop. I would have preferred Debian but using Testing (as suggested by the dev) doesn't some ideal.
Adding keywords in the relevant .desktop files should be enough to make this work in other DE's too. I just tried it in KDE (by adding a 'comment=... (like notepad)' line in ~/.local/share/applications/org.kde.kwrite.desktop), it works as expected
[1] https://github.com/notepad-plus-plus/notepad-plus-plus
When was that ever the case? It's not even the most basic editor on Windows, which would be Edit.
https://github.com/microsoft/edit
And you know what else was included in versions of MS-DOS that shipped with Win9x? Edlin. The editor so basic most people can't figure out how to use it.