It must be hard for Windows users to imagine that on Linux there are is no activation, no Microsoft account, no cloud backup, and no pop-up requesting that you install crapware when you plug in a peripheral.[0] You also own your disk encryption keys and are not assigned an identifier that can be used against you.[1]
Meanwhile Linux updates and upgrades have given me grief far more than Windows ones have, FWIW. As does the UX, all the time. As do a million other things I have no energy to list. Every OS has nonsense you have to wade through. It's just that love is blind, and Windows's feels like it's more out of spite than ignorance.
I've had a pretty good track record with Fedora Atomic / Silverblue. The thing I like best about it is that I can have updates safely staged in the background invisibily. And next time I reboot my computer, I boot into that new version. No waiting around or anything.
That's not to say it's perfect. There was a pretty bad bug maybe around 2 years ago where upgrades just stopped working and without any warnings. You had a notice the issue and run a special command to fix the issue. I've also had quite a few AMD/kernel regressions recently that resulted in artifacts in the desktop and AV1 video decode.
I wish there was like a Debian but atomic that has broad support like Fedora does. Though I did see that openSUSE leap 16.1 introduced an immutable option.
> how often do you run into the software you want not being built for your distro?
Is this even the right question? The whole reason humans create software is to accomplish something. If software a is not available, but software b is and does the same thing nearly as well, why not spend 5 minutes to learn the thing?
Because in practice it's never 5 minutes nor "nearly as well". And because you got some software you need to build and it expects xyz library on that platform as a dependency, not abc library, despite your wishes.
In the age of nix + LLMs, other distros through distrobox, brew on Linux, and virtual machines as a last resort its pretty hard to not be able to get the software you need.
Do you happen to be running Ubuntu? They have made updates terrible in their effort to try and make snaps a thing. I experience far less grief on other distros.
Yeah, though this was always the case for me, not just since snaps came along. I've had breakages on other distros too, just (like you say) not as massive, but still more than on Windows.
>Stick to base community-developed distros like Arch, Debian and Fedora.
Since when is Fedora community developed? It's basically the testing arm of Red Hat and implements their corporate policies that will be added to Red Had in the near future. It's as corporate as it gets, just like Ubuntu.
As much as I love how fast and efficient it is to update every single package on my linux machines, I can count in double figures the number of times there's been a package conflict and I've had to google how to fix it.
For better or worse that doesn't happen in windows update
drnick1 · · focus · HN ↗
[0] <a href="https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6IFVTcM28KA" rel="nofollow">https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6IFVTcM28KA
[1] <a href="https://www.pcmag.com/news/a-hackers-arrest-reveals-microsoft-can-track-users-via-a-windows-device" rel="nofollow">https://www.pcmag.com/news/a-hackers-arrest-reveals-microsof...
dataflow · · focus · HN ↗
novafunc · · focus · HN ↗
That's not to say it's perfect. There was a pretty bad bug maybe around 2 years ago where upgrades just stopped working and without any warnings. You had a notice the issue and run a special command to fix the issue. I've also had quite a few AMD/kernel regressions recently that resulted in artifacts in the desktop and AV1 video decode.
I wish there was like a Debian but atomic that has broad support like Fedora does. Though I did see that openSUSE leap 16.1 introduced an immutable option.
dataflow · · focus · HN ↗
And how often do you run into the software you want not being built for your distro?
MrDrMcCoy · · focus · HN ↗
Is this even the right question? The whole reason humans create software is to accomplish something. If software a is not available, but software b is and does the same thing nearly as well, why not spend 5 minutes to learn the thing?
dataflow · · focus · HN ↗
Free as in puppy?
upboundspiral · · focus · HN ↗
not all atomic distros allow an easy nix install.
0cf8612b2e1e · · focus · HN ↗
dataflow · · focus · HN ↗
drnick1 · · focus · HN ↗
This. Ubuntu is the closest distro to Windows. Stick to base community-developed distros like Arch, Debian and Fedora.
PorciiVorbesc · · focus · HN ↗
Since when is Fedora community developed? It's basically the testing arm of Red Hat and implements their corporate policies that will be added to Red Had in the near future. It's as corporate as it gets, just like Ubuntu.
ChrisRR · · focus · HN ↗
For better or worse that doesn't happen in windows update