Ask HN: Why is Linux so buggy?
There constantly seems to be some kind of network problem, or problem with drivers etc. I use Ubuntu. I'm just tired of it and thinking of just getting a Mac.
Why is Linux so buggy?
Why is Linux so buggy?
So, let me counter with some questions.
What Linuxes did you try, that convinced you all of Linux is buggy and not one (release of) one distro?
What hardware are you running, on which the bugs surface? Is it a cheap, low end laptop with a stressed out motherboard, for example? Did you run other OSes on that same hardware to compare?
Is 'networking' the only bug? Because if so, how does 'one bug' equal to 'full of bugs' or 'buggy'?
Edit: to be clear: I'm not saying your troubles are not troublesome or the bugs you encounter dismissable; on contrary. I am trying to say that there are a lot of reasons for a bug and that debugging or troubleshooting requires elimination. You seem to have concluded that it is "Linux", to have eliminated all other causes (a distro, a faulty setting, broken or buggy hardware, etc) which may be a fair assessment, but if you did, please give the details that made you conclude that.
(Of course the state of Linux drivers plateaued a decade ago, and everyone else says it's just fine, so I'm not really holding my breath).
P.S. Linux, by it's open nature, encourages users to tweak many things on the OS. This also helps to surface edge case bugs that were not encountered earlier. I doubt most users would encounter even 20% of the bugs they hit if they bought a linux machine from a vendor that sells them with pre-installed linux, hence guaranteeing hardware compatibility, and then didn't change key settings, meaning their user work-flows would be on paths tested by the developers. But where's the fun in that? :p
For what it's worth, I only buy Lenovo hardware. I shun HP hardware (except their laserjet printers) like the plague. For me. Debian and its derivatives (Ubuntu, Mint) work 'out of the box'. I can't remember the last time I had network problems. EDIT: Yes I can, it was when I last had a HP laptop and why I made the decision to never again buy a HP computer. That computer's wifi didn't even work with Windows. (Well, to be honest, it was Vista.)