Hacker News Reader

Comment by sacnoradhq | Hacker News Reader

Microsoft has always had shit UX. MS-DOS 6.2x was an improvement over DOS 3.3. Windows 3.x wasn't as clean as it could've been. Windows 95 went too far on special effects. Windows NT was the successor to the failure of the OS/2 joint venture. OS/2 was quite an achievement and very stable. NT 3.1-3.5x had teething pains while NT 4 SP6 became solid. Windows 2000 was quite solid and preferable to XP.

Apple has had functionality that is moved and taken away in the quest for "perfect tomorrow someday" UX and functionality (merging macOS and iPadOS).

No Linux/GNU distro, not even Ubuntu, has reached a point to where functionality AND UX were both good enough for average non-engineer grandma.

FreeBSD usability is about in the Linux/GNU camp. There's less to manage under FreeBSD but it's not as ubiquitous.

View on HN

> No Linux/GNU distro, not even Ubuntu, has reached a point to where functionality AND UX were both good enough for average non-engineer grandma.

Disagree. I have my (extremely) non-technical wife and 8 year old son on Linux laptops and it's totally fine. Is it perfect? No. But it's good enough. I'm the one who updates them, though.

Support is key: I don't support my (extremely non-technical) mom's Windows laptop or her iPhone because there's nothing for me to do. (My mom had a stroke and is mid 70's.) She wouldn't be able to use anything other than Windows because the retraining burden would be too great. I would expect most 8-year-olds to easily move between any OS because they're far more adaptable than ye olde fuddy-duddy adults.

PS: Which Linux distro?

Manjaro for my son and some kind of Ubuntu flavor for my wife.

My elderly parents use a Xubuntu laptop just fine. It ended up with Xubuntu because I got pissed off at the Win 11 Home Edition registration bullshit, and all my parents really use is the web browser.

If I did it again, I'd probably use Linux Mint Cinnamon.

IMO, Windows UI/UX has gotten so bad, even Gnome seems like an drastic improvement.

Sounds like a Chromebook or iPad would've been enough.

I did a T480 motherboard integrated i7-8550U -> discrete i7-8650U swap and rebinding of the license with their phone support. I somehow finagled a Windows 11 Enterprise (retail channel) license that Redmond doesn't have a problem with. It's a cheapskate gaming machine for an eGPU RTX3060 Ti. They can try to pry my dual battery T480 from my cold dead hands, but I'll probably reinstall Qubes on it.

< It ended up with Xubuntu because I got pissed off at the Win 11 Home Edition registration bullshit, and all my parents really use is the web browser.

Yes, a few weeks I spent an hour on the phone walking my Dad through registering Windows 11 and registering his copy of Office. It was abso-fucking-lutely terrible. He didn't even want a live account/address, nor one drive. My Dad browses the web and writes short stories.

Despite spending $149 on his Office license, he has warmed to Google docs, especially that he can share the document and I can help him with the layout very easily. I hope he'll just stop using Word altogether.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com