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Comment by omnimus | Hacker News Reader

I am ux designer and forever Mac user. I also try Fedora on random stuff. I am not sure why but last time tried it i got Blender circa 10 years ago vibes from desktop linux gnome.

Everybody has been making fun of Blender forever but they consistently made things better step by step and suddenly few UX enhancements the wind started shift. It completely flipped and now everybody is using it.

I wouldn’t be surprised if desktop Linux days are still ahead. It’s not only Valve and gaming. Many things seems start to work in tandem. Wayland, Pipewire, Flatpack, atomic distros… hey even Gnome is starting to look pretty.

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It definitely could happen, but there are two things standing in the way of it:

- there's not one desktop Linux that everyone uses (or even uses by default), and it's not resolving any time soon

- I use Ubuntu+Gnome by default, and I wouldn't say it looks great at all, other than the nice Ubuntu desktop background, and the large pretty sidebar icons

- open source needs UX people to make their stuff look professional. I'm looking at you, LibreOffice

Forget looks - I'd just be happy with rock solid.

The standard Ubuntu+Gnome desktop crashes far too often.

Now I have no idea whose fault that is ( graphics driver, window system, or desktop code - or all three ) - but it's been a persistent problem for linux 'desktops' over many many years.

Imho the bright side is that this has solutions and it is getting better. Linux can be very stable, look at servers to android or even steam deck. It's mostly hardware lottery that means it comes down to hw companies support.

The kernel is stable, the desktop ( in my experience ) is not.

I suspect a lot of the problem is in the graphics drivers - they just don't get the love and attention that happens for Windows, and definitely not the Mac ( where they intentionally keep the number of things they need to support low ).

Atomic distros (fedora’s specifically) are what got me to stick to desktop Linux. That was after seeing how well the Steam Deck worked, and therefore Proton. I haven’t reinstalled in almost 2 years. Not even got the distro itch once.

I've been hearing that for 20 years though...

So what? It just means aspirations have been there.

I’ve not been waiting 20 years for linux. But looking at it right now seems pretty positive to me.

And that’s exactly what OP alluded to in their Blender comparison.

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