Hacker News Reader

Comment by fghjl | Hacker News Reader

I assume the problems still are that (1) no Desktop Linux is at the level of macOS or Windows, and (2) the only one close is still RedHat, but most want Debian-based or something else.

MacOS is the best model for a successful desktop Linux to use. Trim down the kernel/drivers to just what runs on that spec hardware, only support that spec hardware, focus effort on the OS and ecosystem, keep it stable, make upgrades trivial, and give it freedom to run other software, terminal apps, etc. And most of all- focus resources on these efforts and charge a lot of money for it!

View on HN

I’d argue desktop Linux passed “the level of windows” sometime around Windows 8 or KDE5.

I have way more stability issues and complicated upgrades on Windows.

in 2003 it was WAY easier to install linux than windows. You had to mess with floppys for sata drivers and shit to install windows.

and KDE was always ATLEAST as easy as windows, arguably more. At this time lots of older crappy hardware people had also only had win98 drivers, giving people immense problems. It mostly worked better on linux. This still goes today.

That was long true by that time. On supported hardware, and if you don’t need applications that are not on Linux, it was fine in the first Ubuntu releases at least.

(in comparison with the state of Windows at the time, of course)

Macos window/desktop management is also stuck in 2001 with "magic gestures" tacked on. For someone who hates using these gestures especially when connected to an actually good kb/m, the base desktop experience is horrible. The dock is completely useless, the various cmd+tab or cmd+` shortcuts are unwieldy, Spotlight is growing increasingly worse year after year.

Rectangle/tiling window managers on top is the only way to make it workable.

Apart from wm, the existence of application notarization is a downright insult (though Windows is also guilty of this with smartscreen but to a much lesser extent).

Apple's "pay us 100 bucks a year or we'll tell your users that your program is malware" is just another step in the inevitable game of locking down macos and turning it into a mobile-like hellscape

What gestures are you talking about? I think you can turn those off, and I’d be surprised if there isn’t a way to turn off the rest with a 3rd party or custom tool.

Application notarization isn’t a problem anymore- you just have a single accept dialog. That problem that made you do a trick to get past it was only a problem years ago, due to whomever the moron was that thought that was a good idea. The current way is acceptable.

I install homebrew and random apps with no problems.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com