I gave my grandma a Linux, she had no idea. All she needed was a web browser that didn’t feed her ads and give her issues. Fedora with KDE was super simple for her to figure out how to use and actually had better accessibility features for her. And it was free.
Linux is actually pretty noob friendly nowadays. And if you don’t want to mess with it yourself, you can buy computers with Linux preinstalled today.
I get that sometimes people just want to complain and not solution. But like, using windows and other surveillance capitalism adjacent products is a path to fascism so like…maybe people should just, critically evaluate their problems and think of solutions every now and then?
I literally use Linux in my daily life non-stop. My desktop is free from Windows and I run numerous servers for various services and microservices.
I just fundamentally disagree with the hivemind that Linux desktop of any flavor is ready for casual user prime-time. Even if they don’t have technical issues with now that doesn’t mean they won’t have technical issues with it ever. In my personal experience, I have only ever had successful long-term rollouts of non-gui cli-only servers. I have always had issues of some sort crop up with desktop Linux eventually.
Further, depending on the DE, getting things set up properly for someone who has, say, vision issues so everything is easily visible for them can often be a fucking nightmare of numerous different config files for different parts of the GUI. Linux accessibility options are notoriously bad.
If you want to pretend Linux is a perfect solution for grandmas, go ahead, but as someone who is a Linux heavy user who doesn’t even use Windows anymore and hasn’t in a while I think that this attitude from Linux evangelists is deeply rooted in a rose tinted view of the OS and it’s user friendliness. And yes I use the term evangelist for a fucking reason, and that is because you people are as fucking pushy about your ideology as evangelical Christians.
I’ve handed noobs Linux machines and they use them just fine, they understand how to open the browser and steam and thats basically 90% of what they need the PC for. They aren’t power users and aren’t installing anything else from what I’ve seen. I gave a bazzite machine to a cousin about four months ago and she’s just happy to play some hello Kitty game she didn’t have on her switch.
I have a buddy on discord who works in IT and works on Linux servers a lot too and he basically said the same thing, that Linux isnt good for genpop, but like, I’m genpop and I found it much simpler than dealing with windows all the time. I tell him all the time too, like I’m not sure what he thinks is so difficult about it, I just login and open Firefox, then close it and shut my PC down. From time to time I edit photos and play games on steam. I’m not building ai models or anything crazy, heck I haven’t even changed the desktop wallpaper because I’m not on the desktop long enough to care.
So then what’s the fucking difference if they’re bitching about their issues with Windows versus bitching about their issues with Linux? Doesn’t that bring us back to the original post? Let people complain. If they’re going to have issues either way and bitch either way, why the fuck do you have to evangelize them to get them to shut up about the ones you’re ideologically opposed to? What are you really doing other than having them bitch about something you feel happy about? You haven’t materially made their life better, they still have computer issues they hate, but now they just have a smaller number of people they can turn to for help. Great job.
I’m not pretending anything. I literally did what I said and gave it to my grandma and I hooked her up with a local computer repair guy that will do house calls and knows Linux because I live very far away. This worked well for 10 years or so until she died.
Im not saying people don’t have issues with Linux. It’s still a computer.
Are you saying people don’t run into issues using windows?
If you need windows for very specific thjngs, I get it. But for most people, if they had a local PC shop that they could trust with Linux issues, then it would be as convenient as windows if not more.
I hooked her up with a local computer repair guy that will do house calls and knows Linux because I live very far away.
…is vastly different than what first post suggested, and literally ignored the major point of my original post which was that most people simply don’t have the time to figure it out and most also don’t have a Linux-repair-guy on hand. Talk about shifting goalposts here.
Of course people have issues on Windows, that’s why they’re always bitching about it. You don’t think someone who likes to bitch wouldn’t bitch to their Linux-repair-guy when they had Linux issues?
And yes I use the term evangelist for a fucking reason, and that is because you people are as fucking pushy about your ideology as evangelical Christians.
I didn’t realize we were sending gay kids off to camps to be given electroshock therapy.
I gave my grandma a Linux, she had no idea. All she needed was a web browser that didn’t feed her ads and give her issues. Fedora with KDE was super simple for her to figure out how to use and actually had better accessibility features for her. And it was free.
Linux is actually pretty noob friendly nowadays. And if you don’t want to mess with it yourself, you can buy computers with Linux preinstalled today.
I get that sometimes people just want to complain and not solution. But like, using windows and other surveillance capitalism adjacent products is a path to fascism so like…maybe people should just, critically evaluate their problems and think of solutions every now and then?
Many distros of linux are easier to use than osx or windows.
I’m glad I don’t have to deal with registry editor anymore.
I literally use Linux in my daily life non-stop. My desktop is free from Windows and I run numerous servers for various services and microservices.
I just fundamentally disagree with the hivemind that Linux desktop of any flavor is ready for casual user prime-time. Even if they don’t have technical issues with now that doesn’t mean they won’t have technical issues with it ever. In my personal experience, I have only ever had successful long-term rollouts of non-gui cli-only servers. I have always had issues of some sort crop up with desktop Linux eventually.
Further, depending on the DE, getting things set up properly for someone who has, say, vision issues so everything is easily visible for them can often be a fucking nightmare of numerous different config files for different parts of the GUI. Linux accessibility options are notoriously bad.
If you want to pretend Linux is a perfect solution for grandmas, go ahead, but as someone who is a Linux heavy user who doesn’t even use Windows anymore and hasn’t in a while I think that this attitude from Linux evangelists is deeply rooted in a rose tinted view of the OS and it’s user friendliness. And yes I use the term evangelist for a fucking reason, and that is because you people are as fucking pushy about your ideology as evangelical Christians.
I’ve handed noobs Linux machines and they use them just fine, they understand how to open the browser and steam and thats basically 90% of what they need the PC for. They aren’t power users and aren’t installing anything else from what I’ve seen. I gave a bazzite machine to a cousin about four months ago and she’s just happy to play some hello Kitty game she didn’t have on her switch.
I have a buddy on discord who works in IT and works on Linux servers a lot too and he basically said the same thing, that Linux isnt good for genpop, but like, I’m genpop and I found it much simpler than dealing with windows all the time. I tell him all the time too, like I’m not sure what he thinks is so difficult about it, I just login and open Firefox, then close it and shut my PC down. From time to time I edit photos and play games on steam. I’m not building ai models or anything crazy, heck I haven’t even changed the desktop wallpaper because I’m not on the desktop long enough to care.
I always hate it when people talk about “eventual issues that people will encounter on Linux”.
As if Windows doesn’t have those of varying degrees. Usually because Microsoft pushes out an update that breaks things.
When I used windows, I would have issues every other update.
With Linux it’s like once a year, unless I do something stupid to my own system with sudo.
Pretty much my experience, though I didn’t want to give the guy I was replying to any personal anecdotes lol.
They have trained themselves to ignore it as just Windows.
So then what’s the fucking difference if they’re bitching about their issues with Windows versus bitching about their issues with Linux? Doesn’t that bring us back to the original post? Let people complain. If they’re going to have issues either way and bitch either way, why the fuck do you have to evangelize them to get them to shut up about the ones you’re ideologically opposed to? What are you really doing other than having them bitch about something you feel happy about? You haven’t materially made their life better, they still have computer issues they hate, but now they just have a smaller number of people they can turn to for help. Great job.
If the issue is just “my PC is becoming slow, it’s full of annoying AI and i don’t want X microft bullshit” reccomensing Linux will totally help tbf
I’m not pretending anything. I literally did what I said and gave it to my grandma and I hooked her up with a local computer repair guy that will do house calls and knows Linux because I live very far away. This worked well for 10 years or so until she died.
Im not saying people don’t have issues with Linux. It’s still a computer.
Are you saying people don’t run into issues using windows?
If you need windows for very specific thjngs, I get it. But for most people, if they had a local PC shop that they could trust with Linux issues, then it would be as convenient as windows if not more.
…is vastly different than what first post suggested, and literally ignored the major point of my original post which was that most people simply don’t have the time to figure it out and most also don’t have a Linux-repair-guy on hand. Talk about shifting goalposts here.
Of course people have issues on Windows, that’s why they’re always bitching about it. You don’t think someone who likes to bitch wouldn’t bitch to their Linux-repair-guy when they had Linux issues?
I didn’t realize we were sending gay kids off to camps to be given electroshock therapy.