Let’s make Windows 10 the last version ever used!
*Sat. 28 Dec. 11h* Stage YELL #KDEEco 's Call To Action against e-waste driven by #Windows10.
*Mon. 30 Dec. 13-15h* B&B habitat join the BoF to organize a global #FreeSoftware campaign to raise awareness of Windows 10’s EoL in 2025, the role of software in #eWaste, and how independent, sustainable #FOSS is a solution to keep devices in use & out of the landfill.
https://fahrplan.alpaka.space/jugend-hackt-38c3-2024/talk/ST8NJA/
As someone who is way into the idea of Linux, wants to switch, and is very gun-shy about the million little programs and extensions I might not be able to replace, let me tell you what is required of anybody who is actually genuine in their desire to see Linux gain the traction it deserves:
Don’t ever tell anybody to read the manual again. Just answer the god damn question. It’s good when answers to basic, common problems are peppered around the internet like that; it’s dumb and wrong and weird to think of it as a thing to be avoided. If you’d like to put a link to the part of the manual where the questioner could have looked to find it, that’s cool, too. Don’t just leave the link–there’s a good chance they didn’t understand it and that’s why they’re asking. Maybe they just want a person-answer instead of a reference-manual-answer, and it’s good when the answer exists in both forms. Every answered question is a contribution.
I would go even further: the version of reality where Linux beats Windows and ushers in an era of community-centric open source dominance is populated by a Linux community that considers “rtfm”, “pebcac”, etc to be borderline bannable offenses. If you are a small, weak person, and want Linux to be your way of thinking you’re better than other people, you’ll drive question-askers away, back to Inferiority Land, using your knowledge to dunk on them instead of help them, and call it a win. These are the ugly bridge trolls, who may as well be paid Microsoft employees, keeping people away from your community, and a serious change of pace might yield much smoother adoption. At the very least, the community owes it to their own work to see how much smoother.
As someone considering the switch seriously, the knowledge that I may have to deal with people like that is absolutely, 100% a factor, and I am someone who has no qualms about telling someone on the internet to fuck off, so it’s gonna be more of an issue for many others who are more conflict-averse.
The Linux community needs to take very seriously whether it actually wants increased open source adoption, or if it wants to remain a tiny minority so that it has a nice, large majority to feel better than.
I always try to help new users. I was a beginner once so I know how it feels to be told to rtfm by some cunt. Half the time I have an issue i’ll search it up only to find some reddit post with someone asking the same question and getting shit on by elitists who have nothing going on in their own lives. In any case, if you ever need help I or someone else would be happy to help to the best of our ability.
I hate it when you Google an issue and all you can find is a Reddit thread of the same problem where the only response is someone saying to Google it
I’ll take that over the windows ‘support’ forums where the people with superuser titles don’t understand basic questions and the answer tends to be to see if it gets fixed in a future version of windows.
And those posts are a decade old because they were never fixed.
OMG, LOL. Yes!
“Do <cut & paste from the MS support, please tell me if it helps” “Ehh, I was asking about something completely unrelated, bro…”
But even that beats the Atlassian forums, LOL
I hear ya. My theory is the Linux community is a world filled with autism. I am autistic (late diagnosed at 30, using Linux since 10yo). I think many of us are undiagnosed. I legit think if people just assumed a bit of neurodivergence in us you’ll see we aren’t hostile. We also need better manuals, such as video series’, interactive tutorials and such. RTFM I agree is not welcome, but we do need these introductory materials (better than the arch wiki you autists) and we need high quality ones. I think that’s a worthwhile investment, no?
Linux is NOT a desktop OS. Ubuntu, Debian, Suse, Fedora are desktop OSses
KDE is a desktop
Linux is a kernel. Linux is Android, Linux is your NAS, the supercomputer where I work at and the servers that make the internet.
Discussing Linux in terms of a desktop OS is moot.
Windows includes FOSS, 99% of “all the small apps” are available in Linux, Mac or Windows.
All the ones that not: Photoshop or MS Office are available on the cloud and way more powerful than their desktop veresions.
You CAN have KDE / Kwin running on Windows.
The Linux community does enough. “We” basically own the internet. If any of us wants a Linux based desktop we install it and use it. The rest can use Android.
Never thought Id upvote a KDE post…
What’s not to love about KDE?
I’ll Gnome somewhere else tho.
🖤
It not a tiling wm by default :(
I’m still using my thinkpad that’s 11 years running Linux mint beautifully.
I’m doing my part.
I unregistered my Win 10 key last Sunday and removed the SSD. All my IT is Windows free.
I’m still rocking a 2010 dual Xeon Mac Pro. I have no desire to use anything else. That plus my Steam Deck are good enough for me.
That’s what they don’t understand.
Every year is the year of the Linux desktop, that’s why we say it every year.
~random 4chan post I’m surely misquoting
I would really love it if we could get normal people using Linux but Linux has to come to them in terms of usability, to be honest. The Steam Deck did it, so it’s clearly doable.
But in the state of things we’re in, I’m afraid that *most people* are gonna follow Windows to Windows 11. and their understandings of how computing is will be mutilated by it.
and therefore we get more anprims per capita, because if you think that’s not at least in part downstream of big tech fuckery you’re lying to yourself
Linux ain’t the problem there. Usability is more of that nonsense thought up by corporations to scare people. Computers are tricky, whether Windows or Linux, and the only reason Windows is more popular is they’ve been installing it on people’s computers without asking for decades. Honestly most people don’t even have computers these days. All they get to have is a phone.
CC: @be4foss@floss.social @kde@lemmy.kde.social @NafiTheBear@bears.town
I agree. I am quite comfortable with computers but, since I have switched to Linux about 10 years ago, I struggle any time I am asked for help on a Windows system.
It’s not intuitive at all. Among the quirks, there are still 2 separate control panels that overlap, but not completely, then you have ever-buggy OneDrive, invasive notifications, a convoluted Start menu, …
People find it simple only because they are used to it.
Like many abuse victims, they apologize and don’t even see how bad it is. I see… things are… bad on all fronts. We need right to repair, and abolish trademark and copyright, and idea patents. And friends near us.
You’re so close. What’s actually needed is that it comes pre-installed by default.
@gyro @be4foss @kde the goal of that event is very ambitious I agree, but if I see that alone this year I myself made 4 friends and my mom to move to Linux then getting Linux to a solid market share and minimalising waste is a practicable goal.
I wouldn’t say it was easy. It is hard work and explaining a normal person what the difference between X11 and Wayland is is next to impossible.
There will be some people who just can’t afford a new PC and we basically just need to help them.
@gyro @be4foss @kde @NafiTheBear i think a significant amount of people are going to just not bother buying another laptop once their Win10 one sucks too much, because they’re on their phones for everything these days
@kyle_pegasus
@be4foss @kde @NafiTheBearWell that’s depressing, that gonna put us so much further away from ever making things good again
It’s certainly an interesting move from the side of Microsoft. Discontinuing W10 will certainly lose them some marketshare.
You’re quite late. I don’t know if you’ve heard, but they’ve got Windows 11 now. There are people using it. Not me, but people.
So many cheap laptops are about to hit the market, and I’m ready for it.
My gaming desktop is the last barrier to a full transition, but I’ve been buying exclusively games with a Linux release for over a year now. Buckshot Roulette, Deep Rock Galactic, Hearts of Iron, Lethal Company, Project Zomboid… There’s quite a few big ones.
W11 is like vista, all frills and no substance. Some people will skip the upgrade due to slowness (it’s slow with i7+16gb sometimes) and in case of users who use chrome only, ChromeOS flex or its siblings could be a solution.
You can still go openfyde if you really need to
Linux isn’t ready for the mass Market yet. I say that as someone that has been a Windows free household for like over 8 years and who actively attempts to convert as many of my friends as I can.
It is not and probably never will be general market ready. Too fragmented and too many options. Which is why I love it so I wouldn’t want it to change either.
there are loads of options, but if you ask almost any linux person what distro you should start with, the answer is mint
I’m not sure what universe you live in lol. Yes lots of people like mint but plenty hate it. I don’t hate it but it wouldn’t be/hasn’t been my recommendation when converting people
@LordKitsuna @pupbiru Same here. I wouldn’t recommend Mint mostly because I don’t have experience with it, but also, I haven’t heard anything about it that makes me think it’d be a slam-dunk recommendation even if I had used it.
I think the single biggest issue I have with Linux is package management. Maybe this is purely distribution dependent, but for example in Ubuntu most of the packages are way outdated, not even on the latest stable version. Then I either have to:
- Build from source which means I gotta also install all dependencies and pray that the thing builds
- Add some rando PPA which I have no idea if I should trust
- Use “flatpaks” or “appimages”
None of those options are appealing. And along with these multiple options I end up having multiple versions of things installed in different locations in different ways and also my PATH ends up a big mess, I think I’m just doing something very wrong.
Flatpaks environment now is the closest to the Windows experience.
Open the app store (GNOME Software / KDE Discover), search, click install, click run.
Flatpak for the Win!
Get it? For the WIN?
aurful
That joke is so good you’ve been
snapped out of existence.
Regarding corporate support:
In my current and late companies, we had the choice between a Mac Powerbook (latest model) or a Dell Latitude, also from the latest and more powerful model. With two or three OS flavours: latest Windows, latest Mac OS X or a Linux distro of your choice.
Mac and Windows are managed by the IT department. Linux is managed by us at “own risk” basis (we do have to follow a few security directives though).
If a user has a problem with her Mac or Win10 they get help from the IT department.
If this is a member of the finance department, it is OK for her to lose an hour or two for an IT person to repair it or troubleshoot remotely. If it happens to me, I can resolve almost any issue related to Mac, Windows or Linux in minutes. Thus, waiting for a few hours because I can’t tweak a setting myself is a waste of time and lowers my productivity.
That’s a fact that not many people think about. Not even people who, like me, are IT professionals and work with Windows or Mac OS X machines linked to large Linux systems.
I also do not understand people who complain about “Linux” (meaning a desktop distro) is “difficult”, get a Mac and don’t complain, even though it is just alien from the Windows point of view, has less of the “little programs” someone was mentioning in this thread, and has a pretty bad support for anything that’s not super-trivial.
@be4foss @kde Live stream of Joseph’s talk: https://streaming.media.ccc.de/38c3/yell
Video recording will be available here:
Linux is ready for the webbrowser. Office? No, MS Office does not run and still the marketshare for MS Office is very high on Windows. It does not run on Linux. If the alternatives were better then people would use them. Gaming? Maybe for Steam OS but that is only one distro. If you choose something else you will not have such smooth experience. The user might be better off by moving to console. Any business tool like Adobe or custom built Windows tools does not work. This is very hard to change. Hence many can’t even move to mac os due to this. Media Player/View Pictures? Yes, Linux is ready here.
Can you choose to have Linux pre installed on a new laptop? No, not normally.
There is still some work to do. I hope we get there. We are close for home users.
Personally I use Fedora with Firefox.
If the alternatives were better then people would use them
No. You are underestimating the power of a monopoly.
And Microsoft software comes pre-installed on every shelf computer.
Yes, trail period of MS Office. But when it runs out then they have to choose what to do. Buy or pick anything else? I think the problem here is that they know they will get full compatibility with others if they buy MS Office. MS Office does not even follow their own protocol standard. Some know that the webbased version is free. That makes it really hard to compete. I hope EU fix this.
Computers can be bought off-the-shelf with operating systems other than Windows from a few vendors including Apple, Dell, System76, and others.
I just want a Windows base kernal that I can build my own OS off of. My own DE, my own programs, I want DX12 and NT. I want File Explorer and driver support for days.
But I also want freedom to not have a giant open hole where my data just dumps into a Microsoft cloud environment.
