Why Linux Can't 'Sell' On the Desktop

New submitter VoyagerRadio writes "Recently I found myself struggling with a question I should easily have been able to answer: Why would anyone want to use Linux as their everyday desktop (or laptop) operating system? It's a fair question, and asked often of Linux, but I'm finding it to be a question I can no longer answer with the conviction necessary to 'sell' the platform. In fact, I kind of feel like a car salesman who realizes he no longer believes in the product he's been pitching. It's not that I don't find Linux worthy; I simply don't understand how it's ever going to succeed on the desktop with voluntary marketing efforts. What do Linux users need to do to replicate the marketing efforts of Apple and Microsoft and other corporate operating system vendors? To me, it seems you don't sell Linux at all because there isn't supposed to be one dominant distribution that stands out from the rest. Without a specific product to put on the shelf to sell, what in the world do you focus your efforts on selling? An idea?"

Comments

heh

[stoolpigeon]

What do Linux users need to do to replicate the marketing efforts of Apple and Microsoft and other corporate operating system vendors?
 
Spend millions of dollars on advertising and even more in subsidies to hardware manufacturers (or like Apple make your own hardware.) But I have no idea why anyone would want to do that. Though I confess, I don't really care if Linux gets the kind of broad use that Windows has or even OSX. I used to worry about it, because I had a fear that if not enough people used Linux it might go away. But now Linux is so incredibly successful on the server and phone that I'm not worried about that any more.
 
I really hate Apple - their whole approach but more and more I find myself telling people, "Hey, if you can afford it try out Apple." It seems to work well for normals. They appear to have less issues than the normals running Windows. Frankly, I don't get it, but then again - I don't care. I just want people to be able to do what they want so they can leave me alone so I can focus on doing what I want - which means using Linux. I'm glad I'm not dependent on winning over people that are willing pay extra for devices that are locked down physically and ideologically. (Nobody needs to get their panties in a bunch defending Apple to me. I've heard all the reason people like their stuff. It's not that I don't understand - I just don't agree. I find their products to be aesthetically pleasing as long as I don't actually have to use them.)
 
And of course MS had to break the law to get the install numbers they had. I'm not willing to go that route either for Linux.

Re:heh

[Anonymous Coward]

I think we have done it completely wrong for a long time. Asking people to please use a platform is counter productive. Telling them they can't have it could be a better solution.

Re:heh

[Chrisq]

What do Linux users need to do to replicate the marketing efforts of Apple and Microsoft and other corporate operating system vendors? Spend millions of dollars on advertising and even more in subsidies to hardware manufacturers (or like Apple make your own hardware.)

Don't forget the smear campaigns and FUD about other operating systems, threats to sue end users over patent infringement, etc.

Re:heh

[stoolpigeon]

That's funny. I need to start quickly shutting off the monitors on my desk whenever someone walks into my office.

Them: What'cha doin?
Me: Nothing. Nothing at all.
Them: Why'd you turn off your computer?
Me: Well, actually I just turned off.. Never mind. Well I use this special operating system, I'm not even supposed to talk about it.
Them: Operating System?
Me: The software it runs, like Windows or Mac
Them: Really? Who made it secret?
Me: It's just an unspoken rule. It's rather expensive and very limited in who is allowed to use it.
Them: Wow. What would it take for me to get it?

Re:heh

[WrongSizeGlass]

So, the first run of Linux adoption is don't talk about Linux adoption? ;-)

Re:heh

[IceNinjaNine]

The first rule of Linux is that you do not talk about Linux.

The second rule of Linux is that YOU DO NOT TALK ABOUT LINUX.

... two geeks walking past each other in the hallway with a knowing nod and a calluses on their fingers from their Happy Hacking keyboards...

Re:heh

[beelsebob]

It's much much much more simple than that. Be usable, have a massive pile of good applications.

Re:heh

[smpoole7]

> If you get all panty-bunched about they have to be open ...

Haven't checked further down in the thread, but I confidently predict that I'll hit a flame war over this very thing, once I scroll down far enough. Call me a prophet. :)

Free Software purists require that Linux must Make A Statement(tm) and Prove A Point(sm). If it also happens to work just as well, hey, that's a bonus. But to some of us, that's actually kinda-sorta important.

Related topic: when I switched to Linux (c. 2000), I always installed Acrobat because most of my equipment manuals are in PDF form. The folks in Linux fora online would scold me, but at the time, all free alternatives STUNK. They were AWFUL. They could display a page and, if you held your mouth just right, they might even print them correctly. But only Acrobat would allow me to zoom, search, print the zoomed portion, bookmark sections and do the other things I needed to do.

So ... I used Acrobat. The Bearded Priests of the Free Software Revolution(tm) hated me for it, and accused me of "enabling" continued bad behavior from closed source companies. I tuned them out as background noise. Hey, I was using Linux -- on purpose -- and whenever I could reasonably do so, I chose FOSS alternatives -- on purpose. If I didn't meet their standards of ideological purity, well, too bad.

Now, thank the Lord, there are alternatives that work well enough (I use Okular). But for years, that wasn't the case.

Go ask the software and hardware vendors why they don't target Linux and they'll give you plenty of reasons. Hint: it's NOT market share. There are small software shops that LOVE writing apps for niche markets. But one of the biggest reasons they don't target Linux is that it's a moving target.

They'll release a package, only to have the next update kill it, and they'll get a flood of support calls (which cost them money). The answer from the Free Software Purists(tm) will inevitably be, "well, if you'd release everything and let us build from source, you wouldn't have that problem."

They're not going to do that. Whether it's right or wrong, that's just a fact and it's time to accept it. They're NOT GOING TO DO THAT. Instead, they'll just continue to target Windows or Mac or (nowadays) Android.

Re:heh

[realityimpaired]

Which graphics card drivers do you use? If you don't care and use the proprietary ones from the card maker, fine. If you get all panty-bunched about they have to be open, then you're just as bad as Apple is with their locked-down-only stuff.

Actually, I don't care which graphics driver I use, because I haven't had to install a graphics driver on Linux in years. Since gaming is a wash on Linux anyway, and Intel graphics can easily handle stuff like compositing, I don't see the point in installing an after-market graphics card on my Linux systems.

And while it may not be gaming, specifically, that is the crux of the problem: proprietary software that only supports platform X. Both Windows and Mac have their share of software like that, and people are stuck with vendor lock-in. *that* is really what's keeping people from installing Linux wholescale... until you stop needing to run Application Y, there's not a lot you can do about it.

Re:heh

[digitig]

First get a product that is as good as Microsoft's and Apple's for that particular job. I think Linux is the go-to OS of choice for back ends, but geeks tend to overlook just how hard it is to get Linux working. Every Linux installation I've done there have been problems getting it to work with the hardware that have involved typing arcane incantations into obscure configuration files. Geeks will do that; Joe User won't. And I still haven't got sound or wi-fi working properly on my current Ubuntu installation (nobody on the Ubuntu forums can work out the problems, and all the hardware is listed as supported and works fine when I boot Windows). Not an issue for a backend, but a killer on the desktop. It's not marketing that Linux needs for the desktop, at least not marketing to users -- marketing to hardware manufacturers to persuade them to support it would be a different matter.

Re:heh

[stoolpigeon]

I'm going to have to disagree. That will get you a following but not on the scale of Apple or MS. I don't think they'd market like they do if they didn't see results. The same with defending their intellectual property.

In the early days of the PC there were multiple platforms that met your description (for their time) and most of them didn't make it. I don't think it was simply a matter of them not being usable or lacking applications.

Those things of course are important, I am not saying you can succeed without them to some extent - but to get adoption on a global scale it takes some additional work.

Re:heh

[stoolpigeon]

I've said it above - but more directly to your point about Linux being difficult - we could argue that all day. I have had a real bear trying to do some rather straightforward things on MS and Apple. The fact that so many friends are calling on me to help fix their problems on such a regular basis (and none of them are running Linux) proves to me that they are not so easy.

So I think it goes well beyond that - to marketing and business practices.

  But in my mind, this discussion about if Linux is as 'easy' as MS and Apple is a waste of time as we'll be throwing around anecdotes and such without really settling anything. So I'd rather avoid that and ask, "Is Windows the dominant OS based purely on usability?" If you really believe that, we'll just have to agree to disagree.

Re:heh

[hawkinspeter]

My experience is that Windows is missing lots of features. No SSH support; no support for filesystems other than NTFS and FAT; no low level disk tools (dd); poor NFS support; doesn't come with a decent text editor.... I could carry on, but you get the idea.

Re:heh

[DdJ]

That "or (nowadays) Android" coupled with the kernel 3.3 news gives me some optimism for the future.

I'm really looking forward to, say, Debian or Ubuntu just bundling Dalvik and a large portion of the Android stack. I'm looking forward to the day when one of my alternatives to Office on the Linux desktop is actually the Android version of "Documents to Go", running full screen "Lion"-style or "Windows 8 Metro"-style.

(Likewise, I'm looking forward to CyanogeMod bundling large portions of Debian or Ubuntu, where it makes sense to do so, so I can maybe run Eclipse or at least Emacs on my Nook Color, with the full surrounding ecosystem that those environments expect.)

(Full disclosure: from about 1994 to 2000 I used Linux heavily everywhere, but today I only use it on my servers, using MacOS on the desktop/laptop. Also, I have an Android tablet -- a hacked Nook Color with CM7.1 on it -- but most of my mobile work today is on iOS. The reason is usability, coupled with enthusiasm for Objective-C left over from my NeXTstep days. But a merged Android and Linux might bring me back "into the fold", so to speak... though I still consider myself "in the fold", because Linux is my OS of choice for all my servers as it has been since the mid 1990s.)

Re:heh

[characterZer0]

As are as the users are concerned:

• Photoshop
• Acrobat
• Sharepoint
• Call of Duty
• Quicken
• Turbotax
• Support for their lousy $50 printer/copier

Re:heh

[MickyTheIdiot]

Linux us NOT missing features. This is the same B.S. we heard constantly with MacOS in the days before OS X came out. There wasn't features (or software) missing then and there isn't now for either MacOS or Linux.

What it is missing is simply the user base to get past the tipping point where the even the worst and laziest developers and companies have to take notice because enough people squeal when you do something idiotic like put PHP code in your web page that blocks a non-Windows browser. As a Linux desktop user I still have to deal with this (though not nearly as much as I used to) when all that has to be done is to make the site work with WebKit and/or Firefox. Simple.

The second biggest category are just companies that are haters, and I have to believe Adobe falls into this area. They have the expertise in house to port the Adobe suite to Linux and Unix but they just won't do it. You can see by their other offerings that they have the ability to do it but they just won't, whether it is because of bean counting or because of OS religious hate. I also think MS probably bends their ear about it because there are plenty of developers that would leave MS behind forever (those that can't afford to go the Macintosh already) if Adobe ported their various tools to Linux.

Having said that there is a legitimate OS alternative for just about every Adobe tool now except for the super-high-end items (and yes, if you get off your butt and learn it Gimp will do just about everything PS will do save some of the newest of the new items Adobe has come up with. PS is in its place because it made itself the standard and that is what people learned. It's a great application, but 99% of the users won't use the power embedded in it).

Re:heh

[VolciMaster]

My experience is that Windows is missing lots of features. No SSH support; no support for filesystems other than NTFS and FAT; no low level disk tools (dd); poor NFS support; doesn't come with a decent text editor.... I could carry on, but you get the idea.

fwiw, most people just do not care about what filesystem they run on. It doesn't matter to the vast majority of end-users. For that matter, it doesn't matter to an awful lot of the server world, either - if it really did, Window Server would not have the footprint in enterprise computing that it does.

While I'd love to have something like ssh for Windows standard, the fact of the matter is that Windows is a GUI environment, and ssh access to that just doesn't make sense - especially when compared to RDP (which, btw, is quite secure).

Re:heh

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you need to include the clueless. They're not the haters, but they're clueless and constantly advocate Windows because that's what they know. I find that many Windows advocates in business do not realize how pervasive Linux is on the internet or in other business. It's a big surprise to many of these people when I tell them that IIS is third after Apache or nginx. They also tend to believe that because ASP.NET doesn't run on Linux or OSX, neither do PHP or Java. It's a circle of ignorance.

Re:heh

[CastrTroy]

There is no possibility of writing an office suite completely compatible with MS Office. Especially with MS Word. The Doc format cannot be duplicated except by using the code written my Microsoft. Even their new XML based file format is a complete mess.

Re:heh

[MacGyver2210]

If this is your first time on Linux...you have to compile your own Kernel.

Re:heh

[jythie]

Linux is great if your are compiling from source or installing from rpm/deb, but everything is so heavily versioned that writing apps that 'just work' is nearly impossible across any significant range of versions. Developing binary packages for Linux is an exercise in frustration and I can not blame companies from not wanting to invest in doing it. The distribution and kernel developers have stated many times that they do not really think backward compatibility of binaries is something that should be focused on so they don't.

I use and love linux, but I have no delusions about its deficicines from a developer/user standpoint.

Re:heh

[Rogerborg]

Bingo. I've just put Mint on the wife's machine, and it nearly worked out of the box. But from her point of that, that means that it doesn't work, it doesn't get a free pass just for trying so hard.

Granted, it is all sorted and working now, but she needed Geek support.

Re:heh

[imakemusic]

I have had a real bear trying to do some rather straightforward things on MS and Apple.

I've had a real centipede giving me technical support. They weren't great at troubleshooting but their words-per-minute was amazing.

Re:heh

[TheRaven64]

How does this translate for most people? I've not used Windows for some years, but this is what I remember:

No SSH support;

PuTTY seems to work fine. It's not bundled, but it is free.

no support for filesystems other than NTFS and FAT;

Except exFAT, UDF and ISO9660. You know, the filesystems that people are actually likely to find on removable media. I love ZFS as much as the next FreeBSD user and cheap snapshots do make a huge difference, but most of the time people only care about filesystems when they come across a disk or flash card with that filesystem. Here, the most likely ones are the ones I listed and of these Windows and OS X are the only ones that support exFAT, which is the standard format for SDHC cards (even though it's patented and not publicly documented), although there is a vaguely-working FUSE exFAT implementation.

no low level disk tools (dd);

How often do you actually need to use dd as a typical user?

poor NFS support;

But great CIFS support, and I've seen a lot more CIFS deployments than NFS.

doesn't come with a decent text editor

Gvim works fine on Windows, and there's a port of EMACS too - both are free. Most users, however, are more likely to care about MS Word, which does run on Windows.

Re:heh

[smash]

Now, I'm no huge fan of Windows, but...

No ssh required with powershell, RDP > VNC, NTFS and FAT are usable anywhere (and there's an ext2 driver for Windows anyway), few people other than greybeards run NFS for desktop use (Windows has SMB anyway which is FAR easier to configure), and Notepad++ is a free download away.

Windows has its faults, but to trade driver support for virtually all hardware in existence, a huge software library (including games and business applications that the rest of the world use) for a decent built in text editor and some low level disk utils is a bit of a stretch. I mean the only desktop shortcoming you list is lack of a decent text editor, and there are plenty of free (both beer/libre) ones available. On the contrary, can Linux run Photoshop? Ableton Live? Hmm...

The lack of your criticisms of actual desktop related Windows shortcomings is pretty telling - by their omission you're actually reinforcing the fact that there is little reason to run Linux as a desktop user, unless that's what you're used to. And if you are, then that's fine.

Re:heh

[TheSpoom]

Force em to use Gentoo like I did. That'll sort the men from the boys (or the women from the girls, if you're optimistic).

Re:heh

[jones_supa]

My experience is that Windows is missing lots of features. No SSH support; no support for filesystems other than NTFS and FAT; no low level disk tools (dd); poor NFS support; doesn't come with a decent text editor.... I could carry on, but you get the idea.

It's interesting how Windows carries a lot from the same bag of clunky applications that were in Windows 95. Are they still very cautious of being too competetive by including "too good" tools?

Re:heh

[Stewie241]

Don't forget Netflix.

Re:heh

[hawkinspeter]

Probably not. Most desktop users would probably want to use PDFs and spreadsheets or write a letter. AFAIK those are not things that come with Windows (yes, you can installl them, but why are you expecting people to go to random websites to install software - that's not particularly easy for most users).

Re:heh

[Moryath]

You just demonstrated why almost nobody wants Linux: linux advocates are assholes like you who tell everyone not using Linux that they are "clueless." Or "too stupid to own a computer." Or some other sort of put-down.

The reality is that to get people to switch to Linux, most of the common arguments of the Linux crowd are fucking retarded themselves. Such as the first two:
#1 - " Free yourself from the Microsoft Tax!!! Build your own Machine!!! " - Most of the the buying public DOES NOT WANT to "build their own machine. They see the computer (inaccurately, but it's how they see it) as a fucking appliance. They think of computers as "I plug it in and it just runs and I get my stuff." This is why Apple's "it just works" campaign was so successful and Microsoft's ads tout "ease of use" as well.

#2 - " But Linux can do so much more... " - Actually, the problem is that out of the initial install it does so much less of what your average user wants it to do. Sure, there's plenty of "free software" out there, but someone a few comments above pointed out a list of software that Linux simply does not have a port for. The list of software not ported to Linux is pretty fucking long, and trying to get Wine/Cedega running and then run the software under that is just as much a pain in the ass. "Setting up Linux and getting comfy in it" takes a new user a hell of a long while. Which leads into my final point...

#3 - You don't understand the actual cost of switching. You say "hey we are giving away this thing and it's all FREE YAY." Fine and dandy. You dismiss the "total cost" idea as FUD. I dismiss your accusations of FUD as Fucking Retarded because I can quantify all the things involved in actually convincing someone to switch. Here is what you are convincing someone to do in order to switch:

1 - Learn how to interact with a new OS. And let's be honest here, most of the programmers in the Linux world are NOT professional GUI designers. Linux desktops, KDE/Gnome, are NOT nice on the eyes and they are not very happy to play around in. Here's one area I have to give Apple some props in: their OSX interface puts some damn pretty and friendly makeup on the pig that was the old FreeBSD interface.

2 - Learn how to interact with all the new programs they will have to use to "replace" the ones from their old Windows environment. This includes figuring out what the fuck they are called, in which of many disparate distribution groups or online package managers they're held with incredibly poorly written Engrish package descriptions, and then learning the interface for each of them because the last thing Linux programmers ever want to do is use a standard, consistent interface experience.

3 - Learn how to navigate an entirely new file structure. This is not trivial by any means. Windows and OSX both at least treat logical drives in a sane manner and clearly delineate what is housed where; /dev/sda1/sdb2/ and so on and so forth are a fucking travesty and confuse the ever-loving fuck out of new Linux users.

4 - Accept that a lot of old, favorite programs just don't exist and don't have substitutes on Linux. Ouch.

5 - Find out what of their hardware is "supported but not really" under Linux. Such as a perfectly good, perfectly working HDTV tuner card that I had in a windows-based HTPC a few years back. Had a friend who's a linux-head insist I should switch it over to Mythbuntu because it "works so much better" and "supports everything" and "uses so much less resources." Whoops. No support for my HDTV tuner card, no support for my stock ATi graphics board in the unit. Now imagine that for the non-techie you are trying to convince to switch that it's their sound card that won't work, or their joystick, or their printer. They're not going to buy new hardware, they're going to say "fuck you" and go back to Windows or OSX.

None of this is a trivial issue or a non-cost. And that's the real "cost of switching" you have to overcome to convince people to switch to Linux.

Re:heh

[Ihmhi]

We could use that exact logic to attract the hipster crowd.

"OSX? Windows? Nah, those are too mainstream for me. Oh, what do I use? Linux. You've probably never heard of it before, though. It's really underground."

And thus, by hitting the hipster buzz word trifecta ("mainstream", "you've never heard of it", and "underground"), we will get millions of trendy Starbucks loiterers to use it out of spite.

Re:heh

[serviscope_minor]

but everything is so heavily versioned that writing apps that 'just work' is nearly impossible across any significant range of versions.

So, you should do what the other operating systems do.

If the library isn't exceptionally stable (e.g. libc, libm), then you ship all the .so dependencies with your program, or statically link.

It's not hard. It's why you can download firefox or chrome or opera or libreoffice or a whole bunch of other OSS and commercial software for generic linux and have them work with no dependency issues.

You have to do exactly the same on Windows and OSX, but since those systems are rather sparse in terms of having anything of any use installed, you have no expectation that useful things will be installed on the target machines, so you already know that you have to carry round all dependencies with you.

It's only an exercise in frustration on Linux because the normal case is so easy compared to the other systems (oh hey, everything I want is already installed! woohoo!). On the other systems, you have already have to put up with the pain and suffering so you don't think about it.

Re:heh

[hawkinspeter]

Granted, I'm not a typical desktop user. Maybe I should have gone for things like spreadsheet software, PDF reader etc. You can add them, but they don't come with Windows. Also, where's the software repository so that I can install software from a known "good" source and have updates to all my software applied with just a couple of clicks?

I've actually found driver support in Windows to be extremely flaky. I've had old hardware refuse to work under Windows 7 as the only driver available is a 32bit WinXP one. I've heard stories of scanners and printers not working in Windows 7 - I don't know if they're true or not.

My experience of loading WinXP onto laptops is typically painful - load the OS, then search the manufacturer website for the relevant network driver/AHCI storage driver. Put the drivers onto a usb storage key or DVD and then attempt to install them. Reboot, get a blue screen as I've forgotten to switch the BIOS back into AHCI mode etc.

My experience of loading Ubuntu onto laptops is typically easy - boot from USB or CD, install the OS and everything is working. Sometimes (if the wireless chipset requires a proprietary driver) I've had to use a LAN cable to connect to the internet and run the "Additional Drivers" program to fix wireless, but that's easy enough.

My view is that I don't care what OS other people run as long as we're all using standards that don't care what OS we run.

Re:heh

[hairyfeet]

I'm sure I'll get cursed for pointing out the emperor's winkie is flapping in the breeze but I'll be happy to answer that, its the "busted shitters" that frankly ruin Linux. oh Linux is a nice IDEA, kinda like how communism with everyone taking care of everyone else for the betterment of all is a nice idea, it just doesn't really work in practice.

For examples there is the docs that are at best an arcane list of CLI commands with fuck all explanation of what they are or at worst a "to do" placeholder, there is Pulseaudio which even the strongest Linux advocate will get the shivers just thinking about, there is the broken driver model which causes things that don't SEEM to be connected to seriously fuck each other up, which seems to hit pulse worse than most but wireless gets shat on frequently as well, there is the insane release schedule which obviously gives the developers ZERO time for regression testing or QA, not that they are gonna do that shit for free anyway, there are the bugs that have been around for years and will obviously NEVER be fixed, please see any distro bug trackers for quite a few, there is the badly inconsistent UI which I would argue is caused by developers just being itch scratchers since they aren't getting paid and therefor don't have to give a fuck what you think, therefor some programs behave like Windows, with Win hotkeys and Win layouts, many rip off Mac horribly which is fucking sad because OSX is a APPLICATION BASED NOT WINDOWS BASED therefor ripping it off for an OS based on Windows (the document format not the OS) makes no fucking sense, and finally there is the old school Unix conventions just to throw the occasional curveball, and finally there is the leaning on CLI as a crutch, whereas in OSX or Win 7 one could remove the CLI completely and have a 100% functional OS that I would argue more than 95% of the population would never even notice CLI was removed with Linux thanks to its actually being a server OS and NOT a desktop OS at heart if you remove CLI you've completely destroyed the OS and many distros won't even boot.

Now cue the nutjobs who will swear I'm secretly a M$ Ninja robot built by Cyberdyne and plugged into a computer under Redmond, coming off as nothing more than total losers when the simple fact is you can't change reality and numbers don't lie. To get Linux up to the same level as OSX and Windows will require north of 100 million dollars because NOBODY and I do mean NOBODY is gonna take on the above problems i named, because it will take years of boring as fuck lousy shitty work that nobody willl do for free which is the essence of the busted shitter dilemma. You see you can get humans to create for free, because we like to do this, what you can NOT get humans to do is come fix that turd filled busted overflowing crapper stinking up the joint for nothing and for every creative job that needs doing you have 100 that are the equivalent of the guy that cleans up the puke at the Chuck E Cheese.

Apple and MSFT have to pay millions upon millions of dollars to get their own busted shitters fixed, which is why you can take a bog standard desktop, install XP/Vista/7 RTM, update it through all those patches and service packs and have ALL the drivers 100% functional. Its not magic, its millions of dollars spent on regression testing and working with OEMs and first party drivers and a shitload of hard nasty thankless work that ends up with something people take for granted. With Linux because of all those busted shitters the support costs will bankrupt you which is why we retailers won't carry your product. I have several XP machines that have been in the field for over 8 years bug free, in fact the machine I'm typing this on is a circa 2004 AMD Sempron still running the default XP install that I kept when a customer traded it in because it was so low powered and quiet it made for a great nettop. Compare this to Linux where I've tried LTS to LTS, LTS to regular, and regular to regular and have YET to

Re:heh

[UncleRage]

No, no, no. Don't mention that OS X has a shell.

OS X is complete and utter crap, you hear me? There's no bash or csh or ksh or anything like that! You can't ssh into a remote box and work from your Mac in an OTB situation, nor can you remote into your Mac and screen a session.

There's no vim, emacs or even nano (for someone wetting their feet); there's only TextEdit and you can only save to .iexclusivetextdocumentformat! Why without tab autocompletion, (semi)sane directory structure think of how impossible it is for someone worth their technical salt to find their way around! Just imagine a photograph of Mardi Gras, that's the exact kind of chaos that comes to my mind whenever I consider needing to edit /etc/hosts or tail /var/log/system.log on a Mac!

You cannot, absolutely cannot compile anything; you hear me? If it isn't able to be installed from Apple's walled garden, then it doesn't exist. No ability to build gcc, no ports installer, no way to install and invoke frotz, mp3blaster and htop in a three way, multi-panelled terminal session so that people think I'm doing something important when I'm really just trying to get that god damned fish into my ear while listening to 8 bit centric podcasts!

The Mac is clearly nothing but a n00b machine that costs too much!

good lord I'm off topic. I really need to cut down my caffeine.

Re:heh

[Moryath]

#1 - OSX acquired a built-in base. They converted existing Mac (OS7, OS8, OS9) users, which depending on how you measured were somewhere between 6 and 8 percent of the market, over to OSX. This included the "Classic Mode" backwards compatibility environment for OS9->OSX conversion, and the Rosetta conversion interface when the PPC->x86 conversion happened. Apple running FreeBSD, unlike most Linux projects, understood that backwards compatibility is fucking important, at least for a long enough period that most users would upgrade/update the applications that otherwise would just break on an OS update.

#2 - They made their interface look goddamn pretty. This is something Microsoft's been struggling to achieve - though Win7 is actually damn good. This is also something Linux distributions have been fucking goddamn terrible at over the years. Admittedly, because Apple controls their own hardware spec, they have a leg up in that they charged a premium price for extremely high-res monitors (Cinema Display, etc) whereas most people experience Windows on much less high-resolution displays from manufacturers like Dell or HP where the "jaggies" can be a lot more noticeable.

#3 - Slick marketing campaigning around the "It Just Works" theme, combined with cross-marketing of other fad devices (iPod, iPhone, and the newest line of iFad tablets) to build a whole brand. Again, Linux has completely fucking failed to build itself as a true BRAND - most phone users with an Android phone don't even realize it's Linux-based, they think Google developed Android entirely on their own thanks to the Android marketing campaign.

Re:heh

[WaywardGeek]

Now there's some good marketing.

Actually, GNU/Linux is getting crusty and losing it's one time ability of fostering innovation and collaboration. Core pieces like GTK are outdated and a poor platform for building a desktop environment. If you try to contribute, you run into a buzz saw of red tape and gate keepers. If you want to write an app today and publish tomorrow, you need to be on Android or iOS. Debian is run like the Catholic Church, and only the priests have any say. We have no simple way for me to write a cool hack of a little game today, and share it with thousands of Linux enthusiasts tomorrow. That's total BS. LInux should be Linux, not GNU/Linux with all those managed Debian packages on top. We should then build a new distributed system for authoring packages, building them for various platforms, publishing and marketing them. As it is, Linux sucks.

Re:heh

[ArhcAngel]

Linux us NOT missing features.

It IS missing two very crucial features...Convenience & Trendiness
MAC & PC users in general do not care that they are using MAC OS X or Windows 7. They just care about getting what they want done AND how they look to their peers doing it.

CAR ANALOGY - The average driver does not want a car where the engine or other mechanical parts are showing but the gear head who loves tweaking his ride will go to great lengths to ensure at least some part of his engine sticks out. Also, people will buy a PRIUS or a Smart4two to appear eco-friendly despite there being other makes and models with similar fuel efficiency but less visibility as a fuel efficient driver.

I have used many different Linux distributions since 1985 ( I expect my compile of Gentoo to complete any day now ) and even Ubuntu hasn't really reached the ease of use factor I expect from a desktop OS. Is it more powerful than Windows? Absolutely! Does that matter one iota when I need to read my email or write a report on a word processor? Nope...Apple got it right IMO when they took BSD and tacked their own GUI on it to hide the power and flexibility of the underlying kernel. This is where choice has actually hurt the Linux on the desktop initiative. Add some peripheral support to Android and have it scale to the desktop and you have the killer Linux for the desktop distro. - This is tongue in cheek but not far from what I envision it will take to get Linux adopted as the desktop OS of choice.

Re:heh

[jedidiah]

No. All of his points are valid. The only thing Windows has going for it, or ever really had going for it, was the perception that it is the monopoly. This means more 3rd party support of various kinds.

Although using the vendor supplied driver is not always the best option.

The main thing is the perception that it "runs everything". This has been fueling WinDOS adoption since Microsoft mean DOS.

Re:heh

[Anonymous Coward]

No. All of his points are valid.

1) You can configure Windows to log on automatically with no password.

2) The last three Linux distributions that I've used (for Android development) Ubuntu, Kbuntu and Mint have all had at least one update that required a reboot per month, so the reboot argument is bullshit too.

3) Familiarity? One word: UNITY. And if you are going to argue that one can switch back to KDE of Gnome, Windows 7 can be made to look and behave like Classic Windows too.

4) Compatibility: Laughable. I can and do run apps that were written for Windows 3.1 and 05 on Windows 7 today. Try that with Linux without recompiling.

5) Ease of use: Subjective

6) Lagacy Hardware Support: A 486? REALLY?

7) OS Upgrades breaking things: Are you kidding me? I've had new linux kernel releases break Cdrtools due to the ubstable driver ABI. meanwhile the same cdrtools binaries worked on FreeBSD 5-7 machines with no problems. On multiple occasions I've had Ubuntu's upgrade process render the system inoperable after letting it go for a long time (six months or so) without updating.

I could probably go on but have a life and won't.

The bottom line is that if you think those bullet points are 100% factual, you live in a ideological bubble and are beyond help.

Re:heh

[aix tom]

Debian is not all Linux. It's actually only one of the "package based" ones.

If you have Arch Linux, you can write any package you like and upload the build script and sources to the Arch User Repository. Then it's shared with all Arch users.

Basically the two I use are Gentoo and Arch Linux. Because they just give you Linux with a software management (portage or pacman), but leave it completely up to you what editor/Desktop Environment/etc... you want to install and use.

Re:heh

[HapSlappy_2222]

You know, you're absolutely right, but I think this is still a big hurdle to a widely adopted Linux desktop. Everyday users don't want to be told "if you do this, it will work." even when it's true. Even though they have to install DirectX to install a game on Windows; average users don't even notice it, because the game installer puts it in place without them having to see anything but a "Next" button. Pushing next is just what you push until "Finish", which is the button that makes shortcuts to click. They just want software to work, with no additional steps that they have to think about. They only perceive installing Wine as "I have to do more stuff than Windows", and that only looks like excuses for a less-functional-than-Windows computer.

Your average joe or josephine isn't gonna want to hear that they need to install Wine to then install Photoshop or Quicken, especially when they have to call Adobe support for help installing Photoshop in the first place. I think what Linux needs for widespread success is a broad spectrum "ezmode" for users that just don't care about things like which OS they use. Put cd in, click next a buncha times, gogo spreadsheet/tax return/headshots. In fact, to the user, an "ezmode" isn't even a feature, it's a "normal", so it just needs to be there by default, with no fanfare. Touting a "brand new ezmode!!" feature will STILL work against Linux, because it'll call attention to the fact the OS can be trickier than a "Windows", which is scary to a new, unskilled user.

I don't know if this is something that the Linux community will want to do anyway, because if it happens and is broadly adopted, Linux won't have a special uniqueness anymore. We'll all be supporting Linux ezmode instead of the stuff that makes Linux beautiful. Maybe if software vendors started packaging things like Wine, with an optimal configuration in their own sandbox, into their installers, we'd see a difference, but then we run into a catch 22. Why would a vendor want to do this for such a small market share?

What's even more unfortunate is Windows and Mac OS's have paved a track that users follow. Unless Linux can funnel users into a very, very similar track, it doesn't stand a chance of breaking them out of the pattern. Free just doesn't make up for a perceived pain in the ass, and while I hate it as much as the rest of you, that's the reality right now.

Why not

[dokc]

Why would anyone want to use Linux as their everyday desktop (or laptop) operating system?

Why not? It simply works, I can do whatever I want.

Re:Why not

[Black Parrot]

Why would anyone want to use Linux as their everyday desktop (or laptop) operating system?

Why not? It simply works, I can do whatever I want.

And you can do that without having to buy (or steal) 50 expensive software packages to get the complete functionality you expect of a desktop or laptop workstation.

I only keep a Windows box around so I can play commercial games. For me, it's just a glorified game console.

Re:Why not

[Vanderhoth]

I think that's probably one of the biggest problems. A lot of people a use to doing what they're told, not what they want. When confronted with too much choice a lot of people just curl up into little balls and cry. Figuratively speaking of course.

Re:Why not

[Anonymous Coward]

"It simply works" -> no, it does not. It works great, but it is not "grandma simple".

Bollocks.

The iPad is "grandma simple" in the same way as the VCR is "grandma simple". I.e. as long as granny only does what she's allowed and the system doesn't have any problems or errors.

"Apple has chosen 1 a long time ago"

NO. Apple has chosen "I will TELL you what you will do, therefore it will be easy to do".

Re:Why not

[Gaygirlie]

Most people do not have such needs and as such that is not a problem for them. And generally "ready for desktop" is quantified by what most people need.

Re:Why not

[dskoll]

My 80-yr-old mother uses Linux. It was not "grandma simple" to install and set up (I did that for her), but she certainly has no trouble using it.

Re:Why not

[Darfeld]

That's simply not true.

Ubuntu, to name the most obvious distribution, make linux grandma simple. As much as a windows at least.

As for iPad/Android/whatever, if your grandma isn't able to work things out with Windows/Linux/OSX, she probably won't be able to figure that out too.

If people are afraid of technology, they will stay away from complex devices, no matter how "easy to use" they are. If they aren't they can handle Windows or Linux, as long as they don't mess with edgy stuff. Windows has an advantage here, because most people, even some "technology afraid people" have been forced to do stuff with it, have learned the basics and are at least familiar with it. Apple has for him that it's smart things for smart people. Well that's what "they" say anyway. Linux has a rep of being complex and difficult to understand. It's true, as much as Windows or OSX, and it's irrelevant for most user. It's even simpler : to install a software, you launch the app Store and search for it then click install button. To launch a software, you click it's icon in the menu, pretty much like windows anyway. most users don't need to know more. (And grandma certainly doesn't)

Re:Why not

[WrongSizeGlass]

Simple for Slashdoters != Simple for everyone

Most Slashdoters belong to a extremely small minority of the market for computers, tablets and smartphones.

I'm not saying Linux is too hard for most people to use, but the perception that Linux is "for geeks" is a serious obstacle. Letting the masses know that "Linux is preferred by geeks rather than Linux is only for geeks" would be a great first step.

Re:Why not

[kev0153]

My 15 year old daughter crashed the hard drive in here laptop by throwing it around. She also lost all the installation discs that came with it. I put ubuntu on it and she never complained once. But yeah it took me awhile to get it setup right, the wireless network card gave me a bit of trouble until I figured out what drivers I needed.

Re:Why not

[Pieroxy]

The iPad and iPhone UI paradigm is DEAD SIMPLE for non tech people because THERE IS ONLY ONE BUTTON.

So, wherever they are and however bad they've screwed up, there is this one button getting them back to the home screen. It's not simple, it's obvious.

This is a major difference with a VCR, and a PC for that matter. The problem with these devices is that they are stateful. Invariably the n00b will find himself in a situation where he doesn't know how to get out. I once did spot my mother in law on a word document, with a magnifying glass of 800% and word windowed in a small window on the top left of her screen. She was literally editing the document with a viewport showing 3 characters. Of course, she found it inconvenient. So I explained to her the "full screen" icon on the top right and the zoom setting in word. The next day, she had forgotten all of it.

Why did she forget? It's not complex dammit !!!!

It's just that these paradigms are completely both alien and useless for random grandmas. So they don't remember them.

Re:Why not

[mvdwege]

You're trolling. The default on Ubuntu is brasero, which gives you the option to burn on the fly right in the dialog.

Next time, pick a less transparent lie.

Mart

Re:Why not

[SomeKDEUser]

Fundamentally, a computer is a Turing-complete machine. Meaning it can execute any programme you can possibly conceive of. And infinitely many more you cannot even imagine.

This is why computers are so different than any other machine ever invented. And the desktop is just a small and useful trick to help you tap the power of your computer. If you try to make your computer into an appliance, you fundamentally did not need a computer in the first place anyway.

Also, you will either fail or make your device pretty useless. It is vaguely annoying to see how many countless hours of human work and ingenuity and how many dollars are spent trying to hide to power of their machines to the users.

Re:Why not

[dokc]

You're trolling. The default on Ubuntu is brasero, which gives you the option to burn on the fly right in the dialog.

Next time, pick a less transparent lie.

Mart

To support the claim:
Brasero features

Quoting:

Features
...
Data CD/DVD:
supports edition of discs contents (remove/move/rename files inside directories)
can burn data CD/DVD on the fly
...

Re:Why not

[LordLucless]

If you can't install a (relatively modern) Linux distro, you can't install Windows either.

Re:Why not

[JimmyVolatile]

This has sometimes been my experience too. I've been with Linux Mint the last 4 years at home, doing pretty much the same set of typical home PC tasks: Reading the paper, youtube, fb, gmail, banking, watching movies, managing photos, home videos the kid's homework etc. After doing it for 2 years, I felt I'd been through whatever Linux Mint could throw at me and I actually started recommending it to a few friends, touting it as a no-cost alternative that would be worth trying. Even the local kindergarten needed 2-3 better (and cheap) PC-system for the next 2-3 years for their occasional office computing needs. They were really impressed. Then it dawned on me. The people I know who are now on LM: 1. Are more willing (and expecting) to be able to pay for better applications can now maybe get 10% of their wishes granted that way. 2. Are willing to and expecting to call someone and give them $50 to fix stuff. (They can only call me as there are no other Linux guys) The point is that the money is there for you, it's just very hard (practically) for people to spend it. Take donations for instance: This is money that you give to the developer *after* you have downloaded and used some application. Only a small fraction of people even remembers to do this. In many cases you can only donate to some foundation and then only hope that this goes towards developing that one feature you need.

Re:Why not

[stoolpigeon]

Grandma is no sucker - she wont be buying her tunes.

But seriously - iTunes sucks unless you have an iDevice that requires it. I can see it for people with a bunch of Apple products - but on Win or Lin it doesn't make any sense to me.

Re:Why not

[ProppaT]

But, let's be real. If Open Office doesn't cut it for you, you're going to want MS Office. If Gimp isn't cutting it, you're going to want Adobe Photoshop/Illustrator. I recognize that there are commercial software packages for Linux, some of them very good, but few of them for mainstream users.

And, of course, you can dual boot or even use Wine to run some Windows programs on Linux, but this isn't what we're talking about. We're talking about Linux for the mainstream. And, to my original point, most of these free ware Linux packages are open source and are available on Windows. I know because I use a lot of them on Windows on a daily basis.

Re:Why not

[miknix]

I don't play commercial games anymore. The only reason why I have one virtual machine with Windows is to use Tax software

Really? At least around here the tax program is java and runs quite nicely in Linux.
Since you are paying taxes, it makes sense you ask your government that ..err.. the tax program is cross-platform, no?

Re:Why not

[dokc]

Really? At least around here the tax program is java and runs quite nicely in Linux.

You must say where "around here" is :-)

Since you are paying taxes, it makes sense you ask your government that ..err.. the tax program is cross-platform, no?

I know you are kidding, but actually one part of the government tax program can really run under Linux, but not tho whole package, You can use the online version from Windows, Linux or MAC.
The only problem is that I really don't understand what should I fill-in. That is a reason why I'm buying the additional tax software where I can use a simple wizard to fill all the forms. Then, the tax software uses government software to upload the tax report.

Re:Why not

[Hatta]

'growisofs -Z /dev/dvd -R -J /path' would have done the trick for you. The trick to using Linux effectively is to ignore all the GUI crap and focus on its strengths. Once you learn to use the command line, Linux is a better desktop than anything else around.

Re:Why not

[dr2chase]

It does NOT just work. I wanted to perform the equivalent of cloning my system partition to a newer, larger drive, then I wanted to turn that into my startup disk. On a Mac, that's a quick run of SuperDuper!, followed by setting the startup disk in System Preferences. There MAY be a similarly troublefree way to do this in Linux, but I could not find it. I did, eventually, succeed. It wasn't fun. (Answer: LVM, and then I think I used grub from the command line, because the magic-friendly UI buttons didn't seem to work.)

Other gripe, adding a new disk (one of those big ones that lies about its block size), the tools were an abomination. Command-line tools were borked by the block size (ask for N gig, get N/8 gig, awesome), GUI tools would by default misalign the partitions, then tell me what a bad stupid person I was to not align the partitions, why don't you repeat the operation and see if you get a different result? And I know, after extensive Googling, that it doesn't matter that much for ext4 anyway. It's UI clusterfuck of misinformation, poorly chosen defaults, and irrelevant insults to the luser.

There's all sorts of fun stuff you can do in Linux, that does not matter to most people. My experience with MacPorts on the Mac suggests that it is possible to have a generally-useful computer that is also 90% nerd-friendly, so I think that the Linux problems are more developer-side cultural rather than technical; stuff that matters to nerds (or to companies sponsoring nerds to work on Linux) does not matter to "most people". The "wrong stuff" is what gets optimized, the stuff that matters to people who buy Macs, does not.

So here's my advice:
1) The defaults should be set right for "normal" people, in the interface that "normal" people use.
Treat that interface like it is the most important one, not an afterthought.
Consider operations at a high level, not a low level -- add a disk, remove a disk, backup a disk, (maybe) convert to RAID. NOT, "align a partition", "copy blocks", "install a bootloader" (and I have bootloader choices, and one of them is apparently VERY WRONG, WTF did you hand me that kryptonite for?)

2) The need to RTFM before doing anything at all is a bug. Figure out what people want to do with your tool, and give them instructions to do that, with progressive disclosure as they get more confident, adventurous, interested.

3) If you're going to have desktop design battles, don't inflict them on "normal" people. I cannot even keep track of GNOME-this versus KDE-that, let alone what the alleged merits are. (Did KDE lose?)

4) Learn to write instructions. "Documentation" is the wrong word, I think it gives people the idea that if you simply mention every detail, it is "documented". Don't use vague terms like "appropriate". Give examples. Ask yourself, whenever writing down unambiguous instructions (a) why is it so hard to write unambiguous instructions -- do we have gratuitous variation between different flavors of Linux? how can that be eliminated and (b) why isn't this a bash/python/whatever script, activated by a button press? If you can't explain it carefully enough for a computer to follow the instructions, are you sure you really understand how to explain it? If the result has ten knobs to be set before the button press, are the knobs really necessary? Are the ones that are necessary, explained? Is there an "undo" button?

Re:Why not

[jawtheshark]

Take a look at VueScan. Best $79.95 I ever spent on software and the only single proprietary software I use on Linux. I'm just a happy customer, I have nothing to do with the creator and/or company.

Re:Why not

[hobarrera]

I actually use wine. You'd be surprised how many games work fine nowadays.

Re:Why not

[swillden]

My 80-yr-old mother uses Linux. It was not "grandma simple" to install and set up (I did that for her), but she certainly has no trouble using it.

My father-in-law runs Linux because it's much easier for me to manage. Meaning, I set it up and it Just Works. Especially since I installed KDE and locked down the configuration so he can't accidentally change anything. Trying to manage a Windows system for him was just nightmarish.

Actually, I think for him the ideal OS might be ChromeOS (or Mozilla's spin on the same concept) -- nothing but a browser. Everything he uses his computer for is done through a browser, so anything else is just confusing cruft that can potentially get screwed up. I think this is increasingly true of an ever-larger set of the computer-using population.

previous info, repeated

[pbjones]

ask not what OS is for you, ask what your OS can do. After the shine wears off it's about what you use a computer for. I play 1 on-line game, read the news, and catch up with a few people on FB. And I have have a diffrent machine for eMail. If Linux does what you want, use it, you don't have to sell it to anyone.

Why do you need to sell it to people?

[lattyware]

Really, why? If you can't think of a good reason for someone to use it - it's probably not for them. I've been a Linux desktop user for ages, and I'd find Windows horrible to go back to now, but I get that it's not the same for everyone.

Look, I'm not saying you shouldn't let people know Linux exists and show them how it could help them, but don't get obsessive about it.

Re:Why do you need to sell it to people?

[Black Parrot]

Really, why? If you can't think of a good reason for someone to use it - it's probably not for them. I've been a Linux desktop user for ages, and I'd find Windows horrible to go back to now, but I get that it's not the same for everyone.

Look, I'm not saying you shouldn't let people know Linux exists and show them how it could help them, but don't get obsessive about it.

Yeah, I'm always amused at the notion that we "should" market Linux. So long as there are enough participants to support a well-rounded free software environment, Linux will have its niche.

It's not competing with OSes sold for other niches.

Also, its purpose is to let geeks do stuff they want to do, not to saturate the consumer market or pump up someone's stock portfolio.

There's no reason for its creators, users, or proponents to do anything other than what they've always done.

Not going to happen. Windows is "good enough"

[RogueyWon]

I don't think the answer here is about Linux, I think it's about Windows. Simply put, there isn't enough "wrong" with Windows these days.

There was, I felt, a moment where Linux had a chance to make a breakthrough onto the mainstream desktop. It was around the point where Windows ME was failing horribly and Windows 2000 had yet to get much public acceptance. At that point, there was a lot wrong with Windows. The technology underpinning 95/98/ME was creaking horribly. It's hard to believe now, but if you were a heavy PC user (particularly a gamer) back then, your Win98 machine would need daily reboots just to maintain basic performance and stability. Over on 2000, until it got a service pack or two, there were horrible compatibility issues with many applications, particularly those that required directx.

And then the moment passed. Windows 2000 got patched up and then Windows XP went on, after a rocky start, to become a stable, pleasant to use OS. Even the debacle of the Vista launch couldn't undermine the general dominance of Windows - because the major competition to Vista was coming from XP, not from Linux.

If you want to unseat the dominant market player, you have to not just be better than them, but be a lot better. It's not just that you have to have a few killer features; you have to be able to at least match the dominant player in every other significant respect as well. Linux is nowhere near that kind of position in respect of Windows these days (take gaming support as a case in point, but there are plenty of other examples).

Re:Not going to happen. Windows is "good enough"

[stoolpigeon]

It will be interesting to see how Win 8 fares. I agree that Windows is not horrific for normal desktop usage at home. Windows 7 has progressed to be close enough to my Linux/KDE setup that I actually don't mind it too much, especially with power shell. But the changes in 8 are rather significant. I've been running the preview in a VM on my Fedora box and there are some huge changes. I think MS may continue pushing more customers to Apple with it. I don't see it being much of a boon for Linux because Linux just isn't on most people's radar.

Re:Not going to happen. Windows is "good enough"

[gbjbaanb]

don't worry, Ballmer won't let you down. Metro is coming.

Re:Not going to happen. Windows is "good enough"

[RogueyWon]

I think the problem for MS's competitors is that, as we saw with the Vista launch, even if MS get something badly wrong, they've got a market dominance safety margin because a) their older OSes are still out there and usable, barring some kind of actual kill-switch and b) the competition needs, in many key areas, a few years to catch up to them even if MS stands still.

Agree that Apple rather than Linux is the more dangerous competitor for MS, particularly if Apple starts to take gaming more seriously in a post-Jobs world. Don't underestimate how many people's OS choice is driven by the games that they and/or their kids play. And it's in gaming support that MS is currently many years ahead of the competition (gaming on Linux appears to have made little substantive progress over the last decade).

Re:Not going to happen. Windows is "good enough"

[ratboy666]

Actually, I think you have that backwards. Windows 95/98/ME were trying to compete with Linux. Microsoft used illegal means to compete -- fair competition would have resulted in OS/2 and Linux on top.

Finally, in 2001, Windows XP achieved some parity with Linux and OS/2.

OS/2 has gone away; Linux hasn't. But, even today, Windows 7 is no particular match for Linux. Does Windows run on Z-series mainframes? Sparc? Anything other than x86? Big-endian? Embedded? With how much compatibility?

The Linux kernel is remarkably successful. What is amazing is that even with all the illegal efforts at exploiting a monopoly, and actual engineering efforts that have been put into Windows 7, that Linux is even considered competitive.

Re:Not going to happen. Windows is "good enough"

[kenh]

God lord man, do you remember wht it was like installing Linux on a pre-2001 machine? It was no big deal to get a text console, but running X Windows took an extreme knowledge of the software and hardware you were trying to make work. It didn't just "work" - not by a long stretch.

As craptacular as Win 95/98/ME were, you could at least install the OS and have a graphical interface on almost any piece of hardware - Linux was a 20 floppy "adventure"...

Wrong Approach

[Penguinshit]

You don't sell Linux as a product: You sell it as an idea.

The idea is that you can do anything you want with it.

Re:Wrong Approach

[Gaygirlie]

General populace is not interested in ideas. That's the whole crux of the thing; they want something concrete, they do not care about the ideas behind the product as long as they can feel they got what they wanted.

Re:Wrong Approach

[Gaygirlie]

I chose Windows because Linux couldn't do what I wanted.

Re:Wrong Approach

[fisted]

>> I chose Windows because I couldn't do what I wanted w/ Linux.
FTFY

Re:Wrong Approach

[Blakey Rat]

Well: 1) You can do anything you want with Windows, and it's equally "free" in the eyes of the consumer, so what's your point?

And of course 2) no you can't. Can I play Skyrim in Linux? (Yes, yes, WINE, whatever, the answer is: no, no I can't.)

Dear god this blog post is terrible

[Idimmu Xul]

It's a Livejournal period drama featuring Teamspeak, Gnomies and Google+ hangouts; a total mashup of the entire Internet.

It name drops, it backlinks, it links images with contribution, it bolds, "quotes", paraphrases and italics. There's even a google advert.

It just doesn't say anything at all. Which is quite impressive considering how long it is.

If only it was compressed down to 140 characters, might have been less painful to read.

Marketing is not the problem

[dejanc]

I make my living on Linux I spend and for the last 12 years I've been using it on desktop. I am very happy with Linux - I spend better part of my day in Linux consoles on various servers. However, 6 months ago I switched to Mac OS X for my desktop needs and I'm not going back. Why?

Firstly, now I have a sane desktop environment which doesn't change often. It took some time to adjust to it's workflow, but with 27'' screen it wasn't that hard (just keep everything open).

Secondly, I get access to all applications I need - ranging from Adobe products to MS Office to various ingenious applications from independent developers. I can still access all console utilities that I had under linux, so nothing is lost but a lot is gained.

Finally, I get a better software selection than I had with any distribution I tried. The foundation is solid, I don't have to worry kernel upgrade will break binary graphic drivers (which I also get from e.g. Debian Stable), but I can keep Firefox, Virtualbox, etc. up-to-date with a click of a button (which I would get from a rolling release distribution).

Simply put: Linux is great, and there are many excellent distributions out there. But until they settle on a DE (including broken DE's like early versions of Gnome 3 or KDE 4 is just not acceptable) and until Adobe, Microsoft et al. start selling their software for Linux, many people will simply not be satisfied with Linux desktop - which has very little to do with Linux itself.

Linux still isn't trouble-free

[mikael_j]

The biggest problem is, IMHO, inertia. In order for Linux to beat the others it has to be clearly superior

And of course, Linux is still far from being trouble-free. I've been a Linux user since the mid-90s (although for a period I mainly used FreeBSD) but switched over to an iMac as my main workstation a few years ago. Was this because I couldn't get Linux to run right? No. Was it because Linux was "too hard"? No. Was is because of marketing? No. It was because it was UNIX and a turnkey solution. I know it's a tired phrase but it just works. I no longer fear software updates (apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade used to terrify me, had a few incidents where it ate its own package database or simply uninstalled necessary packages (like my X server) for no particular reason) and it stays out of my way.

Now, obviously this isn't for everyone. I still have Linux desktops at home, they're just not my main workstation because I still can't quite shake that feeling of "well, it's stable now but it took two days of configuring and god knows what'll happen next time I update some software"...

What about Ubuntu? Well, it's sometimes more user-friendly than Debian but it also breaks in new and exciting ways (for example, for the longest time I couldn't get it to accept the idea of an interface having a static IPv4 address and a dynamic IPv6 address using the GUI tools, and editing config files somehow broke the GUI tools so they would constantly assume that I had no internet connectivity at all).

Seriously?

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you really have to post this?

Hard to sell what is free?

[Anonymous Coward]

I've used Linux as my primary OS for 10 years now and wouldn't consider going back. The things 'people' want in a desktop/laptop PC (YMMV): Stability, reliability, security and speed. But there's another, less tangible aspect. When you're ahead of the curve (or even a little to the left); you're cool. You get that innate smugness when someone proclaims their new Windows x/OS y machine ePeen score that you're just a little bit more awesome than them.

Collaboration and openness; it's the future. First software, then government & enterprise.

Question is: Why *should* it happen?

[F69631]

It's important that we have a free (both meanings of the word) alternative for an operating system for those who want it. However, as long as the existence of that alternative is relatively safe it just comes down to competition. You need to invest something (money, time, etc.) to a system and you gain something from it (be it the knowledge that your system is "free", more stability or the UI and applications you prefer) and if most people say that they'd rather go with Windows... why is that "wrong"?

I guess you can make the point "They might not say that if they KNEW more about Linux" but at that point you are no longer asking "How to increase Linux market share" but rather "How to educate people about Linux so we get more competition" which should be approached with an entirely different mindset. I find it difficult to even think "We should boycott MS because it's EVIL"... Maybe it still is so, but there are so many even more horrible corporations around that I feel a bit apathetic about that.

Summa summarum... If you know that someone would benefit from Linux, it should be easy to sell. If you don't know, why should you even try to?

All major OSes are pretty well usable

[roothog]

I have two offices, each with a different desktop (WinXP on one, OS X Lion on the other), two MacBooks (Lion on one, Leopard on the other), and a home Linux system (Ubuntu/KDE). I find all systems to be fairly usable, and for the most part, I don't really care which one I'm using. I just want to be able to use the computer, so trying to push one type of system over another seems pretty pointless if they're all ultimately usable. The differences among the systems end up being pretty minor:

Linux:
- Easy connectivity to remote systems/servers.
- Easy to find, install, and uninstall software via apt-get, with reasonable assurance that the centralized repositories aren't hosting malware.
- I never think about licenses, everything is free [beer].

OS X:
- Easy connectivity to remote systems/servers.
- UNIX with a pretty GUI (though KDE is pretty nice nowadays).
- Many applications have easy installs/uninstalls, just drag the folder into /Applications or from there to the trash. (Though having to remember which applications uninstall with a drag to the trash and which need to run an uninstaller is annoying).

Windows:
- Usable as long as I can stay away from the start menu (which I find cumbersome).
- Needs a real command line that lets me ssh & scp. Having to use a GUI program to scp annoys me.
- No customizability. For example, I can't figure out how to have the clock on the taskbar also list today's date.
- Installing software via downloads of .exe's from random websites is worrisome.

Re:All major OSes are pretty well usable

[SolemnLord]

- UNIX with a pretty GUI (though KDE is pretty nice nowadays).

It's not "pretty", it's "well-designed", and just happens to look good. Until more Linux advocates start realizing the distinction (and props where props are due, there are plenty of design-centric Linux devs out there. Canonical, for example. Android is forcing a lot more to be), that will always be a massive hurdle for the OS.

Re:All major OSes are pretty well usable

[jamesl]

For example, I can't figure out how to have the clock on the taskbar also list today's date.

Win 7 ... My taskbar clock also lists today's date.

It's interesting that many have complained over the years that Windows is too complex because MS gives users too much flexibility.

Re:All major OSes are pretty well usable

[Blakey Rat]

- No customizability. For example, I can't figure out how to have the clock on the taskbar also list today's date.

Point the First: Customization = bugs. For every checkbox in the OS, you double the time taken to QA. Windows has been reducing customization to ensure they can ship a quality product. (OS X has always followed the same philosophy.) So if that's what you're looking for, Windows isn't for you... but I also think if you were rational about it, you'd prefer a well-tested OS over one that's customizable.

Point the Second: Windows has shown the date on the Start bar by default since Vista. Please update your rhetoric to Windows OSes shipped during this decade, thank you.

I actually wonder if one of the reason Linux users think "Linux is just fine! It's just as good as Windows!" is that they're always comparing to a 10-year-old copy of Windows.

Re:games

[satuon]

I need a Windows partition to be able to use HDMI to play movies on my TV. On Linux there's a loud whistling noise every 10 seconds, and I can't get smooth playback of 1080p videos even though I have core i3. On Windows 1080p videos play flawlessly and audio is OK.

And The Answer Is...

[martin-boundary]

what in the world do you focus your efforts on selling? An idea?

"Linux. The Desktop Teenage Alien Ninja Turtles use. Torrent It This Summer, Or No Pizza For You."

This is an easy question to answer

[Charliemopps]

This is an easy question to answer:
          I can't go to the store and buy software for it.
          I can't play ANY games on it that aren't total crap or 10yrs old
          It's hard to use for most people. (editing text files in emacs is not easy for most people)
          The linux support community are a bunch of assholes. Try and post a question in a linux forum asking how to do something, you get treated like an idiot.
          Even if you had someone to support you, the entire appearance, function and utility of it differs widely from distro to distro... even from release to release. Win7 may be a lot different than Win95... but not nearly as different as 2 Ubuntu distros that are less than 5yrs apart. So even a linux pro can be lost unless you drop to command line, and even then they may be confused unless you're using the same distro... not to mention that its virtually impossible to support a novice, over the phone, while they're entering console commands.

None of this is new... it's the same problem that linux has always had.

Re:This is an easy question to answer

[unapersson]

1) You don't need to, but anyway, it's been a long time since I've seen boxed PC software in the wild. Online there's plenty of software you can buy for it.
2) Humble Bundle. But that said, I game on PC a lot less than I used to, the Windows only policy of a lot of PC game developers drove me to console gaming.
3) Which decade did you last use Linux? I don't think I've even got emacs installed.
4) Given the tone of your post, I'm not surprised, but in my experience that's inaccurate.
5) Gibberish.

Re:'cause it's better

[metacell]

No, it's not the same. Until Windows Vista, the vast majority of users were logged in on accounts with full Administrator priveleges on their local computers. That made it much easier for small security loopholes to escalate into big security loopholes when a user ran a program or visited a web site they shouldn't have. Even on Windows Vista, users tended to turn off the security features because they were badly designed and too cumbersome. And remember that the decade-old Windows XP is still the most widely used Microsoft OS (unless it's been overtaken in the last year).

Also, until around the turn of the millenium, Microsoft didn't believe in the Internet. It may sound ludicrous today, but Microsoft claimed the Internet's popularity wouldn't last, and instead pushed their own proprietary online service, Microsoft Network, which, back then, was similar to America Online. Microsoft products were adapted to a LAN environment, not an Internet environment, so their security was seriously lagging behind, and it took many years for them to catch up.

Internet Explorer has also historically had much more security problems than the most popular browsers on competing operating systems (Safari, Firefox, Chrome, etc).

Saying that Windows OSes get more viruses because they're more widely used is only part of the answer.

some reasons

[e**(i pi)-1]

I use linux as my main work platform since 15 years. Here are a few reasons why I still use a mac. Here are the tools, I use regularly where I did not find analogues.

• dead simple and robust video editing with quicktime pro (copy paste) which is able to read and export in essentially any format
• screen recording which allows to archive any video which is visible on the screen.
• pages, to quickly make a flyer, syllabus which looks great.
• garage band which just works and does not need to be learned because one can just plug into the epiano and work.
• PDF manipulation: preview is a fantastic tool to rearrange, copy paste pages in PDF files. Nothing like this exists. I use Adobe professional to reduce the size of PDF files (especially from scanned books). Most of the time the space reduction is a factor of 10.
• Scanning: with a Fujitsu scanner, I can get a digital version of a book (cut the spine and throw it into the scanner, push one button). The result is a perfectly OCRd PDF file. No hassels, no time waste. Nothing like this seems to exist on linux.
• presentation software. The simplicity and robustness of keynote is fantastic, especially if you want to play embedded videos.
• digitizing DVD's. With handbreak, it is trivial to get a nice video file from a DVD. Throw in the DVD, push a button and wait.
• Backup. I even use time machine to backup some linux directories. Sync them over to the mac, where things are archived nicely.
• hardware: since a couple of years it is virtually impossible to get reasonably prized displays. The imac has 2560x1440. Almost all monitors one can buy now have only ridiculous 1920x1080. Even the ipad has with 2048x1536 pixels twice as many. Also the macbook air is unmatched.

Why do I use linux then?

• Have complete control about the machine
• Have a second leg just in case.
• Not to be dependent on a vendor, who might just one day decide to discontinue with operating systems because it is not profitable. (I do not believe that to happen with the Mac, but I had been burned several times in my life, like with Next). This is not going to happen to me again.
• Have a fast machine. Lag and delays (even fractions of seconds) drive me nuts. Linux allows me to customize my machine so that this never ever happens. Its like going with a racing car. I use a minimal windows manager (blackbox) and disable anything which is not needed, and also regularly buy a decent new CPU. On the mac, especially with "versions", things can become frustrating. open a document for a moment, then close preview, delete the document, then open preview. The program tries to find the old document and blocks the machine. An operating system never should slow down the user.
• Fun. I like to tune things but do not like to do too much sysadmin. Typically, I do not have to do anything once things are running.

Attraction vs. Promotion

[Lorien_the_first_one]

I use Linux because I find it very attractive. Sure, there are problems I encounter but I'm committed to working through them. That's how I learn how computers work and I have learned more about how computers work with Linux than I ever have with Windows. I simply cannot imagine myself going back to jail with Windows or Mac. For me, Linux is the Swiss Army Knife of computing. Anything I want to do, I can do it with Linux faster than I can with Mac or Windows.

For those who want to use Windows or Mac? They're not attracted to Linux for their own reasons so I let them be. They're paying for the subsidy I got on my computer, which has a Windows license. Since they're spending their own money, they have a right to their choice and I support that. I even offer support to fix their computer when they need help, for a reasonable fee. But if they want to convert to Linux with a little boost to get them started, I do that for free.

When i got my last computer, I imaged the hard drive, and put the image away (making Windows installation CDs is very slow compared to a quick image of the drive). Then I proceeded to install the distribution of my choice and I've been happy ever since. I've been on Linux exclusively at home for almost 5 years and I have no plans to go back to Windows, nor do I see a need to sell Linux. If people want what I have, I help them get it. If not, they always have Windows or Mac to use. It's their choice.

I would prefer the use of Linux to grow by attraction rather than promotion.

Z-series mainframe as a desktop?

[F69631]

OS/2 has gone away; Linux hasn't. But, even today, Windows 7 is no particular match for Linux. Does Windows run on Z-series mainframes? Sparc? Anything other than x86? Big-endian? Embedded? With how much compatibility?

The discussion is about desktops so pretty much none of that is relevant... Or maybe there is relevance that you didn't elaborate enough and I'm just not getting? I don't think that anyone here denies that Linux is superior to Windows in that kind of specialized systems but that's just not important in this context.

Re:Nope, fewer viruses because Linux is harder

[Gaygirlie]

There are as many or more Linux desktops than Mac ones

I really doubt that.

then Apache would be the most virus laden product in the world, as opposed to Windows with that "honour".

You're comparing apples and oranges; Apache is a web server, Windows is an OS. Compare Linux to Windows and Apache to IIS.

But you can STILL get a drive-by virus even with the latest, most secure, most up-to-date Windows OS. You don't have to do anything other than connect to the internet.

Don't try to spread lies, that hasn't been true for a good while now. That was true with XP, yes, not now. And heck, even with XP that was no longer true after SP2 which enabled firewall by default.

RMS said it best

[brad-x]

In a recent interview with an Iranian Linux publication, RMS had this to say about the very issue addressed here - it's an opinion I share.

"LR: What's the best way to advocate Free Software? Some Free Software users engage in technical debates with Microsoft and Apple fans, trying to convince them GNU/Linux is more powerful. Another group focus on philosophical and cultural aspects of Free Software and try to make people care about their freedom. Which of the two mentioned approaches are more effective?

RMS: They are both "effective" but they lead to different results.

If you convince people that some free software is technically superior, they might run some free software, but they will remain ready to use nonfree software in the areas where that is technically superior. They will continue to judge an important question based on superficial issues. This is just a partial success.

However, if you convince people that they deserve freedom, they will start rejecting nonfree software whether it is technically inferior or technically superior, because they will see that free software is ethically superior. They will understand the important question and judge it right. This is a full, deep success.

Another weakness of technical arguments is that nontechnical people probably won't care about them at all. But they can understand ethical arguments. Ethical arguments are the only way we can convince nontechnical people to become free software supporters.

I figure that users can judge for themselves whether program A is more convenient than program B. So I don't try to convince them about that sort of question, except when someone has preconceptions about free software and has not tried it. I focus on talking about freedom. "

Re:RMS said it best

[anyaristow]

However, if you convince people that they deserve freedom, they will start rejecting nonfree software whether it is technically inferior or technically superior, because they will see that free software is ethically superior.

Blowing a mod point to say this is a geek pipe dream. Normal people don't give a rat's ass about geek dogma.

Re:RMS said it best

[lennier]

His use of the word "ethical" is troublesome. I think I understand what he means, but I guarantee that many people will interpret it as meaning that they are "unethical" if they don't run free software. I don't think that is what is intended (I might be wrong, I suppose). As a movement geared to *help* the user, using software that isn't free is unfortunate, but hardly unethical.

Not quite, I think.

If I understand RMS's position - his words make perfect sense to me as written, but it's possible I haven't parsed him correctly, so bear in mind I am talking about my own interpretation of his position - he's thinking about something much more deep and subtle than merely "helping the user". From his perspective, merely "getting stuff done" today is a very, very shallow consideration that doesn't really even rate on the evolutionary scale. He's talking about the long-term future of humanity, and he's very deeply worried about the issue that we are creating automated systems which we don't have full control over. A similar level of thinking comes from say, Ray Kurzweil, Ted Nelson, and Danny Hillis.

In the 1930s-1980, this kind of thinking was common. Computers were still new and strange, and there were many valid, deep worries about the future of automation, and they usually revolved around "when we build killer robots, or giant universal computer systems, will we forget to put in an OFF switch?" . But the problem today has morphed a little: now it's not a matter of "can we turn the systems off", but "WHO gets to control the systems?" And the answer today is still very concerning: more and more it is coming back as "not you, and you probably can't even find out who."

These are not small issues, they are very much ethical rather than commercial or even comforting, and may indeed be seen as off-putting or confrontational to everyday computer users. Since the mass adoption of home computing in the 1980s our generation has have grown up with the shiny humming beige boxes, so we tend to think we both understand and can control them. And that we still do have an "off" switch. But we don't, necessarily, anymore. We would be wrong to blindly assume there is no danger, or that an ethical analysis of computing is either irrelevant or wrong.

That's why I think RMS means literally the word "ethical", and means it seriously. He does indeed think it is as unethical, in an absolute sense, to use non-free software as an anti-nuclear-weapons compaigner might think it is unethical to pay taxes which support the development of nuclear weapons - in both cases, one is materially contributing to the development of technology which might literally enslave or destroy the human race in the future. You might not feel comfortable believing or accepting this, you might not want to be "blamed" or "made to feel guilty" - but the issue is nothing to do with your feelings or your comfort. We are all either creating the instruments of our destruction, or of our freedom, and the universe doesn't care how we feel about our part in that. It merely offers us the choice.

I feel that RMS is correct, yet I know that by his (and my own) standards I too am unethical, because I am still contributing to the nonfree-software machine. I run Windows as well as Linux, and I don't yet see how to stop. And my taxes indirectly do support the military state, so I'm unethical on that scale too. And I still buy non-organic food, and use global warming, rapidly depleting oil. But even if I don't know yet how to become 100% ethical, at least understanding that some of my current actions are unethical must be a step forward from pretending that all possible actions are equally ethically irrelevant.

Does that help?

Wait wait wait

[ifwm]

If you get all panty-bunched about they have to be open, then you're just as bad as Apple is with their locked-down-only stuff.

So, if I insist on using a driver that is free and open, that's as bad as "locked-down" Apple hardware? How much crack have you smoked to think that makes sense?

Re:Wait wait wait

[jythie]

The person has a point. Both cases are attempting to force a manufacturer to play by the OS developer's rules rather then their own. People tend to forget that forcing people to open up is still forcing, the fact that it benefits them personally does not change this.

Re:Wait wait wait

[gbjbaanb]

yep, that's pretty much what I'm getting at. Just because you insist on one extreme over the other (and therefore claim your view is good, while the opposing view is evil), the reality is that they're both extreme positions that attempt to impose your ideals on someone else.

Sure, I like OSS, but there is still the argument that a closed environment allows a company more freedom (internally) to produce better products knowing that they can make more money from it, thus encouraging them to do so.

The graphics driver issue is one anomaly in the OSS world though, I agree OSS is better than closed, but I'm quite happy to use a proprietary driver for a gfx card as I need to buy that card and the driver only works with that card. So it doesn't matter if its free and open or not. When I buy a new card, I expect the best driver there is to work with it, regardless of openness.
If this means I have to 'suffer' a closed driver, then that makes no difference to me. It definitely makes a difference to me if the only driver available is poor though.

Hence my position that the "only open" view is just as extreme as the "everything closed" view.

Re:Easy

[kantos]

1 - POSIX. If you want to develop for POSIX, Linux supports this out of the box.

As a developer that is precisely the problem, the only consistent API in Linux is POSIX, and compared to say... WIN32 Core (minwin) that's fine. But as MinWin is essentially just Linux with Busy-box running on it, you have POSIX and nothing else. But as a developer to justify developing for Linux I need a set of rich distribution independent API's that are universal across the entirety of GNU/Linux, and not specific to a particular build of a particular distribution. Without that I'm left chasing distro install numbers to justify what I'm going to develop for or I have to trust that some downstream developer isn't going to screw up my code (See the Debian OpenSSL incident).

So what am I saying? I'm saying that very choice and customization that makes Linux the OS that so many love and cherish is what is preventing desktop development outside the tightly coupled applications that come with the various shells. Fundamentally I don't think that is an issue that can be addressed. Perhaps each shell could agree to make a subsystem to allow their apps to run on the other... (much like QuickTime allows Itunes on Windows) but that would require a lot of development for little payoff so I don't see it happening.

It's not about marketing

[grumbel]

What Linux needs isn't marketing, what it needs is to become the better product. Back in the Windows98 days one could make some good arguments for Linux in terms of stability, security and such, but those days are long gone and Microsoft and Apples OS offerings are just as stable as your Linux box these days, if not even more so. Which doesn't leave much arguments for Linux on the desktop. In terms of usability it's a complete clusterfuck, the user interfaces are an inconsistent non-backward compatible mess (we used to complain about QT looking different then GTK, now GTK3 apps don't even look like GTK2 apps), the packaging formats are all incompatible (even if everything uses .deb, it's still all incompatible) and there still isn't a standard way to ship third party applications on Linux. The fact that it is all Free Software is essentially irrelevant as it rarely povides the user with any pratical benefits over a proprietary alternative (data formats from one app can't be handled by another, etc.). Security is also rather terrible for a desktop OS, as it provides little to no sandboxing for applications, thus making it risky to try third party applications.

In essence, stop complaining about lack of games, hardware suport or third party support. While those are holding Linux back, they are in large part simply the result of the underlying framework being rather shit. If it would be trivial to build and distribute Linux software, a lot more people might actually do so, but it's not, so the support overhead is rarely worth the effort.

Why? I have reasons...

[Lumpy]

Here are the reasons why my non techie wife loves linux over windows.

1 - her computer just works. I dont need to take it and work on it for a weekend here and there. it Just works all the time.
2 - backups and upgrades lose nothing at all. When I do a complete OS upgrade most of the time she never notices. Only the last Ubuntu change to the Unity desktop has she noticed that it is different. All her app settings and even the desktop wallpaper is effortless to backup and restore.
3 - effortless free software. She installs a lot of her own software from the computer on her own. Apple recently did this as well and it is the future for the typical user.

4 - No viruses. And yes this is a fact contrary to all you fanbois. She cant get any of the viruses or trojan horses and spyware that all her friends seem to get weekly on their windows machines. IT just does not happen.

Drawbacks she does not like.

Cant use itunes. This has become a moot point with icloud and her iphone and ipad. she could care less about itunes anymore.
Print spooler still get's finicky at times. Honestly the linux print spooler is great until a printer screws up. For some reason still to this day the linux print spooler does not recover on it's own gracefully. I still have to re start the print spooler to get it to flush the waiting jobs. But we have had no problems at all with printers. In fact the brand new HP color laser we just bought was EASIER to install on her linux box than it was on the Windows 7 machine I have. Yes, Linux is EASIER to install hardware than Windows 7.

Once in a while she complains that she cant install some cupon printer, until I point out that that "printer" is a trojan horse that causes many of the issues her friends have.

She is a light user. Internet, and College masters classes. She understands that professors are not bright demanding "MS WORD ONLY" and turns in Libre office documents saved as word all the time and is acing her classes and never has had any complaints. This is her 5th year using linux for home and School. And yes she plays all those damned games on facebook without problems.

Linux = zero problems desktop for free. You cant get that for a home PC vwithout paying for Apple hardware.

And yes, we used her linux laptop for taxes this year.

Are you sure it's the marketing?

[Kjella]

I switched to Linux full time in 2007 after dabbling with it on and off since around 1999, I switched back to Win7 in 2011 after three and a half years and it wasn't because of Microsoft's marketing message. The reasons were complicated but one of them was that very often I got dragged into problems I didn't want. For example one classic was that I discover a new feature in an application I want. Is that version in my distro? No. Can I find a backport? No. Okay but I can upgrade my distro. Oh, new version has regressions. Oh, upgrade is buggy but problem goes away if I do a clean install - it's the "Why should you reinstall every 6 months" for Linux. One of the great reliefs I've had on Windows is that I can install the latest version and it won't end up hosing the base system.

Without further ado I'll just state the next one simply: There's quite a few Windows applications that either have no counterpart in Linux, lacks features, is buggy or user-unfriendly and WINE/VirtualBox is not always a solution - in particular WINE constantly needs tweaks and has regressions. Saying "you got what you paid for" makes it sound like you had a choice when there is no choice to pay for commercial software, it's either find some way to live with it or ditch Linux altogether. There's many times I wish I could have put down $20 or $50 or $100 for a Linux port and not deal with the OSS abomination. The "all or nothing" approach tends to make people choose nothing, particularly since a lot of good OSS runs on Windows too.

The only part I really miss in Windows is some kind of application update center, where software could register URLs to check for upgrades so you could do it all at once instead of every app running their own updater, not from mostly one repository like on Linux but still centrally managed. Overall though I can't really say I've missed Linux, it's okay enough if Windows turns to shit but it's not a very compelling value even though the cost is very low. But since some now live in the browser I suspect they'll be happy with Facebook, Facebook Chat, Webmail, YouTube etc. and the actual platform is irrelevant. OTOH "switch to Linux, you won't notice the difference" isn't that good a selling point...

Suggest the correct tool for the task

[arikol]

When suggesting a computer or an OS thens listen to what the person wants to do and suggest a system that supports that.

Liking a certain ideology is fine, but that can't blind us to the real world. If I can't complete the task I want/need to complete then that system is useless.
That means that Linux is useless for gaming, has limited CAD capabilities (the main programs are not available), lacks good audio recording/mixing options (lacks the professional applications, although Reaper has fixed this somewhat), and doesn't have many big games. Linux is insanely flexible, but needs technical know-how if any real changes are to be made.
Mac lacks games (those that are released are always behind the Win versions), costs more to begin with, and has lacked CAD software (that is improving right now), but is easier to use and comes with a good default setup.
Windows has an amazing selection of software in almost all classes, but has usability issues, needs more maintenance than a Mac or a well set up Linux machine, malware issues etc. and a worse setup out of the box (and I can back that up with empirical data)

So, for the engineer or CAD student, gamer, or business software user, suggest Windows.
For the casual gamer who needs to work with graphics, text, or sound, then Mac is easiest
And for anyone who is willing to put in time to learn their tools, or wants to play around with systems, Linux. Cheap home media centre? Linux FTW!

All have their pros and cons. Select (and suggest) what fits the user, not yourself..(of course, if you have to provide support then factor in your ease with whatever OS it is. But if you're comfortable with Linux then you can figure the others out...)

Emperor's New Clothes Day again?!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Get real. So what if it's free? Support is terrible and most products aren't accessible if you're not familiar with the programming environment enough to compile source code. People want to USE their computers, not tinker and brag about them.

Also, as if it hasn't been said a thousand times, no gaming worth talking about.

It's easier for the REAL tech support

[Dr. Manhattan]

My 80-yr-old mother uses Linux.

This.

I have my parents on Linux. They used to use Windows, but I got them on Firefox and Thunderbird, and then switching them over was easy. Now when we come over for dinner, I'm not spending half an hour or more cleaning out malware and untangling registry cruft and so on. If they have a problem when I'm not around, I can SSH in and tweak it.

In the real world, most people don't know how to administer a computer, be it Windows or Linux or even Mac. So they get their brother or sister or kids or their friend who's "good with computers" to support them. (My wife got me a t-shirt to wear to family reunions that says, "No, I will not fix your computer.") So if you're going to be supporting someone's computer, shouldn't it be a system that's easier to support?

Ignores one obvious fact

[Dcnjoe60]

The summary ignores one obvious fact. BSD has done quite well on the desktop. It's called OS X. And while BSD is not Linux, it shows that the problem is not OS specific.

  What keeps Linux from repeating that success is that there isn't a large sponsor of it in the PC industry and Microsoft doesn't release Office for it.

what made me give up desktop Linux

[smash]

As a former Linux or BSD on desktop user, I gave up a few years ago. I'll still check out Linux or FreeBSD on the desktop from time to time (PC-BSD looks pretty good actually), but it's just too inconvenient.

Why? At work, we're a windows shop, by necessity. We have a large number of custom applications that will cost multiple millions of dollars, and significant risk to migrate. So work is out. At home? Well, most PC hardware sucks, i'm mostly a laptop user now and Apple make the nicest portable machines.

Given that I'm going to run a Macbook, well, OS X just works fine for me for the vast majority of what I do. In fact, I can't think of anything I want to do at home that I can't do quicker and easier on the mac than I can with Linux - I have bash, csh, or whatever other shell there if I need it. I have Python, Perl, Java and a C compiler. I also have some awesome development frameworks.

Essentially, OS X can do anything for me on the desktop, better than Linux, so I see no need to ditch OS X. in fact, there are apps on OS X that I vastly prefer to anything I've seen on Linux. Such as time machine and mission control. There are apps that are not available at all for Linux, such as Ableton Live. And if I really, desperately need Linux, I can virtualize it anyway. Linux can't legally virtualize OS X.

The "win" from running Linux just isn't there any more. Windows got stable, and OS X is Unix with commercial support and a nice UI. Also, despite what many would have you believe, if you ignore paper spec and just want a decent machine that works, apple is not super expensive. I'm old enough and have been around long enough to not CARE if some other machine is .2ghz faster or has RAM that runs at 1600mhz instead of 1333 or whatever. In real life practical use it makes very little difference - the major gains are when you step from one generation of CPU/bus to another, within a generation its much of a muchness. More important to me is the quality of the display and user input devices/software - and OS X multi-touch is the best interface out there, IMHO.

Sure, I can customize the shit out of a Unix desktop environment, but you know what? Since KDE3 bit the dust, I haven't seen one I actually like. No matter how pretty it is, compared to the OS X GUI, which is at least stable and fairly consistent, the Unix desktop is lacking. It is too disjointed, too clunky and lately, too fucking unstable. I like Windowmaker, but the rest of the apps to turn it into a proper implementation of OpenSTEP just aren't there, and are too much fucking around to get working anyway, as no distribution seems to give a shit about GNUSTEP, and are all fawning over Gnome or KDE and their latest hair-brained idea of the month.

So, in short: home desktop = OS X. Work = Windows (with a few BSD machines doing stuff I REALLY don't trust windows to handle). Home servers = FreeBSD. Desktop Linux just doesn't offer me anything significant, given that I'm already buying apple hardware because they make nice laptop hardware (even Linus thinks so). And because it doesn't offer me anything significant, and I already have an OS X license, I can't be bothered putting up with the shit you need to go through (drivers, lack of software like Ableton, etc) to use it.

And that's before I even get into the political games being played over stuff like h.264, linking to binary drivers, etc. As an end user with money, I don't care about your political ideals. I want an OS that works, and am prepared to pay for it. This is why I run free Unix (FreeBSD or Linux) where it works well, and don't run it on my desktop :)

Re:Don't require the user to think

[gtall]

Customer conversation with HP:

Customer: Hi there, I need a new computer.

HP: What does it need to do?

Customer: Well, I need it to run MS Office mainly.

HP: Okay, here's one, it runs Windows and hence will run MS Office.

Customer: Thank you.

Why I think it can't make it for normal users

[C_Kode]

The sound system blows. It's terrible and has so many issues. They created Pulse to fix it, but Pulse is a train-wreck too.

X is horrible. Hopefully Wayland will fix it.

Not all Linux are the same. Debian clones / Redhat clones. Several of their functions (start up / update) are different. That will just confuse people. Yeah there are others, but only these two are actually feasible due to how wide spread they are.

Ubuntu IMO is doing a great job with the desktop, but the first two things on my list must be fixed.

Linux's hurdles are different from Windows

[unixisc]

There are 2 answers to this one:

• The risk factor - the fact that for the users existing hardware, a Linux driver may not exist, or that future hardware that intrigues him may not have a Linux driver. More often than not, they'd have to buy more expensive hardware to be ensured of its support. In other words, Linux may be free or cheap, but the things that would support it or work well w/ it ain't, like sound. Also, if the networking doesn't work, the user is SOL, since s/he can't even download the correct drivers.
• The choice ceiling - if someone is going there from Windows, then one has to make sacrifices during the move - it's like when one moves from a bigger house to an apartment. Few software titles in Windows have Linux counterparts. So it only makes sense if one knows what one wants to do under Linux, make a list of what one needs, and then go w/ it, knowing fully well that that fantastic game just released will probably not run under it

I think Linux could be more successful if computer vendors bundled complete Linux solutions w/ their systems. Something like say a laptop or netbook preloaded w/ Linux, along w/ things like printer, wi-fi and so on, working right out of the box. But Linux needs to have as complete a driver model as Windows. Right now, since Windows is the default, if a peripheral doesn't work under Windows, its manufacturer knows that they have a problem. But if it doesn't work under Linux, it doesn't apply, since a manufacturer can credibly claim that they never claimed to support Linux.

The other aspect is the risk factor for any PC vendor who might preload a PC w/ Linux and sell it. Problem being that if the customer buys something else to work w/ that PC, be it a new printer, stereo speaker or so on, and it doesn't work w/ the Linux PC, while it's not a problem for the vendor, the result is an unhappy customer. With Windows, this is never an issue, for what I said above, but for Linux, it very well is. That's why Apple limits what they claim will work w/ it, and explicitly tell their customers to buy only their stuff if they want it to work. Which PC manufacturer can do that, unless we have a re-incarnation of Sun or SGI?

As a result, if a vendor decides to sell Linux, they inherit all the problems that come along w/ it. While Windows support is provided by PC vendors such as Dell, there is an organized chain of command to go to, if it doesn't work. Here, even if one ignores the gazillion distros, the fact remains that support for Linux when things don't work is limited, which is why the scalability is just not there. As a result, Linux continues to be a case of pull rather than push marketing.

Re:Linux's hurdles are different from Windows

[Oswald McWeany]

Problem being that if the customer buys something else to work w/ that PC, be it a new printer, stereo speaker or so on, and it doesn't work w/ the Linux PC, while it's not a problem for the vendor, the result is an unhappy customer. With Windows, this is never an issue

Whereas I agree with most of what you said- the above quote I don't. Windows Vista is an example of that. I "upgraded" to Vista and none of my peripherals worked. I didn't blame the vendor- I blamed Microsoft.

It is possible Windows could do "another Vista" with Windows 8. Granted most hardware these days does get tested for compatibility with Windows- and usually gets "approved" for them- this doesn't always happen with Linux.

Re:Linux's hurdles are different from Windows

[wierd_w]

The fundemental problem with drivers on linux (which I do use at home as a desktop) is that there is a decided conflict between hardware vendors and the linux kernel developers.

The linux kernel philosphy is that you are open, straight forward about what your hardware does, what resources it needs, and how to access it.

The hardware vendor philosophy is that you keep all of that secret, create a potentially encrypted or obfuscated blob driver that hooks documented interfaces, loads special proprietary magic code into itself on init, or some other "clever" thing to frustrate people emulating or counterfieting their product, and refusing to budge from it.

The linux devs say "we won't let you make binary blobs, damnit! Not only is that against our project's development model, it is also a violation of our software license! Doing this makes it so we cannot distribute our software legally if you don't comply! To frustrate you and keep you from doing that shit, we will PURPOSEFULLY change our binary ABI for kernel mode drivers on every release, to force you to work yourself to death trying to catch up, until you see the light and just fucking release the driver source already!

The hardware vendors say "if that's the way you want to play, we will go over to microsoft's place. They know the value of a good stable ABI, and the importance of keeping secrets. They also have the lion's share of users, so you linux dweebs can go fuck yourselves. You will take binary blobs and like it, or you can go play somehwere else!"

A small handfull of hardware OEMs "get it", and see how opening their surce code for the linux market, especially in server hardware circles, can firmly cement them as a desirable brand name for hardware that "just fucking works!", like IBM and pals, but for the most part, it is the former, which causes the linux user community (since the line between linux developer and linux user is purposefully blurred by design) have to reverse engineer all the behaviors, quirks, requirements, and secrets of the "oh so secret!" Mainstream devices in order for them to work. Since the users doing this are basically trying to reinvent the wheel with that hardware, they can and often do get things wrong in their reversed driver implementations, and screwy things happen as a result.

Sometimes hardware makers purposefully try to thwart such reverse engineering, like fucking broadcomm. Their wireless chipsets have to pull a secret binary INTO special memory inside themselves from the driver stack in order to turn on. These binaries are signed, and copyrighted. The card won't accept binaries that aren't blessed with the magic number. As such, you have to cheat and use fwcutter to rip the magic blob out of a windows driver, or load the windows driver fully using ndiswrapper.

Either that, or spend a few centuries trying to derive the magic key, by which time nobody will care anyway.

Unless linux reniggs on the open driver requirements (at which point, how is linux different from any other kernel again?), or the hardware companies stop being little bridge trolls (there are some signs on the horizon that show that they might be slowly coming around. A major offender, nvidia, recently said they would start contributing to nouveau, the reverse engineered community driver for their cards. High profile OEMs changing policies and embracing the linux model will only improve adoption, and we can hope more follow nvidia's lead on that), then linux will never have the same direct to market hardware compatibility as windows boxes do.

It's just the sad truth.

Re:Don't require the user to think

[omglolbah]

Either HP or Dell did sell machines with linux installed for a while. I know.. because a friend of mine bought one..

It took less than a week for her to return it for a windows machine...

* No fullscreen flash video playback
* Every time she opened a video in the default video player she would get a font error message.
* Several websites she used would not work properly due to a java issue.. Following the usual directions to get it fixed did not work.

The list goes on. While most 'geeks' can figure this all out, to someone who does not know the command line it can be quite challenging..
For 'security' they also disabled sshd on the machine so it was annoying as hell to go through the procedure to configure and get that running to even be able to remotely help.

It takes just one such meet with Linux to forever label it "shit" in someone's mind.

While a great idea, the execution is severely lacking in the attempts that have been made :(

Applications Don't Matter Anymore

[echusarcana]

Ten years ago, applications might have mattered. However, OpenOffice (or whatever it is called today) is IMHO superior to Microsoft Office. Gimp and Inkscape are great drawing programs. Casual games tend to be cross-platform while hard-core games don't universally work on Windows anyway - this is what a game platform is for. The printer "just works" without any need for the user to fuss with drivers. The good tax programs are all web-based now. Sharepoint - seriously? - does anyone use that pile of crap? Most importantly, videos and music plays without a fuss. NFS networking actually works all the time, unlike tempermental CIFS. There are no virus worries. And Linux is so much simpler to use than Windows.

We have 5 computers in the house. My household was purged of Windows about 3 years ago and it was the best move I've made. Maintenance is low. No one is complaining, except the Windows users I know that want me to fix their computers.

Windows is still dominant because Microsoft uses its monopoly to force manufacturers to charge for it and preinstall it. End of story.

Re:Applications Don't Matter Anymore

[Ihmhi]

However, OpenOffice (or whatever it is called today) is IMHO superior to Microsoft Office.

OO (and the much better LibreOffice, which is what they're calling the good one these days) are very solid but lacking in more than a few features compared to Office. They're not necessarily essential features, but a lot of it is useful stuff. I would strongly disagree with them being called "superior" - I'd say they're more "adequate" than anything else.

Gimp and Inkscape are great drawing programs.

But neither of them stack up to Photoshop in features, speed, or usability.

Casual games tend to be cross-platform

Yes.

while hard-core games don't universally work on Windows anyway - this is what a game platform is for.

No. That stopped being the case years ago. A low to medium end PC will be able to run most games nowadays pretty decently, barring extreme stuff like Crysis.

Re:Applications Don't Matter Anymore

[Moryath]

Ten years ago, applications might have mattered.
They still do.

However, OpenOffice (or whatever it is called today) is IMHO superior to Microsoft Office.
That's fine for your opinion. Unfortunately, your opinion is solidly in the minority and you need to do more than just scream "IMHO THIS IS SUPERIOR" to get people to switch. WHY is it superior? WHAT makes it a better, more user-friendly program? WHAT can it do that MS Office can't?

Gimp and Inkscape are great drawing programs.
Great. I can run GIMP on Windows just fine. I can also use Paint.Net. Or any of a number of other programs. Including, if I care to shell out $50, Adobe Photoshop Elements.

Casual games tend to be cross-platform while hard-core games don't universally work on Windows anyway - this is what a game platform is for.
Actually, Windows is the platform to target for hardcore games, they don't target OSX.

The printer "just works" without any need for the user to fuss with drivers.
Until it doesn't, and then you're up shit creek without a paddle, likely to find some Linuxite telling you "STFU Noob, ur printerz not supprted, go buy a diffrent printer nstead."

The good tax programs are all web-based now.
Sure, until you get into filing anything more than the 1040EZ.

Sharepoint - seriously? - does anyone use that pile of crap?
You're not going to get people to switch to your alternative - wait, what was your alternative anyways? - just by calling their current solution a "pile of crap."

Most importantly, videos and music plays without a fuss.
Some of the time, other times not. Which is a lot like OSX and Windows come to think of it. Best experience I've had with video is running Windows with VLC 2.0.1 installed.

NFS networking actually works all the time, unlike tempermental CIFS.
Right until you try to interact with OSX or Windows boxes.

There are no virus worries.
Because so few people on the planet use Linux as their desktop that no sane virus writer would even bother. Get yourself any appreciable market share and watch that change in a nanosecond.

And Linux is so much simpler to use than Windows.
Bullshit.

Re:Applications Don't Matter Anymore

[Kurt Granroth]

The good tax programs are all web-based now.

Sure, until you get into filing anything more than the 1040EZ.

This isn't accurate. Web-based tax apps are now easily as full featured as their desktop variants. I've used TaxCut Online for some years, now, and have been able to do so relatively complex returns that way (investments, small business employer, etc).

Re:Applications Don't Matter Anymore

[apcullen]

However, OpenOffice (or whatever it is called today) is IMHO superior to Microsoft Office. That's fine for your opinion. Unfortunately, your opinion is solidly in the minority and you need to do more than just scream "IMHO THIS IS SUPERIOR" to get people to switch. WHY is it superior? WHAT makes it a better, more user-friendly program? WHAT can it do that MS Office can't?

It doesn't have THE FREAKIN' ANNOYING RIBBON BAR!!!
This makes it superior for me. And to counter your argument, I'm still looking for the feature or features that Office has that Libre Office lacks. I do a lot of documentation at work, where office is the rule, and I frequently work on them at home using Libre Office on Linux without any issues.

Re:Applications Don't Matter Anymore

[Daniel Phillips]

OO (and the much better LibreOffice, which is what they're calling the good one these days) are very solid but lacking in more than a few features compared to Office. They're not necessarily essential features, but a lot of it is useful stuff. I would strongly disagree with them being called "superior"

Libreoffice has some features Microsoft Office does not have: stability and compabilitity. I would also argue that Libreoffice has better usability, having used both of them quite a lot the couple of years. For example, I just hate the way Ctrl-C/V/X works in Excel. It actually does what you expect in Libre/Openoffice. I would not say that Libreoffice has a huge lead of Microsoft Office overall, but it has a lead, and the lead will widen. Some specific feature you're hurting for... did you try Googling to see when its scheduled to arrive in Libreoffice? I just don't run into such reatures myself.

Linux community needs to show more newb support!

[mc4bbs]

PUSH & SHOVE: People resist change -- they become comfortable with what they know, so they are not seen as idiots. Even with Microsoft, there is strong resistance to 'upgrade' from one version to the next without some serious pay-off or pushing. (i.e. "if you want to run 'game x', you must on Windows 9", or "if you want support from us, you must be running on Windows 8 or better").

LOOK HOW EASY IT IS: People want true plug-and-play. Will Linux support all their USB devices? Software? Printer? Scanner? They want assurances! Perhaps if there were a simple install for Windows/Linux dual-boot system where changing environments was as easy as changing a T.V. channel. In this case, the Linux environment should be defined to access their Windows 'my documents' directory and have the look and feel of Windows.

YOU WANT REAL SUPPORT? YOU GOT IT!: People want a support structure that does not belittle them. How many times have you seen a UNIX PRO depicted on television and silver screen alike as an overweight social reject that compensates their lack of social skills by "talking down to" or insulting newbs? I clearly remember the early usenet and IRC days when anyone new was considered fresh meat for the kill. I know that's not what it's always like, but that's the impression the general public gets.

MADGE, YOU'RE SOAKING IN IT!: A public awareness campaign that shows your android smartphone, tablet and other devices are ALREADY RUNNING on Linux might allow someone to look closer. Many people don't realize how much of what they do on their computers nowadays is actually online and isn't dependent upon what O/S they're running.

Just my 2 cents on this issue.

Works for me

[OhHellWithIt]

Linux works for me. I've been using it exclusively for home use for about 8 years now. I don't try to "sell" it to other people beyond an occasional nudge because it would be obnoxious in the way that pushing one's religion on others is obnoxious. If someone is interested enough to ask, I'll tell him/her about the benefits I get from it, the same way I would if asked about my religion. But it's a personal choice.

I frankly am tired of these "Linux desktop is dead" trolls. The user base seems to be growing, and aside from the travesty that occurred with the introduction of Gnome 3, it's getting better and better.

There are onyl two good reasons:

[scorp1us]

1. Safer web browsing.
2. UPDATES! A unified system updater exists. No more having a Java updater, an AIR updater, and various other updaters. It's all in one place! This seems small but it's huge to a noob that is bombarded with updates to install on what seems like a daily basis these days.

Re:first post

[e70838]

Hello, I use Linux as my everyday desktop (ubuntu LTS) since 2.5 years. I have switched for many reasons (missing drivers on Vista64, openoffice and chrome identical on Linux, I know unix, religion, ...).
My return of experience is that Linux works fine enough for usage, but there are many strange "feelings".
- It is strange to not always be installing software found on internet, deinstalling them because they are crap and then having to fix issues related to bad deinstallation.
- On linux, there is no problem to find and install powerfull packages, but there is a step learning curve. The documentation is either not up to date, incomplete, not existant or does not go beyond basic stuff. On windows, I complain about bad software, on linux, I complain about my ignorance and the lack of time to learn. This is not good for self estim.
- There is a feeling of loneliness. There is almost nobody I can ask when I have a question. Sometimes, I find a question on internet about a problem I have already encountered and solved. But once a problem is solved, it never occur again. I do not remember exactly how I did solve it. I can almost not help. Maybe I should search for a LUG to share my experiences. I have nothing to discuss with people having windows problems.

The main positive points that balance these negative feelings are:
- that my disks are far easier to backup because of the clear separation of data and programs. It is trivial to mount backup images, rip DVD....
- I can access my computer from anywhere (if it is on). I would like to setup the wake on lan, but I have not found clear documentation
- My computer is as fast as 3 years ago, I have no need to change.

For me, the main problem of Linux usage is that there are too few of us.

Before Linux, the CLI was for getting work done.

[aussersterne]

You know, sh, csh, sed, awk, perl, etc. etc. etc. The entirety of the Unix System V Bible that I used to have laying around on my shelf in the old days is not about "tinkering," but about *working*.

It is only once Linux comes along that an OS becomes a tinkertoy and a CLI the interface to this form of play.

I use the CLI regularly on my Mac for a lot of heavy lifting. But you're right, when I was running Linux, I used the CLI mostly for tweaking stuff to try to get it to work better ("work 100%" always seemed out of reach). To my eye, in retrospect, this is an endictment of Linux, not an ad for it, and says a lot about the relative "can get work done now" vs. "still working to make it work now" balances in both systems.

Simple - THERE ARE NO APPLICATIONS

[terjeber]

Despite what a lot of /.ers seem to think, people do not buy computers to run operating systems. They don't even buy them to run applications. People buy computers to do stuff. For private users, what people do is: read email, browse the web, manage their pictures and movies, do some occasional word processing, maintain a few lists database style in Excel. So, for personal use Linux needs: email reader (check), web browser (check), software to manage, manipulate photos (sorry, nothing out there compared to Windows offerings), something to manage and do some edits to movies (sorry, nothing out there for a Linux casual user), a word processing software that works like Word (nothing really, Open Office is a Yugo to the Microsoft Audi, and who wants to struggle with a Yugo), spradsheet software (again, Excel is what people wants - not necessarily needs - and Open Office simply isn't polished enough).

Now, at this point we have not even touched upon the absurdity of having multiple desktop alternatives and the insurmountable hazzles that created for a normal user. You know, the kind that doesn't know that you can use Ctrl+F to search a document for text. Oh, and did I mention Cut/Copy/Paste that still has terrible support on Linux. Yes it does. In Eclipse, for example, you try and hope, but quite often it doesn't work as expected.

For IT departments. You need AD and the management tools. They can be hacked together if you are good, but again, on Linux it is a hazzle. To put it mildly.

Re:Simple - THERE ARE NO APPLICATIONS

[crutchy]

if users were to abandon Windows in droves for Linux, Linux would quickly be the target of virus writers

true, but it doesn't mean they would get anywhere

isn't actually inherently more secure than Windows

if microsoft actually used filesystem permissions to protect system files rather than including it as an optional gimmick, and got rid of their stupid click-through privilege escalation dialogs, then maybe, but without those changes, i disagree, and majority of fortune 500 companies would too. there may be millions more windows machines but majority aren't of any value to malware developers for anything other than building botnets for targeting the much more worthy linux targets. history kind of speaks for itself here; windows has an atrocious track record for viruses, and its primary market is consumer and workstations. if a workstation bombs, it can be easily replaced. i think its generally accepted that linux is trusted for servers for good reason.

There is no video editing software for Linux (outside of specialty software)

...that you've heard of. i'm sure if you went digging deep enough you would find something that could do what you needed. of course you won't find any reference to it splashed all over billboards or on tv, and if you already have vested interest (financial, time, effort, etc) in proprietary equivalents there of course isn't much incentive for you to go looking for such free alternative.

top result for google search of "linux video editing" are:
http://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/top5-linux-video-editing-system-software/
you'll also find linux featured prevalently on the wikipedia page for video editing software
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_editing_software

i doubt that you would consider putting as much time and effort into learning a free alternative than you already have learning a proprietary product, because spending money on something offers a fairly good incentive to make the most of it. most people don't appreciate something they get for free as much.

If we don't "understand" the ribbon it is simply because we are obstinate

actually the ribbon is merely for the benefit of new office users. if office is seen as easier to learn than free alternatives, then they will be happier to part with their money for it. users who dispise the ribbon are existing customers who have already paid their money and are stuck with vested interest in microsoft products (having spent years learning microsoft ways). it is also a cash cow for training organisations. many users of microsoft office aren't even aware of the existence of openoffice, but if they were they might find that openoffice suited their needs just fine.

Linux users thinks that users who are unwilling to put up with badly designed user interfaces are "lazy"

this was the funniest part of your reply, because you seem to imply that proprietary windows software interfaces are better designed than those developed by "lazy" linux developers. i actually think that many people (yourself included) have been brainwashed into using poorly developed interfaces for so long that you are simply accustomed to them, and anything different is alien and uncomfortable. linux programs are often used by the people that develop them, and as a software developer who uses his own programs i can assure you that it is very much in my interest to make sure the interface is designed as cleanly and ergonomically as possible for my needs. the big difference is that my needs are of a proficient user, rather than a noob. it would seem that you are an expert in the use of software designed for noobs, and a noob in the use of software designed for experts. how do it