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Android On the Desktop
puddingebola writes "John Morris at CNET offers a brief review of PC Android devices, many of them hybrids running Windows 8 and Android. From the article, 'Microsoft has spent a lot of time and effort trying to get Windows onto smartphones and tablets — so far without a whole lot to show for it. Now several PC companies are trying the opposite approach, taking the Android operating system and porting it to PCs.' The article reviews the recent releases from HP, Acer, Asus, and Samsung. Does Android creeping onto desktop or 'traditional' PC devices have any kind of possible long term consequences? Could this be a way for Android and Google to develop a larger presence in corporate IT, or could Android ever really supplant the Windows foothold?"
The current gnome and kde offerings are so awful I find myself preferring to use my Android phone, despite the tiny screen, awful keyboard, and limited functionality. It's just plain easier to use.
Why? No one is forcing you into using GNOME 3 on Linux. I sure as hell won't touch it and I've been a Linux user since 2006 (maybe a year or two more if you consider dual-boot configurations and my learning period...).
Still trying to find a Linux environment I like. I got by for some years on Fedora 10 and Windows XP, but those have pretty much reached the end of their life. The Mint stuff seems promising; but MATE and XFCE had some bugs, and lacked configurability. I think with maturity these may improve. It's sad when Windows is more configurable and less buggy than Linux. But right now it is true. I lost track of how many Linux distros I've installed in the last year.
That's another point entirely; first GNOME 3 kept you off Linux, now you're saying no desktop on it is good enough. Which one really is it? Either way, I'm pretty sure Windows has its own share of bugs and lacks things the others don't have, so really, it all evens out in the end.
I don't want to have to be a beardy sysadmin just to get a system running and keep it up. I hacked it for years and you know what? I've decided I have better things to do with my sparse free time. I want something that just works, out of the box, without a silly learning curve, without having to use google as a user manual just to do basic stuff that takes one or two clicks on Windows. If I hack I want to do it for fun, not necessity.
I'm not a hacker; hell, I don't even know how to code--and I can run Linux just fine. And maintenance? What maintenance? I have had to do very, very little maintenance on my machines since switching to Linux. No defragging, no regular clean-up to keep the system running fast, no anti-virus/spyware/adware/trojan/worm/you-name-it software to suck up resources and have to keep updated. System update? Just download and burn the latest ISO, nuke the old / partition and install there. When the system is installed, that's about it; it's ready to go with all user settings intact. Maintaining Linux has been a dream compared to Windows.