[Discussion] My thoughts about the usability of Linux
I mostly agree with the sentiment of this video, but it’s highly biased I feel. On a utilitarian level, everything Muta is criticizing about Windows is absolutely valid. But even as a very experienced desktop computer user, as someone who does not have coding experience or any formal education in the technical side of computing, there are parts of Linux that just cause me to get hung up. If you’re someone who likes to customize deeply and change a lot of really small stuff, you run into rocky patches very fast. Now, I agree that almost anything is possible on Linux, but it’s about the amount of effort it sometimes takes.
For the average user, when they want to change some seemingly basic features, things that aren’t in the settings, eventually, one way or another, you have to use commands. You have to use the terminal for something or other. Some dependency, some change that needs a command to activate. And even if all of that is wrong, and you technically CAN change or acquire everything you need without ever opening the terminal, the problem is that a new user is not going to be able to find a simple answer in a few minutes.
Even with the help of AI, it can still take a long time to troubleshoot what may seem like a basic issue. And like it or not, that matters if you’re trying to get people to switch. People, realistically, can’t be expected to always just “shut up and do the research”. Anyone who’s not a techie, or someone with a lot of patience, is going to run out of gas for this troubleshooting very quickly. I wish I had more suggestions about how to actually fix these problems, but I know that for me they are the main reason I can’t permanently switch from Windows at this point. We’re getting closer, but there is a long road still ahead.
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