> System resources ... the requirements are much higher than they need to be
They don't mention the requirements directly because people would laugh them out of the room.
For hardware (aside from the TPM):
1 gigahertz (GHz) or faster with 2 or more cores on a compatible 64-bit processor, 4 gigabytes (GB), 64 GB or larger storage device.
That is "higher than they need to be"? I don't think so. That's the absolute _floor_ and I'm shocked it isn't higher. Windows raising requirements forces hardware vendors to ship something better and for many people who buy the entry-level computer that's a boon.
> Is it finally the year of the Linux desktop?
No, and I don't see that happening anytime soon. I can't take someone seriously if they legitimately think installing Linux Mint is a viable alternative for normal people. If you are reading this you are not normal and neither are any people for which you support a linux install (parents/friends).
At work we have some old computers which entire existence is running a legacy program from back when software didn't have gigs to spare
Those computers efectively have fixed requirements measured in a few megabytes + Whatever Windows needs
This eventually will mean that either those apps get rewriten for no good reason and moved to other platforms, or they get stuck on 'unsupported OS, AirGapped from as much as possible' limbo
Effectively nothing about them changed, they didn't need anything new, the API's didn't change, Microsoft just decided to do the thing
I don’t understand why Microsoft is planning to die on the TPM 2.0 hill. If they actually go through with trying to charge customers $30 for extended support it will be a PR blunder and many won’t pay leaving systems vulnerable anyway. It’s not like they need more revenue.
You do understand how publicly traded companies work, right? The numbers must go up at all cost.
As for what their end game with TPM is we can only speculate - but they have been trying to push "trusted" computing for a long time now, with themselves in control of the master keys of course.
Like it or not, Linux is still not really user friendly compared to a windows computer. Users still have to do command line stuff, and the software you are used to is not available. The equivalents are not as shiny as the windows versions. Macs might be too expensive for some people who are still running on old hardware.
Not Ubuntu, but we need a Linux that's pretty, standardized, simple, fail-safe, developed as an immutable whole, consistent, and integrated as macOS and long-term compatible similar to Windows without the M+MAANG corporate bullshit of either, perhaps through a non-profit, employee-owned co-op social venture.
Perhaps a far more polished and documented version of Qubes with various btrfs trees selectively presented cleanly to appropriate VM containers. Focus on the user UX meets the dev/ops UX but without gimmicks, not-invented-here, or fragility. All of the various desktop-laptop things need to work without surprises and be easily configurable with a UI. For fleet management, a desktop OS really needs simple, programmatic/declarative/imperative MDM- and/or chef-like configuration agent or hooks.
Linux is significantly more user-friendly than Windows, the problem is it's unfamiliar. Windows is cryptic, roundabout, and very much the black sheep of modern operating systems. Nothing makes sense, there's a dozen settings panels, everything is everywhere, and the OS just breaks seemingly randomly if you leave it alone for long enough.
But we, consumers, have gotten so accustomed to the jank of Windows that we perceive it as intuitiveness. But is it really so? Just consider: what would Grandma have an easier time using? Elementary OS, or Windows 11? To me, the answer seems obvious. But we don't optimize for Grandma.
You absolutely don't have to. There's no reason for normal users to ever touch the command line, every essential task (installing stuff, updating) can be done through the GUI on most distros. Certainly the main ones like Ubuntu, Fedora and openSuse.
> the software you are used to is not available
This is the main issue. The average user has a meltdown if a single button moves. I still remember the Office ribbon fiasco, Windows 8 fiasco, etc...
1. Windows comes pre-installed. That means >99% of users (and I mean this literally) will not even consider running anything else (probably they don't even realise there's such a thing as not-Windows on a PC).
2. Enterprise software runs on Windows, that creates enough lock-in for Windows to always be a majority.
I'm back to Windows for a new $job. It's truly awful in so many ways, Linux is a joy by comparison for daily driving, with Mac a close-ish second.
With one difference: I'm not scared of software upgrades. The number of times my laptop was semi-bricked by an update, usually graphics driver, which required frantic googling for random commands, GRUB scripts with enormous disclaimers about how mistyping something will brick the laptop for good, discussions about Nouveau and how it's lal Nvidia's fault really... That's bad, always was, never got better for me, and I really don't miss it.
I use Debian stable. I'm utterly unafraid Debian's security patches, in fact I just accept them on my home server boxes without inspection. The same can not be said for Windows - I'm seen Windows security upgrades render boxes unbootable.
Moving between between versions is a different matter. Yes, Windows does it better, but not reliably enough for me to trust it. So for both Debian and Windows it's a case of replace the drive, and do a fresh install. In Debian's case, zstd < /dev/sda >/mnt/usb/sda-backup.zstd also works, if you have time to kill. Copying everything to a squashfs image also works well.
If your using Ubunt then your experience will be different. People who choosing Ubuntu over Debian is as perplexing to me as people voluntarily using Windows.
I often notice that Linux (and maybe some BSDs) can accommodate two extremes on the tech competence spectrum especially well: the least opinionated users may treat their computer as a black box and just enjoy web browsing / chatting / media with some help, while the most savvy can extract value from tailored and private setups (like stability of Debian or power of Nix).
At the same time, Linux on the desktop fails often for everyone in between: the learning curve is still higher (especially for people coming from Windows), and some very specialized professional proprietary software can be missing.
Luckily, as mentioned in the article, Microsoft tries to make the balance more equal.
Writing this as a person who has used Linux for the last 15 years with a 2-year break for macOS and back.
> the learning curve is still higher (especially for people coming from Windows)
I don't think the learning curve is higher at all. It's roughly the same as with Windows. But if you're coming from Windows, the fact that you have to mount a learning curve for the new OS can be a real friction point. When most people learned Windows, they did so over time, without pressure. If you're switching operating systems, you likely want to become competent in it very quickly. That can make it seem like the learning curve is higher when, in fact, it's just that you're trying to run up that hill faster.
You'd have to know what an operating system is, that you can install a different one than Windows, and still be able to run all of your software on the new one or acceptable substitutes.
That said, Steam OS for desktop (if ever) would be a serious contender, since a big chunk of high-end PCs are only used for gaming and internet browsing.
That is the funny thing - this regularly happens when a new OS comes out. People have been observing for decades now how Microsoft keeps the hardware industry afloat.
And even now, even though there is a "standard" and schemas for, MS's apps mostly ignore them, or use undocumented extensions (as far as I'm aware), so it the whole thing was truly straight from MS's embrace/extend/extinguish playbook.
But also new people grow up with their school-provided Windows/Apple/ChromeOS laptops and only know mobile phones beyond that so the trend is probably not all that positive.
Ableton or Lightroom both have some level of support under Wine but it depends on the version you need. But both also have alternatives and IME killer-apps tend to become a lot less important once users have sufficient other motivations. Nothing is really irreplaceable.
Man, I'm not so sure about that. The M-series Macbooks are just crazy good for speed and battery life. The basic bottom-tier Macbook is $1000 and will do for a vast majority of people. A $330 Windows laptop is going to be a phenomenal heap of junk. People were running Ableton on 16GB M1 Macbooks a couple of years ago.
Been on Linux for 13 years now, and recent Mint releases really are as close as we've gotten to a "set-and-forget" operating system that...just works. Switchable graphics, power profiles, night colors, a consistent and stable updater, sensible defaults and options...
Microsoft really stumbled upon gold when they designed Windows 7, and fumbled it because investors always need novelty for growth. Mint just picked up the ball and kept running.
ChromeOS flex. It will run on hardware that even Linux complains about. I've even installed it on a Chromebook that stopped getting updates. Though, you have to replace the firmware, which entails some risk of bricking, so you can do a UEFI boot.
Also you can upgrade windows 10 to windows 11 even on hardware that Microsoft says is unsupported. Google for the workarounds. You only need to download the win11 iso from Microsoft and make a bootable USB stick using Rufus. Don't download anything from anywhere else. I wouldn't trust it.
And I just got a Thinkpad E14 for CachyOS (arch based). It auto configured btrfs with snapper. Everything just worked fine so far (fingerprints, cameras, sleep, secure boot, sound, mics, etc)
Fedora is still the king as the main workhorse, no headaches, every 6 months there's a reasonable upgrade.
But I can't help myself going back to arch, it just feels snappier.
So if you have a boring hardware like this thinkpad I got, everything just works, go for Arch.
The main reason I went with Fedora on the XPS was some issues with hardware/wifi/bluetooth from time to time, usually an hour before an important meeting that made me chill, ask for a few minutes to rollback a btrfs snapshot, etc.
I strongly suggest considering a community-run distro instead of one mainly controlled by one corporation unless you desperately want to experience a Microsoft 2.0. IBM is not a charity, they will extract value from their investments.
I can't imagine recommending anyone run a distro that is effectively 10 years old & not really changing. It's still X11 and (mostly) gtk3!
It was a good option in 2015. And for some people I get that never changing never ever doing anything different is a huge value add for them. But I can't recommend starting your Linux experience by rusting in place, by using entirely backwards looking systems. Trying to ignore the broader ecosystem is a bad first Linux start.
Debian KDE is my go-to recommendation these days. Gnome is also fine but much less familiar, and most users I've found tend to like having options where-as gnome seemingly went to war with settings & customization. Debian isn't the most supportive but it's solid & amazing. Trixie is gonna be great, can't wait for release!
Mint is an absolutely outstanding piece of software. Commitment to stability and ease of use, which is what most regular users want from their OS. It moves slowly, but that's the price you pay for consistency and attention to user friendlyness.
If you're technical try Fedora. It's a bit on the bleeding edge side, but it's a zero-bullshit OS that mostly just works. Debian is another great option, but packages are a bit behind.
> Debian is another great option, but packages are a bit behind.
I've got hardware for a new home server that's waiting to be set up, and I was planning to put Devuan on it. Anyone has any impressions of that?
> If you're not technical honestly just buy a mac.
I have two :) And a couple linux boxes but I mostly ssh into them.
I haven't used desktop linux in ages (about 2013, when I switched from linux desktops to mac desktops).
Once in a while I run into the newest Ubuntu desktop for various reasons (this time I needed a server in a VM and I thought why not, let's install the desktop) and I'm astonished at the corporate style spamminess.
I forgot the details already but i got a wizard style setup screen pushing extra services, then a pop up and an update screen both showed up, one wanting to upgrade me to the next LTS (i used 22.04 for reproducibility reasons) and one informing me there are package updates, in spite of the installer allegedly installing updates just 2 minutes before.
> Microsoft has a long history of playing fast-and-loose with the truth. And that’s again the case with Windows 10 coming to its supposed “end of life” this fall.
I can’t take an article seriously, whatever merits it might have, if this is the opening gambit.
“End of life” is a fairly common term of art amongst software and hardware OEMs. Windows 10 is going to be end of life. No scare quotes needed.
Microsoft announced at its Ignite conference this week that Windows 10 will be the last version of Windows. Microsoft has no plans to let Windows 10 become stale. On the contrary, it plans to keep Windows evolving with regular improvements and updates.
This probably refers to the fact that Windows XP still has support contracts. Microsoft commonly calls their software EOL and then supports it for 5+ years. I don't think that's a bad thing, but they tend to use it more as a marketing term than a true hard line where security fixes stop going out.
Also, If I remember correctly, the originally announced end of life for Windows XP was extended because too many people were still running it when the date came. (I think they even extended it more than once)
The funniest thing about this is that any major security indicent with Windows 10 after EOL would obviously get fixed by Microsoft because it would be so existentially terrible for them to point to the fine print and ignore it. But you can't stop outrage journalism.
And this is such a minor point to refuse to take an article seriously, one might as well refuse the theory of relativity paper because Einstein had some mispelling.
Readit News
Dead Comment
They don't mention the requirements directly because people would laugh them out of the room.
For hardware (aside from the TPM):
1 gigahertz (GHz) or faster with 2 or more cores on a compatible 64-bit processor, 4 gigabytes (GB), 64 GB or larger storage device.
That is "higher than they need to be"? I don't think so. That's the absolute _floor_ and I'm shocked it isn't higher. Windows raising requirements forces hardware vendors to ship something better and for many people who buy the entry-level computer that's a boon.
> Is it finally the year of the Linux desktop?
No, and I don't see that happening anytime soon. I can't take someone seriously if they legitimately think installing Linux Mint is a viable alternative for normal people. If you are reading this you are not normal and neither are any people for which you support a linux install (parents/friends).
Those computers efectively have fixed requirements measured in a few megabytes + Whatever Windows needs
This eventually will mean that either those apps get rewriten for no good reason and moved to other platforms, or they get stuck on 'unsupported OS, AirGapped from as much as possible' limbo
Effectively nothing about them changed, they didn't need anything new, the API's didn't change, Microsoft just decided to do the thing
There are plenty of ancient computers running DOS or older still, nothing stops them from working if you don't need features of the newer OS.
You do understand how publicly traded companies work, right? The numbers must go up at all cost.
As for what their end game with TPM is we can only speculate - but they have been trying to push "trusted" computing for a long time now, with themselves in control of the master keys of course.
To introduce WEI, to remove possibility of running Linux, or open os. Everything needs to be signed so you could easily be controlled and tracked.
Not really, unless they're doing something special. But if they're doing something special, they're not average users.
Perhaps a far more polished and documented version of Qubes with various btrfs trees selectively presented cleanly to appropriate VM containers. Focus on the user UX meets the dev/ops UX but without gimmicks, not-invented-here, or fragility. All of the various desktop-laptop things need to work without surprises and be easily configurable with a UI. For fleet management, a desktop OS really needs simple, programmatic/declarative/imperative MDM- and/or chef-like configuration agent or hooks.
But we, consumers, have gotten so accustomed to the jank of Windows that we perceive it as intuitiveness. But is it really so? Just consider: what would Grandma have an easier time using? Elementary OS, or Windows 11? To me, the answer seems obvious. But we don't optimize for Grandma.
You absolutely don't have to. There's no reason for normal users to ever touch the command line, every essential task (installing stuff, updating) can be done through the GUI on most distros. Certainly the main ones like Ubuntu, Fedora and openSuse.
> the software you are used to is not available
This is the main issue. The average user has a meltdown if a single button moves. I still remember the Office ribbon fiasco, Windows 8 fiasco, etc...
2. Enterprise software runs on Windows, that creates enough lock-in for Windows to always be a majority.
With one difference: I'm not scared of software upgrades. The number of times my laptop was semi-bricked by an update, usually graphics driver, which required frantic googling for random commands, GRUB scripts with enormous disclaimers about how mistyping something will brick the laptop for good, discussions about Nouveau and how it's lal Nvidia's fault really... That's bad, always was, never got better for me, and I really don't miss it.
Moving between between versions is a different matter. Yes, Windows does it better, but not reliably enough for me to trust it. So for both Debian and Windows it's a case of replace the drive, and do a fresh install. In Debian's case, zstd < /dev/sda >/mnt/usb/sda-backup.zstd also works, if you have time to kill. Copying everything to a squashfs image also works well.
If your using Ubunt then your experience will be different. People who choosing Ubuntu over Debian is as perplexing to me as people voluntarily using Windows.
At the same time, Linux on the desktop fails often for everyone in between: the learning curve is still higher (especially for people coming from Windows), and some very specialized professional proprietary software can be missing.
Luckily, as mentioned in the article, Microsoft tries to make the balance more equal.
Writing this as a person who has used Linux for the last 15 years with a 2-year break for macOS and back.
I don't think the learning curve is higher at all. It's roughly the same as with Windows. But if you're coming from Windows, the fact that you have to mount a learning curve for the new OS can be a real friction point. When most people learned Windows, they did so over time, without pressure. If you're switching operating systems, you likely want to become competent in it very quickly. That can make it seem like the learning curve is higher when, in fact, it's just that you're trying to run up that hill faster.
That said, Steam OS for desktop (if ever) would be a serious contender, since a big chunk of high-end PCs are only used for gaming and internet browsing.
The mid-oughts battle over this in the international standardizations space is pretty fraught: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standardization_of_Office_Open...
And even now, even though there is a "standard" and schemas for, MS's apps mostly ignore them, or use undocumented extensions (as far as I'm aware), so it the whole thing was truly straight from MS's embrace/extend/extinguish playbook.
Even more reason to switch.
But also new people grow up with their school-provided Windows/Apple/ChromeOS laptops and only know mobile phones beyond that so the trend is probably not all that positive.
So few people actually use Linux and they use wildly different versions of it.
The apps are quite specific to me, but I imagine there are similar killer apps for other windows users.
Man, I'm not so sure about that. The M-series Macbooks are just crazy good for speed and battery life. The basic bottom-tier Macbook is $1000 and will do for a vast majority of people. A $330 Windows laptop is going to be a phenomenal heap of junk. People were running Ableton on 16GB M1 Macbooks a couple of years ago.
Microsoft really stumbled upon gold when they designed Windows 7, and fumbled it because investors always need novelty for growth. Mint just picked up the ball and kept running.
Also you can upgrade windows 10 to windows 11 even on hardware that Microsoft says is unsupported. Google for the workarounds. You only need to download the win11 iso from Microsoft and make a bootable USB stick using Rufus. Don't download anything from anywhere else. I wouldn't trust it.
- Firefox is up to date (Fedora is often 2 weeks late on security patches)
- No upgrade cycle. Just `pacman -Syu` on a regular cadence, or whatever you're comfy with.
When you go with the vanilla install of a major distro, I find you simply run into fewer shenanigans.
I have Fedora on my main work computer (Dell XPS)
And I just got a Thinkpad E14 for CachyOS (arch based). It auto configured btrfs with snapper. Everything just worked fine so far (fingerprints, cameras, sleep, secure boot, sound, mics, etc)
Fedora is still the king as the main workhorse, no headaches, every 6 months there's a reasonable upgrade.
But I can't help myself going back to arch, it just feels snappier.
So if you have a boring hardware like this thinkpad I got, everything just works, go for Arch.
The main reason I went with Fedora on the XPS was some issues with hardware/wifi/bluetooth from time to time, usually an hour before an important meeting that made me chill, ask for a few minutes to rollback a btrfs snapshot, etc.
I can't imagine recommending anyone run a distro that is effectively 10 years old & not really changing. It's still X11 and (mostly) gtk3!
It was a good option in 2015. And for some people I get that never changing never ever doing anything different is a huge value add for them. But I can't recommend starting your Linux experience by rusting in place, by using entirely backwards looking systems. Trying to ignore the broader ecosystem is a bad first Linux start.
Debian KDE is my go-to recommendation these days. Gnome is also fine but much less familiar, and most users I've found tend to like having options where-as gnome seemingly went to war with settings & customization. Debian isn't the most supportive but it's solid & amazing. Trixie is gonna be great, can't wait for release!
Just install the current Ubuntu release (not LTS) for a good experience.
If you're not technical honestly just buy a mac.
I still have rpm PTSD from my youth :)
> Debian is another great option, but packages are a bit behind.
I've got hardware for a new home server that's waiting to be set up, and I was planning to put Devuan on it. Anyone has any impressions of that?
> If you're not technical honestly just buy a mac.
I have two :) And a couple linux boxes but I mostly ssh into them.
I haven't used desktop linux in ages (about 2013, when I switched from linux desktops to mac desktops).
Once in a while I run into the newest Ubuntu desktop for various reasons (this time I needed a server in a VM and I thought why not, let's install the desktop) and I'm astonished at the corporate style spamminess.
Suspiciously like Windows.
I can’t take an article seriously, whatever merits it might have, if this is the opening gambit.
“End of life” is a fairly common term of art amongst software and hardware OEMs. Windows 10 is going to be end of life. No scare quotes needed.
Microsoft announced at its Ignite conference this week that Windows 10 will be the last version of Windows. Microsoft has no plans to let Windows 10 become stale. On the contrary, it plans to keep Windows evolving with regular improvements and updates.
Read More: https://www.slashgear.com/windows-10-said-to-be-microsofts-f...
And this is such a minor point to refuse to take an article seriously, one might as well refuse the theory of relativity paper because Einstein had some mispelling.