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  • Based on my tests on my family and friends, the main problem is tech support. Most geeks seem to assume other people want the same things than themselves (privacy, freedom, etc). Well, they don't. They want a computer that just works.

    Overall when using Linux, people actually don't need much tech support, but they need it. My father put it really well by saying: "the best OS is the one of your neighbor."

    I apply few rules:

    1. The deal with my family and friends is simple: you want tech support from me ? ok, then I'm going to pick your computer (usually old Lenovo Thinkpads bought on Ebay at ~300€) and I'm going to install Linux on it.
    2. I'm not shy. I ask them if they want me to have remote access to their computer. If they accept, I install a Meshcentral agent. Thing is, on other OS, they are already spied on by Google, Microsoft, Apple, etc. And most people think "they have nothing to hide". Therefore why should they worry more about a family member or a friend than some unknown big company ? Fun fact, I've been really surprised by how easily people do accept that I keep a remote access on their computer: even people that are not family ! Pretty much everybody has gladly agreed up to now. (and God knows I've been really clear that I can access their computer whenever I want).
    3. I install the system for them and I make the major updates for them. Therefore, if I have remote access to the system, I pick the distribution I'm the most at ease with (Debian). They just don't care what actually runs on their computers.
    4. When they have a problem, they call me after 8pm. With remote access, most problems are solved in a matter of minutes. Usually, they call me a few times the first days, and then I never hear from them anymore until the next major update.

    So far, everybody seems really happy with this deal. And for those wondering, I can see in Meshcentral they really do use those computers :-P

    1. Installation process of Linux is complicated to an average Joe (Bootable USB/ISO file/Boot priority/format <- what are these scary terms?)
    2. Lack of availability of pre-installed Linux PCs at physical shops
    3. Lack of availability of industry-standard software
    4. Confusion for an average Joe due to excess choice of distros/application packaging format. Average people don't want choices, they want to be guided.
    5. (Minor point) Most available guides for doing something heavily requires terminal usage which can be daunting to new users
    1. All of the basics should just work well out of the box with minimal tweaking. Yes even NVIDIA stuff.
    2. The software center needs a massive overhaul. It feels like an afterthought by people who would rather use a command line.

  • Linux really isn't ideal for anyone who isn't already a tech enthusiast on some level. I recently did a fresh install of Kubuntu and after about a week, it prompted me that there were updates, so I clicked the notification and ran the updates, after which my BIOS could no longer detect the UEFI partition. I had to use a live usb to chroot into the system and repair it, as well as update grub, in order to fix it.
    It's fixable, but this is not something anyone who doesn't already know what they're doing can fix. I've had auto updates in the past put me on boot-loops thanks to nvidia drivers, etc.
    This kind of thing needs to almost never happen for linux to be friendly for those who just want their computer to work without any technical understanding. This, honestly though, can't happen because of the nature of distros, you can't ever make guarantees that everything will work because every distro has slightly different packages.
    Wine is getting better, but compatibility is still an issue, especially for people who rely really heavily on microsoft office or adobe products.

  • When's the last time the average user has had to install an operating system?

    That's the biggest obstacle right there. I think plenty of non-techy people would use linux if it came preinstalled.

    • Also, if it came pre-installed, one would assume all the hardware was properly supported. A big pain point with Linux is that sometimes things just don't work right, and there's nobody to turn to for help except Google. It's been a while since I attempted to run Linux on a laptop, but when I did I struggled a lot getting good battery life, good trackpad support, and a sleep mode that worked correctly.

      Reputations live on for decades after they are earned. Perhaps all of my laptop problems are ancient history, but I have no way to know without trying, and it's too much effort.

      • I have an example: a little whole ago I put Arch on my 2-in-1 laptop just because I prefer open-source philosophy, and although a lot of things worked out-of-the-box, my biggest problem was the actual 2-in-1 function. I know that, like Windows, I'd have to do a little digging to get it working (except Windows would involve drivers, Linux required settings) and I got a makeshift solution working: KDE has its own screen-rotating feature, and I made 2 shell commands on the desktop that, when pressed, disable/enable the keyboard/trackpad. Turns out it only works on Xorg, and Wayland requires a way more complicated setup to work, so I just gave up using Wayland on it. Something to do with udev rules or something

  • To be honest, one part is what everyone mentioned here. Not being preinstalled and all that.

    The other part is that unfortunately at least according to my own expirence as a Linux noob a few years ago some Linux communities can be very toxic. If you're asking questions of how to do X and someone comes along and is all "why do you even want to do X if you could also do Y? Which is something entirely different but also does something vaguely similar"

    That's one if the things.

    And then other curiosities. I cannot for example for the life of me get my main monitor to work under Linux with any new Kernel version. My Laptop just refuses to output to it or the second monitor attached via Display port daisychaining. On the older version it works, on the newer it's broken. I have tried troubleshooting this problem for over half a year and it's still broken. And that's out of the Box on Ubuntu LTS...

    So i don't really understand this question. There are major roadblocks. With Wayland which is default for Ubuntu now those roadblock jist became bigger. Screensharing in multiple Apps including slack is outright broken unless you use the shitty webapp. The main player Office 365 largely doesn't work at all on Linux. All these things that should work for a Desktop operating System don't work out of the Box as they should.

    That's why people aren't using it and companies aren't preinstalling it.

  • Most folks have been sold a story that every new technology they start using is supposed to be "intuitive"; and that if it is not "intuitive" then it must be defective or willfully perverse.

    For example, novice programmers often stumble when learning their second or third language, because it differs from their first. Maybe it uses indentation instead of curly braces; maybe type declarations are written in a different order; maybe it doesn't put $ on its variables; maybe capitalization of identifiers is syntactically significant.

    And so they declare that Python is not "intuitive" because it doesn't look like C; or Go is not "intuitive" because it doesn't feel like PHP.

    It should be obvious that this has nothing to do with intuition, and everything to do with familiarity and comfort-level.

    Commercial, consumer-oriented technology has leaned heavily into the "intuitive" illusion. On an iPhone or Windows, Android or Mac, you're supposed to be able to just guess how to do things without ever having to confront unfamiliarity. You might use a search engine to find a how-to document with screenshots — but you're not supposed to have to learn new concepts or anything. That would be hard.

    That's not how to learn, though. To learn, you need to get into unfamiliar things, recognize that they are unfamiliar, and then become familiar with them.

    Comfort-level is also important. It sucks to be doing experimental risky things on the computer that's storing your only copy of your master's thesis research. If you want to try installing a new OS, it sure helps if you can experiment with it in a way that doesn't put any of your "real work" at risk. That can be on a spare computer, or booting from a USB drive, or just having all your "real work" backed up on Dropbox or Google Drive or somewhere that your experimentation can't possibly break it.

    • It should be obvious that this has nothing to do with intuition, and everything to do with familiarity and comfort-level.

      Not to be petty, but I think that intuitive is not that different to familiar.

      I mean, the problem is in using the word intuitive when "selling" something in the first place. User interaction involves ton of things, large and small, and the intuitive things are rarely noticed. Such promise is likely going to lead to disappointment.

      Adapting to these small differences is a skill in itself.

  • To me, the big problem is still updates breaking things.

    Everybody needs to update their system from time to time, but if doing so leaves your system in an unusable (for the average person, not a linux terminal guru) state, users aren't going to stay.

    I think immutable/atomic OSes like Silverblue, VanillaOS and SteamOS are heading in the right direction to solve this issue. Particularly if they allow users to easily rollback a bad update. Otherwise maybe there is some way to detect and warn about potential compatibility issues before people update.

    1. The misconception that you need to "know linux" to use a computer with linux.

    You need to "know linux" to administer linux servers, or contribute to kernel development. My wife is a retired pharmacist, and she uses exclusively a computer with Linux since around 2008. She knows that's Linux, because I told her so. If I had told her it was a different version of Windows, she'd be using it anyway - she was using win95 at work before, so any current windows would have been a big change anyway (granted, nothing like gnome, that's why I gave her kubuntu).

    This misconception is fed by "experienced" Linux users who like to be seen as "hackers" just because they "know Linux".

    Nobody uses the OS. You use programs that run on the OS. My wife doesn't "use Linux". She uses Chrome, the file manager (whatever that is in the ancient LTS Kubuntu release I have there and update only when LTS is over), LibreOffice Writer and Calc, a pdf reader (not adobe's, whatever was in the distro), the HP scanner app. The closest she gets to "Linux" is occasionally accepting the popup asking for updates.

    Users shouldn't need to care about which OS (or which distro, for that matters) they're running their apps on. The OS (and distro) should be as unobtrusive and transparent as possible.

    1. Distro hopping cult. It's ok to try a few distros when adopting Linux, or even flirt with new ones after you've already settled with one. Even keep doing it forever, on a secondary machine or live usbs, if you're curious.

    Doing it forever, on a primary machine is stupid; NO FSCK DISTRO WILL BE PERFECT. Windows users whine and cry every time Microsoft shoves a new and worse Windows version up their SSDs, but they stick with Windows anyway.

    Distro hoppers hop often because they give up at the first inconvenience. They never feel at home or make it their home, because they never actually use their computers for long enough with any distro. They are more focused on the OS than in using the computer. Nothing wrong with that, but they'll forever be "linux explorers", not actual "linux users".

    There will always be some other that has that small thing that doesn't come default on this one. There will always be compromises. It's like marriage. Commit, negotiate, adapt. Settle down ffs.

    The OS/distro shouldn't be important for the average user; the OS/distro shouldn't get in the way between the user and the apps, which is what the user uses.

    Of course there are distros with specific usage in mind (pen test, gaming, video production, etc), as they conveniently have all main utilities packaged and integrated. But for real average user apps, the OS shouldn't matter to the end user, let alone look like the user should know what window manager or packaging system they're using.

    Then when they are faced with dozens of "experts" discussing about which distro has the edge over the other, and the gory technical details of why, and comparing number of distros hopped, well, it sounds like Linux is a goal by itself, when all they wanted was to watch YouTube and access their messages and social media.

    When my wife started using a Linux computer I didn't tell her which distro was there (she probably knows the name kubuntu because it shows during boot). I didn't give her a lecture about Gnome vs KDE, rpm vs deb, or the thousands of customizations she could have now. "You log in here, here's the app menu, here's chrome, this is the file manager, here's the printer app". Done, linux user since 2008.

    Linux will never be mainstream while we make it look like "using Linux", or "this distro", matters, and that is an objective in itself. Most users don't care. They want to use their apps.

  • The main issue is that easy problems that should be solved baseline by the OS crop up far too often for the average user to want to have to deal with day to day. Also, whenever you go to ask on a forum, you're usually told to just do something entirely different or use another distro. Every time I go to fix something on this machine it sends me down a rabbit hole of shit I don't care about because it doesn't solve my problem since it introduces a brand new one to solve. If I want to use solution X don't tell me to go install program Y that's your favorite program to use but is literally not what I'm trying to accomplish.

    Today I installed Manjaro onto an old laptop and for the life of me I could not figure out why it wasn't connecting to the internet. It wasn't a network issue, it was the fact that the time was out of sync. It took me a while to realize that was the issue and not that I had fucked up my router config or something. It just couldn't validate any cryptography because the time was off. There were like four different solutions that all attempted the same fix and eventually I was able to connect with ethernet and restart timesync, which only worked after a restart.

  • I'm currently trying to run a Sven Co-op server under Ubuntu Server. This has been a five hour chore of trial and error, dealing with library incompatibility, architecture incompatibility, poor documentation and Stack Overflow messes.

    Im currently using about twenty tabs of documentation and support requests. At this exact moment, I'm trying to compile a 32 bit version of libssl 1.1.1, at which point I will be able to test again. If it doesn't work this time, I absolutely do not have time to continue trying.

    So what's the challenge here? Nothing is simple and nothing is well explained. This is a three-step process on Windows that just works. On Ubuntu, the first step requires you to add a new apt repo and install support libraries, and beyond that, you're on your own to figure out the compat issues further down the line.

    Edit: Can't make it work, it's just one thing after another. I'm just gonna do a fresh install of the whole OS, considering how much bs I installed chasing these issues, and then, idk, just not play a game with my brother I guess.

    • I don't know how much time you have left, but if it's a dedicated server machine/system (I assume it is since it's running Ubuntu Server) you could look into installing Pterodactyl which is a game server panel + daemon which can take care of setting up and running game servers for you. It uses Docker under the hood which helps solve issues like this.

      I see there is an egg for this game that someone has made for Pterodactyl (eggs are just basically instructions for Pterodactyl on how to create a game server) that you could import, and then just practically hit create. This particular one uses Ubuntu 16.04 as a container image, which would make sense if that game needs libssl 1.1.1

      Could definitely be worth a shot, especially if you're planning on running other game servers down the line - that repo I linked to has a ton of game server configuration ("eggs") on it. Hell it even has some eggs for non-game servers, like if you wanted a Mumble/TeamSpeak server.

      • I'll be sure to give that a try. While I was vomiting from frustration about this last night, I came across a Docker image I was going to give a shot.

  • I think that is not a question Linux users can answer. I feel so out of touch with what the average joe needs and wants in an OS. Ask them.

  • I recently gave up on daily driving Pop OS. About 6 months ago I got a new laptop with Windows 11, which for various reasons I am not a fan of. I decided it would be a good time to try an experiment and install Linux. The biggest issue right off the bat was lack of hardware support, the fingerprint reader and the speaker amp are not supported. I spent a bunch of time researching and seeing if I could make them work but apparently it has to do with the kernel and isn't really something I can fix. This didn't seem like a big deal at first because I can get sound out of the headphone jack or via bluetooth, and while it was convenient to login via a fingerprint reader, it wasn't something I really felt like I needed. Since then I've become much more reliant on biometric authentication, it's just so much more convenient to be able to auth bitwarden with my finger instead of having to type in a password. More recently, I started using Proton VPN and the client is pretty crap in Linux. Switching over to Windows 11, I can login with my finger, all of my passwords are a finger print away, Proton VPN works natively with wireguard and is generally much more reliable and easier to use. It's just a much better user experience, there's nothing weird and janky to deal with, I don't need to mess about in the command line to do basic things. I really loved Pop, and I'm sure I'll boot back into it, but I'm daily driving Windows 11 until I can sort out the hardware issues and get Proton VPN working better, and I think both of those issues are out of my hands so all I can do is wait.

  • I personally dont understand why mass adoption is a goal.

    The "challenge" to bring users to Linux is simply making them want to use Linux. There are enough flavours and guides ranging from plug and play that anyone can use to build your own kernel and distro from scratch that anyone can find what they want in Linux... if they want it.

    The truth is that for a not insignificant portion of computer users, the OS is a means to an end not a feature. Its "the computer". A laptop that comes with windows 11 is a windows 11 machine.

    If you want the average user to move to Linux, create an desktop environment with the option to look and behave like either windows or Mac, have a software compatibility layer for both that can run at the same time, buy a hardware company and include the distro as default and sell it to the masses at a loss to undercut all other options. Flood all consumer electronics stores with them.

    Outside that, its not going to happen and I dont know why people want to make a competition out of it. Linux doesnt suit everyone and it doesnt have to. We see less GUIs as a good thing, id rather dev time from the solo/small dev teams go towards the functionality not making it look pretty. The majority of computer users dont agree with that though, and thats fine. I like being able to add/remove from my OS, most don't and thats fine too. I like rolling updates, the uproar around windows updates with thousands of youtube videos dedicated to people stopping them indefinitely indicates many others dont. Our semi annual O365 update is currently rolling out at work, and people are freaking out that one of their outlook toolbars moved. Never mind its a 4 second fix to move it back, but can you imagine these people seeking out/installing/configuring/using a new desktop environment?

    Its not an elitist thing. Id love more of my friends to use linux, but I cant make them want to use something. It either appeals to them or it doesnt. For most the appeal of a computer is the software it runs, and the OS is just a means for that.

    • I personally dont understand why mass adoption is a goal.

      Oh this one is easy. The higher market share the better software support they get.

      And as a secondary bonus, the more people use it the more people contribute to it and make it even better. But mostly this one is just an extension of the first point.

    • I utterly agree. I don't get this push to have everyone on Linux. Once you get the majority of users on Linux, the enshittification will begin.

  • Off the top of my head things that Ive run into over the years that would have caused 99% of computer users to throw Linux in the bin:

    *Having to edit xorg.conf to set the graphics driver

    *A typo in the sources list that prevented any packages from downloading (distro upgrade)

    *A bug in systemd that resulted in the OS not booting (fresh install)

    *The wrong graphics card driver being selected and not being installed correctly because Ubuntu kept back 5 packages necessary for it to function (fresh install)

    *A bug in how Ubuntu handles the disk platter that causes hard drives to fail far more rapidly than they should (that bug has been there for years and probably ruined a few hard drives)

    *Having to recompile the wifi driver after every upgrade (broadcomm chipset) before the driver was included in the kernel and having to reinstall the OS after the driver was included in the kernel because something went wrong during the upgrade. ie recompiling didnt fix anything and the native driver wasnt working either.

    *failed drive encryption

    *grub being installed incorrectly (no boot)

    *dealing with UEFI to maintain a dual boot for programs that cannot be emulated or virtualized effectively (lag sensitive non-native games)

    *Audio output defaults being incorrect (no sound, no mic)

    But the one thing that above all else, will drive newbies away is how the general linux community tends to respond to things.

  • it need to work like how your microwave works. You don't don't have to know ANYTHING about how any thing related to computer. Just click stuff to make it work. Also get more companies to ship things with Linux

  • The average user doesn't give a shit about what OS they're running. They also don't know what tools they need. I remember a client who dropped $700 on Photoshop because "How else can I resize my photos?"

    Linux is to hard for someone who doesn't know why it's bad to install multiple antivirus suites. People who don't know the difference between a web browser and a search engine.

    Linux will only ever be for hobbyist because they the only ones who give a damn.

380 comments