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Linux Distros Designed for Former Windows Users Are Picking Up Steam | Linux Journal (www.linuxjournal.com)
submitted 10 months ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 91 points 10 months ago (20 children)

It will take some serious, I hate to say it, YouTube campaigning and such to make Linux a more mainstream thought in the public’s brain.

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  • [–] 72 points 10 months ago (9 children)

    What it takes is people being able to buy a Linux machine at the local electronics store. Installing your OS yourself is still a major hurdle for most people.

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  • [–] 52 points 10 months ago (7 children)

    That is an important step, yes.

    However another important step is that the default distro needs to basically not even highlight that terminal exists.

    If you're trying to learn how to use linux, and step 1 of the tutorial is "open terminal", you will lose 97% of your new install base. Then headlines will flood that linux machines are being returned in high numbers.

    As much as you guys hate to hear this, the first experience for a new linux user needs to be intuitive. Before they even turn the machine on, they have to know how to use this software. Not because they are experts, but because the space and experience guides itself.

    Then as you learn, you can customize a bit more, and from there linux can become a rabbit hole. But the point is, let the individual user control the depths which they dive. Because I suspect 90%+ won't even change the desktop background. And thats ok.

    Make it easy for the dummies, but then you individually can tinker if you want to. And it's linux, so....ya know. Go nuts. But some people don't want to do all that tinkering. That vanilla experience is what gets remembered to represent that OS. Even if you customized it and experienced it very differently.

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  • [–] 7 points 10 months ago

    That's where I think Bazzite really shines... I didn't need the terminal to setup all of the normal stuff at all, and new apps I discovered right from the start menu so I didn't need to go far at all.

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  • [–] 3 points 10 months ago

    Yup. I'm using my terminal every day, but I program for work and don't mind a keyboard-friendly interface for a few forms of tinkering and program updates I'm doing. But even I wanted to prefer the GUI for common actions.

    The stupidest reason I started going back to my terminal was, my GUI package manager didn't have a "Select All / Select None" button for package updates, so if I only wanted to update one app at a time, I had to do it from the terminal. That's not "terminal being awesome", or "terminal being my preference", that's just lazy UI design.

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  • [–] 1 point 10 months ago

    There is no need for a terminal if you don't want to use it.

    On the other hand, the terminal is the single best way to get ideas across so people think they somehow need it.

    Even windows is like this: want to fix something? cmd or powershell is the way they are going to avoid having to give you 20 pages of screen shots and condense it into a single line.

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  • [–] 15 points 10 months ago (2 children)

    Problem is Youtube is known to censor these kind of campaigns. I think they literally got caught delisting Tiny11 tutorials recently. Imagine what they‘ll do if Linux Tutorials pick up steam. Big tech is one giant illegal syndicate and politicians have invested in all of them.

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  • [–] 4 points 10 months ago

    YouTube has done a lot of malicious removal, but I'd be surprised if Windows 11 was one of those intentional targets. YT is run by Google, purveyors of Chromebooks; I'd think they'd generally benefit from a move off of MS/Windows.

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  • [–] 2 points 10 months ago

    Is there another venue? Nebula doesn’t seem keen on DIY and anything not free is going to have an incredibly reduced audience. The people who need the info most are the least likely to be able to afford another sub.

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  • [–] 4 points 10 months ago (6 children)

    And soon there would be a corpo that will make a closed source commercial OS based on Linux and people will somehow use their crap.

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  • [–] 4 points 10 months ago (3 children)

    Red hat is still around...

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  • [–] 5 points 10 months ago* (2 children)

    Redhat is opensource, it's just not free to use

    Rocky and Fedora are based off it ig

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