Darc Sceptor
Member
First I want to begin by saying that I am a retired software engineer/architect and my current project after retirement is to write a new game.
I was on the Microsoft Technical Beta Team who tested and reported bugs on Operating Systems DOS 6 - XP. As a company Architect I also investigated Linux many times over the years but my last five years of work was for the Department of Defense. With the software I wrote our waterways are safe from terrorist attacks on them. And, trust me, some of the secret stuff we have in that would make you poop in your pants in fear.
So now comes this year. I got really sick of Windows. If I switched to Linux for 4 hours and returned to Windows my clock was off by that 4 hours. And I won't even begin to voice my objections to Recall. So I finally reached the point where I wiped out my drives, I wiped out my Windows Install USB, I installed Linux mint as well as creating a Ventoy disk with (I think) 4 other variants I'm interested in.
So after a year of use this is what I've learned:
If you get help from people (and that help is very very good) it comes from someone that only knows the Terminal. Which has it's drawback IMHO. For example: to mount that drive and make it mount at bootup there is about 3 or 4 steps to follow in the Terminal and VOILA it mounts at startup. This includes, of course, editing the etc/fstab file manually as root.
Issue 1: there is one editor command used by many variants...EXCEPT Linux Mint. Every time I want to edit via Terminal I have to google how to do it.
Issue 2: manually editing a system file which I have always viewed as bad
Now you might think "what is the alternative" and I will say that here:
1) Run Disks
2) Select the drive you want mounted
3) Click the gears and choose the option "Edit Mount Options"
4) Turn off "User Session Defaults"
5) Click OKAY and then exit DISKS
Note that a) Disks should be on most variants b) it involves no command line tasks which can be screwed simply with not Capitalizing one letter and c) not editing system files directly. And the one time I was getting help from someone they stated that they have never used DISKS so they know nothing about it. So while I know how it is when you are an expert in a system, as that system evolves we need to evolve with the systems. Hell, I began as an assembly level programmer on the IBM mainframe and taught myself C# and went to programming on the LAN. Since that time I wrote a system to use XML to represent objects, wrote two compilers, and wrote code to fly a top secret air force jet. I was excited when one CTO left her Fortune 50 company after moving it off the mainframe and onto LAN servers and she said 1 down and 49 to go.
The second thing I found with Linux is all of these variants. "This variant took this other variant and made his own variant" which to me seems odd. It feels to me as if many people said "Linux lets me do it so I'm doing it even though it changes very little on the surface." Now please note: this is my view of it and other people have their own reality of why these variants exist. But to me it seems it is at an extent of ridiculousness. The variants that make sense are Arch (aimed at security and an OS that cannot be altered) and one variant aimed to make Arch easier to use. Ubuntu came along to aid Windows users in moving to Linux with a Windows-like interface. Pop OS came along to make it easy for gamers and Zorin is being developed from scratch to provide ease of transition regardless of your former operating system. And there have been other implementations that were coded to be easier to use or easier to game on or ready for Linux and Windows application. Pop OS with their new UI is a variant that makes sense as they are exploring the "what if"s of a UI on a gaming variant of Linux.
While there are many reasons (I'm sure) for these variants it creates problems for new people coming to Linux. The number alone is overwhelming to many people and they may not think to come to a great forum such as here. And even if someone points them to a favored variant for beginners (using Linux Mint as an example) even there you can have variants for the User Interface which again leads to "what does Cinnamon give me and what does KDB mean?". But having these Linux variants means that a) you may not have a consistent way to install it or the install process may be alien to other processes. (I'm thinking of YOU Zorin OS) And without a consistent install process you end up with confused users. Now being involved with Linux since 1996 I know how Linux forums used to be. If you were new to Linux and something didn't work it was YOUR fault not the fault of Linux. I'm so happy that, at least here in the Linux.Org society it isn't like that at all. Which is why this is the only forum I post to now. But it sounds like the Arch forum is like the old days.
So the variants mean that the internals installed are whatever that person felt was the latest and greatest thing or that they have a dislike of one implementation so they refuse to install it. With one application I needed to install it required on library and when you use the standard commands that module could not be found, could not be installed, could not be used. Aggghhh. I searched the internet for a week, because I refuse to give up and return to Windows, and kept using different variants of my google searches. Finally I found a discussion at the end of that week that said Linux Mint did not install these two packages. Included in those two packages is the library I needed according to him. So I followed his directions and installed those two packages. VOILA I was able to finally install what I needed. It should not be that hard. The reason that many people stay with Windows or return to Windows is because (for the most part but not always) it just works. Now I was very impressed with Linux Mint because It. Just. Worked.
And that is the other side of my time here in Linux. Most of my games just run and work. Though I am anxious to see them on my new mini computer that is on it's way as it has an eGPU instead of my current iGPU. And my printer was there, my network was there, my wireless headphone were there, my wireless mouse was there and the only networking problems I see is that the Network Manger sucks as it fails to tell me if the internet is active or dead. And here in Colombia the internet can die for many different reasons. And with the WIFI once again I cannot get connected to it. But since I'm wired I only wanted wireless to bridge the two connections for faster internet. (here in Colombia our backbone is only about 500GB ATM with a new project to improve it more)
So my comments are not so much as one that just stuck a toe in the water. And for the most part everything JUST WORKS. Unless you follow general instructions for running the editor from the Terminal. ;-) And I will not buy a system without a direct LAN connection so I can forgo the use of bridging without problems. Personally, looking back at 1996, Linux has come a really long way and I'm extremely impressed and happy with it. But I will be the loud voice in the back that keeps asking "Why can't we do this with a GUI in Linux?" in the hopes that either a) someone actually writes it or b) I finally have the time to learn how to program in Linux. The time I spent as an architect for a huge, soul-sucking bank I was the one that kept asking "We always did it this way but why hasn't anyone explored doing it like this?" I was the guy managers hated because they would say "this system is great" and I'd say "but there are these problems that may be insurmountable". That would lead to meetings with that company and I would have an engineer come to me and say "yup you know all our bugs".
So I want to expand my thoughts on Linux Mint Network Manager. So there was a loud explosion outside my house and within seconds our internet was dead. But the lights were still on so I couldn't understand why the internet became "slow". I did what I always do ... I floated my mouse over the Network Manger and all it said is that the wired connection is Active. What? So I spread my monitors apart and looked at my router...the light was red. So my internet was dead. But according to Network Manager it was fine.
My expectations are this: Network Manager creates and destroys the connections. I can see I have a wire to the router. I can see I have a wireless entity in my computer that is active. But it should also let me know the other important thing : is the internet active? Now I know that right now there are Linux gurus pounding the keyboard to say all the utilities that exist in the terminal to know if the network is active on the internet. However I see this as "old Linux ways" not the necessary new Linux way. The GUI way is just simpler, faster, and convenient. I have seen a few variants of Network Manager that has extended itself not only saying (using my slang description) "ya got a wire stuck in the hole in your computer and it is hot" but saying you have a network connection and here are the current up/down speeds that I'm sensing. And if I knew how and remembered where I saw it and how to isolate that code, I would definitely install that Network Manager over what is in Linux Mint right now. While it does not directly say Internet : Connected it tells me so by seeing data movements over the connection. But I think there is still a large old school contingency in the Linux development area that are the same ones that screamed bloody murder when the first full GUI version of Linux came out. I was there then and I remember it. An advantage of being a young, old fogy.
So I will continue to push for improvements as I see where improvements are needed. And if I ever learn programming in Linux (I'm taking RUST classes) maybe I will make my own implementations. And I expect that the first responses will be : what took so long for this? And I will push for these improvement not because I hate Linux, not because I hate Linux developers, but because I love Linux and believe it is sooooooo close to being the perfect OS for EVERYONE not just the Linux guru's that have used the Terminal for the past 10 years.
I was on the Microsoft Technical Beta Team who tested and reported bugs on Operating Systems DOS 6 - XP. As a company Architect I also investigated Linux many times over the years but my last five years of work was for the Department of Defense. With the software I wrote our waterways are safe from terrorist attacks on them. And, trust me, some of the secret stuff we have in that would make you poop in your pants in fear.
So now comes this year. I got really sick of Windows. If I switched to Linux for 4 hours and returned to Windows my clock was off by that 4 hours. And I won't even begin to voice my objections to Recall. So I finally reached the point where I wiped out my drives, I wiped out my Windows Install USB, I installed Linux mint as well as creating a Ventoy disk with (I think) 4 other variants I'm interested in.
So after a year of use this is what I've learned:
If you get help from people (and that help is very very good) it comes from someone that only knows the Terminal. Which has it's drawback IMHO. For example: to mount that drive and make it mount at bootup there is about 3 or 4 steps to follow in the Terminal and VOILA it mounts at startup. This includes, of course, editing the etc/fstab file manually as root.
Issue 1: there is one editor command used by many variants...EXCEPT Linux Mint. Every time I want to edit via Terminal I have to google how to do it.
Issue 2: manually editing a system file which I have always viewed as bad
Now you might think "what is the alternative" and I will say that here:
1) Run Disks
2) Select the drive you want mounted
3) Click the gears and choose the option "Edit Mount Options"
4) Turn off "User Session Defaults"
5) Click OKAY and then exit DISKS
Note that a) Disks should be on most variants b) it involves no command line tasks which can be screwed simply with not Capitalizing one letter and c) not editing system files directly. And the one time I was getting help from someone they stated that they have never used DISKS so they know nothing about it. So while I know how it is when you are an expert in a system, as that system evolves we need to evolve with the systems. Hell, I began as an assembly level programmer on the IBM mainframe and taught myself C# and went to programming on the LAN. Since that time I wrote a system to use XML to represent objects, wrote two compilers, and wrote code to fly a top secret air force jet. I was excited when one CTO left her Fortune 50 company after moving it off the mainframe and onto LAN servers and she said 1 down and 49 to go.
The second thing I found with Linux is all of these variants. "This variant took this other variant and made his own variant" which to me seems odd. It feels to me as if many people said "Linux lets me do it so I'm doing it even though it changes very little on the surface." Now please note: this is my view of it and other people have their own reality of why these variants exist. But to me it seems it is at an extent of ridiculousness. The variants that make sense are Arch (aimed at security and an OS that cannot be altered) and one variant aimed to make Arch easier to use. Ubuntu came along to aid Windows users in moving to Linux with a Windows-like interface. Pop OS came along to make it easy for gamers and Zorin is being developed from scratch to provide ease of transition regardless of your former operating system. And there have been other implementations that were coded to be easier to use or easier to game on or ready for Linux and Windows application. Pop OS with their new UI is a variant that makes sense as they are exploring the "what if"s of a UI on a gaming variant of Linux.
While there are many reasons (I'm sure) for these variants it creates problems for new people coming to Linux. The number alone is overwhelming to many people and they may not think to come to a great forum such as here. And even if someone points them to a favored variant for beginners (using Linux Mint as an example) even there you can have variants for the User Interface which again leads to "what does Cinnamon give me and what does KDB mean?". But having these Linux variants means that a) you may not have a consistent way to install it or the install process may be alien to other processes. (I'm thinking of YOU Zorin OS) And without a consistent install process you end up with confused users. Now being involved with Linux since 1996 I know how Linux forums used to be. If you were new to Linux and something didn't work it was YOUR fault not the fault of Linux. I'm so happy that, at least here in the Linux.Org society it isn't like that at all. Which is why this is the only forum I post to now. But it sounds like the Arch forum is like the old days.
So the variants mean that the internals installed are whatever that person felt was the latest and greatest thing or that they have a dislike of one implementation so they refuse to install it. With one application I needed to install it required on library and when you use the standard commands that module could not be found, could not be installed, could not be used. Aggghhh. I searched the internet for a week, because I refuse to give up and return to Windows, and kept using different variants of my google searches. Finally I found a discussion at the end of that week that said Linux Mint did not install these two packages. Included in those two packages is the library I needed according to him. So I followed his directions and installed those two packages. VOILA I was able to finally install what I needed. It should not be that hard. The reason that many people stay with Windows or return to Windows is because (for the most part but not always) it just works. Now I was very impressed with Linux Mint because It. Just. Worked.
And that is the other side of my time here in Linux. Most of my games just run and work. Though I am anxious to see them on my new mini computer that is on it's way as it has an eGPU instead of my current iGPU. And my printer was there, my network was there, my wireless headphone were there, my wireless mouse was there and the only networking problems I see is that the Network Manger sucks as it fails to tell me if the internet is active or dead. And here in Colombia the internet can die for many different reasons. And with the WIFI once again I cannot get connected to it. But since I'm wired I only wanted wireless to bridge the two connections for faster internet. (here in Colombia our backbone is only about 500GB ATM with a new project to improve it more)
So my comments are not so much as one that just stuck a toe in the water. And for the most part everything JUST WORKS. Unless you follow general instructions for running the editor from the Terminal. ;-) And I will not buy a system without a direct LAN connection so I can forgo the use of bridging without problems. Personally, looking back at 1996, Linux has come a really long way and I'm extremely impressed and happy with it. But I will be the loud voice in the back that keeps asking "Why can't we do this with a GUI in Linux?" in the hopes that either a) someone actually writes it or b) I finally have the time to learn how to program in Linux. The time I spent as an architect for a huge, soul-sucking bank I was the one that kept asking "We always did it this way but why hasn't anyone explored doing it like this?" I was the guy managers hated because they would say "this system is great" and I'd say "but there are these problems that may be insurmountable". That would lead to meetings with that company and I would have an engineer come to me and say "yup you know all our bugs".
So I want to expand my thoughts on Linux Mint Network Manager. So there was a loud explosion outside my house and within seconds our internet was dead. But the lights were still on so I couldn't understand why the internet became "slow". I did what I always do ... I floated my mouse over the Network Manger and all it said is that the wired connection is Active. What? So I spread my monitors apart and looked at my router...the light was red. So my internet was dead. But according to Network Manager it was fine.
My expectations are this: Network Manager creates and destroys the connections. I can see I have a wire to the router. I can see I have a wireless entity in my computer that is active. But it should also let me know the other important thing : is the internet active? Now I know that right now there are Linux gurus pounding the keyboard to say all the utilities that exist in the terminal to know if the network is active on the internet. However I see this as "old Linux ways" not the necessary new Linux way. The GUI way is just simpler, faster, and convenient. I have seen a few variants of Network Manager that has extended itself not only saying (using my slang description) "ya got a wire stuck in the hole in your computer and it is hot" but saying you have a network connection and here are the current up/down speeds that I'm sensing. And if I knew how and remembered where I saw it and how to isolate that code, I would definitely install that Network Manager over what is in Linux Mint right now. While it does not directly say Internet : Connected it tells me so by seeing data movements over the connection. But I think there is still a large old school contingency in the Linux development area that are the same ones that screamed bloody murder when the first full GUI version of Linux came out. I was there then and I remember it. An advantage of being a young, old fogy.
So I will continue to push for improvements as I see where improvements are needed. And if I ever learn programming in Linux (I'm taking RUST classes) maybe I will make my own implementations. And I expect that the first responses will be : what took so long for this? And I will push for these improvement not because I hate Linux, not because I hate Linux developers, but because I love Linux and believe it is sooooooo close to being the perfect OS for EVERYONE not just the Linux guru's that have used the Terminal for the past 10 years.
