5 Ways Linux Shoots Itself in the Foot

Jakalwarrior said:
I fiddled with linux again recently. Here is what I ran in to.

Install Linux: Video driver not installed
let it auto install, Reboot to scrambled screen
Google for 45 minutes to find out how to uninstall it from command prompt

Run a bunch of commands to install latest ATI driver manually
Reboot to scrambled screen
after 10 minutes couldn't find the command to uninstall it again
Gave up and went back to windows.



Linux needs more work on usability but that isn't where the development is headed. Hence why it is rarely used by common people. I could put the effort in but I still wouldn't be able to game so I dont.
Click to expand...


what distro, what date, what hardware?
Thing is the basic VESA drivers will start fine on 99.999% of all machine (the odd case is widescreen laptops what have that fugly intel chip todo VBIOS patching at startup). THIS use to be an issue with 2yo distro but not these days (esp with intel working really well with the kernel)

Windows only comes with VESA drivers so there is no difference

Ubuntu then provides you with an option to install "Restrictive Drivers" eg nVidia or ATi, no going to any website to find download or anything, it does it for you.


Sounds like you were using an outdated disk or a non-newbie distro.
Stick with Ubuntu if you don't know what you are doing. Newbiew windows user don't get Windows 2008 Server do they? they get Vista home premium
 
eeyrjmr said:
How in windows do you go about finding that an app is missing a dll? and what dll? and how do you rectifiy it?
Click to expand...


Copy/regsvr32 in some instances.

What if a shared library required by $Software is compiled and linked with a different version of gcc/ld than what is installed on your system?
 
dook43 said:
Copy/regsvr32 in some instances.

What if a shared library required by $Software is compiled and linked with a different version of gcc/ld than what is installed on your system?
Click to expand...

Don't lose the dll in the first place.
If you lose dll's you're doing something wrong.
 
eeyrjmr said:
what distro, what date, what hardware?
Thing is the basic VESA drivers will start fine on 99.999% of all machine (the odd case is widescreen laptops what have that fugly intel chip todo VBIOS patching at startup). THIS use to be an issue with 2yo distro but not these days (esp with intel working really well with the kernel)

Windows only comes with VESA drivers so there is no difference

Ubuntu then provides you with an option to install "Restrictive Drivers" eg nVidia or ATi, no going to any website to find download or anything, it does it for you.


Sounds like you were using an outdated disk or a non-newbie distro.
Stick with Ubuntu if you don't know what you are doing. Newbiew windows user don't get Windows 2008 Server do they? they get Vista home premium
Click to expand...

Translation: you're doing it wrong, newb. Not Linux's fault.

More elitism from the 'nix crowd? Shocker! :p
 
Bankie said:
To install a video driver for my GTX260 I simply boot to the CLI and type 'pacman -S nvidia'. ....................... If I want to update every piece of software on my system that has an update available it's as simple as 'pacman -Syu'.

Linux is harder to setup and learn but once it's setup it's much less hassle to deal with on a daily basis.
Click to expand...

// begin rant

This is what is wrong with linux. Going to the command prompt to type 'pacman -S nvidia' isn't simple. How the hell am I supposed to know to do that? In windows I open a GUI internet browser to my favorite search engine, type in 'Nvidia driver' and the first link is the download... run... reboot done. Now lets do 'Nvidia driver Ubuntu'............. leads me to...

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BinaryDriverHowto/Nvidia

"Intrepid Ibex uses only nvidia-glx which is a virtual package. Dependent packages are as follows:
•nvidia-glx-173
•nvidia-glx-177
•nvidia-glx-71
•nvidia-glx-96
"
What the f.... does any of that mean?

Here have some more of the 7 pages of installation garbage...

"lsmod | grep nvidia reports that the nvidia kernel module is loaded. If removing and reinserting the nvidia kernel module allows X to go ahead and start, it is possible to accomplish this at system start by making this the first command under the start) case in the gdm (or other display manager) init script, like so:
case "$1" in
start)
##hack to deal with broken nvidia km not loading right###
rmmod nvidia && modprobe nvidia"

Yes, it's not just installation instructions, but also troubleshooting.... I wonder why they put both on that page... Ohh right because windows drivers you just double click and they work 98% of the time. On linux you have about 30% chance of it working.

//end rant
 
This article is very fitting with the Linux community ego. Induces nerd rage.

Point 2 about advertising is only true in some areas. For one I know it is very well advertised in India.
 
How do you know to open google and search for nvidia driver? How do you know to install a driver at all?

If someone takes the time to learn to use the CLI they know how to get help their as well. It's silly to argue that what you are familiar with is easier and more obvious and discoverable for you. You grew up using Windows and learned how to use it at one time, whether you remember that or not.

Your point about Ubuntu is silly because when you install Ubuntu on a machine with an Nvidia card, a notice appears on first boot telling you there are proprietary drivers available that may increase performance. It gives you the option to install them right there.
 
samsonJS said:
How do you know to open google and search for nvidia driver? How do you know to install a driver at all?

If someone takes the time to learn to use the CLI they know how to get help their as well. It's silly to argue that what you are familiar with is easier and more obvious and discoverable for you. You grew up using Windows and learned how to use it at one time, whether you remember that or not.

Your point about Ubuntu is silly because when you install Ubuntu on a machine with an Nvidia card, a notice appears on first boot telling you there are proprietary drivers available that may increase performance. It gives you the option to install them right there.
Click to expand...

No, if you know you need an Nvidia driver in either situation, you can google it. One way leads to pain and destruction (your sanity), the other to happily killing space demons. Also I call BS on your "once you learn the CLI it's all good." Tell that to the guys with 9600GT's "If your card does not appear in this list of cards known by Ubuntu 8.04 NVIDIA binary drivers (e.g. the 9600 GT) then there is no Ubuntu 8.04 provided binary driver. For unsupported workarounds try the links in See Also. " Because nobody owns any of those right?
 
For people who prefer the CLI and learn to use it, they know how to get help with it. That's all I'm saying. I'm not saying everyone should use Arch or Gentoo and love pacman or portage. I don't need to drop to the command line to do that stuff in Ubuntu or Windows, nor do I want to.

If PC games are what you want to do then I wouldn't recommend anyone run anything except Windows. I'm not trying to convert everyone to Linux.
 
In a lot of ways I think the the CLI is a more efficient method of helping someone with a computer problem. In the example of the DVD, I can send you a command and all you have to do is paste it and hit send and it's done. I don't have to try to talk you through all of the clicks...and now download this...and etc..
 
welcometohard.jpg


Get this feeling Linux noobs?
 
Sabrewulf165 said:
Translation: you're doing it wrong, newb. Not Linux's fault.

More elitism from the 'nix crowd? Shocker! :p
Click to expand...

Not in the slightest.
I am making a simple statement.
While people have associated windows with BSoD and virus's and remote vulnerabilities (all of which have all but been eliminated) people also associate "must use the commandline" or "doesn't support foo" with linux, which is equally wrong

Every now and again a new bit of tech will come along and throw the linux kernel off for a bit. The last thing with Wifi and that was quite hit and miss surrounded with external dirty hacks for at least 3 kernel releases ~18months until it all stabilized and now it just works.
This display issue (whatever issue it is, a very broad copy&paste from some 2006 net article more likely) is just.. broad


dook43 said:
Copy/regsvr32 in some instances.

What if a shared library required by $Software is compiled and linked with a different version of gcc/ld than what is installed on your system?
Click to expand...
Yes I am fully aware of that, that was just a broad example. If you want a more specific example.
I use xming alot (at work and at home) and I have set it up for a few colleagues as well so that they can use a LINUX app (on one of our linux boxes) as if it was a windows app - its great

NOW... a while back this just worked fine on all machines. but then my work laptop started now actually showing the passwd dialog box - worked fine on all other machines... (I uses use plink for git so I kinda needed it). I had to set plink to "Windows2000 compatibility" for it to work. NO idea why essentially the same build of windowsXP (from the same IT image...) would suddenly start behaving differently. No warnings, no errors, no logs, no verbosity to say why it started acting like this

EVEN worse about a month ago starting Xlaunch on my work desktop would result in that nice "This application has crashed, would you like to send an error report to Microsoft" popup. No fucking infomation about why it does that or nothing. All machines hooked to the same network, all getting updates when IT push them to us YET different machines acting up and NO FUCKING WAY TO FIND OUT WHY

Or a friends personal laptop refusing to run python (well pythonw.exe) because windows says it doesn't have msvcr7.dll YET the files exists and registered YET the SxS structure is screwed up... and no way to repair it.


go search this forum, I posted abt that Xming thing a while back and not a single soul was able to help, not even the dev of Xming because there is no fucking way to find out wtf windows is fucking doing or what is conflicting

dll hell is still around...



I have happily donated over £500 to FOSS, money well spent since I have had infinitely better support for linux issues then I have ever had for windows issues "buy the latest version, reinstall, use another application..."
 
Modred189 said:
I prefer my OS loose, alike a 2$ hooker...
You tell her what you want, and she brings it fast and cheap. Sure, you might get a virus, but as long as you employ some protection you will be fine.

Win7 ftw, lol :cool:
Click to expand...

x2. I don't have the time to wine and dine.
 
i don't know who originally said this, but i once read this:

"linux is only free if your time is worthless."

yea, you can install a linux distribution easily these days, but oh boy be prepared for some hours of forum whoring if you run into a problem and you are just a linux noob.

i have toyed around with it three times over the last 7 or so years and it hasn't convinced me. i got a laptop now so i can work on something between courses at university and i didn't want to shell out money on a new windows license. so i installed kubuntu... maybe this time i may become an illuminati...

(i got mail today that i can get a student license of win7 for just 10 bucks. maybe i can use the winxp key of my desktop on the laptop. always good to have a plan b lol)
 
Like anyone who runs Linux has ever touched a lady. :D

plinko said:
Linux is like a classy lady. You might not know what to say to her at first, but once you figure it out and give her what she wants, it's AMAZING :D
Click to expand...
 
eeyrjmr said:
NOW... a while back this just worked fine on all machines. but then my work laptop started now actually showing the passwd dialog box - worked fine on all other machines... (I uses use plink for git so I kinda needed it). I had to set plink to "Windows2000 compatibility" for it to work. NO idea why essentially the same build of windowsXP (from the same IT image...) would suddenly start behaving differently. No warnings, no errors, no logs, no verbosity to say why it started acting like this

EVEN worse about a month ago starting Xlaunch on my work desktop would result in that nice "This application has crashed, would you like to send an error report to Microsoft" popup. No fucking infomation about why it does that or nothing. All machines hooked to the same network, all getting updates when IT push them to us YET different machines acting up and NO FUCKING WAY TO FIND OUT WHY

Or a friends personal laptop refusing to run python (well pythonw.exe) because windows says it doesn't have msvcr7.dll YET the files exists and registered YET the SxS structure is screwed up... and no way to repair it.


go search this forum, I posted abt that Xming thing a while back and not a single soul was able to help, not even the dev of Xming because there is no fucking way to find out wtf windows is fucking doing or what is conflicting

dll hell is still around...



I have happily donated over £500 to FOSS, money well spent since I have had infinitely better support for linux issues then I have ever had for windows issues "buy the latest version, reinstall, use another application..."
Click to expand...

Ever heard of Event Viewer?
 
Arainach said:
When you start the program, it tells you "can't find MYFILENAME.dll", so you go track down a copy of MYFILENAME.dll and drop it in C:\Windows\System32? And perhaps have to call regsvr32, but usually not?
Click to expand...

What's with all these hidden commands and confusing directory structures? run regsrv32? a black box pops up and goes away. What? I need to RTFM and run it from the command prompt? There's not a graphical interface for doing these things like in a modern operating system?

This is why windows isn't ready for the desktop. :p :D
 
Modred189 said:
I prefer my OS loose, alike a 2$ hooker...
You tell her what you want, and she brings it fast and cheap. Sure, you might get a virus, but as long as you employ some protection you will be fine.

Win7 ftw, lol :cool:
Click to expand...

That is the most awesome thing I've read in a while. Kudos and well played, amigo.
 
My own experience with Ubuntu has been mixed. I've ran into a few driver issues here and there (installed Ubuntu onto a Dell Optiplex 260 only have no video. Found out the built in Intel graphics didn't support the newer video goodies in 8.?? Took me 5 minutes to find the fix online. But, I never could get a dvd to run on other pc with Ubuntu. I finally gave up and took the dvdrom out and just put in cdrom). However, the one biggest problem with Linux is the all the different flavors that are out there cause confusion. Windows is windows. Once you gain familiarity with one, you can pretty much use any other version with a very small learning curve. Linux is not like that. You not only have different distro's, but different environments within those distro's. And say what you want, but until Linux goes fully gui driven it wont be ment for the masses. Sure I can release/renew my ip in command prompt, but other people only know how to "repair" via right clicking on network connection.

Until Linux gets united and simplified, it will always be a niche O/S.
 
Modred189 said:
I prefer my OS loose, alike a 2$ hooker...
You tell her what you want, and she brings it fast and cheap. Sure, you might get a virus, but as long as you employ some protection you will be fine.

Win7 ftw, lol :cool:
Click to expand...
DUDE thats going in the signature :D
 
eeyrjmr said:
what distro, what date, what hardware?

Sounds like you were using an outdated disk or a non-newbie distro.
Stick with Ubuntu if you don't know what you are doing. Newbiew windows user don't get Windows 2008 Server do they? they get Vista home premium
Click to expand...

Sounds like more Linux elitism... "newbie windows user" doesn't use Windows 2008 Server because that is intended for web hosting, intranet/fileserver duties, etc. not desktop use. Vista Home Premium IS meant for desktop use ;).
 
temujin987 said:
i don't know who originally said this, but i once read this:

"linux is only free if your time is worthless."

yea, you can install a linux distribution easily these days, but oh boy be prepared for some hours
Click to expand...

Exactly the truth: if you're a 13-year-old who just goes to school and comes back to watch TV each day, sure, Linux is fine, your time isn't going to be doing anything much more productive anyway unless you're applying yourself at your schoolwork (then Linux isn't suitable for you in any case). However, for anyone who values their time in the slightest, Windows gives better "bang for the buck" by far and is much more widely supported with better support resources for when something does come up.

Personally, I'd rather take a nap for a few hours every month instead of spending that time annoying myself with Linux's latest thing ;). I have tried Linux a couple of times over the last 10 years but time and again it just doesn't offer anything compelling other than being "free"... except for the 100000+ hours you spend aggravated and trying to solve random problems that keep cropping up. Really, the only motivations for using Linux are: A) WOW!!! It's so free of DRM from those corporate mind-controlling fat cats!!! I can live securely, mannnn!!! OR B) It's freeeeeeee!!! I don't have to pay $99 for a full version!!!!! YEAH BABY!!!! Oh crap, I just spent 10 hours fixing a couple of simple issues that I finally turned up a solution for by begging people in PM's on a Linux IRC since no one on the forums would respond anything but "RTFM"! Whoops!
 
majortom1981 said:
That is the sole reason why linux will not get very popular. I had a driver problem with ubuntu linux. My screen was split in half and the bottom was on the top and the top on the bottom.

I went into ubuntu's forums for help and literally got 20 comments saying how i am a newb and shouldnt be asking the question in the forums and should be looking elsewhere for help.

HELLO !!! where else would i go for help .

As long as the linux community acts that way linux will never be very popular.
Click to expand...

TwiceOver said:
Link?
Click to expand...

I'll be surprised to see a link at all about this. For as much time as I've spent in that forum, both asking and answering, I have YET to see something like this, unless the OP posted it in a way that reads "Who do I sue over this? Ubuntu sucks.."
 
Linux will never be mainstream until it is dumbed down for the average user. The average user just wants the computer to work. The same goes for hardware, building pcs, programming, specifications, etc... the average user does not care about any of that- he/she just wants a computer that WORKS. Windows does give problems sometimes but still is easier to deal with.

Here, almost everyone is good with PCs so Linux could be easier to deal with. For the average user, that is not the case.
 
BTW, most of those "too stupid to use linux" people actually do something meaningful everyday, such as working as engineers to bring electricity to the home, so that elitists can post on the Internet calling other people n00b.
 
I think tech infighting is par for the course in the tech industry period. That's not a Linux only thing at all. Just two days ago we had two people whipping out their e-penises over video card architecture. How many arguments have we all had over Vista? Intel or AMD? Playstation 3 or Xbox360 ? Tech users in general are arrogant asses. To say that RTFM is a Linux only thing is a joke. Hell I can illicit a RTFM response and probably start an argument simply by saying Ribbon UI in Office 07 sucks (I'm looking at you Chart Wizard).:mad:

Overall I agree with the article, however it oversimplifies the situation. Tell me how are you going to market an OS that no normal person outside of this forum has seen? You can't buy it from any System Builder other than Dell. Their choice is between an OS that's on 90% of the computers on planet Earth, and an OS that they have never seen before, let alone seen at work. It would take a lot more than simple marketing, and puppies to get Linux in the mainstream. Macs aren't even mainstream and they've been battling Microsoft since I can remember. Apple has provided a cohesive platform. No bickering. No infighting. Hell Mac users don't fight about technical aspects of the platform. They battle over who has the latest Apple products! The Mac is the most Zen-like platform out there so I've got a few questions. Where are the games for it? Anyone run a Zune on a Mac? Hmm... well maybe if there was only.....one......manu...... ok?

The problem comes down really to something that's not likely to change... MONEY. Microsoft has a death grip on the consumer market. If you are a developer are you going to develop for 90% of the market or 10%? Firefox has been rendering websites more accurately based on HTML spec for years compared to IE, yet who has the biggest marketshare? What happened to Word Perfect? Hell I'd say VMWare has 5 years maybe 10 at best and it will be right along with all of the other development corpses... eaten up by Gates in the day, and defecated by Ballmer at night.

As much as I like Linux I think it will pretty much stay in the server space, with a few people like me running Linux on their desktop who don't like Ballmer looking at my browser from afar and then RDP'ing into my porno session at night, thus locking me out of my own computer.

There's always room for improvement. I'd like to see one package manager and one standard file system schematic for libraries, apps, and user profiles. However, those just aren't things your average consumer is going to be concerned with, and no techie should be intimidated by.We cut metal in half, void warranties intentionally, and I'm suppose to be mad that my program installed in /opt and not /usr/share? Microsoft had the dominant OS when all of us were manually managing himem and conventional memory to play Leisure Suit Larry and setting 24-bit color would prevent Windows 3.0 from loading.

I manage my servers at work with my blackberry while taking a dump at home so I'm not afraid of the command line. I still believe that the desktop is far easier than people realize since when I'm home I really don't hit the command line for much (maybe to test concepts or ideas) and I'm much more of a power user than Jon or Jane Doe down the street. My latest voyage to command line at home was to test Gnome Shell. That was 2 weeks ago.

I'm very willing to help people without getting an attitude. Nonetheless that's not enough, even if every Linux user was Rainbow Brite that's unlikely to change the reality that money makes the world go round and Microsoft has more of it than any of us.
 
GoldenTiger said:
Exactly the truth: if you're a 13-year-old who just goes to school and comes back to watch TV each day, sure, Linux is fine, your time isn't going to be doing anything much more productive anyway unless you're applying yourself at your schoolwork (then Linux isn't suitable for you in any case). However, for anyone who values their time in the slightest, Windows gives better "bang for the buck" by far and is much more widely supported with better support resources for when something does come up.

Personally, I'd rather take a nap for a few hours every month instead of spending that time annoying myself with Linux's latest thing ;). I have tried Linux a couple of times over the last 10 years but time and again it just doesn't offer anything compelling other than being "free"... except for the 100000+ hours you spend aggravated and trying to solve random problems that keep cropping up. Really, the only motivations for using Linux are: A) WOW!!! It's so free of DRM from those corporate mind-controlling fat cats!!! I can live securely, mannnn!!! OR B) It's freeeeeeee!!! I don't have to pay $99 for a full version!!!!! YEAH BABY!!!! Oh crap, I just spent 10 hours fixing a couple of simple issues that I finally turned up a solution for by begging people in PM's on a Linux IRC since no one on the forums would respond anything but "RTFM"! Whoops!
Click to expand...

Spending hours doing what? Linux isn't a yeast infection that just stops by for a visit. You either have a problem when you first install it or you don't. I can at least speak for Ubuntu overall regressions are rare for a basic install. You might experience problems if you get jiggy with the package manager but a basic install includes just the basic stuff which works pretty well.

If a student has a problem with Windows (we are assuming that they aren't tech users) who are they going to call ? Ghostbusters? They are not calling Microsoft and very few warranties extend to Windows itself. They will do exactly what you said a Linux user would do...hit the Internet, in which case they may or may not find a solution to their issue easily. Hell they are more likely to find a Microsoft Support page with Northwind DB examples before finding the solution. They most likely will call a friend, call Geek Squad, or find a support site in which case the outcome could be helpful or RTFM,
 
I am sure its been said before in th thread, but what the hell, I like beating on dead horses.

Linux's number one problem is not Linux. its the lack of commercial apps. I don't care how good an OS is, if third party devs don't write apps that people want to use, its a Toy, nothing more. lot of superior OS's faded away for that very reason, and we were stuck with MS-DOS and windows 3.0 anyone remember OS-2?
Emulaters like WINE are a nice patch, but the average person doesn't care about things like that, they just want to stick the disk in or click the download button and play WOW or run Photoshop, etc. as far as distro's like Ubuntu have came in the last few years, the mainstream user has no use for it.
 
motomonkey said:
I don't care how good an OS is, if third party devs don't write apps that people want to use, its a Toy, nothing more. lot of superior OS's faded away for that very reason, and we were stuck with MS-DOS and windows 3.0 anyone remember OS-2?
Click to expand...
Hmm, you might want to tell Oracle that they aren't fighting over MYSQL with the EU, but they are fighting for a billion dollar "toy".

Apple has lasted quite a while in this state as well. Apple users can't just pick a game and install it without first thinking "will this work on my Mac?" and no average user is installing Photoshop. In fact Apple markets their products as the only product that you don't have to buy any applications for it at all (hence the painful iMovie vs. Windows Movie commericals). Games are limited, and using Safari to navigate the Internet likely would cause the wife to continually buy speedos when she's been clicking on the icon for her underwear instead.

motomonkey said:
.... as far as distro's like Ubuntu have came in the last few years, the mainstream user has no use for it.
Click to expand...
That's why Dell sells it as an option? I think you're exaggerating a little bit here. To say it doesn't have usefulness to the mainstream user when the default install comes with most needed products out of the box is a little bit of a stretch don't ya think?
 
At least on page two of this thread, no mention of Freebsd... just skimming
the "pans" of linux, it seems it might solve a bit of the frustration of
handling software installs/deinstalls...
"cd /usr/ports/www/firefox3
"make run-depends-list"
"portmaster www/firefox3"
etc
etc
 
dagas said:
Again? Is it just me who get a Deja vu feeling? It seems the same criticism is brought up again and again about Linux.
Click to expand...

I agree. Seems like this comes up every month of 2. Don't like it, don't use it. Simple
 
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