I agree with your assessment. Linux and open source is, very often, an aftermarket solution. As such, it lags in things like hardware support, design trends, integration with other products. In fact, this is one of the things Microsoft made sure with their business tactics regarding Windows: that Windows should be the primary PC platform. They did their hardest to support this software-wise, with things like backward compatibility, and with ruthless business deals, bundling, support and discounts for govs and schools, and by letting people pirate it to their hearts' content. The result is what we see today: Windows everywhere, every hardware supports Windows, every software runs on Windows. Plug and play. (With caveats of course, for example I have an USB wifi stick that makes Win10 BSOD the moment I disconnect it. Linux has no problem with it.)
That said, I lucked out with my Linux experience. Everything I need works well, and I don't tinker with it more than I did with Windows. The main difference is that I have much more control over the situation, compared to Windows' typical unhelpful messages and opaque environment.
> ings Microsoft made sure with their business tactics regarding Windows: that Windows should be the primary PC platform...and with ruthless business deals
Yes, without doubt, Microsoft make a lot of bad things to Windows being the primary pc platform.
> That said, I lucked out with my Linux experience. Everything I need works well
My friend who uses a USB dongle for Wifi says the same thing!
> My friend who uses a USB dongle for Wifi says the same thing!
I reckon you may have not tried a recent Linux kernel. Network hardware support is definitely better than MacOS at this point, and is creeping up on Windows in the consumer segment. I've used 5 different devices from 5 different manufacturers on Linux. Only one of them had a WiFi issue, which was only because the distro I was testing didn't ship with the specific driver for it (FWIW it was also a Surface product).
It is curious though, I do see people who share your sentiment but, like the parent comment, I legitimately have no problems with it. My OEM Lenovo desktop from 2014 worked just fine. My new custom-built gaming PC with proprietary everything seems to work fine, too. I genuinely struggle to find devices that run Linux poorly, outside of maybe the gaming laptop space and Macbook market. It's probably one of those Paretto principle things: 80% of people will be offended by the 20% of drivers that are missing from your kernel.
It's not guaranteed to be an out of box experience unfortunately, and I say unfortunately, because of how the human mind works. For regular, pragmatic usage, Linux doesn't really have any upsides. So if someone changes, and everything works as it did before, yay, maybe we scored some privacy points, or one-upped a corporation? Great. But if someone changes and is facing issues, and sees no upsides, the conclusion will be clear: the change isn't worth it. This is among the first things that'll come to mind and again, with no positive effects to expect, the person is left with the feeling of regret, or feeling stupid.
This is why I'd like to see the following things in the technology space. Linux, Libreoffice, GIMP, etc being the default software they teach in schools. Them being used as defaults in governments. Linux coming preinstalled on computers by default, with Windows coming with an extra price tag. If these would magically happen somehow, the tables would have been turned - now it's up to Microsoft to adhere to a standard, and people would be confused as to why someone would bother tinkering with Windows and Office when the forms, submissions, contracts and presentations are expected in the libre formats anyways.
I don't think Linux's goal is to eat the world (or should be), which seems to be a common misconception in and outside of the community. Linux does not make a good desktop operating system in an age of smartphones and iPads, and I think that's perfectly fine. Linux effectively has 2 communities to cater to:
- Developers, sysadmins and power-users who intend to exploit the depth of it's featureset
or
- Crypto nerds, privacy advocates, free-software puritans, and other alt-software niches
To that end, I think it holds down both bases quite well. Linux is the #1 server operating system in the world by an insurmountable margin, and the alt-software crusaders are fat and happy. Linux isn't a panacea, it's a piece of software that was made to solve a problem. To this day, it continues to solve that problem (and people still misconstrue it's goals).
I disagree with this assessment. I'd love Linux, or any other free OS to eat the world; I think that standards, protocols, operating systems, and other utility-like components should be 100% open, free and unencumbered.
Also, Linux is pretty much a panacea. We have it demonstrated currently. It works perfectly well in server, desktop, laptop and mobile environments. It continues to prove itself as a viable alternative to whatever else these platforms run.
The crux of people's Linux issues is not a technical one. Linux, as a platform, doesn't have the clout the alternatives do have. This means that the tinkering that comes with integrating systems falls on the Linux people, and the end users. Neither of them have the information, which often doesn't leave the manufacturer, and the adequate time and know-how to keep up - so the systems end up working less reliably. Which, of course, works out well in favor of the companies that offer end-to-end integrated systems - Apple, Google, Microsoft.
Oh, well there's your problem. Gaming laptops are notoriously useless on Linux, oftentimes moreso than Macs. Gaming laptop manufacturers only sell products to Windows users, and likewise don't really care if they buy cheap components without proper driver support. It's a common and sad practice, but I kinda have to blame you for not doing your research here.
I do wish you luck in the future. Nobody deserves to be saddled with telemetry/adware just because their hardware is unsupported on other OSes, but blind-box reverse-engineering the drivers for all your esoteric Chinese WiFi cards is oftentimes not really worth the trouble. Like I said in the other post, Linux never claims to have driver parity with Windows (nor can it, really). However, informed consumers can pretty easily source hardware with excellent Linux support. HP and Lenovo sell first-party machines with Linux preinstalled and guaranteed driver support, as well as many other smaller manufacturers. With cheap, cobbled-together gaming laptops, that's often not possible.
I get your point about the friend, I was quite the zealot myself, and I have known a few others too - they were so obnoxious that I was turned off of Linux for quite a few years.
When I say that everything I need works well, I do mean it, but the "I need" part does a lot of work. I don't need the fingerprint scanner, or the built-in sound card, or the bundleware that comes with the rgb gaming mouse.
That said, I lucked out with my Linux experience. Everything I need works well, and I don't tinker with it more than I did with Windows. The main difference is that I have much more control over the situation, compared to Windows' typical unhelpful messages and opaque environment.