Is Linux Too Dumbed Down?

[Blizzardnh]

   Over the years, I've heard some people claim that Linux is finally ready for the masses. I would suggest that outside of a completely locked down OS such as ChromeOS (which is Linux powered), no OS is genuinely ready for the masses. Instead, it has been my experience that the masses should stick to tablets and Chromebooks.
Smartphones make us dumb

I can see how my view of most computer users would seem a bit harsh. But I'd also be the first to point out that using smartphones have made all of us "dumb" in the sense that our complacency is at an all time high. Comparatively speaking, the difference between smartphones and PCs in terms of root access is night and day.

On a computer, running Linux...root is a mere command away from any terminal. With iOS or Android, you must gain access to a deeper level of the phone in order to have this sort of power. It's not nearly as simple and therein lays the comparative difference.

Most people believe their smartphones are completely safe from exploits and other malicious behavior because they have never experienced it on these devices. Mind you, I didn't claim this was a valid point of view. Rather, this is simply a widespread interpretation of how safe smartphones are. These devices also present a minimal learning curve for most people, so there is little to no reason to learn anything new about them.

Excerpt:
http://www.datamation.com/open-source/is-linux-too-dumbed-down.html

[ShadowAce]

@BikkFire @geronl @Smokin Joe @roamer_1 @Blizzardnh @markomalley

[geronl]

$99... better than a Pi??

http://www.zdnet.com/article/meet-utilite-new-raspberry-pi-rival/

[Oceander]

Then perhaps a flavor of linux should be released that will make it harder to get to the superuser.  Just as the superadministrator account in Windows can be accessed, but is not automatically available.

This could, perhaps, be implemented through an appropriate GUI.  I say this because the average retail user will never be able to handle command-line access to an OS and will stick with the GUI.  Those that eventually do will have gone through a learning process by having to figure out how to get to the command-line and the additional powers/abilities that unlocks which should make them more aware of the dangers of going superuser.

As far as being ready for RTM, I do think that some of the linux distros are there, or almost there; some of the GUIs are quite impressive.

[Blizzardnh]

They have come a long way from start x

[guitar4jesus]

They have come a long way from start x

That's for sure!

[roamer_1]

.

Just read about your biking accident on TOS - Sure hope you are doing better - Day late and a dollar short, I know, but I hardly go there anymore, and didn't get the ping.

@ShadowAce

[Suppressed]

Great to see you here!  I was a lurker over at TOS, and I enjoyed coming across your posts.

[ShadowAce]

Just read about your biking accident on TOS - Sure hope you are doing better - Day late and a dollar short, I know, but I hardly go there anymore, and didn't get the ping.

@roamer_1

Thanks!  I'm back at work now--was out of the office for 8 weeks, but I'm down to only one issue left with my injuries.

[Oceander]

The first time I tried linux, about 10 years ago, I got so frustrated - I was coming from a WinXP background - I actually got suspended from an online forum for 4 days for generally nasty behavior (in retrospect, I think the suspension was too gracious by half).  I think the big problems were (a) not sufficiently appreciating the differences between the two, such as the file structure, and (b) having no real experience with a real command-line interface because Windows' CMD interface barely qualifies as a real interface, let alone an interface from which real work can be done.

Last year I set up another installation of a recently released version, and was reasonably comfortable with it.  I have it running on a homebrew server that I can only access remotely, so I haven't made a lot of use of it, particularly of late since I'm working so much, but I did enjoy it and would be tempted to make it my primary OS if I were using a desktop, particularly one that was a few years old.

I would contribute my more successful second experience to two things:

(a) I am much more proficient with a command-line interface; I've been working extensively with Windows powershell for about 8 years now, and can now do quite a bit from that interface (btw, powershell is much, much more than just an interface; it has access to most of the .NET assemblies in the OS and can effectively be used as a programming language. I have written several programs I used fairly frequently, including one that displays a file in 16-column two-digit hexadecimal format with header numbers and column numbers, one that extracts EXIF data from jpg image files, and one that can parse pdf files up to about version 1.5, extract the text, and display it in a plain text format that is more or less representative of the text as it is displayed in the pdf itself); and

(b) the vast development of the GUIs that now sit on top of linux.  In the fullness of time I expect to be able to do just about everything from command-line, however, the GUI is a great way to familiarize yourself with the layout in a very high level view, and in a way that is recognizable to a Windows user, which facilitates the transition process immensely.

Hopefully, when I finally get some more personal time, I'll be able to really learn, and enjoy, linux.  I don't think I'll ever get to the level of rolling my own flavor of linux, but I do hope to be able to do everything I do on Windows now, as well as some more extensive programming.

[Blizzardnh]

Our house has  three laptops and two desk tops and they all run linux , with one desktop duel booting with win 10. for the rare times we need windows.

[roamer_1]

@roamer_1

Thanks!  I'm back at work now--was out of the office for 8 weeks, but I'm down to only one issue left with my injuries.

'One issue left' could be good or bad - Hopefully not a serious thing... But one way or the other, I'm pullin for ya, and I hope you're back to square one ASAP. 

[geronl]

@roamer_1

Thanks!  I'm back at work now--was out of the office for 8 weeks, but I'm down to only one issue left with my injuries.

Glad to hear you are on the mend.

[driftdiver]

   Over the years, I've heard some people claim that Linux is finally ready for the masses. I would suggest that outside of a completely locked down OS such as ChromeOS (which is Linux powered), no OS is genuinely ready for the masses. Instead, it has been my experience that the masses should stick to tablets and Chromebooks.
Smartphones make us dumb

I can see how my view of most computer users would seem a bit harsh. But I'd also be the first to point out that using smartphones have made all of us "dumb" in the sense that our complacency is at an all time high. Comparatively speaking, the difference between smartphones and PCs in terms of root access is night and day.

On a computer, running Linux...root is a mere command away from any terminal. With iOS or Android, you must gain access to a deeper level of the phone in order to have this sort of power. It's not nearly as simple and therein lays the comparative difference.

Most people believe their smartphones are completely safe from exploits and other malicious behavior because they have never experienced it on these devices. Mind you, I didn't claim this was a valid point of view. Rather, this is simply a widespread interpretation of how safe smartphones are. These devices also present a minimal learning curve for most people, so there is little to no reason to learn anything new about them.

Excerpt:
http://www.datamation.com/open-source/is-linux-too-dumbed-down.html

My goal is to get where I never have to use a computer again (without going to jail).   Not to learn more about the flavor of the month.

[Restored]

I do unix/linux all day at work on a command line. When linux can easily play Call of Duty and Battlefield, I'll think about it. Until then, it stays in a VM at home.

My sister gave me a laptop that was slow. I deleted the heavily infected Windows Vista and installed Linux Mint Cinnamon. It's is blazingly fast.

[geronl]

I do unix/linux all day at work on a command line. When linux can easily play Call of Duty and Battlefield, I'll think about it. Until then, it stays in a VM at home.

There are some good games that play on Linux, its just my old Ubuntu machine has 2 gigs of RAM... if it had 8, I'd be playing things like WAR THUNDER on it!

I play War Thunder on this Win 8.1 machine though.

[Blizzardnh]

There are some good games that play on Linux, its just my old Ubuntu machine has 2 gigs of RAM... if it had 8, I'd be playing things like WAR THUNDER on it!

I play War Thunder on this Win 8.1 machine though.

I play on steam and have 2 gig of ram and you are right , more ram is needed

[geronl]

I play on steam and have 2 gig of ram and you are right , more ram is needed

We need more RAM, Captain!

[240B]

Fedora is a great user interface for Linux.


I know more about Unix/Linux than I will ever know about Windows. So for me, I live on the command line down in the guts.


But Fedora is pretty good for people who need that windows-ish look-and-feel.

[geronl]

I play on steam and have 2 gig of ram and you are right , more ram is needed

The same company (from Russia) that does War Thunder also does Star Conflict, a sci-fi game where you fly around shooting other players on the other team.

Apparently Star Conflict is also available on Linux via STEAM

[Doug Loss]

(a) I am much more proficient with a command-line interface; I've been working extensively with Windows powershell for about 8 years now, and can now do quite a bit from that interface (btw, powershell is much, much more than just an interface; it has access to most of the .NET assemblies in the OS and can effectively be used as a programming language. I have written several programs I used fairly frequently, including one that displays a file in 16-column two-digit hexadecimal format with header numbers and column numbers, one that extracts EXIF data from jpg image files, and one that can parse pdf files up to about version 1.5, extract the text, and display it in a plain text format that is more or less representative of the text as it is displayed in the pdf itself);

Not intending to start any kind of flame war, but in the Linux/Unix world we call that shell scripting, and we've been doing it for at least 20 years.  Just saying...

[Doug Loss]

Fedora is a great user interface for Linux.

Well, Fedora is a distro, not a user interface, but I agree its GUI isn't bad at all.  As you say, I never bothered with GUIs on any of the servers or network devices I admined, but for desktop and laptop systems they're quite nice. (I'm on a Linux Mint system at the moment).

[Oceander]

Not intending to start any kind of flame war, but in the Linux/Unix world we call that shell scripting, and we've been doing it for at least 20 years.  Just saying...

I wouldn't take it that way.  That's the thing about Windows:  until Powershell was developed you basically couldn't do scripting worth a hill of beans.  CMD was basically useful for setting a few things up to go off at a certain time and doing simple file rename/copy/move/delete chores, but any more sophisticated scripting was out of the question.  One of the main developers of Powershell, Bruce Payette, did a really good job in his book Windows Powershell in Action of discussing CMD's deficiencies, how Powershell was designed to fix them, and then how, once they had the bit in their teeth, they took it to the next level.  I would tend to consider powershell along the lines of a full-fledged interpreted (as opposed to compiled) programming language, akin, in that conceptual framework, to the old BASIC programming language, that was also interpreted.

And I know that the *nix systems have pretty much had that capacity for ages and ages.  I haven't really had the time to get as deep into linux shell scripting as I did with Powershell, but I have the books and etc - I'm still a paper pages kind of person when it comes to learning things - and as/when I have the time I want to work on it.

[Blizzardnh]

http://www.ostechnix.com/how-to-install-windows-powershell-in-linux/

[Oceander]

http://www.ostechnix.com/how-to-install-windows-powershell-in-linux/

Ni-i-i-i-i-i-ce!!!

Just out of curiosity, does the installation come with a full installation of .NET as well, or does that have to be installed directly?  Or is this version of Powershell rewritten to access the underlying linux libraries instead?