How do you feel about Linux?

I have a bootable CD of Linux Mint 19 codename: Sarah. So I ran on that for a while, then installed it to my PC for all of 2 days. Got really bummed out I couldn't play almost any games so went back to Windows.

If Linux had the compatibility with software, it would be fierce competition for Microsoft. It seems like the only thing the people behind Linux cares about is having a million flavors 🙄🙄🙄

Not quite sure how that helps anyone wanting to play games on it and get away from Microsoft but whatever

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pdxlinux · 41-45, M

i think that you have made a good point about linux. it works well for people like me who are mainly using a web browser and a little bit of other things like productivity apps and shell utilities. it's never going to be a good tool for games, but maybe VR? i don't know.

twiigss · M

@pdxlinux Yeah, I think it could be useful for VR, but again, you need the software compatibility, not 500,000 flavors of the same thing. They truly fail to see that. They focus on the back-end which is pretty much solid.

I continue to quote this movie, Silicon Valley. It showed how Apple and Microsoft got started. According to Steve Wozniak, that movie is the closest thing to the honest truth on how the two companies started up. In the movie, Bill Gates is sitting there at this table with Steve Ballmer at IBM. Bill tells IBM that he has the answer to all of their problems with DOS, the Disk Operating System. According to Ballmer in the movie, Bill had nothing, nada, zip. And they're sitting there with the highest IBM execs telling them they have the answer to all of their problems.

In the movie, Bill says how he wants to retain ownership of DOS, and just sell a license. The IBM execs smirk and ask, you want to keep the rights to the software? Bill goes, yep, that's right. The IBM execs look at each other and say, well, the money is in the hardware, not this, DOS. Okay, that's fine, you got yourself a deal.

What is hilarious is that the money is in the software and it always will be. You can have a 40" monitor with 20k resolution, and a computer with 4 hard drives, 10 fans, RGB all over it, but at the end of the day, without software, all you got is something you can't use.

And if the people over at Linux really wanted to be competitive with Microsoft, then they have to have more software compatibility. Now I'm not saying go and hijack every little thing that is Microsoft, but there should be some way that people who love PC gaming should be able to game on any OS they want, and it should all run the same. My thing is, Linux doesn't nag you, Linux doesn't track you secretly, Linux doesn't force updates on you every 2 weeks (which is why mine are 100% disabled).

I'm just glad that I did dabble with Linux for a little while and it was familiar to me, even though I had never used it before. As an OS on it's own, it's nice. I just think it can do more and it should be able to do more. A lot more.

BlueGreenGrey ·

You have the cart before the horse

It's up to software developers to make their applications compatible with an operating system, not the other way around ... and they're not logically going to do that with operating systems that have smaller numbers of users (this is your actual issue, not "Linux")

Moreover the "people behind Linux" are just the kernel developers ... the "millions flavors" you speak of come from other people working on a layer on top of Linux ... graphical environments and package managers are stuff that's actually separate from Linux and if Windows was open-source, no doubt some individuals would feel compelled to build alternative environments atop the NT kernel

Now while there are many Linux distributions and desktop environments available, realistically the only thing any newbie is likely to encounter is Ubuntu or something based on Ubuntu. So this generally cuts down your choice of package manager to apt, and generally cuts down your choice of desktop environment to GNOME. So all these "flavors" for all intents disappear. No one is advising people new to Linux to install, say, Arch Linux with an i3 window manager. That just doesn't happen. Honestly most of what a potential new user might find online doesn't even encourage them to install something like Fedore, with some rpm-based package manager. The notion of a million flavors being a barrier to growing the Linux marketshare doesn't make any sense.

If Microsoft actually gave a shit about users, it would simply convert Windows into another Linux "flavor" ... which would make a lot of sense, since at this point they're already going to the trouble to bury a Linux layer inside of Windows itself, they used to sell a version of UNIX in the early 1980s (and Linux is basically UNIX, according to UNIX co-creator Dennis Ritchie, and UNIX predates Microsoft operating systems by a decade), and Microsoft is already moving things like Office to web-based Saas subscriptions and otherwise has also created Linux versions of things like SQL Server, and they have had to develop some expertise in Linux in order to offer it as a hosting option on their Azure cloud platform.

Lilnonames · F

I'll look it up can't right now I'm at work

twiigss · M

@Lilnonames oh no no that's okay, I'm at work too. Not sure what your time zone is, for me it's 3:38pm, and I won't get home until about 5:25pm.

Lilnonames · F

@twiigss hour off is 230, here

twiigss · M

@Lilnonames Oh ok. Well I just got home and on the computer. Basically I'm wondering what sort of software compatibility can I get with Linux and Windows games. I heard DosBox pretty much will run all DOS games on Linux, but I couldn't get the thing to work. I heard about Wine and I had that last time but most games just didn't work. I hear stories about Proton something? And that you want to use that for games.

I have been an MS-DOS 6.22 guy up until Windows 95, went back to DOS until 98SE came out, then I went to XP, then 7. While on 7 I was trying out a bootable CD I made of Linux Mint 19. Eventually I formatted the C:\ drive and installed Linux Mint to my hard drive. Because of the lack of games support, the lack of software compatibility with Linux, I went back to Windows after 2 days.

So really I'm just looking for advice. What's a good Linux OS to use for gaming? I keep hearing Ubuntu, but then I was also hearing that if you want something close to Windows, you want Linux Mint. But okay that's where I get confused. I didn't say I wanted anything close to Windows. I want an operating system that will function, but at the same time be fairly easy to navigate like on a Windows desktop. Does Ubuntu offer that?

Rant
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In my mind, Linux Mint and Ubuntu should operate the same, because it's Linux. The thing I really don't understand is the need for a billion different flavors. Just create one OS, and then focus on making that one OS the best OS it can be. This is just me ranting so you can skip this part, it's not that important.

Finally, when I was using Linux Mint, when I booted I only had a flashing line on the screen. Someone on a Linux forum said it was because I didn't have the proper drivers and that there was something I needed to do first to be able to get in. Once I got in, I downloaded and installed the recommended drivers, but then I was told online that those recommended drivers aren't what I need. But it said it was a driver for my video card, so not even sure what I did wrong there.

But I'm home so I'll keep this up if you see this and want to respond I'll hear the notification go off. Thanks again.

NativePortlander1970

@Lilnonames might be able to help you get around compatability issues

twiigss · M

@NativePortlander1970 thanks, I'll reach out then

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