Author Topic: Goodbye Windows, Hello Linux [advice needed for a Linux workstation at home]  (Read 28944 times)

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Offline rsjsouza

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #125 on: January 20, 2019, 09:38:29 pm »
The problem with Linux distros is the number of branches.  It makes the developer's job a lot harder.
No, I've never had any issues with that.  Sure, there is a few hours of work to verify the package dependencies for each root distribution and write the package scripts, but it isn't a big deal at all.

The people who have trouble with that, are the ones who cobble together particular versions of particular libraries, and write code that only works with those.  They need Snap or similar, because "modularity" is not something they grasp.
In my experience this is not something so simple. We have limited resources and, given the Linux version comprises about 10% of our total downloads, we cannot simply spend "a few extra hours" per distro and per version when the general public is using a wide combination of tools out there. We simply choose the most popular (Ubuntu in our case) and let the customers figure out how to install in their distro of choice.

Having to also support Windows (7 and 10, both 32 and 64-bit) and macOS (Sierra, High Sierra), there's no way to fully appease to the entire Linux crowd. Of all these, macOS is the one that has been giving us the most grief lately, as people tend to update their OSes without thinking and several munor changes come to bite us - although all three had shown issues before.

Regarding usability, *nix can be made quite easy to use, as macOS and ChromeOS can show. IME the biggest issue going agains MS and Linux is to properly support the widest range of custom HW arrangements in the marketplace. That is why the procedure to do proper HW setup or obtain a given graphics performance is so much harder.
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Online nctnico

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #126 on: January 20, 2019, 10:02:28 pm »
The problem with Linux distros is the number of branches.  It makes the developer's job a lot harder.
No, I've never had any issues with that.  Sure, there is a few hours of work to verify the package dependencies for each root distribution and write the package scripts, but it isn't a big deal at all.

The people who have trouble with that, are the ones who cobble together particular versions of particular libraries, and write code that only works with those.  They need Snap or similar, because "modularity" is not something they grasp.
In my experience this is not something so simple. We have limited resources and, given the Linux version comprises about 10% of our total downloads, we cannot simply spend "a few extra hours" per distro and per version when the general public is using a wide combination of tools out there. We simply choose the most popular (Ubuntu in our case) and let the customers figure out how to install in their distro of choice.
The easiest way to support many different kinds of OS configurations is to link all libraries statically OR supply the binaries with the binaries. Not depending on any libraries installed on the system has served me very well regardless the OS. BTW Windows 10 has caused me some grief as well because it seems quite a few things have changed under the hood where it comes to scheduling the user interface events and how serial ports are handled.
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Offline free_electron

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #127 on: January 20, 2019, 10:24:52 pm »
Nobody wants to pay for Linux or Linux applications.  It's "free" software, after all.  The flip side is also true:  Why would a professional developer want to work for free?
Sorry but this is utter nonsense. There is lots of commercial software available which runs on Linux. Think about Cadence Allegro, Xilinx FPGA tools, Altera FPGA tools, Sonnet Professional (EM solver), etc. Each of these cost several $k at least.

and why ? because solaris and sun workstations disappeared , became underpowered and more expensive than commodity pc hardware.
So those guys wanted a simple port ... unix ( solaris / bsd ) -> linux . done. adapting to windows was too difficult. but now the point is moot as those packages also run on windows.
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Offline free_electron

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #128 on: January 20, 2019, 10:31:41 pm »

And you rant on and on and I spend more time unfucking your beloved Windows than I ever have dealing with Linux.

Give me a call next time the licensing tool for your software causes the machine to hard reset shortly after boot with no error and nothing in the logs, absolutely nothing to indicate where to start looking, and tell me how it 'always works'.
My current laptop hasn't been rebooted in at least a year. Last boot was due to a power-cycle to install new hardware ( more ram and a quadro 5100)
Win7-64 bit Enterprise. Stock install.
And what licensing tool ? None of the software i use is dependent on a license tool.
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Offline rsjsouza

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #129 on: January 20, 2019, 10:39:44 pm »
The problem with Linux distros is the number of branches.  It makes the developer's job a lot harder.
No, I've never had any issues with that.  Sure, there is a few hours of work to verify the package dependencies for each root distribution and write the package scripts, but it isn't a big deal at all.

The people who have trouble with that, are the ones who cobble together particular versions of particular libraries, and write code that only works with those.  They need Snap or similar, because "modularity" is not something they grasp.
In my experience this is not something so simple. We have limited resources and, given the Linux version comprises about 10% of our total downloads, we cannot simply spend "a few extra hours" per distro and per version when the general public is using a wide combination of tools out there. We simply choose the most popular (Ubuntu in our case) and let the customers figure out how to install in their distro of choice.
The easiest way to support many different kinds of OS configurations is to link all libraries statically OR supply the binaries with the binaries. Not depending on any libraries installed on the system has served me very well regardless the OS. BTW Windows 10 has caused me some grief as well because it seems quite a few things have changed under the hood where it comes to scheduling the user interface events and how serial ports are handled.
Nico, that is an alternative we have for specific components of our software, but there are many other libraries that, when statically linked, still showed incompatibilities with certain untested distros.

Another issue is download size: I wonder how much adding absolutely everything would add to an already hefty 1GB package.
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Online nctnico

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #130 on: January 21, 2019, 12:30:25 am »
Nobody wants to pay for Linux or Linux applications.  It's "free" software, after all.  The flip side is also true:  Why would a professional developer want to work for free?
Sorry but this is utter nonsense. There is lots of commercial software available which runs on Linux. Think about Cadence Allegro, Xilinx FPGA tools, Altera FPGA tools, Sonnet Professional (EM solver), etc. Each of these cost several $k at least.

and why ? because solaris and sun workstations disappeared , became underpowered and more expensive than commodity pc hardware.
So those guys wanted a simple port ... unix ( solaris / bsd ) -> linux . done. adapting to windows was too difficult. but now the point is moot as those packages also run on windows.
The point isn't moot. You just fail to see that there are a lot of people who prefer to use Linux for engineering tasks. Enough to make it worthwhile from a business perspective to support Linux. Why would these companies bother to support Linux if they have a working Windows port? That is a rethorical question: because they will lose sales (and money) if they don't support Linux. And don't underestimate the effort which goes into supporting a Linux build. It is not a matter of taking some old source code which worked on Solaris from the 90's and compile it. Take Cadence Allegro for example. This is build onto the cross platform Qt framework which is relatively new and didn't exist when the old Unixes ruled the CAD world. Cadence made a clear to choice to support Windows AND Linux for their PCB Layout software product. I'm seeing some changes in Orcad Capture as well which may hint they are porting it to Linux.

Even Altium is feeling the heat:
https://www.altium.com/solution/linux-pcb-design-software
Do you need to design a printed circuit board, but are having difficulty in finding Linux PCB design software? Well, look no further, because Altium has a solution for you.

This page is pushing Altium's browser-based PCB design solution so probably meh but the sign is clearly on the wall.
« Last Edit: January 21, 2019, 01:11:06 am by nctnico »
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Online Nominal Animal

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #131 on: January 21, 2019, 01:13:33 am »
there's no way to fully appease to the entire Linux crowd.
Appease?

Look. The situation is simple. You have a product. Either the users want that product, or they don't.  It is not a matter of appeasing to the crowd, unless your product is so shit its sales depends exclusively on marketing.

IME the biggest issue going agains MS and Linux is to properly support the widest range of custom HW arrangements in the marketplace.
No, that's crazy talk.  I mean, the idea that you tune your software to a specific graphics hardware.  On Linux, you use one of the GUI toolkits (the two most common being Qt and GTK+; if you use either one, your application can run in any desktop environment), and OpenGL for acceleration.  You do need to compile the binaries for x86-64 and at least one or two ARM variants, but if your codebase is sensible, it would not require any code changes.  If you target specific hardware, you're doing it wrong.  If your programmers are those who assume int and pointers are the same size, you fire them and hire better ones.

If your team is one of those who create a really nice-looking thing, that when run on different graphics hardware crashes instantly, it is your task to fire them, and get a team that can do it right.  If not, you're just complaining that this business is too hard for stupid people to run, and that Linux devs are nasty if they don't make it easier so we can make a better profit easier.

I am perfectly aware that that approach means it is hard to implement high-budget games on Linux, because their main attraction is visuals, and optimizing for main graphics hardware types.  For Windows games, the game engine developers all co-operate with the driver implementers.  For Linux, the proprietary game engine developers are not allowed to, not on the up-and-up, with Linux graphics drivers devs, for company-internal reasons.  (Steam folks were the first ones I am aware of, and they don't seem to have any major issues now.)  There are quite a few Linux games, so the technology itself cannot be a problem; it can only be a problem with how one operates their business.

If I were harsh, I'd say your complaint boils down to "butbut Linux is not Windows".  We all know that.  Demanding that Linux becomes more like Windows is not a sane one. Trying to base it on "then you'd get much more desktop users" or "then it would be easier for existing businesses to make money on Linux software" does not make sense either. Neither is a positive for Linux users and developers.  The users prefer it to be non-Windows-like.  If they didn't, they'd use Windows instead.

The same applies to Mac. (Or rather, Apple is even more insular than Microsoft is, even if their operating system otherwise looks like an Unix machine.  They have their own graphics stack, Metal, and are stopping OpenGL support altogether.)

Look.  It is perfectly possible to make lots of money selling Linux software.  You claim you cannot.  I am saying that that can only be because you do not know how to do profitable business on Linux.  You claim there are technical obstacles.  I say those technical obstacles are of your own making, and not inherent in Linux at all.

Claiming that you cannot do business in Linux is just like claiming you cannot do business in Japan or Korea or Germany, because their business rules are completely wrong; my United States business just cannot work there.  So they must change, because that way I could do business there too.  But, they refuse to, so they are stupid and anti-business long-haired smellies who hate money and love Stalin, bloody commies.  Right?
 
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Offline Monkeh

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #132 on: January 21, 2019, 01:27:39 am »
Another issue is download size: I wonder how much adding absolutely everything would add to an already hefty 1GB package.

Easily offset by things like printer, graphics, and sound drivers not being the size of an entire OS unto themselves on Linux..
 

Offline rsjsouza

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #133 on: January 21, 2019, 02:52:08 am »
there's no way to fully appease to the entire Linux crowd.
Appease?

Look. The situation is simple. You have a product. Either the users want that product, or they don't.  It is not a matter of appeasing to the crowd, unless your product is so shit its sales depends exclusively on marketing.
Yes, appease. Whenever a version is released, several questions still pop up as to why distro "X" is not supported, with the occasional complaints. It used to happen a lot more in the past, but nowadays some more Linux savvy developers adapt it to their distro, which is not very difficult but we don't officially test it and therefore do not promise support. It is what makes financial sense to address a minority of our customer base.

IME the biggest issue going agains MS and Linux is to properly support the widest range of custom HW arrangements in the marketplace.
No, that's crazy talk.
No, it is not. The context is when comparing to the HW available to Chrome OS and macOS, which is locked. Don't cut quotations to cater to your narrative.

I mean, the idea that you (ZZZZZ....zzzzzz....zzzz...zzzz....) business.

If I were harsh, I'd say your complaint boils down to(ZZZZZ....zzzzzz....zzzz...zzzz....) use Windows instead.
I am impressed - you could extract so many vitriolic reactions and wrong assumptions from my small post? Don't worry in your guessing; you are being harsh all around - fortunately for me this is entirely irrelevant as not everyone is making games or creating beautified GUIs locked to feature "Z" of adapter "X".

Look.  It is perfectly possible to make lots of money selling Linux software.  You claim you cannot.  I am saying that that can only be because you do not know how to do profitable business on Linux.  You claim there are technical obstacles.  I say those technical obstacles are of your own making, and not inherent in Linux at all.

Claiming that you cannot do business in Linux is just like claiming you cannot do business in Japan or Korea or Germany, because their business rules are completely wrong; my United States business just cannot work there.  So they must change, because that way I could do business there too.  But, they refuse to, so they are stupid and anti-business long-haired smellies who hate money and love Stalin, bloody commies.  Right?
Stop putting words in my mouth and get rid of your frivolous assumptions to try and prove your narrative. Repeating what I wrote above and before: financially for us it makes zero sense to "spend a few hours" with each distro, validate and properly document and provide continuous support for absolutely everything on the marketplace.

Your post can be barely taken seriously when compared to what I posted - it only showcases a typical Linux fan that cannot take criticism for someone that lives a different reality than yours. Anyways, all this is going off topic.

Another issue is download size: I wonder how much adding absolutely everything would add to an already hefty 1GB package.

Easily offset by things like printer, graphics, and sound drivers not being the size of an entire OS unto themselves on Linux..
I agree with the ridiculous sizes of certain support packages for peripherals, but that really does not help in my case as I don't provide them. I don't work for any of the HPs, Epsons, Nvidias, etc.
« Last Edit: January 21, 2019, 03:39:49 am by rsjsouza »
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Offline Halcyon

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #134 on: January 21, 2019, 03:21:06 am »
1.  Which one would you choose as a home desktop?
2.  Is there a big difference in the software availability between the two?
3.  I don't like to reinstall too often, yet I want the latest gimmicks, too.  Which one to pick for the long run, Fedora 29 or Ubuntu 18.10?

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Offline free_electron

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #135 on: January 21, 2019, 03:21:26 am »
Does anyone here use virtual containers ?
I would think that pc hardware these days is so powerful you could just spin up a bunch of VM's , drop whatever OS you need in them and run them parallel.
i'm talking a vm that does not require a host OS for itself. (XEN )

Then you can just run whatever OS is needed for whatever apps you want to use. run that on one box and simple setup Remote desktop connections to the different os's running.

Then again for graphics intensive stuff that may not work very well...
« Last Edit: January 21, 2019, 03:26:48 am by free_electron »
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Offline edy

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #136 on: January 21, 2019, 03:42:22 am »
I want to reply back to the original post... regarding my foray into Linux after also ditching Windows 7 just around the time Win 10 was being crammed down our throats. I am not an expert in all the Linux distros and features of each. However, I burned a bunch of Live DVD's at the time and then Live USB's (for my newer machines that allowed USB boot) to experiment... and here's what I found.

I ended up settling with various Ubuntu distro's depending on the hardware. For my older computers that the kids are using, I used Lubuntu (https://lubuntu.net/). I am up to the latest Lubuntu version (and continue to update/upgrade to every new release). My kids are still using an old Dell Latitude D820 laptop made circa 2006 with Lubuntu. I have also an old PC upstairs that the kids use, also Lubuntu. Lubuntu is very lightweight and uses LXDE, yet you can add on whatever you want after if you choose. Very capable on older hardware.

My newer more capable laptop and PC desktop are running Ubuntu Studio (https://ubuntustudio.org/), also I keep up to latest version. I like Studio because it also has a nice clean desktop XFCE and pre-installed with tons of graphics, office, video and audio apps. I install tons of extra things on it and it is my "daily driver" on my ASUS Core i7 laptop.

My wife has a regular Ubuntu install on her 5-6 year old HP machine but I don't like whatever desktop they put on there at the time (I think it was Unity). I think they moved on to Gnome 3 now, which I like much more than Unity. I would much rather install Ubuntu Studio from scratch and have the cleaner and faster XFCE desktop environment and all the packages preloaded than start off with a default Ubuntu install... So my preference is still either Ubuntu Studio, or Lubuntu for older hardware, or Ubuntu if they moved away from that aweful Unity Desktop environment.

I also occasionally run a Tails Live USB when I want to boot up and leave no traces (https://tails.boum.org/). Currenty I am reading through the book "Linux Basics for Hackers" (https://nostarch.com/linuxbasicsforhackers) and it provides tutorials through the use of Kali Linux (https://www.kali.org/) so I am trying to get some experience with security and penetration testing, network sniffing, etc. I run this in a VirtualBox machine on my Ubuntu Studio machine.

Speaking of VirtualBox, I also run Windows 10, Windows XP Mode, Mac OS High Sierra, and have tried a few other OS's all in VirtualBox on my Ubuntu Studio-running laptop with no issues. So as far as ditching Windows, I have not had any regrets. I managed to still install a few fun but older PC/Windows games under WINE.

I don't want to fan the flame war between Windows vs. Linux... but whatever you find useful for your needs, all the best to you!  :-+  At home for my family's needs and my needs, I have found Linux to be a wonderful replacement for Windows and have taken advantage of some very old hardware, saving it from landfill. I am not as worried about them getting viruses and malware, and as far as all the major productivity and connectivity tools are concerned, they are not lacking one bit. I can sleep better at night knowing I can handle their IT issues, and I have all the tools, install disks/USB's required to manage their systems in case something goes completely to hell. I don't have to go scrambling for licenses and figure out whether it was registered, how many machines I can use the license on before issues occur, or stick to some old version. I can pick the latest version and keep updating and I can make sure we are patched up to the latest releases.

At work, I have no choice but to use Windows 10 because the specialty software used for our industry is only available on Windows, and requires a Server-Client setup (Windows Server 2008 R2 or newer with SQL and workstations running Win10). For a while I tried virtualizing Windows on Linux (with VirtualBox) and I had it working, but it made no sense since it would just run slower in VirtualBox than if I was running it straight. Also these machines do not need to be running Linux at all, the office machines are strictly using this Windows software and very little else. I spoke to our software vendor and they have no plans to make a Linux version available. So I have no choice but to be in a Windows environment at work. Do I love Windows? No... but since my software vendor doesn't support anything else, I have to invest a pile of money on it because I need to upgrade my entire office every few years to keep running the latest version of Windows and Windows Server!

Meanwhile, if I take some of those office machines home and wipe them and put Linux on them, I can extend their usefulness another 5-10 years!
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Offline BravoV

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #137 on: January 21, 2019, 07:22:18 am »
Does anyone here use virtual containers ?
I would think that pc hardware these days is so powerful you could just spin up a bunch of VM's , drop whatever OS you need in them and run them parallel.
i'm talking a vm that does not require a host OS for itself. (XEN )

Then you can just run whatever OS is needed for whatever apps you want to use. run that on one box and simple setup Remote desktop connections to the different os's running.

Then again for graphics intensive stuff that may not work very well...

Have you seen this ?

Created by our local moderator Gnif -> KVM Virtualization under Linux

Set the video below to start at 4:30 for the demo action.

https://youtu.be/1MI1s4hZ_yE?t=270

Online tggzzz

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #138 on: January 21, 2019, 08:39:31 am »
I'm not clever enough to run Windows 10. I wouldn't know how to deal with this kind of problem, which floated into my inbox last night.

Quote
I came in this morning to the dreaded Windows 10 update. After waiting just under and hour, unfortunately the Fall Creators Update has been re-applied for some reason.

I attempted re-installing the driver (with driver signing disabled) to no avail. It appears something in that update blocks what ever that driver is interfacing with. I didn't have any further time to get into it after already burning time waiting for the update to apply.

So it is not working in it's current state. Perhaps someone who has looked this before can have another stab. Otherwise we are going to have to roll back again but it seems Windows 10 updates cannot be disabled indefinitely.

There are videos of important presentations being scuppered by Windows updates.

How can people deal with being stopped in their tracks like this? Why do they put up with it?

EDIT: apparently the fix is
Quote
the trick was to uninstall the hidden drivers through registry, reinstall everything and to place the missing dll it complains about in the root folder.

Obvious, isn't it. And editing the registry is much simpler and less error prone than editing an application's config text file or deleting its directory. Isn't it?
« Last Edit: January 21, 2019, 06:13:41 pm by tggzzz »
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Online Nominal Animal

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #139 on: January 21, 2019, 01:18:01 pm »
Financially for us it makes zero sense to "spend a few hours" with each distro, validate and properly document and provide continuous support for absolutely everything on the marketplace.
That is a fair statement I can accept.

However, I don't understand how that ties in with your other statements.

As a practical example, when your users clamor for a Linux version, or a package for a particular distribution, you tell them how much it would cost to produce, and how many units you'd need to sell for that to be practical, in rough numbers.  There is no appeasing needed.  If that is a regular question, I'd put it in a FAQ section for that product.

Your post only showcases a typical Linux fan that cannot take criticism for someone that lives a different reality than yours.
Criticism?  I missed that.  All I saw was demands for change for your particular business to be easier.

(I also would not label myself as a "fan", more like developer.  And please do bear in mind that I did run a successful IT business, part of which was developing, customizing, and installing Linux stuff, for almost a decade.  It did break me -- not the Linux part, I still do that for fun; the business part did.  I am too much of a problem-solving-junkie rather than a business person to be able to run a business successfully without damaging myself.  Nevertheless, the business was profitable up to the year I broke, and was shut down in an orderly manner, not via bankrupt or similar.  I think I've described this in detail elsewhere on this forum.)

The problem I have with a few businesses is that they refuse to make profit when it comes to Linux, because they are unwilling to change their business practices to match the sector.  I do not understand why they refuse to make a profit.  It does not compute.

I have that same problem with many, many other business fields.  Media, and their insistence on "protection" (which is not), is a good example.  I thought otherwise until I read Baen Books' Eric Flint's essays about the effect of Digital Rights Management, and how getting rid of it increased their sales (for some authors, like 5×).  The same observations match my own experiences in other media fields.

Consider, for example, the fact that even now, there is no officially licensed way of playing Blu-Ray discs on Linux.  That is, you cannot buy an officially licensed player for Linux.  The reasons for this are not technical (if you disagree, I can explain exactly how a player strictly licensed for one combination of hardware can be implemented, and how to implement the surrounding licensing in a way that keeps the users well "appeased"), so they can only be political.  And I do not understand why a company would refuse to make money;  I am surprised why their shareholders are not putting the executives to task.

The only explanation for that political stance I have, based on my discussions with people in Finland who make large-scale software choices and invariably lean towards Microsoft or other large firms (that have as low as 33% success rate with large-scale software projects in Finland, but which does not seem to have any effect in their business), is that the untrue statements spread by Microsoft between 1997 and 2015 or so, have been integrated into the minds of the nontechnical decision-makers.  That annoys me.

From your (rjsouza) description I understood that your business counted among those.  That the profit margin would be there, except that you see it as "wrong" to provide packages for individual distributions, because they "should" instead provide one package format that worked for every Linux distro; that Linux being fragmented to a number of distributions is harmful, because it does not work for you.

If I misunderstood, and providing localized/distribution-specific packages is simply non-feasible financially, I do apologize: I know that situation as well, and it can be very irritating; but it only applies to rather small/low-cost software projects.  It is, also, not nearly as common as the profit-exists-but-we-refuse case, the examples for which I've listed above.

Thus far, I have not encountered a single business that does the cross-distribution packaging right.  I do count my Canadian friend selling proprietary Linux stuff in this category; he too does not have the resources to do it right yet.  I have discussed the matter with him, but providing it as a simple encompressed tar archive works for him for now.

TL;DR:

If the problem is that packaging the software for different distributions is too expensive (there is not enough profit to do that), there are better ways of lowering that cost than demanding the business sector change, or lambasting Linux users or developers as difficult.

One way to do that is to put a call out for users/developers to repackage the software and/or port the documentation for their preferred Linux distribution, with the express intent of finding out how expensive it would be to verify and maintain those.  Some businesses have a separate section for community-maintained packaging/documentation; that could be an option.

Another way would be to pay an one-off fee for a proper Linux consultant to package and document the software for the top five widely used distributions.  This is a business risk, but a very simple and easy to manage one.  This would be my suggestion.
 

Offline rdl

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #140 on: January 21, 2019, 01:24:30 pm »
How can people deal with being stopped in their tracks like this? Why do they put up with it?

This is why I don't like Windows 10. You can't freeze it once you get it working the way you want. It's no longer an operating system. It's a service designed to make money for Microsoft and they're going to be changing it frequently. And every change basically resets the system to the way Microsoft wants it to run. Your preferences are irrelevant.

Here is something interesting to read.

Why Windows 10 Sucks or
Everything Wrong with Microsoft Windows
 

Online Nominal Animal

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #141 on: January 21, 2019, 01:31:54 pm »
I don't want to fan the flame war between Windows vs. Linux... but whatever you find useful for your needs, all the best to you!  :-+
My sentiments exactly!



I wanted to point out that the Linux business sector does differ from the Windows/Mac one, and to do it profitably, you must adopt different business practices.  It has been done by myself and others, and isn't harder or easier than others, just different.  And that there is a lot of misunderstanding and misinformation about that.  Some even claim it cannot be done, because it works different to Windows/Mac/Android marketplace, and therefore it must change.

My intent was to point out the errors, that many people are still in the throes of the old Microsoft-funded anti-Linux propaganda (whether they know it or not), and that instead of thinking as software as one business sector, they really need to see Linux as a different business sector to Mac/Windows/Android/iOS/etc. with its own characteristics, and adjust their business practices to make a proper profit in it.

I would be very happy to discuss the details and practice of maximizing profit and minimizing costs when selling multi-distribution Linux software, and help others make a better profit and a better product; but thus far, the discussion has been more like "oh how hostile to business the Linux fanbois are".
 

Online nctnico

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #142 on: January 21, 2019, 02:56:21 pm »
Just my 2 cents: for over a decade it has been clear to me that you should develop an application cross-platform even if your primary target audience are Windows users. It is very likely a good business opportunity comes along which requires your software to run on Apple or Linux. Porting an application later on will be a costly nightmare or even impossible.

Altium seems to be going through such a rewrite  process to support OSX (and later on Linux):
http://www.techdesignforums.com/blog/2017/12/18/altium-designer-18-multi-board/
« Last Edit: January 21, 2019, 03:05:02 pm by nctnico »
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Online jmelson

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #143 on: January 21, 2019, 04:51:58 pm »
Most Linux distros are the same OS wrapped up differently and most are very easy and quick to install these days.
Well, I've had pretty good luck with Ubuntu (although I hate their newer user interfaces, but you can select which one you prefer.  I choose Gnome Classic.)  You have to add in a package of video players to view all the new video formats for web browsing, but that is just one command.

As for reliability, I just had to reboot my main desktop after 540 days of uptime when diagnosing a dying scanner.
My server (web, mail, DNS, etc.) has been up 323 days, and is constantly attacked by hackers trying to break in.
So, Linux is certainly reliable.

As for Windows software, there are only a couple packages I need.  I run the old (but very good) Protel 99 SE electronic CAD package under Windows XP, using VirtualBox, and my annual tax program under Windows 7, also under VirtualBox.  I used to use VMWare, I don't mind paying for a really amazing program, but their tech support is absolutely the WORST in world history!  VirtualBox has a few TINY little nits, but I've never even NEEDED tech support for it.

So, even my kids and my **WIFE** run Linux, and think it just works fine for their needs.  (Two of my kids have Apple MacBooks, but that is pretty close to Linux also (BSD UNIX-based).  My kids were amazed when I drpooed into the command line level and used standard utilities to diagnose a network issue on their Mac.


Jon
 

Offline rstofer

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #144 on: January 21, 2019, 05:05:25 pm »
Just my 2 cents: for over a decade it has been clear to me that you should develop an application cross-platform even if your primary target audience are Windows users. It is very likely a good business opportunity comes along which requires your software to run on Apple or Linux. Porting an application later on will be a costly nightmare or even impossible.

Which drove the interest in Java.  I wonder how much interest there will be next year when the license terms change?  I haven't read through all the details but it seems they want clients to buy the runtime.  I'm sure it will be a nice revenue stream - if anybody cares enough to sign up.
 

Online Nominal Animal

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #145 on: January 21, 2019, 05:28:46 pm »
For new graphical user interface application without huge amounts of data processed through the UI, I do recommend a Python3 + Qt or GTK+ user interface, on top of (possibly proprietary) C libraries used via ctypes or gi.

It allows easy modification of the user interface as necessary (and both Qt and GTK+ support theming, so with a little care you can make it pretty close to native, if desired), but keep the business "secret sauce" in clearly separate binaries.  These proprietary libraries, although "proprietary blobs", are pretty much accepted as par for the course for proprietary applications.

I do mean the UI code is provided in readable Python, not as python object code.  The UI code should not contain anything business-sensitive, but allows end users to try and fix glitches themselves, rather than have to rely on the vendor to provide every little fix.  (Look at your own internal bug database, and see what fraction of all fixes are UI/UX fixes.  The main objection Linux users have to proprietary blobs is that they are a black box, take it or leave it -type deals; separating the user-facing, no-secrets-holding part into a form that allows users to suggest fixes is a big deal.)

The downside in Python is that only one thread will execute Python code at any given time.  (The default CPython interpreter does support multiple threads, it is just that for a thread to execute Python code, it must hold the Global Interpreter Lock.) For the user interface, this should not be a real drawback.  A typical interface will have a couple of Python threads: the main UI one, plus one or more for data event handling between multithreaded library code and the main UI thread via Python Queues for example.

(If you do have objections to this, or experiences where this has failed for you, do let me know, please.)
 

Offline Mr. Scram

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #146 on: January 21, 2019, 05:32:00 pm »
This turned into another OS holy war. Who would have thought?
 
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Online tggzzz

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #147 on: January 21, 2019, 06:16:46 pm »
Just my 2 cents: for over a decade it has been clear to me that you should develop an application cross-platform even if your primary target audience are Windows users. It is very likely a good business opportunity comes along which requires your software to run on Apple or Linux. Porting an application later on will be a costly nightmare or even impossible.

Which drove the interest in Java.  I wonder how much interest there will be next year when the license terms change?  I haven't read through all the details but it seems they want clients to buy the runtime.  I'm sure it will be a nice revenue stream - if anybody cares enough to sign up.

There will be two options: use the open versions, or bend over and pay Oracle.

I'm sure quite a few (but not enough for Oracle's liking!) will pay. Many won't.
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Offline edy

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #148 on: January 22, 2019, 01:00:49 am »
Even just yesterday I installed Linux for someone....

A friend of ours had an old HP Pavilion a1324n (Pentium 4 machine with 1 GB RAM and 300 GB HD) running Windows XP. The machine is ancient! I popped in an Ubuntu Studio 16.04 LTS DVD and booted it. It asked if I wanted a dual-boot menu (WinXP, Ubuntu Studio). The machine had a Belkin WIFI USB dongle to connect to the internet. It worked no problem, that's how I got internet access to download the latest Chrome, LibreOffice and a few other packages I like to install.

After Ubuntu Studio installed, it wanted to upgrade to 18.04 and proceeded to do so! All smooth and easy!

So now the machine has options to boot WinXP and Ubuntu Studio. I can access WinXP partition from Ubuntu so all the Documents can still be found and worked on. The machine runs fast and on the latest software with more current security patches.

Going this route with Windows would have been impossible... Win7 would not have run on this WinXP machine, and Win10 forget it. While most people would laugh at this old hardware, it is now saved from landfill and this family can enjoy new life out of this computer which they thought was otherwise useless.
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Offline Mr. Scram

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Re: Ditching Windows at home [Linux advice needed]
« Reply #149 on: January 22, 2019, 01:38:08 am »
Even just yesterday I installed Linux for someone....

A friend of ours had an old HP Pavilion a1324n (Pentium 4 machine with 1 GB RAM and 300 GB HD) running Windows XP. The machine is ancient! I popped in an Ubuntu Studio 16.04 LTS DVD and booted it. It asked if I wanted a dual-boot menu (WinXP, Ubuntu Studio). The machine had a Belkin WIFI USB dongle to connect to the internet. It worked no problem, that's how I got internet access to download the latest Chrome, LibreOffice and a few other packages I like to install.

After Ubuntu Studio installed, it wanted to upgrade to 18.04 and proceeded to do so! All smooth and easy!

So now the machine has options to boot WinXP and Ubuntu Studio. I can access WinXP partition from Ubuntu so all the Documents can still be found and worked on. The machine runs fast and on the latest software with more current security patches.

Going this route with Windows would have been impossible... Win7 would not have run on this WinXP machine, and Win10 forget it. While most people would laugh at this old hardware, it is now saved from landfill and this family can enjoy new life out of this computer which they thought was otherwise useless.
Windows XP is dead. Windows 10 requires less resources than 7.
 


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