Edit: might as well link to the merch: https://www.ebay.com/str/evolutionecycling
Most people likely don't have an opinion besides being able to browse the web and will not even be aware that they are not using Windows.
So this is great work! Keep it up!
On that side-note I would also not be surprised if people are leaving "computers" altogether in favor of phones, it's a capable enough computer today for most lay-people, my ex and her parents don't have computers anymore and my daughter hardly uses her either.
Those that actually need computers such as developers are more prone to use Linux anyhow (especially when Microsoft is pushing annoying features such as forced reboots for those dropping their computers anyhow onto powerusers).
Do you have any recommendation for an extremely lightweight Linus distro which installs and runs Steam fine? It would be used exclusively for that, so it shouldn’t run a ton of background stuff.
Basically, what I care is that as I’m running the game, the system is consuming as few resources as possible. It’s an outdated machine, so every bit matters.
> probably XFCE Ubuntu (Xubuntu)
Thank you. Will check it out.
- App Installation via repositories is more common than single program installs. No DMG files. There is a similar concept to DMG with "snap" installs. Steam should probably be installed via a snap. You trust the producer (Valve). But most software and security should come through repos (in CLI, sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade)
- Home directory is /home/<username>
Much of the rest is similar -- Apple's BSD and Linux share a common Unix design progenitor.
Linux is way open to rewipe, just pay attention that you don't lose files. My first day on Linux in the mid 2000s, I somehow overwrite the file system allocation table with the content of an MP3. It was recoverable!
Good luck, and have fun!
Or if you have an AMD GPU, you could even try SteamOS itself, though it's intended for handhelds.
Bazzite looks to be the next best thing. Probably what I’m looking for. Thank you.
7-8 years ago it was pretty frustrating to spend £4k+ on a gaming rig to be unable to play a bunch of titles but I will not use Windows, I just accepted it.
Fast forward to today, and I'm playing Helldivers 2, with its anti-cheat and everything online with my nephew who's on Windows and getting far, far better performance (granted my PC is also more powerful). I can play the modern DOOM games with better performance than if I was running Windows on the same hardware.
My point is, Linux gaming is only getting better, I now also own a ROG Ally which I "flashed" (installed the same way you would any other Linux distro) with Bazzite straight out of the box without even booting Windows and I can play the single-player games I like to while travelling, or can have a quick game of Helldivers with my nephew if I'm not near my PC but have a stable connection. When I need/want to I can plug it into a monitor/kb/mouse with a single cable and have a full desktop with HDR, VRR etc.
Obviously there are very cutting edge drivers you can't get on Linux, and Nvidia support is questionable, and some anti-cheat doesn't work, etc, but if you mostly play games released in [current year - a few] on hardware released [current year - a few] it's really a much more enjoyable experience.
The biggest issue I find is external devices that need firmware flashing require some crap piece of Windows software from the manufacturer in order to flash, so I'll spin up a Windows VM and USB passthrough to do the update then blow it away again.
I have no idea what I can still try, and it annoys me, that for most games I still have to reboot into Windows to play them. I seem to have had more luck following guides for using WINE for specific games in the past, when I made games like StarCraft 2 work better than on Windows, than I have had with Steam and Proton so far.
So anecdote. It is not smooth sailing for everyone yet, unfortunately, and I don't know what the issue is.
Anecdotally, I've been using Fedora Workstation for a few years already, and my Steam + Proton Experimental experience has been fantastic with an AMD GPU using the drivers that come with the kernel.
Although I must admit, I miss having a Debian-based distribution sometimes, because in some situations I can't find rpm packages for more specific things I'm trying to do in my system. The problem is I just don't know any other distribution that's not Debian Testing that could work like Fedora Workstation but with .deb packages.
I add flathub.org and remove the fedora flatpak repo. The few other things I need are in copr/terra, but honestly they are very rare. I think I have maybe 1 piece of software per thing that doesn't release a native .rpm (ghostty is one)
https://copr.fedorainfracloud.org/ https://terra.fyralabs.com/
When it comes to Steam, I go to steam -> settings -> compatibility -> Enable Steam Play for all titles
I have used Nvidia GPUs and more recently switched to an AMD 6700. No issues with either.
$ dpkg --list | grep -i steam
ii steam-devices 1:1.0.0.75+ds-6 all Device support for Steam-related hardware
ii steam-installer 1:1.0.0.75+ds-6 amd64 Valve's Steam digital software delivery system
ii steam-libs:amd64 1:1.0.0.75+ds-6 amd64 Metapackage for Steam dependencies
ii steam-libs:i386 1:1.0.0.75+ds-6 i386 Metapackage for Steam dependencies
ii steam-libs-i386:i386 1:1.0.0.75+ds-6 i386 Metapackage for 32-bit Steam dependencies
When a game doesn't work and the described symptoms happen, I usually try a few different Proton versions via the game's settings, but this has not helped me make a game run. If anything for some games it has reprocessed shaders or similar things that Steam games do before launching, maybe. But the result stays the same. Game is not starting, button changing back to "play" button.
I tried it, discovered that Nvidia has a known regression that causes anywhere up to 25% lower performance compared to Windows in GPU limited games in D3D12, and immediately went back to Windows.
I'll never understand why people keep championing Linux for gaming when it has such a severe regression on the most common gaming GPU vendor. Steam says 75%. An Nvidia employee even stated that the fix is not trivial so they're not committing to a timeline for a fix. This is a year+ old issue. They're never fixing it because it doesn't affect CUDA.
https://github.com/NVIDIA/egl-wayland/issues/164#issuecommen...
I know that a large portion of our business is to other resellers and businesses. FWIW, long before I started working here, I replaced XP with Xubuntu on my parent's computer about 15 years ago. I told them that "it works like Windows[0]", showed them how to check email, browse the web, play solitare, and shut down. Even the random HP printer and scanner worked great! I expected a call from them to "put it back to what it was", but it never happened. (The closest was Mom wondering why solitare (the gnome-games version) was different, then guided her on how to change the game type to klondike.)
[0] If "it [Xubuntu] works like Windows" offended you, I'd like to point out that most people don't care about how operating system kernels are designed. They care about things like a start menu, and that the X in the corner closes programs.
One aspect MS has been criticized for over the past few versions of windows is that they are opinionated about how the base windows UI operates and looks for a very large number of users. One of the things I find interesting on the subreddits for some distros is a lot of posts is showing off how they've customized things, so you can nudge people towards the theming support or panel components you can swap out, or that you can have drastically different DEs with different operation models yet handle the same applications.
Proton has completely changed the game (pun not intended). All that’s really missing now is the big studios who won’t release their anticheat for Linux.
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/activate-windows...
https://superuser.com/questions/1575650/how-does-a-windows-d...
Wrong. IT IS 100% stored in the UEFI firmware, specifically ACPI tables, MSDM field. Only if that exists, it is then verified on-line for activation to make sure the license is genuine and matches the device ID you're referring to for witch the license was sold(typically for OEM) or if it's portable.[1]
On linux you should be retrieve the license via something like:
sudo strings /sys/firmware/acpi/tables/MSDM sudo acpidump | grep MSDM
Btw ACPI is a specification, not a separate piece of hardware. ACPI tables are stored in BIOS nvram, there is no other place for it to go.
The reason why I buy refurbished is, that my use-cases don't need the newest hardware and for a long time, older hardware was more compatible with Linux and BSD for me. Also, you get for a small price, high quality hardware.
If you now ask yourself, why that many notebooks? Notebooks are like handbags. They have to match the occasion.
and 100% of the time the person was like "yes! Linux is what I wanted"
Well alright then, there you go...
I have an old ThinkPad with Linux, but agreed, no way this can be true.
When it comes to laptops, we have a lot of MacBooks out there, and an endless Sea of $400 low quality Lenovos and HPs eternally marching to the garbage bins.
Ultimately my observation is just anecdotal, but I have built a lot of computers for people worked on a lot of family PCS, etc, and have never once worked with a Linux system in that context in 25 years of doing that stuff. I'm not interacting with a tech oriented crowd though (obviously those people would be chatting about tech instead and I would never be touching their system). Perhaps the tech oriented crowd is big enough to hit 5%, or perhaps Linux gaming is moving the needle, but I can't imagine 1 in 20 system is Linux in the US. I just can't.
Linux has been very usable for a long time. Windows 11, being deliberately unusable on older hardware that works perfectly well is enough incentive for more people to try an alternative. That's not going to move the needle in corporate IT but it's enough for a couple percentage points of the installed base.
The extreme majority of users doesn't care about that, they'll stay on Windows 10, they don't give a single fuck about the fact that it'll stop receiving security updates.
Either way I don't think the 5% are impacted by scraping bots.
12 years ago or so, a similar headline appeared, then someone explained that the Chinese government had recently cracked down on Windows pirating (to appease the Americans) with the result that some PC vendors had stopped including (pirated copies of) Windows with the computers they sell (shipping some Linux distro instead of course) but since pirated Windows install media was still widely available, there quickly grew a cultural practice in which the consumer installs Windows (or gets his more technically-inclined cousin to do it for him) as soon as he gets his new PC home. But the headline reported on a statistic that did not catch this cultural practice because it counted only the OSes on computers when they were sold (i.e., "OS shipments").
With over 50% of Internet traffic being robots, the results really don't make any sense at all if you don't.
This will lead to a virtuous circle for Linux unless someone does something; privacy issues are leading people to the OSes where you get to freely choose your level of privacy. Anybody have any more weird old unix patents to throw at them and slow it down?
edit: maybe the way to stop Linux is heat up the war against all general purpose computing. Linux could be used to run unauthorized AI.
It's not an apples to apples comparison. But the userbase is largely the same, and it's easier to switch a browser than it's to switch an OS. So it does have a significance.
[1] https://gs.statcounter.com/browser-market-share/all/united-s...
This means many Linux users install an alternative browser, not to use Firefox. That's funny, but so true.
2. Built-in cloud AI spyware / Copilot
3. Millions of abandoned laptops that had been made 4-5+ years ago. Basically electronic and ecological waste: machines from 10 years ago work perfectly fine if you change thermal paste and don't hit them too much. Even if you don't care about the planet, you might care about your wallet though.
MacOS is the best model for a successful desktop Linux to use. Trim down the kernel/drivers to just what runs on that spec hardware, only support that spec hardware, focus effort on the OS and ecosystem, keep it stable, make upgrades trivial, and give it freedom to run other software, terminal apps, etc. And most of all- focus resources on these efforts and charge a lot of money for it!
I have way more stability issues and complicated upgrades on Windows.
and KDE was always ATLEAST as easy as windows, arguably more. At this time lots of older crappy hardware people had also only had win98 drivers, giving people immense problems. It mostly worked better on linux. This still goes today.
(in comparison with the state of Windows at the time, of course)
Rectangle/tiling window managers on top is the only way to make it workable.
Apart from wm, the existence of application notarization is a downright insult (though Windows is also guilty of this with smartscreen but to a much lesser extent).
Apple's "pay us 100 bucks a year or we'll tell your users that your program is malware" is just another step in the inevitable game of locking down macos and turning it into a mobile-like hellscape
Application notarization isn’t a problem anymore- you just have a single accept dialog. That problem that made you do a trick to get past it was only a problem years ago, due to whomever the moron was that thought that was a good idea. The current way is acceptable.
I install homebrew and random apps with no problems.
The "real" number shouldn't be far from 10%, if not already exceeding it.
Because virtually nobody who says "desktop Linux" means ChromeOS.
Fedora going up is a sign of progress. Regular Linux going up is just a sign that Windows sucks.
You even have a demonstration in this very article, with the surge of classic Mac OS to 7% for several months. The data is obviously nonsense, and when it has errors nobody at the company cares about them. But when they have persistent "data reporting issues", why are we supposed to believe any of these numbers?
So that looks like it might be some change in how Apple computers are reporting their OS.
This happens all the time. When their numbers are clearly wrong, they don't care about the numbers enough to fix even the glaring problems, their sample is unsound, and their methodology is unpublished, why exactly are we supposed to give any of their numbers any credence?
What you've written is the first I've heard of a recent change to the Safari on OS X user-agent string, and I see no indication of it in my access logs. What's it supposed to be now? It seems a bit unlikely, and given Safari never ran on classic Mac OS, it seems like a company that's supposed to specialize in analytics should be able to handle it...
I'm not sure what's up with listing both "OS X" and "macOS", but I'm quite confident it's not classic Mac OS.
[1] https://github.com/bbenchoff/MacSSL [2] https://wiki.mozilla.org/Security/Server_Side_TLS
There's a discussion in a peer thread about how people never notice its Linux and keep using their refurbished machines as-is. This too, is surprising to me, as my own experience as well as the ones I've heard in person from IT folks and IT-related forums online, people immediately notice that the UI looks different and panic as to how to achieve their current tasks. I'm skeptical of that entire thread too.
In general, I just wonder how much of any popular forum is just people LARPing. I do wish that it didn't occur here, though it's undoubtedly difficult to moderate.
This was probably a bigger problem 10 years ago than it is now. Plenty of people never do anything at all with their computer besides opening a browser. No matter what OS you use, "click the Chrome logo" still applies.
I've watched my grandparents use a computer. I guarantee I could swap out Windows for KDE or Cinnamon and, as long as I make the wallpaper the same and I put the Chrome icon in the same place, they wouldn't notice anything had changed. I'm not actually going to do that, because then I become the only person in the family who can tame their computer if it starts acting out, but still.
Also, Microsoft's own UI isn't a steady target. Windows 11 is, dare I say it, more akin to Plasma 6 than it is to Windows 7.
Also, for people unfamiliar with the Apple ecosystem: the OS X => macOS rebranding happened back in 2016, IIRC the Safari user agent never ever included macOS (Safari on M4 Macs running latest macOS 15.5 reports itself as “Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7” in its UA), so absolutely no idea where they’re getting this new “macOS” category. Maybe they publish technical details of their methodology somewhere? I can’t bother to check.
25%+-3.5% means it's 5%+-0.7% for proportional error bars. They don't have to be linear, true, but they are certainly not 5% +- 3.5% either.
Are you disputing that? Or did you miss that in the article?
Cloudflare has also OS stats available and I'd imagine they are far more reliable. Some silver lining of them having such wide dragnet on the web. They report 4.4% Linux desktop marketshare in the US. Tbh I believe the summer vacation season probably influences the numbers here, but there is some real growth too.
https://radar.cloudflare.com/explorer?dataSet=http&groupBy=o...
2. Both StatsCounter and Radar break out Linux and ChromeOS; if you combine them, StatsCounter hits 7.7%; Radar hits 6.3%.
3. That being said: Both StatsCounter and Radar experienced an anomalous drop in ChromeOS clients & rise in Linux clients over the past month. StatsCounter took ChromeOS from ~4.4% to 2.7%. Radar took it 2.6% -> 1.9%.
This kind of implies that something changed with a major ChromeOS device out that; some model/version maybe changed its UA and started reporting itself as a Linux device instead.
Add the fact that all my kids hate their school chromebooks.... maybe this isn't such great news for Linux afterall.
But if it significantly explained the rise in other percentages, we'd see all the other shares go up. However, Windows and MacOS are flat; 64% and 30%, respectively, last and this month.
Only Linux went up; so its likely there's some genuine linux desktop adoption going on. But the rise in Linux marketshare is pretty steep; two months ago Radar measured it at 2.6%, now its 4.4%.
It could be legit. There's been a significant uptick in tech Youtubers pushing linux content (LTT and Jayz have both done recent videos on it), including the Lenovo Legion Linux vs Windows perf comparisons which found Linux to be faster, Lex Fridman just interviewed DHH and they spoke at length about linux setups (~1M viewers on that likely), and the pushback against Apple in the tech circles is reaching a fever pitch.
Once the unwashed masses start coming in, the software and its interaction patterns pander to the lowest common denominator and the quality of the medium degrades.
* just open the terminal and type this magic spell to make x work *
Pandering to the masses would be in the form of specific desktop environment, and maybe specific distribution integrating it well with all kinds of desktop software.
Nothing would change for the existing users of obscure software, hackishly stitched together.
If Linux software starts widely adapting more dark patterns it will probably impact users across all distributions.
Not that I believe it will necessarily be good, but I'm not sure it will necessarily be bad. Could go both ways, IMO.
What is preventing people from just creating a fork?
And I agree with that concern, though my hope is that we can make it easier for the peasants without sacrificing control for the nerds (trying to find a word that would work with "peasant" in this context :D).
it really isn't, as Google Chrome and Chromium shows there's no clear dividing line in the real world. Linux isn't developed by Bob the free software enthusiast, take a look at the code contributions to the kernel.
Overall I'm also in favour of driving linux adoption because it's still a better world but the idea that this has no spill over effect on anyone else is wrong. It's a fiction to think that Linux, just like a browser is anything but a collective project with most development driven by very few organizations who also have commercial or proprietary interests.
There are lots of Chromium forks. I don't really see how this contradicts my point.
And if there was a drastic mainstream adoption of linux, whatever implications that has for development focus, it would affect everyone because nobody is going to run a sincere kernel fork.
My point being that it's okay for some projects to sacrifice control, as long as others don't. I can't tell Ubuntu how they should make their distro; what I can do is choose Gentoo (or anything in between).
It happened with git a few years ago, when people were up in arms over its use of the word "master". Stupid, pointless changes will be made to appease these people.
Same response: just do your own thing then and ignore the normies, it's not a big deal.
The problem in most any technology sector is that its impossible for one person in reasonable amount of time to put together systems for use. Maybe in the future when LLMs are advanced enough to where I can have it code a full OS for me to my liking this will change, but right now, I have to depend on other people doing work.
Linux happens to be in a sweet spot where the collaborative development is guided by technical decisions instead of market forces, but Linux is just an OS. It needs open hardware to run. It just so happens that laptop manfuacturers who target Windows just don't see Linux as a big enough threat to start locking things down.
But historically, along came Apple, made the iPhone, realized most people want jewelry more than functionality, realized they could monetize this, and now their Macbooks are locked down to MacOS pretty hardcore.
If Linux went the same route, you could very well see a distinct lack of hardware being made that can run open source Linux. Which then limits you to smaller manufacturers that don't have capital or bandwidth to compete with bigger ones.
If you see alot of sheep coming into your glade, the jackels are close behind
But other than that, as long as I can compile the project from source (and if it's done properly I don't need instructions for that), I'm fine.
I would assume that a repo providing instructions for the AUR is already better than one assuming that "Linux == Ubuntu", because the developer knows at least one distro that is not Ubuntu :-).
On the other hand, I think it's great when companies or government try to move to Linux (if you're not a US company or the US government, it makes total sense to try not to depend on US software so much).
But I want to believe that there is space for everybody. I wouldn't use Mint myself, but I convinced a couple friends to use it and it works really well! EU governments moving to european distros like Suse and the likes is great. And I will stay closer to "more advanced" distros like Gentoo or Alpine.
The beauty of Linux is that there is not one Linux; it's about freedom of choice. Because many people move from Windows to Mint doesn't have to mean that it's hurting Gentoo, I think? Hopefully.
not necessarily. There's room to have the mass market make breakthroughs in laymen software for linux if there's sufficient demand.
And having the mass market lowest common denominator doesnt remove the good stuff - they still exist and you could still choose to use them. This is esp. true for linux, where as you'd have fewer choice/customizability for windows as it's close sourced.
You mean other than Ubuntu and the likes?
I guess a bit of both.
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/07/some-macs-are-gettin...
Maybe a few more years would have been good but I can't really blame Microsoft for requiring modern hardware support eventually.
Linux hasn't necessarily gotten better, sadly. My install was unusable due to video issues, I had to boot a recover console to fix it. I also had to fix some issues with X desktop effects glitching after waking from suspend, making the desktop environment nearly unusable. Otherwise, Linux performs a lot better on my system than Windows.
I've had nothing but bad experiences with Debian installs and I'm curious if this is where a lot of issues are coming from when people switch to Mint or Ubuntu when they hear it's the "beginner distro"
W10 once removed CCleaner from my system because it was an older version. I kept it that way because it was the last version at the time that didn't come with telemetry.
Outside of gamers, I don't know anyone that has a computer at home that is not their work laptop if they have one. At least in my circle everyone I know has moved to their general computing being on phones and tablets which is not captured here. So is a solid chunk of this the people that would have already had Linux desktops continuing to have theirs since they would likely be the same people (more technical, needing to do tasks not possible on phones and tablets) less likely to be making that switch.
Basically if the higher percent is due to less desktops overall instead of a major uptick in Linux desktops, it is not really much to celebrate.
Given these numbers are percents I would be very curious.
Now yes there is a clear uptick thanks to the Steam Deck (however with Microsoft pushing their optimized for gaming Windows it will be interesting to see if that continues or goes backwards). But I would be reluctant to call that Linux Desktop anymore than I would call Android an uptick for Linux.
> thanks to the Steam Deck [...] but I would be reluctant to call that Linux Desktop anymore than I would call Android an uptick for Linux.
The Steam Deck very much runs Linux Desktop. Android runs the Linux kernel, but everything else is different. SteamOS is a Linux distribution based on Arch. If you run your Steam Deck in "desktop mode", it is very much a Linux Desktop (with a read-only system and A/B updates etc, but still).
But, I think there is a conversation around this to ask how many of the people using a Steam Deck actually go into desktop mode or care that it is Linux (or even understand that it is Linux) vs would switch to a Windows version if it worked as well.
If you open a terminal (or SSH into it), you're on Linux. It's very, very different on Android.
> how many of the people using a Steam Deck [...] care that it is Linux
Probably most don't. But that's a goal. If corporate employees could use a Linux Desktop without caring that it is Linux, it would mean that the corporation can move to Linux, and that would be big.
From my understanding Xbox is running a version of Windows on their consoles (not talking about the new handhelds) tailor made for Xbox. But I would not call that adding to the Windows marketshare.
iOS and iPadOS were started with versions of OSX and then modified (and clearly share some pieces) but we would not call either of those as contributing to Mac's marketshare.
Obviously yes neither of those let you go into the traditional Mac or Windows desktop unlike SteamOS. But how the users perceive it is still important.
> Probably most don't. But that's a goal. If corporate employees could use a Linux Desktop without caring that it is Linux, it would mean that the corporation can move to Linux, and that would be big.
The problem is this works the other way also. If most users of the Steam Deck don't care or really know that it is Linux there is not much getting in the way of Microsoft coming in with their new handheld/OS and eating up that market if they can get the OS to perform as well.
Put another way, if Valve decided (not saying they would, just asking a hypothetical) to either write their own OS or switch the underlying OS to Windows but kept the look of SteamOS as it behaved now and performance was the same. Would most users of the Steam Deck know or care?
Personally I think for claims about the "linux desktop" to really matter, there has to be a conscious desire and care that it is Linux or it could disappear.
Agreed. And IMO, the thing is that you can benefit from the work made on SteamOS on any Linux Desktop. By making most games run on SteamOS, Valve contributed to make Gentoo a better platform for gaming.
> If most users of the Steam Deck don't care or really know that it is Linux there is not much getting in the way of Microsoft coming in with their new handheld/OS and eating up that market if they can get the OS to perform as well.
Sure. But what I see is really the other side: if SteamOS is relevant, then game devs will have an incentive to support SteamOS, which gives the opportunity for gamers to move to SteamOS. Now they are on Linux, so they can start using software that runs on Linux.
Users generally only care about the latter.
1. if someone uses Linux Desktop without caring about that it is Linux, why is that different from them using Windows? 2. why do we say SteamOS count as Linux Desktop but Android doesn't? is it really because how much of it is "Linux"?
For me, I think what matters to me is who has control over it. SteamOS is based on Arch, so the community has a say over where it will go, and Valve will have to work with the community. Android/Windows are fully controlled Google/Microsoft, doesn't matter that Android is Open Source.
I actually daily drive Linux (Arch) because Windows is a PITA I'm not willing to put up with. But there are things I use which still don't run on Linux (Photoshop and Lightroom), so I'm actually thinking of getting a Mac again instead of having a second PC / dual boot, even though I know that can also be irritating (though less so than Windows).
"Who controls the OS" isn't that important to me. What matters is that it gets out of my way and lets me do what I want to do with as little friction as possible. I know Linux being free means I can go and hack on it however I like. But I also have to contend with reality: I can't reasonably think that I (personnally) am going to hack on the kernel or on some desktop environment in any meaningful measure, so I still have to put up with whatever other people figure is best.
But if there are enough people like me, including those who don't actually care about what OS they're running, maybe the apps I want to run will adopt Linux. But that only matters because, as it turns out, it's the OS which I find the less irritating to use. If tomorrow Windows 12 finally became sane, I'd switch in a heartbeat. I'm not married to Linux.
If someone runs SteamOS, it means that they play games on Linux. So it becomes interesting for game devs to test for Linux. And then if someone runs SteamOS, instead of a dual boot with Windows maybe they just go to the Desktop mode. Which means that instead of Microsoft Office, they use something that runs on Linux, etc.
This is good for the Linux ecosystem. And the reason I like the Linux ecosystem is because, as you say, it's not fully controlled by TooBigTech.
If Linux adoption is to increase significantly (and I guess I'm of the opinion that would be a positive thing), then at some point that can only be done by acquiring users who don't care particularly deeply or understand much about their OS. That is, the vast majority of people. And that's probably not going to happen by converting that demographic to true believers.
Some of those people might decide they want to dig deeper later, and that's great. Most won't and that's fine too.
It would be a bit asymmetrical to restrict the definition of "Linux user" to folk who really care what Linux is or know their way around coreutils.
How many Windows users care that it is Windows? They just want to click on the Internet icon.
Said differently: if manufacturers cared to mainstream their changes, they could. And we would all be better for it.
This may be technically true, except it has no single meaningful implication, like no Linux software works there.
We can argue about Android being a horrible OS for all sorts of reasons but that's a separate discussion.
> The Termux app avoided that by using a targetSdkVersion of Android 9, declaring that it was not compatible with the Android 10 requirements.
Android level 9 is from Android 2 Gingerbread (2010!!). https://apilevels.com/
For now it's not a huge barrier to Termux running. We can go run Android 2 stuff today, & maybe Android will forever be backwards compatible.
It does mean that Termux can't build a top or use any new Android features. Termux is glued to a truly ancient version of Android, because Android became inhospitable to basic Linux userland use cases. Seems its mostly about being unable to run downloaded code, which feels admittedly like very much "just a technicality", but boy oh boy has that technicality kept Android from expanding outside of its own bespoke userland.
> Android level 9 is from Android 2 Gingerbread (2010!!). https://apilevels.com/
Wait, no, Termux is not stuck at Gingerbread, it's stuck at Android 9 (Pie).
Agree with the rest though. Android is a sinking ship, not only the Termux issue, but the increasing number of basic apps and features that are proprietary and not part of AOSP. I hope we'll be able to be caught by Linux Mobile or something like this in time.
The AI age where the AI needs to be able to peak into all the apps will hopefully create a new API / MCP age, new machine-to-machine work. I'm not sure how much of what Google is doing today is proprietary, adding hooks into all their apps and creating some means for Gemini to access that all, and how much is paved road & available for others. Very curious to know more.
You can run applications running different target levels side by side though
> desktop Linux where even a program from the mid-1990s will run unmodified in the latest version of the OS
mhm... I wish but that's not so true for Linux. Your old program will likely be missing some dynamic library or be incompatible with your current libc. Desktop Linux userspace is awfully unstable, compatibility is broken left and right, basically no one cares except the Linux kernel itself. There's a reason people jokingly say that win32, through wine, is the most stable Linux API. If you still have the source code of your program (and the linux ecosystem is full of free software so that's likely), you can always recompile but you'll probably need to edit the code so it's compatible with the current versions of libraries).
I've heard macOS is not great at this neither.
No, this only a problem with Termux's approach of trying to put all apps into a single app. One Linux app should correspond to one Android app. This also makes it so that permissions you grant to the app is not to all of termux, but to a specific app.
That's not exactly what it does, it dynamically downloads the programs using apt-get.
I get the security benefits of preventing the execution of data stuff, but building one Android app for each binary is difficult to work with.
And then runs them as the Termux app. I didn't mean to imply that it put all of the apps into itself at build time.
>Android app for each binary is difficult to work with.
You could group multiple binaries that belong to a single conceptual app into a single android app. What do you think would make it difficult to work with? I think most of it could be automated away.
Not sure it would fly with Google's Play Store policies.
to your parent:
> And then runs them as the Termux app. I didn't mean to imply that it put all of the apps into itself at build time.
ok, got you
Please give it a try and if you find it useful, donate.
The Linux kernel has its own merits outside standard Linux userspace.
I agree, saying that the fact standard Linux distros and Android share the same kernel has no single meaningful implication really undervalues the Linux kernel.
I also agree that it's important to keep in mind the two OSes are mostly incompatible.
The two OSes sharing the kernel have practical implications, including (theoretically) seeing improvements coming from Android dev in the kernel that can benefit standard linux distros, and things like Termux or Waydroid.
> So
I reject the link here.
> when somebody says "Linux reaches X market share", are they talking about the kernel?
Likely not.
> Why does it even matter how much the kernel is used?
Why not? Depends what's your concern.
> Would you count WSL?
Depends what you want to evaluate.
This is exactly my question. You said the discussion's about the kernel. Why do you want to evaluate its usage? Which conclusions are you going to draw?
Because when talking about the OS, you can conclude that Windows and MacOS start falling behind the free software.
I never implied this. This subthread is about countering your affirmation that Android being based on the linux kernel has no single meaningful implication. It's not anymore about evaluating usage and counting stuff.
This all started with a commenter writing "Android systems don't even run the linux kernel in any real sense", which is wrong, or at least highly misleading and confusing (I do agree with this commenter about the fact that we are talking about forks that don't upstream their shit, which does have severe implications). You could say that Android systems usually don't run mainline Linux kernel.
> you can conclude that Windows and MacOS start falling behind the free software.
I wish :-) And I wouldn't generally include Android in the free software family, few people run Replicant or some Android flavor without the Google services, let alone without proprietary blobs. (I would count blob-free Android)
What do you even count as "an OS"? Linux + gnu userland + Gnome? Or is it KDE? Embedded Linux? Does ChromeOS count? LG's WebOS?
Can I install LibreOffice on Android? Gnome, KDE, Xfce? Which percentage of packages in the Debian repos can I use on Android?
There is also a major family of OSes building on the kernel + gnu userspace, which you probably call "desktop linux".
In my house there are dozens of devices running linux the kernel: routers, a tv set, washing machines, NAS, printers, etc. Some have the full gnu posix-like stack, others are very barebones.
Then, there's is a bunch of android devices running the kernel as well.
What's wrong with all of these? At what point should i draw a line?
This is different from embedded Linux or Linux on a server. And this is different from Linux-the-kernel (which runs on Android).
All of that is just too nebulous. Linux is something that runs the kernel, that's about it.
I mean, I've been using linux for all of my life, servers, at home, for work, embedded dev, corporate environment, as a manager and as a dev, etc.
What I see is that linux as already everywhere. Desktop space is the only OS market where non-linux OSes are in the majority, and maybe this is why people are so excited about these pointless numbers.
> maybe this is why people are so excited about these pointless numbers.
I'd be excited by numbers showing an increase free software use, including the OS, first and foremost.
For what I personally care, I'd be happy to drop the Linux kernel requirement and extend the scope to Desktop BSDs and other open source desktop OS as well. People being trapped in closed OSes that happen to be based on a Linux kernel is of limited comfort anyway, actually.
What if that same VM also is running nginx and serving up web content?
What if I have a pc with a keyboard and monitor sitting literally on my desktop, and it's running linux + gnu but no graphical environment, and I use it for coding (it has music playing when I do this, and i sometime check email or github issues, etc via cli) - yes I've done this, even recently to reduce distractions... some days GUIs are bad for my adhd. Is that a desktop linux? If not, why? What's different about this than doing basically the same thing, but also having a browser open when it's surrounded by a GUI?
* Embedded Linux is what you expect to see on a "small" device that usually doesn't have a graphical environment (it may have a small screen showing a temperature).
* A Linux server is what you expect to see in racks, serving stuff over the Internet. A homeserver could be that, too.
* Linux on mobile is what you would put on your phone.
* Desktop Linux is what you would put on your working computer, the one you interact with "physically".
Of course, you can run a server on your personal laptop, and you could run a "Desktop" graphical environment on a mobile phone. But that's beside the point. And of course, you can work on a Linux without a graphical environment.
Doesn't mean they don't run the same kernel, does it?
EDIT: I think you still don't understand. It doesn't matter what hardware Android runs on it's written to be appliance firmware. Even if you put it on a laptop it just turns the laptop into what is essentially a television.
But now that you say it, Android is very much a full OS. It's not a Linux Desktop, but it is a full OS. And televisions running Android are called "smart TVs", precisely because they run a full OS instead of a minimal firmware like they used to.
Google is working on bringing Android to the Desktop, and Samsung already does it. As in: you plug your smartphone into a docking station and it is suddenly a Desktop computer.
> > I would still count it as the Linux kernel.
> This may be technically true, except it has no single meaningful implication, like no Linux software works there.
Termux is notable is because you in fact don't need a virtual machine at all, or even a proper container. Even the "chroot" aspect is basically just to create a facade to make software work with less effort; it's not literally needed. And you can indeed run typical graphical Linux software as long as you have a compatible display server; Termux offers an X server as an add-on.
This doesn't mean that Android is the same as desktop Linux, but that's not the point here. The point is that Android runs the Linux kernel, and not just in name only. You actually can make use of the Linux aspect of Android, which many of us do.
It's possible that Google will lock down Android further in the future and make the host Linux environment less usable for stock Linux apps, but today you can run quite a lot of typical CLI and even desktop Linux software directly in Android with minimal fuss. Even if it's a little cumbersome, it's quite useful in a pinch.
I'd argue whether you can readily install software to the Linux host environment is also neither here nor there. For an immutable abroot setup like SteamOS, you can't really install directly to the host environment, but in my mind that does not make it any less "desktop Linux" or Linux kernel based.
Android is not GNU/Linux.
Article talks about GNU/Linux clearly. There is a point to the whole "I'd like to interject for a moment..." copypasta and Android's situation is the clearest illustration of it.
Well… :-)
With you in spirit, but to add to the mess, one could argue Alpine (and Postmarket OS) is a standard Linux distro, but non GNU.
"GNU/" cannot be used for clarifying things anymore.
macOS is more posix than NixOS, but everyone knows NixOS is a real linux distro, and macOS is not one.
There are Linux distributions that don't use the GNU userland. Should we start being pedantic about that? And say Busybox/Linux or MyCustomThingy/Linux etc?
And actually, were you talking about GNU/Linux/Xorg, or GNU/Linux/Wayland? Can I also ask people to mention which libc they use? Alpine is OpenRC/Busybox/musl/Linux, which is not systemd/GNU/glibc/Linux.
So yeah... Desktop Linux is not worse a way to describe an OS than GNU/Linux.
Linux is a kernel.
Not sure what your point is?
Though, I guess outside tech circles, people will just talk about Linux as the whole desktop OS. E.g. our municipality was promoting installing a Linux distribution to save Windows laptops after the Windows 10 apocalypse, and they just call it Linux.
Even Wikipedia says: Linux (/ˈlɪnʊks/ LIN-uuks[15]) is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds.
The only reason "ChromeOS" isn't considered Linux in this dataset is because Chrome has a flag that removes Linux from the user-agent on certain systems. If we were talking about Linux on the desktop casually, or were compiling a dataset through some other means where the kernel is a known quantity, we'd most certainly include said systems.
This. It actually surprises me that it's apparently not entirely clear for everybody.
The point being that “Linux Desktop” means something more than “runs the Linux kernel”.
You cant do that on mobile devices or other handhelds
If all you care about is some very technical sense of "how many linux desktop environments are installed in the world", then none of these questions matter. But if the reason one is interested in the "Linux Desktop market share" is some level of interest in how people are using desktop computers, and when/if they are choosing them over competing OSs like Windows and MacOS, then these questions matter a lot. My guess is that 90% of SteamDeck owners don't think about the fact that it is Linux, barely every leave the steam launcher, and were they to be looking at getting a new desktop computer, their SteamDeck experience would not make them consider a linux distro vs. Windows or MacOS.
In case it matters, I think more people should be running Linux than do, I think people over-estimate the difficulty of switching. I want the steam deck and SteamOS to be a gateway for people to switch in more contexts....I'm just skeptical that it's actually doing that more than a trivial amount.
And it got me thinking, i already hook up the deck to my tv and use bluetooth peripherals with it. Maybw ill try using it as my daily driver at home
Can I so that with a Switch?
I can plug in a USB dock, with a monitor, mouse and keyboard and edit images with GIMP.
Can I do that with a PS5?
If I like the Steam Deck UI, I can install a package on my desktop and pick it on login, thus gaining basically all of this functionality. I in fact do have the SteamOS 3 UI installed on a gaming PC, and it works really well.
Can I install the PS5 UI and the ability to play PlayStation games on a BSD box?
You can install Ubuntu on a Nintendo switch by using a paperclip so yes.
https://www.reddit.com/r/SwitchHacks/comments/8f0ugz/hardwar...
So, no?
Some installations of linux require a USB drive.
This one requires a paper clip.
> > Can I so that with a Switch?
> Yes. With a paperclip
A paperclip isn't a standard menu item. It's a hack to switch the operating systems. Once you've hacked it you can't play Switch games until you revert back. That's nothing like what the deck is offering.
> Some installations of linux require a USB drive.
We aren't talking about hacking, we are talking about whether the deck comes with desktop Linux, which it does. What you are talking about is nothing like what the Deck is offering.
You literally just have to reboot into the normal switch OS, it’s not different than dual booting.
Hit the power button and instead on sleep or shutdown pick desktop and it switches interfaces.
When in the desktop mode it still has Steam and you can still play Steam games.
You're really reaching with the Switch is a desktop OS.
99% of Steam Deck users won't ever use the desktop mode except for maybe setting up emulation or Discord.
In general, that makes Steam Deck users no more Linux users than people that use Android.
Following your logic, people using the old TiVo setop boxes were also Linux users.
Active Linux desktop adoption rates matter because it means companies will put money into ensuring their product works well on it. 1Password or Telegram is not going to meaningfully care about Steam Deck users. Or Android users vis a vis the Linux desktop client, because Android can't readily run Linux GUI applications :)
It's honestly kind of nuts no one here is getting that.
What matters, to me as a Linux user on the desktop, is that Nintendo and Google simply follow the license. I don't want them contributing patches to GNOME or Firefox, I want them downstream testing the kernel and contributing patches back for me to benefit from. And I do! My Switch Pro controller has official Linux support because of Nintendo. My day-to-day life on the desktop is improved by both company's contributions.
The idea that Nintendo or Google are neglecting their duty because Photoshop doesn't run on Linux is a facetious argument. It might be a major issue for you, but clearly millions of Linux users are perfectly happy without those trappings.
> Or Android users vis a vis the Linux desktop client, because Android can't readily run Linux GUI applications :)
A travesty for Android's adoption metrics, one can only imagine. Thankfully for Linux users, the inverse is not so true: https://waydro.id/
Well, unless you hook a screen and keyboard to it, I suppose. No idea how many people do that. But if you do that, phones and tablets also become desktops.
What's important is that we have an alternative to keep Microsoft and Apple honest. If they overdo it with their crappy ideas - like showing ads in the start menu or recording the desktop - then people can easily switch, at least for personal computing.
The stats come from website trackers - do people browse the web on Steam Decks?
> [...] (more technical, needing to do tasks not possible on phones and tablets)
Somewhat unrelated but something I never see discussed is how the form factor of the computing device changes our relationship to, and the types of, media that we produce and consume.
One critical task not possible on phones and tablets is the production of long-form textual media; hence the concomitant rise of picture and video and the smartphone camera, which is now the primary medium through which many, many people view the world. Editing anything longer than a Tweet is torturous on a phone or even a tablet, and I suspect that this lack of ergonomics is what leads to the proliferation of reductive, simplistic, short-form, and byte-sized thinking.
Computing "interface culture" was once hyper-literate; "in the beginning was the command line" [0], and people's primary way of seeing the internet was through words, keyboards, and terminals. Now we have the "colossal success of GUIs" and a Disney-fied [0], touchscreen interface to computing, where the control mechanisms used by adults are the exact same as the ones used by toddlers.
The key addition obviously being “for me.”
For others tablets (and for some others, phones) are what they use for producing long-form textual media.
I, for example, have no issue producing long-form textual media on my iPad w/ Magic Keyboard.
I’m sure that you will feel as though I’m not producing Real Long-Form Textual Media.
Games isn't the only driver. It's hard to do things like write papers on phones.
[1] Of course, you can hook up most phones to a display, keyboard, mouse, but that blurring the lines a bit. A Samsung DeX device or future Pixel desktop mode device hooked up to peripherals is pretty much a desktop (Pixel will even support Linux apps in a VM).
Using a phone to write papers seems like an exercise in masochism, if better alternatives are available.
It's also possible that their peer group that does use laptops to write papers is doing far better in many ways.
And of the remaining desktop/laptop users, 90% of their work is being done in a browser. Which makes Linux distros like Ubuntu suitable for more people.
Why would I recommend a Linux system?
Greater control over what hardware and software you wish to run. e.g. you wouldn't have to follow Apple's decisions in making things obsolete and effectively keep old hardware running for a lot longer if you so wish. There's also a possible issue in having a U.S. based company in control of your O.S.
But the comment is about most people only caring about the browser.
Interesting, could you tell me which part of US you are from?
---
My 2 cents, small country, mid-Europe, more or less in the middle of list of GDP / AIC per capita in EU.
Nearly everyone has some sort of PC or laptops for personal use.
Now it's changing, kids(~5-13yrs old) are using phones and tablets for school, Tiktok, Ytube, games. And only minority of kids is using PCs.
After they reach certain age, they've switched to PC games, at least in the past. Let's see what will happen now.
Gamers use primarily PC (Windows, because forced BS Anticheats), consoles are minority.
Probably because big tradition of piracy here, for long time it was legal to download anything. Even after forced change from EU, it's somewhat grey area and you can torrent anything, without VPN and nobody will care. But regarding pirating games, it changed years ago, with Steam of course. Like everywhere else.
Still it's funny that we have same price or sometimes even higher than US and our median salary is ~5x lower than US. :-) Here we call it "specific market", meaning "everybody buys it and everybody's stupid".
Only prosecuted cases I know, it was people uploading movies (usually local production) and they've made money from it.
In case of Germany and their automation of spamming letters from lawyers with ransom for €1k because someone on your internet torrented something. That's totally ridiculous from our point of view and it would spawn huge public backlash. I think that even lawyers torrents here :D
I don't think I know any non-gamer that has an actual desktop, just people with laptops.
For the gamers consoles are the vast majority, of the PC gamers pretty much all use Windows. When I tell friends I use Linux it's mostly "oh yeah I looked into that as well when Windows 11 came out but didn't end up switching".
Latops and desktops, it's a mix here. Older people had mainly desktops in the past. That's my experience, at least.
Banking, yeah mainly phones because of ridiculous forced banking apps from corporate masters, like everywhere else? (certain bank even lost a lot of customers because of that)
Taxes, if you are just an employee, taxes are done by your employer for you, by law. (I presume it's a post-communism BS, so people doesn't pay attention how much taxes we pay.)
If you have other types of income, you do it yourself, you have app/website to click through it, easy. Not automatic though. Self-employed IT pay less taxes than normal employees :D and overall lower-income people pay bigger taxes by percentage, what a great country :D
We call your country Holland, great country imho, If I would thinking about moving, that's top option for me.
Only thing that keeps me here are best gun laws in EU (I have Glock, AR15 clone, Bren3 ordered), you can conceal carry nearly everywhere, you can even use gun for self-defense, sadly very low criminality here :)
Hell, I can even legally carry katana, not kidding.
Linux is used only by IT people, friends cannot switch because they play MP games with invasive Anticheat running on kernel.
Personally, I'm only switching people to Linux if they cannot afford new PC because of Win11 upgrade. Zorin OS usually.
> Only thing that keeps me here are best gun laws in EU (I have Glock, AR15 clone, Bren3 ordered), you can conceal carry nearly everywhere, you can even use gun for self-defense, sadly very low criminality here :)
90% of tax payers claim the standard deduction. That means filing your taxes just means going to Turbo tax and it importing your W2’s automatically if your employer uses one of the major payment providers like ADP or worse case taking a picture of your W2, clicking “Next” a few times after answering a few questions and it’s done.
Why would I need a desktop to buy plane tickets? I launch my airline app, get the ticket.
Plans? For my personal projects I use Trello. I have an M2 MacBook Air that I only bought when I was between jobs for around a month to do a side contract.
My wife wanted a new computer to replace her aging x86 MacBook Air and then her older iPad went out. We bought an iPad Air 13 inch and paid $70 for a regular old Bluetooth keyboard and mouse and that’s her “computer” now.
Whoa interesting, so everyone is using 3rd party company service, is it paid service or free, I've checked their website and cannot understand if it's free or not for this basic level you've mentioned.
In my country, if this was a thing, that you must pay some company to file your taxes, it would probably cause public meltdown and end of any current government :)
Here, basic level taxes are done by your employer for you, by law, for free. Because actually they don't do taxes, but they only report amount of tax advances, social security, healthcare paid by your employer, to state, (all 3 is required by law to be paid and you or your employer have big legal problems if not). And also variables for tax deduction and then "something like IRS" will just send you tax return into your account.
And for any other cases(if you have more sources of income, eg.: salary + self-employed / rent) you must do taxes yourself, website for helping you to file taxes, is managed by state agency, for free.
Or you pay some money to "tax specialist" to file your taxes for you and liability to file it right goes after them (something like accountant, but hired only for this one task)
If you have stock trades, IRA distributions, rental income, things like that, then yea, you probably need computer-based help.
Comparing multiple different websites, copying and pasting information to share, looking up locations, etc. All way easier with a mouse, keyboard, and large tabbed browser windows.
Even Airbnb is better on desktop, since it very easily resets your search queries on the mobile app, because state is managed differently vs browser you can leave 10 different spots or multiple queries open in different tabs, which is common issue in mobile apps. And tab switching on mobile browsers is very slow.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44159562]
We travel so much, we keep things as “simple” as possible - Hilton and Hyatt brand hotels 95% of the time, Delta for domestic flights and preferably Delta or SkyTeam (AirFrance, Virgin Airlines, etc) for international flights. We have status with Hilton, Hyatt and Delta (Platinum Medallion) and Delta lounge access. Of course we have TSA Precheck and Clear.
We found a couple that runs a few AirBnbs in Costa Rica for our winter stays there starting next year.
In october 2022, my wife and I got rid of everything we owned that wouldn’t fit in 4 suitcases, sold our cars, rented our home [1] out to our adult son (and two of his friends that we considered family) and flew one way trips to 15 different cities until landing in our then second home [2] in Florida. We did all of the planning via a shared Google Sheet on our phone, the Delta and American airline apps and Hilton and Hyatt hotel apps.
During the past 7 months, we’ve had trips to Vegas, Costa Rica, 4-5 flights back home to ATL, a few flights to see my parents in south GA, DC, London and Niagara Falls Canada, we still have a few trips back to Atlanta and to see my parents this year.
While we are doing all of this traveling together, my wife flies to conferences and I did travel semi frequently for business as a consultant but that has died down.
At the same time, I’m managing the best use of Delta Skymiles, when to transfer points from Amex to AirFrance to get cheap domestic flights on Delta (check out r/awardtravel), Hilton points, Hyatt points either directly or by transferring from Chase. These are all using the apps.
I have a Google sheet to keep track of various credit card perks (Delta stays credits, companion passes, etc)
I have a spreadsheet with tabs for the next couple of years plans - next year we are staying in Costa Rica for a 45 days in an Airbnb and 3-4 cities domestically during the summer and a couple of other random domestic flights during the year.
I am also keeping track of my budget, when is the best time to “nomad” based on potential rental income from my home [2].
While we have one account for hotels and a shared calendar, miles flying are based on “butts in seat”, whoever flies gets the miles. But you can book flights for others using your miles. We juggle those together too.
This is all from our phones usually at night.
We really have this down to science after 3+ years.
[1] we sold our primary home last year
[2] our current home is a unit in a condotel (https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/condotel.asp) we own. When we leave for months at a time, we just pack everything we own in 4 suitcases and store what we can’t in our one car - like my “desk” which is just a card table.
We then put our unit in the rental pool and get income whenever someone stays in our unit. That covers our mortgage and all inclusive HOA fee. But that really only works in March - mid April (spring break), during the summer and the last two or three weeks of the year.
Opening a specific airline's app and just getting whatever they have on offer is completely foreign to me. I would think I am getting cheated.
Also, federal taxes may be easy but the only way to free-file the state tax is to do it directly with the state and that means filling out a form myself.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44583545
We don’t comparison shop. Domestically flights on Delta, hotels are either Hyatt or Hilton brand hotels. Internationally? Most Delta partners (AirFrance, Virgin Airways) or Delta itself.
For Hilton, we get points directly and can transfer from Amex (rarely worth it). For Hyatt, points are more valuable and it’s easy to get points from Chase credit cards (r/churning) that can be transferred to Hyatt (saves us thousands a dollars a year sometimes).
On Delta, we have lounge access, 2 free checked bags, free regional (domestic, north and Central America) flight upgrades, priority check in, etc.
Why even pay TurboTax if you're just taking the standard deduction and have only W2 income? Might as well just paper file for free. Anything more complex than that, and having a desktop monitor and full size keyboard is very useful. I can imagine even filling out 5 stock trades in TurboTax on a phone would be quite painful.
> Why would I need a desktop to buy plane tickets? I launch my airline app, get the ticket.
This one bit me recently as I did some traveling. None of the major airline apps even work on my phone anymore. Their developers all just up and decided to block use of their app on older phones with full-screen modals preventing the software from working. My only choice is to buy a new phone or do my flight booking on a desktop. Mobile apps are an absolute shit show unless you have a <= 5 year old phone.
Sad, but true. Recent batch of new hires where I work, same age range - mid-late 20's, none of them have computers at home except their work issued laptop. They are by far the biggest source of help desk tickets for us, and same story as you, using phone & iPad for everything at home.
Honestly concerns me for talent recruitment in the future, if AI isn't doing everything tech when that time comes - kids only tech experiences now are fully locked down walled gardens, takes away both the ability and incentive to tinker, explore, or even troubleshoot. Whole generation of new workers coming in without even the most basic of troubleshooting/problem solving skills. Have a few at my work where even just reading an error message on the screen seems overwhelming to them.
Interesting. I don't know anyone who doesn't have a personal computer at home. Mostly laptops. With the exceptions of nerds like myself, the signifier that someone is a gamer is that their home computer is a tower rather than a laptop.
I wonder how much regional variation there is around this sort of thing? It sounds like it might be quite a lot.
Mobile OSes are strictly designed for consumption and are too restricted for most other use cases. It’s an OS limit not a hardware issue.
A Linux desktop is far better to run LLM experiments with.
My home, tinker workstation used to be Windows but there was no reason to keep it that way, when most of the build and support tooling prefer Linux.
There’s interest in LLM and GenAI beyond regular tinkerers; local NSFW image generator models are apparently a thing.
Why? If Windows & OSX desktops are in decline, but Linux isn't, I'd still celebrate that - apparently Linux is serving the more "important" / long-lived use cases?
I think there is likely an argument that the people that would have previously used Linux are likely using Linux for tasks that would not easily work on a phone or a tablet and are likely more technical users.
Where as many users who would have previously used Windows or Mac for general basic computing can easily accomplish those tasks on their phones or tablets. (Not all tasks obviously, but there are a lot of tasks that an iPad can do that you would have previously done on your traditional computer).
That is why to me just celebrating a percent change really is not telling us much of the story. And to be clear here, I am asking the question not to say that the number is not something to celebrate but to ask why the number is the way it is and celebrate accordingly.
So, the true meaning of the "Year of the Linux Desktop" was that in the end there would only be a single unit left?
It helps that I can now do all of my gaming on Linux, so I'm not touching Windows again, outside of an employer paying for my work devices to use it on.
As it stands though, that's not the case, so I'll be stuck supporting a couple of Windows desktops permanently.
Before you suggest the app versions of Excel or Google Sheets, that's already a step too far. My mom told me she's "basically done learning new technology" and that's just how it's going to be.
That's very anecdotal of you. Proves absolutely nothing.
Since we're posting anecdotes here, everyone I know has at least one computer that is not "their work computer" (which is confusing, is it employer-owned, or just personally owned for their own purposes?).
Many people do not like typing on tablet or phone keyboards, real keyboards are much nicer. Bigger screens are also much nicer than tiny phone screens and most tablet screens.
I suspect your anecdotal circle is probably very young and may just not be able to afford a real computer, or have never used one, so they are fine with their tiny devices, not knowing the benefits of having a more traditional laptop or desktop computer.
I went for Ubuntu, while my friends mostly went to some type of "gaming-optimized" flavour of Arch.
I'm definitely an edge case as most computing goes, but it feels for the first time like the gaming-on-Linux train's gaining traction, and there's enough community support out there that making the jump feels like a palatable ideal.
I've been saying this for a while, in the sense that the "year of the Linux desktop" isn't going to come from mass adoption of Linux on the desktop, but will come because overall "desktop" market share will decrease to the point where if you need a desktop, you are probably technical enough and more likely to be running Linux.
Desktop (and laptop) computing is becoming niche outside of work. Like you said, most folks just use their phones, and maybe an iPad. By having a non-day job computer at home, and having it be a core device, already puts you in a niche group of users.
Gamers, devs, media professionals and enthusiasts are the remaining desktop computing users. Linux is well suited to take over gamers and devs, media professionals will continue using Macs. So yeah, it might appear Linux usage is growing, but I think the more likely story is it's relatively stable and overall desktop usage is shrinking.
I know quite a lot of professionals, who for them the last straw was purchasing the professional edition, and then finding out later after an update that their company lock screens now have ad's posted; and worse, those ads frequently have malware that cause even more headaches for them in a unmanageable way.
The bean counters at MS pushed their biggest supporters over the knifes edge, and alot more people are getting serious about alternatives to MS now.
I think the biggest obstacle in the Linux world is people knee jerk recommending Debian/Ubuntu/Mint/outdated linux.
If people rallied around the current SOTA, Fedora, we would've hit 5% a few years ago.
The variety of distros cause people to get confused, and go with the most heavily marketed distros, Ubuntu flavors. Just because Ubuntu gave away free CDs 20 years ago, doesnt make them good. It makes them good at marketing.
People confuse Fedora with Arch, which is terrible. People confuse Ubuntu with 'stable like a table', instead of 'outdated stable'.
We almost need a reduction in favored distros. Out with the complexity: Fedora for desktop. It has all the DEs too.
Ultimately, anything that will run on one Linux distro will run on any other, with the only significant differences being on distros that run on unusual architectures or have made major changes to the kernel.
With enough effort, this is true... but out of the box, you are going to have significantly more bugs and conflicts using outdated distros.
I'd love to see a 'time in terminal' by distro. I imagine Fedora would be in the mere minutes per year, and Ubuntu in the hours per year.
I'm also not sure what you mean by "outdated distros". It should be implicit that I'm referring to the currently maintained versions of available distros, not deprecated versions.
And the "time in terminal" metric might not generally make sense, given the preference that many Linux users have for CLI/TUI tools over GUI ones, given the efficiency and consistency advantages of the former -- many people prefer to work in the terminal even where GUI tools for equivalent functionality are readily available.
Then Office 365 came around and I could do quick work w/out a windows machine.
Since flash didnt work I didnt use Linix
Since I didnt use Linux I wasnt very good at it
Since I kept at noob level, I couldnt install Flash, which was pretty hard
You still cannot crtl+V in the terminal. No faster way to scare off users than give them a CLI heavy OS and have the trip over the very first copy+paste command they try to run (once they figure out the circa ~1982 cursor)
I really cannot say enough about the total fumble of Linux distros in an age when people are more desperate than ever to leave Windows.
Fedora is a different level completely. With Fedora, I remember installing nvidia drivers via terminal, and that was essentially it.
Sometimes I open up ports for my kid doing minecraft, but that was it. Its not like when you use Ubuntu or Mint and you need to manually update something just to get Netflix to work on Chromium.
Fedora is so good, I won't call it linux. Linux has the Debian/Ubuntu baggage. Fedora stands alone. Its easier to use than Windows, I don't think I'm exaggerating. Windows 11 has ads, unresponsive search, UI/theme issues that make it impossible to read text, it has fake paths to files. Fedora just works.
When referring to the terminal, these are 1 time events every 12 months. Its not really a huge deal on Fedora because you basically don't need the terminal. On Ubuntu, its a much bigger deal given how many things are broken and need to be repaired.
The more poignant issues might be that there's inconsistencies around UI here. Some terminals allow that directly (Kitty), others require Ctrl+shift+v (Gnome shell, iirc Powershell and Konsole).
To be fair, the best non-windows OS likely is MacOS. It has software support for a lot of commercial prosumer stuff, e. G., Adobe, and has a convenient and stable 3rd Party offering for Windows VMs (Parallels).
As a Linux user it seems like there is a lot to learn in regard to UI consistency from both though (maybe less from Windows). Gnome and KDE are probably moving in the right direction here but it is still a bit off sometimes.
As you said, it works for the people who make it. Why does it need to do anything else? Linux desktop conquering the world is just an old Slashdot trope, it’s not something anyone is actually working to achieve in real life.
Why is 5% a magic number? Why not 4% or 6% or 10%?
> You still cannot crtl+V in the terminal.
Try Shift+Ins. CLI and GUI conventions have always been different, and the sort of users who work in the terminal are the ones who know the difference. Overloading Ctrl+V, and breaking applications that run in the terminal, just to make two completely different paradigms use the same hotkeys seems a bit ridiculous to me.
BTW, this applies across OSes, and isn't specific to Linux.
This makes no sense. There are so many different ways to use Linux, there is not a single profile of "people who love Linux".
1. The statistics only show Desktop usage relative to each other. But I could totally imagine that macOS "loses" users to iPadOS. Similarly, Windows could be losing users to smartphones in general (I see more and more people who don't actually have a personal computer anymore).
2. Valve (and others, surely) is doing an incredible job with video games on Linux. 20 years ago, I needed a dual boot just to play games. I dropped Windows when I stopped playing, and I started playing again thanks to the Steam Deck. I am convinced that many people today "need" an OS on which they can play video games, except that today they have a choice (thanks to Valve and others).
3. Privacy. I think it's becoming a lot more important outside the US (it's actually now a national security concern there), but I'm convinced that people are slowly learning about that. TooBigTech pushing to train their AIs with everything the users do surely has an impact on that.
But this is desktop only. If someone stop using windows completely, it won't show a decrease in windows usage. This will basically only show when people switch from desktop OS.
I remember the days when we were under 1%.
Congratulations to all involved on making this true.
Thirty years ago Bill was writing angry memos about the rise of Linux and how Microsoft had to stop free software.
Additionally, a smaller factor could be the growing trend of Dev and Op professionals moving from Macs to Linux. And the trend before, to move from Windows to Mac's because they are cheaper to administrate. This shift is supported by manufacturers like Dell and Lenovo, who are providing more devices with Linux pre-installed, aligning well with the supply chain requirements of IT departments.
Also, at least for me, it's hard to envision vendors specialising in Linux desktop hardware, such as Tuxedo, Framework, and System76, experiencing a surge in their market shares. I am very curious to see their numbers and the kind of people and companies that buy this products.
Also worth noting: if you count Chrome OS under the Linux kernel umbrella, the footprint is even bigger. It shows that open-source roots can quietly gain ground, even if the branding isn’t “Linux” front and center.
Role models for computer use today: “PewDiePie”.
This is why we can't have nice things.
Or rather, I don't know whether those who think PewDiePie is "cool" have the same understanding of "cool" as computer nerds do.
Reports about high battery drain, suspend issues and similar exist as well.
I'm running Fedora on a Framework laptop, but with the awareness that it can require some tinkering.
I also think a number of influencers like PewDiePie moving to Linux has to have moved the needle at least a little as well.
After seeing SharePoint.exe using 1GB and 100% of the CPU today for over 12 hours I’m seriously considering removing my VM (that I only boot for MS Office). Edge even greeted me with a message that I have access to Copilot Vision that can now see everything I browse when I right clicked the process and clicked on search!
Earlier reporting on Windows MAU noted "400 million Windows PCs vanished in 3 years" (https://www.zdnet.com/article/400-million-windows-pcs-vanish... ). As Windows 11 wrecks havoc on older PCs, many may just sit unused or get discarded, thereby increasing the relative share of the surviving PCs (including Linux PCs).
5% seems too low. Would it be 30%? Or 51%?
Answering that question in the public sphere may quell many of the "Is ___ going to the year of the Linux desktop?" posts we get each year.
> 1 week later PC stops booting
Some people will find the idea of elements of a mobile OS on their desktop attractive. Other people will find it less unattractive than buying a new PC to run Windows 11.
The simple example would be LibreOffice.
I wanted a gaming PC forever but I just couldn’t stomach Windows. I had a great experience with the Steam Deck in the past 2 years so I built a Bazzite desktop. I am having a lot of fun.
My choices were to spend $200 on a new version of Windows that was worse than the one I lost, or switch to Linux. Guess which I did?
What's torturous about using Fusion 360 in a VM?
0: https://hackaday.com/2025/06/03/my-winter-of-99-the-year-of-...
Last 30 days: 6%
2025 so far: 5.7%
2024: 4.5%
edit: analytics.usa.gov includes iOS and Android in its operating systems breakdown — e.g. Windows has a 32% share vs OP's 63%. Assuming most of Linux users are on desktop, it could be the case that Linux share in desktop users is a bit higher than 6%
Apple could do the same to some extent if they cut their prices some.
I've used macOS for work for many years and Arch-based derivatives for personal desktop. The challenge with that has always been gaming: Gaming on Linux _mostly_ works, but third-party launchers (e.g., Battle.net, Origin, etc.) HATE it. I also don't love the Proton shuffle (i.e., "Which version of Proton do I need to use to get this to work?"), but it's tolerable for me. I'll tell you for whom it _isn't_ tolerable: my wife (who mostly uses a different system running Windows 10, but sometimes wants to use the more powerful gaming PC running Linux). And thus the only remaining choice for the home system has been Linux + Windows (in some capacity).
Now, I've not used Windows full-time since 7, but I recently installed Windows 11 (via QEMU using LookingGlass) and it is simply TERRIBLE. There are full-blown ads in the Start Menu, the built-in search ignores your default browser/search engine settings, and (critically) __you can no longer put the Start Menu bar at the top of the screen__ (It's less common, but I've done this my entire life).
I think it comes down to the following wishes:
A. I wish Windows 8/10/11 didn't suck so much.
B. I wish Linux was widely-supported by ALL game platforms.
C. I wish macOS gaming wasn't so expensive.
It does suck resources so using it on Laptops is not ideal, but for desktop its by far the best, mostly because of WSL2 integration, which is mature enough to not only run graphical linux apps, but also supports CUDA.
For Laptops, honestly, Linux Mint with I3wm is the way to go. Once you get used to I3, its hard to go back standard display managers with icons and menus.
In my experience this is every few weeks.
What really surprised me was how hard it is to switch back to Linux. After about a year using windows there was a ton of friction to get my mindset back in Linux. But I made the switch and I will never use windows willingly again.
Fundamentally the thing that keeps me on Windows is battery life. I need to be able to trust that my laptop won't lose more than 20% of its charge in a week when not in use and Linux just can't reliably do that.
A related thing is stuff like play/pause/mute not working when the screen is locked.
The ever increasing number of GPUs of the world are making the cloud PC gaming services ridiculously cheap. I only pay $12 USD/month (boosteroid, gaming only).
If I bought a gaming PC with similar specs, it would take over 7 years to pay it off (no use for a PC besides gaming). That would be 7 years of fixed hardware, where the cloud hardware specs keep improving with time, and I can pause the subscription whenever I want.
You definitely pay with some extra input latency, but not enough to impact my casual play. Definitely worth trying, if you have nice internet.
I've used all three OS's for many years and I really just.. don't care which one I'm on anymore. They all do the same thing. Currently on windows 11 after ~5 years of debian gnome and its fine. Enjoyable even, especially with WSL. GUI software support is much better here
Booting it up about half an hour before the meeting... Installing updates...
After rebooting twice and only five minutes before the meeting started I reverted to my Linux desktop, opened the email with the link to the Teams meeting and was a minute early using the web version of Teams.
Phew, saved by Linux.
Kudos to Microsoft for making Teams web version operating system and browser agnostic. But fuck what they've done with Windows updates. Numerous coworkers also saying their computers decided to reboot of their own volition the last couple of days in order to install updates.
Maybe it's a worthwhile trade off for security, but I'm glad I had an alternative option this morning.
I'm the five-odd years since switching to Linux exclusive at home, my decision is only ever reconfirmed as correct.
(I'm a reformed gamer from a long while ago, but the very few games I do play I have gotten to work on Linux).
I would love to know what Microsoft thinks the purpose of the standalone app is, when it is both slower and less reliable.
I have that exact workflow with any computer I do not use on a regular basis. If I use the thing every day it is ok. But if I let something sit for like 6 months it is 'patch city'. I usually play that game on my game consoles because i do not use it much. My daily used computers 10-15 seconds tops until usable desktop.
Then is this really an increase in Linux "desktop" market share? I'm aware that it's Arch based and can surely run as a desktop but I see it's contribution no different than if they included ChromeOS or Android with the 5% of Linux. A targeted platform more intended for the purpose of gaming.
Desktop Linux's biggest obstacles have always been hardware/software compatibility, and user friendliness for average users. If they're going to list "Windows Woes", then how much of this increase is actually happening on the REAL forefront of Desktop Linux: Ubuntu, Mint and so forth?
I no longer have a windows machine. If I can't get a game to run on Linux then I don't bother with it. I played Clair Obscur start, to finish, in Mint on a 3090 with zero issues. I just forced it to load in steam since linux isn't officially supported.
But that's a very key point of advantage in by-design open-ness and non-commercialisation.
It's taken 30(-odd?) years and the coining of the word enshittification, but the advantages of this ideology is now having the last of the clay and sand brushed off it, baring its beauty to a growing audience.
And Linux has, in fact, gotten steadily better over that time too, but it's been a slow consistent grind, so it doesn't appear as grand as a sudden red-curtain-unveiling-worthy improvement, but it is, in fact, that grand.
(What Valve / Steam / Proton has done may be the closest to a rapid increase of usability / marketability, but even that has been relatively subtly under the radar unless you're paying attention).
No more hundreds of background processes sapping my battery life and performance.
No more blatantly manipulative ads every time Windows updates, about how I won't be "safe" unless I sign up for OneDrive, switch to Edge, and subscribe to Office Live Dynamics Pro Limited 365, because now word processing and spreadsheets are a subscription for some fucking reason.
No more 3 different generations of UI styles sloppily bolted together (though Linux desktop styling can be plenty sloppy).
No more news feeds in my start menu and task bar filled with the outrage and statistically improbable evil human acts of the day, no doubt with MS ads, alongside prods to install Candy Crush and other crap.
No more whack-a-mole MS telemetry I have to read obscure guides to find out how to turn off.
No more needing to sign in to a FUCKING CLOUD ACCOUNT to use my own computer.
No more stupid crap like copilot, sucking screenshots and forwarding them to MS and OpenAI, and other sparkly AI icons on every damn thing.
Haven't booted Windows in a month or two. So happy to have switched - my computer belongs to me again, for the first time in a long while
Occasionally I will boot into a Windows partition because I have to do something windows-only. I’m so out of the Windows world these days that I mentally have to prepare myself not to get too fired up with it all, just calm down do the thing and get out. :)
Agree that it’s a lot of effort to switch though, so good for you on making the switch!
My routine at some point after moving to W10 was to create/update system partition image, turn off all bypasses/tweaks that kept update components tamed. Then do the update, reboot and quickly run through all setting that in the past tend to reset "itself", apply tweaks again and reboot to see if these still work, and finally - look up if some processes or services were added.
I was dualbooting, using VM's for years and pandemic gave me something to do so I finally escaped from Microsoft grip.
Tho, it wasn't issues-free ride. Mint and Manjaro would randomly soft-hang for no reason; some Manjaro updates would made me few times reinstall the system (that would be still faster than manually correcting everything). I had to freeze GPU drivers for older card because newer ones would crash games. Keeping unified look across all types of applications is indeed a sloppy task - especially with all Gnome shenanigans regarding theming but atm is still doable. But overall, I'm happy and I see how much changed and improved since Mandrake 8 times when I tried Linux for the first time.
For majority of people, for doing basic tasks plus playing some games Linux should be fine.
Why use Photoshop when Gimp is available? Fusion360 when there is FreeCAD? etc.
This is great news btw, and consistent with what is coming out of the Steam survey.
I primarily went back to Linux Mint because of this problem. Thankfully Steam allows me to game my library just like on Windows. I have no reason to return.
So I'm assuming these "5% desktop market share" aren't using that kind of distro.
Successful Linux-based OSes have unattended atomic updates and user-friendly app installation. That includes ChromeOs and Android, as well as modern atomic desktop distributions. Fedora Silverblue, Bluefin, Bazzite.
edit: however, market share is probably coming from legacy distributions. That’s largely a sign of how bad Windows gets, and how desktops/laptops become more niche.
Didn't realize that it was also for grumps who wanted bug-compatibility in their workflow.
Which is fine if that’s your preference, too. However, you shouldn’t expect your experience to be significantly different from what it was when that desktop experience was fresh when you choose a product made by people with such strong preferences.
Again, Bluefin and the like update (atomically, with a rollback option) when you turn your computer off, with no interruptions or sudoing; app installs are through Gnome Software (for GUI stuff; through brew otherwise), without a need to enter passwords. You pay for that with some customizability, but it’s rock solid if it works on your hardware.
It’s becoming a more viable option - assuming you don’t need multiplayer with anticheat
Also gaming on Linux works great for the most part with Proton. Thanks Steam!
Seriously though, I switched to Linux late last year and haven't looked back. It has everything I need for a computer and a lot of the "problems" people say is holding them back from switching full-time are greatly exaggerated. Like if you're not willing to make some small compromises so you can have a computer that respects you as a human and not a metric then I don't know what to tell you.
Microsoft could kill off Windows as a desktop operating system and it wouldn't dent their financials in a major way. You'll know they're truly serious, though, when they start making contributions to Wine and also makes bash the default command line interpreter in windows.
1) Windows chatting behind your back causes distrust. And for good reason. 2) Yes, forced updates, but the consumers don't understand that they're just crofters in MSFT's world with all MSFT's products. MSFT will update as much as fits their needs to protect their property, not yours. 3) Re: adware. Part of your relationship with MSFT is that you are the commodity. It's a general internet business revenue model.
sylware•10h ago
elf/linux distros are hardly pre-installed on PCs and forced upon users.
btreecat•10h ago
>According to the latest StatCounter Global Stats for June 2025, Linux now holds 5.03% of the desktop operating system market share in the United United States of America. This is fantastic news!
ghc•10h ago
ssgodderidge•10h ago
> Statcounter is a web analytics service. Our tracking code is installed on more than 1.5 million sites globally. These sites cover various activities and geographic locations. Every month, we record billions of page views to these sites. For each page view, we analyse the browser/operating system/screen resolution used and we establish if the page view is from a mobile device. For our search engine stats, we analyze every page view referred by a search engine. For our social media stats, we analyze every page view referred by a social media site. We summarize all this data to get our Global Stats information.
[1] https://gs.statcounter.com/faq#methodology
yjftsjthsd-h•9h ago
I think the general conclusion is that they don't know it reliably; notice the other comments in this thread pointing out that the numbers jump up and down more or less every time they're measured.