 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 1119, 28 April 2025 |
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Welcome to this year's 17th issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
This week we get to share a range of fun, exciting, and interesting developments from across the wider open source community. Our news section this week reports on CachyOS shipping with the OCCT stress testing software while the Debian project enters soft freeze, an early step on the road to Debian 13 being released. Debian held its Project Leader election this week and we share the details. We also share a tutorial on getting NetBSD to run on a Nintendo Wii and even run a web server on the gaming hardware. When we cover this week's new releases, later in the newsletter, we share one of the largest distributions to ship - with a 36GB download. We share details on this and other releases below and list the torrents we are seeding. First though we talk about Ubuntu MATE. Jeff Siegel takes Ubuntu MATE 25.04 for a spin and reports on his experiences with this community edition in our Feature Story. Plus we talk about what is missing from the Linux ecosystem. Sometimes it is harder to notice what is not there rather than what is and we explore this in our Questions and Answers column. What missing feature do you think would benefit the Linux community? Let us know in this week's Opinion Poll or share your thoughts in the comments. Finally, we say a fond thank you to the kind readers who sent us donations. We wish you all a terrific week and happy reading!
This week's DistroWatch Weekly is presented by TUXEDO Computers.
Content:
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| Feature Story (By Jeff Siegel) |
Ubuntu MATE 25.04
Linux has been criticized - and then criticized some more - because there are too many of them, whether distros or desktops. Linux's great failing, the critics complain, is that all those choices are too confusing, too baffling for the vast majority of users. All that choice also wastes resources, they claim, that could be better used to perfect the "best" distros to better appeal to that vast majority of users.
To which I say "nuts", and point to Ubuntu MATE and its current release, 25.04, codenamed Plucky Puffin, as an example. It's a professional, competent, and well-designed distro, and it serves its users with speed and efficiency, despite a couple of irritating aggravations. Most importantly, the fact that - after spending a week with it - I don't want to use MATE 25.04 as my daily driver is completely irrelevant. If nothing else, I've never used Evolution, so why would I want to start now?
In a larger sense, MATE isn't designed for users like me. Rather, it exists for those who want the familiarly and straight-forward approach of the GNOME 2 desktop (which GNOME abandoned 14 years ago in its pursuit of the more tablet-like GNOME 3 interface) and that will work with modern hardware and software. There's nothing wrong with that. In this, 25.04 does exactly what its users want it to do, and its creators should be complimented for achieving that goal.
The basics
In fact, Ubuntu MATE 25.04 marks the 10th anniversary of the distro becoming an official Ubuntu flavor. It's not a long-term release, so it's only supported for nine months. The ISO download is 3.72GB, compared to 5.9GB for Ubuntu and 4.7GB for Kubuntu. Recommended system requirements are an i3 processor, 4GB of memory, and a 20GB SSD, but the distro should also work, according to the documentation, with older Core 2 processors and as little as 2GB of memory and a 10GB hard drive.
Installation uses Ubuntu's new Flutter-based installer, which has received mixed reviews (mostly for its stability). Oddly, it worked without any problems in VirtualBox, zooming through the process in less than 10 minutes. On the other hand, there were any number of problems during installation on the test machine, and I installed it twice because I couldn't believe an Ubuntu-based installer was being so difficult. First, it was slow, as much as 45 minutes from beginning to end; second, it threw several errors each time. The first installation locked up when it finished, and I had to do a hard reset to get the newly installed system to load. The second install offered a "Brisk Menu" error, which apparently dates back to at least version 18.04, and was followed by another system freeze that required another hard reset.
Ubuntu MATE 25.04 -- The system installer
(full image size: 359kB, resolution: 1290x823 pixels)
Was this a failing with the Flutter installer? Or did it have something to with the test machine, given that installation on VirtualBox was so straightforward? I'm not sure. I've never had any problems with other, non-Flutter installations on the test machine, but the Flutter installer has also worked smoothly on my other, slightly older, test machine. If I had to guess, given the problems others have reported, I'd lean to the installer.
Still, once all was set up, MATE offered a modern, if a bit retro-quirky, experience. And yes, there was a pang of nostalgia when I used the MATE Tweak tool to configure the top panel to make it look like GNOME 2, with its Application, Places and System sub-menus.
Ubuntu MATE 25.04 -- The classic top panel
(full image size: 900kB, resolution: 1368x768 pixels)
The distro comes with much of the usual Ubuntu collection of software, save Evolution instead of Thunderbird for mail. In particular, 25.04 includes the Linux 6.14 kernel, the MATE 1.26.2 desktop, Firefox 137, Evolution 3.56, and LibreOffice 25.2.2, as well as a host of installed additions for encryption and dual booting. The current version of the Caja file manager is 1.26.3, complete with the ability to change folder colors.
Getting work done
As to apps, Shotwell 0.32.10 handles photos, Rhythmbox 3.4.8I is the music player, and GNOME's new Celluoid 0.2.7 does videos. The default camera app is not the venerable Cheese or GNOME's new Snapshot/Camera, but Webcamoid 9.2, which crashed each time I tried to use it.
MATE offers the usual Ubuntu-style control centre, where users can also fiddle with the distro's appearance - change themes, set up a head-up display (HUD), finagle with the panel indicators in a limited sort of way, and adjust the Plank dock's preferences. The latter is especially helpful for anyone who has spent way too much time trying to right-click on a Plank icon to reach the preferences option.
Ubuntu MATE 25.04 -- The MATE settings panel
(full image size: 476kB, resolution: 1368x768 pixels)
MATE's Tweak tool allows users to change desktop icon settings; switch the theme; install Plank (again, much welcome); and work with the Marco window manager. Its choices don't seem quite as extensive as the various GNOME tweak tools and their options, but it probably does what its users need.
Also much welcome: An updated version of the GDebi package installer with a working GUI, which I haven't seen in years. And the Nextcloud desktop file manager, to allow me to access my Nextcloud home server, installed and worked without any problems, and the Zoom Snap package also installed successfully.
Ubuntu MATE 25.04 -- The MATE Tweak utility
(full image size: 592kB, resolution: 1282x801 pixels)
App Centre 1.0 handles most of the package management (though Synaptic is in the repositories) and, given the problems that have plagued Canonical's efforts to build a decent, one size fits all software store, it's a noticeable improvement. For one, the update function seems to work better than previous versions, which sometimes hung up. For another, search actually works, and it's possible to search for snaps, Deb files, or both. It's still not as streamlined as it could be; for example, there are three versions of Thunderbird and four versions of Chromium available without any explanation of which version is which, and none of the versions explicitly say they're a Snap (which each seems to be).
Ubuntu MATE 25.04 -- The software centre
(full image size: 281kB, resolution: 1368x768 pixels)
I really only ran into two problems (other than Webcamoid crashing). The first was the well-known and long-standing printer installation "failed to connect to server" error, which seems to be common among most Ubuntu flavors and distros based on Ubuntu. It renders the GUI useless, even though it recognizes the printer, and forces printer installation through CUPS and localhost:631 (and even then requires patience and trial and error). Will this ever be fixed?
The second was trying to adjust the top panel to my specific needs. Yes, the weather applet (Weather Report) actually provided the correct temperature instead of just a forecast. But adding applets and rearranging them was not nearly so simple. On Xubuntu, for example, a right-click on the panel almost always provides fixes for all issues. But MATE sets up most of its applets through eight Ayatana indicator managers, so trying to delete one unnecessary applet often ends up deleting other, necessary applets that are managed through that specific Ayatana manager. The Ayatana managers are even hidden in the startup manager, to prevent easy editing.
No doubt this is to ensure that changing the panel theme and layout through the tweak tool works more easily, and maybe there's a way around this that is simple and straightforward. But I never found it, so I was stuck with applets I didn't want and was limited in adding those that I needed, like a clipboard (for which there doesn't seem to be a MATE default for the panel).
Also annoying: the panel separator applet is a skinny line that apparently can't be expanded or changed into a space, which gave me a cramped, unpleasant looking panel. Again, maybe there's a way around this, but I never found it in a week of looking.
Having said all that, these are minor - and more personal - problems. Would that most Linux distros offered these as the worst parts of the experience. That's something for all those critics who want to consolidate distros and resources to consider.
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Hardware used for this review
My physical test equipment for this review was a HP EliteBook 840 G5 laptop with the following specifications:
- Processor: Intel Core i7-8550U, 1.80GHz
- Storage: 512GB M.2 SSD
- Memory: 16GB of RAM
- Networking: Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 8265 802.11a/b/g/n/ac Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4.2 Combo
- Display: Intel UHD Graphics 620
When he is not testing out new versions of Linux distributions, Jeff Siegel can be found writing about all things related to wine at Wine Curmudgeon.
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Visitor supplied rating
Ubuntu MATE has a visitor supplied average rating of: 8.1/10 from 76 review(s).
Have you used Ubuntu MATE? You can leave your own review of the project on our ratings page.
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
CachyOS ships OCCT stress testing tool, Debian enters soft freeze and elects Project Leader, Fedora discusses removing X11 session from GNOME, Murena planning business services, NetBSD running on a Wii
The CachyOS project has published refreshed live media. The new snapshot (version 250422) mostly focuses on bug fixes, but there is a new tool on the live media to help users perform stress tests on their environment: "Today we pushed out a new release, which is a fixing release for the previous one. There were some issues with the kernel, which have been resolved. Also, this now includes the tool OCCT, which makes it possible to use the ISO as an isolated stress testing environment. Thanks to @kaitokariheddo for providing this excellent idea!" Information on OCCT can be found on the OCBASE website.
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The Debian project is preparing for a new table release which will likely arrive around the middle of 2025. Debian has entered a "soft freeze" which means no new major features are being added to the Testing branch at this time. From this point until Debian 13 "Trixie" is released only bug fixes will be allowed. The Debian website has further information on the freezing process.
In other Debian-related news, Andreas Tille has been elected Debian Project Leader. The candidates and the results of the vote can be found on the Debian 2025 Vote page. Congratulations to Andreas Tille and best of luck in the year ahead.
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The Fedora distribution has defaulted to running the GNOME and Plasma desktop sessions on Wayland for a release or two. A new proposal suggests Fedora may remove the GNOME X11 session option from the distribution entirely, dropping GNOME X11 from the package repositories. "Remove the GNOME X11 packages from the Fedora repositories. All users of the GNOME X11 session will be migrated to the GNOME Wayland session." While this change has not been implemented yet, it is likely to happen as GNOME 50 is expected to drop X11 support, making GNOME a Wayland-only desktop environment.
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The Murena team has some new features planned for later in 2025. The project, which provides a de-Googled build of Android along with cloud services, is expanding to offer business services and management tools. "We've been receiving continuous requests from organizations looking to migrate away from platforms like Office 365 and Google Docs. To address this, we're thrilled to announce Murena Workspace for Businesses, specifically designed for businesses. It will provide comprehensive tools for team management, collaboration, email, calendars, and more - all hosted on your own custom domain if desired. Additionally, we'll introduce a powerful Mobile Device Management (MDM) solution, enabling organizations to effectively manage fleets of Murena smartphones and tablets." Further information can be found in the Murena founder's post.
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The NetBSD operating system is highly portable and lightweight. This allows the project to run on a wide variety of CPUs and unusual devices. Alex Haydock tested the range of NetBSD recently by setting up a website, powered by NetBSD, running on a Nintendo Wii. "The NetBSD Wii image has all the necessary metadata & structure needed to boot directly from the Homebrew Channel as if it were any other kind of homebrew app. I think there's a lot of credit due here to NetBSD developer Jared McNeill, who seems to be the main author of the Wii port.
Placing our SD card in the console and launching the Homebrew Channel is all we need to do to prepare ourselves to launch NetBSD. Once booted into NetBSD, we can use a USB keyboard just fine, but it will be easiest to get SSH working so we can manage the system remotely. The SSH daemon is already running out-of-the-box, so the only changes we need to make are to set a password for the root user and then enable logging in as root by adding PermitRootLogin yes to the sshd_config." Haydock's blog post offers details on getting NetBSD running on the Wii. Status and resource usage information has also been provided.
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These and other news stories can be found on our Headlines page.
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| Questions and Answers (by Jesse Smith) |
What is missing from the Linux ecosystem?
Looking-for-something asks: With Windows 10 hitting its end of life date this year, what is the Linux community missing? What is something a distro could do that hasn't been done yet that would make a difference in adoption?
DistroWatch answers: I'm going to answer these questions in reverse order. As to what could make a difference in Linux adoption, I have always maintained that getting Linux pre-installed on computers being sold in shops is the main change which would make a difference in market share. In fact, it's probably one of the few things which will make a significant difference in the number of users who run Linux.
Regardless of the market - whether we're talking desktop computers, phones, cars, TVs, or gaming consoles - around 90% of people will not change the default system which ships with their device. To most people, the software which runs on their computer (or phone) is just part of the device, part of the appliance. Most people aren't aware of the concept of an operating system as a separate entity, something than can be swapped out. When they buy a new computer from their local electronics shop, most people see it as a complete unit, an appliance. Generally people won't consider changing the operating system which came with their computer any more than they'd plan to swap out their car's motor for one from another manufacturer.
In order to increase Linux adoption, beyond a percentage point, you'd need to get retail shops to stock computers with Linux installed on them. Consumers would need to be able to walk into a Walmart or Best Buy and purchase a system running Ubuntu or Linux Mint. If you're looking for a feature which will make people install a Linux distribution as an alternative to their existing operating system, your idea is cutting out the majority of the population from your plan who will never switch.
As to the other question (What is the Linux community missing?) I'd say the big feature I notice is missing is automation.
There are some distributions which will try to automate a few tasks. There is one Debian-based distribution which completely automates the install process if you boot it from a thumb drive (which is as dangerous as it is effective). There are some distributions which will automate setting up local printers. A few distributions will set up a guest account with just a click. But these features are often not in the same distribution.
I think automation is what is missing, especially for less technical users. Most users will not manually install updates, even if an icon or desktop notification tells them updates are available. (This is doubly an issue if there are multiple package managers involved, like DNF and Flatpak, on the same system.) Most people are not comfortable setting up printers, configuring the install process of a new operating system, setting up a guest account, or doing various other maintenance tasks.
To see what I mean, sometime borrow a non-techie friend's laptop or smartphone. Look at when it was last updated, when the browser cache was last cleaned, when its old log files were last purged, when a backup was last made - chances are the answer will be that none of these tasks were ever done, unless they were done automatically by the operating system. This is why Windows automatically updates, it's why Android will automatically offer to remove unused apps, it's why iPhones famously sync files to a cloud account, it's why so many people give up when they reach the disk partitioning section of Linux system installers. These tasks need to happen automatically for less technical users or the tasks won't be performed at all.
There are a lot of friendly Linux distributions, and a few (like Mint) come pretty close to automating the install process. But almost no Linux distributions provide automatic updates by default, automatically sync files to a cloud backup, automate disk clean-up, or a dozen other little tasks about which regular computer users never think.
These are things Linux distributions usually don't do because most Linux distributions are made by tech-savvy developers for tech-savvy people. Technologically literate people usually don't want their systems automatically doing important, disruptive tasks for them. But this is going to be a requirement for larger adoption by less technically literate people.
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Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.
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| Released Last Week |
CRUX 3.8
The CRUX distribution is a lightweight operating system with software added through a collection of application ports. CRUX 3.8 is the first release in about three years and features upgrades across the system. "CRUX 3.8 comes with a multilib toolchain which includes glibc 2.40, GCC 14.2.0 and Binutils 2.43.1. Kernel: Linux 6.12.23 (LTS). CRUX 3.8 ships with X.Org 7.7 and X.Org Server 21.1.16. CRUX 3.8 includes Wayland 1.23.1. Ports continue to default to X.Org, but Wayland can easily be installed along and run in either pure Wayland or Xwayland mode. If you decide to run a Wayland session, you will need to enable the 'contrib' collection and rebuild a few ports (for example xorg/mesa) to make it fully available. The ISO image is processed with isohybrid and is suitable for burning on a DVD or putting on a USB drive. UEFI support is available during installation with dosfstools, efibootmgr and grub2-efi/syslinux available during installation. Because all bootloaders are in our opt collection now, no bootloader is installed as a core port by default. To give the possibility to select a bootloader, we have added a new menu to setup. Important notes: glibc depends on libxcrypt now, we have added libxcrypt to our core repository; latest shadow depends on libbsd or libmd, we have added both to core...." Additional information is provided in the release notes.
Commodore OS Vision 3.0
Commodore OS Vision is a 64-bit Linux distribution which maintains a retro C64 style and ships with many games pre-installed. The project's latest release, version 3.0, includes over 200 games. "Commodore OS Vision 3.0 is the largest, games oriented, Linux distribution ever produced, featuring 200+ free linux compatible games as well as an assortment of classic Commodore games and demos that will undoubtedly scratch your nostalgic itch. Commodore OS now has its own BASIC. Commodore OS BASIC V1 is a modern BASIC implementation featuring 3D graphics, built-in sprites, built-in tilemaps, 2D and 3D physics and user types. Future development will be geared towards compiling software for the original C64 and Amiga hardware. With Commodore emulation all set up, a plentitude of pixel based graphics editors (including C64 sprite and charset editors), as well as Amiga MOD and C64 SID trackers, why not build you dream retro game on Commodore OS?" Additional information can be found on the project's release announcement page.
OpenMandriva Lx 6.0
Bernhard Rosenkränzer has announced the release of OpenMandriva Lx 6.0, a major update of the project's independently-developed distribution that started as a fork of Mandriva Linux back in 2013. "The independent, community-controlled distribution, OpenMandriva Lx 6.0, a fixed-point release (as opposed to the rolling-release branch), is out right now. Main features: KDE Plasma 6 desktop by default (X11 and Wayland available); community spins featuring the latest desktop environments LXQt 2.2.0, GNOME 48.1, Xfce 4.20.1 and COSMIC 1.0 alpha; this also features the first official stable release of the OpenMandriva Server edition; if you run OMLx 6.0 inside VirtualBox, we strongly recommend using the X11 variant, since there are some known problems with Wayland on VirtualBox-emulated GPU; VirtualBox users may need to set VMSVGA controller to boot successfully; it works fine on most hardware and in QEMU with KVM...." See the release announcement and the release notes for further information.
OpenMandriva Lx 6.0 -- Running the Plasma desktop
(full image size: 1.0MB, resolution: 2560x1600 pixels)
Archcraft 2025.04.24
Aditya Shakya has announced the release of Archcraft 2025.04.24, a lightweight, Arch-based Linux distribution with a choice of two window managers and a selection of lightweight applications. The available window managers are Openbox (a stacking window manager) and bspwm (a tiling window manager which supports tiling, stacking and tabbing layouts). The new version of Archcraft comes with the latest Linux kernel, version 6.14.3, bspwm 0.9.10, NVIDIA 570.144, Firefox 137.0.2, updated packages from Arch Linux and AUR repositories, and some bug fixes: "The April 2025 ISO image of Archcraft is now available to download. Changelog: updated ISO image profile to archiso 83-1; latest base with new packages; update all Archcraft and AUR packages; updated Openbox and bspwm configurations; fixed issues with rofi menu layouts; fixed Polybar crashes; small improvements and bugs fixed." Read the brief release announcement for all the details.
OpenBSD 7.7
The OpenBSD team have released OpenBSD 7.7. The project, which places a high priority on secure code and correct documentation, has improved performance in out of memory situations, improved hybernate support, and interoduced new userland features: "Various new userland features: Numerous changes to make the imsg API stricter and better, which were followed by adapting all applications across the tree. Allow the user to provide an alternative perfpolicy when on battery, extending the semantics of hw.perfpolicy to provide two buttons to specify desired behavior. This gives users more flexibility in setting the performance when AC-powered vs. battery powered. Made calendar(1) use the environment variable RECIPIENT_EMAIL for sending mails to. Made security(8) use GMT rather than the local timezone when checking for changes in device nodes and setuid files. Avoids false positives when changing timezones. Added a new variable PASSWDSKIP that can be set in /etc/daily.local to prevent security(8) from complaining about specific accounts that have no password. This is typically used for services like anoncvs and gotd. Added [-f file] to sysctl(8) to apply sysctl.conf(5) in one go, and started using it in rc(8) instead of a parser implemented in ksh. Added support for read/write of xmm/ymm registers to lldb(1)." A complete list of chances can be found in the project's release announcement.
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Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases
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| Torrent Corner |
Weekly Torrents
The table below provides a list of torrents DistroWatch is currently seeding. If you do not have a bittorrent client capable of handling the linked files, we suggest installing either the Transmission or KTorrent bittorrent clients.
Archives of our previously seeded torrents may be found in our Torrent Archive. We also maintain a Torrents RSS feed for people who wish to have open source torrents delivered to them. To share your own open source torrents of Linux and BSD projects, please visit our Upload Torrents page.
Torrent Corner statistics:
- Total torrents seeded: 3,203
- Total data uploaded: 47.1TB
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| Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
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Summary of expected upcoming releases
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| Opinion Poll (by Jesse Smith) |
Do you think the Linux ecosystem is missing something?
In this week's Questions and Answers section we talked about Linux adoption and what, if anything, is missing from the Linux community to encourage further adoption of desktop Linux. Do you think Linux is missing anything? Do you think our answer was correct? Do you have a better solution for attracting new users? Let us know what you think Linux needs in the comments.
You can see the results of our previous poll on text editors for the console in containers in our previous edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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| Website News |
Donations and Sponsors
Each month we receive support and kindness from our readers in the form of donations. These donations help us keep the web server running, pay contributors, and keep infrastructure like our torrent seed box running. We'd like to thank our generous readers and acknowledge how much their contributions mean to us.
This month we're grateful for the $113 in contributions from the following kind souls:
| Donor |
Amount |
|---|
| J S | $50 |
| Jonathon B | $10 |
| Sam C | $10 |
| Joshua B | $7 |
| Brian59 | $5 |
| Chris S | $5 |
| Chung T | $5 |
| John B | $5 |
| TaiKedz | $5 |
| J.D. L | $2 |
| PB C | $2 |
| aRubes | $1 |
| Colton D | $1 |
| Stephen M | $1 |
| Kai D | $1 |
| Lars N | $1 |
| Shasheen E | $1 |
| William E | $1 |
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New distributions added to waiting list
- Helwan Linux. Helwan Linux is an Arch-based distribution featuring the Cinnamon desktop. Helwan offers localization for Arabic users and includes both system rescue and developer tools.
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DistroWatch database summary
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This concludes this week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly. The next instalment will be published on Monday, 5 May 2025. Past articles and reviews can be found through our Weekly Archive and Article Search pages. To contact the authors please send e-mail to:
- Jesse Smith (feedback, questions and suggestions: distribution reviews/submissions, questions and answers, tips and tricks)
- Ladislav Bodnar (feedback, questions, donations, comments)
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| Reader Comments • Jump to last comment |
1 • A couple of things Linux is missing (by brad on 2025-04-28 01:03:18 GMT from United States)
Although I think Jesse is correct by asserting that "Linux" needs to be pre-installed to encourage adoption, even when it is (Dell computers, for instance), "Linux" is missing "familiar" tools that Microsoft Windows users expect - Office (not Libre/Free/OpenOffice), Outlook, Photoshop, and the Edge browser.
Ah, but you say, "what's wrong with the substitutes"? Learning curve, mostly, as well as incompatibility - the rendering/publishing functions of the "free" Offices are not well-liked in the publishing/graphic worlds (see Dedoimedo for further details); who wants to learn a completely new app like GIMP for those used to Photoshop; even the differences between Thunderbird and Outlook are daunting.
I understand that Edge is available for "Linux", but I tried it last night on my distro (MX Linux), and the screen tearing was horrible.
Each of these thing, if not addressed, will prevent "Linux" from going beyond 2% adoption - better than 1% for sure, but trying to get my wife to switch from Windows 10 to Linux Mint (arguably the "easiest" to learn) was a no-go for her.
2 • Missing...? (by Arve Eriksson on 2025-04-28 01:32:46 GMT from Sweden)
Whether Linux is missing anything is a tricky question... I'd sooner say that there is *too much* to choose between that new people just get confused - what does it mean that one distribution uses RPM and the other DEB package formats? Should I use Nix or older tools? This distribution makes a big hey about using this or that init system, but what even is that?
I argue that the problem is that prospective users can never tell what experience they will get, or how one distro will be different from the next.
I agree that having Linux preinstalled will increase adoption. Maybe making distro-hopping easier could be another thing? (With VirtualBox, maybe distros could provide disk images with a "default", boring, standard installation that the user could just import, instead of setting up the virtual computer and then running the installer? This is a variant of the LiveCD/-DVD idea.)
3 • Mate Automation (by Guido on 2025-04-28 01:39:39 GMT from Philippines)
I've also had repeated problems with the Mate Panel, sometimes even crashing. This isn't unique to Ubuntu. It's best to leave it as it is or perform a reset. On the other hand, Mate is also relatively easy to learn for those switching from Windows. With Mint or MX, some things can be automated. You can have important updates installed automatically. MX Clean can delete junk on a scheduled basis.
4 • things Linux is missing (by sm on 2025-04-28 01:55:33 GMT from United States)
I agree that getting Linux pre-installed on computers being sold would be a game changer. Perhaps giving buyers a choice of Windows and having to pay for the MS Office and other MS products or buying a new PC with Linux and letting the customers know they can get all the Office products that are just as good as the MS products for free. Additionally, make it known that Linux is more secure and less prone to getting hacked. And also really no great need to buy anti-virus software and much less prone to malware and getting hacked when using Linux. If new PC customers were aware that buying a new PC with Linux gets you a safer, faster and more secure OS that the MS OS and is much cheaper to get the needed software most people need, many buyers may opt for Linux being pre-installed than MS. A little bragging about about all super computers running Linux and Linux requires less maintenance could sway some buyers as well. Just my opinion.
5 • Kind of off-topic, but... (by brad on 2025-04-28 01:57:40 GMT from United States)
I recently picked up a "cheap" Mac AirBook, and I can see that people who want to migrate from Windows10 would have a (much) easier time moving to Mac than "Linux" - most of the "familiar" tools are there already, and I found that I wasn't even really locked into a browser like Safari.
As an added "bonus", adopters would be using a system that is UNIX-like in its underpinnings, without needing to know anything about CLI.
I suspect that many more Windows10 refugees will opt for Mac than "Linux".
6 • Missing... (by puce on 2025-04-28 01:58:13 GMT from Canada)
This is wishful thinking but what Linux needs is for Adode to create/code/add their apps for Linux to be able to use. Just this would bring a major shift of people adopting Linux.
7 • linux is missing (by Gary on 2025-04-28 04:02:00 GMT from Canada)
Having migrated from Windows 7 to Debian, what I miss most is the far more comprehensive display of metadata Windows file manager offers by default!
Linux offers maybe 4 columns (including attribute permission). Windows offers many columns which are easily toggled on or off via check boxes.
This makes sorting my music collection easy by showing all the album artists or genre or whatever other terms interest me.
With photos, I can sort and organize my files by exposure or F ratio or location or just so many other choices that linux file managers don't acknowledge even exist.
I never encounter anyone else mentioning this in linux forums or linux news sites!
Certainly I'm not the only linux user to notice this? Anyone?
8 • Missing ? (by A vd Tweel on 2025-04-28 04:43:36 GMT from The Netherlands)
I thought layers in pdf pages were missing, but I found "Master PDF Editor 5" offers this. BTW the Thunar File manager offers 12 columns (13 if you include the name of the file)
9 • KDE to the rescue (by Jasper on 2025-04-28 04:51:31 GMT from Sweden)
@7 KDE's Dolphin offers a huge number of possible columns (just right click on the bar containing the columns). What desktop/file manager are you using?
10 • The missing link (by JOH451 on 2025-04-28 04:51:44 GMT from United Kingdom)
One thing that nobody is mentioning is Chromebooks. Tech-savvy Linux users might not like them but they are all the average man in the street really needs.
11 • Missing features (by Keith S on 2025-04-28 05:23:24 GMT from United States)
Completely agree that having Linux preinstalled on hardware that is readily available is the only way to increase adoption significantly. The only problem I see with improving automation is that doing so tends to reduce the ability to fine tune the system. There is very little that is changeable or customizable on a Windows system compared to a Linux or BSD system; same for Apple products. It is one of the many things that drove me away from Windows.
As for security being inherent to Linux systems, that is a fantasy driven by the fact that 98% of the valuable targets for scammers are running Windows or Mac computers. If Linux had a much larger share of the market, I am certain that many vulnerabilities would surface fairly quickly as more scammers would start to attack them systematically.
Linux servers are not immune either. Many of the big institutions that get hacked are running Linux or BSD servers. 4chan just got taken down because of terrible system maintenance, running FreeBSD 10.1 (EOL in 2019 I think!) and a version of PHP that hadn't been updated in over a decade. This makes Jesse's case for more and better automation very strong.
12 • libre boot (by Always_curious_about_FOSS on 2025-04-28 05:25:28 GMT from Germany)
I am mostly missing an open source substitute for UEFI like Coreboot or Libreboot. The actually UEFI are the must unfree part of the computer and bigest security gap.
13 • i never cleaned my log files (by Always_curious_about_FOSS on 2025-04-28 05:35:39 GMT from Germany)
I am nearly daily updating my computer. I put the settings of firefox, so that the cache is always deleted when firefox is closed.
But I have to admit, that I never cleaned up the log files.
Is that same important like an update ?
14 • Mate (by Devlin7 on 2025-04-28 05:40:53 GMT from New Zealand)
I don't use Mate but I would choose it over Gnome, KDE Plasma, xfce4 and Cinnamon. It feels complete, certainly lighter than other desktop environments, stable etc.
On the subject of missing....
I think distro variety is important but also its downfall. If you have a computer problem with Windows the IT support guy is going to ask you whether you are using Windows 10 or 11.
With Linux it is what distro are you using? What init system are you running? What desktop are you using? What file system are you running? Are you using X or Wayland? Is your authentication Local accounts, ldap, radius?
MS support techs are a dime a dozen, Linux engineers are expensive and specialised.
15 • never this kind of automation again (by always-curious_abou_FOSS on 2025-04-28 06:03:01 GMT from Germany)
There is something horrible that I never want to experience on my computer again: If you want to switch off your computer and then there is this window "don't switch off your computer, wait untils they updates are intstalled." And you are waiting and waiting..
I want to dicide, when to switch off my computer, no one else.
If I am going to switch off my computer, then it has to switch off at once.
16 • Linux is missing ... (by Felix on 2025-04-28 06:04:50 GMT from Germany)
Convenience is what automation really means. And I am not sure if Linux is missing this. Windows users are junkies - at home or at work. They need their quick fix. (I am no better in any way.) Linux users are mostly more mindful. And actually the whole world needs more human mindfulness. And if those "missing" things in Linux contribute to more mindfulness, I am all in for it. It's really the reason I use FreeBSD, because my mindless computer usage got a little less, because gaming or even watching DRM content is inconvenient on FreeBSD. :) Also this sites slogan is "put the fun back into computing". Mindlessness is not fun, it is actually suffering in disguise. Have a nice one!
17 • Hardware drives (by Shafiq on 2025-04-28 06:21:01 GMT from United Kingdom)
I want to buy a new laptop with the best specs. Unfortunately the ones I like don't work well with linux, due to the monolith nature of the linux kernel and how long it takes to attempt to get the drivers merged.
18 • Automation (by Wedge009 on 2025-04-28 06:30:30 GMT from Australia)
I agree automation will probably help with mass adoption, but for me, the automation in Windows is part of what drove me away from it. Any automation needs to be optional, have a way to opt-out of it so that more technically inclined users can maintain the manual control they want.
Forced updates and waiting for a restart that never happens because Windows is so broken... ugh.
19 • Automatic updates are bad sometimes (by Explorer09 on 2025-04-28 06:33:27 GMT from Taiwan)
I DO turn off automatic updates in my Windows computer at work. It is one of the examples that Linux should NOT learn from them. When updates are supposed to improve user experiences and/or security, they may also be harmful by introducing incompatibilities, bugs (regressions), and at the very least break user's workflow. Install updates only afters the user's consent. That's how Linux did it better in this part.
20 • Linux adoption (by A on 2025-04-28 06:42:29 GMT from United Kingdom)
Why do you want Linux to be adopted by people whose interest is so limited that they just stick with whatever OS is pre-installed by the manufacturer? Linux is an active choice, you have to actually choose to install and learn it, which is what makes the community so strong.
I for one wouldn't want to see the community's spaces overwhelmed by whiny "my computer no worky" tech support demands from non-technical users who bought a Linux box from a tatty big box store because it was 10% cheaper. Linux is for those with an active interest in how their computer works, often overlapping with other technical interests such as the maker community, science, ham radio, and so on. It's not a "consumer OS", it's a minority interest, and I'd prefer it to stay that way.
21 • @17 Tuxedo or Sytem 76 (by Always_curious_about_FOSS on 2025-04-28 06:43:55 GMT from Germany)
Have you ever had a look at the Tuxedo or System 76 websites? They offering Laptops with Linux drivers for Hardware.
Maybe there is something suitable for you.
Do you really need the best specs? If not, then buy a used Laptop, install Linux on it and save a lot of money.
22 • What Linux is missing is a friendly user base and less "religion" (by Karsten on 2025-04-28 06:53:20 GMT from Germany)
What Linux is missing is a friendly user base and less "religion"
If I have a question (in a forum) I am looking for *help* and not a *discussion* (close to religion):
If Linux is all about choice, I expect other users to respect mine and help me or quietly ignore my question (which is okay). This sets me and other users off. I hardly never had this experience in Windows forums.
You find these topics *everywhere* in forums:
- But why are you using Ubuntu, XYZ is better?
- You shouldn't use Wayland, X was better.
- systemd is bad for you, why don't you use XYZ?
- Your desktop is bad for you, desktop XYZ is better
- switch to application XYZ to avoid your problem
You might also have had this experience - I bet.
I like Linux as an operation system and not as a religion.
23 • Poll (by LuckyMe! on 2025-04-28 07:18:34 GMT from Spain)
I understand that some people need programs that are only available in Windows or some very special hardware that only works with Windows, but I don't need any of that, so for me the answer to the survey is "Nothing." Linux is just perfect for me. Lucky me!
24 • What is missing (by dr.j on 2025-04-28 07:19:23 GMT from France)
Of course you're right Jesse. Pre-installed Linux systems would spread Linux further. Goggle and Android have shown the way. Chromebooks show it for laptops.
But automation? No way. It's a complete capitulation. More and more, we are living in a world that nobody understands anymore. Computers and smartphones are only a small part of it. Cars, heating systems and much more. And “understanding” is one thing, but shaping and controlling is another. And in order to do that, I have to ask myself what I actually want and how I want it. Or hand all this over to amazon, google, apple, etc. It's not about “fun”, it's about control. Over our lives.
An automated Linux? That's the day I switch to BSD or wherever.
Linux is perfect. It may be that some people are missing something when they start a system out-of-the-box. But so far I haven't found anything that couldn't be solved in some way. And that's exactly what I love about Linux, this problem-solving process. Sure, it's annoying sometimes when an update has messed something up again. But I'll repeat myself: I've been able to solve every problem so far. Almost every problem, because of course there are limits. Not every proprietary software has a real replacement in Linux and that won't change as long as 98% of all computers run Windows. But it can stay that way, because when it changes, Linux changes and becomes Android (or something similar).
25 • see the missing as an advantage (by Always_curious_about_FOSS on 2025-04-28 07:26:43 GMT from Germany)
Windows have everything installed to do everything on every hardware for every purpose by everyone everywhere in the world. in other words: you don't need 80 to 90 percent of that installed on your windows computer.
And so could be security gaps in 80 to 90 percent of the installed software you don't need and you never going to use.
Linux distributions are going an other way: Linux has a modular structure.
There are Linux Distributions trying to be like Windows. But the real avantage is to take the core and only add what is really needed.
26 • The problem is not what's Linux is missing (by Ender on 2025-04-28 07:32:17 GMT from Italy)
The problem is we're being obliged to get any device with a pre-installed OS. I could buy PCs with nothing aboard so far in order to put Linux (and the distro I chose) and I hope I'll be able to in the future, but the more time goes by, the more it's hard to be able to avoid Windows and, above all, it's rather impossible to do the same for smartphones and tablets.
Any HW producer should be imposed by law to provide a device and a list of supported OSes, to let customers choose its own one or, even better, be given the opportunity to install their favourite one. Instead, apps approach is restricting more and more customers' freedom.
27 • Robust vector format for clipboard (by Luca on 2025-04-28 07:41:03 GMT from Italy)
On Linux desktop environments, there is still no robust and universal clipboard format for exchanging complex content, particularly vector graphics. In contrast, Windows applications benefit from native WMF/EMF support, allowing seamless sharing of vector objects through the clipboard. Meanwhile, on Linux, even widely used applications like Inkscape and LibreOffice often struggle to exchange vector graphics through simple copy-paste operations.
A natural next step would be to introduce a Linux-wide standard for object linking and embedding (like OLE in Windows), bridging this important gap.
Lastly, I believe Linux binaries should embed their icon as a resource.
28 • What Linux is missing for mass adoption (by benf on 2025-04-28 08:02:38 GMT from United Kingdom)
is MS Office
29 • What Linux is missing (caveats) (by Danny on 2025-04-28 08:09:20 GMT from United States)
The automation part wouldn't be a desirable trait unless updates were scrupulously tested over a wide range of hardware. Who would want to have an OS that consistently and automatically broke your machine ? Esp at random intervals and you just turned it one with a game of deadly Russian roulette, never know if it would boot without hours of repair work? Hey that sounds like Windows :)
30 • @28 spot on! (by anamezon on 2025-04-28 08:33:28 GMT from Finland)
exactly! a natively-run MS Office on Linux (without tinkering with WINE and suchlike) is the missing piece for wider Linux adoption; nothing else can convince the average customer to buy new hardware with pre-installed Linux
31 • What I did when my workstation died (by eco2geek on 2025-04-28 08:34:39 GMT from United States)
(This is off-topic, but DW is probably a good place to post it. Please don't yell at me, Jesse. :-)
My old workstation recently died. First the video became flaky, and the fan on the video card (in a PCIx16 slot) stopped running. I tried installing another, similar card, but got no video signal from it. So I plugged the monitor into the VGA port on the motherboard. (NVIDIA 7025, ugh, but it worked. Sort of.) Next, the system started having problems reading from the hard drive (a 2TB Mitsubishi SATA drive which has held up remarkably well). When both Windows and GParted started having problems seeing the partitions (of which there are many, since I have several Linux distros installed, plus Win10), it was time to shut it down and pull the hard drive.
I installed Linux Mint next to Win11 on my laptop so I wasn't stuck in Windows all the time. (I would have installed LMDE, except I figured the Ubuntu-based version would have more end user support.) This is the first time I installed Linux to dual-boot on a computer with a UEFI BIOS, and it presented a learning curve.
It turned out that, since I was dual-booting, I had to install GRUB in the same EFI partition that the Windows bootloader lives in, /dev/sda1. And every time I install a new kernel, I have to mount /dev/sda1, become root (because using "sudo" alone won't allow access to the EFI partition), and run grub-mkconfig manually. On the other hand, the BIOS menu gives me an exhaustive list of boot options, including setting "ubuntu" as the primary bootloader, so it runs GRUB at boot time.
The really cool thing is that I put my old hard drive in an external enclosure, set the laptop's UEFI BIOS to run in Legacy mode, and told it to boot from a USB hard drive -- and there was my old, familiar GRUB menu, booting from /dev/sdb. I'm not sure how to go about installing new kernels when I run updates, since I'm pretty sure the installation scripts will want to update GRUB on /dev/sda, not /dev/sdb. But for now it's nice to not only have my data accessible, but also my operating systems.
I will probably go on eBay and find a legacy motherboard to replace the one in my workstation (it's already been replaced once; I'm not sure yet why this one died) so I can put this hard drive back into it. It won't meet the hardware requirements for Win11, but I'm fine running only Linux on it. And it won't cost that much. For the price of a new motherboard/CPU combo that meets Win11's specs, I could probably just buy a new computer.
32 • Linux mass adoption (by A on 2025-04-28 09:14:47 GMT from United Kingdom)
Why does anyone care about "mass adoption" of Linux? If it works for you, then it's all good. I don't care what other people use on their own computers, and I don't see Linux as something that needs to "beat Windows", or that other people need to be converted into using. I use what works for me, others use what works for them, everyone is happy. What's the point of this obsession with Linux adoption other than "number go up brrr"?
33 • @14 • Mate (by Jake on 2025-04-28 10:25:01 GMT from United States)
I use Ubuntu Mate as my daily driver, and wouldn't use any other.
'MS support techs are a dime a dozen, Linux engineers are expensive and specialized'.
Ubuntu Mate has a forum, help is free and there are members that have worked their whole life in IT. I have used many Linux OS's at this is by far the best forum I have used.
'so trying to delete one unnecessary applet often ends up deleting other, necessary applets that are managed through that specific Ayatana manager. The Ayatana managers are even hidden in the startup manager, to prevent easy editing.'
You don't delete the applets. You go to System> Preferences> Personal>Start up applications and uncheck the the applets you don't want on the indicator applet complete or the single applet.
'If nothing else, I've never used Evolution, so why would I want to start now?'
You don't have to, I also don't use Evolution, but it is easy enough to uninstall and Thunderbird (which I use) is still in the repository.
'App Centre 1.0 handles most of the package management (though Synaptic is in the repositories)'
I also don't use the App Center. It works okay for Snap packages by Synaptic will be my go to apt package manager as long as it exists.
I am a total GUI guy and have successfully used Ubuntu Mate since is was started. I
34 • Poll: (by dragonmouth on 2025-04-28 10:35:01 GMT from United States)
Originally I answered that Linux needs to be pre-loaded on PCs available at WalMart/Best Buy and needs Windows-like automation. After reading the responses so far, I changed my answer to "Nothing". Do we want on every Wednesday, after every Update Tuesday, to be reading articles on "How to Fix the Things Broken by the Update"?
If there needs to be a change about/with Linux, it is a change in attitude towards it. The big criticism of Linux is that there is too many distros, too many desktops, too much choice. Those are specious arguments. Do the critics have problems with choice when they go grocery shopping? In fact, they EXPECT a choice. Do the critics have a problem with choice when they go car shopping? No, they WANT a choice. In fact, we DEMAND a choice in almost every area of our lives. All of a sudden, when it comes to choice in Linux, the critics are "dazed and confused"?! To coin a phrase, that is Linux Derangement Syndrome.
35 • What linux is missing (by kc1di on 2025-04-28 10:39:18 GMT from United States)
To me a long time user it's missing nothing but Jessie is right in order to gain market share it would have to be preinstalled on the hardware at the sales point. Not an after thought. Too many choices are what makes linux different from others but is also very confusing to newbies.
36 • Re- Linux Mass Adoption (by Allan Vázquez on 2025-04-28 10:44:59 GMT from Mexico)
@32 Linux is community driven and it seems to me that the developers of a lot of important proyects are aging, that is why adoption is important.
37 • @25: (by dragonmouth on 2025-04-28 10:49:59 GMT from United States)
You have it backwards. Linux is the O/S that comes preloaded with everything needed for a turnkey system. And 99% of the programs are free, as in NO COST.
To do any meaningful work on Windows, the user must install a bunch of programs, none of them cheap. In the Windows Universe most programs are Software as a Service, i.e you can only RENT them, you never get to OWN them.
38 • Mass adoption (by DachshundMan on 2025-04-28 11:02:05 GMT from United Kingdom)
There is a lot of good stuff above but if the year of Linux is to really come then shops selling PC's with preinstalled Linux is a must. It worked for ChromeOS which is not considered in any way controversial or unusual by the man on the Clapham omnibus..
In addition, if I buy a preinstalled Linux PC :-
-I do not want to find that some Linux progam I want to use is not packaged for my distro and so I have to install some other distro or snap or flatpak etc.
-i do want it to be secured properly and for updates to install automatically.
-I want a functional set of basic software to be installed and I do not want it to change to a different default just because I got an OS version upgrade.
-I do not want my PC to become obsolete or insecure because Bill Gates (or whoever) decides it should.
-Wide hardware compatibility and drivers for most/all printers, scanners, etc with easy installation methods. Ideally peripheral HW would come with a sticker saying it works with Linux and drivers are available.
-GUI support for everything that a typical user wants to use. No need to use the Terminal unless you want to.
Of course, this all starts to sound like Windows and it is because whilst some people, including me, like to tinker with the depths of the OS most people want the benefits of what the PC provides.
Look at the example of Japanese Motorbikes, they destroyed the UK bike industry by being reliable, efficient and fun to use with no requirement to do maintenance every weekend. That is how Linux for the masses would have to be.
39 • Reminiscing my switch to Linux (by DeepLurker on 2025-04-28 11:13:18 GMT from Switzerland)
Here is what I remember from my early days of switching to Linux (2017?). I guess these slowed my adoption.
- Difficulty of setting up a dual boot. I know beginners shouldn't do it and advanced users wouldn't do it. But I doubt I would have dipped my toes in the water otherwise.
- Too much choice. Choosing a Distro was manageable and fun in some way (Linux Mint was a good start and I am glad it was recommended). Choosing a DE, on the other hand, felt like a useless chore. I was lucky my laptop was weak so I defaulted to the lightweight XFCE spin.
- Not having my familiar shortcuts. I wish there was a way to automatically reassign them to windows' convention (winKey+Pgup to maximize instead of Alt+F10 for resizing etc). I am glad KDE has the same shortcuts.
- Not having my familiar softwares. (I was pleasantly surprised that many of Mint XFCE default software were very satisfactory, unlike in MS Windows.)
- Linux Mint didn't run "apt autoremove" automatically. So I was once stuck at the TTY because the system partition was full with older unneeded kernels. Solved the problem the same day but smart automation could have avoided the trouble.
- Last but not least, I wanted to switched but in the end I did it because I felt I had to. Windows was becoming unusable and buying a newer computer wasn't an option then.
@28 and @33
Agreed. I saw someone not long ago saying switching to Linux was out because the software he needed for work wasn't there.
40 • Could sane defaults be acceptable (by DeepLurker on 2025-04-28 11:32:45 GMT from Switzerland)
@34 I understand and agree to your points but I have already adopted Linux. These bugs for the familiar user can become features for a newbie interested in a new OS. Automatic updates could be a default setting to be toggled off once one is comfortable enough.
I am glad there are choices of DE as I don't have affinity with Gnome, a frequent default DE. But even today, I am not interested in studying the pros and cons of Cinnamon, Mate, Openbox, Fluxbox etc. I like what Artix has done. They currently have a two ISOs (KDE and GTK) recommended "for users that want a fully preconfigured desktop that Just Works™ and/or are too busy to set it up themselves".
So to sum up. Keep the choices and freedom but let newcomers have a sane default to rely on until they are familiar enough.
41 • Linux adoption and missing features (by Josh Smith on 2025-04-28 11:37:59 GMT from Australia)
I agree with Jesse on automation, but I do believe there are other reasons why Linux may one day become more widely adopted. That is if Windows really botches things on the desktop. One reason people switch to Linux is concerns over privacy and security. This is usually only a concern for tech-savvy people, though. If Windows manages to majorly alienate another significant segment of their user base, Linux adoption will likely soar.
I also believe that a universal installer for all Linux distros that can default to installing a beginner-friendly distro like Linux Mint for users too impatient to answer some questions but will otherwise try to determine the most appropriate distribution for a user by asking them some questions could improve adoption. I doubt it would improve adoption that massively by itself, but one major concern people experience when they look into Linux is which distro should they use? If there was an installer that could determine this with a decent degree of accuracy, it would probably make diving into Linux easier for new users. Especially if it also provided links to documentation in plain English.
42 • Automation (by Hank on 2025-04-28 11:54:33 GMT from Germany)
I have automated weekly disk checks, very easy to do.
My modern printer setup was automatic.
For wifi, I had to select a network and key in my password.
I have often automated workplace start and mail fetching, easy jobs including starting and placing daily use applications on different workspaces at a given size and position. 6
workspaces to chose from but more could be set with one line in config.
I do not want automated install, updates of OS or applications all of which can produce the microsoft effect and quickly kill my fully working setup. I keep home and root separate, always.
I select my desktop from a choice, Herbstlüft, a Tiling WM, Fluxbox, JWM or ICEWM.
After selection that becomes standard unless I change the setting.
Note: I use ICEWM because I want performance not flashy effects. My OS is Debian based sysd madness free antiX running on a fairly modern I5 system. It is lightning fast and totally reliable, power consumption way down compared to lumbering gnome or flashy KDE effect toy environments..
Power is a factor as solar energy is not always available from my be as independant as possible supply system.
43 • Re- Linux Adoption (by Allan Vázquez on 2025-04-28 10:38:33 GMT from Mexico)
@20 Linux as an active choice is very subjective. There are a lot of communities inside the Linux community, everyone with different levels of ‘active choice’. It isn't the same to use Arch or Mint. Slackware or Linux From Scratch. Build your own kernel, computer, electronics, power source, etc.
My point is that what matters to me now is to have a choice, and to choose what works for me. Whatever is too ‘active’ or ‘pasive’ to others. Automation and preshipping Linux could be another choice, the more the merrier.
44 • Adoption (by Jesse on 2025-04-28 12:30:55 GMT from Canada)
@32: "Why does anyone care about "mass adoption" of Linux? If it works for you, then it's all good."
Because things only work if there is adoption of a significant number of people. You might be new to the Linux community, but if you were around in the 90s and early 00s (when Linux users were measured in the thousands, not millions) it was a very different landscape. Software modems didn't work, printers often didn't work, gaming on Linux was almost non-existent, many websites didn't work properly with Linux-friendly browsers.
These days people tend to take for granted that their printer will work, that many Steam games will work, that the web-based office suite will work, that most web browsers will work. That is only because enough people started using Linux (largely thanks to Canonical's marketing push) that companies started to take Linux seriously. Without critical mass, almost nothing works.
@24: "But automation? No way. It's a complete capitulation. "
Really? Do you build all of your own software packages manually? Do you rotate all of your log files manually? Do you check each piece of software for updates by reading the upstream changelog?
Virtually everything your computer does is a form of automation. That's pretty much why computers exist, to automate tasks. What you are speaking out against isn't automating, it's more automation than what you were accustomed to when you started using computers. To you, what a computer was already doing wasn't "automation" it was just how a computer worked.
But, over time, computers get more complex, operating systems get bigger. It's not practical to keep the older, limited forms of automation. Operating systems need to evolve with the times.
Drivers don't hand crank their cars to start them anymore, it also doesn't make sense to manually check three package managers for updates on a modern OS.
45 • Linux doesn't miss much, computer users do (by Jeffrey on 2025-04-28 12:46:49 GMT from Czechia)
@1 Forgive me for saying you're view is pretty faulty. Edge is absolutely not needed, probably anywhere, and definitely not on Linux. We've got Chrome and Chromium (and then some other variants/clones of it) -- there's objectively no need for it. What users need is a decent web browser, and they _must_ learn the difference between a program category (e.g. browser, text editor, word processor) and a particular program (e.g. Firefox, Chrome, Edge; xed, gedit; MS Word, LO Writer). Helping beginners and less technical users is good; fostering ignorance and faulty thinking is actively harmful.
As for Photoshop: I'd bet actual money that around 90% of the time at least 70% of PS users only need a handful of functions that can be found in e.g. GIMP as well. (Hello, Mr Pareto.) And yes, there are other pieces of free software image generation and editing. Again, users mistakenly learning they need a particular piece of software (a proprietary one at that) and refusing to learn at least one other way of doing things is harmful. A few months ago a wannabe influencer and "social media manager" complained that their favoured video editing software (probably TikTok's built-in one) got closed down (or made payed-only or something), so they need something else to edit their videos (which are often shorter than a minute...). If learn to use any one of the many free software alternatives, you likely won't have this problem, and even if you do, you already have experience learning something new.
Outlook vs. Thunderbird? Again, you need to learn general skills, you need to see the general functions (e.g. emailing) as opposed to any particular product or service. If someone cannot do emailing without Outlook, they are doing something wrong.
So no need for the smear campaign, thank you.
46 • @37 (by Always_curious_about_FOSS on 2025-04-28 12:53:32 GMT from Germany)
Well, the last Windows I used was XP about 12 Years ago. Seems to be change3d a lot in windows then.
47 • What is Linux Missing? (by The Linux Revolution on 2025-04-28 13:52:00 GMT from United States)
Corporate and educational adoption. Having OEM versions of devices/PCs on shelves is simply not enough. People will still CHOOSE Windows or Macs because that is what their corporate jobs say to use. Teachers will use Windows/Mac because that is the platforms they use to teach students. Lets say an organization orders 50 Linux Dell laptops for their employees. Who do you call for networking support? How do you push default workplace or education apps on to the students/employees desktops/laptops/devices? It seems to me there are way more complexities for greater adoption.
48 • Re- What is Linux Missing? (by Allan Vázquez on 2025-04-28 14:14:54 GMT from Mexico)
@47 I think that Raspberry Pi is doing great work in that direction.
49 • What Linux is missing (by Name on 2025-04-28 14:15:14 GMT from United States)
1. Real security
2. Microsoft Office support
3. Adobe support
4. Support for most video games
5. Corporate and educational adoption
6. Lack of support in general
7. Freedom from Red Hat
8. Not having too many distributions to choose from
9. A consistent desktop (and people thought Windows 10 was inconsistent)
10. Wayland support across all desktop environments and window managers
11. Preinstalled Linux computers from mainstream manufacturers
12. Troubleshooters, help, and support when things break (reading barely eligible 'man' pages in your terminal and being told to rtfm)
13. Overall lack of user-friendliness (even the "beginner" distributions like Mint and Ubuntu are way harder to get working than Windows and when things break, you're done for)
Linux will never be mainstream. It's a wonder it even got to 4% market share because that's as high as it'll ever go.
50 • What Linux does not need... (by Bobbie Sellers on 2025-04-28 14:24:59 GMT from United States)
Unannounced kernel updates such as Windows has which in Dual-Boot systems
screws up the Linux boot. That is the cost of automation.
bliss- Dell Precision 7730- PCLOS 2025.04- Linux 6.6.73- Plasma 5.27.11
51 • What's missing in Linux (by Jack Slayter on 2025-04-28 14:29:51 GMT from France)
I've been doing distro hopping for more than a month now. I can't believe how many people think it's worthwhile to re-invent the wheel again and again and again. Why so many text editors? Why so many file managers? Why so many file viewers? From 10 distros only 2 recognise my NAS out of the box. It's very strange that these 2 do so with CIFS which is Windows stuff. NFS is native Unix/Linux, right? How come no distro can handle this without digging deep into the Linux guts? This is very disappointing, especially since doing NFS sharing in my NAS is very simple.
I've been trying hard to install NFS without success so far and I can't understand why in 2025 it's still so complicated. Editing fstab is supposed to be easy but I've tried 250 times entering the mount point including the pwd to no avail! They say Linux "is about choice". But since getting familiar with a vast "choice" I can't help but feel that I'm wasting a lot of my time.
Is it useful to publish a distro if only 10 people use it? Why don't the programmers agree to contribute only to the 15-20 distros which are the most used? Should a normal user care about systemd or no systemd? Just as an example, why did it take 25 years to replace X11 with Wayland? I really don't get it.
At the end there is my biggest disappointment : USB drivers for Linux don't exist. I won't be able to listen to my vast music collection on my NAS because Linux can't connect to my digital amplifier. What this means is that I can't get rid of Windows. And that I will do again Windows upgrades which break my printer.
52 • My (less than) 2 cents (by ForTheTux on 2025-04-28 14:25:28 GMT from France)
Well, I don't have anything new to say about the hypothetical "Mainstream Linux" but from what I've seen for 18+ years of using Linux (and, of course, talking a little about it with others) is that:
* Most people use a "computer" to browse "internet", they mostly don't know which OS and browser they use.
* They may even don't know what is an OS, a SSD or a graphic card, or why they would need to install a browser because it should already be installed (since computer are used for that).
* They always prefer what they are familiar with (which is true with everything, from a car to a coffee machine) even if they don't know a single percent about it.
* They don't want to change anything but if they have to, they'll be slowly and quietly adapt.
* They always use default settings (mostly because they feel lost in dozen of sub-settings pages) and expect the computer to know what they want.
* They accept there is an alternative to what they use, but not hundreds of them.
* They won't have even few hours to spare to learn something new if they don't have to.
* They think that IT professional fix computers, as bakers make bread, mechanics repair cars and doctors heal people, they don't how they do it and so pay good money to let them doing their job (but will retaliate if they fail).
* And, they mostly use their phone.
As for Linux on desktop, would it much better piece of software if many billions people use them daily? Is Linux really better thanks to Android? I won't say the Linux experience has changed so much theses last years just from that.
53 • What linux is missing (by vw72 on 2025-04-28 14:57:25 GMT from United States)
What linux is missing is hard to answer without clarification. Are we talking about business/enterprise users or home users? The answers make a difference.
For business users, programs like Microsoft Office and Photoshop come to mind. Yes, there is Office 365 and also Google Office. But many of those are lacking features. There are ways to run Office and Photoshop under Linux using virtual machines but that's kind of a kludge and you still need a windows license. Also, while there is LibreOffice and others that can handle most tasks of Microsoft's Office, change is hard. (I worked with a several public schools that changed to Linux a number of years ago and while they were still on Windows, we switched them to LibreOffice first, so that by the time we moved them to Linux, they were already familiar with it.) That said, there still is no real substitute for Photoshop.
For home users, the barrier isn't what is missing as many, many already use Office 365 or Google Office. What they need are end user tools to make system maintenance easy. openSUSE's Yast2, while long in the tooth makes it easier for people coming from Windows or OS X to maintain their machine. What hurts the home users is gaming. Yes, there is Steam but getting somebody new to Linux and then having to install it, etc., can be a put off for non-tech people.
Ultimately though, what linux is missing is nothing technical, it's perception. There is no linux, there are numerous linux distributions and they all compete with each other and make things seem more fragmented and complex. On top of that there are distro zealots that make disparaging comments about any other distro than their distro of choice. This hurts all distros.
The good news is that the days of applications not being available for one's distro of choice has been pretty much taken care of with flatpaks. (I don't include snaps as they are only really used by the *buntus so, they are just one more repository). On my test rig, I install flatpaks into my home directory, which is on a separate partition. I can load a complete different distro for testing and the flatpaks just work. Can they still be improved? Yes, but that is a different topic all together.
A perfect distribution, in my opinion, would be one with a long term release option like Ubuntu or openSUSE Leap, graphical management tools like openSUSE, and a more non-tech user installer that can walk the first time user through the process with plain language prompts and sane configuration options, things like do you want to install an office suite or do you want to install the ability to play games made for Windows, etc. Unfortunately, that doesn't exist.
Just my thoughts.
54 • whats really missing (by Larry Miller on 2025-04-28 15:23:43 GMT from United States)
1- commercial software like burning to dvd cd & Blueray
2- Printing software
3- software to burn mp3 cds
55 • whats missing (by GangSan on 2025-04-28 15:41:26 GMT from Slovenia)
The thing that is really missing is a good documentation and translations in some languages.
56 • What's really missing (by Mike W on 2025-04-28 15:48:17 GMT from United States)
If the Linux community wants Linux to be a viable option to consumers following the sunset of Win 10 support, it need to do one thing: have a laser focus on what the desktop end-user wants and needs. Figure out what they want now, and in the near future, and then develop a plan to deliver that.
This is not a criticism of the Linux community. It is, IMHO, the type of stretch goal that the Linux community would have a real challenge with. It would require a united effort, singular focus, willingness to compromise in some ways that don't impact the customer experience, but might require folks to shelve their strong opinions in favor of focusing on the end goal.
There are a ton of folks in the Linux community with great ideas that they're quite passionate about. But in a world where real schisms are created within the community over things that the end user by and large doesn't care about (the systemd debate comes to mind) its hard to envision a community wide collaborative effort driven almost exclusively by customer focus and feedback.
57 • What is missing? (by Robert on 2025-04-28 16:07:57 GMT from United States)
I think you hit the nail on the head for the vast majority of people.
I think it has been generally known that to significantly increase market share, Linux absolutely has to be preinstalled on off-the-shelf computers.
I hadn't really thought about the automation aspect, but I think you are absolutely right on this one as well. Automatic updates are a big one, probably the automatic syncing to linked cloud accounts, perhaps automatically opening up your phone when you plug it in via USB - and actually having it stay connected instead of disconnecting after 3 seconds (is this a Linux problem or an Android problem? I actually don't know.)
People can and often do bring up many other things that are missing - MS Office, Adobe, CAD. But most of these are relatively niche and/or professional software and having them would not swing many people.
58 • Butning tool (by Any on 2025-04-28 16:08:09 GMT from Spain)
@54 Did you try K3b?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K3b
59 • Support (by Flavianoep on 2025-04-28 16:10:47 GMT from Brazil)
What Linux is missing is not part of the system itself, but something that has nothing to do with software. The hardest thing to find to any Linux user is an IT technician who will not suggest installing Windows when you tell them you have a problem with your Linux machine. Gods! some will suggest Windows even if your problem is a hardware problem.
60 • Linux adoption (by Hank on 2025-04-28 15:55:24 GMT from Germany)
Teachers will use Windows/Mac because that is the platforms they use to teach students.
No that is not in many cases really true, They push windoze and apple because they get incentives. As a parents representative I found my daughters school was scheduled to change to rotten apple. Many of the kids were at the time using linux with my help and support. All teachers were promised a Mac Pro desktop, a pro Laptop a tablet and a phone. They really wanted those, parents would have been forced to purchase apple tablets. 700 Plus kids at the time..
The school concerned is south of Hannover Germany. I know the same happened in many other schools in the area. Business as usual...
MS Office was never asked for, kids eagerly learned to use Gimp and the old free Master PDF Editor and were busy converting friends and famiies.
When my daughter moved to University she was forced to pay for office 365. The people behind the move received huge incentives from MS reps.
There is with very little exception no commercial lobbying and incentivising for a change to Linux.
Laptops with Linux, Lenovo is another very good choice.
61 • @12 libre boot (by picamanic on 2025-04-28 16:53:32 GMT from United Kingdom)
@12 libre boot: these days I will only buy Coreboot [or Libreboot] computers with Linux pre-installed [starlabs.com, minifree.org amongst many examples]. I never like the flavour of Linux distro that is actually installed, but easily fixed.
62 • @45 (by Brad on 2025-04-28 16:54:17 GMT from United States)
My apologies - a smear campaign was not my intent - I merely wanted to point out some of the difficulties involved in getting "regular" folks to move away from Windows. Those of us who are tech-savvy enough to realize that Linux is *miles* ahead of anything cranked out by Redmond (and their co-conspirators) are still in the vast minority of folks (in my country, anyway).
If anything, I realize that weaning people away from Windows in the good ol' USA is *much* harder than it is in Europe or Asia.
My point was that few of us folks using DW, Linux, BSD, etc. don't seem to have much insight into the non-technical mindset - the only reason I feel like I understand *some* of that mindset is because I interact with those people on a semi-regular basis, at work, at home, and in social situations.
I would certainly *love* for folks to move beyond Windows, if only because I could see myself as an advisor to help them (and make a few bucks along the way in my retirement).
63 • Linux adoption - Marketing and Education (by John on 2025-04-28 16:34:40 GMT from Canada)
I agree some distros could do a better job at making their distros smoother to use, but overall I don't think this is what blocks Linux adoption - Out of the box, Windows is far from complete or stable. You need to add printers and programs and updates and (more updates) and user accounts and wade through endless ads etc.... Windows isn't better, or the "people's choice", it's just what they are used to.
I work with a lot of technically minded people but even they have the misconception that Linux is just for hackers, is all command line and difficult to use.
For Linux to become a bigger player in the desktop space, some serious marketing campaigns need to be built and properly educate the public. Valve is doing great with its push of Steam Decks and then releasing SteamOS to other manufacturers and even for installation on regular PCs. Properly managed, that could replace Xbox & Playstation consoles. People just need to be made aware of all of the great options that exist and shown that it's not hard at all to switch!
64 • What's missing from Linux? (by Corenti on 2025-04-28 17:58:26 GMT from France)
What is missing is a reliable kernel.
65 • Linux Proliferation (by Slappy McGee on 2025-04-28 18:57:35 GMT from United States)
If we feel that we need to promote Linux as an operating system, we need to first ask "why?"
Usually the desire to promote a product and get more usage is driven by the desire to make money and then more money: sales driven revenue.
A few distros out there have that model, but not the majority as far as I can see.
Microsoft has an OS that is driven by computer sales, not so much by OS sales. So does Apple. There are Windows computers and there are Apple computers, each with their installed operating system and that's that.
Yes we can cover their inherent OS with Linux or BSD or BeOS. But there goes the warranty; many are fine with that but as Jesse points out most are not even aware that they can do that and not even aware that the OS is something other than the machine itself. I find that sad.
Tiny companies out there are coming along with Linux as the default OS. Some run ads here at DW. Anyone here bought one? Tell us about it.. promote it? Heck I don't know.. I have machines with all major operating systems out there and I find them all to be just fine. I honestly see no superiority from one to the other. So if Linux has something missing it might be that Linux enthusiasts can't accept that their fave OS is a tiny portion of the OS market and... that's that.
66 • Linux? Missing? (by buckyogi on 2025-04-28 20:10:05 GMT from United States)
I am a retired hobbyist who doesn't game and loves working in a CLI (zsh) so Linux is perfect for me. The last two laptops I purchased had the option of shipping Linux preinstalled, but I chose the bare metal option. Between VMs and distrohopping I am experienced, comfortable, and confident installing Linux, in fact I even enjoy it. Every morning I update dnf, flatpak, gem, npm, cargo, and rustup from the command line, I like being active in the update process. I love the plethora of options and the ease of configuration, the time I spend tinkering with config files always brings me joy. I do a little coding in C, Lua, and Erlang; I'll never be more than a hobbyist programmer, but I derive great pleasure from it, and Linux supports it so well. I maintain some simple Web sites entirely from the command line with a text editor and Neocities' CLI. I create custom images and gifs for some friends who livestream, FFmpeg, ImageMagick, and GIMP meet my requirements perfectly. Most !
of the rest of my time logged in is spent in a Web browser. Personally, I don't care if the year of the Linux desktop never arrives, in fact if it gets too popular I worry that aspects of it may be taken over by for-profit corporations (although my experience with Fedora has been overwhelmingly positive). PS: I missed last week's opinion poll: If I may, my text editor is Neovim, and my seldom-used GUI text editor is Pulsar.
67 • What is Linux Missing? (by RetiredIT on 2025-04-28 20:33:07 GMT from United States)
The most serious thing: Quality Control. The story of the Linux desktop over the past 10 years is "lack of quality control". With a few exceptions, virtually every distro has become buggy. It is no wonder that Linux on the desktop has not made great strides in user acceptance and adoption.
68 • What is Linux Missing? (by Mark_UK on 2025-04-28 21:22:38 GMT from United Kingdom)
Across Linux distros there's a great deal of settings tinkering apps where a unified settings panel doesn't exist. At times it feels like another handfull of these instead of unifying anything is the prefered way to go.
Someone else mentioned the level of compatibility between MSOffice and the various Linux alternatives available. To say these are compatible is a bit of a liberty. For all but the most basic use, everything else needs considerable work. For instance, while the Word file types are accommodated by the alternatives, the layouts in documents are invariably wrecked. I realize this isn't an issue for home enthusiasts but for any kind of productivity within a work environment where one hopes to open existing documents without turning them into some kind of abstract artform, it's frustrating and time consuming.
69 • How a user successfully moves from Windows to linux (by Clarence Perry on 2025-04-28 21:33:15 GMT from United States)
My wife retired from accounting 5 years ago. Since she retired, she only uses email and a browser.
I put her on Linux mint with Thunderbird and Firefox. Both of them open when she logs in.
She no longer has to contend with weekend IT changes of the system. Her computer is the same every time she logs in.
She doesn't miss the work software she used, she hated spreadsheets. I gave her a simple easy to use word processor which serves her needs for letters to friends without the complication of WORD.
She really doesn't miss Excel. I have offered to set her up with a Linux spreadsheet and she has absolutely no desire for it.
She was a kind of different person who slipped into using Linux daily with no problems. I think there are probably many retirees that don't require a set of work software and are a good fit for Linux.
Number of Comments: 69
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