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from the it's-already-perfect-is-not-the-right-answer dept.
We all know about Microsoft's latest OS, so I won't rehash. A lot of us intensely dislike it, to put it politely. Those of us who can, use other operating systems. This is Soylent, so let's focus on the one that is the most important to us: Linux.
I have been using Windows as my OS since right after Atari times. A few years ago I bought an ARM (ARMHF/ARMv7) netbook and put Lubuntu on it. I had problems with my first Linux experience, mainly in the area of installing software: missing packages in Synaptic, small dependency hells, installing a package at a time by hand, some broken stuff. I put it down mainly to the architecture I have been using, which can't be supported as well as x86-64.
Now, we all know that no software is perfect, and neither is Linux, even though it is now my main OS. We support it in spirit and financially, but there is always room for improvement.
So, the question is: What are your problems with Linux and how can we fix them? How do we better it? Maybe it's filesystems, maybe it's the famous/infamous systemd. Let's have at it.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by higuita on Wednesday February 22 2017, @02:34PM
>I had problems with my first Linux experience, mainly in the area of installing software: missing packages in Synaptic, small dependency hells, installing a package at a time by hand, some broken stuf
So the old: missing software-> search the web-> download something-> try to install-> result
This is usually very wrong way of thinking in linux and usually the result is "fail"
This is a problem with almost all users coming from windows, they are used to fetch software from the net and install it. On linux, due to all distros, versions and archs this do not work and requires a change of mind.
People should stick to their distro repos and if really need something, use external repos for the distro and version. Trying to install debian .deb in ubuntu will generate a dependency hell, using a fedora repo on centos will break the system, installing a .rpm on a deb based disto is plain wrong. All this is possible, but a newbie should never go near this, as he have no knowledge to understand it and will be overwhelmed by it. It is just like trying to install windows 95 software or drivers on windows 10... it may be possible, but hard and requires knowledge
Linux gives you power, but you have to learn how to use it. What distros could do is after searching for some software on their package manager and fail, warn the user to not randomly install software from the internet and redirect the users to forums to ask for the software or special repos (like the ubuntu ppa)
ubuntu may have several problems, but this is one of the reasons it is recommended to newbies, the ppa repos teach the user to use then instead of installing random packaged. ubuntu could do the next step and catch the missing software searches and list the possible PPA (but warn against using then and tell that they are not supported in any way) or alternative softwares (maybe via the alternative.net)
Another problem i see many times, again taken from windows, is running software as root. When new users hit a permission problem, many switch to root and problem solved. Most software needs to be blocked from running as root. Also create a "fix permissions problems", a simple script that will use strace or something similar that is preloaded to the program to catch where the "permissions denied" may exist and show the user where the wrong permissions is and suggest a fix (usually "chown user file")
but all resumes to one thing: users have bad thinking habits, distros should try to catch then and teach the correct way
Finally, most distros have problems with file association when users start to install software. Some distros and/or desktop environment do it better than others, but usually all in different ways. freedesktop.org and the major Desktop environments need to give users one way, the SAME way to check and change this.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Thursday February 23 2017, @03:25PM
What *is* file association?
(Score: 1) by higuita on Saturday February 25 2017, @02:01AM
file type ABC is always open by program XYZ
when everything is fine, great, but if for some reason it is trying to open the wrong program, users have usually some difficulty to fix it
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 23 2017, @03:51PM
Sigh.. If I had a nickle for every time I found some tool, game or other program I wanted to use and found out it was not in the distro repo so it had to be manually installed... then I would have a lot of nickles.
Adding alternative repo sources to the list is often pretty much mandatory if you still want to get some of the more popular-but-not-in-repo software and the developers just happen to run one of those repos for your distro. Doing this is in theory much safer than downloading random installer executables, but of course still a security risk. So the setting is buried in some hard to find configuration file which needs hand editing, which is a great user experience! /s
Also being in a repo should, but does not actually indicate anything about quality. There are a lot of broken packages in there which can and will irreversibly mess up your system upon install.
My point is, the usefulness of a repository is directly related to its contents and in its reliability. If half the software I need is not in the repo, and the other half can still break my audio or X or whatever, then there is not much point to a repo. With a package management situation like that, even the 'download random installer' alternative is better. Because that alternative allows getting things done.
These issues are symptoms of the real problem with Linux. Too much fragmentation. Yes choice is good. Too much choice is detrimental. Debian and Ubuntu, and Mint and Redhat and Suse, and Arch and all others simply need to get their shit together once and for all and designate one package management system as The One, and focus all their efforts on it. Then with a few more changes, maybe we can also start seeing some more commercial software on linux because developers will no longer need to compile/package/test for a dozen different systems all with their own quirks.
Of course, I'm dreaming. None of that will ever happen.