Why Linux>Mac>Windows

[alexa9]

I switched ten years ago from Windows to Mac and just recently switched to Linux. Windows is a nightmare and Apple abandoned their desktops. Luckily for me I discovered Linux Mint and it’s even easier to use than Mac OS which is overrated now to me. Steve Jobs was a great salesman and iTunes and the iPod hooked me. I don’t like where Apple or Windows is headed with their computers. I am grateful for the ease of use of Linux although I am amazed there aren’t more users. I tell everyone I can about it.

[Pierre]

absolutely - - Tell Everyone About Linux:
- especially about how great the LinuxMint System is . . . .

[silvatech]

I switched ten years ago from Windows to Mac and just recently switched to Linux. Windows is a nightmare and Apple abandoned their desktops. Luckily for me I discovered Linux Mint and it’s even easier to use than Mac OS which is overrated now to me. Steve Jobs was a great salesman and iTunes and the iPod hooked me. I don’t like where Apple or Windows is headed with their computers. I am grateful for the ease of use of Linux although I am amazed there aren’t more users. I tell everyone I can about it.

Totally agree with you. As an IT I service all the above and pretty much have to agree with you.The Boards here are great and full of information and people willing to help and I am to directly if ever have any questions =).

People here are great and their is no stupid question.

PS

Welcome to the true PC OS =).

[Portreve]

This is really one of those strange subjects upon which volumes and volumes of books of history could, should, and maybe one day will be written.

Independent of Pirates of Silicon Valley it was known (though usually glossed over or ignored by some in the same way as people of various political affiliations ignore the sins of their peers) that Apple and Microsoft both independently licensed much of what Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center had built for their PARC system. That said, however, Steve Jobs had the same reaction to PARC that I personally did when, several years later, I saw a Macintosh for the very first time, circa 1985: this is the future of computing. In Mr. Jobs' case, it was visionary because his intent was to turn a company's business strategy into one which expanded, perfected, produced, and promoted that sort of user interface (and other odd bits which lived underneath, like object-oriented programming). In my case, I don't claim any special credit; I just feel I saw the truth for what it would eventually become, and I'm confident I am merely one of hundreds or perhaps thousands who felt that way.

What is alleged in Pirates and backed up by a lawsuit (Apple v. Microsoft) is that Microsoft ripped off Apple's own developments rather than merely executing the license they had from Xerox, and this includes various different code-level comments and easter eggs unique to Mac OS and not present in PARC. In my view, and based on what we've all come to know of Microsoft's code development and software production history, they were superior marketers, but lousy software developers. Generally, their products (MS-DOS, Word, Excel, eventually Windows) have a history of being "good enough" but not actually really good or totally solid products. Certainly, they paid lip service to anything like good user interface guidelines, and anything in their graphical era continued for decades to be poor rip-offs of things Apple did a much better overall job doing.

That said, Apple completely sucked at business, and so just as Microsoft's designs were handicapped by a team not really up to the task of producing something either rock solid or at least with a good design aesthetic, Apple was just as handicapped and compromised by a leadership and general management team which was far more rooted in the 60s/70s counterculture movement than in anything like solid business practices.

The reason I bring this up is it is an odd bird to try and have this discussion comparing the libre software movement (and GNU+Linux in particular) with Apple or Microsoft. It's not invalid, but just odd.

GNU's underpinnings (which is to say, the OS we're running here apart from the kernel) was intended as a non-copyright-violating reimplementation of one of the several UNIXs of the 1960s and 70s. Linux likewise, though by one person instead of many people, was a reimplementation of a kernel Linus Torvalds liked. He had originally planned to write an entire OS, but stopped when he learned about GNU and realized he didn't actually need to bother. (Both are now of course actively worked on by a great many people and not just a few or one.)

I bring that up by way of differentiation. If one looks at some of the original and fairly basic desktop environments for GNU+Linux, it's pretty obvious they were influenced by other GUIs, of course the most readily available and accessible would have been Classic Mac OS, some early iteration of Windows, and to the extent that IBM produced UIs for OS/2 and OS/2 Warp (or other UIs were made for some particular UNIX OS) those as well. But, really, I doubt at the time there were many who had access to PARC machines, which leads me to conclude the primary influences would have been Apple's Mac OS UI and Microsoft's Windows UI.

Advance a few years and we eventually find KDE and Gnome, and lo and behold what do we find? UIs which are very clearly Windows-like and Mac OS-like. KDE did a lot of very unique things so even though to me their desktop environment feels kind of Windows-like, that's only a partial thing because it is pretty different. But, nevertheless, if I was going to describe it as being similar to something, Windows would be how I would describe it. Gnome, on the other hand, feels so very similar to Mac OS that, with its further imbellishments and enhancements, it feels like either a rip-off of, or an homage to — depending on how you want to look at it — Mac OS.

In any event, I think pretty much anyone familiar with the Mac OS or Mac OS X user interface should rightfully feel pretty much at home, especially if they have at least a little bit of Windows 95 -> Windows 7 exposure, with Gnome 2.x, and therefore its MATE and Cinnamon derivatives. They'd also not be lost if faced with XFCE, though it's not quite as similar.

[MintBean]

I agree with you Alexa. The only thing that's lacking as you mention is certain hardware and software support. If you're intent on using Apple products/iTunes, Linux is a non starter (or at least not an easy sell.) For me the lack of MS Office is a bit of a pain. Generally I'm happy with LibreOffice but the compatibility's not 100% so it's a problem when sending documents to Windows users.

[CaptainKirksChair]

Windows is a nightmare and Apple abandoned their desktops...I don’t like where Apple or Windows is headed with their computers. I am grateful for the ease of use of Linux although I am amazed there aren’t more users.

This has been an ongoing topic of discussion on almost every Linux forum. The problem with Windows is that the NT kernel is very buggy and all Microsoft wants to do is to violate your privacy so they can force partner advertisements to YOUR computer. They claim they are allowed to do this because it is their software. My hardware or their software, which one takes precedence? You volunteered to use their software so they win. So I unvolunteered with Windows and freely chose Linux Mint instead.

As for where they are headed, to Microsoft and Apple, it's a tablet-based world. Or at least they are trying to make it a tablet-based world. So the operating systems are focused on that. Windows 8 was a disaster because you started in tablet mode and the desktop/laptop users told Microsoft to fix it. So Windows 10 with partner advertising is now upon us.

The reason there aren't more Linux users is because if you use macOS, you probably won't use anything else. If you use Windows and change, you'll think you are just getting something that is exactly like Windows and can do everything Windows does exactly the same way. That's the biggest hurdle for Linux; if the user can't use their current software and do exactly what they're doing now, they won't bother. Or if they switch, they'll complain endlessly. For 80%+ of computer users, web surfing, on-line commerce, email, social media, web videos, word processing, some spreadsheets, and photo and music management (not manipulation) are their primary uses for computers. Linux does that better than either Windows or macOS. But it's difficult to get people to change because if they think they're giving up something they will never get back, they will be reluctant to change. Even though most of the included Windows bloatware is never used and completely unnecessary.

Linux is superior. Getting 80% of the computer users to see that is the task ahead.

[sphyrth]

Though we generally agree with the Title "Linux is Superior to Mac is Superior to Windows",
the OP is more of a journey of switching OSes: "Linux from Mac from Windows".

[KBD47]

For me the lack of MS Office is a bit of a pain. Generally I'm happy with LibreOffice but the compatibility's not 100% so it's a problem when sending documents to Windows users.

MintBean, might check out this thread for MS file compatibility on Linux:
viewtopic.php?f=58&t=270056

[Portreve]

The main compatibility issues I've bumped into have to do with graphical objects generated within MS Word. Obviously, Microsoft-proprietary stuff (scripting, etc.) can be problematic, though I don't personally deal with that.

[151tom]

.

[Pierre]

absolutely - - Tell Everyone About Linux:
- especially about how great the LinuxMint System is . . . .


Why is everyone so hell bent about converting Windows users over to Linux.

Nah - - just wish to Rescue that Machine - - onto something that stands a better chance of working !.
IE: the Windows System itself - gets updated regularly - - But, the hardware rarely gets updated.

so, the Owner of that Machine - - thens starts the Ritual of "Gee It's Slow".


Answer: Replace the Operating System - with something that is more suited to the hardware.

[Moem]

I don't care what OS other users use and I don't promote any OS let people use what they want.

I want people to know about their options. It's not really a free choice if you don't know that there are other options available. So I like to tell people about Mint... if they are interested to know about it.

[151tom]

.

[KBD47]

I don't care what OS other users use and I don't promote any OS let people use what they want.

I want people to know about their options. It's not really a free choice if you don't know that there are other options available. So I like to tell people about Mint... if they are interested to know about it.

This. People are reinstalling Windows 10 twice a year because updates are breaking things and causing ongoing issues. Many people would use Linux if they knew about and understood it was a viable option.

[Bolle1961]

and Apple abandoned their desktops

Abandoned? Check this out, what do you want : iMac, iMac Pro, Mac Pro or a Mac mini?
https://www.apple.com/mac/

[151tom]

.

[BG405]

f a Windows user isn't happy with Windows than the Windows user should have the initiative to look for a better alternative.

True, but the thing is, many people are either oblivious to the existence of good alternative operating systems like Linux Mint or they don't know that it can (usually) be easily installed alongside Windows.

When people see my netbook in use and see how responsive it is, they become interested, especially when I tell them it's a 6 or 7 year old dual-core Atom-based machine with 2GB of RAM and a spinning rust storage device. (Actually that description may be incorrect. I believe the magnetic surface is not oxidized; it doesn't appear to be anyway.) Although I've once been called an anarchist too for being a Linux user, presumably for not being one of the sheeple & / or towing the corporate line. Go figure.

[KBD47]

If a Windows user isn't happy with Windows than the Windows user should have the initiative to look for a better alternative.

I know absolutely the wrong attitude although after helping others get started with Linux and then they go back to Windows ya kinda quit trying.

Not everyone is cut out to use Linux. You are correct that if you have to talk them into it--they shouldn't use Linux. But too many people know nothing about Linux and it never hurts to give people information.

[151tom]

.

[alexa9]

and Apple abandoned their desktops

Abandoned? Check this out, what do you want : iMac, iMac Pro, Mac Pro or a Mac mini?
https://www.apple.com/mac/

Not interested in an all in one/iMac.
Mac Mini hasn't been updated in 1,324 days.
Mac Pro hasn't been updated in 1,032 days.
https://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#Mac