We are getting many new users. But are we losing any?

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TerribleReason4195@reddit

I have and went to BSD. I feel so good knowing that if something goes wrong, I have ZFS. I am not a big fan of the development of linux, tho. Wayland, rust, and all sorts of stuff. Why can't linux improve what they have, like FreeBSD?

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Left_Sun_3748@reddit

Have you looked at the market share thats why. Linux is moving into modernization.

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TerribleReason4195@reddit

If you call it modern that is up to you. I feel they are reinventing the wheel, and also disagree that is modern.

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Left_Sun_3748@reddit

I am a long time lnux user but I am considering getting a Macbook as the battery life is so good.

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_LePancakeMan@reddit

Talked to a professor recently, that started using mint on his PC. Unfortunately he couldn't get some piece of software to run and he didn't want to spend the > 100h required to rebuild his lectures - especially with only 4 years to go.

He begrudgingly switched back to the windows installation provided by the university and I can't blame him for doing so.

We might not like it, but software compatibility can be a problem, especially for fringe use cases

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mmmboppe@reddit

if certain software does not run in Linux, it's not a Linux problem. it's the problem of that software

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_LePancakeMan@reddit

It's a problem for Linux adoption though, independent of who is to blame

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photo-nerd-3141@reddit

Set up libvirt, virt-manager then a VM running windows.

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_LePancakeMan@reddit

Yes, but the man is a physics professor wanting to free himself of windows. Running windows in a VM just adds more complexity and means he'll still have to tend to a windows installation. At that point, he is better of running windows directly.

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mmmboppe@reddit

of course we are losing users. people get old, then die

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letmewriteyouup@reddit

Quite a few people must be migrating to macs I reckon, especially as they start gaining traction beyond the western hemisphere.

Macbooks are still unmatched in battery efficiency and longevity afaik. Also seem to be getting first-class treatment by most AI app developers nowadays.

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Nelo999@reddit

They aren't really good when it comes to longevity actually.

Apple is notorious for engaging in planned obsolescence.

Also, most people don't care about AI.

MacOS continues to only have 8% of the OS market share.

Although since MacOS is obviously better than Windows, most of it's market share increase is due to former Windows refugees.

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letmewriteyouup@reddit

What are you talking about? Macbooks are universally known to last longer than the average Windows laptop. It's a major part of their USP.

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SCphotog@reddit

Lots of people give Linux a try and then bail on it.

There are LOTS of reasons why - but I think most of them revolve around hardware compatibility, meaning manufacturers don't provide drivers for their products, for Linux.

We are getting a lot closer to a prime time situation with Linux because of Ubuntu and Valve's efforts (among many others) but until we can get native hardware drivers for everything from mice to racing sim wheels adoption is going to remain slow.

Microsoft is pushing many people over to at least give Linux a try and that's great, but someone who tries Linux and has a bad time will be hard to or impossible to convince to give it a try the second time around.

My own personal experience with Linux... finding myself frustrated trying to find instructions on how to do stuff under the hood. I run into a 'how to' or whatever instructions that conflict with 5 other sets of instructions on how to do the exact same task... simply installing a comms program or the like.

I still don't get why it's such a PITA - why is it the task of creating a desktop shortcut to a program not really easy by now?

I lost a drive in my last Linux box a few months back... it IS time to rebuild it. Maybe a Mint distro this time around...

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Nelo999@reddit

Hardware compatibility isn't really the issue.

Linux had impressive hardware compatibility, it can run on most hardware new and old.

Even gaming peripherals works right out of the box.

The real issue is gaming, not a lot of games are available on Linux, especially multiplayer games.

Although hopefully Valve might solve that issue eventually.

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perkited@reddit

The majority seem to be Windows gamers who decide they would rather game in Windows. Gaming seems to be the main reason many use a PC, so it makes sense for them.

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photo-nerd-3141@reddit

Soundwave propagation is actually kinfda fun. Though I call it 'live jazz' :-)

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psaux_grep@reddit

You don’t really uninstall an OS.

But 15 years ago I went from hoping for the future of the Linux desktop to giving up on that hope. That said, Microsoft is doing a bang up job getting people to switch.

And for what it’s worth, thanks to me we have 40+ Linux servers where I work.

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SilentSinger69@reddit

You're not alone. 10 or 15 years ago you'd constantly hear people talking about trying to make Linux more popular in the mass market. Now most people seem to have given up on that and are happy for Linux to simply meet their needs. Which is fine, of course, but it's disappointing to me because I really don't think it's that difficult of a goal. There's just no one out there making that effort who actually understands what it will take to succeed. It's too much of the blind leading the blind.

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D-S-S-R@reddit

I started also using macOS for some creative software, but my main gaming, surfing and so on is still done on Linux, idk

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syklemil@reddit

There's a huge variance in reasons people leave Linux.

Sometimes it's because of an issue that the ecosystem agrees is an issue, and may or may not have the resources to work on.

Sometimes it's because of something the ecosystem doesn't agree is an issue, like not being some other OS.

If you stick around, you'll see that there are plenty of those discussions going on, with varying degrees of usefulness.

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Alice_Alisceon@reddit

I know a lot of security people who switched to a Mac once we were out of school. Not a majority but a plurality. Not because Macs are BETTER for security work, but they’re good enough and doesn’t take time out of your day to set up and maintain.

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m_uggu@reddit

i think at some point people try macbooks or mac os and just stick to it. customizing everything, experimenting and being power user is fun but not for everyone who would rather not use a command line for everything.

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FryBoyter@reddit

But are we losing any?

Of course. Anything else would be strange.

think we should be discussing about cases and experiences like this.

In my opinion, that wouldn't do much good. Many newbies think, for example, that Linux is simply a better version of Windows, and then realize that it's a separate operating system. What's there to discuss? I think it makes more sense if people switch back to Windows instead of continuing to use Linux and being dissatisfied.

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DividedContinuity@reddit

Yes thats the biggest issue. I think a lot of windows users coming in don't realise just how different linux is and how much of their windows knowledge and experience is just not going to be useful.

The most common piece of advice i give to windows users interested in Linux is to stay on windows - unless they're determined to use linux or determined to leave windows, and have already made up their mind to accept the learning curve, the tinkering, the loss or replacement of certain applications etc.

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Unclear-Direction@reddit

I mean.. There's literally a reddit sub dedicated to shitting on Linux. I assume a lot of the whiners in there ditched Linux, and went back to Windows or MacOS.

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RoomyRoots@reddit

The old ones are dying. A very small percentage uses BSDs and Solaris-like too but I doubt anyone jumped completely.

Indirectly many support MacOS since Apple products seem to be very popular if you look at conferences.

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Historical-Bar-305@reddit

Many user of BSD doesnt know about what they are using (its about Playstation and macOS users).

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RoomyRoots@reddit

I mean pure BSD. In the homelab forums it's common to find people using OPNsense/PFsense so there are more people using it too.

Here's to me hoping now with the OCI containers we get more people into BSDs. They are good.

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A_Canadian_boi@reddit

I've heard of a couple of people that have switched to MacOS because of its similar unixy features, good support, and the sheer power of the M-series CPUs.

I've has a couple friends leave Linux, but only because of running into false walls - eg. one friend complained about unstable Nvidia drivers, but later discovered that their card had a hardware defect. Another gave up because of poor GPU performance, but it turned out they were plugged into their iGPU. People heard that Linux was unreliable, so the moment they ran into a hardware problem, they assumed it was Linux instead.

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MelioraXI@reddit

Don’t really care if someone uninstall. Nor do I expect people to announce it, that includes people who feels the urge to announce they installing Linux and F Microsoft.

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visualglitch91@reddit

It's not a cult

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JellyBeanUser@reddit

I switched from Linux to macOS because I pursue photography and video production more and I needed better software for editing them.

But I'm still using Linux for some other things (like data archival, data recovery etc.), but not so often anymore

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OkFlatworm2645@reddit

Switched for about 3 months. I use fusion 360 too much and spent quite a while learning it. Got tired of dual booting every time I had to use it so I switched to windows. I know there are alternatives lie free cad but these days I don’t have much time to learn a new system.

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sloomy-santana@reddit

nah, when I got my laptop and a 1tb ssd I installed opensuse and haven't gone back since

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Mr_Lumbergh@reddit

Every once in a while you get one of those "bye, Linux" threads where someone gives up and bails. I think that's just crying for attention. Mostly though, I think when they do go they just go; if you have legit reasons for wanting to, why announce it? Those are the cases that are hard to track.

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pgauret@reddit

Me as an example. Used to run Ubuntu, but not too happy with some of their technical choices.

Now running FreeBSD on servers, Apple on clients. Only Linux left is OpenWRT on router/wifi.

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buchinbox@reddit

I dont think there is a broader discussion to be had. If people leave they dont hang around to discuss their situation. They are gone. The whole discussion would be speculations.

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_angh_@reddit

there are many post in here or linux gaming about people who decided to go back to windows. Many of them didn't find it working for them the way they expected, or weren't technical enough.