azorius.net

Windows is not free as in freedom
from trespasser69@lemmy.world to technology@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 10:50
https://lemmy.world/post/22494206

Fuck Micro$oft

It’s time to switch to Linux! Because it’s free as in freedom.

#technology

threaded - newest

Mr_Blott@feddit.uk on 27 Nov 11:01 next collapse

Aye so you can spend your Free™ time getting stuff to work aye sounds great mate

Edit - ha ha Linux users ITT

“Sudo reinstall mouse driver so I can downvote this guy’s comment come onnnnnn!!!”

TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 12:00 next collapse

People always say this as if you don’t spend time doing stuff on Windows.

floofloof@lemmy.ca on 27 Nov 14:15 collapse

I use Linux specifically because it saves me all the time it takes trying to get things to work properly in Windows. Printers, USB drives, multiple hard drives, encrypted volumes - all of these give me less trouble in Linux than in Windows. And when it comes to software, the usual experience in Windows is to click on the icon and then wait around a minute or two to see whether it registered, then go and check the Task Manager, kill the process if necessary and try relaunching, etc. On Linux you click the icon and the program pops up.

sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works on 27 Nov 18:52 collapse

I just unplugged my SO’s PC to clean it and reconnected everything, and during startup, it spammed me w/ endless popups saying it “recognized X device” or whatever (it’s all the same equipment…). I just wanted to make sure the network was back up, but it kept covering the little popup window where the wifi settings were. I’ve never had this issue on Linux, on startup, things just work, no stupid popups telling me about it.

I haven’t done any encrypted volumes on Windows, but the rest have been about the same on Linux vs Windows. I had to install a driver for my Brother printer on Linux, but other than that, everything is smooth, just plug it in and it’ll probably just work (and Windows will “detect drivers” or whatever and spam popups to tell you about it).

So yeah, Linux just works for me, whereas Windows seems to constantly want attention. Both work fine, Linux is just less annoying.

rikudou@lemmings.world on 27 Nov 12:12 next collapse

Yeah, like the constant driver issues. I had to reinstall the OS and it wouldn’t even recognize my hard drive, just told me there’s no drive.

Or when it refused to use my dedicated Nvidia GPU and only used the integrated one.

Or when my sound stopped working all of a sudden.

Oh, right, those were all Windows!

Viri4thus@feddit.org on 27 Nov 13:42 collapse

Yes, but didn’t you appreciate the targeted ads you were getting while trying to troubleshoot? Think about all of the trash you won’t know about if you use anything other than Mac(i)OS/Windows!?

rikudou@lemmings.world on 27 Nov 16:33 collapse

Heh, they didn’t really stand a chance, I block them on network level, device level and I also used some software to block all the annoying shit on Windows itself (OO Shut Up or something like that). But the huge empty spaces where something was very obviously missing told me pretty exactly where I would see the ads.

TheTechnician27@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 12:58 next collapse

Okay, anyone who’s saying this either tinkers way the hell too much without the know-how to back it up, has never used Linux for more than a week, or should probably be using this as their daily driver.

Software is, in the vast majority of cases, obtainable through a GUI package manager, versus going out onto the Internet and finding whatever you trust to give you a valid version of the software. Software is updated all at once and without even being forced to reboot (save for some niche cases). With two (2) clicks and one (1) password, every single piece of software on the OS is up-to-date. It’s like a half-step up from an app store in difficulty.
I have never once in two(?) years using Linux had to fuck around with software drivers. Whereas trying to connect game controllers to Windows was a fucking nightmare, and it feels like I would have to go mucking around with audio drivers every time Windows decided my headset didn’t want to work anymore.
Windows 10 has, at least once, completely shit the bed to a point where I spent most of my day trying to get my desktop working again. Zero catastrophic issues with Linux.
Windows 10 placed itself into a state where it couldn’t update at all because Microsoft fucked up and pushed an update that enlarges the recovery partition without regard to the users whose recovery partition is bordered on the right and can’t be enlarged.
Linux’s install is extremely fast and trivial, whereas Windows’ is full of dark patterns, makes you sign up for a worthless account just to use your desktop (lol), and can be completely fucked if you replace too much hardware in your own PC.
The shell experience if you actually do need to get some kind of even light power user work done is way less intuitive than Linux.
Customizing Windows is the biggest pain in the ass imaginable. I had to go into the registry on Windows 11 just to give me the basic tools present on Windows 10’s context menu. Go try to uninstall Internet Explorer. Go ahead, I dare you.
Whereas Linux has extensive, crystal clear, and highly specific guides for basically any problem you’ll ever fall into (see: the Arch Wiki), Windows has support forums where you pray someone has the same issue as you, and if you find it, 90% of the time it’s a canned response with fuck-all to do with the issue, terminating the thread. So then you go searching your issue appended with the term “reddit”.

I use Manjaro KDE with Wayland on an Nvidia GPU, and it works right out the box. I then have maybe half an hour’s worth of personal customizations which are not at all necessary to use. Something like Linux Mint is what I would recommend to my grandparents any day of the week over Windows.

kittenzrulz123@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 27 Nov 13:53 next collapse

Controversial opinion, if you enjoy Windows and want your software to work like Windows just use Windows (shocking)

sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works on 27 Nov 18:49 collapse

I’ve had far more problems on Windows than Linux. For example:

SOs computer marked the GPU driver as disabled?? WTF? I thought her monitor died…
SO’s computer audio was messed up, and it took me an hour of fiddling to get it working (probably more AMD’s fault than anything)
had to manually download drivers for a variety of stuff…

And this is just since I upgraded my SO’s PC a couple years ago.

Here’s a similar process for my Linux PC:

all HW recognized OOTB - I ended up swapping my WiFi card to something better, and it worked OOTB

That’s it, everything just works. I sometimes need to fiddle w/ audio settings, but that’s because I have three audio outputs (headphones, and both monitors), and it understandably gets confused, but switching takes like 10s. That’s it. Oh, and I run openSUSE Tumbleweed, a rolling-release OS, and I’ve had fewer problems in the 5-ish years I’ve used it (and upgraded HW in between) than my SO has w/ Windows.

So yeah, don’t know what to tell ya, Linux has pissed me off way less than Windows.

webghost0101@sopuli.xyz on 27 Nov 11:16 next collapse

Say it with me:

micro-soft-small-mind-energy

14th_cylon@lemm.ee on 27 Nov 11:18 next collapse

What is the point of this “revelation”? When did Microsoft claim that windows were free in any way?

TheTechnician27@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 11:23 next collapse

Yes, they called themselves the “most open operating system”. Which in fairness doesn’t imply all the “free” FSF freedoms, but at least being unable to work around restrictions or reverse-engineer to me definitely contravenes “open”.

That said, this is just beating a dead horse; literally anyone with a brain who knows what Linux is knows that Windows is less open.

hendrik@palaver.p3x.de on 27 Nov 14:33 collapse

Maybe they meant open, as in it leaks your private data and is open to be exploited by advertisers, malware etc?

moody@lemmings.world on 27 Nov 14:50 next collapse

Only if the people doing the exploiting aren’t using Windows, because that goes against the terms of service.

Zorsith@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 27 Nov 16:23 collapse

Open as in “spread your cheeks and your wallet” open

SaharaMaleikuhm@feddit.org on 28 Nov 06:10 collapse

I would not mind the first part

LiPoly@lemmynsfw.com on 27 Nov 12:24 next collapse

threads.net/…/thoughts-anyone-is-windows-the-most…

14th_cylon@lemm.ee on 27 Nov 13:44 next collapse

that specifically says open, not free. it is marketing buzzword you can project really anything into.

conciselyverbose@sh.itjust.works on 27 Nov 14:16 collapse

It doesn’t resemble open in any legitimate interpretation of the word, though.

Even if you hack your way to a tolerable experience, they can and will randomly revert changes you make on a whim.

14th_cylon@lemm.ee on 27 Nov 16:49 collapse

we are slowly drifting away from the original point…

conciselyverbose@sh.itjust.works on 27 Nov 16:54 collapse

We’re not. The point is that Microsoft is lying and pretending Windows isn’t a locked down pile of shit.

14th_cylon@lemm.ee on 27 Nov 17:22 collapse

we are. “open” can mean lot of things, and the original post was not about open, it was about free. no one has to be convinced windows are not free, it is as surprising as the fact people don’t fuck for love in brothel.

if anything, this is far more funny:

conciselyverbose@sh.itjust.works on 27 Nov 17:29 collapse

Open absolutely cannot mean a lot of things, and there is no possible legitimate definition of open that could ever in any context be used to describe Windows, with the sole exception of “open to bad actors”.

It’s a locked down, restrictive, broken pile of shit.

Zak@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 15:18 next collapse

This is marketing puffery. It’s an imprecise claim about the product’s goodness that cannot be objectively tested.

LiPoly@lemmynsfw.com on 27 Nov 16:43 next collapse

Duh

(I know, you watched a recent WAN show and just wanted to brag with the word puffery)

Zak@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 17:27 collapse

I hadn’t heard of the WAN show before this comment. I learned about puffery as a kid when my parents were shopping for a car and I was very excited to inform them I had just heard on the radio that a specific dealership was the best.

Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 29 Nov 07:43 collapse

I see a very high inflation of the word "puffery* in the recent times ;D

tja@sh.itjust.works on 27 Nov 16:18 collapse

I liked this image more: icosahedron.website/@halcy/113554477309412476

Quadhammer@lemmy.world on 28 Nov 03:32 collapse

When did we start bending over for every company out there

14th_cylon@lemm.ee on 28 Nov 07:37 collapse

I don’t know, tell us, when did you start?

FourPacketsOfPeanuts@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 11:21 next collapse

As a Windows “normie” for a long time I used to roll my eyes when people said try Linux. But getting ads in Windows when trying to do a simple admin thing was the last straw. I followed instructions to install Debian on a spare drive and gave it a go and do you know what, it was fine. It made me realise 90% of what I do is in a browser anyway, so why did I have a hang up about having the exact same browser experience in a slightly different operating system?

Using libre office instead of word was a bit of a shift but, again, for the majority of what I wanted to do I it was fine. Libre office works with words .docx format. In fact, I noticed that for a quick document or spreadsheet I’d been using Google docs so much that this wasn’t affected at all.

Gaming was a concern, as this was something I (lazily) believed just didn’t work on Linux. But I was totally wrong. Not only is steam available on Linux, but even very recent titles work fine run through a Linux based windows emulator. I guess the important thing is that far more of this was automated than I thought it was going to be. There’s a stereotype that you’re going to be buried neck deep in obscure command lines trying to get basic things working but in my experience I didn’t have to do any of that, it all just worked.

Bonus was along the way learning that those “obscure” command lines were not actually that obscure and were actually convenient. Typing “sudo apt install vlc” on the command line and having VLC installed and ready to use about ten seconds later was amazing. (I know package managers are available for Windows, I’m just referring to the ‘norms’ of each platform)

Ganbat@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 27 Nov 11:42 next collapse

I’ve been running Pop OS strictly for a few months now, but in terms of gaming, it just doesn’t quite feel like it’s quite there for me.

Take Half-Life 2 for instance. Valve is one of the few devs/publishers actually making an effort with Linux, and it shows, but it still manages to be inferior.

By default, it uses OpenGL, which is… a mess. Just plain a mess. It’s bad. Busted lighting, models look off, effects don’t draw right. This has no business being the default.

So, command line options, turn on Vulkan. 1 billion times better. Looks right, feels right… crashes on boot occasionally… and the workshop uploader crashes too…

Well, there’s always Proton, except… yeah, performance is decreased a bit. That’s nothing major here, but since I don’t have the best hardware, it becomes more of an issue with newer games. In regards to HL2, though, it also introduces microstuttering, which is absolutely a big deal.

wewbull@feddit.uk on 27 Nov 12:10 next collapse

You are talking about a game that was developed before Vulkan was a glint in Khronos’ eye.

Ganbat@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 27 Nov 16:24 collapse

That response doesn’t make any sense. You do know this game received a major update just last week and has native Vulkan support, right?

wewbull@feddit.uk on 28 Nov 13:43 collapse

The graphics API isn’t something superficial. The source engine was designed from the ground up around APIs from 20 years ago. Any Vulkan adapter will be a bodge.

Ganbat@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 28 Nov 22:09 collapse

Source was branched off of GoldSRC, which was built around OGL and D3D simultaneously, but for Source, OGL was excised from the final engine. Meanwhile, D3D functionality was later removed from GoldSRC altogether. And further back than all that, the engines are both based on Quake, which only had a software renderer, so going by your logic, it could be said that every renderer in Source and GoldSRC is a “bodge”.

Besides all that, I said the Vulkan renderer is the absolute best way to play the game on Linux, so your point in the first place isn’t even totally really clear.

FourPacketsOfPeanuts@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 12:24 next collapse

I’ve been playing Half Life 1 on windows (geforce RTX 3080, latest drivers etc) and it’s buggy as hell. I guess my expectations are low…

conciselyverbose@sh.itjust.works on 27 Nov 14:18 collapse

“Proton decreases performance” isn’t a fact. Benchmarks tend to very from very minor drops in some games to meaningful improvements in others.

Ganbat@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 27 Nov 16:32 collapse

Eh, in my testing, I’ve found a drop of a few fps across the board, with a few games that are just plain problematic. I haven’t found any performance improvements yet myself, but I also only have a part of my library right now due to a drive failure.

TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 11:59 next collapse

For what it’s worth, if you want an office suite that’s perhaps not as feature-rich as Libre Office, but has an appearance and UX like MS Office, as well as better compatibility with MS Office out of the box, there’s always OnlyOffice.

It’s especially good if you’re putting it on a parent’s PC who’s only used MS Office before.

FourPacketsOfPeanuts@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 13:22 collapse

Never even heard of it, I’ll have a look thanks

Melatonin@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 27 Nov 13:40 next collapse

I was all worried about gaming then I had a revelation.

I almost never game.

moody@lemmings.world on 27 Nov 14:55 next collapse

Linux based windows emulator

Wine is not an emulator. It’s in the name.

I’m really just joking, but it’s a translation layer which has much less overhead compared to an actual emulator. That’s why you can get performance that is so close to Windows, and sometimes even better since the OS itself takes up fewer resources as well.

homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 15:56 next collapse

I followed instructions to install Debian on a spare drive and gave it a go and do you know what, it was fine. It made me realise 90% of what I do is in a browser anyway, so why did I have a hang up about having the exact same browser experience in a slightly different operating system?

That’s how it’s done people. Alright let’s go 2025 Year of the Linux Desktop (Again)! Chop chop! Let’s move out!

MonkderVierte@lemmy.ml on 27 Nov 17:25 next collapse

Using libre office instead of word was a bit of a shift

Btw, you can change the look under Appearance > uh, “Benutzeroberfläche” in german.

I’d been using Google docs so much

Just so you know, Google owns your documents, not you.

SaharaMaleikuhm@feddit.org on 28 Nov 06:15 next collapse

those “obscure” command lines were not actually that obscure and were actually convenient

Yes, let the darkness flow through you.

FourPacketsOfPeanuts@lemmy.world on 28 Nov 08:58 collapse

Lol

Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 29 Nov 07:45 collapse

The command line will be needed for exotic ways to solve a problem or troubleshoot unusual products.

Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 11:48 next collapse

Do you have a few minutes to talk about our Lord and Saviour, Linus Torvalds?

rikudou@lemmings.world on 27 Nov 12:07 collapse

You mean GNU/Linus?

stoy@lemmy.zip on 27 Nov 11:54 next collapse

I work as a Windows/365 technician, I have thought about switching ti Linux at home, but I worry about loosing my Windows skills if I do…

rikudou@lemmings.world on 27 Nov 12:06 next collapse

You won’t. Just install Windows in a VM once every few years and you’re good to go.

stoy@lemmy.zip on 27 Nov 12:44 collapse

That is not enough I am afraid, I work both as an admin and as general user support, so I need to be in the user side with current skills.

rikudou@lemmings.world on 27 Nov 16:31 collapse

I regularly fix Windows bullshit of my team members without actively using it myself. Windows doesn’t really change that much, I just make sure to check it out for a few days when some huge changes arrive, other than that I don’t care.

stoy@lemmy.zip on 27 Nov 16:37 collapse

I am glad that works for you, sad to say, it doesn’t for me (:

TimeSquirrel@kbin.melroy.org on 27 Nov 12:46 collapse

I found that switching to Linux made me able to understand both OSes better, and computers in general. Half of my computer science knowledge comes from screwing around with Linux.

You can still dual boot to keep self-teaching yourself latest Windows concepts so you don't fall behind there, while experimenting and learning on Linux in your free time.

stoy@lemmy.zip on 27 Nov 12:49 collapse

I have actually switched once before, back in 2009-2010 I daily drove Ubuntu, but came back to Windows because of gaming.

At my last job I was a helpdesk technician, 365 admin, VIP technician and their only Linux sysadmin.

TimeSquirrel@kbin.melroy.org on 27 Nov 12:59 collapse

Might want to give it another shot these days. Gaming has become exponentially better since then with Steam's Proton software. Still not perfect, but being able to do 90-95% of them ain't bad. The last technical hurdle is games with kernel-level anti-cheat.

stoy@lemmy.zip on 27 Nov 16:04 collapse

Oh yeah, if I didn’t have to do computer support at work and only dealt with the backend I would absolutely try it!

n3cr0@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 12:05 next collapse

Aatube@kbin.melroy.org on 27 Nov 12:56 collapse

what was the conference about

n3cr0@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 13:14 collapse

It was about Co-Pilot and Office365. I only skipped through it, but all I’ve seen and heard was BS.

ignite.microsoft.com/en-US/sessions/GS06?source=%…

sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works on 27 Nov 18:39 collapse

Wow, and Co-Pilot and Office365 are clear indicators of Microsoft being less open.

Shihali@sh.itjust.works on 27 Nov 13:55 next collapse

In other news, snow is cold and wet.

spongebue@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 19:40 collapse

Arguably it’s not wet if it’s cold enough

Kolanaki@yiffit.net on 27 Nov 19:47 collapse

Even if it melts back to water, is it really wet or does it simply make things wet?

Nougat@fedia.io on 27 Nov 14:12 next collapse

LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX LINUX

nixcamic@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 14:33 next collapse

It’s not free as in free beer either?

boonhet@lemm.ee on 27 Nov 16:17 collapse

It is if you don’t pay for a license but at this point I don’t even want to use it for free.

nixcamic@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 16:29 collapse

I mean anything is free if you pirate it.

boonhet@lemm.ee on 27 Nov 16:30 collapse

You don’t have to pirate it, you just download it off their website and don’t activate it. It’ll work, but you can’t change your desktop background.

accideath@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 16:45 next collapse

And you get an annoying watermark. And an even more annoying operating system, so it’s not really worth it.

sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works on 27 Nov 18:38 collapse

Works fine for the handful of times I need to run an Windows app throughout the year.

TriflingToad@sh.itjust.works on 27 Nov 19:33 next collapse

I reset my BIOS and I guess it forgot my windows key, googled it and ran a single command in powershell (found on GitHub a microsoft owned platform) it instantly activated. I don’t understand why people pay for it, it was literally so easy to get around it.
I hear “oh go to a key reselling website you can get it for like $15” and it feels like how I imagine taking damage in Minecraft is lmao

nixcamic@lemmy.world on 28 Nov 19:30 collapse

That’s basically pirating it but worse lol. You still are violating the license but also get an annoying watermark.

Retro_unlimited@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 17:56 next collapse

It’s called windows because they are always looking in at what you’re doing. It’s “open” so they are now public about looking inside your windows.

They were stealing my data from my desktop as it was syncing to their cloud. Seeing those sync icons when I had one drive disabled made me switch to linux about the time they were taking about the AI tech screen shots. F that, I’m out.

Been on Linux for a while now and it’s been great.

affiliate@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 23:22 next collapse

can we get another red rectangle around the whole picture please

KomfortablesKissen@discuss.tchncs.de on 28 Nov 14:36 collapse

Don’t work around the limitations!

ArtVandelay@lemmy.world on 27 Nov 23:56 next collapse

Windows is Free, as in free to gargle deez nuts

JackbyDev@programming.dev on 28 Nov 06:17 next collapse

No fucking way!

supercriticalcheese@lemmy.world on 28 Nov 19:50 collapse

very shocking indeed

interdimensionalmeme@lemmy.ml on 29 Nov 18:49 collapse

Sorry Microsoft, I actually had a served all rights already. Nobody else has rights. That’s just how it is and I work around all limitations.