[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

With regard to stupidity: I think the internet just exposes us to more people who actually don't know what they're doing.

Today I saw some people lamenting the fact that Linux _still_ isn't one of the top dog operating systems on desktops and laptops. "Everybody is denying the numbers", one said. "Linux runs on EVERYTHING but desktops and laptops, from phones to supercomputers!"

There's difference between "runs on" and "is used on".

The one thing this guy forgets is:

- A phone runs Android. Yes, it has the Linux kernel under the hood, but nobody knows. For all intents and purposes, the OS is Android, not Linux.

For that matter, dedicated eReader devices like the Kindle and the Nook have a Linux kernel under the hood, and are technically Linux systems. I suspect only a tiny fraction of the user base is aware of that.

Linux, Windows, or OS/X - you don't interact directly with the OS kernel. You interact with a shell, which may be a desktop GUI or a command line in a terminal window.

- A supercomputer doesn't run an off-the-shelf Linux most of the time. The builders of the supercomputer for a distro such as Debian, Red Had/CentOS or whatever, strip it, rebuild it to their specifications, and write their own drivers. Maybe they even start from scratch, from the source code. Yes, the OS is Linux, but it's a specific version for that computer.

"Off the shelf" generally means a generic "one size fits all" kernel plus supporting utilities, GUI, and likely some bundled apps.

A supercomputer from Cray, Hitachi or the like will probably start with kernel source and compile specifically for their architecture, with drivers.

Once upon a time, most Linux users got a generic kernel in place just long enough to grab the source and do a custom compile for their hardware, incorporating only the drivers their system required. Hardware was slower and more expensive, and you built and tuned for performance. like leaving out stuff your system didn't need.

(One of the design features of Android is that it's modular, designed to be picked up by OEMs and built to support their systems. Don't have Bluetooth hardware in the system? Don't include the Bluetooth driver and supporting software in the build...)

And the most important point:

- Linux isn't used on desktops or laptops by the average person not because of the fact that it's a bad OS (it isn't), but because it doesn't run the software the users want to run, or doesn't support the hardware users want to use.

I've been around this before in Linux forums. It has minimal pickup on the desktop because it's different. Back in the days when I was supporting users on a mainframe, I learned that the average user learned just enough to do what they needed to do, then stopped.

I saw the same thing when PCs came around, and when Windows took over the desktop. There would be foot dragging when a new version of Windows came out because things would change, and the user response tended to reduce to "I don't have time to get my work done now. I certainly don't have time to learn new things to be able to do it."

What people know and are familiar with is Windows. Without a very pressing reason, they will not spend the time and effort to learn a whole new UI and workflow. Why should they?

Yes, that's not Linux's fault, but still. People use an operating system for the applications it runs and the hardware that is supported, not for the sake of running a particular OS. You first choose your applications, then you choose your hardware, and THEN you choose an operating system that supports both, and on a desktop and laptop, it often ISN'T Linux.

It's almost never Linux. It's Windows or OS/X.

In short: people having an entire discussion about computers and operating systems without knowing what using a computer is really about: GETTING SHIT DONE.

I have encountered people who like playing with OSes. So do I. But I started using Ubuntu as my desktop Linux OS a while back because it did the best job I'd seen in a distro of figuring out what it was running on, setting itself up in installation, and Just Working with minimal interaction with the user. I wanted to spend my time using the system, not fiddling to make it usable.

I can tweak and fiddle afterward, but I want to begin and install and have a working system an hour or so later that I can start using. (Working video, and especially networking, are sore points on other distros.) Yes, I'm a tech, and I know how to answer the installer questions, but it should be able to figure out what I'm installing it on. All I should have to do is review the assumptions it made and what it plans to do and correct things I disagree with. (Ubuntu, for example, allocates a swap partition, which defaults to being the same size as installed RAM. My box has 8GB RAM and will barely touch swap in use. It doesn't need an 8GB swap partition, and might get away with no swap partition at all.)

And with faster and more powerful hardware, we are increasingly reaching the point where it doesn't matter what the OS kernel as, as software is cross platform. I can run Libre Office, for example, on Windows, Linux, or OS/X. (And I have a port of Open Office under Android.)

Most OS discussions have little to do with technology and much to do with perceived status. "I'm Smarter/cooler than you because I run Linux (or OS/X, or Android...)" Dream on.

I just say "I don't use things because they're cool. Things are cool because I use them!" That tends to put a cork in such bottles.
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Dennis