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TCB13, in New Linux user here. Is this really how I'm supposed to install apps on Linux?
@TCB13@lemmy.world avatar

This post is proof that Linux desktop isn’t as good, perfect and polished as everyone says it is. Stop living in the delusion.

ChaosAD,

Do you even use Linux?

answersplease77,

He’s using a shitty version of linux. I use Arch btw

TCB13,
@TCB13@lemmy.world avatar

Yes and I do and while it is great for infrastructure, magnitudes better than anything Microsoft ever offered as a reasonable desktop it’s a fucking a joke.

gamma,
@gamma@programming.dev avatar

You’re deluded if you think that “everybody” let alone a large minority of people say that the Linux desktop is “good, perfect and polished”.

TCB13,
@TCB13@lemmy.world avatar

That’s a new one around here ahaha

uzay, in Thoughts on this?

As an enduser my only noticeable issue with Wayland is that Auto-Type with KeepassXC doesn’t work.

jw13,

Yeah, that one is annoying.

Deebster,
@Deebster@programming.dev avatar

Yeah, that one is annoying.

What one?

jw13,

Auto-type not working.

Deebster,
@Deebster@programming.dev avatar

Huh, that’s weird: when I posted, I saw your your comment as a top-level comment but I now I see it as a reply. Maybe it’s a Lemmy bug; I’ll keep an eye out in future.

Telodzrum,

Auto-Type will be disabled when run with a Wayland compositor on Linux. To use Auto-Type in this environment, you must set QT_QPA_PLATFORM=xcb or start KeePassXC with the -platform xcb command-line flag.

keepassxc.org/docs/KeePassXC_UserGuide#_auto_type

This works for me.

uzay,

I tried that, but neither option seems to work. At least not in Wayland programs, like Firefox. It works in Chromium because iirc that runs in Xwayland. That doesn’t solve my issue with Wayland though.

juli, in New Linux user here. Is this really how I'm supposed to install apps on Linux?

That’s what I hated as a beginner on debian/ubuntu as well. On fedora it’s straight forward. Adding repo and then isntalling the app.

bizdelnick, (edited )

Lolwhat? It is the same in any distro: adding the repo and installing the app.

iopq,

It’s not like that on NixOS

There’s no adding repos, you just put mullvad-vpn in your system packages list

vzq, (edited )

Yeah, the only odd thing is installing the signing key, but it’s there for a good reason.

That said, it’s not a great user experience, especially if you start stacking a lot of ppa’s.

risencode,

It’s the same on Debian, so I’m not sure what you mean?

TimLovesTech,
@TimLovesTech@badatbeing.social avatar

Yeah, how Ubuntu is supposed to be noob friendly and continues to be recommended blows my mind. Seems like every stupid app you want to install needs you to add a ppa that is almost guaranteed to break on the next major update. And ugh snaps …

dvdnet89,
@dvdnet89@lemmy.today avatar

Believe or not many people who know little Linux world always believe Ubuntu is the de-facto Linux itself.

fxdave, in Did deep sleep broke for anyone else recently or is it just me?

You still had deep sleep until now? Lucky you. To me Dell forbided S3 way earlier.

Tushta,

So… Bios update broke deep sleep, because fuck you, that’s why?

quackers, in New Linux user here. Is this really how I'm supposed to install apps on Linux?

Yeah no, generally you just copypaste the software website’s instructions. Many programs can be installed through the app store (or equivalent install commands) but a lot of aoftware you just gotta copypaste the code. Many also just provide an inataller.
The meme about linux software being much easier to install is true in some cases, but mostly bullshit. even if its just sudo apt install vlc you generally still want to check the website to make sure its the best way, or you end ip with an out of date version.

Updating software on linux is better pretty much automatic without annoying popups most of the time though.

neonred,

This was terrifying to read 😨

quackers,

Yeah, well, linux is great, but people seem to rarely give the full disclaimer. So people end up disappointed, go back to windows and end up thinking you need to be hackerman to be able to use it. Or they do end up learning everything, think they’re hackerman and tell everyone in the world how linux is just sooo much better and easier because theyve been using it since 1969 or whatever.

My view: Your grandma could comfortably work on linux. It’s when you need stuff beyond the most basic aoftware that there’s a much steeper learning curve than windows. You fuck up, your system implodes. Once you’re balls deep into computers, lets say software development, linux becomes easier and more useful again. Its that middle group of average users who have the hardest time.

toastal, in Flakes aren't real and cannot hurt you: a guide to using Nix flakes the non-flake way

I dunno, I don’t trust a guides still recommending flake-utils. You can make the same four loop in like 4 lines of Nix which is a smaller diff & doesn’t pollute your downstream consumers with a useless dependency. Flakes also don’t eliminate pointless builds, fileset or filtering the src can & the only tool with file tracking on by default is the Git VCS specifically (which also involves the intent to add flags which is the other side of annoying).

hallettj,
@hallettj@beehaw.org avatar

I sometimes write a flake with those 4 lines of Nix code, and it comes out just messy enough that tbh I’m happier adding an input to handle that. But I recently learned that the nixpkgs flake exports the lib.* helpers through nixpkgs.lib (as opposed to nixpkgs.legacyPackages.${system}.lib) so you can call helpers before specifying a system. And nixpkgs.lib.genAttrs is kinda close enough to flake-utils.lib.eachSystem that it might make a better solution.

Like where with flake-utils you would write,


<span style="color:#323232;">flake-utils.lib.eachSystem [ "x86_64-linux" "aarch64-darwin" ] (system:
</span><span style="color:#323232;">let
</span><span style="color:#323232;">  pkgs = nixpkgs.legacyPackages.${system};
</span><span style="color:#323232;">in
</span><span style="color:#323232;">{
</span><span style="color:#323232;">  devShells.default = pkgs.mkShell {
</span><span style="color:#323232;">    nativeBuildInputs = with pkgs; [
</span><span style="color:#323232;">      hello
</span><span style="color:#323232;">    ];
</span><span style="color:#323232;">  };
</span><span style="color:#323232;">})
</span>

Instead you can use genAttrs,


<span style="color:#323232;">let
</span><span style="color:#323232;">  forAllSystems = nixpkgs.lib.genAttrs [ "x86_64-linux" "aarch64-darwin" ];
</span><span style="color:#323232;">  pkgs = forAllSystems (system:
</span><span style="color:#323232;">    nixpkgs.legacyPackages.${system}
</span><span style="color:#323232;">  );
</span><span style="color:#323232;">in
</span><span style="color:#323232;">{
</span><span style="color:#323232;">  devShells = forAllSystems (system: {
</span><span style="color:#323232;">    default = pkgs.${system}.mkShell {
</span><span style="color:#323232;">      nativeBuildInputs = with pkgs.${system}; [
</span><span style="color:#323232;">        hello
</span><span style="color:#323232;">      ];
</span><span style="color:#323232;">    };
</span><span style="color:#323232;">  });
</span><span style="color:#323232;">}
</span>

It’s more verbose, but it makes the structure of outputs more transparent.

toastal,

Saving the dependency is pretty big since each flake you import will bring along its jungle of dependencies now in your downstream project. I can’t think of a use case where < 10 lines is worth a dependency—especially since as you noted, lib has the glue right there for you to put it all together.

doom_and_gloom, (edited ) in Thoughts on this?
@doom_and_gloom@lemmy.ml avatar

I think adoption is king. The best solutions often fail when it comes to adoption, though. And starting a new solution when one is already adopted is not at all easy.

I understand that this author is working at a much lower level than the gamers and other casual users, so they will be much more likely to have to deal with the repercussions of poor design choices and edge-case bugs and missing functionality. But if they can make things work well enough when they are paid to do so, then adoption will continue. (On the other hand, they will also be the among the first to hit any showstopper issues if they do exist.)

I don’t think this kind of community is the best place for discussing nitpicky technical details because to most of us it is effectively whining about issues we will never have to deal with. (Nor is it a bad place, per se.) I think the comment would find a better home being digested by the technical experts who work on display solutions and other interoperating pieces of the larger environment. They are in a good position to weigh the criticism’s merits, and if any concerns are highly merited then they are the ones who would decide whether and how to design and and implement improvements.

IzyaKatzmann,

Great comment rat-salute-2

RenardDesMers, in Flakes aren't real and cannot hurt you: a guide to using Nix flakes the non-flake way
@RenardDesMers@lemmy.ml avatar

Probably not the goal of the author but I guess this article convinced me that nix/nixOS is not for me.

tuto193,

Yeah, it really isn’t for everyone. The advantagees it provides is mostly for developers and companies. If you’re a company, managing a NixOS fork is useful, so all users of the system are on the same page always.

Otherwise the package manager itself can be used on its own. It’s neat being able to use packages from basically any distro without even needing to use a VM.

Nix is daunting indeed, but cool for those who want such tooling

Atemu, (edited )
@Atemu@lemmy.ml avatar

This is a lot to take in; it’s basically an overview of all the interesting features of Nix. When starting out, you don’t need this kind of in-depth knowledge. I personally gathered most of what was covered here in over 6-12months of using it and I did just fine.

It might still not be for you but don’t take this as the reference point.

Lettuceeatlettuce, in Thoughts on this?
@Lettuceeatlettuce@lemmy.ml avatar

This has Systemd vs Runit vibes. No matter how many anti-systemd folks scream to me about how horrible it is for XYZ technical reasons, every Linux distro I’ve ever used for years, desktop and server, has used systemd and I’ve never experienced single problem that those users claim I will.

Same here with Wayland. All the major desktop environments and distros have or are implementing Wayland support and are phasing out X. The only reason I’m not on Wayland on my main computer already is because of a few minor bugs that should be ironed out in the next 6-12 months with the newest release of plasma.

It’s not because Wayland is unusable. I try switching to Wayland about every 6-9 months, and every time there have been fewer bugs and the bugs that exist are less and less intrusive.

Any time you get hardcore enthusiasts and technical people together in large community, this will happen. The mechanical keyboard community is the same way, people arguing about what specific formula of dielectric grease is optimal to lube your switches with and what specific method of applying it is best.

At a certain point, it becomes fundamentalism, like comic book enthusiasts arguing about timeline forks between series or theology majors fighting about some minutia in a 4th century manuscript fragment. Neither person is going to change their views, they are just practicing their arguments back and forth in ever-narrowing scopes of pros and cons, technical jargon, and the like.

Meanwhile the vast majority of users couldn’t care less, and just want to play games, browse the web, and chat with friends, all of which is completely functional in Wayland and has been for a while.

corsicanguppy,

This has Systemd vs Runit vibes. No matter how many anti-systemd folks scream to me about how horrible it is for XYZ technical reasons, every Linux distro I’ve ever used for years, desktop and server, has used systemd

You’ll one day learn the difference between Popular and Correct.

Trump is popular, for instance.

and I’ve never experienced single problem that those users claim I will.

This is a “everyone tells me to get smoke detectors and I’ve never had a fire in all my 23 years of life” comment.

There’s a reason we have building codes, seat belts, traffic lights, emergency brakes, FDIC, and pilots’ licenses.

Lettuceeatlettuce,
@Lettuceeatlettuce@lemmy.ml avatar

Systemd isn’t “correct” what does that even mean? If you don’t agree with the standards and practices of the systemd project, that’s fine, but don’t act like there is some golden tablet of divine standards for system process management frameworks.

I wasn’t making an argument that systemd is perfect or that other frameworks like runit are inferrior. My argument was that I’ve been running a lot of Linux servers and desktop systems for years and I’ve never experienced the “huge stability problems and nightmare daemon management” that multiple systemd haters claim I will inevitably experience.

Maybe I’m incredibly lucky, maybe I’m not actually getting deep enough into the guts of Linux for it to matter, or maybe systemd isn’t the devil incarnate that some people make it out to be.

And also, free software is a thing. So I absolutely support and encourage alternatives like runit to exist. If you want your distros and servers to only use runit, that’s totally fine. If it makes you happy, or you have some super niche edge-case that makes systemd a bad solution, go for something else, you have my blessing, not that you need it.

caseyweederman,

All of the technically-minded posts I’ve read about systemd have been positive. The only detractors seem to be the ones with less technical knowledge, complaining about “the Unix philosophy” and parroting half-understood ideas, or worse, claiming that it’s bad because they have to learn it.

I know xorg has problems, but it was good to get some insight into why Wayland is falling short. Every argument I’ve seen in favor of Wayland has been “xorg bad”.

kunaltyagi,

X code is convoluted, so much so that the maintainers didn’t want to continue. AFAIK, no commercial entity has put any significant money behind Xorg and friends. Potentially unmaintained code with known bugs, unknown CVEs and demands for permission system for privacy made continuing with Xorg a near impossibility.

If you don’t want new features and don’t care about CVEs that will be discovered in future as well as the bugs (present and future), then you can continue using Xorg, and ignore all this. If not, then you need to find an alternative, which doesn’t need to be Wayland

Oh, and you might need to manage Xorg while other people and software including your distro move onto something else.

So yeah, “xorg bad” is literally the short summary for creating Mir and Wayland

caseyweederman,

I get it.
But as far as I can tell, there are just two xorgs now, one of them is just spelled “Wayland”.

meekah,
@meekah@lemmy.world avatar

yeah that’s that’s the impression I got so far as well.

voidMainVoid,

Meanwhile the vast majority of users couldn’t care less, and just want to play games, browse the web, and chat with friends, all of which is completely functional in Wayland and has been for a while.

The last couple of times I tried Wayland, it broke my desktop so badly that I couldn’t even use it.

Granted, that was “a while” ago, so my experience might be better now, but it’s made me very wary of it.

bennieandthez,
@bennieandthez@lemmygrad.ml avatar

What does “broke my desktop so badly that i coudlnt even use it” even mean? Such an over the top statement lol, makes it seem as if wayland is malware or smt.

meekah, (edited )
@meekah@lemmy.world avatar

I think the vast majority of users won’t change their display server without doing a fresh install, so I’m not sure if that’s a fair comparison to the average use case. That being said, you experiencing that issue is a fair reason for staying wary.

wewbull,

Why would I ever do a fresh install?

meekah,
@meekah@lemmy.world avatar

To avoid issues like misconfiguring your display server.

frazorth,

Been using Wayland through Fedora for years on multiple systems and its all been transparent. I’m not even sure what “it broke my desktop” could even mean except that you were using KDE, and that has been a buggy mess for a while when using their Wayland fork. That’s not Wayland, that’s KDE as Sway and Gnome have been stable for me for a very long time.

NeoNachtwaechter,

every Linux distro I’ve ever used for years, desktop and server, has used systemd and I’ve never experienced single problem that those users claim I will.

That means simply that you have never used systemd. You have only used a linux distro.

When you use a car only from the backseat and have some driver driving it for you, then you aren’t going to have any complaint about the engine.

Systemd becomes the more horrible, the closer you get to it.

yyyesss,

ha, you beautifully illustrated their point.

i’m not saying you’re wrong, it’s just funny how on-the-nose you got it.

Lettuceeatlettuce,
@Lettuceeatlettuce@lemmy.ml avatar

I run a bunch of Linux servers, multiple desktop instances, manage multiple IT clients, and took my first Linux certs working with Systemd management, all for years now.

But I’ll be sure to switch away from systemd when it becomes an issue…

ElectroLisa, in Thoughts on this?
@ElectroLisa@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Isn’t Linux about choice? If you don’t like Wayland/SystemD etc. then you can just not use it lol

zagaberoo,

Well of course, but some of us want to be well-informed on the tradeoffs we’re making.

Mango,

Performance isn’t about choice. It’s about the best choice.

ngn,
@ngn@lemy.lol avatar

it is but if 20 years later there are no apps that support xorg… well, you wont have the choice of running xorg

frazorth, (edited )

Isn’t Linux about choice?

No it isn’t.

www.islinuxaboutchoice.com

SnotFlickerman, in Linux reaches new high 3.82%
@SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

gs.statcounter.com/faq#methodology

Considering their methodology, I wonder how many of these are Steam Decks registering as “desktops” when they visit a website in the web broweser?

Fizz, (edited )
@Fizz@lemmy.nz avatar

I would consider the steamdeck to be a linux desktop if someone is browsing the internet on it.

SnotFlickerman, (edited )
@SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

I agree, but it’s definitely marketed as a gaming console of a sort, and not really marketed as a full-fledged PC.

So, imho, that technically skewers the numbers a bit, as it’s not a “desktop” in the traditional sense.

I mean, I’m still not calling 2023 the “Year of the Linux Desktop.” I’m calling it the “Year of the Portable Linux Gaming Console.”

The growth in percentage in Linux in Steam metrics is almost entirely because the Steam Deck.

Mouette,

You cant be sure, Valve pushing Steam Deck and Proton is what made me switch to Linux as lot of games now works but I haven’t bought a Steam deck

tsl,
@tsl@lemmy.stefanoprenna.com avatar

As stated from official Valve’s page www.steamdeck.com/en/oled

“Use your Deck as a PC, because it is one.” So Valve did market it as a PC and it’s one of the reasons I bought one more than a year ago. And it’s really my desktop (that I bring with me to places occasionally)c

Fizz,
@Fizz@lemmy.nz avatar

When you are using the steamdeck in handheld mode there is no web browser unless configured from desktop mode. The desktop on the steamdeck is no different to my computer therefore I don’t think it’s fair to wave it off as a console. It’s far closer to a pc than a console.

SnotFlickerman, (edited )
@SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

It’s far closer to a pc than a console.

Ehhh, you have to spend money on a decent dock to be able to use it with any consistency as a desktop. Sure, software-wise, it’s not a console, it plays PC games.

However, it’s physical form factor is a console. It looks and functions out of the box far more like a Nintendo Switch than a IBM ThinkPad.

It’s literally a gamepad with a screen and no keyboard or mouse. So despite being a PC platform, I would still consider this a “console,” based on outward-facing form factor alone, personally.

Fizz,
@Fizz@lemmy.nz avatar

That’s a fair point. Since we are talking about linux os share, the software that’s running on the device is more important to me than the form factor. What’s running on my steamdeck is so close to what’s running on my desktop pc that when I’m browsing the web on my steamdeck I’d consider myself browsing on linux rather than browsing on specifcally steam os.

silvercove,

Which is still good.

EddyBot, (edited ) in Is there any way to emulate aegis authenticator (fdroid) on an ubuntu based computer?

you can just use any other OTP application on Linux like gitlab.gnome.org/World/Authenticator or apps.kde.org/keysmith/, they all follow the same protocol
you can export your keys in Aegis and import them in most applications

sserdarth,

Of course there is a KDE app that is feature packed and beautiful and no live being has heard or known about.

kariboka,

Hahahaha so true

JCreazy, in Linux reaches new high 3.82%

My journey to Linux pretty much started with the reddit thing. I moved to Lemmy and started slowly eliminating corporations out of my life.

Olgratin_Magmatoe,
JCreazy,

I’m going to steal this okay?

Olgratin_Magmatoe,

Go for it. It was already an old, long dead meme when I posted it here.

kariboka,

Me too

WeLoveCastingSpellz,

same

Ramin_HAL9001, in Linux reaches new high 3.82%

I wonder if that dip in Windows in April, going down to like 62%, and the correlated boost for “Uknown” operating systems to 13% might somehow simply be Windows not being recognized properly and categorized as unknown?

It seems a bit far-fetched to me that a bunch of Windows users would for 1 month suddenly all decide to use ReactOS, FreeDOS, BSD, Solaris, Illumos, Haiku, Redox, and Plan 9.

mexicancartel,

Yeah probably some chrome update which made statscounter to fail to determine the OS, probably

chaorace, (edited ) in Thoughts on this?
@chaorace@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

I am of two minds:

  1. He’s not wrong
  2. It doesn’t matter at this point

It’s a mess, but honestly so are a lot of critical FOSS projects (e.g.: OpenSSH, GNUPG, sudo). Curmudgeons gonna curmudgeon. There was a point of no return and that was years ago – now that Wayland’s finally becoming useable despite itself it’s probably time to come to terms with the fact that better alternatives would have arisen had anyone thought they could truly manage it.

bear,

it’s probably time to come to terms with the fact that better alternatives would have arisen had anyone thought they could truly manage it.

This is the most important takeaway. There’s a lot of people whining about Wayland, but Wayland devs are currently the only people actually willing to put in the work. Nobody wants to work on X and nobody wants to make an alternative to Wayland, so why do we keep wasting time on this topic?

someacnt_,

Maybe the one who wrote the criticism is putting the work into an alternative, and complaining that it is not going afloat?

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