Your post couldn’t be more true. Decades ago I was sold on MythTV, this PVR software but it only ran on Linux and you had to compile it yourself. So I gave Linux and MythTV a shot. As it turned out, both MythTV and early desktop Linux were a buggy, frustrating mess. X broke all the time. Incomprehensible, ungoogleable compile errors all the time.
I spent so much time troubleshooting MythTV and compilation problems that I ended up learning Linux inside and out and the C programming language to be able understand the compile errors. I went on to lead a major open source project and have had a long career as a programmer, using all the knowledge I gained that started with fighting MythTV.
I don’t want to dox myself so I’d rather not say, but it was some time ago and I’m no longer leading that project. I do still do development in the same field though!
That sounds kinda like my journey, although without the Marxist part.
Clueless about tech, bought an iMac
These ads are annoying. [Installs adblock Plus]. There. Except for fricking Taboola, they can DIAF. And the cookie popup banners. Why do they love cookies if they’re not playing cookie clicker?
It’s the MacOS Catalina Update!! It Thanos snapped my iPod music library. This taught me to avoid MacOS and realize that updates often just make things worse. Set up a dual boot with Windows.
I start browsing r/asshole_design too much. Teaches me to never trust a corporation. I also realize how phones keep dropping useful features. I finally realize uBlock origin blocks much more than ads.
Oh boy, this is where the rabbit hole starts. I’m sick of how slow my Mac is, addicted to discovering new cool apps on my phone, and discover FOSS. I install Linux for the first time, and it runs quite well on a laptop from 2009. Also YouTube goes full greed mode.
Get my new Windows gaming laptop, try to balance privacy with convenience. But I’m irked at how slow it is for some basic tasks. Everything is stable, except when the laptop’s SSD borked.
Uh oh. Discord, YouTube, and Reddit all make massively greedy decisions, and I don’t want to support those platforms anymore. I discover Lemmy. I try to focus extra hard on FOSS and donate $150 over the course of the year. I think this tells me I’ve became radicalized. Proprietary platforms keep getting worse and worse.
Linux resurgence. Tired of Windows, and one of my classes needs a UNIX terminal. Sounds like it’s time to dual boot (on 2 SSDs), with Ubuntu being the default. Also I buy a year of Nebula to support creators and stick it to Google.
Same thing happened to me. Moved to pop!_os.I have zero regrets. I’ve learned a ton. I use tons of apps off f-droid and foss Ubuntu apps. I have degoogled most of my life. I’m also developing an Firefox addon for lemmy. It’s usable as a user script addon now. It’s called lemmytools. It’s my small contribution. All because Reddit got stupid. I don’t even browse reddit for answers usually about tech/programming stuff anymore because they block my VPN.
There are literally dozens of us! I’m running Zorin. The Reddit debacle really hit home for me that free alternatives to commercial projects work best when everyone pitches in a little.
Lol, saaaaaame! I’ve run plenty of Linux servers over the past 30 years with only occasional attempts at desktop Linux, but never got it to graduate past a secondary box or dual-boot. All of the happy Linux desktop users I’ve run across on Lemmy convinced me to give it another go. I tried Ubuntu for a month under the mistaken assumption that it was still a relevant, stable, easy distro (10-15 years ago, it was the distro to use if you just wanted a no-fuss Linux desktop). Snaps made me want to end myself, but not quite give up on Linux altogether, so I pivoted and now I’m on month 3 of happily maining Arch!
Isn’t nix mostly for multi-system install? I did the nix thing a few years ago, spent a month on the config, and then never needed it again. Personally, I don’t see a use-case for single desktop installation ;)
I use multiple systems and even I feel NixOS is overkill, especially with their confusing and sometimes incomplete documentation.
On the other hand, Nix the package manager has been fantastic - especially if you’re on an immutable OS, or running some ancient “stable” distro - you can get all the packages you want, without breaking your system - and no need to learn the Nix language and write convoluted config files.
I’m running nix on my PC turned server, and there’s definitely a lot of advantages…I highly recommend it for people who can pick up languages easily and prefer fixing a problem once by brute force trial and error.
Doing easy things is much harder, but doing hard things can be laughably easy
I probably wouldn’t pick it as-is for my primary PC, but for a server? Amazing.
Ubuntu GNU/Linux is not entirely FOSS, as it ships with non-free software by default. If you’re committed to FOSS principles, I would recommend Debian GNU/Linux instead.
However, it’s important to note that Debian GNU/Linux is not recognized by the Free Software Foundation (FSF) as a completely FOSS distribution. This is because Debian includes non-free firmware packages for those who need them.
From a security perspective, this is acceptable, as the Linux kernel won’t load these packages unless the corresponding hardware is available. Debian ships with Free Software by default, and I would suggest giving it a try if possible!
It’s essentially the same as Ubuntu, but more freedom-respecting.
Completely FOSS isn’t completely self-sustainable either in the real world - you’d need to be using something like RISC-V with coreboot and a completely open hardware stack with zero proprietary firmware blobs in the mix + not to mention running a fully self-hosted email/cloud stack. And if you’re using a mobile phone - even a dumb one or a pinephone - then you’re not fully FOSS. I’m not aware of anyone who’s fully FOSS out there, except maybe RMS?
TBH, once stop running Windows, everything gets easier. And if your running Ubuntu or Mint, it’s not even that painful to start and hardware more or less just works.
Debian is nice for servers, but it’s a little out of date for desktop. YMMV, welcome to the club and ignore the snobs ❤️
Reddit death > installing mint on my second PC > realising I can run most of the games I play and installing mint on my main PC > start learning Rust as a first foray into programming in a long time > realise I want to go back to uni and study info tech to get out of my shitty marketing job > get a shitty second hand laptop off my parents that struggles to run windows and install endeavourOS to try something different.
It really is a slippery slope. When does it end???
The next step, you’re handwriting a fixit code because said ancient one off laptop won’t compile linux from scratch properly and some stupid piece of essential hardware is blocking your efforts to get to the shell first time.
You still have yet to get through some pis, then a couple of OSX boxes, a Windows VM on proxmox or when you find something in particular you want that’s easier in that direction. Then move into kubernetes.
You’ll end up with a couple of everything living their best life.
realise I want to go back to uni and study info tech
I highly recommend it! College as an adult who’s been in the workforce is way better than college as a kid fresh out of highschool. Great opportunity to make some more friends, do some cool college activities, plus there’s lots of good opportunities for student pricing on stuff if you have a .edu email and its a brilliant change of pace.
It ends when you write an AI better at configuring Linux than you are, but is also very good at soothing your pride… The latter is the infamous “alignment problem”
My slippery slope started with buying an old laptop off my company and deciding to install Ubuntu on it. Now all of my devices run Linux, I switched to Android with a FOSS ROM, degoogled myself in almost every way, and I run Nextcloud on an old laptop. Feels great to really own my devices and data.
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