The future of Linux

I’m not proposing anything here, I’m curious what you all think of the future.

What is your vision for what you want Linux to be?

I often read about wanting a smooth desktop experience like on MacOS, or having all the hardware and applications supported like Windows, or the convenience of Google products (mail, cloud storage, docs), etc.

A few years ago people were talking about convergence of phone/desktop, i.e. you plug your phone into a big screen and keyboard and it’s now your desktop computer. That’s one vision. ChromeOS has its “everything is in the cloud” vision. Stallman has his vision where no matter what it is, the most important part is that it’s free software.

If you could decide the future of personal computing, what would it be?

SapphironZA,

I wish distro’s would combine efforts much more so we have a better desktop experience. Do we really need 15 window managers when we could have 2 or 3 much better ones.

Unify to a single package manager, they are all functionally the same.

Standardize on flatpacks and abandon snaps and appimage

tar_xf,

I like the option to pick different package managers but it would behoove the community to actually settle on a package format. Making a deb or rpm are very different processes and while containers are nice for server side stuff I wish there was something easier for desktop

SapphironZA,

The fact that the processes are so different, is part of the problem. Developers need to spend the same effort 3 or 4 times.

q47tx,
@q47tx@lemmy.world avatar

Appimages serve a different purpose than packages that you install.

SapphironZA,

I get that, but in functionally they are so similar from an end user perspective, I would argue their development efforts should be combined.

bitwolf,

Steam Deck gets more popular.

Steam console released with improved multi user experience and VR.

PlayStation sales drop in growth.

Steam OS released, PCs can use it with generic kernels.

Gaming PC manufacturers offer steam OS as a preinstalled.

PC manufacturers start to offer popular distros preinstalled.

System 76 puts their in house laptops into Best Buy shelves.

Adobe and Office no longer stuck on Windows and are distributed as wasm applications.

jsdz,

Well okay, since it’s up to me: Let’s have free software. Fully free Linux on every phone, including all “firmware” which has gotten awfully soft lately. No more proprietary driver blobs for ethernet controllers or cellular modems. No more proprietary DRM modules. No more “smart” consumer goods that come without source code. The free software revolution has gone pretty well in some respects, but we need to finish the job and put an end to all that garbage.

Snoopy,
@Snoopy@jlai.lu avatar

An immutable OS that run all app whatever are their package distribution.

Later a full OS rewritten in Rust with goods tools that share folder’s content accross all devices and mass storage device as syncthing do.

Let’s imagine a button where you click on add devices, then you scan the QR code and chose which folder you want to share. :)

  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • •
  • linux@lemmy.ml
  • localhost
  • All magazines
    •
    Loading…
    Loading the web debug toolbar…
    Attempt #