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0 pointswhatch5y ago0 comments

> I have the same effective level of support which is to say none-at-all or via the community of volunteers.

I find community support for linux much much better (askubuntu, superuser and numerous blogs rather than official ms forums). Not sure if this is because I am software developer and am used to stackoverflow-like kind of support or windows "community support" is a mess.

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bartread5y ago

I literally dread ever having to Google for help on Windows related issues because the various forums are some of the worst cesspools of crowdsourced ignorance out there[0]. Every question has a dozen or more responses and almost none of them have anything useful to say. Absolutely awful.

I suspect the reason the quality of the community support for Linux is so much better is that the community is smaller, self-selecting, and generally more knowledgeable versus the majority of the Windows community. Up until recently it required a certain commitment to run Linux on the desktop and that still bleeds through.

Normally when I buy a new computer I just get a Macbook Pro but, with Apple seeming a bit off the rails, and working from home making a desktop machine more viable again, I'm thinking about building my own machine. I'm also seriously considering Linux because Windows 10, I'm afraid, drives me to distraction most days (I have to use it for work unfortunately).

[0] The StackExchange sites aren't quite as bad, but the other forums are absolutely grim.

AnIdiotOnTheNet5y ago

Official (free) support from Microsoft is pure garbage, but at least in my experience it is much easier to get support from the Windows community than Linux for a few reasons: 1) no ideological bullshit, 2) there aren't 100 different distros, 3) the way things are done doesn't change drastically every few years.

whatchOP5y ago

1) I agree, but it is quite easy to ignor. I do not see it often though.

2) Agree, but with popular distributions it is relatively easy to find help. With unpopular ones not so much, but you can always choose more common one. If you need to use some special distro experience can be worse.

3) Sorry, cannot disagree more. For me OS utilities in Ubuntu are dead simple and this works for me quite well. But once upon a time windows 10 decided that for some reason I must have 3 different English laouts (UK, US and Latin or smth like that). I did manage to remove redundant ones by performing some unobvious actions in unobvious settings sections. And extra layouts kept returning after reboots. I had other similarly annoying problems and they were difficult to resolve because solutions posted literally month before had completely different settings layout on screenshots compared to mine. In windows 10 settings do change drastically every few... months?

Command-line-based interfaces seem more stable. And most common issues are already have accessible solutions if you use stable release of popular Linux distro. At least in my experience.

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