alt Hacker NewsMicrosoft forced me to switch to Linux
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This was me in 2022 or 2023. I have posted on HN about my shift a few times. I gave up with Windows 10 because you needed Windows Pro in order to make an "offline" account, I spent $2000+ for a gaming rig, and I couldn't add new users, one program told me to use the other program which brought me back to the original program... I had to go out of my way, buy a license just to make it work. I just went and installed Linux finally. I was on POP_OS! for a good year, but been on Arch Linux for one year plus now.
I know its a "meme" to talk about how great Arch is, but when you want the latest of something, Arch has it. I use EndeavourOS since it had a nicer simpler installer (idk why Arch doesn't invest in whats standard in every other major distro) and if you just use "yay" you don't run into Pacman woes.
Alternatively, I'm only buying Macs as well, but for my gaming rigs, straight to Arch. Steam and Proton work perfectly, if you don't sell your games on Steam or in a way I can run them on Linux I am not buying or playing them.
As a long-time Linux user who fairly recently dropped the Windows partition entirely, I do think the remaining chafing points are these:
* UI framework balkanization has always been, and remains a hideous mess. And now you don't just have different versions of GTK vs QT to keep track off, but also X vs Wayland, and their various compatibility layers.
* Support for non-standard DPI monitors sucks, mostly because of the previous point. Wayland has fractional scaling as a sort-of workaround if you can tolerate the entire screen being blurry. Every other major OS can deal with this.
* Anything to do with configuring webcams feels like you're suddenly in thrown back 20 years into the past. It'll probably work fine out of the box, but if it doesn't. Hoo boy.
* Audio filtering is a pain to set up.
My story is simpler. Microsoft dropped the support for Windows 10 and gave me no upgrade path to Windows 11 because my CPU was 5 years too old apparently.
So I installed Fedora on that machine, I learned the process, I went through the hurdles. It wasn’t seamless. But, Fedora never said “I can’t”. When it was over, it was fine.
Only if Microsoft had just let me install Windows 11 and suffer whatever the perf problem my CPU would bring. Then I could consider a hardware upgrade then, maybe.
But, “you can’t install unless you upgrade your CPU” forced me to adopt Linux. More importantly, it gave me a story to tell.
There is a marketing lesson there somewhere, like Torvalds’ famous “you don’t break userspace”, something along the lines of “you don’t break the upgrade path”.
I came to rely pretty heavily on Docker and WSL(2) in Windows. I was an insiders user for a bit over a decade, and worked with .Net and C# since it was "ASP+" ...
I had setup a dual boot when I swapped my old GTX 1080 for an RX 5700XT, figuring the "open source" drivers would give me a good Linux experience... it didn't. Every other update was a blank/black screen and me without a good remote config to try to recover it. After about 6 months it was actually stable, but I'd since gone ahead and paid too much for an RTX 3080, and gone back to my windows drive...
I still used WSL almost all day, relying mostly on VS Code and a Browser open, terminal commands through WSL remoting in Code and results etc. on the browser.
Then, one day, I clicked the trusty super/win menu and started typing in the name of he installed program I wanted to run... a freaking ad. In the start menu search results. I mean, it was a beta channel of windows, but the fact that anyone thought this was a good idea and it got implemented, I was out.
I rebooted my personal desktop back to Linux... ran all the updates and it's run smoothly since. My current RX 9070XT better still, couldn't be happier. And it does everything I want it to do, and there's enough games in Steam through Proton that I can play what I want, when I want. Even the last half year on Pop Coxmic pre-release versions was overall less painful than a lot of my Windows experiences the past few years. Still not perfect, but at least it's fast and doesn't fail in ways that Windows now seems to regularly.
Whoever is steering Windows development at Microsoft is clearly drunk at the wheel over something that should be the most "done" and polished product on the planet and it just keeps getting worse.
Every month more and more people switch to Linux and I just love it. I'm tired of one company controlling the core operating system of 85% of desktop computers and users being at their whim.
You want proprietary programs? Alright, fine, one can argue for that. But the central, core operating system of general purpose computers should be free and fully controllable by the users that own them!
> You had unsaved work? Too bad, it's gone, get bent.
This has happened to me a couple of times. I put the PC to sleep and the next morning I discover it has decided to close everything to install an update.
Not using Windows ever again to do any work. Say what you will about Apple but at least they don't do crap like this.
Its was a good read until at the end ...
> For the remainder of 2026, Microsoft is cooking up a big one: replacing more and more native apps with React Native. But don't let the name fool you, there's nothing "native" about it. These are projects designed to be easily ported across any machine and architecture, because underneath it all, it's just JavaScript. And each one spawns its own Chromium process, gobbling up your RAM so you can enjoy the privilege of opening the Settings app.
I'm a little tired of people junking on react native when they have no clue what they talked about (And I'm not even react native dev but iOS dev). React Native doesn't spawn any chromium process. This is not electron. React Native doesn't even use v8 engine. All UI views and widgets are native. Platform SDK is native, Yoga Layout is native C++ and even faster than UIKit layout. Majority of RN code is Native - go have a look at github at languages section. JS is only 19% of codebase, everything else is C++, Obj-C, Obj-C++, Kotlin, Java.
The problem AFAIK with startup being laggy was making http requests to downloads those ads.
I've been running Ubuntu Linux for a long time now (over a decade, started with 8.04). Linux still has it's fair share of bugs but I'll take having to deal with those over running Windows or MacOS any day.
For me the biggest thing is control, with Windows there are some things like updates that you have zero control over. It's the same issue with MacOS, you have more control than Windows but you're still at the whims of Apple's design choices every year when they decide to release a new OS update.
Linux, for all it's issues, give you absolute control over your system and as a developer I've found this one feature outweighs pretty much all the issues and negatives about the OS. Updates don't run unless I tell them to run, OS doesn't upgrade unless I tell it to. Even when it comes to bugs at least you have the power to fix them instead of waiting on an update hoping it will resolve that issue. Granted in reality I wait for updates to fix various small issues but for bigger ones that impact my workflow I will go through the trouble of fixing it.
I don't see regular users adopting Linux anytime soon but I'm quickly seeing adoption pickup among the more technical community. Previously only a subset of technical folks actually ran Linux because Windows/MacOS just worked but I see more and more of them jumping ship with how awful Windows and MacOS have become.
I'm still surviving on Windows but only because over the last four years, as each new annoyance and regression arose, I made the mistake of very gradually, in tiny increments, sinking the time into invoking the arcane incantations necessary to tame each one.
15 minutes to deactivate an entire branch of notification pathways, 20 minutes to (mostly) restore the Right-Ctrl key they hijacked into a CoPilot key. 10 minutes to restore Win10 functionality to the Win11 taskbar with the wonderful ExplorerPatcher. $5 spent on Start11 to sidestep the whole start menu train wreck. And little 3 to 5 minute fixes with WindHawk (an amazing store-like platform to discover, install and manage open source Windows GUI patches).
I'm the stupid frog who didn't leap from the gradually heating pot. I acclimated to the boiling. And it's... okay. At least for now. But I know someday soon, the thousand faceless product managers at MSFT will break something unfixable. Somehow exceed the considerable abilities of the large community finding clever hacks and patches to keep the harsh Win wasteland livable for hardy souls.
While I greatly appreciate Linux philosophically and deeply respect it architecturally, I still really liked what Windows got so close to being - right before MSFT shifted biz models, simultaneously de-investing and turning it into a promotional platform for their other business. When that day comes, it'll suck to leave behind the wonderful third-party tools like Everything search, Ditto clipboard and AHK automation that streamline my day.
The thing I don't understand is why MSFT refuses to just make a version of Windows that's a Product again. I'd gladly pay them $100/yr for an upgraded "Windows Ti Super+" that just wants to be a good operating system for advanced users, instead of a strategic moat or monetization flywheel.
Shhh! Don’t tell anyone.
Years ago MS depended on Windows. It was the profit center. Everything MS did was a moat to sell more seats. Even MS-Exchange was just a ploy to force enterprises to stop deploying any other operating system.
That all changed with Azure.
MS realized they could make billions in Windows or trillions with Azure.
They changed the org structure. Now Azure is at the top and everything else is a moat or a way to draw people to Azure. They changed the sales commission (your multiplier doesn’t kick in unless you’ve sold enough cloud services).
Windows is no longer a profit center. It’s a cost center.
Anything that scares people away from using Windows is a benefit.
Let those other suckers spend money developing operating systems. As long as it runs on a VM in Azure, Microsoft will profit.
Windows being worse and worse isn’t a bug. It’s a feature.
I take an adversarial approach to Windows. Which started with Windows XP and its supremely annoying zip-files-as-folders approach. Sorry, but I didn’t want that, and I still gleefully rip it out of every Windows install I touch.
And then things started snowballing with every version.
Plus, I had elderly clients that got hopelessly lost on any UI after XP, so I had a lot of hacking-and-slashing to do there for not only them, but also myself. Like, just give me the option of a traditional XP-style start menu, goddammit. Thank goodness for StartIsBack.
But what took me about 6-8hrs of directed work with XP is now about 24-48hrs of work with Windows 11. Honestly, I am at the point where I just want to create a highly opinionated one-click configuration app that does everything for me.
And I would, if I still did as many installs as I was doing even half a decade ago.
Hmmm… as a DotNet developer… anyone interested in a spyware-eviscerating, copilot-extracting, settings-preserving app that allows you to retain a mostly-XP style look, and which remains resident to alert you of Microslop changing settings back?
Apple forced me to switch to Linux!
Linux should consider paying Microsoft and Apple for new customers. Perhaps the customer acquisition funnel is quite long, at least it took 20 years of using Apple in my case before switching to Debian (Xfce), but it was worth it!
> Basic operations are so much faster on Linux. Opening directories,
The fact that "opening directories" is something specifically mentioned as a point of difference hints to me that there is something terribly wrong in Microsoft / Windows -land.
If "opening directories" isn't a solved problem in any Operating System that's no longer in beta, never mind one that's been around for 30-odd years, there's something rotten in the foundations.
With Windows 10 EOL, I had to decide whether to upgrade my laptop to Windows 11 or Linux. I've been a Windows user for decades, but with all the user-hostile bullshit coming out of Microsoft and the degradation of performance on Windows 11, I decided to go with Ubuntu instead.
I'm still on a Windows 11 desktop for the time being, but seriously considering switching there as well. The main thing stopping me is the undeniably better ecosystem on Windows for professional video editing and music production, with no comparable open-source options. I've spent hundreds if not thousands of dollars on high quality virtual instruments and effects plugins. But if I can manage to run these under emulation on Linux or find equivalent Linux-native versions, I will happily abandon all Microsoft products at this point.
Still reading the article, but early on it says:
"Also, is it weird that I still remember the specs of my first computer, 22 years later?"
My first computer was a TRS-80 Model 1, 1.78 Mz Z80 with 16 KB RAM.
That was 48 years ago. Is it weird that I remember that?
How likely is a future where Microsoft
(a) gives us back 2000/XP/7/11 options for UI,
(b) gives us a desktop-first experience when we have keyboard/mouse plugged in,
(c) stops turning every OS feature into an ad, and makes it utilitarian again,
(d) and focuses 100% on making a stable OS and high quality dev/office apps?
It would be so nice if they just forked a commit from ~2005 and started from there.
(Maybe Copilot will mess up & erase commits so they have to? One can only dream.)
I think Linux is not quite there as gaming system. Simply due to games' compatibility (and I don't play latest and hottest titles, more like Cities-Skylines/Transport Fever/Anno/Satisfactory etc). Plus to my knowledge NVidia drivers are still an issue.
But for literally anything else I think it's ready. Just browsing? Office work (writing/spreadsheets/presentations/email)? Development? Media production? You're good.
For Linux-curious I'd advise to get a dedicated hardware, like 5/7 year old business machine (Thinkpad or even smth like Dell Latitude), they'll be under $300. Don't do Arch (unless you do that for the sake of being able to install Arch). Instead, get Ubuntu, Mint, Fedora, Debian, Zorin (the last one specifically for Windows users), or one of many other beginner-friendly distros, and drive it for a bit. Get the software you want, see if it works for you, and if you don't like it, it's all good. If you do, you can gradually move all your stuff to the new machine, or install Linux on your main machine.
That's what I did (quite a) few years ago when I got fed up with Windows 8, took me about a year, but I've been on Mint Mate ever since. My gaming rig is still Windows 11 but all it has is my Steam collection.
I switched from Windows (11) to Linux (Xubuntu) back in November, mostly because of all the AI stuff I didn't trust. While Linux is working ok for me, I can see why people complain about its not being user-friendly, particularly if you're not a Real Programmer. I've had to go to forums too many times to figure out why this or that doesn't work. The latest is the fact that 'apt update' has stopped working today for Vivaldi--it worked ok yesterday, but I have not been able to get it working after spending an hour or more. (If you're interested, there's a thread here: https://forum.vivaldi.net/topic/115133/public-key-is-not-ava....)
Also the fact that some apps update via 'apt', some by 'snap', and if you don't watch out some might update by 'flatpack'. While I think snap is updating automatically, it's hard to tell; some mornings I wake my PC up and only hours later do I discover that there's an update pop-up hidden behind other windows.
Oh, and every day I get a 'system problem' popup that asks if I want to submit a report, but won't tell me what the alleged problem was. I thought only Microsoft did that sort of thing?
I'm also not happy about the malware protection. Apparently the only anti-virus still available is ClamAV (and Kapersky, but for reasons I won't go into I don't trust that). But the gui for ClamAV has not been supported for several years, and running it from the command line is not so straightforward, never mind keeping it updated. (And don't tell me that Linux doesn't need antivirus protection. That's just whistling past the graveyard, particularly if you sometimes log in on public WiFi networks.)
I guess there are distros that are better about some of these things, but life is too short to try all of them, and hope that some bug (like the Vivaldi update thing) doesn't show up months later.
So yes, I'm using Linux, and I'm not planning to go back to Windows. But Linux sure could work better.
Linux since 1996! In chronological order: Slackware, SuSE, DLD, LSF, Gentoo, Ubuntu (starting with 04.10!), eventually Debian 12, now 13.
Back in the days I compiled the kernel myself! :-D
Sure, occasionally I used Windows 3.11, 95, 98se, XP, Vista, 7 and 10, but never as my main system.
I am a software developer, but also do gaming, video production and audio producing. I never got the discussion, Linux works for me for almost 30 years now.
One day, I applied for a new job and was already on the company tour. When they told me that I could only use a Windows computer provided by them, I quickly said, ‘No, thank you,’ and left. The faces they made were truly priceless.
Another day, I applied for another job again and, after some hesitation, unfortunately said yes when they tried to foist a Windows computer on me, because the actual project was really cool. That was the worst year of my career, thanks to restricted Windows 10.
As an Ableton user myself, I’m pretty surprised that this musician could just… switch from Ableton to Bitwig. Goes to show how dire the situation was I guess.
I still have yet to hear any non-technical person I know encounter issues on Windows and seriously consider switching away. The learned helplessness instilled by Microsoft is very difficult to get people to shake off.
Linux user since about 1998, leaning towards BSDs today. Network engineer + R&D + software dev. Daily driver (desktop) about 2002-2010 - work made it too difficult later. Very occasional gamer. Corporate world will give you a Windows VDI or web cloudy things if need be. Win10 on my laptop out of habit, mostly using terminals + WSL and a browser. Lightroom user, but flexible. None of the other gear I own runs Windows, and the numbers are significant (racks). I run my laptops until they die - the current one is 10y and hasn't died yet but won't run Win11 without going through hoops. Next laptop will not be running Windows outside of a VM.
Win7 was a workhorse, moving to win10 felt unnecessary - and I still remember how the laptop vendor had a system performance tuning app for win7 that you could use to put it into limp mode and have it run on battery for a full day and most of the night. No such thing on win10 on the same hardware. Everything has its time, and hopefully I'll never even get to experience the joy that apparently is win11. The times for software freedom of choice are as good as they have ever been.
Like the author says:
> Linux is the preferred platform for development
Honestly I'm surprised he was using a non unix system this long, I guess it kinda proves his point that switching costs can seem huge
Ah, the Microsoft "updates".
After the last "update" the setting for turning windows "game optimization" on and off doesn't work anymore and made factorio unplayable (it MUST be off, otherwise it optimized lag and stuttering and it automatically turns on after every larger update). Since games was the only reason I still had a pc with windows it was time to move. For funzies it tried installing some updates on the last shutdown (it got wiped afterwards).
The only pc I now have with windows on it is a early 00's pc with 98SE on it.
I was away from Windows for the past 12 years. Recently we bought a desktop and had to install Wondows on it. I was just shocked by the level of shittification that happened. I can't even find a Solitaire game that is not littered with ads.
I was a big fan of Satya. I thought he had new vision that aligns with the emerging world. I saw some successes he had with cloud, office 365 etc. But when offered to take Altman in, I knew Satya is no longer maintaining the stature of the grand company built by Gates.
For a while when I bought new computer (recently Intel NUC), I'd just keep the Windows installed there in case I needed it and I'd dualboot into Linux. More recently I just reflash the whole ssd with Debian and I haven't looked back. Interestingly enough I also have older Macbook Pro from 2015 that I also installed clean Debian on and it's been working amazingly well too. The only thing that would need any patching is the camera, but I don't use it. Everything else worked out of the box - keyboard backlight with nice UI controls in GNOME, LCD brightness, sound, bluetooth, etc.
Without knowing anything internally about how microsoft builds:
Product driven development and too many managers with MBAs led to this problem.
I think Windows 11 would have had much more consumer buy-in in the early days if they would have at least extended non-OEM support back to the Skylake generation, if not further, which it looks like it would have be easy to do, since it ran just fine on much older machines. I didn't object to them making TPM 2.0 mandatory for new OEM builds, just to the making it mandatory for people wanting to upgrade to it.
Of course, then the ads and other broken-ness got a lot worse. But people might put up with that more if they had upgraded to Windows 11 years ago instead of just looking at doing it now that Windows 10 support has ended.
I had the same story but 15 years ago. I was so happy with XP, but Vista was terrible, so I put Ubuntu on my laptop. When 7 came, it became my OS on my desktop. But then it was 8 time. Couldn't bare it. Now it's Linux everywhere, including my sister, parents, grand parents, girlfriend, brother. Linux Mint is perfect for non technical people BTW. I heard good things about Zorin OS as well.
Between using macOS at work and macOS at home, I really only had my Windows 10 PC for running games in Steam (and I don't even really game very much. I had originally built it with all new parts for Flight Simulator 2020) so its behavior was already becoming annoying whenever I went to use Windows such as the nagging and lack of consent implied with the "finish setting up your PC" window having "continue" (in a bold button) or whatever and "maybe later" (in a tiny link) as options, for example. (The linked article also pointed this out.)
So after making sure I had everything I wanted to keep copied off that computer, I was going to try out Bazzite, but something made me try out the plain old SteamOS steam deck installer first. To my surprise, it actually worked, but only because I had the exact type of system it expected:
64-bit Intel or AMD CPU. (I have AMD.)
AMD Radeon graphics.
NVMe SSD primary boot drive.
UEFI BIOS support
Even the wifi worked. Well, it didn't work the first time, so I thought it wasn't supported. So I hard wired it with Ethernet, but then I saw the Wifi was working. It's possible it updated something or maybe it just needed a reboot.
If it hadn't worked then Bazzite or something similar would have since it's designed to run Steam but with more driver support.
So my complete Windows history is: 3.1, 3.11, 95, 98, 2000, XP (set to the classic GUI mode), 7, and finally 11, skipping all the others. Windows 7 was peak.
I’m getting closer and closer to making the same decision.
I have a Surface Laptop 5 that won’t enable the AI cruft so I got somewhat lucky there.
But the copilot business is AAF.
And now that I use Claude Code in WSL or my Ubuntu server, I’m pretty much done with visual studio development.
Not sure what’s left.
Satya Nadala will have single-handedly destroyed the Windows ecosystem.
At work, my employer is still running Microsoft products for the desktop environment. At home, assuming I'm using Microsoft products at all (rare), it's from inside the Chromium web browser on Linux or BSD.
I'll switch to emacs if things go on like this.
Everyone are very unhappy with Windows 11. They kind of were OK with Windows 10. It's continuing the same old cycle. Windows 12 they will make hopefully things tolerable again..
I use Windows to play some games. I remember dual booting on 2000s -- my grub entry for Windows was called "WOW Client".
There’s a lot of odd things said in this article. Like “no more file explorer hanging”, “no more waiting for the start menu to open” - is this something that actually happens to people? Perhaps on very old hardware I could see it, but it’s not my experience at all. Lots of weird emotional and very biased parts to this article.
But it’s just gonna take off here anyway because it’s a switching to Linux article which is like offering HN users free coke.
It's not going to get any better. Microsoft's problem is tech debt. Copilot doesn't pay tech debt it creates it. It will only get worse faster.
You know what's funny about this article.... Back in 2012 I had the same problems with Windows Update and that is what forced me to go to a mac. I've never looked back.
> Actually, scratch that, I think it really started with the non-consensual updates
MS in general have idea of consent of an average rapist.
Yes/Remind me later is basically norm in their dark UI patterns, it bothered me for months to add copilot button to teams
He doesn't get into why he didn't switch to Apple. Kind of a middle ground - it's still got the maddening things about being from a corporate behemoth, but it's closer to Unix and you can run your audio software there. (I would be using Linux instead of Apple yesterday if it weren't for a single music program I can't live without).
I am thankful that so far Microsoft hasn't removed local admin capabilities of Windows, but I dread the day that happens (mainly because it remains the most consistent ways one can deny windows updates).
Because forcing updates down people's throat creates this, and boy do I hate Microsoft's insistence on doing this for drivers, where you get such fun things like Microsoft installing a different AMD GPU driver than the one that AMD gives out (this to be fair is partially to be blamed on AMD for not having just 1 versioning system) so then you have to go into safe mode, DDU, disconnect the internet, install the drivers, turn off automatic driver update in an obscure setting.
Meanwhile on Linux it's literally 1 version that exists in the kernel.
Ever since Wayland added support for changing mouse scroll speed & changing/customizing middle click behavior that is a lot more consistent, I've used Linux to daily drive, especially with immutable distros ensuring even IF an update breaks my system I can rollback.
I never advocated for Windows, but I always used it because it "just worked". At a certain point, I realized - as OP had - that I was spending just as much time configuring Windows as I would be spending configuring Linux.
I've moved to Kubuntu and haven't looked back. Proton support is amazing, and Claude Code fixes the doc-diving problem that used to plague Linux. In fact, with Claude, I was able to get such a buttery smooth setup on Kubuntu - Wezterm auto-saving and restorable sessions (even with multiple windows), a working fading background switcher with history, automounting drives and vhdx images on startup - and these are all relatively simple things, but they were near-frictionless to set up and they don't break on a random Tuesday. I love it and would recommend anyone who is on Windows to reconsider.
Had a similar experience in around ~2017 and switched over to Linux. At the time I didn't have the time to build my own and bought a mid-range System76 laptop.
Best computer decision I've ever made. I'm not a heavy gamer so the machine is still running fine. I've only had one time in the last 9 years where I had to drop everything and fix my computer vs Windows where it felt like once a year
> All major browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Edge, Brave) have native Linux builds. Full support. No compromises.
Full support ? I thought that the DRM were not the same (e.g. Disney+ and Amazon Prime limited to 480p on Linux which is a scam... At least, I remember having to hack something to use the Windows version of Chrome with WINE in order to get a decent image with Amazon Prime when I got a 6-month offered subscription a few years ago)
I've been using Linux as my main system for ~25 years, but always kept Windows installed for games. On my latest computer I've build 3 years ago, thanks to Steam with Proton, I no longer have Windows and have been happily playing Windows-only games without major issues.
I remember reading an article many years ago about product management being like being a parent, and there being a latter point where you need to let the product go and admit it's done. Windows is clearly there, and Microsoft are doing a terrible job of it. Yes, it's less relevant than it's ever been, but it's still vastly widely deployed, earns money, and delivers other cash cows (like Office) - all they have to do is do the basic stuff to keep it going and not mess it up, but somehow that is not what's happening. Wild.
>Also, is it weird that I still remember the specs of my first computer, 22 years later?
Only weird because you were only 6 years old. My first computer was an IBM XT clone, with the full 640k of RAM, a 30 MB harddrive, 5 1/4" floppy drive, Hercules graphics and the amber-colored screen. Also had the turbo button that took it from 4.77 MHz to 10 MHz. Ran DOS v3.3 for a while but eventually upgraded to v5.0.
So happy to see so many new Linux users as a long time user and developer for the platform. I want to welcome anyone and PLEASE feel free to use AI to make awesome stuff or solve problems. The FOSS community is still adapting to the new influx of developers and tools, vibe coders, etc.
Be cautious with running commands or making package changes based on suggestions from AI tools. Ask clarifying questions and it may realize doing so would either break your system or be attempting to vastly modify it.
My advice is get Docker installed and do most of your stuff in there. If you mess up and expose a Postgres container it will get hacked, but not escape the container, whereas if you install Postgres as a system package and make that same mistake you will be fully owned.
I'm an Apple guy through and through, but I am in Georgia Techs OMSCS program. For some of the classes, you need to use a VM that doesn't play nicely with Apple Silicon. So I went over to Microcenter and picked up a cheap PC with Windows. I loathe using it, even if I am in the VM the whole time. I'm amazed at the amount of ads that pop up and for a while, sound just didn't work. Like not with headphones or just out of the normal speakers until eventually a random update fixed it. I get not wanting to be in the Apple ecosystem, but at this point in time I don't know why you would want Windows and not go for Linux.
Past week I got to know about InputActions [0] so I installed Kubuntu 25.10 to test it, and it is very promising. Linux never had a proper mouse gesture support, and I won't go into details, but this was one of the three dealbreakers for me. The other one was a Windows-only app which ran so sluggishly on all previous tests I've made over the years, but with Wine 11 the app is just as good and fast as on Windows. Though I first need to populate the registry with an icon set. But now with AI this can be easily automated (letting it write a script I then run). The third is some custom electron-based launcher which is heavily Windows-customized, which I will need to migrate to Linux, but also this should be easy with AI.
For the first time I feel like there is a real path for me to switch to Linux, and it's about time!
I just started a new job where I'm subjected to Windows 11. They gave me a behemoth of a laptop. 64GB of RAM, absolute screamer of a CPU, big GPU, the whole deal.
Windows 11's file browser lags when opening directories with more than 100-ish files. Windows 11's file browser takes a few seconds to open at all.
Context menus take a noticeable amount of time to appear.
I'm getting used to a new keyboard, so I keep hitting Print Screen by accident. Half the time I can smack Esc and Snipping Tool will go away. The other half of the time, I have to mouse over and click the X to close it. There is no pattern to when Esc does/doesn't work.
If my computer goes to sleep, WSL becomes unresponsive. I have to save all my stuff and reboot to continue working.
If Windows 11 struggles this badly on a brand new laptop that I'm certain would retail for $4000+, I can only imagine how miserable it is for everyone else. All my colleagues who have been here for a bit longer got last-generation laptops. oof.
Edit... and besides, what does Windows 11 even do that KDE Plasma 5 wasn't doing a decade ago? How did it take this long to get a tabbed file browser?