> And yes, there were Linux distros like Debian where people could get real computing done[0].

The author then kids in [0] that the most popular software in Debian was editors to edit X86Config but...

I fully agree that Windows was an horrible crashing piece of crap back then. Linux was a godsend to me (installed it in the early Slackware days).

Armed with Emacs and LaTeX, on Debian 1.1 then 1.2, I wrote a 440 pages book (published by an editor).

Linux was already rock stable solid, while Windows was a crashing PoS.

Linux was so solid that I'd also run it on my laptop (and back then all laptops were crappy). When I was late I'd let LaTeX convert the files to .dvi (IIRC) and the PostScript while driving to my editor. We'd then the PostScript file to the printer at my editor.

It was something else then Windows.

As for Windows, yes, I was using it too.

And the absolute best software I ever got back then was Ghost, way before Norton bought them (it then became Norton Ghost). That allowed me to take a full dump of the Windows partition and then restore it at will from that partition, when Windows would invariably become unusable.

When I discovered Linux, suddenly I had a stable system that didn't need to be re-installed every other day. There's a reason the world is powered by Linux and companies like Google weren't built on Windows.

And I also had a small consulting gig (for little SMEs) where I basically had a business installing brand new Windows systems for the clients and all their stuff (like Outlook) and then immediately imaging the entire disk.

Because the only guarantee was that Windows would be borken rather sooner than later.

TFA is right and Microsoft has always produce mediocre shit.

It's hard to say if the BSOD'ing Windows of yore was even shittier than the ad-infested, surveillance, behemoth Windows of today. Both are equally bad IMO.

Because the day Microsoft shall product a product that doesn't suck is the day they'll start producing vacuum cleaners.