1y ago

"Linux Desktop: A Collective Delusion" - an unhinged rant

Linux has made significant strides, and in 2023, it’s better than ever. However, there are still individuals perpetuating a delusion: that desktop Linux is as user-friendly and productive as its mainstream counterparts. After a few discussions on Lemmy, I believe it’s important to provide a clear review of where Linux falls short as a daily driver for average users.

EDIT: can I just make it clear I don't agree with this article one bit and think it's an unhinged polemic?

You're viewing a single thread.

120 comments

There us so much wrong with this article. From installing a fucking browser via flatpack, over ignoring the fact that office 365 is a thing to the fact that there are alternatives to Adobe.
Sure, not everything is perfect right now, and people have to learn new stuff.
I have migrated multiple people to fedora in the last two years. And guess what, regardless of type or age of user, they had no troubles with it to this day. They use gimp, play, have browsers with password managers, and write office documents. Yes. MS office.
Articles like this are one reason why people hesitate to make the switch. Doompainting, that's all it is.
And what the hell are you talking about vrr? Kde, sway and hyperland support it for years now under wayland. Gnome still does not have it, but that is gnome.
And if more distributions would not per default use gnome, such misconceptions wouldn't exist in the first place.
- What rivals photoshop on Linux? Gimp is shit.
  
  Factual reasons for this please. Besides the horrible, privacy braking, AI stuff, what can photoshop do that gimp can not?
  
  If you are professional you use what your colleagues are using. You can’t have 8 people in photoshop and 1 person in Gimp. You are not going to get a studio to flip over to gimp if they are a Photoshop house because it will cost a lot of time and money. Especially not larger operations.
  Individual freelancers? Sure. Industry capture? Way more difficult.
  
  This is a reason, but it has nothing to do with alternatives. It would still hold true if you have 8 gimp and one photoshop users
  
  If you want more people to use your app, then more people have to be using your app. Simple as.
  
  Well yeah, we are talking about what causes adoption. You have to incentivize people. Maybe it’s cost. Maybe it’s feature sets. Maybe it’s being FOSS. The point is people don’t change their professional software lightly. Production houses even less so.
  
  The problem with this is that GIMP doesn't aim, or have the funding to be more than just a Photoshop clone, so at best it will be as good as PS but for free. That won't help you convince people already making money from their work using PS, but maybe given enough time and some advertisement people who are new to image manipulation will start learning how to use GIMP instead of Photoshop.
  
  GIMP's problem - and most FOSS media production tools face this issue - is that it is always years behind Adobe's offerings. The gap is very wide the moment you go from hobbyist to even part-time professional. Day to day users who just need to cut a video around or touch up a photo are generally going to be happy.
  Make no mistake, I do not like Adobe as a company. I only use Premiere and Photoshop/Lightroom because my company pays for it. But the fact is Adobe is years ahead. GIMP will never have the AI-integration/automatic tools that Adobe has been building out either. Go use Adobe's audio enhance tool or auto-transcription and be amazed. Truly. They are remarkable tools I only dreamed of even 5 years ago. Your Hindenburgs and GIMPs of the world are just not going to match that any time soon. These developers do not have that kind of capacity.
  
  I had another section about GIMP having to play catch up with Photoshop for eternity because of low funding (compared to PS), but I deleted it. And yeah this is another thing: GIMP will always be behind if it doesn't have professional users who are willing to donate, and professional users will not use GIMP unless it stops lagging behind. additionally even professional users of GIMP may not donate, because they are not forced to. So even if GIMP gains a lot of users, it may still be underfunded.
  
  I had another section about GIMP having to play catch up with Photoshop for eternity because of low funding (compared to PS), but I deleted it. And yeah this is another thing: GIMP will always be behind if it doesn't have professional users who are willing to donate, and professional users will not use GIMP unless it stops lagging behind. additionally even professional users of GIMP may not donate, because they are not forced to. So even if GIMP gains a lot of users, it may still be underfunded.
  
  Wrong: this is the only thing that matters, the rest is wishful thinking and delusions.
  
  So, if you are in a company that uses Gimp, and you want to use PS, it is still gimp's fault that this will not work?
  
  I guess it depends on how likely that company interacts with external people who use PS. The problem is that PS is the industry's standard and if you go against it and things break your fault.
  
  Windows is an industry standard. And so is office. As long as we treat it as such. If we want things to change we have to go against such standards.
  The big difference between Office and Photoshop is: Microsoft opened their file format. And has support for open standards.
  Adobe locked their eco system down to build a monopoly. This is not gimps fault. It is 100% on Adobe.
  While the outcome is the same, I would love to see a different wording: nothing is an alternative to Photoshop, because Adobe has a monopoly.
  
  Even with an open format MS Office and LibreOffice and others have compatibility issues. Microsoft keeps certain features kind of exclusive to their solution and then there's the bigger picture called the Microsoft ecosystem. They are now very focused on that and that's really hard to beat.
  
  This is true. But in reality, it still works.
  And yes, the expansion of their Ecosystem is an issue. But to be honest: the cloud version works, and if I get a docx that is broken in Libreoffice, I use 365. At least I have this option.
  It's a complicated topic with no real solution
  
  Collaboration with other Adobe users? Same thing with Office. If one lives in a bubble and doesn’t to collaborate with others then native Linux apps might work and might even deliver a decent workflow. Once you’ve to collaborate with others who use Windows/Mac it’s game over – the “alternatives” aren’t just up to it.
  
  Factual will be relative, and no matter what I say you’ll find a way to turn this into a fight.
  What other apps compete with photoshop besides gimp?
  
  You started with "gimp is shit", so why not provide reasons for it?
  Or is this the apple vs android, coffee vs tea, stick vs automatic kind of subjective argument?
  What other products on windows compete with photoshop in your opinion? I don't get your reason>!!<
  
  You answer my question, and I’ll answer yours.
  
  Nope. That's called the burden of proof. You started by saying "gimp is shit", it's up to you to prove it, it's not up to the people responding you to disprove your point of view. What you're doing right now is called a fallacy and just totally discredit yourself.
  
  No. Im asking for alternatives, and then saying my opinion is that gimp is shit.
  Making excuses for not answering my question is pretty lame. If I answer you, you won’t answer me. You’ll just attack my opinions and leave. No thanks lol
  
  The answer is simple, Gimp is the only "full featured" photoshop replacement. And the os doesn't matter for this. There is no alternative in windows besides gimp. Apples products also fall short.
  And now, why is gimp shit?
  
  Affinity Photo is perfectly fine.
  
  You see, I answered your question. Now, where is the answer you promised? Let me guess, you don't have any?
  
  GIMP's interface can definitely be less intuitive for some users.
  GIMP does not always seamlessly integrate into professional workflows.
  Photoshop offers a more extensive set of advanced features and tools, such as advanced text handling, 3D capabilities, etc, which are not as robust in GIMP.
  GIMP's CMYK support is not robust at all.
  GIMP's non-destructive editing features are poor in comparison to photoshop.
  GIMP's native format (XCF) is not as universally compatible as PSD
  GIMP has significantly fewer learning resources. This is more about the community and less about the software.
  These are just a few examples.
  
  I think some parts are just a question of perspective. I am not a GFX person. But I have friends that work in this field. One of them starter learning with gimp. And he constantly is ranting about photoshop at work. He claims the interface of PS is garbage, support for some obscure file format is not even there and so on.
  So, I think it depends on what your are used to.
  For the documentation: yes! And raw image support is an issue to. Mostly because of proprietary bullshit standards, but yes. This is missing.
  Does this make gimp to a shit software? No
  
  GIMP is not a replacement for Adobe's tools. Anyone who says so is not a professional. It is perfectly suitable for hobbyists and somewhat advanced work but it is a decade behind on features that are considered standard now. FCPX is running into this same problem in the NLE world. Until 2018 or so apple could hang but Resolve, Premiere, and Avid are just so far ahead now and innovating while they languish. At the end of the day if you don't have modern, advanced tools, you have a ceiling to professional market capture. Adobe then trumps gimp on name recognition and usability so they get the casual market too. It's just not a contest.
  
  Photoshop online?
  
  Isn’t that just Lightroom?
  
  Well there is light room, and the more expensive Photoshop online.
  They now offer an online version of maybe full Photoshop. Tho no idea what is included.
  
  I just tried it. It’s super limited. There isn’t even a pen tool. Idk what they’re thinking.
  There is photopea.com, which used to not have ads but I guess they got greedy.
  
  I wish they would just release a docker so I could install it myself...
  
  Heck, they could just release an electron app.
  
  Photoshop Web is closest

120 comments