(Assuming your comment was in reference to GUI) Linux desktop has several issues wrt GUI. Speaking as a windows-familiar but nerdy/techy guy, command lines are nowhere as good. Arch linux's documentation is nice if you know what chroot is for. And why do I need to know about /etc?
In comparison in Windows C:/ has program files, or documents in /user1, which make much more sense (to me at least).
> Speaking as a windows-familiar but nerdy/techy guy, command lines are nowhere as good.
I mean, speaking as someone working on windows nearly every day, I hate GUI/its GUI. Every single "gui" app is some trash that I wish there were just some cmd line for (and I've been doing this sort of thing for over 10 years, its not lack of familiarity).
There are things I want/find lacking in cmd line, to be sure, but they're generally nothing that a better cli interface/script/wiki can't solve better.
Personally discoverability and ease of use are the biggest issue(s), sometimes related. On Linux you use command lines way more than GUIs. I don't disagree with CLI being efficient if you know it - I'd ideally love both being an option.
I wanted to see and just googled how to create a new account:
On windows, from my knowledge - open control panel and search for account.
Linux - I don't know, so I googled it for Fedora (which I have installed). What I got was [0] - which... talks about UIDs, GIDs, ACLs, UPGs, Shadow Passwords... It's great to have options but I'd love a "Just add an account" option rather than needing the user to understand what's going on. Oh, and most of the explanations are only for the command line even though a GUI exists.
For comparison, Windows has [1] which is much more simple.
It's been death by a thousand command lines for me on Linux so far unfortunately. Would someone more determined have succeeded? Likely. But if my update fails because of space issues in a drive which needs me to do 'a', and 'a' has an error needing me to do 'b', and 'b' needs me to understand 2000 words to only use 5 words finally in my command... it's exhausting unfortunately. And not to brag or boast but I'm not a tech noob. I'm the go-to tech guy in most rooms. I've mucked around with custom android ROMs and root access on my iPad (trollstore/fileza) and edited registry files and other root-level files without bricking anything. And yes I can use chatgpt to repartition my drive, but c'mon, I'm not that dumb to blindly plug in what it says. I'm going to research the individual commands first and take an hour to realize it was right all along.
Sorry if this became too ranty, I'm just pissed because I want to like Linux. But it's really, really hard.
>Personally discoverability and ease of use are the biggest issue(s),
Personal discovery can be one of the main catalysts for easy migration.
Google is not your friend.
That ship has sailed.
Nothing "personal", but knowing nothing about Linux, if you walked up to an already booted desktop of something like Linux Mint, there is a particular series of incantations you would need to make if you wanted to see something about the user accounts.
I can only imagine what different people think about this.
You would have to click the start button, then a popup will occur which may or may not be surprising.
There would be a button labeled "Administration" in a field which is visible on most size monitors.
You would have to click that then scroll to the very bottom of the resulting icon list where under careful observation you would find another button, labeled "Users and Groups".
You would have to accurately click that before arriving at the exact little control panel which then pops up, where you would finally be able to create another account.
Fortunately, no command line is needed, this is bad enough.
Once you get accustomed to this type of thing you could always start abbreviating it something like;
Start > Administration > Users and Groups.
It might be a lot more advanced than Windows in some ways but not others, but eventually it's possible to get accustomed to it.
Without giving up Windows at all if you don't want to ;)
You've still definitely got a legitimate comment about discovery compared to Windows that has not been completely overcome though.
You're 100% right. I was where you are 20 years ago, and while things have definitely improved a bit in 20 years, the attitude of "GUI bad, CLI good" hasn't really, so I don't think this will be solved in another 20 years either.
> It's been death by a thousand command lines for me on Linux so far unfortunately.
That issue isn't solved by UIs, though. Things are constantly moving/changing colors/disappearing. That's why so many UI "redesigns" get so much hate, breaking user's mental models, etc.
> Would someone more determined have succeeded?
Nah, its not about determination. Command codes take memorization, sure. But that's mostly solved by search. Combine with a good library of scripts, and you don't need determination, just a little natural curiosity.
In case you missed out from the library metaphor, what do you do when you have some information that you want to access repeatedly? Use a bookmark.
You can't even do remotely the same thing with a UI, its all inaccessible nonsense-crap that takes eons to learn and then you still have to figure out the "hard" commands anyways (because invariably there's a bug or some feature it can't do).
Installing 20 guis or recompiling several programs from source constantly is a terrible way to operate. Commands, on the other hand, can be chained, they can be scripted. There's nothing approaching that level of usability in "gui" land. They're a waste of time in comparison.
> That issue isn't solved by UIs, though. Things are constantly moving/changing colors/disappearing. That's why so many UI "redesigns" get so much hate, breaking user's mental models, etc.
I agree. What is ideal for most people is a system to explain what are the choices available. In case of command lines often help commands I believe are meant for this.
…However, GUIs (like the settings app in Windows, Android, iOS and even Linux IIRC) are much better at explicitly showing the hierarchy. For example on android, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth are both in the section of wireless radios, but different from the section of a factory reset. Adding a Bluetooth devices requires navigating via submenus.
While that may sound inefficient (and it is when you’re doing the same thing 10 times a day), it’s excellent for breaking down a hundred settings into easily understandable ones. Listing -help often causes this issue - important arguments or options or commands are mixed with ones that are hardly used and not related.
And the thing is, all this is entirely a design thing. One could make a friendly CLI with submenus as options, with warnings that go beyond the basic “do as I say”, like the “are you sure you want to delete this user” thing.
I will still mention that using red colors and orange exclamations and Skeuomorphic icons helps - a picture speaks a thousand words, and the battery emoji takes much less space than 7 letters - but unfortunately in my experience CLIs are about as informative for discovery as the Sahara. I can open any GUI settings app and learn all that is possible in an hour, while understanding relations and context. Display scaling is related to font size, and wallpapers to personalisation.
It’s definitely possible to have a nicer CLI where such relations are obvious/clear. But I haven’t found anything yet, unfortunately.
(Edit: I realised I didn’t respond to your full comment, it’s almost midnight here so I’ll try and reply tomorrow)
> It’s definitely possible to have a nicer CLI where such relations are obvious/clear. But I haven’t found anything yet, unfortunately.
As per my previous comment, I suggest you more fully leverage the concepts of bookmarks, and (script) libraries.
You can have some very simple "graphical" aids on top - your console must live in a window somewhere, and you probably want to be able to tile them. You probably want to be able to quickly reach for a couple (common) digital knobs.
However, just like you haven't found a "nicer CLI", finding this "nicer GUI" is difficult and rare experience.
In comparison in Windows C:/ has program files, or documents in /user1, which make much more sense (to me at least).