Do you think that Linux is difficult?

[pp4mnklinux]

Puppy is easier (nowadays she is working with fossapup 9.5)

https://youtu.be/flUSH3fZ4A8

[p310don]

Linux can be difficult. Especially if you're trying to make it windows, which many new users do.

Once you retrain yourself, it's often much easier.

Once you learn how to make little scripts it becomes much much easier.

Once it becomes much much easier, linux is much much more difficult to not use.

[amethyst]

Linux can be difficult. Especially if you're trying to make it windows, which many new users do.

Once you retrain yourself, it's often much easier.

Once you learn how to make little scripts it becomes much much easier.

Once it becomes much much easier, linux is much much more difficult to not use.

That's a pretty good summary, I think. I vote for putting it up as a sticky in the section for Beginners!

[stevie pup]

I think it simply depends on which distro you're using. Some have a reputation for being beginner friendly, whereas some would be damn near impossible for a new Linux user.

[wizard]

It certainly is if you don't have good instructions and help files.

These things apply:

1. People are adverse to change
2. People like what they know
3. Frustration leads to abandonment

wizard

[mikewalsh]

@wizard :-

You could also look at it from the other side of the coin, I suppose. F'rinstance, those most likely to successfully beat the learning-curve & adapt to Linux are

• a) Those who are ready for a change

• b) Those that are open-minded, and prepared - and happy! - to embrace new ideas & ways of doing things

And more often than not, such individuals rarely become frustrated because they want to succeed. If you're determined - and interested enough - to succeed at something, you usually will.....

Unfortunately, that's only applicable to a small minority, if we're honest about it. Most humans are creatures of habit; once they've learnt, and mastered one way of doing something, they have this tendency to get "stuck in a rut".......and see absolutely no reason why they should go through it all again in order to learn a new way of doing the same thing.

(*shrug*)

Mike.

[TC-21-32]

Different not difficult. I liken Linux to driving a model T Ford if you're used to an automatic. A couple things to unlearn then a couple to relearn.
No matter where you are with Linux or a T, there aren't many close by that know how to drive it.
But we like to teach it to those interested.

[mikewalsh]

Different not difficult.

Yah. That's about the size of it.

Linux has been with us now for 30 years. Hardly seems possible, does it? Yet the modern "GNU/Linux" distribution - I'm no politically-correct fanatic, but in this context I think credit needs to go Stallman's lot - is light-years away from how things were back in 1993.

Back then, absolutely everything you wanted to install had to be compiled from source. There WAS no other option!

Yes, Linux IS "different". But at that, with the massive strides forward being made in terms of user-friendliness, it's not so far away from using Windows. Everything has a GUI nowadays. Software installation is definitely easier than on Windows, with huge collections of carefully-curated software all gathered together in one place, and accessible via any one of at least half-a-dozen package management systems. And system updates are a piece of cake, with the user having the choice as to when & how those updates are installed.

And driver updates are likewise simple. Update the kernel.....and every driver in your system is updated simultaneously, along with security and stability fixes. I know which approach I prefer.

I still maintain that if you sit two complete noobs down together beside each other, having never used a computer in their lives - one at a computer running Windows, and the other at a computer running a beginner-friendly distro such as Mint - I'm fairly confident in predicting that the Linux user would be getting comfortable with their system long before the Windows user. Especially with no "bad" habits to need to 'unlearn' first.....

Windows may well be pre-installed on just about every new 'puter in the shops. But that doesn't disguise the fact that in so many ways, Windows is a truly archaic system at heart. The definition of Windows has it thus:-

Windows; “32-bit extensions and a graphical shell for a 16-bit patch to an 8-bit operating system originally coded for a 4-bit microprocessor, written by a 2-bit company that can't stand a single bit of competition.”

Okay, so that dates back to the days of Windows '95. But it's still essentially true.

Mike.

[ozsouth]

It certainly is if you don't have good instructions and help files.

These things apply:

1. People are adverse to change
2. People like what they know
3. Frustration leads to abandonment

wizard

Definitely. The thing that kept me 'Pupped' after starting in 2005 was BarryK's helpfulness & initiative. (I had used Mandrake in 1999, then Vector, which some early pups were based on).

[wizard]

@ozsouth

Me too, played with both of them as well as a small distro named Amigo Linux. Puppy was the winner based on many things including great help from the forum members.

wizard