FreeGameDev

I like my code properly indented and I am fine using {} or keywords if/fi. Python indentation drives me nuts whenever I want to comment something in/out for debugging and it refuses to parse without laboriously changing the indentation and then changing it back after the debugging is done.

Lyberta {l Wrote}:Argh... Well, I'm getting too emotional to reply. I guess I just got too unlucky with my brain.

I think your brain is just fine. We all have different things we're good at and/or like to do and things that are difficult to us or feel like a waste of time.

I have a really hard time interpreting Ribbon icons, especially when they come in different sizes. Reading text is so much easier for me and takes a fraction of the time. So, for me, LibreOffice has much better usability than modern MS Office. Also, the spellchecker for LibreOffice is superior for my language. So there, FLOSS software can actually come with better usability and quality than a proprietary counterpart!

Lyberta {l Wrote}:Like, seriously. "If you want freedom, install Linux". "If you want to use Linux, you have to know terminal". "If you want to know terminal, you have to tolerate white male neckbeard incel virgins who hates women".

there fixed that for you.

Hey, you don't need to deal with anyone to learn the command line, just read one of many manuals out there that teach it.
http://write.flossmanuals.net/command-line/introduction/

and that book is also sold in the FSF store.https://shop.fsf.org/books-docs/introduction-command-line

Honestly, Lyberta, don't push it. I've edited out the nonsense. I should really go and delete the posts talking about it too. Perhaps somebody will.

As for a more user friendly FREE OS then get involved with Haiku.

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Lyberta {l Wrote}:Then ban me you neckbeard.

OK. Wish granted. 1 month ban.

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Lyberta {l Wrote}:
Holy, f*** this thing is amazing. After so much pain and suffering with Linux I could just do most of the stuff by tapping on the screen with my finger. Wooooooooooooow.

Of course, spyware is still there and I couldn't even create an empty Microsoft Word document without going online and creating an account. But, in the grand scheme of things, almost nobody cares. Microsoft won. They've made a damn amazing UI and are siphoning all the data they want because they've given users what they want - convenience.

That is the problem with the free software movement, so much focus on developers, and not anywhere near enough concern paid to users and what they want. Remember, all developers use software, but not all users develop software. Anyone uses a lot more software than she or he develops. So much focus is on developers scratching their itches, instead of users, and I want this software, I will chose people from among the potential users to take the position of the developer to get the users desires met.

*taps away happily on his fully GNU Linux based Ubuntu Touch device*

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Long story short: Usability on most FOSS is shit.

I think I can also explain why: Many many FOSS projects are heavility dominated by programmers. Other rules, like UI designers, are often lacking. And if programmers design an UI, usability is usually shit because programmers make the wrong assumptions about their user. UI design is a separate skill that needs to be learned separately.

FOSS projects seem to generally have a shortage of non-programmers in their teams. The solution? Convince non-programmers to join us.

The free software movement was fairly successful in making a healty number of programmers join it. However, finding people skilled in any other task, anything that is not programming, is still much tougher.

As for postmarketOS: As a developer, I'd say making this process run out-of-the box is a challenge, even if you have money. postmarketOS is something the user is supposed to install on their smartphone to replace an existing OS. The challenge comes from the fact that postmarketOS devs have no freaking idea on which device YOU want to install it on. From a programmer viewpoint, you would have to test the install process on loads of loads of different devices with all their different hardware, some of which just don't work in Linux at all because no Linux driver exists at all, or the only Linux driver that exists is 3rd-party, proprietary and shit. The more devices you want to support, the harder it will become, because it just would eat so much time to test every possible hardware. I'm not saying this task is impossible, but it will definitely be a lot of work. I hope they at least wrote down somewhere which devices are supported; this question is very important.

When installing a Linux-based OS on any device, the hardware question is very important. You need to know if the hardware in your device is even supported by Linux. Otherwise, you can already forget it. You might find some 3rd party drivers somewhere but those are usually shit and installing and maintaining them is definitely a nightmare, based on experiene. Good libre drivers are usually already included in Linux itself, so the best way to install Linux is to first find a device/hardware that Linux supports. I think “missing hardware support” is still the biggest roadblock.

I think for smartphones, the only real solution to make FOSS OSes practical is to sell those devices with a libre OS pre-installed. There are some manufacturers that do this already, but they are rather small, very few people know them, so you have to specifically search them. FOSS on smartphone is NOT mainstream at all (it should be)!

Installing a new OS on a smartphone is, in my experience, never a foolproof task, it generally requires a deep understanding of how things work, and patience. However, a manual can help here, IF the manual is actually giving the correct instructions. I think far too many software projects (not only FOSS ones …) don't test their documentation, and broken installation instructions are left there for years because nobody checks if they actually work.
Your experience suggests there might not have been a proper installation manual. Those are questions that should have all been covered in a proper manual (you DID look for a manual, right? RIGHT??? ). Yeah, shitty or missing documentation is another problem in some FOSS. Not all FOSS, mind you!

On the other hand, I have to defend postmarketOS here. This system is currently in the ALPHA version now which is clearly stated on their homepage. This means it's not even finished, so it's only for demonstration purposes right now; many bugs, rough edges, missing features, and many other problems are expected. So you have no right to complain about bad usability of postmarketOS specifically. Maybe come back when they release version 1.0.

Nobody deserves such pain to just use the device they've paid their money for.

Now you're just being mean. You clearly can't blame the smartphone manufacturer for a bad OS if you install a 3rd party OS on their device. The blame only belongs to them if the pre-installed OS is broken/bad, or if they officially support the OS you chose. I highly doubt postmarketOS is officially supported since it was not pre-installed.

However, I DO think they (and the traders) deserve blame when they only sell their devices with proprietary software pre-installed, so the only option that buyers have is proprietary, and no FOSS. FOSS must become more mainstream, and pre-installing it is a big first step.

You need to remember, FOSS is, at its core, a political movement. And yes, a lot of FOSS is still shit, and we have many usability problems, and other problems. Granted. But we also are lacking greatly in manpower, we're just a small puddle in an ocean of proprietary software. So we're simply at a huge disadvantage … yet. Convincing more people to join our side is still a very very important challenge of the free software movement.

I wonder if people are confusing infamiliarity with suckage.

For example, I find windows to be unusable and non-intuitive and frustrating and find myself unable to figure out how to do the simplest things, like copy a file, and find it generally to be a total piece of shit. This is because I don't use Windows at all and haven't in the last 20 years, and I am ignorant of its ways.

If you don't know linux, you're probably going to find it very confusing. This is not the same thing as sucking. (Consider Vim. To the novice, vim will appear to completely suck. Yet it clearly does not suck.)

Also, I am perfectly happy if "normal" users don't come along and "improve" linux, fucking it up for people that actually know what they're doing. (Perfect example of this is "normal" people prefering click-to-focus over focus-follows-mouse (e.g. every window manager's default doesn't do focus-follows-mouse, because windows trained every user since the late 80's to be a moron who doesn't know any better, and enforced circa 2007 with Ubuntu's Unity when they moved application menus to the top of the screen (like Mac) meaning that if you had focus-follows-mouse behavior, attempting to move the mouse to the top of the screen caused the menu to change to whichever random window your mouse happened to pass over. That is to say, they completely broke focus-follows-mouse because they were too ignorant to know that it is superior in every way, as Sun Microsystems knew in 1985.)

"Normal" users DO NOT KNOW what they want, and DO NOT KNOW what is good. What they think they want is often utter crap, but they're too ignorant to know that what they think they want is crap.

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smcameron {l Wrote}:For example, I find windows to be unusable and non-intuitive and frustrating and find myself unable to figure out how to do the simplest things, like copy a file, and find it generally to be a total piece of shit. This is because I don't use Windows at all and haven't in the last 20 years, and I am ignorant of its ways.

Exactly this. Microsoft got to teach generations of people that their way was the right way. That does not mean it is the best way.

smcameron {l Wrote}:Also, I am perfectly happy if "normal" users don't come along and "improve" linux, fucking it up for people that actually know what they're doing. (Perfect example of this is "normal" people prefering click-to-focus over focus-follows-mouse

If people would stop moving our settings around, and a fifth freedom were established, this would be settled.

I don't want newbies dictating how I use the computer, and I am well aware they don't want to use it the way experienced users do.

freemedia2018 {l Wrote}:I don't want newbies dictating how I use the computer, and I am well aware they don't want to use it the way experienced users do.

This is exactly the reason why Linux being "fragmented" into distributions, targeting different niches, demographics, and skill levels is a strength and not a weakness.

Wuzzy {l Wrote}:Now you're just being mean. You clearly can't blame the smartphone manufacturer for a bad OS if you install a 3rd party OS on their device. The blame only belongs to them if the pre-installed OS is broken/bad, or if they officially support the OS you chose.

I figure you're joking, since the idea of the computer being tied to a single OS is a smartphone-era "innovation", unless we are all working for Tim Cook now.

I was a PC before Apple computers were (typically) called a Mac. You get a choice of OS, and if you don't, it's crap.

Technopeasant {l Wrote}:This is exactly the reason why Linux being "fragmented" into distributions, targeting different niches, demographics, and skill levels is a strength and not a weakness.

Preaching to the choir is alright by me, as somebody else may hear you and the choir could have a few more people.

I have been using Linux for a while. However, I have accumulated a large number of games that do not support this OS. I gave up and switched to Microsoft again.

Lots has changed in the last 2 years in regards to Linux game compatibility. As of today most Windows games on Steam run fine through their Wine implementation (Proton/SteamPlay). Except for some game specific bugs it is basically only special anti-cheat software that wants kernel level access, which causes some multiplayer games not to work. Even VR games work pretty well through Proton. All in all I would guestimate that 80-90% of my games library works fine on Linux.