Saturday, January 31, 2015

The Linux Catch22

Over the years I've heard a lot of game / app developers claim that they would make Linux ports of all their software if they saw Linux become more popular (more people using it), and I've also heard consumers make the claim they would use Linux if more games / apps were available for it. I see a Catch22 here because if nobody makes a move then nothing will change. Obviously the ball is in the consumer's court here. If anyone can make change happen its us. However as a Linux user myself I can tell you straight off that it's a bold move that will leave you having to use WINE to run all your Windows games and apps, that is the ones you can't shed for a Linux alternative. My only suggestion is to find the distro you're more comfortable with. I prefer Mint, but I usually swap out cinnamon for XFCE.

(the next paragraph is a bit ranty)

I seriously want to make a permanent switch to Linux, but every so often theres this one app that needs something like silverlight or dotnet. I know theres pipelight for linux, but it's actually more of a hackjob if anything and it don't work that well. I hope there will come a day where what OS you use will no longer matter, however that day will never come until all developers decide to go cross platform instead of limiting themselves to a particular OS. I mean seriously who the hell uses silverlight anymore? I only have one thing that uses it. The brighhouse BHTV web app... Which leaves me having to use pipelight over firefox just to be able to watch the TV I pay for. Why can't they use html5 or java or flash or something other than that archaic junk we call silverlight? At least then when you say "it works for PC" it actually will... Heck even with directx I have issues using the unity editor to where speedtree is totally invisible under wine. yes I'm looking at you Unity3D team. You made an editor for Mac, so make one for Linux. And don't use that "not enough people use Linux to justify it" excuse, because it's getting old.

1 comment:

  1. It is a catch 22 situation. But its not just becuase of a lack of software for linux as compared to the amount of software for Windows and even Mac. Its the fact that when people are in a rut, Windows being the dominate OS being that rut, its harder to get people out of a rut. However the landscape of computing is changing. It may still matter what OS you are running for PC enthusiasts and content creators. But what we consider as general computing that the average Joe does will be handled by tablets, smart devices , and the cloud. So for the average user what OS one goes with will be less of a matter than it is today.

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