I've noticed that the MX forum is as busy as the Manjaro forum

[BitJam]

My fancy xps-13 laptop came with Windows pre-installed. I wanted to keep it to test dual booting. The first thing it did was ask for my wireless password, which, like a fool, I gave it. It immediately updated itself and broke the wireless driver. The machine had no RJ45 connector and I had no RJ45 dongle (now remedied) so I spent about half hour with tech support, downloaded the correct wireless driver on another computer, transferred it via a usb-stick and installed it manually.

[dreamer]

My fancy xps-13 laptop came with Windows pre-installed. I wanted to keep it to test dual booting. The first thing it did was ask for my wireless password, which, like a fool, I gave it. It immediately updated itself and broke the wireless driver. The machine had no RJ45 connector and I had no RJ45 dongle (now remedied) so I spent about half hour with tech support, downloaded the correct wireless driver on another computer, transferred it via a usb-stick and installed it manually.

----------Sorry for long post not super related to Manjaro. Read only if you are interested in opinions on Windows and Systemd.------------

Windows 10 in a nutshell. Don't judge Windows tech by looking at Windows 10. If you like software (and not just a particular flavor of software) you'll see that Windows does many things right. As I stated in my previous post I think it's pointless to compare Windows to Linux in general, we have to compare feature to feature. Microsoft has at least 10 000 paid software developers and not all are working on pointless stuff so in theory the chance of creating a good OS should be pretty high. However, Windows 10 has shown us that it's possible to destroy anything if you try hard enough... (the base system has actually improved - you can now move Windows from one computer to another just like Linux, but will probably lose activation).

You should be proud of your antiX base system. Upstart is "dead" (maybe still alive in Chrome OS) and if I had to choose between Systemd and all the crap that Windows 10 does I would probably choose Windows 10. It's hard because I dislike Systemd and Windows 10 equally. So the reason I would choose Windows 10 would come down to the fact that Windows 10 can keep an Ethernet connection, while my (limited) experience with Systemd tells me that Systemd (in combination with Network Manager) has a really difficult time keeping Ethernet connected. And these days a computer without a solid Internet connection isn't much fun. That being said, Windows 10 is super user hostile and I hate it for that reason, but it has nothing to do with the underlying Windows tech.

For a non-technical person like myself it's easier to deal with Windows 10 because many GUI utilities exist to disable driver updates, telemetry and forced updates/upgrades. Systemd seems very hard to deal with for a non-technical person and even technical people on forums (like developers) seem to have a hard time with the complexity of Systemd.

Maybe I'm wrong about Systemd. Manjaro is using it for example. My biggest problem with Systemd is that I don't trust it. I don't trust that Systemd will:

1. Boot to a fully functioning desktop (due to race conditions)
2. Shut down without triggering a time-out
3. Release RAM anywhere as efficient as SysV or Upstart
4. Keep an Ethernet connection alive for prolonged periods

And a few other niggles:

5. It's not happy to share swap partition with other distros
6. Big security concerns - 1 million lines of code and never audited
7. Ever changing and expanding into Systemd OS - new bugs
8. Centralized power over desktop Linux. Linus also has a lot of power but he has promised to never break user space.

PS What does this have to do with Manjaro? Well, I'm confused and have a difficult time understanding how a rolling distro using Systemd can be so popular. For me an OS is a platform - something stable that I shouldn't have to think about or worry about. It's all about the applications. Windows used to offer 10 years of support, which meant no OS re-installs necessary before switching hardware (great for business) and you could always run up to date applications. For Windows 10 that's only true for the LTSC edition, which MS won't sell you, but that's only because MS has become a foolish company and it has nothing to do with the underlying Windows tech.

What I want to say is that in a feature by feature comparison between Windows and Linux there would be some wins and losses on either side. The big deal is this: Windows is proprietary, Linux is open source. This is a slam dunk for Linux. All proprietary software will eventually die when the owner runs out of inspiration/time/money. It seems Microsoft is ready to retire Windows and move completely to the cloud.

I wish mainstream desktop Linux would be ready to take over the crown, but I’m not so sure that the Linux desktop ecosystem is ready for that and Windows users will instead migrate to Android, iOS and Chrome OS. After the rise of mobile, maybe the desktop paradigm is too geeky and not super important to many people?

[timkb4cq]

I fancied myself a Windows power user in the Jurassic period. I remember arguing on the Xandros Forum that Windows software was easier to find and install then Linux software. Needless to say I was dead wrong.

Well, you were not entirely wrong at the time. I learned how to compile software, and then to make deb packages, back in the early KDE3 days because I didn't have a printer driver for my HP printer or home accounting software that could import MS Money files unless I compiled them myself. This was in Mandrake Linux. Finding software wasn't that much of a problem, but installing it really was harder. Even in 2006 on MEPIS 3.4-3 there were programs I needed or wanted that were not packaged for debian which led to sharing my debs for them on Mepislovers, and eventually on an unofficial repository.

[KBD]

Lots of very old timers on this forum. Strong base of guys/gals from the MEPIS days. A group of regulars who are active, and a growing user base. Good combo for an active forum :)

[handy]

I too was a Windows (ex-Amiga) power user (ran a business sorting out/setting up/building/networking, primarily Win95/98/SE/NT/XP - thankfully only ever saw 2 Millennium boxes - basically fixing anything hardware/software/OS).

Dumped MS, & went to Linux when I retired in 2005 (thought if I don't learn Linux now I'll be too old & it will be too hard to do) - Ubuntu Breazy Badger came out just after I started in Debian. Ubuntu forum got me going, then I've been helping get other people going ever since (not as much these days as in the past though, I've got a bit tired of computers after >30 years, don't know how to do much else though...).

[sunrat]

It's heartwarming that MX and the forum have become rapidly more popular. The devs and regulars are just so damn nice! And MX is truly a work of art.
Popularity is bound to have a downside as already mentioned. Several that bug me are:
- requests for packages where a large selection is already available. Who needs another 5 text editors?
- request for GUI utilities to run a single line of code
I've been on Debian User Forums for about 12 years and some members there are not afraid to call out help vampires or tell people to RTFM. It is always way preferable to help people to help themselves as that's the way to learn, rather than spoon feeding things they will forget the next day.
Ultimately I'm proud of how accommodating the team are here, but it's a fine line between being helpful and encouraging reliance instead of learning.

[Mauser]

There is a downside of becoming so popular that you end up with riffraff that don't know it's 2019 and throw the command line at other users for everything like the 8-bit computer days. They bring their bad attitude over and respond to questions with RTFM or some other nasty response. I remember those kind from a distro I tried and thankfully I found MX Linux that has a really nice community and distro. We don't need that kind of riffraff here. One of the many reasons I chose MX Linux is to get away from that riffraff. Thankfully the MX Linux forum has excellent moderators to handle them but they will get hammered with work.

[sunrat]

@Mauser - there's the flip side that we shouldn't be telling people to fear command line, or that it's only for nerds and h4x0r5.
I don't use it a great deal but there are some things for which it is faster, more efficient, and produces better results than any other method. And other times where it's needed for deeper system operations for which GUI is impractical.
Never stop learning, your mind will thank you.

[Captain Brillo]

2 cents:
I've never received such good, direct, teaching help on any other forum, ever. You may have seen a lot of questions from me since I joined. Those quick answers are allowing me to keep rolling in my Linux learning...I'm an old dude and I get easily distracted if you're not talking to me....

But really, I've always just dabbled, with the resulting very shallow learning curve, But you folks here on this forum have really helped get me climbing.
Cheers.

[Stevo]

I like to throw out hints that the OP can use to almost instantly find the answer with a web search, (teach a man to fish...), but some still want the fish handed to them.

Some command line tricks are just too quick and useful to not give to even the most terminalphobic. Inxi, or "apt policy something", or "aptitude why-not something".