Sorry, forgot this thread was even here. Been trying so hard to get Linux to where I would like it. Instead of just leaving it where I can only use it.
I also re-arranged my desktop a few times. Looks like utter crap. These eyes stopped bleeding years ago though over such things. Might have to look into cable management sometime in the future. Though I will have to figure out how to do it my way. I haven't much cared for some of the ways I have seen. I need to be able to move or even remove a cable at a whim. One of these day I will have to research the different methods used.
Took a set of bookshelves out of my brother's room and using that as a monitor stand / shelf. Staid with the footstool that one of us made in shop class a few decades ago for my Raspberry pi and its monitor. The shelve has me worried. I don't know if it provides enough breathing room for my monitor. Guess I will find out in the summer.
Kind of worried. I bought two Raspberry Pi PCs this month and all the equipment they would need (and the equipment to take the place of that when it proved inadequate.) Then decided to go without windows. A lot of decisions that might bite me in the bum later. I've done stuff like this before and after the mood wore off ended up having to get everything back to where it should have been.
Thinking this time that won't happen. Those episodes are usually much shorter than this. Instead of finding myself more and more dissatisfied with how things turned out I am actually finding it is very much alright.
((I have some sort of grammar check on here. Chrome is doing it's usually spell check and underlining a lot of stuff in red. Every now and again something is underlined in a really light grey. When I check that it tends to suggest a word more appropriate for that sentence or suggests a run together version of two of the words I used. Still have to re-read my post a few times though to check it. Even then a few errors get through.))
It is hitting me pretty hard. My favorite game of the moment is a windows exclusive. Only about a third of my steam library is even available for this OS. My other digital game libraries show a similar shortening. I even all most broke down and installed Wine to try and play one game.
I still want to play that game. It is called "Grim Dawn" it was a really interesting experience.
You are a much stronger person then I. I can't force myself to not use Windows. That said, my laptop exclusively runs Ubuntu(would run Antergos, but getting WiFi working was hell.). Good luck mate!
It is something I have been wanting to do for years. The loss of use of a large part of my software library had been the main thing holding me back previously. It isn't like it is a very good reason either. It is that I don't want them taking over the market.
I dislike the bloat that comes with their OSs. I dislike some of the recent choices they made with Windows 10. It isn't dislike that is causing me to switch though. It is a fear that if I don't switch now the option won't be there anymore to switch later. I already have no choice on what utilities I use. I don't want that extending to my PC as well.
The biggest thing is that means I can't use Windows at all. Just using a different OS isn't enough. If I kept using Windows then none of the companies would have any impetus to give support to a different OS. They don't need to sell a version of their product for every OS I own, if they cover only one of the platforms that I use then they have me as a potential customer. The most horrible thing I am just one person and can't affect the market at all. So it really doesn't make any difference.
I have been taught over and over again I can't change any one but myself. So I will change me. At least in the end I did what I thought I should. For me it is more about me doing what I think I should then actually succeeding in a hopeless cause.
I've been giving Linux a try on the desktop every few years since the late 90s, when it took days to download CD images over 56k and half an hour to burn them. I always felt that same "maybe this time" sense of optimism. But it's never offered a satisfactory experience on par with Windows. It always feels like a compromise, giving up performance here or hardware support there, or wasting so much time dealing with brain-numbing issues that you could have spent actually being productive.
When I was younger, I enjoyed tinkering around with these things, and actually had the time to waste trying to make it work. I can remember recompiling the kernel multiple times, when it took hours per recompile, to get the right configuration I needed. And I wasted so much disk space on OS source code, when space was already at a premium. But now that I'm older, life is just too short for that kind of stuff. I've used Windows since 3.0, so take it from me, I've experienced my share of b.s. from Microsoft as well. But I always got Windows to do what I needed it to do with minimal effort. I don't abide by any kind of open-source philosophy so that makes no difference to me. If it did, I probably wouldn't be playing games like Minecraft.
An OS is just a tool to perform a job. If a different OS can't perform that job to your liking then you should probably question why you're limiting yourself to it. That goes for Windows, Mac, Linux, and everything in between. I use Linux on servers, on my phone, even my router, but just not on my desktop. Dual-booting gives you the experience of learning more about Linux while still allowing you to enjoy the things you've paid for. Forcing yourself into one is really just doing you a disservice, if you ask me.
I have been trying Linux too over the years. It was never meeting my expectations. To tell the truth it still isn't something I can recommend to others. I spent over a week re-installing the software over and over again. Sometimes twice a day. Just trying to get it setup exactly how I want it. I know just enough to break things. I don't know enough to fix them.
My latest install was early yesterday. It is most the way through the day here now. I decided to go with "Debian Jessie, KDE" again. This time with the intention of using a virtual machine to lean on. Leaving the rest of the machine as stable as I knew how. I ended up updating to the "Testing" branch. Like the other times, it uninstalled a lot of the software with the update. Even though I had set everything up right. After the update I ended up with a bash(command) prompt and handful of software. I have most the stuff I wanted back installed back on the system and configured. Even managed to move the home folder without reinstalling. Though I am certain I messed that up.
I still need to configure some stuff on here. I feel I am past the worst of it though and will not need to format the drives again. I also installed i3 again. Even though I haven't done much with it. I want to learn how to set it up in a virtual machine before I give this one a try.
I don't think I am doing myself a disservice. I don't believe it is the best decision I could have made. It is one I think I can live with though.
I didn't really have a computer until windows 98 was out. Before that I owned a commodore for a little bit and enjoyed programming it, every dang time I turned it back on, or the power fluctuated, or. I did pick up a monochrome all in one at the thrift store at one point. I was able to get it to read the disks that came with it. Not much more then that. So I guess I had computers before that. That is when I started having a computer on a consistent basis though. Most my software experiences have been on windows OSs. I don't even think the OSs are bad when they are taken by themselves.
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Edit:
One recommendation I just thought of though. Linux is built around easy to find and download free software. With windows the quality and trustworthiness of software tends to go up with dramatically if it is paid for. Even then it is best to research the software to make sure it what it says it is.
If I wanted free software on windows 10, the best place to look was on the net. There is a massive selection. Yet once the iffy choices are eliminated there isn't very much left. Most of that doesn't compare well with the commercial software that is available to do the same task. Some software I couldn't even find for window for free. Like shell customization and replacements software was next to nonexistent. The only one I liked the looks of cost a good bit.
Linux software is available in something similar to the store on windows 10. Except that it is all free and it is a lot easier to find quality products. I never managed to find anything in the windows 10 store worth installing, let alone paying for. I actually regret everything I got from that store. The Linux package managers on the other hand are full of good software. I have yet to regret something I have installed from the package manager. My regrets on linux are from installing stuff off of the net. Strangely enough it has all been stuff I would normally install in windows 10.
I am still trying to get a good setup for a browser. I like the sync options that are available in firefox and chrome. Chrome has full support for all the web stuff (it is the only browser for linux that I know of that can fully display the "Netlix" site). Firefox has extensions I want. I am almost to the point of using both.
