Since there’s been a resurgence lately of the “mastodon is mostly just for folks who use Linux” thing …
… i’m now curious about my community here
(i’m offering intentionally crude and ungranular options in this poll)
“I use Linux …”
(Please boost!)
Personally I am in the “occasionally”
I float between a modern top-of-the-line MacBook Pro, a cheap desktop running windows, and a 13-year-old Thinkpad running Linux
@lufertec I also voted for "occasionally", since I use a MacBook on the go and a Linux PC at home. My phone is a Google Pixel running @GrapheneOS, the best mobile operating system I've ever used. Unlike normal Android you would find on a Samsung, Pixel, Xiaomi or whatever, GrapheneOS doesn't have any bloatware, no ads, no creepy spyware embedded in the OS. It also has substantial security improvements compared to AOSP. you can find a detailed list on their website: https://grapheneos.org/features
But unlike with other degoogled ROMs, you don't lose out on anything. You can install Google apps using the Sandboxed Google play compatibility layer. That way Google doesn't get any elevated access to your device, but you still get to enjoy the entirety of Google services (except for Google Pay, see this thread https://grapheneos.social/@GrapheneOS/112878067304840664) working with no issues. But the best thing is that it looks and feels just like any other Android-based OS, you don't have to relearn much, the user experience is almost identical. It's so easy to use that I even got my grandma a Pixel 6a with GrapheneOS, and she's been very happy with it. She didn't even notice that anything is different compared to her old phone.
Shouldn’t you include “ I use terminal in osx “ and or “ bash is better zsh hater “ under your Linux?
I use osx every day but it’s how I interface with the HPC on Linux - but the distinction is mostly my compile command and whether I am currently using graphics. Not on Linux every day but might as well be.
And my family refuses to get off windows so I play that too.
@clive
WellActually(tm) the MacBook is running BSD Unix, that of which Linux was an imitation, so you're in the larger POSIX or *nix camp.
I'm almost sufficiently annoyed with Linux today to install a noncommercial BSD on desktop. (I already prefer BSD for servers.)
Of course, everyone using Android phones&tablets as their daily-driver in lieu of laptop/desktop are also Linux users, whether they know it or not. (Ditto Samaung TV with YouTube App.)
@clive
Your sample of course is skewed by who'd follow you here.
I expect a similar survey by some other FediFolk would get different results.
But yes, those of us who are passionate about FLOSS are likely to use one or more Linux distros &/or {net,open,free}-BSD and want to make this Fediverse open protocol federation thing (not just Mastodon 🦣) work.
(And given a choice of M$Win or Mac laptop by employer, we'd prefer real BSD to WSL comp[a|os]tability layer.)
@clive
I've got different ids here because of different communities of interest - so far, 2 🦣🦣 and one PixelFed 📷, and am also on 🟦🦋 because some people I liked at the former place will only/mostly be there.
Some of the alternative Fedi apps look interesting. I'm using github.io for MD->HTML blogging so haven't jumped on a Fedi long-form app yet, but it may happen.
(I might need to add ➕️ a mathstodon ID to more easily interact with their math-enhanced linear text in browser.)
love it!
@clive I went with "occasionally" but 100% of my usage these days is cloud machines and VMs.
Oof, though. 10k responses and >%50 saying "every day" really highlights the insular and tiny nature of this network.
if you know what it is but don’t use it I would still put yourself in “never”!
I suspect there’s a lot of people here in the “never“ category who certainly know what Linux is and what it’s used for
@clive oh, I did :)
I just wonder because in my dealings with various people, I'm always amazed that so few people know what Linux is (let alone use it). We did have it set up on one of our PCs just for kicks, but it's not something we use for daily operations
Yep yep
Or nearly any set top box — Roku, etc
Hell, half of the “smart” devices these days probably run some flavor of Linux
Yeah that’s part of the reason why I use Windows too, I’m morbidly interested in seeing what’s going on in that ecosystem
Yep — this whole Recall thing is an absolute security crap show
Linux... I'd start with Ubuntu (supported more) and with experience move to Debian, the distro Ubuntu is based on. Debian is the most stable experience. You can match packages from less stable, fresher sources (testing repository, flatpak). Good to try an install on a virtual machine, like free virtualbox. I personally gravitate toward command line tools because they don't change their interface. It's setting things up how I like only once. Same reason to separate "/" and "/home" file systems.
@XauriEL @clive I run Linux on 3 of my 4 PCs, so I'm a fan. The one issue to consider carefully is whether you have acceptable open source alternatives to important applications. I have a few for which there's no good analogue.
I upgraded my main PC to Windows 11 reluctantly. Fortunately, tools like the free ShutUp10! let you disable telemetry, Recall and CoPilot, and a host of other privacy stealers.
Yeah totally I would include that
I think servers counts pretty strongly 😅
@clive I used to dual-boot Ubuntu and Windows, until WSL* came out 🤷
And since I started making music, my workflow depends too much on Ableton and a lot of different VSTs. But seeing that Windows 10 will be retired next year, I don't know. Might be worth looking into how to migrate back.
Yeah — same with music for me; I’ve used several DAWs on several systems but nothing works as well for me as Logic … I am like 10x productive using it, so it keeps me lashed to macOS at least some of the time
@stefan @clive 1/2 You can pass through physical devices to a virtual machine. Much easier to restore the state of a virtual machine than a physical windows mess. Audio is generally in a confusing state but pipewire has made things much easier and logical on Linux. There's also pulseaudio, alsa, jack (realtime audio) so take it into consideration that there might be weird problems with the different parts interacting. Might also work 100%.
@sandycorzeta Ah, yes, I do! Or at least I try.
I only started about 3 years ago, and I'll leave it to others to decide whether I'm any good yet. If you're interested:
Depends on how much you're willing to dig into vm setup. https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/PCI_passthrough_via_OVMF#Passing_through_other_devices
May be better to host the vm on MacOS (music people recommending it and has unix capabilities similar to linux)? Haven't used that for virtual machines though. From my MacOS use, there's a lot of differences that I didn't like, mostly wrangling things to work with automation like in Linux. Not quite Windows levels of messing around but not great.
My personal OS has been QubesOS or FreeBSD since 2001, broken only by a spell of using MacOS for a while. I don't know how to use windows.
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