
Switching my parents over to Linux saved me a lot of headache and support calls - l1am0
https://write.as/simonfrey/how-switching-my-parents-over-to-linux-saved-me-a-lot-of-headache-and-support
======
jaredandrews
Just to add another anecdote...

Back in 2008 or so, my relatives did the _really nice thing_ of buying my
Grandma the cheapest possible Walmart computer they could find. You know the
sort of Windows eMachine that comes preinstalled with spyware?

Of course, my relatives live about 6 hours away from her and all of the "on
site support" fell to me. In the first 2 years of my Grandma getting this
computer I must have gone over more than 10 times to fix all sorts of stupid
issues that were pretty much inherent to the machine.

I grew sick of this and one day I went over, backed up the few important files
on the machine and installed linux mint. That was in 2010, it is now 2019 and
I have gone over to fix my Grandmas computer twice since. Once to help her set
up a printer, and another time when she accidentally cleared her cookies and
couldn't figure out how to log back into anything.

The strange thing is that my Grandma never commented on the Mint interface and
as far as I can tell she never noticed that I completely changed the operating
system ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

~~~
gambiting
So my personal anecdote also involves mint - I've set one up for someone years
ago(probably around 2013-2014) and you're right, it had no issues. However,
when I came over to visit last year I wanted to do some maintenance, so "apt-
get update" and "apt-get upgrade" would be the start. Nope, turns out that the
update servers for that version of Mint have been switched off long time ago
and none of the links resolve anymore. Upgrading the apt server list just
resulted in hundreds of errors when actually trying to upgrade the system. At
this point I stopped, worried that I'm just going to break everything.

After that, I had a realization - yes, the system ran for 4 years without any
maintenance, but it also received no updates and no patches whatsoever during
that time, because linux does not do that by default(or at least Mint didn't).
And then the only issues my windows-using family have is 90% of the time due
to....windows updates. Things are not where they used to be, some application
changed so it's now different, they had something open and the computer
restarted itself....the usual. And while that is a problem....at least their
machines are always patched and up to date. That Mint installation was running
in the same state that it was in the day I set it up, and after just few years
it couldn't even be updated any more(to my best effort). That's pretty bad
too.

~~~
phaedrus
This was what turned me off from Linux Mint for my own use. The catch-22 of
you need to upgrade to a supported version, but the servers / packages you
would need in order to do the upgrade were turned off in the meantime. To be
fair, Linux Mint states that a complete reinstall is the recommended way, but
since I do development, it's a pain to have to locate and reinstall from
scratch all the packages I need.

Also I think Ubuntu suffers the same problem, if you wait long enough. I'm
pretty sure I have an Ubuntu install that I waited too long to upgrade.

It is enough to make me serious consider switching to FreeBSD, except I don't
think the 3D (game engine) library I want to use is supported.

~~~
rhizome
_it 's a pain to have to locate and reinstall from scratch all the packages I
need._

    
    
        dpkg --get-selections | cut -f1 > ~/installed_pkgs.log
        cat installed_pkgs.log | xargs sudo apt install

~~~
rabidrat
Tell that to your grandmother over the phone and see how much of a pain it is
:)

~~~
johnchristopher
Story-time:

If she's like mine she's going to tell you everything is fine and when you
visit her in a few months you'll see it isn't working.

I once helped my grandma, on the phone, navigate through a VCR to record a
star trek episode. Everything was going well but I came home to an empty VHS.

"I told you it was fine so you wouldn't worry."

I miss my grandma more than that episode of star trek.

~~~
rhizome
I'm just jealous you had a grandma who watched Star Trek!

------
city41
I run Ubuntu on three machines and never in a million years would I set it up
for my parents. I still struggle with lots of little gotchas and annoying
issues like sometimes it just doesn't want to suspend. Or sometimes after
resuming, the keyboard doesn't work so gotta unplug it and plug it back in.
Sometimes my wifi just conks out for no apparent reason. On and on, just lots
of little paper cuts.

I switched my parents over to OSX years ago and have had to do almost no tech
support at all. I really like Linux, but I still would argue that the OS that
"just works" the most is still OSX.

~~~
gbil
The problem you describe is mostly because of hardware. And you didn't switch
to OSX, you switched them to Apple hardware with Apple software, not an OS
switch.

On well supported hardware for Linux I have my parents since many years on
Fedora. I even just swapped the drive from an old Lenovo netbook to a newer
Fujitsu laptop without any issues in between

~~~
hutzlibu
"The problem you describe is mostly because of hardware."

Which does not change the fact that they are still problems - no matter how
unfair it is and how little the Linux-Community is to blame for it.

I used Linux on many different machines - and sadly I can confirm lots of
problems with hardware. Standby/Resume, etc.

~~~
thomastjeffery
The point here is that the solution is simply to get better hardware, which is
much less expensive outside the Apple ecosystem.

~~~
city41
In my experience the same hardware when ran under Windows does not have these
issues.

EDIT: also just want to say I'm not anti-Linux, I'm just being realistic. I
understand Linux's history and how it has some disadvantages (and advantages).
I'm just saying at the end of the day, my interest is a reliable machine,
regardless of how I get there.

~~~
int_19h
Of course, since that hardware is tested under Windows.

OPs point is that if you're comparing Linux to macOS, you need to also compare
the hardware accordingly - just as you buy a Mac to run macOS on, you need to
buy hardware that's guaranteed to work well with Linux. And such Linux
hardware is still going to cost less than a MacBook or a Mac Mini.

~~~
pjmlp
I bought an Asus 1215B, sold with Ubuntu, a couple of years ago.

WiFi working has always been ups and downs, specially bad at the beggining
when Canonical decided to exchange the closed source driver by an open source
one, even thought it wasn't feature complete. I had to spend 3 months using
LAN cable until the drive was actually working.

The Radeon on the Brazos APU is a DirectX 11 class GPU, but after AMD dropped
fxglr, I lost video hardware acceleration, and the OpenGL feature level has
been droped to a lower version.

So much for buying a laptop with Linux support out of the box.

------
sgt
Many years ago I idealistically tried to switch my dad over to Linux but that
was a nightmare, mostly due to hardware incompatibilities. My missus also ran
Linux at some point but Ubuntu upgrades kept breaking and 3G modem drivers
never worked properly. But that's years ago so I am sure the desktop Linux
situation has improved slightly.

Since about 2010 my entire family is on Mac and support calls have also pretty
much ended. When I read some of these other threads, it seems like it's
accepted that parents/grandparents do nothing else than just open up a web
browser.

That hasn't been my experience at all.

They buy printers, scanners, use apps from the app store, try to connect new
and strange cameras, card readers, external screens (try simply connecting an
external 4K screen to a random Linux computer, I guarantee you'll get a few
surprises).

My dad's recently got into 3D printing (keep in mind he's a consumer, not an
expert) and Fusion 360 would not even have run on Windows. He would not have
been able to figure out FreeCAD either.

~~~
bigbugbag
Hardware incompatibilities goes both way stuff that won't work on windows or
that requires some obscure/bloated driver will work plug and play on linux.
Depends on the hardware and the work put on it but the opensource people.

Many people have their first linux experience with ubuntu which is a shame
seeing how this distribution is riddled with problems that are not being
addressed because the distro is going to be binned in 6 months anyway and devs
have to work on the next release.

I agree with you, daily usage is mostly a web browser / email client but
there's also all the uncommon stuff and exotic hardware except my experience
is that 70-80% of time you plug it and it just works, 10% of time it requires
some web searching and meddling with installing/configuring somethins and 10%
of time it will not work (85% of those are apple devices).

There's also one important thing to take into account, in 2010 Mac were
repairable and serviceable, since 2012 repairability of Mac is abysmal and
consistently get the worst score on fixit. The long list of Apple engineering
failures[1] adds to the idea that getting Mac just to be able to run OSX is
not as good as it was in 2010.

[1]:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUaJ8pDlxi8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUaJ8pDlxi8)

~~~
slavik81
I have had occasional issues with Ubuntu, but differences between distros feel
minor in comparison to the problems that initially coloured my perception.

My first experience with Linux was in the university computer lab. I just
needed to quickly send an email. I logged in, and I couldn't figure out how to
do anything. Not even log out. After asking a random other student for help, a
group of people came to my aid. Turns out the desktop environment was actually
broken, because the IT staff had configured it wrong. One of the other
students figured out how to open a shell without using any menus and he logged
me out. I decided not to use those computers again.

My second experience with Linux was on a remote terminal at my job. It was
awful. Nothing worked correctly. I now realize that whoever had set up my
account had done a bad copy/paste/edit job from somebody else's dotfiles, but
at the time I just assumed that's how Linux was. I figured the misconfigured
tcsh shell with broken autocomplete that they gave me was normal, because I
had never seen anything different before. The oddly configured, licenseless
RHEL desktop they gave me reinforced the idea that everything is hard on
Linux.

I had an incredibly negative opinion of Linux at this point. Every interaction
had shown me that Linux was a confusing mess of garbage. Then I installed
Ubuntu on my desktop. It was easy and everything worked million times better.
Later, I tried Fedora and CentOS and the same was true there. At that point, I
realized that Linux wasn't broken and hard to use by default. It was IT staff
that was ruining it.

------
Svip
I concur with this experience. A few years before my grandmother died, I
installed Ubuntu on a new laptop for her. All she wanted to do was check her
email, view her bank account and play solitaire. It was easy to set up
shortcuts to any of this, and she never had any problems.

Every time I came to visit, I would make sure to check the status of the
packages, and run the software updater if any updates were available.

The only 'problem' I experienced was confusion from my uncles, when they tried
to use her laptop, when _they_ came to visit. But I wouldn't really rate that
a problem, since they just gave up and didn't ruin anything.

~~~
rocky1138
I set my dad up with Lubuntu just under a year ago and the only problem he's
had is a system lockup that we traced to a malfunctioning mouse crashing the
computer. We replaced the mouse a few weeks ago and haven't had the problem
since. He's very happy with it.

------
dsr_
My father was willing to switch, my mother was not.

So: my father is now on his third Linux machine in 16 years (two laptops and
now a NUC hiding behind a 24" monitor). Normal updates are handled
automatically; I do a major upgrade once a year. rsnapshot backs up to an
external disk three times a day. Every so often he tells me that he wants to
do something new, and asks if it's possible; the answer is always yes.

My mother is on her fifth computer in that time. She's always unhappy with it,
but refuses to change, because she's afraid that Linux will be incompatible
with the new service-du-jour that her friends are always adopting.

~~~
gotorazor
That’s the biggest problem I see to Linux adoption in these scenarios. Unless
it is something super geeky, nobody makes client softwares for desktop Linux.

~~~
brightball
This has actually been one of the big perks of Electron.

~~~
pjmlp
I think you mean the Web.

------
chimen
Switched my father-in-law to ubuntu 10 years ago and I basically ended all his
"support" calls to me :). He was constantly getting malware from all sorts of
banners and popups while playing chess and rummy online. That, coupled with
some good extensions such as mining block + uBlock + Disconnect changed the
whole deal in an hour.

He's 76 now so yes, linux is a very good option for them.

~~~
etxm
> He was constantly getting malware from all sorts of banners and popups while
> playing chess and rummy online

Wink, wink, nudge, nudge.

------
rootoor
My 97 year old grandpa has a MacBook Pro and a few years back he was
constantly on the phone with my mom trying to fix issues. We installed a
Remote Desktop server so my mom could fix things quickly. After a visit we
diagnosed the problem. Because of his poor motorskills, he was clicking and
clicking-and-dragging things by accident. To mitigate this, we installed some
software that locked the applications in the dock and got him a mouse with a
ball you move with your thumb. The problems disappeared overnight.

~~~
Synaesthesia
You should get him an iPad or consider it. My grandpa who’s 94 won’t use
anything else. That said he’s probably used to the setup now.

~~~
sgt
My grandmother (100) just phoned me using FaceTime on her iPad. I find this
insanely cool. She was born during World War 1, experienced World War 2 and is
now able to enjoy modern technology to get in touch with her family. The only
issue she has is accidentally touching the screen.

~~~
martimarkov
There is a setting for that in iOS. It’s somewhere in accessibility

------
noir_lord
I did this for my Mum about 6 years ago.

These days she doesn't buy a computer unless it will "run that minty thing".

I pretty much don't have any tech support calls from her anymore, I think a
couple in 5 years and one of those was her knocking the video cable out with a
hoover.

I just install Mint based on LTS and forget about it.

~~~
perakojotgenije
I did the same with my parents-in-law. The best thing with mint is it has very
similar interface to windows (they were using windows XP previously). So I
didn't need to explain anything, the icons just became green, chrome icon
became blue and Firefox icon was the same. And nowadays they can even play
some of my (even windows only) steam games like zuma or peggle deluxe. When I
meet them I do an upgrade and that's it.

------
owaislone
I used to install Linux on any computer I could find 10 years ago. Friends,
family, fellow students, college labs (yes!) and had almost the Linux snob but
I learned the same thing. Some fairly non-technical people I introduce to
Linux are still using Ubuntu to this day and they actually feel totally lost
when they have to use a Windows computer. They feel like pulling their hair
when they have to use a Windows computer for some reason.

I've since calmed down and don't "preach" it anymore because of the "support
calls" as I don't have a ton of free time and energy I had 10 years ago but I
can totally relate to OP. Once I set a laptop up with Ubuntu and install apps
that people need, they go without asking for help for _years_. Only issues
people used to call me for were when they had to access documents that Ubuntu
wasn't able to deal with properly like MS Office docs or old CDs with auto-
play apps. Better broadband speeds almost completely fixed that problem on
it's own.

------
taylodl
I was going to comment why not get them an iPad, but that would be a big
change all at once. I like your approach of slowly introducing them to the new
software they'd be running on Ubuntu on their Windows 10 system. That way they
get used to all the new programs and the final switch to Ubuntu is pretty much
a non-event. Smart! So smart that I don't think transitioning them to an iPad
would be that easy.

~~~
l1am0
The iPad way could also work quite well, but as my dad does a lot of writing
he needs a keyboard :D

~~~
daveFNbuck
iPads have decent keyboard cases now. I considered getting one to replace my
laptop last month but decided against it because it's not really viable for
coding yet.

~~~
calgoo
IMO, those keyboards are ok for some quick notes, but for anything longer, its
going to give you issues (unless you have tiny hands).

~~~
daveFNbuck
I'm doubly glad I didn't go that route then.

------
lgleason
I switched my dad over to Chrome OS and never looked back. Now he tells all of
this fiends to do the same thing because it's so much simpler. I really wish
there was a better open source alternative because Google is evil these days
but...

~~~
SiVal
Yes, I think the ChromeBook idea is probably the best "computer as managed
appliance" for our older relatives these days, BUT I really would prefer to
get the OS from a company that didn't have so much interest in surveilling and
managing society.

~~~
steelframe
It's a bit of a chore, but you can switch off surveillance on Chromebooks
through a series of configuration changes:

[https://www.laptopmag.com/articles/keep-google-spying-
kids-c...](https://www.laptopmag.com/articles/keep-google-spying-kids-
chromebook)

Combine with the usual DuckDuckGo, Apple Maps/OpenStreetMap, Posteo, uBlock
Origin, and friends, and you have a pretty good maintenance-free privacy
solution.

------
pjmlp
I also tried to.

The first thing they did on my absence was having a local PC store install XP
again on it, because they couldn't use any of the software for their devices.

Nowadays they just use Windows and I am confident any local PC store will take
care of their issues, instead of having me deal with them.

~~~
simion314
The article mentions that first you check how they use the computer,
transition them to free software apps, after that transition to Linux. To
check if their hardware works you can use a Live session, check the video,
sound, network,printer.scanner etc

~~~
pjmlp
That doesn't work for stuff they buy on their own, which was what happened on
my case.

Additionally any dude at the local PC store can help with configuration issues
during warranty.

Or when their network goes tits up and the calldesk from the network provider
only has support scripts for Windows or macOS.

~~~
simion314
For configuration you can help them with TeamView or something similar,
usually parents don't go and buy printers or video cars without asking you if
you are the one that is more technical.

But if you already ton't help them cleaning Windows and instead sending them
to a store then sure let them continuing use Windows.

I am a Linux user and Free software supporter but I would never try to switch
someone that is happy with his system, I am lazy and I hate taking
responsibility for the system. (as an example a friend of mine fixed someone
PC by reinstalling Windows but the sound would not work because of missing
drivers (he did not had internet do find drivers) and he was suspecting of
stealing the sound card or breaking the sound somehow... so yeah if you don't
care send them to a store)

~~~
pjmlp
Exactly because I care to have a life outside work, and don't want them to
have to depend on someone located 3000 km away, that I rather have them going
to the local PC store.

Actually, yes my parents do buy stuff on their own, or by talking with friends
of theirs, to whom Linux is that strange thing that some "university guys"
use.

And to make it clear, it isn't a random PC store that does dirty tricks, just
like many random car repair shops happen to do, rather something proper.

~~~
simion314
That is fine, I completely agree, you are not the "target" of this article, I
would do the same.

------
daveFNbuck
> It is not FOSS, but I did install google chrome as it was the easiest for
> watching netflix

I haven't had to do tech support for my parents on this, but I find that the
best and easiest way to do streaming media is via a set-top box like Roku or
Fire TV. The interface is simple and you'd probably rather be watching on your
TV than your monitor anyway.

------
yawaramin
When it comes to parents, a 'tech support call' is not just a tech support
call, it's a chance for them to talk to their kids.

~~~
mpweiher
So this comes down to "After I switched my parents to Linux, they don't want
to talk to me any more"...

~~~
5580
Sometimes elimination of "technical difficulties" greatly reduces time spent
together.

------
williamdclt
I really would like to do the same. My father is always complaining about
Windows problems that just don't happen with Mint/Ubuntu, and my mom has an
machine that's too weak and old to run windows properly.

The one thing that prevent me to do that is that they use their computer for
work. While I'm certain that I wouldn't have any problem doing their job with
Linux, they ask me "can you absolutely guarantee that I'll be able to open and
edit any Word document and that it'll look the same when I send it? Or that I
won't have any problem with video conferencing?"

Well... No. I'm fairly certain, but I can't take the responsability in case
I'm wrong

~~~
y4mi
I can guarantee you that there is no equivalent to word on Linux. All
compatible office suites display word documents differently, and none come
close to feature parity if we're talking about advanced macros and similar.

There is no alternative to Windows If they need Microsoft office for work...
Or a VM just to run that shitty application.

Same applies to video conferencing software. If he is forced to use a specific
tool, he'll probably be be plain out of luck. Most can't host the conferences
from Linux.

Thankfully, most people don't need word or one specific brand of video
conferencing software... So using Linux would still be an option to a lot of
people

~~~
jmkni
> no equivalent

...

> _that shitty application_

Pick one!

~~~
y4mi
you clearly didn't understood the point i was trying to make.

I don't like Word and thankfully, don't need it myself. I'm perfectly fine
with word.office.com and google docs, as I neither need nor want the advanced
features. I also don't mind if the document has an occasionally entirely
different layout and sometimes even an entirely broken one.

If you are forced to use the doc/docx formats and need to share these files
with other people, you'll be forced to use Microsoft Office and by extension
Windows. There is no viable alternative.

all alternatives only work if you only need to produce PDFs and don't need to
collaboratively edit said doc/docx

and exactly the same applies to the video conferencing tools. If you can
choose your own, appear.in works fine from linux for example.

If you need to use Ciscos or SAPs (for example) video conferencing tools,
you'll be plain out of luck on linux, unless you're fine just joining other
peoples sessions (never hosting one yourself)

------
bproven
This part is critical:

1) Sit down with your folks and talk trough their daily usage of their
computer (Please be not so arrogant to think you already know it all)

As technologists this all comes easy to us and it is easy to forget what
everyday computer usage means.

~~~
agumonkey
sometimes even double clicking has to be discussed

------
SamWhited
I did the same thing a while back, except that I used Fedora because
everything in Ubuntu crashed constantly on their old hardware and half the
drivers wouldn't work. When their old Dell finally died, they decided to get a
new one and asked me which they should get. I pointed them at the previous gen
XPS (that still had USB-A ports) and they bought one with Ubuntu on it out of
the box without asking questions and don't appear to know the difference (they
did ask me if I could change the trash icon back to the old one, because they
didn't like how "blue" the new one was… but that was a minor change compared
to my dads work machine being upgraded to Windows 10 so I think they're okay
with it for now).

So far they seem happy with it; hopefully more laptops ship with Ubuntu or
similar in the future.

------
unknowns
I have sent my father (who I no longer interact with) and my mother, a laptop
with ubuntu installed. I have not had to support that thing for 5 years. it
just runs. no updates, no virus scan ads. Its been amazing. i installed VLC
player and firefox. They are living the life being "connected"

~~~
michaelmrose
No updates for 5 years including security updates?

~~~
unknowns
No updates at all. Its not my problem and I have expressed the dangers. Family
situation prevents this kind of support and they wont stop using it. No issues
at all. My fiance's aunt on the other hand (using windows) has had to call me
frequently for virus/slow down/connecting printers etc.Its been a pain.

------
simplicio
I always thought a good line for Canonical to get into would be to release a
"Granny-buntu" distro that was super-locked down that grandkids could set up
for their elders once and then ideally have a few easily identified launchers
on the desktop that would launch with sensible defaults, and nothing else.

~~~
l1am0
You could do this yourself, by setting a root account for your admin work and
an unprivileged account for your parents.

With that setup is not so easy to nuke things over. (But a backup is still
important :D)

~~~
icebraining
An unprivileged account can still do stuff like accidentally hide the toolbar
or delete some shortcut to an application. The machine still boots, but it's
effectively unusable.

------
excalibur
My nitpick is about some of the inconsistencies. You said that you got them
accustomed to Firefox and LibreOffice, and then you turned around and
installed Chrome and MS Office in Wine. Does that mean they didn't take well
to the new apps, and your user training method wasn't entirely successful?

~~~
l1am0
They use firefox as main browser, but for using DRM content I found Chrome to
be the easier solution.

They worked their way to LibreOffice, but regarding spell- and grammar-
checking LibreOffice really sucks. As my dad does professional writing it was
just not enough.

~~~
gnulinux
(disclaimer I never used Chrome) What's the problem with Firefox and Netflix?
I never had an issue?

~~~
wink
I don't remember details but I also had major problems there, must have been
two years ago, in the summer. Updating the needed plugins stopped working for
some reason. Can't comment on current state as I haven't used Netflix on Linux
for quite a while.

------
bitxbitxbitcoin
The best part is when they get that call from a scammer claiming that
something is wrong with their windows installation and it dawns on them how
obvious the scam is.

~~~
benbristow
And even if they still think it's Windows by the time they get to the
'download this remote access client' stage they won't be able to run the exe
and the scammer will probably give up on them.

~~~
_emacsomancer_
Unless you've installed Wine....

~~~
benbristow
Depends if Wine supports the software.

And an easier solution, don't install WINE!

------
osrec
I switched my family to elementaryOS and Google docs. It was more than enough
for their needs. I can't remember the last time anyone in my family used
Windows or MacOS, and I don't think they miss either.

------
bashwizard
I pushed my dad to get an 27" iMac a few years ago. I haven't heard of them
since. I hope they are still alive.

------
jeena
I too have an anecdote...

I am a family friend to a older couple, and for reasons I don't want to
discus, the wife who was doing all the needed things on the computer like
paying the bills, checking the bank balance, checking emails, printing, etc.;
and suddenly now at the age of 72 he needed to learn to do those things.

It was not easy, especially because there is nobody who can teach you how to
pay your bills, and if you want to pay a bill of say 8 EUR, you need to pay a
fee of 10 EUR if you go to the bank in Sweden and do it there.

He had an old Toshiba laptop which was not usable anymore (that is why they
bought a new laptop some years ago which his wife took with her), so I
installed a lightweight Ubuntu version on it, installed Thunderbird and
Firefox and connected the printer. It took quite many times for me to show him
how to log in into the bank account and how to pay the bills, and he still
struggles with it sometimes, but at least the OS itself is not hindering him
in doing what he needs to do. There are basically two icons when he opens the
computer and then he opens the browser and writes the bank name into the
search field and then google shows him the website so he can log in and do the
thing.

------
gerdesj
I've solely been using Linux as a workstation at home and work for about 12
years now. I used to use Gentoo on both and then switched to Arch, mainly to
save my lap from melting and speed up updating.

When we got wifey her first laptop about 10 years ago, I naturally put Windows
7 on it - it was what she expected. I've also been a Windows (and NetWare 8)
sysadmin for rather a longer time than Linux. It was OK (Windows 7) but the MS
updates were a pain (slow) and I had problems with the GPU drivers and I had
to keep on finding updates for each package/app installed. The GPU driver
thing was unusual to me but happened and this was wifeys only machine and
hence it was a thing.

I binned Win 7 in a final fit of pique. I backed it up and turned it into a VM
(just in case) and installed Arch on the physical machine. That was three
laptops ago. Each time I back it up using Clonezilla and dump it back on the
next one and extend the file system to fill the new, bigger disc.

To update her laptop I ssh into it, run the update routine (aurman -Syu)
whilst she is using it and schedule a reboot late at night. Normally, she does
not even notice except that I do mention I'm doing it and to save open files
(OK .

The reason I use a rolling distro by choice for workstations is because it is
always up to date and there are no discontinuities in the lifecycle. I do not
use a rolling distro for my servers (any more) for them I generally use LTS
Ubuntu releases.

All my Linux (and FreeBSD) boxes update everything when updated and they do it
quickly and without much fuss. My Windows and Apples do not update everything.
They need each and every add on updated separately. That takes ages and you
need to know that something is actually installed.

A FOSS box updates everything on an update ... everything.

------
hpcjoe
I got fed up with being the family windows support guy. It was really bad when
my wife's laptop could not do basic DHCP correctly at $dayjob-1 office. She
and daughter had problems with printing, networking, security ... it was
horrible.

I gave them a few options at the laptop replacement cycle. I said you can do
either Linux or Mac, I didn't care which. Mac had always worked well in laptop
format for me, though my primary machine has been a linux desktop for about 15
years. I knew both would work without problem.

I gave my wife my mac laptop for a week, and she used it. Then I had her play
with the linux desktop. I asked her which one she liked better. She opted for
Mac. As did my daughter.

Just replaced the first one for wife, and daughter had to buy a new one for
college anyway. So far, 1 problem on wifes old mac, which turned out to be a
hardware problem with the wifi card. Quickly fixed, and pretty much no
problems since then.

Though I have to help them do system updates.

Either Mint or Mac. Both work very well. I even have mint working on my work
Mac.

------
bigbugbag
Switched my whole family on Linux 15+ years ago, call for support went down
dramatically maybe 95% now versus then. There was a few hiccups along the way
to find a suitable distro, dropping ubuntu was a _huge_ improvement in this.

Most recent major issue is when Mozilla decided that they would remove support
for ALSA with mentioning it in changelog on a ESR release and suddenly there
was no sound in online videos and I had to scramble to replace firefox on a
dozen of computers.

Almost all computers can be remotely administered over a secure connection,
they have automated backups and most have unattended upgrade.

Issue arise when KDE releases half baked stuff and changes the way things
worked, Mozilla messes firefox some more and systemd is being systemd. Once in
while there is this family member who is too clueless/proud to admit he messed
up who broke something or did not find way something obvious.

------
Rietty
This is a very minor nitpick, but you do have some spelling errors in there.
The one I noticed however is the word:

save/saver instead of safe/safer.

~~~
l1am0
Thanks for that info! Yes I am native german speaker, so I appreciate your
help here :D

~~~
lucb1e
Also not a native Markdown speaker I see :P

------
avatarbl
I would have switched to Chromebook, based on the usage pattern.

~~~
code_duck
I switched my mother to Linux years ago and it was much better for her than
Windows. These days, though, Chromebooks are even better since they are
essentially Linux and much more foolproof than a general purpose Linux distro.

------
barbecue_sauce
Dad has a really shitty Toshiba laptop (previously running Windows 10), barely
uses it, but it was clearly infected with something. Weird alerts at all hours
of the night over its speakers saying that a virus was detected. Has had a
Norton subscription for years, but hasn't really done any good. My Dad was
constantly complaining about not being able to log in (though I suspect he was
really forgetting his password).

Switched him over to Linux Mint a few weeks ago. I had to fight with some
driver issues for the wireless card, but so far he's had no complaints.

------
mmckelvy
Related aside, what's the best way to run Microsoft Office on a Linux box? My
ideal setup would be Linux for everything but Office programs, which I'd
prefer to run in a Windows environment.

------
tbiteteitb
It seems that for every Linux discussion on HN there's always user spreading
some kind of FUD based on personal experiences from 2011.

Glad to read so many success comments on this discussion BTW.

~~~
jamiek88
Dissent and sharing opinions and experience is not a campaign of ‘FUD’.

There is no cabal ganging up to share misinformation on Linux.

Please give more credit to those you disagree with and assume their intentions
are like, I presume yours are: to share your opinion and experiences.

~~~
tbiteteitb
I don't want to engage with no one in particular.

And You are right, giving Your opinion does not mean it's FUD.

But if You pay attention, you'll see that for some folks here Linux it's never
an option or solution they will take and are pretty vocal about it.

~~~
sbuk
And by the same token; in fact on this thread, there are many that feel the
same way towards macOS and Windows. Plenty of anecdotes right here that could
be construed as FUD. I use all 3 platforms frequently and I can tell you that
they are all as “bad” as one another.

------
vonseel
My dad needed to play a video file sent to him by a lawyer recently. I assume
it wasn’t QuickTime compatible.

Well, he couldn’t get in touch with me and installed some crazy video player
he paid for on the App Store. I was shocked.

Literally, the first result when I search for “video player Mac” on Google is
something for VLC.

Why is it so hard for less technically knowledgeable users to find reliable,
spam/malware/marketing-bullshit free software?

~~~
acct1771
Because the market's advertising is geared toward informing them about the
malware.

------
indymike
I switched my Dad to Linux around 2012, mainly because I couldn't talk him
into spending $2000 on a MacBook Pro (he needed a big screen due to vison
issues). I love MacBooks for relatives because the Apple Store can and will
help... Chromebooks are nice, too because they just don't have issues.

------
m45t3r
I remember years ago I setup a XFCE desktop on my Arch Linux to my mom, since
I was tired to fixing the problems that my PC got every time she wanted to use
it.

I just explained: this is "the internet" (Firefox), this is Word
(OpenOffice.org Writter), this is Excel (OpenOffice.org Calc), everything else
you can come to me and ask (I lived with her).

This did reduce the number of reinstallations I had to do, and I don't
remember she ever asking for some actual problem (mostly some basic
questions).

Nowadays she only uses her smartphone and it is much easier to avoid problems.
Since she doesn't blind install apps before asking me if they're safe too, her
smartphone is clean.

------
kup0
A NUC-like machine + Linux has worked wonders as a computer for an older
family member of mine. We ran into a plethora of update and performance issues
with Win10. Installed Linux and never looked back and it's been far more
stable.

------
Myrmornis
I also switched my parents off Windows to Ubuntu for a while (when I used
Linux desktop myself and before OS X). It worked pretty well and didn't cause
them too much pain. Subsequently of course I got them to switch to Apple and
that's even better, primarily because they don't have to feel that they're
using some weird thing their child encouraged them to use. Avoids the Windows
nonsense of computer getting slower and slower all the time, and malware. The
only thing I've failed to help them with is the baffling Apple stuff
surrounding iCloud and storage on multiple devices.

------
qrybam
I installed Ubuntu on our spare laptop for general web browsing and day to day
use. My wife used it for about a year. Not a week went by when I didn't hear
about something not working. Granted, it's probably because I didn't spare
enough time to set things up like our network printer and installing Office
via Wine (she wasn't impressed with the FOSS alternative). I finally bit the
bullet, bought a Windows licence and haven't looked back since.... Some things
I'd be happy to put myself through, but would avoid inflicting on my non-techy
family members.

------
isostatic
I got my parents and mother-in-law to get a chromebook. Never had a question.

~~~
bschwindHN
My mom has been on a chromebook for years and I only occasionally get easy
help questions. For simple web browser usage it doesn't get much easier.

------
balls187
Convinced my mom to get an iPad Pro, and a keyboard case. She has never been
happier.

My dad is a tech savvy, but now that he travels 80% a year for retirement, he
prefers an ipad as well (even gave me his macbook pro).

------
dj_brown_sugar
I'm curious how it actually saved you headache and support calls? Your general
process of switching them over was well thought out, but I can't see how this
really helps either of you.

In my experience Linux requires a lot more command-line tweaking and such to
get basic things working, but then again that could be for my more advanced
use cases.

So the only benefit I can see is that it is more privacy focused and safer
than Windows, but at the cost of a limited application selection (through the
Ubuntu App Store at least).

~~~
gnulinux
There are tons of people using linux distros who don't even know command line
exists. One time I was helping my friend to do something. She studies design
and is basically computer illiterate. Somehow she was using Ubuntu, not sure
how that happened but she claimed to be very happy. Anyway, the problem was
super simple, but as an i3 archlinux user I literally never use GUI so I fired
a command line and solved it in one line. She was perplexed and wasn't really
sure what just happened. She didn't even know what command line is. Anyway, to
be more helpful, I also managed to solve the problem by clicking buttons...

------
alexandernst
I did the same with my parents. At first, it worked good enough. But soon the
support calls started again, and they shifted from "my PC is slow" to "how to
I connect X to my PC", being "X" anything from "printers" to "Point&shoot
cameras" to "my iPhone so I can transfer my photos".

Unpopular opinion: I just switched them again, this time to Mac. 0 support
calls since then.

------
mpg33
90% of the issues when it comes to tech and my parents is dealing with
accounts(aka setting up accounts and keeping track of usernames and
passwords).

~~~
neodypsis
I can relate to this. I tried, unsuccessfully, to teach my parents to use a
password manager (e.g., KeepassXC).

------
throw7
I've done this for my parents for close to 10 years now. Been able to give
them a stable gui environment over the years going from Gnome2 to MATE.
Mozilla Suite to Seamonkey to combo Firefox/Seamonkey email client.

Really, the biggest issue is that websites will complain about
seamonkey/firefox, saying things like "your browser not supported", "please
upgrade your browser", etc.

------
zapzupnz
I got all my grandparents iPads. The only tech support calls I get is when
they forget their Apple ID passwords. Thankfully, I know them all.

~~~
grogenaut
till you're on vacation and they go to the apple store and they "helpfully"
set a secure password on the device. Happened to my mom. She doesn't always
remember to write things down. Now I'm on a 3 way call with apple trying to
get the password reset for an hour then talking her through resetting it on
her several devices. They wouldn't let her set what she thought the password
was.

~~~
acqq
Yes, recent iOS updates tried to force people like my parents to have
passwords or logins that are too complex and simply unnecessary for them. If
you use iPad in your own home, there's no reason to "authenticate" on every
open (my parents surely don't want/can't perform the fingerprinting every time
-- not to mention that if the device prompt them to enter a new complex code
they might even type in twice but they will never remember it, or be prepared
to write it down first, the expect the device to "just work" and not to have
to maintain some other external notice book with the access codes, and I fully
understand that). It's not easy to match the security "requirements" and
general "common" use.

The iPad of my parents (that they use mostly at home) seems to insist on more
complex security procedures for my parents to watch the pictures of the kids
than the procedures which secured the launch US nuclear missiles (the later
had simply the code 00000000 [https://arstechnica.com/tech-
policy/2013/12/launch-code-for-...](https://arstechnica.com/tech-
policy/2013/12/launch-code-for-us-nukes-was-00000000-for-20-years/) ).

Balancing the security and usability is hard.

~~~
grogenaut
Having done a security review on a photos app for a company with high customer
trust, and knowing what people put in their photo shares... photo and document
shares are one of the highest risk areas for people. I didn't know about this
until the review but when it was pointed out to me, it's obvious that for some
people having their photos stolen is massively worse than credit card fraud or
other recoverable things. You can't get those docs and photos back.

However that means that you are right, it's nuclear launch code level security
for everyone's photos.

------
hanshenrik
Just want to say that Xubuntu remind me a lot of win7, and they're not even
trying to be windows-ish! (.. at least not officially?)

~~~
zozbot123
Xfce in general reminds me a lot of WinXP - the _good_ parts of WinXP, of
course. There's another thread at the time I'm writing, discussing what was
good about the Win98 interface - WinXP kept a lot of that interface, and Xfce,
LXDE, even MATE are rather reminiscent of it. I even find the GTK3 interface
quite a bit cleaner than what we got with Windows 8/10.

(As an aside, I kinda expect Xfce, LXDE and MATE to converge in the near
future. Now that essentially all of them are moving to GTK3, there seems to be
very little reason for them not to standardize on a uniform set of underlying
components and tools.)

------
ajuc
I did the same when I was at university and couldn't help my parents with
computer on daily basis anymore. Looking back now, 14 years later - it was a
very good decision. They mostly use the browser, some graphic programs and
libre office, it doesn't really matter which system runs under that.

The've had some version of Kubuntu installed ever since.

------
amelius
My parents use tablets for everything. Not sure what version of Linux would
run on a tablet, and what tablet they should buy.

------
rb808
It would be great if you could install Chromeos on any hardware. I guess
Chromeboxes/books/bits are cheap enough.

~~~
Toutou
You kinda can. e.g.
[https://www.neverware.com/freedownload](https://www.neverware.com/freedownload)

------
faitswulff
> Show them the app store and tell them, whatever they install from there is
> safe (so no viruses or something)

Is this generally true for Ubuntu? I'm not terribly familiar with it, but i
was under the impression that vetting apps is a difficult problem in general.

------
UncleBumbleFuck
Eh... Spotify provides dedicated app for Linux users. No need to use Google
Chrome for that.

------
etxm
The easiest way to get out of support calls with family is to tell them you
work in sales.

------
NuSkooler
I switched my mom from Windows to Linux years ago and have not had a single
issue since. Actually, the only real issue I have is her distro is now so old
it's well beyond LTS and I'll have to probably re-install to do any upgrades.

------
quattrofan
Would love to switch myself but with a 4k XPS had all kinds of scaling issues
and gave up which was a shame. Considering typical Linux user probably has
cutting edge hardware was surprised how poorly 4k was handled.

~~~
mixmastamyk
I use Ubuntu mate on a 4k xps and it works quite nicely. There is a double dpi
button in the tweak app.

------
gtirloni
I first tried to switch family to LibreOffice but existing Office documents
kept getting corrupted (especially complex spreadsheets). That was a deal
breaker. Last attempt was as recent as last year

~~~
williamdclt
What about Google docs? I find that it does a great job

~~~
oever
Google Docs seriously mangles ODF documents.

------
napolux
Funny how this is not true for mobile phones.

If your parents have an iphone they won't have any problem. My dad with
android has a problem with spyware, or similar, once a week.

I gave him my old iphone 6, let's see....

------
tarasmatsyk
Awesome, I enjoyed a lot the article and found it to be the best guide on how
to switch parents over to Linux :D

My fav part is cheating with SSD, made my day!

------
imandride
Interestingly enough I just installed an ad blocker on the parents Windows 10
machine and I haven't had a support call since.

------
mrmyers
This has been my experience as well.

So, background: I've maintained computers for various people close to me for
maybe 6-7 years or so. A couple computers for my mom (laptop and desktop, with
both replaced once or twice), two laptops for some younger cousins going
through middle/highschool, a desktop for an aunt, and 2 of my girlfriend's
laptops over the same period.

At first, I was very pessimistic about how well it would turn out. For my
cousins, the thing that drove me to it was observing how overrun their
computers were with viruses, adware, and spyware from all the .exe files they
randomly downloaded which claimed to be games, to the point where their
computers were more or less unusable (their fans would be blowing full speed
and the whole thing overheating from the moment they started, it was kind of
surreal). My mom had similar issues, though not quite as bad, mostly from
email stuff. Over time, I grew a bit more confident in being able to manage
this sort of thing, and now it's my default for this sort of situation.

So, some of the benefits I've noticed:

1\. It's a lot easier to dictate terminal commands over the phone or through
email than to walk someone through gui operations. If the person struggles
enough with computer stuff that they can't even manage with the help of 'user
friendly' interfaces, optimizing for the ease with which you can trouble-shoot
and fix things over the phone is a lot more practical than chasing after the
lost cause of finding a friendly enough interface for them to manage on their
own. You can write an important terminal command on a post-it-note next to
their compute. You can attach a shell script to an email. Or, with a little
bit of setup, you can just ssh into their machine remotely whenever they're
having troubles to fix it from the comfort of your own home.

2\. It's very easy to set up a minimal, XP-ish interface where all of their
needed programs are just right there in the start menu, and such that it's
very hard for them to mess up their system such that that base level of
functionality is impared.

3\. Runs well on fairly limited hardware.

Some general advice if you're considering doing the same:

1\. Keep a text-file with all the stuff you installed/changed on the persons
computer so you can reproduce it easily in the future.

2\. This is more general advice, but have separate / and /home partitions, so
you don't need to move their data back and forth if something happens to the
OS.

3\. Look up issues with their machine and linux ahead of time before trying.
It's not always a simple "you can't", sometimes you'll find out there's some
firmware you need to install for their wifi to work properly etc.

4\. Figure out how much autonomy they should have over their machine. If
you're sort of hoping for them to be able to choose and download software on
their own, and be able to try to figure out menus to configure stuff, Ubuntu
or Linux Mint might be a good choice. Otherwise, surprisingly, Debian might
actually be easier for both of you. I've generally found Debian stable just
has fewer surprises once it's set up, and you can for the most part just
ignore it for years in a way that always seems to go badly when I try it with
Ubuntu or Mint, thus lowering the burden on _you_ in maintaining it quite a
bit (versus figuring out wtf happened with some random Ubuntu update, or
troubleshoot for the umpteenth time how Mint screwed up apt). Decide whether
they should actually have sudo privileges or not.

5\. Only do it if you're prepared to be their first contact when something
happens, and conversely, make absolutely sure they know to contact you first
whenever there's a problem. There's nothing more frustrating than a neighbor
who thinks they're tech-savy poking in, only to 'fix' things by reinstalling
windows, or convincing them they must have a 'virus' because they don't
understand what they're looking at.

6\. MAKE SURE THE DEFAULT SAVE FORMAT FOR LIBREOFFICE IS doc NOT odf!

7\. It'll feel kind of icky, but make sure you have their root password
written down on a piece of paper somewhere safe. They will never remember it,
and if you give them a piece of paper with it on it and tell them "absolutely
do not lose this", they will lose it. Also, more general, but pwqgen is a
pretty great program for generating random passwords that are fairly easy to
remember.

8\. Configure it to work with any home printers they need, and just set their
expectations that they will not be able to figure out how to make other
people's printers work with their computer. Configuring printers is a discount
hell run by a counterfeit Satan.

9\. Make sure they have adblock on their browser.

~~~
mxuribe
All of these are great suggestions and comments! But, the funniest comment...

> Configuring printers is a discount hell run by a counterfeit Satan.

Genius!

------
michaelmrose
l1am0, did you consider abiword for a simpler word processor?

~~~
l1am0
I never worked with it, but will give it a try for my daily work (y)

Currently I use following setup for myself: LibreOffice + languagetool for
spelling

------
benbristow
I'd probably install Google Chrome over Firefox by default.

Usually slightly better with compatibility as most developers target Chrome
first and has Flash support for even the oldest of sites.

------
wordpressdev
My parents were on Human OS, never tried to switch them to Linux. Have I
missed something?

------
Odenwaelder
Obligatory read: [https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/in-which-i-fix-my-
girlfr...](https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/in-which-i-fix-my-girlfriends-
grandparents-wifi-and-am-hailed-as-a-conquering-hero)

~~~
dTal
Not especially relevant, but funny!

------
uvu
Gnu/Linux

------
hamilyon2
Skype is not mentioned on the page.

I guess, we live in different realities.

~~~
mrweasel
The only people I know that uses Skype are people working for large companies
and they only use it because their employers tell them to.

I think it has to do with how your countries telcos developed. If phone calls
a cheap, why would you care about Skype? WhatsApp, Telegram and other
messaging services seem to be popular around the world, but, perhaps because
SMS quickly became basically free here, everyone just use that.

~~~
walshemj
Not in the US where I suspect a majority of HN readers come from.

~~~
Marsymars
I'd be interested to see numbers. I'd guess plurality, but not majority.

~~~
walshemj
That would be interesting to a poll on

------
jcoffland
> Do yourself a favor and use standard Ubuntu.

Do yourself a favor and use standard Debian. Honestly, I don't know why anyone
bothers with Ubuntu anymore. It doesn't really add much over Debian except for
it's shitty release cycle.

~~~
opan
Ubuntu has non-free software enabled out of the box unlike Debian. To me this
is a negative, but to some it could be the difference between their wifi
working or not. It's not that this is hard to change, but if you're already
planning to make changes right away, maybe it's not the best distro for your
parents. I've taken a liking to some pretty niche distros in the last few
years. GuixSD and Void in particular. I used Arch for a long time as well. I
love these distros, but I'm not sure they're right for my parents. Maybe if I
learned how to make a customized installer that would ship my configs and
certain software out of the box I could go that route.

~~~
mrmyers
Eh, I think generally if you want to set up linux for a non-technical person,
regardless you're going to need to personally spend a couple hours configuring
and setting everything up for them initially, so the difference of editing
sources.list and adding "main contrib non-free" to a couple lines is pretty
minimal.

------
paulie_a
Years ago I suggested my bosses wife switch to a Mac after having to do
endless tech support for her fucking the system up. She still managed to fuck
up the Mac and ask for help. But I don't know Macs so I couldn't help.

After the 100th or so malware they got I told them very emphatically they
should change their bank account info, knowing full well it would be a huge
pain in the ass for them. Yes I was a dick, but they were stupid. And they
stole 600k from the federal government.

------
moron4hire
All of my tech support calls from family are about smartphones (both Android
and iOS, but more for iOS, "what do you mean I can't do that?").

Well, and getting the email server switched to something more reliable than
Gmail, but that's a business tech support call, technically.

