
Linus Torvalds, Alan Cox respond to Miguel De Icaza on Linux Desktop woes - emkemp
http://www.itwire.com/business-it-news/open-source/56418-torvalds-pours-scorn-on-de-icazas-desktop-claims
======
cletus
The actual conversation is more interesting and revealing than the blogspam on
top of it (toolbar I have to dismiss? really?). This quote is noteworthy (from
Linus):

> I personally think that one reason that the Linux kernel has been so
> successful was the fact that I didn't have a huge vision of where I wanted
> to force people to go

I agree. Thing is, this just doesn't work when it comes to user interfaces.
You end up with a morass of principalities and wanna-be-kings who all have
their own different view of what Linux on the desktop should be. This is an
area where consistency really matters (to users).

What's more the primary contributors are engineers who are unrepresentative of
any kind of mass user base (potential or actual). People who want to be able
to customize everything when no one else cares.

Ultimately I think the pseudo-anarchic development process doomed Linux on the
desktop but some external factors didn't help, namely OSX. OSX really is "good
enough" for anyone wanting a _nix desktop/laptop. Sure it has problems but it
means the gap between it and Linux is just that much smaller. And with Linux
you give up great hardware (to varying degrees) and a snappy and_ consistent*
UI/UX.

The company that has had the most success putting Linux interfaces in people's
hands is, of course, Google with Android (disclaimer: I work for Google). And
even there the principality problem has created a fragmentation nightmare as
different vendors seek to "differentiate" themselves.

Phones and tablets of course don't have the same expectation and technical
legacy that desktops do (from X11 on up). Hell, Apple did the same thing with
iOS (essentially forking OSX).

Audio is another problem. Peripherally I've had to deal with PulseAudio and it
really is a solution looking for a problem. Graphics drivers are another
issue. AMD/ATI and nVidia have of course not helped matters here.

I think Canonical had a chance to make a real impact here but they essentially
blew it.

~~~
mekoka
_> I think Canonical had a chance to make a real impact here but they
essentially blew it._

I keep seeing claims being made, and mostly by (former?) Linux superusers,
that Canonical and Ubuntu are "doomed". Could someone point me to some numbers
that show signs of this?

I know when the Unity desktop came out, a lot of people were flaming. I didn't
install it on my laptop (I'm still on 10.04 LTS), but I did on a colleague's
desktop. From time to time, I have to assist him with code he's writing.
During those sessions I have to interact with it and to be honest I'm not
pleased, but each time I ask him if he wouldn't be interested in switching to
Gnome or maybe installing Mint or something, he keeps saying it's not that
bad. I'm sitting next to him and frustrated because I can't find where
everything is and how to bring stuff up, but when I ask, he just presses a few
keys and whatever we need shows up on screen.

When Miguel de Icaza's post came out last week and I saw claims on the doom of
Ubuntu, I started looking for evidence. I couldn't find anything that in fact
confirmed this. I found a lot of people who complained about Unity last year
when it first came out, but fast forward in 2012 and there are also more and
more posts of people going _I use to hate it with a passion, but I have to
admit, it's now growing on me. Not everything is perfect, but with a bit of
work I think they're on to something_. Also interesting to me was that I had a
sense that the most positive reviews came from people with no prior Linux
experience. So much so that I'm getting more and more curious about it and I'm
slowly mentally preparing to make a switch to it.

Is it possible that Canonical is actually moving away from Gnome and taking
things in-house to avoid exactly the problems that Miguel de Icaza is
underlining?

~~~
lukeschlather
What really bothers me about Unity is that I haven't seen it work. I've got a
quad-core machine with a decent NVidia GPU and 4GB of ram, and I was seeing
multiple seconds of UI lag, even on the 2D mode.

I switched to Xfce and haven't looked back. Everything is snappy, and
everything is configurable.

~~~
no_more_death
The Unity interface is incredibly cool. Love it, love it.

Performance was a bit choppy when I had 4GB ram, and sometimes compiz would
freeze my system. However, upgrading to 8GB RAM (costs about $50) totally
fixed everything for me. Just upgrade.

I'm sure they could optimize things better, but that would slow down their
frantic pace of innovation.

~~~
dkersten
_Just upgrade._

Why? Why should someone upgrade their ram just so the UI works smoothly? We've
had smooth UI's for twenty years, even back when 32 MB of ram was the norm -
so why should someone upgrade to 8 GB just for the UI? Hell, if I upgrade my
ram (I have 8 already, but anway) I'll want it to be to benefit all the
applications I like to run and I expect the UI and OS to use as little as
possible and still perform smoothly.

My old eee pc was able to run windows xp just fine before I installed Arch
with a tiling window manager on it and everything ran well, everything was
fast, everything was smooth - for about three years - and then I installed
Ubuntu and Unity brought it to a standstill despite not using any different
applications than I always used. Even switching workspaces sometimes took 15
seconds or so. Yes, it only has 1 GB of ram, but like I said, I used the same
applications that I always did without problems. I struggled with it for a few
months and switched back to Arch and haven't had any problems since (though I
now use a laptop which does have 8 gigs of ram and rather than using that ram
to make unity run smoothly, I'm using it so I can run windows 7 and linux at
the same time with VirtualBox).

------
guelo
A link to the actual discussion is probably better, it includes some back and
forth between Cox and Icaza as well as other comments:
[https://plus.google.com/115250422803614415116/posts/hMT5kW8L...](https://plus.google.com/115250422803614415116/posts/hMT5kW8LKJk)

~~~
PayUpPal
"probably"? Very definitely better than an article that goes like a story
written by a 10yo: A said this and then B said that and then A responded ...

------
lifeguard
The Linux desktop has been wildly successful! Hobbyists have been using it
since the 1990s. Yahoo! was _built_ using the linux desktop. Much of Facebook
was, too. People in web dev and tech support use it as their workstation OS.

The Linux desktop has failed to become a mainstream 'consumer' OS. Meritocracy
has nothing to do with it. Microsoft's monopoly is just unbreakable here. OS X
is less than 10% of the market. Linux less than 1%. I believe the Linux
desktop is usable in the retail space, because I installed gOS on a guest
computer and several novices (including my mom) used it for email, web, music
and word processing.

My linux desktop progression has been X11R6 -> KDE -> Mandrake -> Ubuntu gnome
-> Mint -> latest Ubuntu _HATED IT!_ -> Xfce crunchbang -> (plan to) Mint Xfce

~~~
mbell
> The Linux desktop has been wildly successful! Hobbyists have been using it
> since the 1990s. Yahoo! was built using the linux desktop. Much of Facebook
> was, too. People in web dev and tech support use it as their workstation OS.

While true, look around at younger companies, OS X has taken over a very large
segment of the web dev crowd and I don't see any signs of that changing,
especially with the almost mandatory nature of using OSX for iOS development.

~~~
zanny
This is entirely brand. I went through college where all the cool kids had
overpriced shiny aluminum macs and that was the hip thing to own. Having used
OSX on laptops in High School and IMacs in college the desktop is awful and I
much prefer the diversity of Linux DEs, especially ones like Cinnamon and
XFCE.

OSX got its market share off spoiled 20 year old college kids getting their
parents to buy them overpriced trendy hardware. I have a 15 year old and 13
year cousin who each have a macbook because its hip.

But besides the hip factor, OSX succeeds because it is the default on Apple
products, where Windows succeeds because it is the default on everything else.
When average Joe buys a pc, they go to best buy, and every single device has
Windows on it, so they use that. They don't know any better and would never
fathom installing an OS, and if you show an alternative to them it breaks
their minds because it is universe breaking that Windows isn't the computer.

~~~
untog
_"the desktop is awful and I much prefer the diversity of Linux DEs [...] OSX
got its market share off spoiled 20 year old college kids getting their
parents to buy them overpriced trendy hardware."_

Sigh. Stop stating your opinion as fact. Personally, I use OSX because it's a
*nix OS that actually has a coherent UI, and it's paired with the best
hardware available right now. Saying that it's popular because it's trendy is
wildly misguided- how do you explain all the developers that use it?

~~~
old-gregg
_Saying that it's popular because it's trendy is wildly misguided- how do you
explain all the developers that use it?_

Trendy, popular, whatever... The original comment is spot on. Products becomes
trendy and popular mostly because of great marketing. The reason you prefer
OSX (or almost anything else in your life) is because you've been conditioned
to. We make decisions based on a complex cocktail of facts and feelings, most
of them external to our own thinking and, therefore, susceptible to clever
manipulation.

Every BMW owner buys an "ultimate driving machine" (with an automatic
transmission) and most OSX users believe they're enjoying "the best UI/UX"
(and obediently squeeze their life into ~500 vertical pixels leaving the rest
to the Dock and global menu).

It does not make sense to look for a technical explanation for why "Linux
desktop" is not popular. Technology has nothing to do with popularity.
Moreover, Linux Desktop is _indeed_ widely popular among people who're pre-
conditioned to like things it offers.

Here's an anecdote: I have introduced younger relatives to computers in
mid-2000s using only Ubuntu. After years of daily Gnome 2.x use they find both
OSX and Windows incredibly "retarded" and hard to use.

Don't kid yourself thinking we're far ahead of Pavlov dogs.

~~~
untog
_The reason you prefer OSX (or almost anything else in your life) is because
you've been conditioned to._

No, it's because I've used the other alternatives and made a rational
decision. I tried Ubuntu, it didn't work with the hardware in my laptop, the
trackpad was useless and it didn't run a number of programs I require (the
Creative Suite, for one). I would happily use Windows, but the hardware Apple
creates (in my case, the Air) is largely unparalleled in terms of build
quality and weight. So, OSX it is.

These are all measurable, quantifiable things. While I can't disagree that
marketing affects people, to suggest that the reason _everyone_ likes
something is because of conditioning is a gross generalisation.

~~~
dedward
This. While it's true many people buy Apple gear because of branding and
image, well, that's marketing for you. That's how retail works. As a well
seasoned computer guy, I've _chosen_ every single mac I've purchased over the
last number of years. There was a time when I wouldn't touch one with a 10
foot pole, and I'm sure a time will come when I won't want a new one.

I've used enough different operating systems in all kinds of configurations
over the last 20+ years to decide like a grown-up what I'm going to spend a
considerable amount of time using.. not because other people think it's cool,
but because it fits my budget and works for me. My recommendation to others
is: Try stuff and use what works for you.

------
yk
Short rant ahead:

Why should Linux be doomed (or killed as wired puts it) just because Windows &
MacOS have more idiots using it? For a desktop there are certain design
choices to be made. If one wants to target users, then one should use sensible
defaults and try to hide complexity. If one wants to target hackers, then one
should have a lot of easily accessible APIs, preferable accessible via a CLI.
That means exposing complexity. For the two groups consistency in a UI does
mean two different things, users want a "intuitive" UI, whatever that means.
Hackers want a UI which is based on principles, such that one can deduce the
proper operation, even if it is complicated and takes some time to learn in
the beginning. The list could go on, but in short: I have different needs on
my desktop than the average user. And if Linux would become a sensible desktop
OS for the average user, then I would likely move to BSD (or Plan9 or
whatever).

~~~
mbq
Agree; moreover Linux is only a kernel, so you'll always find a distribution
with aims compatible to what you want.

~~~
qznc
Unfortunately, there is no distribution which matches my "want" exactly. I
know, I'll just make my own...

------
zanny
Why does this topic come up ever other day, and every time people go on
tyraids about individual projects and developers being wrong or right, when
the answer isn't complicated at all.

Windows is the default. Microsoft got in bed with hardware producers and
computer retailors and got Windows on every product on every shelf. For 2
decades you went to buy a PC and you were buying a PC with Windows pre-
installed. The extreme majority of PC users and buyers have no comprehension
of how to build your own PC, what an OS is, or that they can even use
alternative operating systems. At this point, Windows is the computer to a
tremendous majority of desktop OS consumers.

OSX is prosperous because it is the Mac default in the same way Windows was
prosperous because it was the everything default. The average consumer does
not conceptualize or think about how the software is independent of the
hardware, what they see and get is what they stick with 99% of the time. The
other 1% is Linux / BSD / everything else.

The day of the Linux Desktop is the day a laptop running any flavor of a linux
distro sits in Best Buy next to a Windows laptop and costs $50 less because it
doesn't have the Windows license fees attached. Everything else is just window
dressing of that issue, which is in plainest terms that Apple and Microsoft
have a profit motive in getting their OS on your machine, and go out of their
ways to see hardware with the OS preinstalled so Joe Shmoe uses it, whereas
Linux distributions have no financial incentive or warchest of influence to
push Linux as the default. And the default is what matters.

~~~
ANTSANTS
You should read the "story" before commenting. Allow me to copy and paste the
response I gave to a similar comment earlier:

"None of this recent discussion is about why the average computer user doesn't
use Linux or won't try it -- that topic has long since been beaten to death.
It's about why Linux has the inferior desktop experience, and how OSX was able
to steal away so many of the developers and users that, in a perfect world,
should have been happiest on Linux."

~~~
tsahyt
But that's not really sparking a discussion. "Inferior desktop experience" is
_completely_ subjective. Personally I think OSX has the worst desktop
experience of the three (Windows, Linux and OSX), Windows sits in the middle
and Linux is the most joyful one to use. That might not be true for you or for
anyone else though and arguing about it is really leading nowhere.

All I know is, that I'm glad to see differences between OSes regarding not
only kernels and the way things happen but also regarding UX and interfaces
(where Linux is by far the most flexible, because there's more than one
desktop environment - a further differentiation) and I _don't want_ them to be
the same either.

------
mixmastamyk
I've read several of these pieces now post-mortem re the linux desktop. Far
from disagreement, I find myself agreeing with everyone's major points.

I think the bottom line is despite how much people want one, there isn't just
_one_ reason for its unpopularity, there are dozens. It isn't good enough on
multiple fronts--paper cuts abound next to deep slashes. All in the shadow of
two compelling choices in modern Windows and OSX.

They have their own annoyances as well, but you can expect drivers, audio to
work, no major regressions--nothing you use to just disappear between releases
without recourse. I'm thinking of the gnome service control manager workalike
and sessions, thanks Ubuntu.

~~~
mgkimsal
"nothing to just disappear between releases without recourse."

Spaces, "Save As"... :(

~~~
batista
Those are annoyances one can work around. They are not APIs anyway (which is
what the debate is all about), they are UI design decisions. Plus "Save As"
kinda came back (hold Option while browsing the file menu), and Spaces are
still here inside Mission Control.

Changing APIs like Gnome/KDE did frequently is something else altogether,
especially when you don't have the luxury of a huge user base to force
commercial companies to rewrite their code. As for open source application
developers, they often just flee and abandon their apps than rewrite them for
the third time around some new API.

~~~
mpyne
I'd just like to point out as a KDE developer that we _don't_ go changing our
APIs all willy-nilly.

Every major release I can remember (since KDE 2.0) has kept binary
compatibility for the libraries (see
[http://techbase.kde.org/Policies/Binary_Compatibility_Issues...](http://techbase.kde.org/Policies/Binary_Compatibility_Issues_With_C%2B%2B)).
There have been exceptions for Plasma libraries, but those were announced
beforehand.

Many current KDE libraries are evolutions of technology going back to KDE 2
(for better or worse).

Perhaps the biggest change over the whole lifetime has been the shell (going
from kdesktop+kicker in KDE 2+3 to Plasma in KDE 4) and going from aRts in KDE
2+3 to Phonon in KDE 4.

Btw, we were highly encouraged to adopt the popular multimedia framework at
the time (gstreamer 0.10) instead of writing Phonon. gstreamer will soon be
releasing an incompatible 1.0, while in the interim Phonon gained native
support for the sound server that become highly popular in the meantime,
PulseAudio.

KDE has been doing its part to insulate developers as much as possible from
mandatory API changes. It's not as good as the kernel or Microsoft has been
able to do, but it's certainly not as bad as GNOME IMHO.

I can say this as an app maintainer too. Going onto the KDE 4.10 development
cycle, JuK _still_ has code that uses the "kde3support" library. :(

~~~
batista
I've stopped following KDE like 5 years ago, but I remember constant changes
to the multimedia APIs. Also each new QT version (2->3->4, now 5) brings
incompatibilities, no?

~~~
mpyne
The multimedia API changed from KDE 2 and 3's aRts to KDE 4's Phonon. The API
is still Phonon, and this will be true in KDE 5 as well.

There were other application-specific APIs that were used for things that were
beyond the capability of aRts and Phonon (e.g. Juk could use gstreamer
directly in KDE 3) but the KDE APIs themselves were pretty stable.

It's true that a Qt change in binary incompatible and involves at least some
source porting effort, but honestly those have been fairly infrequent, and
only one of those transitions (3->4) involved more than minor source changes.
Qt 4 was released at the end of 2005 (around the time of Linux 2.6.15) and is
still the "current" version, though the Qt 5 release is around the corner.

In just the KDE 3 timeframe to now, on the other hand, there has been
gstreamer 0.6, 0.8, 0.10, soon 1.0, PulseAudio, ConsoleKit, HAL, HAL's
replacement (DeviceKit), DeviceKit's replacement (udev and friends, upower,
udisks, etc.), PolicyKit, PolicyKit's replacement ("polkit"), NetworkManager
0.8, NetworkManager 0.9.

Needless to say, trying to keep in sync with all of that has not been fun. :-/

------
sgt101
The point of desktop linux is that it keeps MS and Apple honest. If they push
things too far away from where the common good lies (ie. toward the short term
interests of their stock holders) then expect to see a huge resurgence of
desktop linux, supported by OEMs who will suddenly be pushing cheaper faster
linux machines with tested specs as a way of winning back territory. Until
then, don't, because it will be down to a volunteer community to do heroic
work to other peoples schedules and basically that's always going to be hard.

Server side stuff has a lot of support from big shops that need their iron to
work well - so that can go along just fine as is.

My point is that because it exists and is nearly viable it is a success and
does what we need it to, even if using it can be nightmarish.

------
emperorcezar
Linux will never work on the desktop because it is made FOR neckbeards by
neckbeards.

It is a community driven effort, which means the community pushes its
development and design. Who do you see using the linux desktop? The exact type
of people who design and develop it. Power users and developers.

They are a stubborn bunch. Even if Unity/Gnome 3/etc were more usable
desktops, the majority of users would hate it. Because something like a newbie
usable desktop just doesn't fit who's designing the desktop.

Something else will have to shove it into the wider market where it can be
judged by those standards, not by what set of power user keyboard short cuts
it supports.

~~~
fromhet
Oh don't tell people how they feel about things! There are hordes of non-
programmers (or their likes) using Ubuntu, even if they could choose Windows
or Mac. Neither my SO or brother can code and they have rarely if ever been in
a terminal, but are both very happy with Ubuntu.

~~~
emperorcezar
I agree with you, my SO is fine with it also. I'm talking about the design
process. I really like the direction that Ubuntu is going. It's being designed
for the masses, but the pressure on ubuntu is from the power user crowd.

I think it will go nowhere because the current linux user base will be holding
it back. Gnome3 and Unity are fighting this tide also.

I don't think the state of the linux desktop should be, "Copy XP and put a
real shell behind it".

~~~
vacri
Ubuntu's mission statement from the start was linux for normal users. They
always said that they were trying to provide a desktop for regular users, and
their argument was that there are already heaps of distros out there for power
users. It's not a new direction they've taken, it's just when they had the
opportunity to simplify, a lot of users didn't understand what their core
mission was.

Besides, if you want a Power User version of Ubuntu, just use Debian.

------
smartkids
Just based on the Linus quotes, I think he's right.

The kernel did what it was supposed to do back in 1991.

What is the "desktop" supposed to do?

There will never be unanimous agreement on that - every user will have
different needs and preferences - and so desktop developers live in constant
denial, believing they are the only ones whose preferences are relevant - i.e.
they know what's best for users - and blaming others for their own failings.

I'm not a Linux fan, but I give Torvalds' +1 for his response (and knowing the
value of "not breaking stuff").

------
antirez
The problem with Linux is much simpler IMHO. No I don't mean the actual
causes, but the root cause: Linus is a technical leader, so the kernel is a
good product. He is not a "product leader" from the point of view of the final
Desktop experience, so he took no responsibility for that (he actually blamed
the UX of Linux many times in the past).

No one emerged as the "Linux Desktop Guru", taking full responsibility of a
distribution completely targeted at fixing the UX, selecting a set of defaults
to actually create a development platform. Fixing the problem of users
supporting in a perfect way at least a subset of computer systems (targeting
macs makes sense for instance).

So the Linux Desktop was the sum of a multitude of different tries, that alone
sometimes were interesting, but not enough at all to define the whole OS
experience from the point of view of the user.

~~~
TheCondor
Is it possible for the community to allow a desktop guru? Early on in GNOME
they had a number of popular graphics designer types making all sorts of
really exotic looking UIs, a number of conflicts ended that. (enlightenment
was the official window manager for a while there)

Then the eazel guys showed up and made Nautilus, if anybody could have been
the guru, it was Andy. I honestly don't know what appended there. Nautilus is
still around, it's under gone some substantial changes along the way.

Seems to me it's a very difficult community problem to solve. Look at
replacing sysv init, it's a very technical issue, it doesn't matter to a lot
of users, there are some technical goals you can bring up to keep the
discussion rooted in fact over opinion and there is tremendous disagreement
about it. The community hasn't arrived at any conclusion exactly. Why should
something as esoteric as a ui be easier to arrive at consensus on? Everyone
has an opinion on ui.

There is another aspect to it, it's distribution fragmentation. How do you set
an ip address in Ubuntu? How about Fedora? Do it via UI and command line. They
are different and that's an easy one. The mechanics are so different, it's not
a desktop problem, it's a distribution problem, which sort of makes KDE and
GNOME toolkits rather than desktops themselves.

~~~
antirez
Well what I mean is, imagine if Ubuntu at some point started to be opinionated
about what a Desktop Linux should look like more and more, with some people
inside fully responsible to build the UX in every detail, how binary packages
should be trivial to download and install, how drivers should be trivial to
install (for a subset of the hardware that is fully supported at least), and
so forth.

A distribution that tried to provide a _full_ experience, instead of being,
indeed, a _Software Distribution_. In that case you can have people in charge
of deciding all the details. Payed people to do the best work possible.

~~~
jeremyjh
Well that is what Ubuntu is doing now. So we don't really have to imagine it.
Maybe we could imagine it being more complete, or more successful.

------
chris_wot
"We'll force Corba/.NET down your throats"... ???

Firstly, Corba was there from the start, and then it was removed.

Secondly, there is no .NET dependency that must be satisified to create GNOME
applications.

While there are a few interesting points Tovalds made, the problem isn't
really a technical one in the code, but rather a lack of focus on what really
matters.

~~~
rbanffy
> there is no .NET dependency that must be satisified to create GNOME
> applications.

No, but many apps that are part of the "official" Gnome desktop run on Mono.

~~~
danieldk
Like?

~~~
jahewson
Banshee, F-Spot, Tomboy.

------
shin_lao
There might also be the fact that OS X and Windows are more than decent
desktop OSes and competing with them is not easy.

~~~
fromhet
I think it is more about people being exposed to Windows and Macintoshes. If
my non-technical parents had Ubuntu at their jobs and their computer were
shipped with it, do you think they would even dream about searching for a new
OS to learn?

~~~
dedward
The same argument works for any of those systems.. not just linux.

The reality is many people try many systems and settle on one they like.

------
teyc
The discipline of being posix compliant forced Linux to innovate across the
defined boundary. I recall Chris Click's talk about JVM and its definition of
garbage collection APIs, class libraries etc each enabled innovation to be
done independently of one another.

There is no such story for kernel-mode drivers. The problem was so dire with
network card drivers at one time that there was a project that enabled windows
drivers to work on Linus. Think about it - if Linux standardized on a stable
external API, then there'd be no arguments about how to implement it.

Linus kept talking about userland vs kernel, and did not address the issue
Miguel talked about. Kernels need performant external interfaces too. Drawing
a line around what is being innovated and changed will only help Linux the way
posix did.

On another tangent, when Microsoft made IE6 the stable browser platform, it
gave a clear goal for Mozilla. It became a reference implementation, allowing
Mozilla to emulate all the layout behaviors and eventually carving out a nice
marketshare for itself.

~~~
voltagex_
ndiswrapper is/was more a function of the hardware vendors not supporting
Linux/supporting Linux very badly. Go look at some of the early Linux Realtek
drivers for example.

------
batgaijin
Perhaps it has more to do with the Micrsoft tithe for all devices that
distribute Linux:

[http://www.informationweek.com/windows/microsoft-
news/micros...](http://www.informationweek.com/windows/microsoft-
news/microsofts-new-cash-cows-linux-and-andro/231601809)

<http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20090619161307529>

<http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2331462,00.asp>

~~~
ANTSANTS
None of this recent discussion is about why the average computer user doesn't
use Linux or won't try it -- that topic has long since been beaten to death.
It's about why Linux has the inferior desktop experience, and how OSX was able
to steal away so many of the developers and users that, in a perfect world,
should have been happiest on Linux.

~~~
batgaijin
It has an inferior experience because you can't profit from making it better.

