My computer doesn't meet the requirements for Windows 11 so I opted to stay on Windows 10 until support ran out. Then, as Windows does, the performance and reliability of my computer just started to deterioate more and more. A few weeks ago I completely wiped the system drive and did a fresh install of Ubuntu 24.04. Microsoft can pound sand I'm never buying a Microsoft product ever again.
Proton has been playing the steam games I've tried either just as good or even better in certain cases than Windows, which was the only thing keeping me on Windows anyway. Good riddance.
I got a Steam Deck last year and it really opened my eyes to how far along gaming on Linux has come. Even a crash-riddled game like Fallout: New Vegas runs more smoothly than it ever did in Windows.
Yeah, I"m planning on getting one as well - the switch has made me realize how great having "real" games on a portable platform is - just waiting for a hardware refresh.
Your mentioning of AWS devops reminded me of a story my dad, a mechanical engineer, told me. He travels a lot and works with engineers all over the world. He was talking to me about how the new "wave" of engineers (mainly in Canada and America) that he works with there is a a complete lack of people that know how to do things like manually calibrating various parts by hand.
He's had to completely rethink how they approach their industrial designs and build machines and transition to much more electronic based things with fewer moving parts, and build things they can just adjust with computers and point-and-click GUIs, because people just don't know how these old things work from a physical reality perspective. My dad was very distraught by the caliber of engineers he's seeing in the "next generation".
But that's not the only thing.
In Canada, our aging population of tradespeople are retiring in droves and we have a dearth of younger people to replace them. It's so bad, that in my province they've completely redesigned the Grade 11-12 highschool curriculum to have "fast track" paths into trades where 80% of their time is spent in coop/apprenticeship (good thing!). We have a housing crisis and we have nobody that actually knows how to build houses in our country while the federal government imports 1 million people per year with nowhere for them to live. Most kids these days just want to be "influencers".
Spelling and grammar in young people is absolutely atrocious because they are totally dependent on autocorrect; and they can't type using physical keyboards because they only ever used a touchscreen keyboard on phones and tablets.
It's not just programming being destroyed by copilots. It's an overall dumbing down of our entire civilization.
I have the same issue with young software engineers. We used to install every Linux distro because it was fun. Junior are now scared of the command-line.
Another example that I see all the time: I recently had to review a pull request from a junior. 200 lines of very simple C++ doing almost nothing, you can't fail that. I had to write more than 50 suggestions and comments on very basic stuff that the guy should have learned when he started coding. Yes, they must learn the ropes, but it seems like the passion is not there. We used to be passionate about coding, and all I see is people who went to private college to make money but don't enjoy what they do.
I was a hobbyist programmer installing all sorts of Linux and BSD distros on my computers since the age of 10. My first real software job still had me go through a period where I had 50+ comments on some of my initial changes because life before work doesn't really prepare you for what you need to know on the job. If they aren't learning from your feedback and constantly making the same mistakes then I understand, but it's somewhat misguided to expect folks to simply know a lot early in their career.
Heck even folks coming in with experience, but from a company with a very different coding culture or simply a different primary language can result in the same situation.
Do you/they learn is the question. Not programming but a different role in tech but I’ve had a recent intern who did a very competent job and vacuumed up feedback and opportunities to learn. And I’ve had a longer tenure person who moved in from a different type of role at a different company who… did not. And just couldn’t appreciate how what they were creating was a net time sink for everyone else. They didn’t last.
Niche-ness isn’t a hard metric, but the argument is the same for “this is what happens when a profession hits a critical mass of people just in it for the money and not at all for the enjoyment of the profession.”
lol, i'm reinstalling a linux distro right now just because I want to try a new one
I work with seniors that are scared of the command line. I can somewhat understand why Microsoft might be trying to turn everything into AI Copilots because when I'm trying to explain to someone how to revert changes in a file with `git reset/checkout` they practically recoil in terror at the suggestion of using the terminal. They are married to their git guis and have no idea how it works. Best AI-ify as much as possible to keep people in their ecosystems.
But are they any less productive? My experience is no. I was a command line aficionado when I entered the workforce, but I saw several people get the same results as me in a purely GUI environment. I see the same today. They get shit done and that is what is required. I feel like older devs romanticize certain parts of their workflow too much.
They're not necessarily dumber (maybe in the sense that they would be less able to survive on a desert island), but rather the same neural circuitry is being repurposed for other things. If anything the environment is dumber and they're just better at efficiently navigating it than we are.
When I need to explain to other so-called seniors how to revert changes to a file with git checkout and they recoil in terror in using the command line, then yes - I believe they are actually getting dumber.
No. Most kids strive to follow whoever "mentors" and teaches them.
What is sad is that this job is left to influencers. Not the kid's fault if our education system, parenting and attention economy are completely f'd up.
engaging with hobbies with your kids, which can also teach them useful skills, is one way
when I was a kid, when my dad was repairing the house or car I was always "holding the flashlight" or he would actually teach me to use power tools and do the repairs myself while guiding me along.
> Green Party leader Justin Trudeau was ejected from Canada's House of Commons after fiery exchanges with Prime Minister Jagmeet Singh. Mr Trudeau's removal came after he refused to apologise for calling Mr Singh a "wacko" and "extremist" during a question period.
And your service game up with
Green => Liberal;
was => was not;
fiery => factuality;
Prime Minister => NDP Leader;
"Mr Trudeau's removal came after he refused to apologise for calling Mr Singh a "wacko" and "extremist" during a question period." => did not occur as described;
What really happened was:
Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre was ejected from Canada's House of Commons after fiery exchanges with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Mr. Poilievre's removal came after he refused to apologise for calling Mr. Trudeau a 'wacko' and 'extermist' during question period.
Considering this happened yesterday, this is pretty impressive. Great work.
I'm gonna do this with debian in 2025 when windows 10 runs out of security updates. Proton has been great on my steamdeck so I probably won't miss out on many games.
i was also tempted to just go the debian route - but the free Ubuntu Pro subscription for personal use with 12 years of bug/security updates (and ultimately, peace of mind) was what won me over - I hate reinstalling or upgrading my OS so over a decade of not changing anything is really appealing to me.
i've been playing my steam games with Proton so far and it's been solid
I haven't had Windows in the home for a good 10-ish years now. While that is good for my personal use. It is bad when others need help with their computers and my skill set of windows support has atrophied.
My experience of Windows is via the very locked down work place and it is not great.
had a few small bumps getting everything I need configured and running the way I need it, but now that I have everything the way I like it it's damn near perfect
mmmmmmm regulatory capture, wouldn't be america without it - nothing says freedom and open markets like sawing off the rungs from the bottom of the ladder after you've already climbed to the top
Open source AI is not at the bottom of the ladder; like closed source AI, some of the brightest, well-educated and arguably well-paid people in the world are the driving force behind it. OpenAI, arguably at the top of the ladder, was supposed to be open source as well.
It's not a perfect analogy, but it's still corporate interests trying to entrench their position to prevent disruption by less politically powerful players.
I got locked out my apple account the other day while trying to login to webmail - thankfully I was able to just unlock it again by reseting my password using my iphone. Kinda terrifying.
Proton has been playing the steam games I've tried either just as good or even better in certain cases than Windows, which was the only thing keeping me on Windows anyway. Good riddance.