Yes, look up the author's name.
Look at their contributions to the Linux kernel, GCC, KDE, Wine, and many other projects.
A total clickbait for sure.
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I don't think that will convince many people. Appealing to authority is one third of rhetoric, Aristotle would say that you need emotion or logic to convince me completely.
Speaking for myself, I'm mostly surprised that someone with such an intimate knowledge of Linux has ignored it's developments to this extent. This entire thread is mostly at the consensus that you have tortured many of the talking points in this article beyond taking seriously.
Many in this thread have also identified that MacOS and Windows are deficient in several of the criteria you listed. So what even is a desktop, really? An ideal, or a thing people use?
> has ignored it's developments to this extent
What have I ignored precisely?
Bugs? Regressions? Missing features? Lack of funding?
Xorg being deprecated, Wayland being all the rage while being usable only in Gnome and KDE?
> Many in this thread have also identified that MacOS and Windows are deficient in several of the criteria you listed.
Windows: 2 billion users with no technical background.
Linux: 40 million users most of whom are geeks.
End of story.
The X.Org project is not deprecated. It handles both the X.Org X11 server and Wayland.
That said, Linux has more users than Windows:
https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/
Android Linux is at 46%, while Windows is at 26%. Other Linux versions have 1%.
Not a single Windows MacOS iOS Android user knows what their display server is and how it works.
Xorg is being deprecated and replaced with semi-broken something where tons of functions only work in KDE and Gnome. That's all you need to know about Linux.
You are calling the Xorg X11 server Xorg, which is wrong. As someone who has “contributed” to so many projects, you should know that. In any case, it is odd you are whining about this considering that the article’s author is a well known X11 hater and you seem to agree with everything he says.
By the way, “Not a single Windows MacOS iOS Android user knows what their display server is and how it works” is both a non-sequitur and untrue. The guys who wrote the display servers used on those are users of those systems.
> You are calling the Xorg X11 Xorg, which is wrong
Xorg has been the de-facto X11 implementation on Linux for the past 25 years.
First XFree86, then it was superseded by Xorg.
You're being nit picky only that's not a counter argument. That's ad hominem.
> the article’s author is a well known X11 hater and you seem to agree with everything he says.
I'm the author of the article and I'm not a hater. Understanding the limitations of something is not "hatred". I guess the entire world is black or white to you, either I have to be deeply in love with Linux or "You're a hater" which is another ad hominem.
See you've stopped arguing and now switched to discussing me personally. I knew it would happen given how you never had any counter arguments in the first place, the problem is I've been here for over 25 years and know Linux inside out and EVERYTHING that is "claimed" in the article is the common truth.
> By the way, “Not a single Windows MacOS iOS Android user knows what their display server is and how it works” is both a non-sequitur and untrue.
Yet another "counter argument" that lacks any validity because it's empty.
> The guys who wrote the display servers used on those are users of those systems.
This is an article about Linux _USERS_.
You still don't bloody understand that. I don't care about software engineers that can make anything work given enough time. I don't care who wrote Quartz or Surface Flinger. They are not end users.
End users use Operating Systems, buy them and buy software for them. Their developers are absolutely IRRELEVANT. There have been dozens of forgotten OSes that no one uses.
There is nothing “ad hominem” in what I said. I was discussing your remarks, rather than you. However, I will now discuss you. You exhibit severe deficits in logical reasoning skills. Some of your comments exhibit signs of disorganized thoughts, which are linked to schizophrenia.
To give an example, the sudden interjection of “Not a single Windows MacOS iOS Android user knows what their display server is and how it works.” appears to be an example of disorganized thinking, since its connection to what was being discussed is superficial to an extreme. There are other comments by you that exhibit signs of disorganized thinking even more clearly.
You likely could benefit from seeing a psychiatrist.
I have commits in half the projects you mentioned and I think the article is FUD. There are technically wrong points in it, such as the claim that you cannot run old Linux binaries on modern Linux. People are able to run old binaries on Linux that are 30 years old, although it requires copies of the old libraries those binaries need. If the guy actually is involved with so many projects, he would know this.
The guy even contradicted himself:
> Linux is not an operating system
> While Linux is unrivaled on servers and has been the world's most popular operating system for over two decades, the situation on the desktop is quite bleak.
Both cannot be true.
You've not read the article at all and it explains full well what constitutes an OS.
The Linux kernel is NOT an OS.
Any given Linux distro which is not compatible with any other Linux distro or even its own earlier or later versions couldn't be called an OS. It's a software compilation for a certain time period.
An OS implies everyone runs it, anyone can compile software for it and have it run on all devices with this OS. This is impossible with Linux outside of Snap/FlatPak/AppImage which themselves are lightweight virtualization solutions.
This is what Windows, MacOS, iOS and Android are. Linux is not.
Also, please don't throw FUD around without explaining yourself. You probably don't even know/remember what it means any more.
I read the article. It did correctly say that Linux is not an OS and that the distribution is the OS. Then it said Linux is an OS. The article author and you are the ones spreading FUD here. Much of what the two of you say is factually incorrect.
Linux is not an OS and that's an indisputable fact.
An OS must have:
* Stable API/ABIs including for the kernel
* Wide software compatibility
* Decent QA/QC
* Can be used with any hardware it's meant to support
E.g. the open source AMD driver, amdgpu, has a gazillion of regressions and issues for any kernel: https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/drm/amd/-/issues
If it works for you, that's called "anecdotal evidence". That doesn't mean suddenly Linux has become an OS.
None of that fits the definition of an OS. As per Wikipedia, “An operating system (OS) is system software that manages computer hardware and software resources, and provides common services for computer programs.”:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operating_system
The reason Linux is not an operating system is because it is just the kernel and you need more than a kernel to fit that definition.
The only thing you said that is correct is that amdgpu has issues. Everything else you just wrote is wrong.
Oh god.
1. Is Wikipedia _page_ an authority?
2. Does Wikipedia page buy operating systems and software for them? No? That's what I thought. Where's native commercial applications for Linux aside from very few specialized ones? Where's native Linux for Linux? Oh, wait, even Indie developers have abandoned Linux because why if there's Wine + DXVK.
3. Who cares about obscure something that pretends to provide APIs? How is it relevant for adoption and usage? Oh, wait, it's not. We've had dozens of dead wanna-be OSes that provide APIs. All dead. Linux on desktop is one of them as well.
Yeah, "I'm wrong".
Linux desktop market share proves it beyond reasonable doubt. LMAO.
The fact that absolute most people shy away from Linux is another proof that it's a "great OS" and "better than Windows".
Keep on living in your fantasy world. Sadly people around you don't share your ideals. They want shit to be done. They install Windows, use it for a decade without any issues, buy a new device. All good.
You response has almost nothing to do with the comment to which you replied. There is no sense in trying to address the moving target that are your replies since you are unable to stay on topic. I will however address the one on topic thing that you said. Wikipedia’s definition of an operating system is roughly what was taught in my university when I got my CS degree and I am in full agreement with it, so regardless of whether Wikipedia is an authority, the definition Wikipedia provides is correct.