Is Ubuntu Linux ready for the average Mom/Pop home User?

[16k_zx81]

I totally disagree with you. But thats alright. Everyone has their personal opinion.

I sure have installed alot of specific instances.

Yeah.. Its a complex argument and I am referring to previous discussions where I explain my position in more depth

Right now, let's say there are 4 options for home users for day to day computing

Win, iOS, osx, and android

Really that's 99% coverage of domestic devices right there

The fact is that for desktop computing, Linux has nothing on osx or win for app support, or hardware compatibility, or even just user base

For portable computing, iOS and android kill it completely for ease of use and app support

I won't pontificate because, as I said, its a complex argument, but you will note there are still very few hardware manufacturers selling Linux based machines for home users, and very little market demand from home based users for Linux based machines. There's a reason for that.

You will win me over when I hear from domestic customers on a regular basis tt they want to know about ditching windows fr Linux. To date, in the last 5years, I think maybe one person has approached me with this question.

That's because, t be frank, no ones interested *because* its still not a great choice for home users, in comparison with the other systems that are available.

Jim

 

[TechLady]

I have had a grandmother running the latest Ubuntu (12s) on an old Dell laptop and she's done GREAT with it. Except for one recent snafu with her printer, she's had the least amount of trouble out of all my clients. Granted her needs are minimal but I have been very pleased.

 

[pctutor]

check their virus email program called AOL

You may be on to something here - I'll bet if AOL came out with a Linux distro, the senior population would be all over it.

 

[Choppie]

I have had a grandmother running the latest Ubuntu (12s) on an old Dell laptop and she's done GREAT with it. Except for one recent snafu with her printer, she's had the least amount of trouble out of all my clients. Granted her needs are minimal but I have been very pleased.

I swear, any HP printer that's plugged into a computer that's connected to the internet, is getting controlled by HP, and when its time, its time! A few months ago, I had a whole slew of HP printers (from 2 months old to 4 years old) experience THE SAME ISSUE; they were printing like they were out of red or cyan ink even though the client had already put in NEW cartridges, not the refilled ones--same issue. I could not for the life of me get them to print normally! Their software showed their ink was FULL..but the printing all looked way washed out.....AND...some of them would ONLY print the top of web pages and no text...almost like some DRM was interfering with printing the content off the web. Even hitting the print view on the web sites would not render a normal printing. A copy and paste into a LebreOffice writer file would get the same result, however when pasting into a ms word doc, it printed perfectly. So I would say your printer issue was more likely the fault of HP or the crap printer its self, and not linux.

 

[bertie40]

You may be on to something here - I'll bet if AOL came out with a Linux distro, the senior population would be all over it.

Lol. I find they are the only (UK)AOL users left.

My 50 schilling.
WARNING. This is a rant.

Let me get this straight at the start.
I don't like Linux,
but I have to use it.

There, I said it.


I've messed around with Linux for years, and I've gone through numerous attempts to get my head around it.

I use an Amahi home server which I'm happy with, so I have to understand it, but I have never never ever had a simple Linux installation go through without issue.

(Quick diversion. My server has "gone again" so yet another reload required. I loaded a popular webcam monitoring program, which upset it / overwrote something. Aggggh. )

From undetected or misdetected graphic drivers to misdetected screens. Printer issues. Having to jump through hoops to get Nvidia running correctly. I can never achieve the resolutions capable by my hardware. So you google and google, and find someone who has used terminal to add additional settings into some submerged text file somewhere.

.

......Then you find that although you are the single user, and an administrator, that you lack the required privileges, so you google that etc etc ........ Etc.

The sheer unbelievable bulk of additional junk which installed, whether you like it or not. I don't want Bluetooth, I don't want libreoffice, I don't want a startup sequence sufficient to fill the dead-sea scrolls.

The elongated installation time, as you see it installing this stuff, and then, ....and then, going online to update it.
And all the time knowing that you are going to uninstall that stuff anyway. A 15 min install taking the best part of an hour.

And can you just delete this stuff?, sorta, but you run the risk of breaking dependencies.

....... And don't get me started on grub.

And the distributions haven't helped themselves by bringing out crap windows managers.
Unity for pitys sake. Great name

How many people google "classic gnome"

Corel gave the home user market a good push a few years ago. Where are they now ?

The only way linux will achieve the greater home market , is if they remove the need for terminal access altogether.

Some people say its strength is the diversity between versions, I say that is it greatest weakness.

Linux needs a windows skin, like lindows, which, I believe is already dead.

Casual Linux users do exist, but they are few and far between. The question is why ?

I WANT to like Linux, but they don't make it easy.

Edit : why can't they bring out a distribution that installs the bare bones basics, then offers you the choice of addon software afterwards. If this exists, I ain't seen it.

 

[Choppie]

Lol. I find they are the only (UK)AOL users left.

My 50 schilling.
WARNING. This is a rant.

Let me get this straight at the start.
I don't like Linux,
but I have to use it.

There, I said it.


I've messed around with Linux for years, and I've gone through numerous attempts to get my head around it.

I use an Amahi home server which I'm happy with, so I have to understand it, but I have never never ever had a simple Linux installation go through without issue.

(Quick diversion. My server has "gone again" so yet another reload required. I loaded a popular webcam monitoring program, which upset it / overwrote something. Aggggh. )

From undetected or misdetected graphic drivers to misdetected screens. Printer issues. Having to jump through hoops to get Nvidia running correctly. I can never achieve the resolutions capable by my hardware. So you google and google, and find someone who has used terminal to add additional settings into some submerged text file somewhere.

.

......Then you find that although you are the single user, and an administrator, that you lack the required privileges, so you google that etc etc ........ Etc.

The sheer unbelievable bulk of additional junk which installed, whether you like it or not. I don't want Bluetooth, I don't want libreoffice, I don't want a startup sequence sufficient to fill the dead-sea scrolls.

The elongated installation time, as you see it installing this stuff, and then, ....and then, going online to update it.
And all the time knowing that you are going to uninstall that stuff anyway. A 15 min install taking the best part of an hour.

And can you just delete this stuff?, sorta, but you run the risk of breaking dependencies.

....... And don't get me started on grub.

And the distributions haven't helped themselves by bringing out crap windows managers.
Unity for pitys sake. Great name

How many people google "classic gnome"

Corel gave the home user market a good push a few years ago. Where are they now ?

The only way linux will achieve the greater home market , is if they remove the need for terminal access altogether.

Some people say its strength is the diversity between versions, I say that is it greatest weakness.

Linux needs a windows skin, like lindows, which, I believe is already dead.

Casual Linux users do exist, but they are few and far between. The question is why ?

I WANT to like Linux, but they don't make it easy.

Edit : why can't they bring out a distribution that installs the bare bones basics, then offers you the choice of addon software afterwards. If this exists, I ain't seen it.

Every thing stated--is exactly true x4 (AND....if got the rez, and HZ wrong when choosing your monitor specs on some of those install screens, you ran the risk of blowing out your CRT on the next reboot......YO!!!

I have a retail box sitting on my shelf here from circa 2002 ish of Coral Linux Deluxe, which had Coral office that included Word Perfect, I remember it working really well, but it disappeared as fast as it came out--very strange! I also have some CDs some where here from around the same time period of some Linux distro that LOOKED ALMOST EXACTALY LIKE WINXP....and that got MISSING off all the mirror sites as fast as it appeared...very strange...

I remember walking into CompUSA and seeing 2 full isles of LINUX distros in so many colorful boxes and versions....Red Hat, Mandrake, SuSe, Coral, there were a few others but have no clue what they were...then one day...they were just gone...

...C

 

[codegreen]

Edit : why can't they bring out a distribution that installs the bare bones basics, then offers you the choice of addon software afterwards. If this exists, I ain't seen it.

It's called Debian. You won't like the bare-bone basics, though.

 

[SilverLeaf]

It's called Debian. You won't like the bare-bone basics, though.

Exactly! It's a blessing and a curse. Several distro's offer this. You get an extraordinary amount of control, but you have to work under the hood, and the learning curve can be steep.

The install iso for my distro of choice, Arch Linux, will give you basic hardware support, a command line package manager, text editor, and basic command line tools...and little else, no GUI (X11), no pre-installed services above basic functionality, no sound,... You then build the system you want on this foundation. It's a lot of work, but when your done, you have exactly what you want, and nothing you don't. Lean and fast or full-blown DE with all the bells and whistles...the choice is yours

 

[bertie40]

.......You then build the system you want on this foundation. It's a lot of work, but when your done, you have exactly what you want, and nothing you don't. Lean and fast or full-blown DE with all the bells and whistles...the choice is yours

..... And we expect Mr & Mrs Josephine Public, of No. 30 Acacia Avenue, living just outside the village of Upper Buttock, married with 2 kids and working in a supermarket, to do that.

This, I believe, is the point we are making.

 

[DocGreen]

My only hesitation would be this...

You install Linux for Joe Schmoe, and he has no problems navigating the interface, browsing the web, etc. But what happens when Joe goes to walmart and decides he wants to try the new version of some fancy software he sees on the store shelf? Odds are it's only compatible with Windows... but Joe's not going to realize this right away. He's gonna buy it, take it home, and try to install it... unsuccessfully. Then he'll call you and you have to explain to him that the software he bought doesn't work in Linux. You could install an emulator for him (I think I remember hearing about something like Wine?), or he could return the software to Walmart... except that Walmart won't accept the return of open software. So now Joe's stuck with a software he can't use, unless he want's to pay extra to have you come out and set it up for him.

I can see that getting really frustrating for Joe.

 

[SilverLeaf]

..... And we expect Mr & Mrs Josephine Public, of No. 30 Acacia Avenue, living just outside the village of Upper Buttock, married with 2 kids and working in a supermarket, to do that.

This, I believe, is the point we are making.

No. you're absolutely correct. I was just pointing out that it is entirely possible to do this if one has the intestinal fortitude to pursue it. I would suspect that most residents of Upper Buttock may have other things to worry about than this.

Really, it's just a matter of knowing your customer. For many, linux may be perfectly viable. For others, probably not. It's important to ask the right questions before going down this path with a customer. Educate them and manage expectations.

 

[NYJimbo]

Not to hijack, but how many of you get customers calling you (or if you have a shop, coming in) with a problem on a PC that is running Linux ?

I don't mean existing customers you installed that O/S, but new customers. The only time I have had people come in is when they want to load windows back on after using a *nix, but even that is extremely rare.

Not sure if that means nobody is running Linux or if it means that they just don't need help, which I doubt because they can still have hardware issues.

 

[SilverLeaf]

Not to hijack, but how many of you get customers calling you (or if you have a shop, coming in) with a problem on a PC that is running Linux ?

I don't mean existing customers you installed that O/S, but new customers. The only time I have had people come in is when they want to load windows back on after using a *nix, but even that is extremely rare.

Not sure if that means nobody is running Linux or if it means that they just don't need help, which I doubt because they can still have hardware issues.

Honestly, probably a combination of both. As a percentage, linux desktop use by the general public is still fairly small. I would guess that most people already using linux (outside of Android), are usually more tech-savvy than the average user and are probably capable of addressing most basic service/repair issues themselves.

 

[bertie40]

Not to hijack, but how many of you get customers calling you (or if you have a shop, coming in) with a problem on a PC that is running Linux ?

I don't mean existing customers you installed that O/S, but new customers.......

In 10 years, I've been asked once, and that was 6 months ago when I went to pick up our new psychotic hamster from a nearby pet shop.

The lady behind the counter saw my shirt logo, and asked me about Linux support.

No joking, I was stunned. (I've had no reply though).

My recent flirtation was with a raspberry pi, which was gathering dust.

I reconfigured and sold it on.

 

[NYJimbo]

...our new psychotic hamster...

Here in the States we call them "gerbils".

 

[gunslinger]

I have heard this back and forth on here for years. The short answer IMO is no, Ubuntu Linux is not ready for the average Mom/Pop home User. The only distro that even comes close is Mint I think and then only in certain specialized circumstances.

If the only thing the end user does or will ever do with their computer is browse the interwebs, use facebook, check email and listen to music and price is an issue then I think Linux Mint would serve them well.

I will always recommend a Mac before anything else. After that its Windows 7, and under the above set of circumstances Linux mint.

 

[16k_zx81]

I just bought a new printer and it doesnt work on the computer....

I need the latest MSoffice for training I am doing at work....

Can I play this game on it?

I plugged my camera in, and the software does not install...

The sound stopped working. I googled the problem and got as far as "open a terminal window and type~sudo /blah blah - switch run lsusb yadda yadda>>>>" but it didnt work.

I want to start working on a geneology project with my grandpa, can I run ____ software on it?

... I mean, the list just goes on, and on, and on, of all the scenarios that have been annoyances for us, as techs, using linux, let alone some of the PITA technical gymnastics that end users will face getting involved with it over any significant period of time.

The perfect end-user customer for Linux is someone who we know, for a fact, will probably never want to use any program that does not come with a Mint install, and already has hardware that is fully compatible.

Anyone who ever wants to add applications, or add new hardware (ie, pretty much any end user at some point over time) will run into irritations and obstacles that will just not be there @ using one of the 'big 4' OSs.

 

[gunslinger]

The perfect end-user customer for Linux is someone who we know, for a fact, will probably never want to use any program that does not come with a Mint install, and already has hardware that is fully compatible.

Exactly. super secret invisible filler text.

 

[codegreen]

..... And we expect Mr & Mrs Josephine Public, of No. 30 Acacia Avenue, living just outside the village of Upper Buttock, married with 2 kids and working in a supermarket, to do that.

This, I believe, is the point we are making.

Not at all. You asked about a bare-bones install. SilverLeaf and I are pointing out that that's probably not what you really want. A bare-bone Linux install requires a lot of customization and configuration. If I were inclined to switch clients over to Linux (which I'm not), I would be installing one of those pre-configured desktop-oriented distros. You know, the ones you were complaining about.

Linux needs a windows skin, like lindows, which, I believe is already dead.

It's been done, many times. No one cares, no one wants it. People who want something that looks and feels just like Windows already have their ideal choice: Windows.

 

[codegreen]

... I mean, the list just goes on, and on, and on, of all the scenarios that have been annoyances for us, as techs, using linux, let alone some of the PITA technical gymnastics that end users will face getting involved with it over any significant period of time.

I agree when it comes to adding hardware (Linux support isn't a priority for manufactures), and particular software (Office, games), but really, these days the list doesn't actually go much further than that. Sure, problems can turn up that require arcane-to-end-user fixes, but that's hardly unique to Linux. A good chunk of my business comes from fixing things in Windows that used to work but got borked by some update or new piece of software. If these fixes were easy for end-users in Windows, they wouldn't be calling me.

Windows has its own long list of problems and annoyances. But people are used to them, and treat them as "normal". The biggest problem with switching people to Linux, and the reason I don't normally do it, is that the world assumes you're running either Windows or a Mac. Most of the problems with Linux stem from that printer on sale at Wal-mart not having Linux drivers, or 1st level tech support telling you that your OS is "not supported". These aren't things that a typical home users should have to deal with.