Full-Time Linux Users React to the Linus Daily Driver Challenge Video

Linus from Linus Tech Tips recently released a couple of videos where he attempts to use Linux as his daily driver, and makes some interesting decisions. In this video, Tom and Jay, two full-time Linux users, share their thoughts on how Linus could've done better.

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#Linux #Linus #LinusTechTips

[ChrisHolzer]

7:30 it comes from the Linux community.
"Linux runs on everything, you never have to reboot Linux, switching from Windows to Linux is
What Linus and Luke went through is what many people who try to truly switch from Windows to Linux for everything will experience.

[Steamrick]

The problem with "what do I have to buy to make this work" is that this basically precludes anyone that wants to try out Linux on their current system - which is the angle that LTT was coming from and that the vast majority of casual users will inevitably be coming from. People coming from Windows are used to being able to just assume compatibility.
Research what is compatible? Please, the vast majority of users have no idea what's inside their current system, much less what should go inside the next.

[PentiumMHz]

"I don't like what Microsoft is doing with Windows 10/11"
"Hey, maybe you want to try Linux? I think it's better and has not telemetry"
"Cool, what do I need for it"
"First, you need a new PC with compatible parts"

Yeah, that's not going to work.

Also, while Linus should have done research, he explicitly wanted to imitate a normal user. I think they have someone who's good with Linux, they could have asked him for advice, but they didn't, because most "normal users" do not have friends who are Linux experts.

[esenel]

When it comes to Linus uninstalling his DE, I doubt he's doing it on purpose, he just doesn't know the OS well enough to realize that error is not normal. He probably googled issues installing steam through the pop store, and found the instructions to install steam through the commandline, probably something like:
"sudo apt install steam" and then confirm it to install steam.
Not realizing that the "Do as I say" crap is NOT the confirmation he was supposed to give. A very easy mistake that experienced linux users won't understand because they know what the confirmation is supposed to look like, and that this is not it. But if some forum post or wiki tells you to just apt-get it and confirm it, if you don't know any better, you'll just do as apt asks you to do.
The average person will copy/paste anything forums tell him/her to without giving it a second thought. Back when I was in school, we had programming tasks and for 1 project we decided to create a fake forum discussion on a big website where programmers ask questions, and paste some code that would do exactly what the assignment was, BUT grabbed a file from my webserver, without it, it would hang...
Before we had to show it off in class, we could already see a whole bunch of IP's grabbing that file as apparently all the other "teams" were using it.. and before presenting the resulting application, I removed the file from the server..
Every single "team" at my school that did the assignment had blindly used the code we pasted, without even checking it, and had a non working application.
Don't underestimate how many people just copy/paste random stuff off the web.
And that's why I don't really like the solution of "creating a file" to be able to do this again that they new introduced. because the chances of someone copying and pasting commands that make the file, or people even adding it to scripts to make sure their apt command that's in there will run is huge.
Always think twice before telling people what commands to copy/paste in their terminal, or before giving them code to fix their issue. Make sure they know what they are doing, and are capable of understanding the risks. If not, stick to the UI, and report a bug or wait for an update.

[QRFAQRFA]

Linux YouTubers doesn't see that most people that are thinking about moving to Linux, want to do so because Windows sucks, NOT because they want to learn Linux. They just want things to work. No terminal & no bullsh*t..
So all of you giving them a hard time or calling them stupid, you don't get the point.

[Ithirahad]

Do recall that Windows refers to installing a program or doing anything requiring administrator permissions as "potentially harmful" regardless of what it is. Nobody expects that to destroy their desktop environment.

[kiliandjfilms]

"you need to pick hardware that works with your OS".
In an idea scenario... yes...
But what are the chances in the real world, of an average user/ pc gamer, to just so happen to need to replace an entire setup at that moment?
Thats not how that will ever go down.
I know the proper and ideal IT way is to research and prepare, and then do.
But thats not the average user way.
The video is about an average gamer, stumbling upon linux, or having it recommended.
Being convinced to give it a shot, and try it.
Not about an IT guy doing 3 weeks of research to show linux off in the best way possible.

[ericr]

I think the reason he keeps going to the command line is that the guides he finds from internet searches instruct him to go there.

Yes, it is not suprising that some of his hardware didn't work. This video series is the experience of a long time Windows user trying to get into gaming and streaming on Linux. If not all hardware works, well that is part of the experience of using the operating system: not all hardware works and that likely includes the hardware you already have.

[Steamrick]

About 'you don't have to use command line' - have you ever tried to find a Linux tutorial or troubleshooting steps for anything worth doing that doesn't go straight to command line?
Mind you, the same is true of Windows troubleshooting - I suppose in no small part because telling someone to screenshot an 'ipconfig /all' (or whatever) is much easier than getting them to screenshot the relevant parts of the GUI.

[geezee]

The LTT Linux experiment was intended to prove if Linux really was good enough for most people to use it as daily driver.

The entire point was to see if anyone could just switch their windows computer to Linux overnight, without being tachsavvy, without Googling every step of the process, and without buying a brand new computer.

And that is exactly what LTT proved. Linux is not gonna work for the average Joe who is not either very techsavvy or has a Linux expert looking over their shoulder.

[tomslikk]

I just want to bring up a point of view that is not really mentioned much. I think what this challenge was really trying to accomplish is that MANY people have had it with Windows and only stay to play games (Me and my adult kids among them). With all the publicity that Steam/Proton, play on Linux and Lutris have come such a long way allot of users are wanting to jump to a Linux solution. The problem is that Users have to be more technically literate for Linux and it is not easy at all to get the systems set up to run games since most are produced for Windows not Linux. Just my point of view. Good job with your review.

[AnnCatsanndra]

I feel like the confusion over Linus going directly to the command line to do apt-get is that he probably _did_ google on how to solve the issue he was having installing it graphically on Pop, then once he saw the apt-get workaround in the google results, he tried it and the system "broke", so he probably thought it was the distro's fault rather than the system (because why would people be posting these helpful guides with these commands if they didn't work?)

So then he installs the new OS, picks up where he left off by trying to install with apt-get (since his access to the pop store would no longer be available) and then being surprised that apt is not inherent to all versions of Linux.

I've had a very similar experience to this kind of thing when I was first distro hopping and learning, but 15 minutes of googling for results and trying to figure out which ones are relevant and which ones are for a completely different Linux setup doesn't really make for interesting video content for people who aren't already interested in learning Linux.

But maybe I'm making mistaken assumptions on how he got there. But this is a confusion that seemed common across the 10 reactions to his challenge that I've watched so far.
--

"He downloaded it as HTML because the guy told him to"
When I first started my development career but _before_ I learned how to use git or knew what Github was, I was asked to download things for modding from Github and I've definitely run into this kind of issue to. Intuitively, somebody new to Github but familiar with downloading images from the net would see the listing of files and think to:
1: Right-click save-as on the file name - Doesn't work because the link is to the webpage of Github's convince view of the contents along with the editor and edit history and all.
2: Right-click the raw button and save-as. This seems to work now, but I very distinctly remember having issues where attempting this would try to save as html rather than getting the correct filetype of the file I was trying to save.

But yes, absolutely, the developer should have written better instructions there.
--

This is a good podcast though, I agree with the bulk of it. Even if it doesn't sound like it from how much space my complaints took up. (Much like the video. Luke's straightforward experience takes up little compared to Linus's constant struggle)

[ianfromnyc]

What I gathered from hearing him talk about it on his WAN Show stream is that when the Pop Shop gave him that error, Linus Googled the error message and found a tutorial for how to deal with it. That's why he made that comment to the effect of "Apparently this is what you have to do to make it work" and why he didn't read or comprehend the warning prompt.

[daioten]

I feel like there's a big misunderstanding of the approach that Linus is taking with this series. He's not trying to make his videos from the perspective of someone who wants to "game on Linux". He's creating videos from the perspective of someone who wants to "game". Period. And chooses to do so on a Linux operating system. It's kind of funny how everyone seems to respond to this Linux gaming series saying, "oh, well if you want to game on Linux, first you have to research your hardware and software compatibility, figure out how to use the command line to a certain extent, etc". If your goal is just to "game", that's not going to be an experience that you enjoy. And I think that's the point that Linus is trying to make. From the perspective of a "gamer", or a "streamer".. the barrier to doing those things is *still* much higher if you try to do it on Linux. While it's true that it is now *possible* to do those things on Linux, provided that you do your research and learn your way around the platform, if you were a gamer who just heard "Hey! You can game on Linux now!", and decided to blindly try it out, you'd probably have an experience that's VERY similar to Linus'. If the Linux community *really* wants Linux gaming to be a thing, we're going to have to stop expecting that everyone doing so wants to be a "Linux gamer", and instead focus on building a good experience for the "gamer". That means making it so that users don't have to rely on googling or checking documentation to get things to work. If our response to "I couldn't figure this out without doing some research." is, "...and that's fine.", Linux is never going to take off as a daily driver for people who want to do the tasks that require that research.

[dzaima]

A couple of years ago, I had the same issue with installing Steam wanting to remove half of the OS. It took me a good half an hour or something to decide that, no, I should not let it run.
I had been using linux (mint) for months by that point. For Linus, that was his first apt call he had ever made.

Like, from the user point of view, it's:

"install steam please"
[giant unreadable wall of text] (if you happen to see that it's saying it'll uninstall stuff, maybe you think to yourself that it's just updating it, and removal is part of the process. And the reinstalling info is another couple kilometers down in the log)
[You are about to do something potentially harmful] "no I'm not, I'm installing Steam."
[type in the phrase "Yes, do as I say!"] "geez fine"

Because, OBVIOUSLY, installing steam from the official package manager has *zero percent* chance of messing up your whole OS. It's just not a thing that you consider. Moreover, "potentially harmful" can be interpreted as a generic message before installing things that don't come pre-installed (or viruses or something), not the OS actually having detected that something is *definitely gone wrong* for this specific invocation.

The message apt gives is just simply near useless to anyone who isn't already completely familiar to apt.

[HadToChangeMyName_YoutubeSucks]

My understanding of the pop!_os issue was that they put the wrong iso up for a few hours and he happened to grab it. That's not linus fault, someone at system 76 should get a thorough beating with a wet fish.

[Chukijay]

The fact this sort of video even exists proves Linus’ whole point about this. Linux isn’t user-friendly, let alone beginner friendly. The expectation is that it should *mostly* work because Windows does, and everything did before. You guys are looking at this from the other end. People aren’t going to go out of their way to build a Linux box, specifically catering to Linux. These people already have a rig built for windows, and decide to run a Linux distro. That’s going to be your main demographic of Linux desktop users those videos appeal to, and that’s what’s going to have to work to get Linux more popular.

[steveatkinson]

The reason Linus was going to the command line is because he is following instruction online, when you google how to do X on linux, you normally hit a list of shell commands. I have 20 years unix/linux so I can filter the google responses that are clearly for the wrong bistro.

[ShiroKage]

He's not reckless. He's doing it from the prospective of a regular, average user who wants to play games. I had some of the same problems he did and it took me forever to solve things.

So he could definitely solve these problems, but I feel the frustration because I had to go through it.

[garrettkajmowicz]

He kept going to the command line because all of the online help he found provided shell commands to run.