Literally just app support. I think most people would happily live with GNOME, coming from Windows.
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Short and to the point, nice.
My momâs laptop was one of those Win7 to Win10 free updates that just didnât work- so I installed Gnome Ubuntu, already had Firefox and OpenOffice- easy day. If the GUI was too much of a leap, there were alternatives. But that is a special case of really light use and she has only two requirements, web browsing and word processing- nothing else.
I would use 100% Linux at home if I didnât have odd requirements- a little outdated vsphere client here, some WindowsXP to support tuning a Greddy EMU there, a little casual gaming here etc. For home desktop replacement, IMO its a âit just worksâ and also a âit is compatibleâ thing. My mom had zero use case for a Windows app that does not work on Linux. But many people do. Wine isnât enough.
Android wouldnât have the adoption it has if it didnât have a healthy selection of apps, and IMO just as importantly, its the same app (at least mostly) as found on the Iphone. How many Android users would kick chalks and go Iphone if Android suddenly lost the apps they hold near and dear? We expect more from Windows users?
I donno, Iâm going on a tangent so I need to digress⌠plus maybe Windows (and the desktop) is going the way of the dinosaur, there is just less and less software that is Windows only, less and less software that is native vs hosted somewhere else, and less reason to have large desktops as well.
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I think browser-centric distros, like Chromium OS, will fill that niche quite well. If you consider that the vast majority of people donât need the software support, beyond browser apps, I donât think thereâs any reason why Linux-based operating systems canât become the norm.
Regarding app support, most distros position themselves as Windows/Mac alternatives, and without investment from companies like Adobe, Autodesk, Dassault Systèmes, Microsoft, etc⌠I donât think weâll see a major shift. Too many people, myself included, arenât impressed with the selection of open source or GPL alternatives.
For my use case, Blender is fine for surface modelling (problem comes with having to re-learn the same things in different software, even with @Phantom making it look so easy), but GIMP is no replacement for Photoshop (especially when you consider the integration with other Adobe products [Same reason Inkscape canât replace Illustrator]). I donât think there are any decent alternatives for AutoCAD or SolidWorks/Inventor.
Itâs less that users arenât willing to change OS, and more that these packages are unofficial industry standards, to the point where youâd be putting your business at a disadvantage, and wasting yourâs and othersâ time, by not using them.
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thats the thing I can see things from both sides of the fence in a way
most experienced linux gurus will tell you its better to learn it the hard way!
and to a certain extent i agree.
learning and exploring cli and the power it gives a user teaches you more about the computer and linux than you thought possible.
But because there are a lot of people who can barely turn a pc on that have to learn how to do complex programs because their jobs require it they want to be able to hit the ground running.
most often because they have to learn it fast and dont have a lot of time to mess with cli.
learning a distro to use has to be easy enough to run but interesting enough to warrant wanting to learn or else it pushes them away by being too confusing.
sad to say many long time linux users tend to forget that.
things are not the same as when they started learning linux.
and its one reason we see so many posts such as which one is best?, which do i choose?, and why is linux so hard?
i started linux back in 1998
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I did a very similar thing, Ubuntu Gnome on a touchscreen laptop for her birthday. I stopped getting tech support calls from her, for the most part; because everything just works. Her only complaint has been that the Gnome file-picker sucks.
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You guys are right.
People donât use an operating system, they use applications.
The applications use the OS.
People will go with what runs their software.
Simple as that.
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AD does a lot more than file/print.
Linux was made and designed to do work and be a tool.
The unwashed massâs need a stupid proof OS and super easy toolset. No one is wasting time making that for free.
When Microsoft switches to linux. They will spend to time and money on the stupid proofing. It will be well into the 2020âs but.
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And samba does a lot more than file/print
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Blender is available for Windows, and you can run Blender from the command line in Windows. How is Adobe not offering CLI support the fault of Microsoft? If Adobe did release itâs products for Linux they would still be proprietary and unlikely to offer much in the way of command line support.
Iâm not saying this because I think Windows is better than Linux, but it sounds like Blender is a more powerful tool than its adobe equivalent in some areas. Kudos to the Blender dev team.
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Is it wrong that Iâm kinda ok with Linux not being adapted widely on the desktop? Getting too big and too unified could lead Linux to becoming more like Windows in all the wrong ways.
Think about it critically for a second and youâll realize that many of gripes about Windows can be directly linked to the fact that it is so widely used.
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Appreciate the attempt, but Iâve used this argument many times and the incessant screeching about spyware and âWindozeâ just increases in volume. 
âLinux doesnât get viruses!â
Right⌠Put two Linux boxes in every home and letâs see how fast that changes.
If youâre going to rob a bank, do you go to the one with 6,000 clients, or 600,000,000 clients?
No, itâs not wrong. A few have argued that mass adaptation and a unified distro/DE will stint innovation. I can see that, for sure. Iâm okay with Linux being a service handler/niche sysadmin/niche developer tool.
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I think thereâs a happy medium between true wide adoption and where weâre at now. A few percent of desktops would be a great share. Itâs enough users to make Adobe rethink porting again, but not so many that we suddenly have to deal with people who are mad that they double clicked on âdefinitelyavirus.exeâ and nothing swooped in to save them or their files.
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At this point, i donât think Ubtuntu is harder to use than windows.
I think its lack of compatibility with the programs people are familiar with (especially with decently computer literate people that game), unfamiliarity with the OS (theyâre used to windows or macos and there is a barrier to a new OS), It isnât the default OS on the computer they buy.
And really i think its like 30% lack of compatibility with programs people are familiar with, 60% it isnât the default OS on the computer they buy and 10% they arenât familiar with the OS. Because ubuntu is close enough to windows, where i think most people wouldnât be too inconvenienced using it.
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With regards to the OPâs original question on why itâs not more adapted. I think you hit the nail on the head.
After having now tried this on the chromebook my sister uses (asus c302) itâs not available on all chromebooks. On this one it isnât. Feature updates on chromebooks kinda get rolled out on a per device basis and itâs running chromeos 71.something and 69 is the one that supposedly introduced the container feature. Sure enough I could probably enable developer settings and it may or may not be available then in a âbetaâ state. But since she essentially uses it as a pdf reader, google machine and for google docs in university. I donât even really know what having Linux support would be providing that she canât do already.
Here are 27 chromebooks listed that supported the feature when it came out. Donât know how many they are now exactly. Just that this specific model I have access to does not.
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Older generations wonât see some of the features because they went built with it in mind. But chrome books can run chromeOS, Android, and Linux apps in containers etc. They run fine.
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Ye it can do Android already (for a long time now). And Linux may or may not be comming eventually to this one too. But no set date or even concrate information on that. Just no information that it wonât be happening either (witch does exist for other models, hence this one may get it at some point).
Thats is about as close as linux gets to being mass adopted. A containers in a controlled OS.
As least for now. Windows and OS X need to devolve more.
There is even a sign that apple will ditch x86 and go to there own CPU on laptops. Then move up the stack. If they even care about desktops at all.
mostly i think is that the adoption is so slow because people are completely illiterate when it comes to CLI and linux.
that is mostly because Windows has been the OS of the masses for the last 30 years.
Try to google any random software and add âlinuxâ to it and compare that to any search for the same software for windows.
a) is windows the default os
b) you can download any random packaged .exe file from somewhere (incl. âtoolsearch barsâ and all)
c) if that piece of code didnât do it, there are a million other .exes to install
And people dont know how to operate linux and dont want to. They want âitâ to âworkâ so they can to their non-tech stuff. Most people dont care about kernel versions, open source graphic drivers or filesystem changes on network storage home servers.
they wanna google shit, watch video on demand and do social media, write emails and some âdocumentsâ and thats it.
so, in a way, there is no way of turning that around and if people even had that knowledge, they wouldnât turn because they are simple not interested in it, at all.
And nothing wrong with people doing what they like to do.
The real problem is located somewhere in the consequences of that long-term, but thats a different question entirely.