> Just highlights the piss-poor state of Linux desktop even after all these years.
What exactly is wrong with it? I prefer KDE to either Windows or MacOS. Obviously a Linux desktop is not going to be identical to whatever you use so there is a learning curve, but the same is true, and to a much greater extent, for moving from Windows to MacOS.
> layman to sanely develop programs for Linux systems
> or the average person
The "layman" or "average person" does not develop software.
The average person has plenty of problems dealing with Windows. They are just used to putting up with being unable to get things to work. Ran into that (a multi-function printer/scanner not working fully) with someone just yesterday.
If you find it hard to adjust to a Linux desktop you should not be developing software (at any rate not developing software that matters to anyone).
I have switched a lot of people to Linux (my late dad, my ex-wife, my daughter's primary school principal) who preferred it to Windows and my kids grew up using it. No problems.
> What exactly is wrong with it? I prefer KDE to either Windows or MacOS.
KDE is my choice as well (Xfce #2) if I have to be stuck with a Linux distro for a long period but I'd rather not put myself in that position because it's still going to be a nightmare. My most recent install from this year of Kubuntu/KDE Fedora had strange bugs where applications froze and quitting them were more painful than macOS/Windows, or that software updates through their app store thingy end up in some weird state that won't reset no matter how many times I reboot, hard crashes and so on on a relatively modern PC (5900X, RTX 3080, 32G RAM). I had to figure out the commands to force reset/clean up things surrounding the package management in order to continue to install/update packages. This is the kind of thing I never face with Silicon macs or even Windows 10/11.
This is a dealbreaker for the vast majority of people but let's come to your more interesting take:
> If you find it hard to adjust to a Linux desktop you should not be developing software
And that sums up the vast majority of Linux users who still think every other year is the year of "Linux desktop". It's that deeply ignorant attitude instead of acknowledging all these years of clusterfuck after clusterfuck of GUIs, desktop envs, underlying tech changes (Xorg, Wayland) and myriads of confusing package distribution choices (debs, rpms, snaps, flatpaks, appimages and so on), that no sane person is ever going to embrace a Linux distro as their daily driver.
You need a reality reset if you think getting used to Linux is a qualifier to making great software.
> KDE is my choice as well (Xfce #2) if I have to be stuck with a Linux distro for a long period but I'd rather not put myself in that position because it's still going to be a nightmare. My most recent install from this year of Kubuntu/KDE Fedora had strange bugs where applications froze and quitting them were more painful than macOS/Windows, or that software updates through their app store thingy end up in some weird state that won't reset no matter how many times I reboot, hard crashes and so on on a relatively modern PC (5900X, RTX 3080, 32G RAM).
A matter of your experience. Its not something that happens to me or anyone I know personally. Even using a less newbie friendly distro (I use Manjaro) its very rare.
I have not tried Fedora for many years, but the last time I did it was not a particularly easy distro to use. It is also a test distro for RHEL and Centos so should be expected to be a bit unstable.
> It's that deeply ignorant attitude instead of acknowledging all these years of clusterfuck after clusterfuck of GUIs, desktop envs, underlying tech changes (Xorg, Wayland) and myriads of confusing package distribution choices (debs, rpms, snaps, flatpaks, appimages and so on)
Most of which is hidden from the user behind appstores. The only thing non-geek users need to know is which DE they prefer (or they can let someone else pick it for them, or use the distro default).
Even a user who wants to tinker only needs to know one of the distribution formats, one desktop environment. You are free to learn about more, but there is absolutely no need to. You also need to learn these if you use WSL or some other container.
> You need a reality reset if you think getting used to Linux is a qualifier to making great software.
What I said is that the ability to cope with the tiny learning curve to adjust to a different desktop look and feel is a disqualifier for for being a developer.
Every non-technical user who switches from Windows to MacOS does it, so its very odd it is a barrier for a developer.
If you're just kicking the tyres on Fedora or Ubuntu, you're not getting KDE. I love it myself, but I know it's there. The average curious person is going to get whatever Gnome thinks they deserve at that point in time.
Gnome being the default does probably harm Linux desktop adoption.
On the other hand do people care that much about DEs? Most people just want to start their web browser or whatever.
> If you find it hard to adjust to a Linux desktop you should not be developing software
For most it’s not a case of whether you can do it, it’s whether it’s worth doing it. For me Linux lacks the killer feature that makes any of that adjustment worth my (frankly, valuable) time. That’s doubly so for any of us that develop user facing software: our users aren’t going to be on Linux so we need to have a more mainstream OS to hand for testing anyway.
If you're developing server software (presumably you are if using containers), it's going to run on Linux, so desktop Linux is by far the sanest choice with the least moving parts.
Certainly, but then that is also a valid objection (and one I have heard) for switching from Windows to MacOS.
The objection is really I do not want to use anything different, which is fine. After many years of using Linux I feel the same about using Windows or MacOS
> For me Linux lacks the killer feature that makes any of that adjustment worth my (frankly, valuable) time
It lacks all the irritants in Windows 11 every Windows user seems to complain of?
> That’s doubly so for any of us that develop user facing software: our users aren’t going to be on Linux so we need to have a more mainstream OS to hand for testing anyway.
SO for desktop software, that is not cross platform, yes. If you are developing Windows software you need Windows.
If you are developing server software it will probably be deployed to Linux, if you are developing web apps the platform is the browser and the OS is irrelevant, and if you are developing cross platform desktop apps then you need to test on all of them so you need all.