Sure. Many computer users have some specialized software they need. It’s not about only professional software either.
My phone records video in 4K HDR. Editing and viewing that on Linux is a pain to not possible last time I checked. Or software to do my taxes is absent. There’s also nothing on Linux that’s close to Apple’s GarageBand, which I use once in a while for fun to make music. If Netflix is now available in more than 720p, I haven’t checked. For vector illustration Inkscape is just no fun to use compared to Affinity Designer. For Software Development I haven’t seen a nicer git client than Git Tower. Screen recording was also painful last time I tried it.
I have tried Linux on the desktop from time to over the years. The weak point were always the applications. Often they are inferior to those available on macOS or windows. Support is practically nonexistent. Packages in the repository might be years old. So far I haven’t found a Linux desktop application that actually got me excited. Something or other also seems to be broken every time I try using it for longer. A ton of work on distributions seems to go into yet another desktop environment instead of actually useful applications. Upgrading between releases of the same distribution is often painful or even not supported at all.
I’m glad that Linux exists and it can be very useful for sure, but it barely meets my use cases and just isn’t a joy to use overall. My main use case for Linux on the desktop is to explore Linux. For an operating system and software available free of charge, it’s truly impressive though.
Normally I use kdenlive to edit video, which supports 4K AFAIK, but although that doesn’t support HDR it looks like DaVinci Resolve supports both.
Taxes
That’s surprising. Turbotax and Quickbooks have online options, and there are a few native apps like GnuCash, but I haven’t used them—TurboTax works for me.
GarageBand
Yeah that’s too bad. I hear good things about Ardour, though. Also, bandlab if you’re okay with a webapp.
Netflix
I only stream on an actual TV, not my computer, so I haven’t done this in a while, but I thought you could do this in Firefox with DRM enabled? If not, seems like there are addons which enable it. Might be outdated knowledge.
vector illustration
Fun is hard to come by
git client
Git clients all suck for me, CLI is the way to go. However, my co-workers that use git clients all use GitKraken (on macOS) and that is available on Linux, too.
screen recording was also painful
Won’t argue with you there. Don’t know why it doesn’t have first-class support in many distros. I hear OBS Studio works well for this if you want to do anything fancy with the recording, otherwise there are plenty of apps for this (Kazam might be a simpler choice).
barely meets my use cases
I think really (considering the above) your main issue is that you just have some strong software preferences. There are certainly ways to meet most if not all of the use cases you listed. It requires a big change in workflow, though.
For what it’s worth, I find that most of the issues with software alternatives in Linux is that everyone often recommends free/GPL replacements, which are invariably worse than the commercial/non-free software the user is used to. But there is paid software in Linux land, too, remember. In my case, I have often found that if I can pay for the software it will be better, and if there’s a webapp version of something non-free it will often be better than the native FOSS alternative. There are many notable exceptions to that rule, but money does solve the occasional headache.
your main issue is that you just have some strong software preferences
Yes, I want to use applications and do something productive with them. An operating system shouldn’t be an end in itself.
I avoid browser based software because the UX is always a bit icky. It does fill lots of niches for special software you are right.
I have often found that if I can pay for the software it will be better
Yes, developers need to eat, pay rent, etc. Culturally Linux users don’t like paying for software. That in turn leads to the indie developer scene you see on macOS for example to be very small.
Even donating to FOSS projects I use can be a hassle. And of course I can’t feasibly donate to the developers of all the packages on a Linux distribution. It would be cool to pay a monthly subscription, that’s then distributed among the software I use or have installed. That could be integrated into a package manager even. I don’t know if any Linux distro does something like it.
Sorry but saying Linux users don’t like paying for things is just not true. In fact stats about gaming from Humble Bundle (I think, don’t remember exactly) demonstrates the opposite: that Linux users will happily pay and on average more than windows users.
As for paying maintainers of important packages etc I think states (and corpos) should start doing it given how much of the IT infrastructure depends on them.
You are right, I remember something about Linux users paying more than Windows users and Apple users paying the most for HumbleBundle. The number of small paid applications is low compared to macOS.
Corporations and governments are already paying Red Hat or similar companies for their services and development. Their use cases aren’t the same as the average desktop users though. Linux makes for a great thin client for web applications for example. That’s very far from Audio and video workstation applications.
It would be cool to pay a monthly subscription, that’s then distributed among the software I use or have installed. That could be integrated into a package manager even. I don’t know if any Linux distro does something like it.
I’ve been thinking the same thing lately. It would be cool if at least there were some sort of metadata maintainers could include on packages saying, “if you want to donate money, upstream accepts donations at this link: <…>”. Then I (or someone else) could put together a tool that helps you track what upstream projects you’re donating to.
I understand that isn’t nearly as easy as just a subscription though. The issue I see with that is legal - you’d need a legal entity specifically for accepting payments and disbursing each upstream project’s share, plus all the accounting and such that goes along with it. I don’t see why it couldn’t be shared across multiple distributions though. Upstream packages could create an account with the funding service, then distro maintainers could include some sort of Funding-Service-ID: gnu/coreutils metadata and a way to upload a list of Funding-Service-IDs to the funding service’s servers.
I think that would be doable, but it would require buy-in from distributions, upstream maintainers, and someone who could operate such an organization. Not to mention users.
Sure. Many computer users have some specialized software they need. It’s not about only professional software either.
My phone records video in 4K HDR. Editing and viewing that on Linux is a pain to not possible last time I checked. Or software to do my taxes is absent. There’s also nothing on Linux that’s close to Apple’s GarageBand, which I use once in a while for fun to make music. If Netflix is now available in more than 720p, I haven’t checked. For vector illustration Inkscape is just no fun to use compared to Affinity Designer. For Software Development I haven’t seen a nicer git client than Git Tower. Screen recording was also painful last time I tried it.
I have tried Linux on the desktop from time to over the years. The weak point were always the applications. Often they are inferior to those available on macOS or windows. Support is practically nonexistent. Packages in the repository might be years old. So far I haven’t found a Linux desktop application that actually got me excited. Something or other also seems to be broken every time I try using it for longer. A ton of work on distributions seems to go into yet another desktop environment instead of actually useful applications. Upgrading between releases of the same distribution is often painful or even not supported at all.
I’m glad that Linux exists and it can be very useful for sure, but it barely meets my use cases and just isn’t a joy to use overall. My main use case for Linux on the desktop is to explore Linux. For an operating system and software available free of charge, it’s truly impressive though.
Normally I use kdenlive to edit video, which supports 4K AFAIK, but although that doesn’t support HDR it looks like DaVinci Resolve supports both.
That’s surprising. Turbotax and Quickbooks have online options, and there are a few native apps like GnuCash, but I haven’t used them—TurboTax works for me.
Yeah that’s too bad. I hear good things about Ardour, though. Also, bandlab if you’re okay with a webapp.
I only stream on an actual TV, not my computer, so I haven’t done this in a while, but I thought you could do this in Firefox with DRM enabled? If not, seems like there are addons which enable it. Might be outdated knowledge.
Fun is hard to come by
Git clients all suck for me, CLI is the way to go. However, my co-workers that use git clients all use GitKraken (on macOS) and that is available on Linux, too.
Won’t argue with you there. Don’t know why it doesn’t have first-class support in many distros. I hear OBS Studio works well for this if you want to do anything fancy with the recording, otherwise there are plenty of apps for this (Kazam might be a simpler choice).
I think really (considering the above) your main issue is that you just have some strong software preferences. There are certainly ways to meet most if not all of the use cases you listed. It requires a big change in workflow, though.
For what it’s worth, I find that most of the issues with software alternatives in Linux is that everyone often recommends free/GPL replacements, which are invariably worse than the commercial/non-free software the user is used to. But there is paid software in Linux land, too, remember. In my case, I have often found that if I can pay for the software it will be better, and if there’s a webapp version of something non-free it will often be better than the native FOSS alternative. There are many notable exceptions to that rule, but money does solve the occasional headache.
Tbf the taxes thing is only a US and maybe a few others thing.
Yes, I want to use applications and do something productive with them. An operating system shouldn’t be an end in itself.
I avoid browser based software because the UX is always a bit icky. It does fill lots of niches for special software you are right.
Yes, developers need to eat, pay rent, etc. Culturally Linux users don’t like paying for software. That in turn leads to the indie developer scene you see on macOS for example to be very small.
Even donating to FOSS projects I use can be a hassle. And of course I can’t feasibly donate to the developers of all the packages on a Linux distribution. It would be cool to pay a monthly subscription, that’s then distributed among the software I use or have installed. That could be integrated into a package manager even. I don’t know if any Linux distro does something like it.
Sorry but saying Linux users don’t like paying for things is just not true. In fact stats about gaming from Humble Bundle (I think, don’t remember exactly) demonstrates the opposite: that Linux users will happily pay and on average more than windows users.
As for paying maintainers of important packages etc I think states (and corpos) should start doing it given how much of the IT infrastructure depends on them.
You are right, I remember something about Linux users paying more than Windows users and Apple users paying the most for HumbleBundle. The number of small paid applications is low compared to macOS.
Corporations and governments are already paying Red Hat or similar companies for their services and development. Their use cases aren’t the same as the average desktop users though. Linux makes for a great thin client for web applications for example. That’s very far from Audio and video workstation applications.
I’ve been thinking the same thing lately. It would be cool if at least there were some sort of metadata maintainers could include on packages saying, “if you want to donate money, upstream accepts donations at this link: <…>”. Then I (or someone else) could put together a tool that helps you track what upstream projects you’re donating to.
I understand that isn’t nearly as easy as just a subscription though. The issue I see with that is legal - you’d need a legal entity specifically for accepting payments and disbursing each upstream project’s share, plus all the accounting and such that goes along with it. I don’t see why it couldn’t be shared across multiple distributions though. Upstream packages could create an account with the funding service, then distro maintainers could include some sort of
Funding-Service-ID: gnu/coreutilsmetadata and a way to upload a list ofFunding-Service-IDs to the funding service’s servers.I think that would be doable, but it would require buy-in from distributions, upstream maintainers, and someone who could operate such an organization. Not to mention users.