why not? it’s not like there is any competition.
Microsoft is making more money off Linux with Azure than several red hats combined.Yes, but people find this interesting because historically, Microsoft was actively trying to destroy Linux (look up Halloween documents) and even said that Linux is cancer.
WSL has been integrated into Windows for a while now. The days you’re referring to are in the past.
A lot changed after Satya Nadella took the helm. The modern .NET platform is really quite nice, and MS does a lot of
FOSSopen source work.Obviously it’s good to be sceptical, they’re a large corporation and all they want is money, they’re not our friends. They’re just not as draconian as they were in the 90s and the 00s.
Windows: What is my purpose?
User: You are a bootloader to install Linux.
Oh my god
Grub
Oh my Bill
Thought that was what PXE boot was for
“An expensive bootloader at that, but hey you already paid us when you bought your laptop thanks to our decades-old grip on the market, so we could not care less what you do next”
While I see an extensive amount of “Embrace, Extend, Extinguish” and do agree that this is the typical logic of Microsoft.
It’s obvious this is to try and avoid getting hit with similar monopoly accusations that their competitors are receiving.
“Look, Look!! We support other Operating Systems! We have a guide! We’re not a monopoly! See, See!!”
This has way more to do with Azure is their main product and they know what people want to run on the cloud runs on Linux workloads. They’ve seen their Kuberbetes numbers, they know where the money is
and their OS is becoming an AD + 365 sub selling machine
There’s definitely an element of that, but imo their recent embrace of WSL and linux tooling for development is just to try and expand their market share in the software development space. Very few devs develop on windows unless they’re game devs, C# devs or working on something else that requires windows/Microsoft tooling, everyone else is on Linux and macOS because windows is bad for developing software.
It’s basically an admission that their tooling is bad, but it’s fine because you can just run linux development tools on windows now, so please don’t switch to Linux fully
Your assertions are not supported by industry analysis.
While this years survey is closed, the results haven’t been published. In last year’s survey, MacOS slightly edged out Linux, moving to second place.
Why is windows bad for development? Outside of specific languages or IDEs which suck for Windows, why would windows be bad for development?
Start your pc, start the IDE and type away. Docker runs in windows so running databases, redis, rabbitmq, elastic or whatever is not an issue.
In my experience, it’s damn near impossible (or at least used to be. I don’t use windows anymore) to get cli programs to work the way they should. I’d edit the environment variables, logout, login, restart the computer, check the variables again, set the variables again, and after about 20 times windows would go “oh yeah, there’s that compiler you were talking about”. With Linux I just get whatever language/libraries/compiler/interpreter I want and its there. At most I might have to ‘source .bashrc’ or something.
Well, I don’t think it’s anti-monopoly evidence, but instead a way to intercept a popular search phrase and control the narrative.
You search for “how to download and install linux” in google, and the very top link is the Microsoft page. And the narrative is:
-I just want to get started: Oh, use WSL, that way you are using Windows really, and just a touch of Linux
-I need to use it for real: Oh, then use Azure, you can have us set up those scary Linux instances for you and Microsoft Terminal will hook you right up to those instances
-I really really want to use it: Ok, but remember, you’ll lose access to Windows applications, so there are downsides, and also, we are going to make this hands down the scariest looking procedure of the three…I don’t think this is the reason. Windows is in no danger of being a monopoly
They just got through the US, EU, and UK courts regarding the Activision/Blizz acquisition. In which they gave up some streaming rights to Ubisoft to appease concerns ragarding game pass monopoly. It’s probably on their mind.
I love when people on the Internet say “X did Y quietly” to make it more suspenseful. This doesn’t look quiet to me…
What does “quietly” even mean? Didn’t take out ads in Times Square?
Also how is this bad?
Not bad, just ironic
I’m reminded of Google’s financial support for Firefox, so as to dissuade the idea that they are a monopoly
In exchange, FF uses Google search by default. So they’re also getting direct value from the deal.
Maybe their Linux distro will use bing.
And they’ll bake in ads to the desktop.
Ubuntu, one of the most popular Linux Distros, already did that.
Or are we just hating on Windows?
Microsoft must make 40% of their revenue off of Azure at this point. I would not be surprised if more than 50% of that is on Linux. Windows is probably down to 10% ( around the same as gaming ).
https://www.kamilfranek.com/microsoft-revenue-breakdown/
Sure there are people in the Windows division who want to kill Linux and some dev dev folks will still prefer Windows. At this point though, a huge chunk of Microsoft could not care less about Windows and may actually prefer Linux. Linux is certainly a better place for K8S and OCI stuff. All the GPT and Cognitive Services stuff is likely more Linux than not.
Do people not know that Microsoft has their own Linux distro? I mean an installation guide is not exactly their biggest move in Linux?
Do people not know that Microsoft has their own Linux distro?
MS has been at Linux expos since 2004! They started working on SUSE in friggin 2006! I truly don’t get the amount of bile and ignorance the Lemmy community has towards them, it’s like half these folks are still on 2001-era slashdot, talking about FUD and Micro$oft.
Yeah, Microsoft has been a shit company making mediocre products its whole lifetime, but the amount of unhinged hatred here does not in any way match the present-day company’s actions.
Microsoft contributes to Linux and other open source projects in many ways, including financially. The cynical among us believe it’s for the same reason Google contributes to Mozilla. Legally it’s harder to prove you’re an evil monopoly if you financially support your competition. Microsoft’s involvement in Linux only became noteworthy after their 2001 Antitrust suit.
The hatred literally stems purely from Windows 10 and 11.
They are products engineered so expertly to frustrate you in such a distasteful way it’s downright offensive to anyone who has used any other operating system. It’s genuinely a marvel of human engineering.
I got radicalized by Slashdot. But I don’t regret it.
Great source, but it also shows they make 23% off office. Together with Windows, that’s over 30% of their revenue.
Office doesn’t work on Linux, so it really doesn’t make financial sense to push Linux
Also, if you spend any amount of time around the Linux Kernel Mailing List, there’s no shortage of microsoft.com email addresses involved and contributing here and there.
I would not be surprised if more than 50% of that is on Linux.
Depending how you count “on Linux” the over/under is closer to 90%.
I have one dream for Linux. I’m a huge OSS fan and I want to see it thrive.
I think Microsoft should partner with Oracle to make Oracle Linux 9 support all the Microsoft ecosystem. I want AD in Linux. I want Microsoft Word on Linux. Oracle Linux 9 is the obvious successor to RHEL and Microsoft has an opportunity here to build something great.
Lmao just kidding
I was about 90% reading this going wtf is this guy on?
You got me, I had my torch and pitchfork ready and my FOSS-themed chanting was growing louder…
You actually can use Active directory with linux
It’s a huge portion and an important technology Linux or not - doesn’t hurt to learn somethin new especially when it’s helpful
I could see that with Ubuntu since they are already throwing money and dev time to support it. Also DoD is already putting out automated STIGs for it.
My perspective is that it’s there so it shows up on search results for “installing Linux” and recommends WSL over bare metal. At least that’s how I understand the wording.
But who knows.
True. Dont trust that company. They may invest 1% of their money into WSL now, but its for making the “Linux” experience so good there literally is no reason for many anymore, to really switch.
Indeed, it’s to contain the “Linuxification” of the developer community.
Before WSL, any developer dealing with backend development almost had to install Linux to have a vaguely decent development environment to align with what they get to use on the servers. While they were dragged into that world by their requirements, they may find that the packaging and window management is actually pretty cool. There reluctance to venture out of the Windows world transforms into acceptance and perhaps even liking it.
Now with WSL, those Windows desktop users say “I just need to click a distribution in the Microsoft Store and I’m golden and don’t have to deal with that scary Linux world I don’t know yet.”.
I’ve repeatedly have people notice I’m running a Linux desktop when I’m presenting and off hand say “you know you can just run Linux under Windows, you don’t have to endure Linux anymore”. They seem to think I’m absurd for actually preferring Linux when I can get away with it.
I think they are all in on wsl
Thank you.
Ways Lemmy is already feeling like modern reddit: Instead of link to an article, we get screenshot of a post with a screenshot of the article.
Old habits die hard
So the Embrace-Extend-Extinguish continues…
They’re having issues with step 3 on Linux
More like:
1 - embrace it in the cloud 2 - profit madly 3 - extend 4 - profit more
It makes me chuckle that people think Microsoft actually wants to extinguish Linux. I mean, the Windows division sees it as a competitor to be vanquished I guess. Over at Azure though, it is the golden goose.
Where I’m from, Triple E is something spread by mosquitoes… something about it just attracts blood suckers I guess
How many years will you people keep parroting this? Show me the extinguish part already…
Wouldn’t it happen by now considering how much MSFT/corporate influence Linux already has?
Great! Then now you’re ready to install Microsoft Edge on your fresh new linux installation: https://packages.microsoft.com/repos/edge/pool/main/m/microsoft-edge-stable/ 🤡
It comes with bing search pre configured for you so you don’t have to look for the settings, we also hid them so you don’t accidentally switch to duckduckgo because we believe Linux users shall experience the full potential of our services even out abroad on another OS
For all two people who genuinely use edge on Linux, it’s still a more private experience than Windows. Regardless, more power to them
If only they stop overwriting boot loader.
Install linux second and create a second boot partition. most distros will probe foreign os and add a grub chainloader entry from grub to windows boot partition. windows never lnows about the other boot partition
You could not live with your own OS. Where did that bring you?
Back to meThe thing is, I don’t think a guide is really needed to install Linux. Most of it is pretty straight-forward. (The only tricky bit that comes to mind is making the USB that you’ve put your distro on bootable. That probably isn’t obvious; and it might not be obvious how to get your computer to boot from a USB anyway if you’ve never done it before.)
Anyway, the way I see it, Microsoft’s guide is more about how you can use Linux while still having Windows. If someone is searching for “how do I install Linux?” Microsoft would obviously prefer the answer to involve something that preserves Windows. First preference: WSL, second preference: Virtual Machine, third preference: dual-boot. And after that, you’re on your own.
third preference: dual-boot.
Does that mean they’re gonna stop eating grub? Becouse I won’t dual boot let alone allow windows near my hardware till it stops eating grub
I wouldn’t count on it… From Microsoft’s point of view, dual booting works as long as you install Windows first - which probably suits them just fine.
I prefer having Windows safely tucked away on a virtual machine where it can’t hurt anything.
You know that could be interpreted as a challenge.
I personally haven’t seen windows do that in many many years (last time I saw it happen was with windows XP, though I haven’t ran dual-boot system with every windows since then, just some).
In my dual-Linux setup though, one keeps trying to get over the other in every minor update.
Last time it happened to me was early in my linux journey (around 2 years ago) with win 10, honestly if I wasn’t already extremely pissed off at windows at the time I probably would have given up on linux when it happened, as it was though I instead gave up on Windows and haven’t looked back
Doubt it
windows hasn’t overwritten my uefi settings on major update in 3ish years
You have to install Windows first, then your Linux distro.
Doing that has solved all my problems with Windows being a douche
So I’d have to remove my already setup to how I like it OS, install windows, remove all the garbage it comes with, reinstall Linux, and then re set it up to how I like…
Just to “more easily” do VR? Yeah no thanks, seems like far more effort than windows is worth to me
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Those are (made up) problems that might arise after you’ve already installed it; and I doubt Microsoft’s guide says much about them.
While I agree with you, the issues described are definitely not made up. Linux tends to remove proprietary drivers on every update and the open source drivers for Nvidia still fail with a lot of hardware.
this only happens if you install proprietary drivers manually and not through the software center (or package manager for the cli folks) on almost every given linux distro
this is why no sane linux user recommends installing download scripts from websites, you rely instead on your package manager to handle everythingI never installed any driver in any way other than the software center and it happened to me in every single update for several years until I finally bothered to search how to configure the update process to stop doing it (last month).
Multiple machines, distros, DEs, you name it. None of them ever not had this problem.
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Umm… I really don’t know why you’re coming at me with some sarcastic anti-linux shit right now. All I said was that it was pretty easy to install. I didn’t say or imply that it was problem free. As for the problems being ‘made up’, I made a reasonable assumption that GRUB doesn’t care what day of the week it is - and so what you described was hypothetical only.
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I don’t think a guide is really needed to install Linux
I had a guide and it was still a big learning curve. Linus had a guide and he still bricked his machine trying to install Steam. Imagine your parents or grandparents being told without context to mount an ISO to a USB and set up their BIOS - for 90% of people there is no way in hell they’re installing Linux without a guide unless they can double click an exe and have an install wizard do it for them.
I agree; but please take my comment in the context of Microsoft’s guide - which doesn’t tell users how to do any of things that you’ve mentioned. My point is that the underlying purpose of the guide is not so much about how to install linux, but how you might try linux while still keeping Windows.
The thing is, I don’t think a guide is really needed to install Linux. Most of it is pretty straight-forward. (The only tricky bit that comes to mind is making the USB that you’ve put your distro on bootable. That probably isn’t obvious; and it might not be obvious how to get your computer to boot from a USB anyway if you’ve never done it before.)
It’s been awhile since I installed a Linux distro…Have some of them improved guidance related to allocating disk space on install? I remember that was one of the parts that I wasn’t entirely confident I’d handled properly the last few times I did so. Something something swap, something /, and the like.
I did a Mint install a few weeks ago, and I’d say that if you want to preserve some existing OS (i.e. dual boot), then it isn’t super easy. You have to tell it what new partitions you want - and therefore you have to know something about what partitions you should have. The good news is that you don’t actually need any swap or home partition. You can just put it all on one partition - but I don’t think it’s obvious what to do.
On the other hand, if you aren’t trying to preserve something you already have, you can tell the installer to just go with all the defaults, and then you don’t have to know anything about it.
Note: Microsoft’s guide doesn’t mention any of that detail. It basically just says to follow the instructions of the installer.
Ou can dual-boot with the default options, but iirc if you want to choose how much of your Windows partition you want to use you have to do it manually. Haven’t done it in ages though so I could be wrong
And after trying Linux inside windows and then inside a VM and realising it runs like shit, they’ll be convinced windows is better, but they’ve been deceived.
You’re so right! I feel like I always need to try two programs and I am never doing it often enough to actually remember which works.
Why wouldn’t they? Windows 10+ is a great development machine and Microsoft knows that a lot of developers develop with Linux. WSL is great for all parties - including Linux
I, too, have had the audacity to say WSL is useful on this community and it was also met with down votes. Purists hating and gate keeping, and then they wonder why Linux isn’t more popular.
WSL may be fine for a Windows user to get some access to Linux, however for me it misses the vast majority of what I value in a desktop distribution -Better Window managers. This is subjective, but with Windows you are stuck with Microsoft implementation, and if you might like a tiling window manager, or Plasma workspaces better, well you need to run something other than Windows or OSX.
-Better networking. I can do all kinds of stuff with networking. Niche relative to most folks, but the Windows networking stack is awfully inflexible and frustrating after doing a lot of complex networking tasks in Linux
-More understanding and control over the “background” pieces. With Windows doing nothing a lot is happening and it’s not really clear what is happening where. With Linux, it can be daunting like Windows, but the pieces can be inspected more easily and things are more obvious.
-Easier “repair”. If Windows can’t fix itself, then it’s really hard to recover from a lot of scenarios. Generally speaking a Linux system has to be pretty far gone
-Easier license wrangling. Am I allowed to run another copy of Windows? Can I run a VM of it or does it have to be baremetal? Is it tied to the system I bought with it preloaded, or is it bound to my microsoft account? With most Linux distributions, this is a lot easier, the answer is “sure you can run it”.
-Better package management. If I use flatpak, dnf, apt, zypper, or snap, I can pretty much find any software I want to run and by virtue of installing in that way, it also gets updated. Microsoft has added winget, which is a step in the right direction, but the default ‘update’ flow for a lazy user still ignores all winget content, and many applications ignore all that and push their own self-updater, which is maddening.
The biggest concern, like this thread has, is that WSL sets the tone for “ok, you have enough Linux to do what you need from the comfort of the ‘obviously’ better Microsoft ecosystem” and causes people to not consider actually trying it for real.
well about networking: windows proxy settings just work transparently, while on linux it’s just a config option that applications may or may not respect (vpn still works perfectly, but not proxy)
True, though I’m mostly invested in the kernel networking behaviors, rather than having a nicely standardized place for proxy settings so that applications have a logical place to go.
It’s a fair criticism that in userspace, proxy settings have been not standardized and also TLS certificates are similarly a bit messy.
Just in case a Windows user sees this, install WingetUI and your update flow will be fixed.
Of course the problem is that wingetui isn’t there by default, isn’t integrated to Windows Update, no matter what, WinGetUI basically becomes yet another tray icon, alongside a half dozen other auto-updater tray icons that various vendors added since there’s no integrated facility to rely upon.
So sure, it’s a bandaid on winget, but it’s still awkward and the ecosystem is a mess. Compared to Linux where a distribution will have, in the box, an extensible central update facility maybe serving two different types of repositories (e.g. apt and snap, or dnf and flatpak).
I’m by no means a purest but I’ve found WSL… More annoying than using Linux as is. Network oddities, random programs not functioning and just generally subpar as is.
Windows 10+ is a great development machine
If doing Windows development, I agree. WSL is a nice “I would like to have a Linux-like environment without losing Windows or running a full-blown VM” measure. This idea has existed for a long time with things like Cygwin, but at the end of the day, a natively-ran Linux distro will be considerably better for many development stacks than WSL.
Yea anyone who says wsl is good is a windows user and shouldn’t try to administer Linux systems.
If you are going to use Linux on windows just use virtualbox
