What Are The Biggest Problems With Linux?

[finalzone]

In reference of this post.

Thanks for the info. Maybe Ubuntu will do something similar, but I think it will be better if they make more user friendly bug reporting tool, so issues will not be hidden like in Windows, but fixed.

No need to look further. Fedora, one of largest Linux distributions, since its 11th release does have a similar Windows 7 method called ABRT (Automatic Bug Reporting Tool). Documentation is available in plain sight. I am amazed Canonical did not adopt that feature for their Ubuntu releases.

[plonoma]

the stable API has high costs. that is library bloat. for one thing, only a monumental idiot would run an app that is not actively maintained. and besides, you can't count on backwards compatibility. quickbooks written in 2004 did not work for vista that came out in 2006. i think the osx's minimal approach to backwards compatibility is the best balance between "running 3.1 apps on windows 8" and constant breakage.

Bloat is not a problem. Having a few hundred megabytes of libraries on a large HDD or SSD is really not so bad if it means you can run old and new programs.

[finalzone]

The two overall biggest issues with linux IMO:

1. Drivers. Yes, its gotten far better than it used to be, but hardware support under linux is still far from the ideal.

Key reasons, hardware manufacturers themselves unwilling to provide documentation to write drivers. Some of them like Nvidia provides binary drivers. Try to run any bone stock Windows series including 7 and 8 system without using third parties drivers and come back comparing the hardware support. You will realize Linux kernel outclasses those from either Windows or OS X in term of support. The latter heavily relies on third-parties or heavily optimized on their specific chosen hardware.

2. Fragmentation. Choice is one of the biggest strengths of linux, but also ends up being one of the biggest weaknesses. There seem to be too many pointless forks and/or duplication of work. (for a good example look at the video editor situation. New ones popping up constantly, no great ones).

I saw "fragmentation" as a strength because of different needs from users themselves. Learn to proceed by elimination. At the end, three main distributions are left: Fedora/RHEL/SUSE/Mageia, Debian/Ubuntu/Mint and others. Other distributions are just the subset of these listed main one which likely help enhancing a better experience.

[Alliancemd]

Bloat is not a problem. Having a few hundred megabytes of libraries on a large HDD or SSD is really not so bad if it means you can run old and new programs.

Absolutely and totally agree! And I also don't see the problem of having more Development Frameworks(GTK, Qt), the specific components are loaded from HDD when needed and released when the application is closed anyway.
I've read all the comments and a lot of people don't have any idea of how the market works, and that you should not block developers to use their favorite development platform to make for you great applications. "We should not use anything, we should be primitive and have only 1 standard" that's not possible, that's called evolution when a new option appears, you can't make 1 standard that will solve all the problems at once. Hardware evolves and the ecosystem changes and the initial standards(and not only) are by design not compatible with the new things.

[Alliancemd]

While it relies upon noble principles (have more people discover GNU/Linux and make them compare it with other systems), the roots of GNU/Linux might fade away and dissolve into the mass effect because, IMHO, most people are interested in a machine that just works. They don't care about the philosophy behind. Nor do they care about choices and freedom. Nor do they care about learning their system. They don't care about their rights being limited or not being able to fully control their system. Bringing a GNU/Linux desktop to that user base is “dangerous” to me as it might result in being tainted with values that it was once against.

These people should be educated (i.e. informed and convinced about the goods of it) prior to using our favourite system.

Get over it people, what's with all this mind limitation. Every simple user should be a geek in order to use Linux and learn of the roots of it? Really? What's the point? There is no need in that stupid nonsense. If you like to learn of the roots it doesn't mean that all should do like you...
I see A Lot of "Selfish" in here(in almost all the posts I mean). "I want a user to learn all about the roots. Oh, that grandpa should not use the internet on Linux, he has first to read the assembly code if it's there!", "I want all the distributions to use old, crappy technology cause I am so nostalgic", "I want Linux to not evolve cause I love the terminal and ugly and featureless stuff", "I don't give a sh** about programmers, I want all the distributions to use GTK and 1 standard for everything even if that standard is faulty by design for the current hardware and ecosystem and needs a replacement".

[gamerk2]

And that's Windows is damn vulnerable. It's not a mystery there are security holes from a DOS era! This makes your APIs and ABIs bunch of crap.

To be fair, unlike Linux, Windows has been very hesitant to drop support for older parts of the OS and older API's. At the end of the day, Microsoft leaves implementation to the developer, rather then forcing it upon them.

You're simply dumb. What's Linux missing are just games and some software. That's all. Games are coming and there's more and more software as well. Like I said before Valve proved you wrong.

Remember the Source engine was designed with both OpenGL and Direct3d support? Makes porting a LOT easier then having to undergo a DX to OGL conversion.

Note: The majority of the market uses Direct X.

[finalzone]

To be fair, unlike Linux, Windows has been very hesitant to drop support for older parts of the OS and older API's. At the end of the day, Microsoft leaves implementation to the developer, rather then forcing it upon them..

Biggest mistake is to think Linux as a whole. Next time, talk about a distribution. Debian/RHEL, with its conservative approach, still has older API parts.

[elanthis]

Just refresh your mind that the popular Android jvm runs on top of Linux

Linux the kernel, yes. That has absolutely nothing to do with the larger GNU/Linux family of OSes, which is what people usually mean when they say "Linux."

Android has as much in common with desktop Linux as Firefox has in common with IE (they both use a couple popular FOSS libraries like SQLite internally, but 99% of the code is completely different).

Also, Android is not a jvm. It's an OS. Dalvik is the VM component of Android.

One of the first & may be the first OS used in the Internet servers.

Bullshit. The Internet was around and very successful long before Linus even started college. Probably safe to say it was around before your parents were even in high school, given how young I'd guess you to be.

[gamerk2]

Biggest mistake is to think Linux as a whole. Next time, talk about a distribution. Debian/RHEL, with its conservative approach, still has older API parts.

When the Kernel is re-worked to drop support for old(er) GPU's because its "difficult" or "expensive" to support 3 year old hardware, thats the kernel, not the distribution.

My advice: Work on creating an infrastructure that makes it trivial to support future hardware features in the future.

[birdie]

As a developer:
I miss stable api's.
Good drivers
A lot of distribution specifics that form problems.
Lack of software delivery especially considering file formats and file system.
Concerning the file system < seriously people, learn to organize things better! (Gobolinux)

Here, a real developer which pretty much proves the second post of this thread. But people will argue that that list is BS, plain and simple.