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What non-FOSS software are you using that you wish you could replace? (beehaw.org)

submitted 1 year ago by John_Coomsumer@beehaw.org to c/foss@beehaw.org

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For me its honestly a ton of my work software (digital forensics), shit is too niche to be replaced by good FOSS options. Cellebrite, Magnet Axiom, etc. Autopsy is great and free and has a linux version but it simply cannot get the same level of data without a pretty nutty level of custom code.

And the biggest side effect of this is FUCKING WINDOWS. God I would replace this nightmare OS in a heartbeat if the aforementioned work software would make linux compatible versions. We have legitimately wasted 10k hours dealing with windows bullshit that would not be a problem in linux. Though im sure linux would take a different 10k for its own problems.

What about you guys? Doesn't have to be work related, thats just the thorn in my side right now.

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[–] d3Xt3r@beehaw.org 10 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

I'm curious what "basic settings" require you to touch the command line. My elderly mum and dad - who aren't very tech savvy btw - have been running Linux for nearly a decade now (Xubuntu previously, now Zorin) and haven't had any major issues in all this time. Admittedly their requirements are pretty basic, but they do all your tasks a typical basic PC user would - surf the web, check emails, work on documents, print and scan stuff, backup files from their phones/USB drives, video chat etc. In fact, the entire reason why I got them onto Linux in the first place was because Windows wasn't really stable for them - I got tired of having to troubleshoot or reinstall Windows for them all the time. They'd complain about how an update broke something, or how the system was becoming slower etc. But no such issues with Linux. Occasionally I might get a call asking "how do I do this", but after a few years, these support calls have all but vanished. Linux "just works" for them, it's rock solid, the GUI is intuitive (at least for Xububtu/Zorin) and they never had to touch the command line.

[–] MJBrune@beehaw.org 6 points 1 year ago

The best example that comes to mind is mouse acceleration. Fedora has a setting in the GUI for it but it didn't work. So I literally had to set it in my bashrc to get it to work.

Another issue I saw was os theme being multiple settings depending on gtk or qt apps.

Another issue is video card driver. I've had Ubuntu auto update and brick my install, dropping me down to grub because grub was set to use my Nvidia proprietary drivers but the kernel module wasn't installed despite me setting it in the GUI to use the Nvidia drivers.

Multiple issues with peripherals and having to install a random GitHub Python script for watcom drivers or Xbox controllers.

Oh, also vpn settings on the os level didn't work on debian recently. I had to configure it via command line.

[–] monotrox@discuss.tchncs.de 4 points 1 year ago

In my experience most problems with linux are at the intermediate level, i.e. things like setting up university/work vpn, installing games (with wine), getting used to different applications for office stuff. This is all stuff that many people have to do that can be hard to achieve if you only have guides for windows/mac