I'm always amazed by the misconceptions out there about the Linux desktop, Maybe the last time you used it was like 3 years ago ?

> Like connecting peripherals, printers

SANE for printers and scanners support hundreds of peripherals out of the box. No specific driver installation required. Most USB devices are recognized and supported in the kernel.

> Dual video card support

That I can agree with you, but it's not related to the "desktop" per se, it's for a tiny amount of people who have this kind of configuration that it's an issue. There are workarounds like Bumblebee, and with Wayland the situation is supposed to improve.

> Kernel support for new Intel CPU's

Intel is releasing patches all the time. That's not the Linux's project fault if Intel is not working at the same pace on all platforms.

> Support for HD monitors / screens

The situation has vastly improved with GNOME, Mate, Cinnamon and KDE for HDPI support. The issue remaining are mostly applications that have not been rewritten to take advantage of modern GUI frameworks yet. Note that on Windows the situation is far from perfect either.

> There is a reason Linux isn't gaining any market-share on desktop..

It has actually beeing gaining steadily about 0.5% market share in the past 6 months according to different metrics of net usage. And it's gaining that kind of share DESPITE having no company doing marketing for it, and very few hardware sold with Linux in the first place (99.9% PCs come with Windows by default).

When you are not in a situation where the choice is left to the user, OF COURSE you will get this kind of share.

I don't get the anger against Linux on the desktop.

It may work, it may not. Let's even say that Linux works on the level it did in the 90s (when compiling your own kernel was a regular thing).

It's not Linux's fault it has terrible driver support. In reality, the same issues back then cause the same issues now.

Lack of standards plus NDAs mean that sometimes Linus just can't figure out how your screen works. It's like screaming that CM doesn't support Samsung S6. It's Samsung you should be angry at, not CM.

It surely does not help that whether something works or not depends on the distribution.

Pointing out drawbacks of a platform is different than blaming the authors of the software.

Using the trackpad on my Mac with Linux installed will probably always be worse than with macOS. Obviously that's not the fault of Linux. Still a drawback.

Still does not qualify in any measure as "awful".

> I'm always amazed by the misconceptions out there about the Linux desktop, Maybe the last time you used it was like 3 years ago ?

I'm using it right now (and have been for years), rather I was going to ask you the same thing..

> SANE for printers and scanners support hundreds of peripherals out of the box. No specific driver installation required. Most USB devices are recognized and supported in the kernel.

Really, what front-end are you using? 50% of the time or more I've had to wiki [0] / run terminal commands to get a printer to work and if that floats your boat that's fine. As for Android it's a complete crap-shot e.g. the Archlinux wiki lists as many as 5 different MTP packages[1] one of which will hopefully work?

> That I can agree with you, but it's not related to the "desktop" per se, it's for a tiny amount of people who have this kind of configuration that it's an issue. There are workarounds like Bumblebee, and with Wayland the situation is supposed to improve.

It's not a tiny-amount of people -- it's anyone that wants to play games on a laptop.. Have you tried Bumblebee? I only got very marginal ~10 FPS improvement running a game with Bumblebee (Nvidia+Intel) vs. only dedicated Intel (after hours of configuration) -- basically useless: don't play modern games on Linux.

> Intel is releasing patches all the time. That's not the Linux's project fault if Intel is not working at the same pace on all platforms.

I don't see how it matters whose fault it is - it doesn't change the fact that if you buy a new laptop/desktop with a CPU less than one year old -- you are going to be in for a world of hurt if you chose Linux.

> The situation has vastly improved with GNOME, Mate, Cinnamon and KDE for HDPI support. The issue remaining are mostly applications that have not been rewritten to take advantage of modern GUI frameworks yet. Note that on Windows the situation is far from perfect either.

I've tried HiDPI with GNOME Shell -- maybe it works for all the built-ins but breaks lots of other programs you might install, again I'm not saying you can't fix it, I'm saying that passing command-line arguments to grub or editing XML files isn't something most users are into.

> When you are not in a situation where the choice is left to the user, OF COURSE you will get this kind of share.

This kind of delusional thinking amazes me. You want users to spend hours monkeying around on command-line/googling getting their system to work -- and than you still think the reason it doesn't have market-share is because users don't have a choice? Don't believe me? I encourage you to give a Linux laptop to some non-programmer friends and ask them about it.

[0] https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/CUPS

[1] https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/MTP#Functionality

> You want users to spend hours monkeying around on command-line/googling getting their system to work

Funny, you seem to live in a world where Windows users never have technical issues. Look at support forums for Windows, you are in for a good time.

Oh, and for reference, I have installed Linux distros for several of my family members who are non-programmers and complete noobs with computers, and they never complain and actually tell me it runs much better than before (ie. with Windows). You have to wonder which opinion if the most reliable.

You paid for your printer with money, so contact your vendor and solve your driver problem with them. When you will finish, compare their support with community support, provided by community for free.

>1. linux portability. yes, most likely you cant just write one app and it works on 'linux'. without additional work it will only work on your specific distro. Probably even just your specific distro with a specific version number. 2. linux installers in general. i get it, we all like just typing in a quick command and installing a whole suite of programs. thats nice. but for general installations, in 99% of the cases it would be helpful to offer some easy gui click-through installer just like we get on windows. 3. easy to break it: no, i dont see it as my personal user error if i install some random nvidia driver from some random ppa and it breaks my boot desktop and i only get a black screen. i dont care how i broke it, that simply should not be possible ever.

1. & 2. We're not in the 90s. Nowadays, I go to chrome or JetBrains and download one of _four_ files: a 32bit deb, a 32bin rpm, a 64bit deb, and a 64 bit rpm, and use a graphics installer.

3. You download an EXE and it breaks your computer? Naah, can't happen on Windows /s .

I think people should be reminded that downloading things from some PPA is _exactly_ like downloading random_cat_video.exe

Since when does "Linux is no worse than Windows with the random_cat_video.exe problem" count as a valid argument?

Linux is constantly touted as superior to Windows and macOS. So it should do better. Either that, or it should stop being advertised as better.

Pick one.

And it's always the "evil OEMs" and "the stupid users" fault that its desktop adoption is still not there.

I know there are a lot of closed hardware components and you can't do much most of the time. I get that and that's a fair counter-argument.

That however means the fan community should stop pretending Linux is superior on the desktop and that it "just hasn't been discovered yet". This is simply not true.