People use the command line because it’s so much faster and more convenient. But there’s often a gui tool. I use Yast from time to time. It has its uses too. It’s slower though (if you know the syntax).
Is this a joke? The main way most Linux users install software is still via the command line.
I reject the premise that the command line is not user friendly.
With either a GUI or a command line, the first step is going to be “Search the internet for the instructions.”
The second step for the command line option is “ctrl-c, ctrl-v”. The task is now complete.
The GUI option is only superior if it allows the user to skip the “Search for it” step. If it does not, now you are manually searching some arcane hierarchy for the specific location the developer decided to place that option.
There are two concepts in UI design that often pull in opposite directions. They are usability (the ability to do advanced stuff easily) and discoverability (the ability to find unfamiliar functions in the interface without resorting to the manual/the Internet).
Command lines are highly usable, but they’re not very discoverable. Most people have been trained to want the reverse—discoverable, but often not very usable—and so the command line scares them. It’s less a logical reaction than an emotional one, although not wanting to waste time on something they feel they shouldn’t have to deal with does figure in.
Thing is, Windows’ “everything is in the GUI” is an illusion. If you have to fix ailing Windows machines, or even just make one produce anything other than the default telemetry-infested user experience, sooner or later you’re going to end up mucking around on the command line or in arcane undiscoverable interfaces that are an order of magnitude worse than anything Linux has ever produced. Give me a command line over regedit any day. But most people outsource the repairs to their ailing Windows machines so that they don’t have to touch this stuff themselves. For Average Joe, finding someone who will fix his ailing Linux box for him is more difficult, because they don’t set up counters in the big-box stores that most people buy their computers from.
The whole point of the GUI is to be more intuitive. If you need to go to the internet to realize how to do the basic stuff, that means your GUI “failed” in its purpose.
That’s still unavoidable for very complex UIs though, but still you measure how good a UI is at helping people accomplish their tasks.
Agreed. And I certainly use a GUI more than a command line.
My point is only that the command line should not be considered “unfriendly” to the user.
I don’t think “intuitive” is the proper metric for determining user friendliness. I think “ease of accomplishing a given task” is much more important. There are many tasks for which the command line is faster and simpler than using a GUI. Windows tends to hide these simpler, faster methods from the user. By regularly exposing the user to the CLI, Linux pushes the user to learn them.
Every button click is a dialog with the computer. It presents you with options and context, and waits for you to make a decision. Using a GUI, even simple tasks are going to take several dialogs to accomplish.
Most of the time, though, the user knows the exact task that needs to be accomplished, and is just appeasing the computer by going through each dialog to get to the point.
In these cases, the command line can enable the user to skip all that uneccessary dialog and go straight to execution of the intended task. I would say that this is not “unfriendly”.
Of course, I normally use a GUI on Linux to control WiFi, so that’s not a particularly good example.
I regularly use shell scripts. I do know how to use the GUI to change file permissions to make them executable. But why would I open a file manager, browse to the file location, right click, select properties, select permissions, and save, instead of just firing off “chmod a+x *.sh”?
The last shell script I made for work automatically concatenated a bunch of PDF documents, applied a watermark, and printed two copies, all using command line utilities. A simple task that would take several minutes for the user to perform with GUI tools.
This was a simple task that was regularly performed by several users. The command line gave the user a simple, consistent method to automate this task. To my way of thinking, that makes the command line more user-friendly: it does not limit the user to the pre-configured operations allowed by the GUI.
Most things I do in command line I am not aware of or would want to do in a GUI on windows tbh. Recursive search for any files that contain a specific string? How do you do that on windows without.
Most people just want Facebook and pornhub, Linux has everything you need.
(Ok it’s kind of a shitty search feature but that’s besides the point.)
Most people just want Facebook and pornhub, Linux has everything you need.
Sure, but don’t confuse covering 90% of what people do with covering 90% of people. It’s like electric car range or browser website compatibility. It might have enough range for 99% of my journeys of work on 99% of websites but that final 1% matters! You can’t just ignore it.
If you did you’d sound like a bit of a tit seeing as roads are just about everywhere in the world. The number of places accessible by train and not road is a rounding error on a rounding error.
Most things are point & click & no one uses CLI in windows, it’s objectively inferior to linux
Also “start & stop a service” ? Does that sound like something an average user deals with in windows ?
Linux does need a control panel, I can admit that but let’s not pretend that Linux’s CLI is tough to learn.
& the CLI is the most effective way of doing things in a pinch, when push comes to shove.
If someone like Pewdiepie (he’s no tech-savvy guy) can use linux, thrn linux has gotten user-friendly enough, although linux can do better & more needs to be done
Ease of installation😅
now you’re straight up lying, linux is by far easier to install with a liveUSB
as for hardware, that’s upto the manufacturers to open up their systems
Thanks for revealing your hatred for linux (I cannot wait for you to call me a linux-cultist, eventhough I admitted that linux can do better)
The bad cli thing is a 2000s view not a 2020s view. PowerShell is better than bash and windows terminal does everything I need both for local PowerShell stuff and remote bash stuff.
However I just got to the point where I learned you’re gullible enough to believe in anything pootie shoe says and so time to stop interacting :'(
There’s a reason why POSIX is still enduring to this day. Microsoft’s penchant for writing short novels for a basic command is not what I would call “better”. And that’s ignoring the fact that PowerShell doesn’t have a fraction of *nix shell capabilities and utilities.
Well, ya. Its terminal interface, I’d expect it to have “basic” capabilities.
also can run standard dotnet libraries.
That’s not exactly a selling point.
What can bash do that PowerShell can’t?
Write succinct and easy to read commands. Interop with all the powerful tools in the Linux ecosystem (which is the point of a shell like bash).
posix lost except insofar as it lives on in the two mainstream highly proprietary OSs.
That’s just simply not true. Three majority of core utils you find on most Linux systems are POSIX compliant or mostly compliant. IIRC all the GNU tools are POSIX.
Who cares about Pewdiepie, the point is how much more “user-friendly” do you want, the excuses never end.
If a stupid guy like pootiepie can handle linuxmint, then people are out of excuses
Plus it’s actually the apps that we’ll need to focus on (& games)
Is this a joke? The main way most Linux users install software is still via the command line.
On Windows the command line is an exceptional thing you sometimes have to use for troubleshooting. On Linux it’s the default way everything is done.
For example how do you stop a service on Linux? The top answer just assumes command line.
If I search for how to do it with a GUI I get a 5 year old post explaining that all the GUI attempts are dead.
Now if I search for Windows, I get these instructions (from the AI but they sound like I remember it):
And the top SO question is someone asking specifically how to do it with the command line because the GUI way is so easy and obvious.
That’s just one random example. Not even getting to hardware support, ease of installation, etc.
People use the command line because it’s so much faster and more convenient. But there’s often a gui tool. I use Yast from time to time. It has its uses too. It’s slower though (if you know the syntax).
I reject the premise that the command line is not user friendly.
With either a GUI or a command line, the first step is going to be “Search the internet for the instructions.”
The second step for the command line option is “ctrl-c, ctrl-v”. The task is now complete.
The GUI option is only superior if it allows the user to skip the “Search for it” step. If it does not, now you are manually searching some arcane hierarchy for the specific location the developer decided to place that option.
There are two concepts in UI design that often pull in opposite directions. They are usability (the ability to do advanced stuff easily) and discoverability (the ability to find unfamiliar functions in the interface without resorting to the manual/the Internet).
Command lines are highly usable, but they’re not very discoverable. Most people have been trained to want the reverse—discoverable, but often not very usable—and so the command line scares them. It’s less a logical reaction than an emotional one, although not wanting to waste time on something they feel they shouldn’t have to deal with does figure in.
Thing is, Windows’ “everything is in the GUI” is an illusion. If you have to fix ailing Windows machines, or even just make one produce anything other than the default telemetry-infested user experience, sooner or later you’re going to end up mucking around on the command line or in arcane undiscoverable interfaces that are an order of magnitude worse than anything Linux has ever produced. Give me a command line over
regeditany day. But most people outsource the repairs to their ailing Windows machines so that they don’t have to touch this stuff themselves. For Average Joe, finding someone who will fix his ailing Linux box for him is more difficult, because they don’t set up counters in the big-box stores that most people buy their computers from.The whole point of the GUI is to be more intuitive. If you need to go to the internet to realize how to do the basic stuff, that means your GUI “failed” in its purpose.
That’s still unavoidable for very complex UIs though, but still you measure how good a UI is at helping people accomplish their tasks.
Agreed. And I certainly use a GUI more than a command line.
My point is only that the command line should not be considered “unfriendly” to the user.
I don’t think “intuitive” is the proper metric for determining user friendliness. I think “ease of accomplishing a given task” is much more important. There are many tasks for which the command line is faster and simpler than using a GUI. Windows tends to hide these simpler, faster methods from the user. By regularly exposing the user to the CLI, Linux pushes the user to learn them.
Every button click is a dialog with the computer. It presents you with options and context, and waits for you to make a decision. Using a GUI, even simple tasks are going to take several dialogs to accomplish.
Most of the time, though, the user knows the exact task that needs to be accomplished, and is just appeasing the computer by going through each dialog to get to the point.
In these cases, the command line can enable the user to skip all that uneccessary dialog and go straight to execution of the intended task. I would say that this is not “unfriendly”.
Well yeah, and it usually does so it is usually superior. Did you have to Google how to connect to a WiFi network with a GUI? Of course not.
True.
Of course, I normally use a GUI on Linux to control WiFi, so that’s not a particularly good example.
I regularly use shell scripts. I do know how to use the GUI to change file permissions to make them executable. But why would I open a file manager, browse to the file location, right click, select properties, select permissions, and save, instead of just firing off “chmod a+x *.sh”?
The last shell script I made for work automatically concatenated a bunch of PDF documents, applied a watermark, and printed two copies, all using command line utilities. A simple task that would take several minutes for the user to perform with GUI tools.
This was a simple task that was regularly performed by several users. The command line gave the user a simple, consistent method to automate this task. To my way of thinking, that makes the command line more user-friendly: it does not limit the user to the pre-configured operations allowed by the GUI.
Most things I do in command line I am not aware of or would want to do in a GUI on windows tbh. Recursive search for any files that contain a specific string? How do you do that on windows without.
Most people just want Facebook and pornhub, Linux has everything you need.
Open explorer. Type string in the search box.
(Ok it’s kind of a shitty search feature but that’s besides the point.)
Sure, but don’t confuse covering 90% of what people do with covering 90% of people. It’s like electric car range or browser website compatibility. It might have enough range for 99% of my journeys of work on 99% of websites but that final 1% matters! You can’t just ignore it.
My bike is fine for 99% of trips. For the other 1% I can get a train
As long as you’re going somewhere that has trains…
I mean you could say the same thing for ICE/EVs, neither are taking you somewhere that doesn’t have roads.
If you did you’d sound like a bit of a tit seeing as roads are just about everywhere in the world. The number of places accessible by train and not road is a rounding error on a rounding error.
More a combination of train/bike. Almost everywhere I cycle to can’t be driven to.
Most things are point & click & no one uses CLI in windows, it’s objectively inferior to linux
Also “start & stop a service” ? Does that sound like something an average user deals with in windows ?
Linux does need a control panel, I can admit that but let’s not pretend that Linux’s CLI is tough to learn. & the CLI is the most effective way of doing things in a pinch, when push comes to shove.
If someone like Pewdiepie (he’s no tech-savvy guy) can use linux, thrn linux has gotten user-friendly enough, although linux can do better & more needs to be done
Thanks for revealing your hatred for linux (I cannot wait for you to call me a linux-cultist, eventhough I admitted that linux can do better)
The bad cli thing is a 2000s view not a 2020s view. PowerShell is better than bash and windows terminal does everything I need both for local PowerShell stuff and remote bash stuff.
However I just got to the point where I learned you’re gullible enough to believe in anything pootie shoe says and so time to stop interacting :'(
It factually and objectively is not
There’s a reason why POSIX is still enduring to this day. Microsoft’s penchant for writing short novels for a basic command is not what I would call “better”. And that’s ignoring the fact that PowerShell doesn’t have a fraction of *nix shell capabilities and utilities.
Why is it factually and objectively not?
It has standard bash capabilities and also can run standard dotnet libraries. What can bash do that PowerShell can’t?
I’m skipping by the POSIX part because well…posix lost except insofar as it lives on in the two mainstream highly proprietary OSs.
Well, ya. Its terminal interface, I’d expect it to have “basic” capabilities.
That’s not exactly a selling point.
Write succinct and easy to read commands. Interop with all the powerful tools in the Linux ecosystem (which is the point of a shell like bash).
That’s just simply not true. Three majority of core utils you find on most Linux systems are POSIX compliant or mostly compliant. IIRC all the GNU tools are POSIX.
So your factual and objective point is, let me make sure I captured this right, is:
Cool
Who cares about Pewdiepie, the point is how much more “user-friendly” do you want, the excuses never end. If a stupid guy like pootiepie can handle linuxmint, then people are out of excuses
Plus it’s actually the apps that we’ll need to focus on (& games)
??
Clearly you do. You brought him up. And brought him up again.
As a point of argument, I could’ve brought up Luke from LTT as well. You’re something else😅