Take for example linux mint, you go to the site choose a version (mate, xfce or cinammon) and download a iso then have to either create a usb to boot or get a tool like ventoy to then boot from
Thats a lot of work if you know nothing.
One answer would be a usb ready to just use, put it in and go. For a long time magazines came with a free CD or DVD ready to use. That was my first start with ubuntu 9 on a magazine. Still have the disk and used it a few months back on a old laptop just to get it going.
Its fine for us experts on the site to do these things but not a new users
Go onto Amazon and you can order windows disks ready to use, just put them in and install windows 11, except not many laptops come with players now.
Or another solution would be a site with a net boot ready to go like is available for apple.
You have to soon feed new users to make them changé.
Ok I would loose out on new clients but that is no longer a worry for me.
I believe the problem is even bigger then knowing how to create an USB boot drive.
Typical Window user;
Does not backup the OS.
Does not backup their data.
Does not know how to partition a disk.
Has never use the command line.
His PC is working fine and does what he wants to perform.
Now image this user plugging in a USB stick and over writing his OS and data. He has no way to restore Windows if something goes wrong and he has lost his personal data.
Would you be willing to perform this task on your PC not knowing how to recover?
I have known about Linux since about 2002 and what has keept me from it until this February was first of all i heard it was very difficult to play games on Linux and the second was the Terminal and at that time i had never used the terminal , now this february a friend recommended Linux Mint and i tried it and loved it but the terminal still scared me but as time went on i use it from time to time and im not scared of it any more .yes i can get insecure on what to do and then i found this lovely friendly forum and i have learned much here thanks to you all .
You can download an .iso file , and boot it using grub, without writing it to a usb drive … but … the process is tangled and differs for each distro.
Perhaps we need to work on this approach… maybe it could be made practical with some work … maybe you could put a wrapper around a .iso file and make it look like a CD drive … it would have to work in Win to help people convert, but it would be useful in Linux too.
My Linux Magazine still has DVD’s
Why cant magazines have a USB drive? Sure it is bulky … develop a thin one.
Why cant a Linux USB drive come free in your breakfast cerial packet?
When I last checked, you could still buy a Linux USB drive online.
Yeah - I just had a look online - lotsa choices to buy a thumb drive with Linux on it…
There’s desktop mode on Samsung devices “DeX”… You could probably run it on your Samsung tablet Neville - plug a USB C to HDMI adaptor in (or you can get a dongle that also doubles as a USB hub and ethernet and power) and hook up to a monitor… Bluetooth Keybard and Mouse - you’ve got Desktop mode on Android…
And I believe there’s a similar feature on later versions of Android…
Google now have a laptop form factor running Android (not Chrome OS)… Saw some screenshots of the interface the other day - it looks like Samsung DeX…
I once bought a shrinkwrapped box of Red Hat Linux 6 (not RHEL) around 1999 - at a department store (Myers) - because it was easier than downloading over dial up… i.e. it came on CD-ROM… Most PCs back then didn’t support boot from USB (heck some PCs from the mid to late 1990’s didn’t even support boot from CD - you had to boot from floppy to get CD-Rom support - and many Windows CDs weren’t bootable then either - like Win95, and NT 4).
I still have some Red Hat stickers from that boxed Red Hat… However - my employer at the time was interested in it - so I got re-imbursed and they kept everything else…
Here in Sweden there is no magazine just about Linux . There is a pc magazine but its only about windows which is a shame. there is however some swedish web sites about Linux but most of them are about Ubuntu and hardly ever updated.
At one stage the trend was is on one drive then data on another. Ok not physical drives just logical. If that had continued then installing on the c drive would have worked
Not sure how many users I saw who actually did this. Normally they just save the file and have no idea where. Made worse with one drive or Google drive trying to explain or even find the file can be impossible for many users
So , in addition to not understanding partitions, they do not understand filesystems.. … Msoft is a promoter of ignorance… At least you cant accuse Linux of that.
Perhaps the end-user does not want to know such details?
I know, it’s frustrating, but “normal” people view a computer as a tool to get stuff done; they don’t care about its inner workings.
A lot of people don’t know how to maintain leather things which get exposed to the elements, such as jackets and satchels. You need to greace them once a year or something like that.
Stuff which is made from felt you ought never put into the washer with soap, lest it felt – and shrink – more.
True, but how can one expect to live in a technological society without embracing all aspects of its technology.
There was a time when anyone who wanted to travel had to learn how to harness a horse to a cart. … Today anyone who wants to use digital technology has to learn how to manage a computer.
If you wanted to outsource your horse and cart technology, you needed to employ a groom. Today people outsource their digital technology to Msoft or Apple. DIY is not popular.
My wife is guilty as charged. Her problem she has a linux laptop she never uses, prefers phone, tablet and windows computer. They are all full, as is her one drive and google box which she has 2 addressed.
Mainly she stores too much and cannot remember where she started to retrace her steps.
No i cannot help her !
Bit like driving you should never try.
Her linux box has the biggest hard drive, she could store everything on that … Just keep suggesting the solution but not strongly
Windows laptop drove my wife nuts. She is an artist, very creative. Only understands things she can see. Kids gave her a macbook many years ago. She does fine with an occasional “need a little assistance”. I run Debian, with an occasional boot to LMDE. My DNS server is a pihole. My backup is to Pi with Open Media Vault, briefly booted, encrypted.
I run Windows in VM’s to support a client 50 miles away (mostly surveillance cameras and Blue Iris now), some scripts (Python now, the shame of it all!) for security. Some DR planning. I will probably retire from it all this year. I am 92, wife is 90. I wrote my first “program” in 1964.
The year of Linux on the desktop is a pipe dream. The average home user has the technical expertise of a house plant. Get over it
Oh, yeah: COVID sucks, voice of recent experience.
We live in a society absolutely dependent on science and technology and yet
have cleverly arranged things so that almost no one understands science and
technology. That's a clear prescription for disaster.
Carl Sagan
https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/carl_sagan_1274392?utm_source=share&utm_medium=select
I remember the quote as
We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology,
in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology.
Carl Sagan
https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/carl_sagan_130525?utm_source=share&utm_medium=select
I suppose one or both quotes came from him. And that was back in 1995.
In the Ancient and Medieval Worlds knowledge was the property of a select few.
The Modern World is supposed to have made knowledge available to everyone,
but,
there has also been an enormous expansion of information, so that it is not possible for one person to know everything. We have to be selective.
What we do have, thanks to computers, is a much better facility for finding info when we need it.
So why dont people want to learn about computers ? It is may not be because they can not access the information … it is a selective choice … they learn about other things or nothing.
In learning Linux , people seem to set limits ? Most learn enough to get what they want done, some like to experiment further. Linux is a deep topic… it is probably beyond one person to learn everything about Linux … that is why AI beats us in debugging … it is a better learner. There is no substitute for knowing all the facts in debugging.
So how are we going to cope in a future where we will be continually outperformed by AI?
I hope that is untrue.
I have encountered people with in-depth knowledge of one area of science, but no computer skills. Biologists and medical professionals come to mind.
“Most people would sooner die than think; in fact, they do so.”
― Bertrand Russell
IMHO, you, as the users, should be raising your voice rather than waiting for a “year of Linux”. Because it’s a decision you need to make. Otherwise obviously vendors are pretty much reluctant. This was what Richard Stallman started about 45 years ago.
