[HN Gopher] Cosmic DE update: System76's new Linux desktop envir...
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Cosmic DE update: System76's new Linux desktop environment
Author : Santosh83
Score : 170 points
Date : 2023-01-31 18:10 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (blog.system76.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (blog.system76.com)
| jagged-chisel wrote:
| Are these four-finger gestures customizable? Is there perchance a
| profile for the incoming macOS user to match what they expect?
|
| Edit: I suppose the assumption, based on the paragraph and
| screenshot, is that they update depending on the arrangement of
| workspaces: horizontal vs vertical
| askvictor wrote:
| I just want 2-finger gestures to be configurable (or at least
| the same as on Windows as I use both). For some reason it has
| been almost impossible to get a two-finger left/right swipe to
| act as forward/back actions (the only browser it works for is
| Epiphany, which doesn't support plugins until the most recent
| version)
| jagged-chisel wrote:
| Oof. You are indeed welcome to your own customizations, but
| having the scroll gesture suddenly become a navigation
| gesture because I dared bump into the end of a scroll area is
| absolutely infuriating. Customization ftmfw.
| Kukumber wrote:
| I don't know if that's the image compression, but the font looks
| very blurry.. they need to fix that asap
|
| Also i'm not a fan of the color scheme, they'll need to make
| things a little bit more vibrant
|
| Looks like it's still the Gnome Shell, not a fan at all
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| > they need to fix that asap
|
| Why does this urgently need to be fixed?
| mardifoufs wrote:
| Good text rendering is pretty essential imo, not only for
| usability but also because it can make software look dated
| and... cheap, I guess. Sure, looks don't really matter, but
| for text they really do.
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| Huh, I usually associate poor text rendering with modern
| software.
| LinAGKar wrote:
| It's the compression. There are some pretty heavy JPEG
| artifacts in the screenshots.
| resuresu wrote:
| Just what Linux needs, more fragmentation.
| krolden wrote:
| Ummm, a vibrant ecosystem of desktop environments/window
| managers is one of the best things about Linux.
| BizarreByte wrote:
| Except for the fact virtually all have serious usability
| issues, bugs, and general problems.
|
| The community spreads its efforts thin into a thousand
| projects rather than making one amazing one.
| pmontra wrote:
| Windows and Mac also have usability issues and they are
| driven by two companies that don't allow break ups of their
| DEs.
|
| I don't think that a FOSS community will ever converge on
| an amazing DE without part of it breaking apart and
| starting a new one, for the sake of building something even
| more amazing or failing on the way.
| ssnistfajen wrote:
| The back-end stuff doesn't really change, so more DE options is
| not going to be the end of the world.
| Finnucane wrote:
| Is there a right amount of fragmentation? Or is monolithic
| control like Windows and MacOS better? Part of the promise of
| open source software is that it can be adapted and extended.
| Part of the promise of Linux is that the kernel and the DE are
| not completely dependent on each other. So it can hardly be
| surprising when people take these promises at face value and
| make things with them.
| Darmody wrote:
| I don't actually see the fragmentation here.
|
| You can move from Gnome Shell to this without having to change
| the software you use.
| runjake wrote:
| I think they are referring to the human resources part of the
| fragmentation issue: capable people working on yet another
| desktop environment.
|
| The, perhaps unrealistic and naive, thinking behind this is
| that if these capable people combined their efforts into one
| desktop environment, we'd have one great Linux desktop
| environment, instead of several okay desktop environments.
| Darmody wrote:
| Well, they are not starting everything from the scratch.
| And as you say, you can't have people with different ideas
| working on the same project.
|
| Cosmic exists because Gnome devs have their own roadmap
| that many people dislike.
| kaba0 wrote:
| That assumes they would even in theory work together, or
| would have a design choice they can all agree on.
| runjake wrote:
| Yep, thus "unrealistic and naive."
| Longhanks wrote:
| With friends likr Gnome, you don't need enemies anymore. If
| gnome were to collaborate with others, there would much less
| necessity for forks (such as in the GTK2 days). But instead,
| the close any feature request minimally differing their
| pristine idea of what a desktop should look like, shut down any
| other discussion about the topic, and god forbid if you mention
| you want customization like themes or, gasp, tray icons.
|
| Sure, this may come off polemic, but I very much think that
| gnome is largely to blame for the fragmentation of the Linux
| desktop.
| yamtaddle wrote:
| Redhat. They've made some power-plays (including with Gnome)
| and have been successful at it.
|
| Ubuntu tried to do the same more than once, but fell so hard
| on their face every time that it can be hard to tell that
| they were trying to do the same thing.
| ssnistfajen wrote:
| The only "fragmentation" GNOME directly caused was MATE being
| forked out of GNOME 2. Fragmentation is just the natural
| evolution of FOSS because there isn't a monopoly shoving
| license terms down the throat of every customer. GNOME's
| philosophy is kind of restrictive but they are not the one to
| blame for the fragmentation of the Linux desktop especially
| considering DEs and distributions are SEPARATE things and
| many distributions provide multiple DE options bundled at
| install.
| still_grokking wrote:
| You need to look further into the past.
|
| If Gnome wouldn't had poped up Linux would have a standard
| desktop named KDE likely today.
|
| So the claim that they caused fragmentation seems not
| completely off.
| wmf wrote:
| Nah, if GNOME never existed either KDE would have
| fragmented or people would have invented other DEs. You
| can't wish away diversity.
| javier2 wrote:
| I dont want themes at all. I just want a vertical dock and
| tray icons!
| johnchristopher wrote:
| Meh. No, gnome is not. XFCE was there before gnome 3 and is
| still here today. Same for all other popular desktop
| environments.
| LinAGKar wrote:
| Mate, Cinnamon and Budgie were not.
| johnchristopher wrote:
| Gnome 3 can't be responsible for Mate, Cinnamon and
| Budgie adding 3 fragments to the desktop environment
| space instead of those 3 adding 1 by merging each other.
|
| Gnome 3 brushed people the wrong way but blaming it for
| fragmentation when those 3 went away to do their 3
| different things doesn't make sense.
|
| Come on, MATE and Cinnamon ? To be consistent Cinnamon
| shouldn't exist and only MATE would make the cut if Gnome
| 3 is the problem.
|
| Numbers I can find speak for themselves though:
| https://eylenburg.github.io/de_comparison.htm
|
| There's no fragmentation, only KDE and Gnome.
| lucsky wrote:
| They call it "choice" I think /s
| pxc wrote:
| This but unironically.
|
| Use a different operating system if you want your vendor to
| tie you up and tell you what to do. Buy a pretty toaster if
| you want a slick appliance-- not a computer.
|
| I'm sick of this complaint, which boils down to this: desktop
| Linux (taken collectively) isn't very much like a _product_
| for _consumers_ by a _vendor_ who wants to suck you into
| their _ecosystem_.
|
| Guess what? That's *what's good* about the Linux desktop.
|
| If you want a no-choice monoculture whose design better
| supports a thriving hellscape of proprietary crapware, you've
| got options already. If you want to be a consumer instead of
| a participant in a community and a tradition, go buy
| something.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| Hah, is there a middle-ground that likes choice in the
| Linux world without subscribing to the delusion that
| Mac/Windows ecosystems constitute anything a reasonable
| person might describe as "a thriving hellscape of
| proprietary crapware"?
|
| I'll buy/build a Linux desktop when we get quality hardware
| and software options (where "good hardware" means more than
| "fast CPU! big memory!"), but for now Mac is a pretty good
| experience. You can't hack around the source code for
| proprietary programs (I've pretty much never wanted to do
| this on any desktop system), but you can run open source
| alternatives for everything except maybe some core
| software.
| pxc wrote:
| > Hah, is there a middle-ground that likes choice in the
| Linux world without subscribing to the delusion that
| Mac/Windows ecosystems constitute anything a reasonable
| person might describe as "a thriving hellscape of
| proprietary crapware"?
|
| I realize I come off as extreme here, but that's really
| how I feel.
|
| I think that's an obviously fair way to describe the
| Microsoft Store and the Google Play Store. (Idk about
| iOS' App Store because I don't use iOS.)
|
| I'd also make the argument that it's a good way to
| describe the setup of basically any macOS power user,
| with their inevitable collection of brittle, mostly
| proprietary, solo dev apps they use to hack basic
| functionality back into Apple's anemic OS offering.
|
| (Windows suffers from that latter problem, too, though
| it's not as egregious as macOS.)
|
| > you can run open source alternatives for everything
| except maybe some core software.
|
| The core software is pretty much what we're talking about
| here: DEs and/or bundled apps.
|
| > for now Mac is a pretty good experience
|
| I understand that many people like it and I think their
| reasons for liking it are mostly good. But for me, using
| macOS is genuinely miserable, not just a little off. And
| I think the kind of app ecosystem that Mac people really
| love, of thoughfully designed, hidden gems by very small
| teams or individual devs, distributed as proprietary
| software for a small fee... is just not that great. To an
| extent that Mac lovers rarely admit or don't understand,
| a huge proportion of those apps exist only to compensate
| for Apple's own oversights, which wouldn't matter so much
| in an open ecosystem. The rest just aren't worth the cost
| of a closed ecosystem, in my opinion.
| yamtaddle wrote:
| > I'd also make the argument that it's a good way to
| describe the setup of basically any macOS power user,
| with their inevitable collection of brittle, mostly
| proprietary, solo dev apps they use to hack basic
| functionality back into Apple's anemic OS offering.
|
| Mainly a DOS/Windows user for about five or six years,
| then Linux for about eight or nine (mostly Gentoo and,
| later, Ubuntu), macOS for my serious-business desktop
| needs since 2011.
|
| To this part of your comment: Wut.
|
| I truly have no clue what you mean by this. I think I use
| one program that might fit this description (Spectacle--
| which has several active replacements I _could_ switch
| to, and still works perfectly, not so much as a single
| glitch, bug, or bit of jank that I 've ever seen, despite
| its having been abandoned years ago)
|
| Meanwhile, "brittle and relying on tons of solo-dev apps
| to hack in basic functionality" (ok, mostly not
| _proprietary_ ones, sure) is about how I would have
| described desktop Linux. But... I suspect we have
| different definitions of "basic functionality".
|
| Power management I never have to think about or fiddle
| with is table-stakes for me these days, for instance--I
| don't got time for that shit these days, a computer that
| can't do that fairly competently without my telling it
| what to do is just _broken_ , same as a thermostat if I
| had to go poke it every single time I wanted the AC or
| heat to kick on, then watch carefully to make sure it
| actually did what I wanted, would be broken.
|
| A good default en keyboard layout (why would the default
| _not_ be a good one? It boggles the mind--and sure, that
| 's a distro concern, not a "Linux" concern, but _so 's
| everything that matters on Linux_).
|
| "Find my" or equivalent.
|
| Low jitter and reasonably consistent latency, at least
| under light load.
|
| Solid, well-considered, capable, well-functioning
| accessibility features.
|
| A trackpad good enough I don't even consider taking my
| mouse unless I'll be gone several days.
|
| Bluetooth audio that works well enough that I don't hate
| it and spend no more than a minute or two a week fiddling
| with (and that mostly because I also use the same devices
| on Windows).
|
| Seamless password & payment sync across all my (non-
| server) devices, relying on biometrics on all of them so
| I rarely have to type a password at all.
|
| I'd be "hack[ing] in" all of that--and far, far more--
| back in on Linux, if I could attain it at all, and that
| stuff--the stuff that I rely on weekly, if not multiple
| times a day--is what I regard as "the basics".
|
| I'd also still be using exactly one of those
| "thoughtfully designed, hidden gems by very small teams
| or individual devs, distributed as proprietary software
| for a small fee" text editors if I went back to Linux.
| Sublime beats anything else I've used on Linux, and it's
| not a close contest--failing that, something from
| Jetbrains. Open source editors and IDEs would only enter
| the picture if I somehow couldn't get Sublime or
| something from Jetbrains. Meanwhile, I struggle to think
| of anything else in that category that I use. It's mostly
| first-party or open-source. If I did more multimedia or
| GUI design I'd probably use a few more of those small-
| team proprietary programs, but I don't think it's
| controversial to assert that those largely blow anything
| available on Linux out of the water (except the ones that
| are cross-platform because they're--ugh--electron or
| browser-based, so _do_ work on Linux) so it 's not like
| I'm missing out on the riches of open-source, at least
| when it comes to that kind of thing.
| nibbleshifter wrote:
| Exactly this.
|
| I don't know why some people seem to want a "one true
| desktop" monoculture.
|
| The whole reason I use Linux is because I get to make
| choices that make sense for me.
| pxc wrote:
| In fairness I think I do know what they want, which is
| better support from third-party (and especially
| proprietary) software vendors. A Linux workstation can be
| painfully close to perfectly usable for a lot of
| professionals who have various personal reasons to prefer
| it to Windows or macOS-- reasons you and I would likely
| emphatically agree with, no less!
|
| There's this hope that _if only for the fragmentation_ ,
| Linux might finally have Photoshop or whatever.
|
| I get it. I've contended with integrating disparate GUI
| frameworks on my system. I appreciate what Apple's
| virtual monopoly on app frameworks for macOS allows them
| to do in terms of accessibility and integrations and UI
| changes, in rapid, uniform ways.
|
| But you can't impose uniformity on the Linux desktop
| without draining the oasis, without killing what makes it
| a breath of fresh air in the first place.
| robinsonb5 wrote:
| I don't think it's even the UI that's the problem. The
| problem is this:
|
| > ./GuitarPro
|
| ./GuitarPro: error while loading shared libraries:
| libssl.so.0.9.8: cannot open shared object file: No such
| file or directory
|
| I bought this program several years ago while using a
| Mint 13 system - it won't run on Mint 20. Maybe I could
| set up a Docker, or copy the correct version of the
| libraries, or whatever - maybe it could be coaxed into
| working, maybe not - but while end users are likely to
| encounter this kind of roadblock Linux is just a non-
| starter as a platform for commercial software.
| nibbleshifter wrote:
| Openssl specifically not providing a stable ABI is the
| bane of my fucking life.
|
| Many other libraries are similar. See: glibc...
|
| At least the kernel promises not to break user space. I
| guess because user space keeps fucking itself.
| pmontra wrote:
| > There's this hope that if only for the fragmentation,
| Linux might finally have Photoshop or whatever.
|
| If Adobe builds Photoshop for Red Hat and make it run
| only on Red Hat, people wanting to use Photoshop will
| install Red Hat. The big problem is what happens when
| Microsoft makes Excel work perfectly on Ubuntu and only
| on Ubuntu.
| pxc wrote:
| > The big problem is what happens when Microsoft makes
| Excel work perfectly on Ubuntu and only on Ubuntu.
|
| This is basically how Steam still works, pending the
| release of SteamOS 3.0, and it hasn't been a problem for
| other distros. They can sub in their own libs and
| repackage the thing or use an Ubuntu chroot.
|
| This is what Snap and Flatpak are for though, and I think
| they'll handle it well, going forward.
| spoiler wrote:
| I actually agree with you, but I think that's not what
| people complain about. I think people mostly complain about
| a lack of cohesion that Windows/macOS have.
|
| But then again, their design language has recently started
| to be less cohesive too (or more precisely, mix of older
| and newer design systems are apparent).
|
| Like, it's generally difficult to get something
| working/looking nicely and consistently on Linux. A
| somewhat exception to this rule is GNOME, but even then
| there's issues with KDE/Qt app theming sometimes.
|
| Like, until 2021 (I think) I lived with a broken looking
| inkscape and Krita (used it as a hobby) because I gave up
| trying to figure out how to fix the theming, since none of
| the fixes suggested online worked. Then one day after some
| random update it started working
|
| So, there's a lot of space for improvement and better cross
| compatibility between these "subsystems"
|
| Granted, though, it's getting better. But I assume not at a
| pace an average user can perceive. So, i thinking that's
| where people get frustrated.
| jsz0 wrote:
| In a strange turn of events I think you might have a
| better shot at a cohesive experience on a carefully
| curated Linux desktop these days than macOS. Even Apple's
| first party apps are now a mix mash of different UI
| styles. Once you start installing third party apps you
| get something that looks more like a Linux desktop from
| 15 years ago than the glory days of OSX.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| The Windows ecosystem has never had a coherent design. I
| fondly remember the Windows 7 days where we had Windows
| Media Player, Windows Media Center, and Zune Media Player
| each with a completely different design style despite
| coming from the same company. Similarly, Outlook vs
| Windows Live Mail vs etc or Word Perfect vs Word. And
| these are just comparing similar Microsoft products.
| spoiler wrote:
| Ok I guess I've had a bit of a different perception back
| then, since thinking back I think you're rights.
|
| I guess the thing I was thinking of being cohesive were
| stuff like context menus, or integrating better with the
| window manager (or whatever it's called on Windows) than
| they do on Linux (since you had to integrate with the
| only existing one, not choose one). My earlier complaint
| about Krita/Inkscape is that most "labels" rendered in a
| colour and labels that was almost indistinguishable from
| the background, so I was largely working with shortcuts,
| or from memory and sometimes squinting to see what I'm
| clicking lol. It was an issue with all non-gnome apps,
| but I mostly used those two.
| prmoustache wrote:
| Back in the days even on windows you had java apps with
| different toolkit / experience. Now you have electron
| apps, there isn't even much cohesion.
|
| I quitr remember that on Mac it is barely better.
|
| Now take some specialized areas such as DAW, video
| editing software and 3D editors and you can just throw
| that idea of cohesion out of the window regardless of the
| OS.
| spoiler wrote:
| Hmm. I think that devs developing for macs tend to at
| least try and reuse established design language forms.
| I've only recently started using a mac for work and a lot
| of stuff I use seems to try and feel "maccy" (with
| varying degrees of success). But then again, I don't use
| many mac apps either, so I could have a poor sample rate
| and was recommended good looking apps by colleagues
|
| On Linux, if you used Gnome but ran a KDE app (or were on
| Gnome but ran a GTK app) you'd by default get something
| that looked horrendous broken visually but worked, and
| sometimes the visuals actually managed to break the app
| (ie thing being out of proportion, or invisible etc). It
| would look great and cohesive if you ran a GTK app on
| Gnome, or a KDE app on KDE, etc.
|
| I think it's gotten much better at some point when these
| environments decided to support each others themes,
| though.
|
| I wish they all sat down and came up with a unified
| theming framework for apps (maybe based on CSS, since
| they kinda use CSS flavours already), but have the rest
| be implementation details. Dunno how realistic that is,
| though.
|
| Windows I think I missed the mark actually. A lot of
| people pointed out stuff I didn't think about or forgot
| about (every Office Suite release looked different, Java
| apps etc, branded stuff like Adobe or specialist
| software, etc).
|
| I think it might be because I never really used those
| apps that my much, since Windows was basically only my
| gaming OS
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| Yep, I think cohesion is only going to die going forward,
| and I think web technologies are going to be what kills
| it. Electron is already popular, and nowadays every
| platform has a system web browser that can run in a
| "webview" mode so you don't have to bundle a full browser
| with each app. And building apps with HTML/CSS/JS is
| wayyyyyy easier than using native toolkits or cross-
| platform toolkits, especially if you want to target
| multiple platforms.
| pxc wrote:
| > But then again, their design language has recently
| started to be less cohesive too (or more precisely, mix
| of older and newer design systems are apparent).
|
| It's the age of Electron, baby! For better (more frequent
| cross-platform support, rapid app development, empowering
| the masses of web devs to create desktop apps without
| retooling) and for worse (non-native look-and-feel, high
| resource consumption). Nobody really has a cohesive
| collection of apps on their desktops anymore, not even
| Mac people.
|
| > I think people mostly complain about a lack of cohesion
| that Windows/macOS have.
|
| Like we've both noted to some extent here, I think this
| is pretty much a thing of the past. It can be pretty good
| on Linux, at the same time. If you stick to KDE or Gnome
| (which I think are both reasonable propositions), your
| desktop on Linux will be way, way more cohesive than
| Windows has ever been in my lifetime (maybe ever).
| winrid wrote:
| This is long overdue. The Linux desktop needs a lot of
| polishing and i feel like we've hit a wall with productivity
| considering the gnome file picker has had the same issues with
| thumbnails since i was in highschool with Ubuntu 6.10.
|
| If Rust helps us actually improve and change things, then fine.
| krolden wrote:
| Try kde
| winrid wrote:
| I'm on KDE right now (KDE Neon). Basic stuff like,
| installing Chrome still uses the GTK file picker, is an
| issue. Loading screen goes to wrong monitor and oriented
| wrong. Plugging in monitor sometimes makes both go black
| requiring hard reboot (I think I fixed this with a kernel
| flag...). Just overall polish. Although I do like Neon as a
| distro so far.
| criddell wrote:
| It needs more than just polishing. It would great to see the
| community come to agreement on a modern permissions model so
| that you can do things like grant access to your
| camera/microphone/calendar/location/photos/etc... for ever,
| just this time, or never. I know it's being worked on and
| there are some competing systems, but it would be great for
| there to be a single API.
| rrgok wrote:
| On one hand, it is great to have different options. On the
| other, think about the amount of effort wasted away.
|
| Sometime I wonder what can they pull off if KDE team, Gnome
| team, XFCE team and now Cosmic team got together.
| prmoustache wrote:
| Same with billions of programming languages, frameworks.
|
| Do you guys complain because there is more than 1 game
| studio? You'd rather have one movie/serie and a handful of
| actors director so all movies and series are made by the same
| team in order to not waste ressources? A single house
| architecture plan so that everyone live in the very same
| house with no customisation possible?
| godshatter wrote:
| People want different things. The extra work added on
| different desktop environments is work that neither Microsoft
| or Apple is doing, and I think that's a good thing. If you
| want an environment for the average Joe, use desktop A. If
| you want a techy "fiddle all the knobs" one than use desktop
| B. If you want a minimalist one, use Desktop C, etc. MS
| doesn't make three or more versions of their OS suited for
| different populations, you get what they want to give you.
| Same for Apple.
|
| Diversity is a strength of Linux. I don't think Pepsi worries
| about fragmentation with their various flavors of Pepsi,
| Mountain Dew, and whatever other hundreds of brands they own.
| Sure, diversity can be a problem if there aren't enough
| developers to go around but I'd rather have more options than
| fewer.
| ssnistfajen wrote:
| There is no one-size-fits-all solution here because there
| isn't a single entity controlling the development and access
| of Linux desktop environments. Pretty sure if all of those
| teams got together to somehow deliver a solution, neither the
| devs or the users will be happy with the result.
| prmoustache wrote:
| The team working on a single desktop wouldn't necessarily
| be much bigger anyway.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| I'm fine with trying new things. In particular, I'm curious as
| to whether people have tried to build a desktop environment
| around webkit or similar--basically using the web stack instead
| of traditional GUI toolkits? Is there some obvious reason this
| is a bad idea (yeah, I know working in JS is unpleasant, but we
| have alternatives these days and frankly all of the native GUI
| toolkits for Linux are pretty unpleasant as well).
|
| EDIT: I know ChromeOS exists, but that's a lot more than a
| desktop environment (can't even run a compiler natively for all
| intents and purposes iirc).
| dvdkon wrote:
| I think Deepin's DE used to be based on HTML years back, but
| they switched to Qt.
| Eeems wrote:
| So Gnome?
| [deleted]
| rrgok wrote:
| That's a great question about using web tech to build a DE.
| I've been wondering the same for sometime. Someone should
| shed some light on this.
| [deleted]
| exabrial wrote:
| My next laptop is going to be from them, no doubt. I'm hoping
| someday they offer Arm offerings too!
| eatonphil wrote:
| Dumb question: when considering a company that sells branded
| generic laptops, why not buy from the generic laptop vendor
| directly (Clevo in the case [0])?
|
| [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17039414
|
| (Yes there's a response in that link from S76 folks but I'm
| still curious on the buyer side your reasoning.)
| ivarv wrote:
| I bought my S76 laptop via my work's "choose your own
| workstation" program. It's a great way to support continued
| development of the software I use PLUS when you buy via S76
| you get lifetime support for the device. The support is not
| something I've made use of often, but it certainly paid off
| the one time I needed it. Basically, it depends on your idea
| of "value" - do you value money (buy cheaper hardware) or
| time (buy S76 with support)?
| ok_dad wrote:
| Yea, I had to pay for the battery, but when my battery died
| they shipped one out immediately with free shipping for the
| cost of the battery (no markup from the "aliexpress
| special" I found later; and I bet theirs is more reliable
| than that one). Also, when I had password issues with FDE
| due to my own failure, _after_ the warranty ran out, they
| emailed back and forth for days until we fixed the issue.
| tilsammans wrote:
| I bought a NUC from them years ago that was always a bit
| wonky, but not unusable. Until one day I couldn't stand it
| any more and sent it back for repair. At that point I'd had
| it for well over a year, maybe more than two. It came back
| with a fixed controller and has worked flawlessly ever since.
| So, you pay for support. And the price difference is peanuts
| compared to all of our hourly rates.
|
| Edited to add: the repair was free of charge.
| autoexec wrote:
| Same reasons other have stated really:
|
| It supports a company selling linux laptops, and they make
| sure everything works out of the box, and provide support.
| Pretty much the same reason to use their OS, which is
| basically just Ubuntu + drivers. It should all "just work"
| which is exactly what a lot of people expect from a laptop.
|
| If you have a desktop system that's giving you problems in
| linux because of incomparable hardware or crappy drivers it's
| a pretty easy to find what component is working well for
| other people and swap some parts, but laptops are such a pain
| I don't even want to open one up if I can help it. It sounds
| like System 76 works with Clevo to put together certain
| builds they might not offer normally. Why risk getting a
| similarly spec'd Clevo only to find out it's got a different
| wireless chipset or GPU variant and now you're stuck with a
| bunch of of problems to try to work around.
| ok_dad wrote:
| I have one of their cheapest compact models, the Lemur, and I
| love it. I don't use it much lately, but everything "just
| works" for the basic cases, and I only have to sometimes deal
| with poor Linux support for non-System76 peripherals which
| would be an issue on any Linux notebook.
|
| I plan to buy a desktop from them soon because I'm not into
| having a laptop now that I work from home permanently and I
| also want to run some games on it that you absolutely cannot
| run without a graphics card.
| 0cf8612b2e1e wrote:
| At this point, my white whale for a Linux laptop is
| functioning sleep. Any problems/higher than expected power
| consumption?
| schaefer wrote:
| I was in the same boat, but in my case I finally figured
| out that it wasn't that the hardware that couldn't do it, I
| realized the configuration wasn't optimized.
|
| So I'll share my number one optimization trick. Install
| powertop and get familiar with all the tabs it provides.
|
| Use: sudo powertop --auto-tune
|
| it can make a HUGE difference.
|
| After a while all the tricks started to snowball and I was
| able to set up my laptop so I could swap between nvidia
| discrete graphics (2-3 hours off a full battery) and the
| integrated Intel Xe graphics (13.5 hours off a full
| battery). Power consumption on suspend under intel graphics
| is negligible. Wake is flawless. Now I find myself wishing
| I knew windows better so I could get the same graphics-
| swap-trick working under windows too (dual booted system).
| ok_dad wrote:
| The power usage isn't great, but it's as good as any non-
| Apple compact laptop I've ever owned. It sleeps fine, but
| not in the "hibernate" type of sleep.
| yamtaddle wrote:
| NFTs exist, but _fully_ , and more-or-less reliably,
| functioning sleep states are still something Apple can
| use as a differentiator in 2023.
|
| Markets are weird.
| gkbrk wrote:
| Is it? My ThinkPad running Linux goes to sleep and wakes up
| just fine.
| nerdponx wrote:
| Mine does too, but the battery still dies after a while,
| unlike my MacBook which seems to have nearly unlimited
| sleep capability.
| pmontra wrote:
| There are a number of factors. In my case it's the driver
| of the graphic card.
|
| I never had problems with sleep on any of my Linux
| laptops. The problem is with shutdown. Shutdown is
| shutdown when I'm using the Noveau driver for my NVidia
| card but it's reboot when I'm using the NVidia driver.
| Unfortunately Noveau doesn't get sync right for my card
| with both Wayland and X11 so I have to use NVidia with
| X11. The few times per year that I have to poweroff I
| press the power button right before the BIOS screen
| appears.
|
| At least version 470 of the driver fixed the brightness
| control keys. The didn't work for years and I remapped
| them as hotkeys to run xbacklight.
| phowat wrote:
| In all fairness, windows laptops don't have functioning
| sleep either. Only apple nailed it.
|
| Edit: This is what I'm talking about:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHKKcd3sx2c
| bernawil wrote:
| > Only apple nailed it.
|
| it used to be true, but sleep sucks now in the M1 line.
| When I leave my 14 inch mbp on sleep with 20% battery
| before bed I wake up to a dead battery.
| ikurei wrote:
| May be some app you use is preventing sleep from
| functioning correctly? Is this something that happens to
| many users?
|
| I have two M1 macbooks, one that I use almost daily and
| another that I only use a couple times a week. None of
| them have had any problem with sleep or battery life, I'm
| actually extremely happy with them in this regard.
| elteto wrote:
| Sleep on the M1's is as good, if not better, as it ever
| was. You might have a power hungry application throwing
| things off.
| vladvasiliu wrote:
| Yeah, the classic let's copy Apple (power nap), but only
| half-ass it. Bonus points for completely throwing out S3
| sleep (though I hear some laptops still support that).
|
| Speaking of Linux, on my particular HP laptops (Elitebook
| 840 (intel 11th gen) and 845 (zen 3)) it wipes the floor
| with Windows. Even though "HP Recommends Windows 11".
|
| Main reason being that it actually stays asleep. Windows,
| half the time, will wake back up moments in. When it
| stays asleep, there's a high probability that it will
| somehow crash and reboot [0] or just randomly wake up
| while being closed in a bag.
|
| There's no power management while the actual OS hasn't
| started booting [1], so you get the screen going at full
| blast, etc. Good times, especially in a bag or at night
| [2]. It also sometimes starts spinning the fan while
| pretending to sleep. It does indeed get rather warm, so
| I'm not really sure what it does.
|
| What Windows sometimes does and Linux never does: wake
| from sleep to a black screen, wake from sleep to a
| garbled screen, sometimes with the fan blowing like a jet
| engine.
|
| ---
|
| [0] No, it doesn't reboot for updates. The event log
| talks about unexpected shutdown. It also doesn't run out
| of battery, since it also happens while being plugged in.
|
| [1] I use bitlocker with TPM + PIN, so it doesn't boot on
| its own
|
| [2] I don't usually close it because the screen touches
| the keyboard, so it gets dirty.
| gautamdivgi wrote:
| I love my system76 laptop. Shit just works. No messing with
| drivers, setting, etc.
| brundolf wrote:
| [deleted]
| hoppyhoppy2 wrote:
| Just to clarify, System76 doesn't make Framework laptops;
| that's a different company.
| brundolf wrote:
| [deleted]
| slaw wrote:
| Framework doesn't sell Linux laptops. They have option to
| buy laptop without operating system, which is very rare.
| tssva wrote:
| Framework laptops are capable of running Linux but they
| aren't "Linux laptops"in the manner System76 systems are.
| They ship with Windows or no OS.
| haberman wrote:
| What are people's opinions of PopOS? I tried it one after reading
| a good review, but the experience had enough bumps that I
| resolved to just do Ubuntu next time.
| wilsonnb3 wrote:
| I like it. Used it on an AMD/Nvidia desktop and had minimal
| problems.
|
| The fact that it comes with the proprietary nvidia drivers is
| nice for gamers.
|
| Main reason I stopped using it is because I dislike Gnome 3 and
| there isn't much benefit to running popOS over another Linux if
| you don't use their DE.
| pbohun wrote:
| I've run PopOS for over 2 years now, and am happy with it after
| distro-hopping for years. It runs Steam very well, the
| interface is great and works well with a hi-res display, and it
| is very easy to setup custom keyboard shortcuts, which I use to
| launch programs.
|
| My workflow is pretty simple, I mostly want the OS out of my
| way, but when I have to interact with it, it's been nice.
| FridgeSeal wrote:
| I use it as the main OS on my desktop, fairly unsophisticated
| usecase-some web browsing, programming, playing games via
| Steam. I've encountered no real friction or hiccups. It feels
| like "ubuntu but cohesive".
| PartiallyTyped wrote:
| I prefer it over Ubuntu simply because of the nvidia image
| that's available instead of relying on generic drivers
| initially and then installing the proprietary ones. I have had
| no issues w/ it, though I had with Ubuntu over nv drivers.
|
| Unfortunately I am stuck with NVDA until well, Triton has AMD
| support, or RocM PyTorch catches up in performance.
| claytonjy wrote:
| I like it a lot, using it on my Framework since I got it, and
| on a S76 laptop before that. Came from Mint, I like the
| simplicity of Pop. High "just works" factor.
|
| Only other place I can imagine going is NixOS, but I suspect
| PopOS+Nix might be a better balance for me.
| hexis wrote:
| I like it, but I'm a fairly unsophisticated user of any Linux
| desktop.
| bokchoi wrote:
| I like it! It's nicely polished and their Pop Shop app
| installer is better than gnomes.
| stonemetal12 wrote:
| Running it pre-installed on a laptop. Other than the fact it
| seems like they push updates multiple times a day, it has been
| the closest I have had to "it just works" in a long time.
| acomjean wrote:
| I use it for work. I kind of like it, works well enough and it
| keeps updating and not breaking which makes me happy. I feel
| its like ubuntu on training wheels.
|
| The Gnome desktop environment is servicable, the only issue is
| I which there was a shortcut on the top bar for sound
| selections.
|
| Basically it seems pretty robust, and I don't have any issues.
| WuxiFingerHold wrote:
| This looks really good. I'm curious when we'll get to see the
| first beta of the whole DE and especially how the tiling will
| work.
|
| I recently switched back from Pop!_OS to Ubuntu because of really
| annoying bugs with the tiling window manager and especially with
| the suspend functionality. So I think they should not neglect
| their current DE.
| nilslice wrote:
| recently updated firmware fixed the suspend issues I had on
| lemur pro!
| throwawaaarrgh wrote:
| I would enjoy it greatly if people would stop making any more
| fucking desktop environments for Linux, thanks. 5,000 of them is
| enough.
| [deleted]
| gchamonlive wrote:
| Nobody is forcing anyone to go through all the different DE
| offerings.
|
| Sometimes, innovation springs out of reiteration. You find out
| new ways of doing something, with its own set of tradeoffs, by
| pursing different avenues.
|
| So please direct this energy towards something productive.
| Maybe write your own DE, or your own IDE. Who knows what would
| come out of it. Certainly something better than wasting energy
| on aimless ranting, that is for sure.
| wilsonnb3 wrote:
| I kind of agree with the GP, mostly because I feel like if we
| could focus the efforts of the various DE communities on a
| single project then we could finally get a Linux DE that has
| as much polish as Windows and MacOS.
|
| Probably just a pipe dream though.
| aidenn0 wrote:
| Not GP, but (all else being equal) the more people that are
| using the same DE as me, the better off I am. The more DEs
| that exist, the less likely a person installing linux will
| use the same DE as me.
| cmm wrote:
| Things some people (ahem) learn only _after_ investing in
| System76 hardware: most of the premium goes not toward Coreboot
| development (S76 employs all of one full-time firmware guy) but
| rather toward a largely-pointless rewrite of Linux desktop in
| Rust. Welp, lesson learned
| arp242 wrote:
| How many people do you realistically need for working on
| Coreboot/firmware stuff? I guess that one full-time person is
| just all that's needed?
|
| And I bet that many System76 users don't actually care about
| all of this either. _Some_ do, but I 'm not so sure the
| majority do. It's certainly not something that actually sells
| significant amount of machines in the mainstream market. Having
| a usable functional desktop does.
| cmm wrote:
| > I guess that one full-time person is just all that's
| needed?
|
| Emphatically not. I mean, just look at the bug tracker. Or
| how about this data point: my Lemur Pro (lemp11) could not
| suspend at all when shipped -- the model started shipping in
| Summer IIRC, but the relevant workaround/fix was only finally
| released in November. So yeah, the Coreboot/firmware field is
| very understaffed.
| Karsteski wrote:
| I certainly care a lot about having a Linux desktop that works
| well with the hardware I bought for it, and has a company with
| a vested interest in keeping it that way. I admire how Apple
| controls their entire stack and is able to do interesting,
| smooth integrations with all of their offerings.
| EFreethought wrote:
| That is why I went with System76.
|
| A year ago I asked on my local Linux mailing list for some
| hardware recommendations, and I mentioned I would like to buy
| something w/Linux pre-installed. A lot of people got upset
| with that idea.
|
| I am done installing OSes. I never learned anything from it,
| and I buy a system to use it, not to configure it.
| nix23 wrote:
| > Welp, lesson learned
|
| Yes go to HP/Dell/Lenovo/Apple where no one works on open
| firmware, i don't understand your mindset....
| cmm wrote:
| I wonder what's worse: not supplying open firmware at all, or
| doing it at the S76 level. You get laptops that don't suspend
| as shipped, you still cannot remove of disable Intel ME, but
| yay another desktop shell!
| newsclues wrote:
| Are these S76 level bugs, or issues from their suppliers?
|
| The leap in scale from using Clevo designs with S76
| software to designing your own hardware is massive.
|
| They worked with HP. But if you are expecting Apple MacBook
| Pro level devices in the Linux flavour, I think it's going
| to take a few more years of buying what they are selling to
| achieve that scale.
| ndneighbor wrote:
| I am still kicking myself for not scooping up the Dev
| Ones when they were $200 off. They had a keyboard nipple
| dammit!
| nix23 wrote:
| >You get laptops that don't suspend as shipped
|
| They have not suspended the laptops during shipment?
|
| >you still cannot remove of disable Intel ME
|
| Yeah right? Another good point for open firmware.
| krolden wrote:
| Every vendor that seems to say they care about coreboot
| implementation seems to just be doing it to capture the eyes of
| people like us who actually care about it. But then as you
| stated, they'd rather spend their time/money to write their own
| DE than give a shit about open firmware.
|
| If I was going to buy a coreboot laptop it would likely be a
| higher end Chromebook that mrchromebox has a hack for.
| faefox wrote:
| I'm curious to know who you would suggest supporting instead.
| Shared404 wrote:
| I'm actually very happy to see this.
|
| I like S76's additions to GNOME, and I'm happy to see them
| moving to a place where they'll no longer be stuck on GNOME's
| whims and wishes.
|
| They've been positioning themselves to have a more put together
| and unified stack as time goes on, and this is just one part.
| On top of that, it seems to me that a DE is a very good place
| to get memory safety, so I'm glad to see someone moving that
| direction.
| snvzz wrote:
| Can't upvote you enough.
|
| You'd think they'd have clear priorities, yet they don't seem
| to understand firmware matters, and that there are enough Linux
| desktops already.
|
| I don't like the idea of supporting a Linux distro or DE I
| won't use or ever care about.
| JasonFruit wrote:
| Things I learned after buying one of their machines: I now have
| a nice usable laptop that has great hardware compatibility with
| every Linux distro I've tried. They can spend the money however
| they like, if you ask me.
| kibwen wrote:
| I got a System76 last year and I have no urge to go back to
| Windows. I was worried from prior experience with desktop Linux
| 10+ years ago that I'd be suffering a constant toll of minor
| breakage and annoyances, but it's been a lovely experience. (It's
| also possible that every Linux DE these days is this good, I only
| have a single sample.)
| colordrops wrote:
| My experience now is that the Windows desktop is intolerable
| compared to Linux at this point. Overwrought, buggy, and
| confusing. Mac is better but it's far too locked down. If you
| are willing to put some effort into customization, especially
| with tiling window managers and other WMs besides gnome, you
| can get a sublimely efficient and natural experience. I'm
| currently using Sway and it's vastly better than commercial
| desktops for software dev.
| NovaPenguin wrote:
| In a way it has stripped out a little of the fun of it, but
| that is a very VERY minor thing by comparison to systems that
| now just work!
|
| As for Desktop environments, it is very rare that I have had
| any game breaking events on these for a very long time. The
| foundations are mature and hardened nowadays.
|
| I have had the occasional issue on a elderly T400 Thinkpad when
| transferring large files on Mate and Enlightenment DE but I get
| the feeling that is potentially a hardware issue.
| okamiueru wrote:
| I was about to reply to you before reading your last sentence.
| I'd say that is very much the case. In fact, I tried pop! out
| of curiosity, and found that I liked it less than arch + gnome.
| At least overall, there was a little mix of pros and cons.
| alexklarjr wrote:
| They changed text from puke orange to puke grass. This is
| progress I aways embrace. May be in far away future my
| grandchildren will be able to select the text colour or even
| define it themselves at their loking. That quantum leap would be
| called "century of linux on desktop".
| deafpolygon wrote:
| I'd like to see how things develop with this. But a fundamental
| issue is that the underlying system is still just.. Linux.
|
| edit: Downvotes all you like, but it's the truth.
| Shared404 wrote:
| The downvotes aren't because you've stated some uncomfortable
| truth, it's because you've not added anything to the
| conversation.
|
| Duh it's Linux. It's S76. Lot's of people here _want_ Linux.
| yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
| > the underlying system is still just.. Linux.
|
| Don't be ridiculous. It's GNU+Linux. Linux is only the kernel.
|
| In all seriousness, though - yeah, that's... the point. Linux
| distros have their pain points, but they beat Darwin or NT.
| charcircuit wrote:
| The GNU software is insignificant compared to the rest of
| what is included in the operating system. Most casual users
| won't even actively use GNU software.
| yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
| You still need it. I'm struggling to imagine any sense in
| which GNU is less vital to the functioning of the system
| than Linux, though it's true that both are potentially
| somewhat under the hood components.
| timeon wrote:
| > But a fundamental issue is
|
| Is it? Is it really though?
| skrtskrt wrote:
| I'm waiting for (probably far off) day when System76 makes its
| own laptops instead of using Clevo hardware. I just can't deal
| with that keyboard & trackpad quality.
|
| Everything System76 makes themselves is awesome.
| samtp wrote:
| Really wish they would just merge with Framework to make an
| amazing Linux based hardware & software package.
| rpdillon wrote:
| I just wrote into System76 support looking for a replacement
| battery for my Lemur Pro (swollen battery), and mentioned I'd
| switched to my Framework in the meantime. Just got a response
| a few minutes ago:
|
| > I received your message in the support ticket that you have
| gotten a Framework Laptop. A great choice.
|
| Gave me a burst of hope for official Pop!_OS Framework
| laptops sold through S76.
| bcrosby95 wrote:
| If that means getting 15" framework laptops with discrete
| GPUs, sure. If it means sticking to the current framework or
| a larger one with the same basic hardware... nothanks.
| fsflover wrote:
| You can consider Purism instead, which already are making their
| own hardware. Happy owner here.
| m463 wrote:
| I have one too. I love the very standard hardware - even a
| regular barrel jack for the power adapter.
|
| That said, the keyboard could be better.
|
| I hate the trend in flat-top keys we have now. I honestly
| love the feel of gently recessed keys. I had an early macbook
| pro and the keys seemed to press against my fingertips
| uniformly instead of having the "hotspot" you get in the
| center of the flat key.
| laptop-man wrote:
| I actually got a laptop from sager (clevo) and after 5 years of
| heavy use. my biggest complaint is the dam case. all the
| plastic clips broke. only a few screws holding it together.
| lots of gaps now. and a few cracks in the plastic.
|
| but it's been thrown in a back pack and gone through several
| years of traveling in a back pack
| deepsun wrote:
| But how about "do one thing, but do it right"?
| CoastalCoder wrote:
| Similar for me. When I looked at System 76 laptops 1-2 years
| ago, the keyboard type was a deal-breaker for me. They were
| like Asus ROG laptop keyboards, whereas I strongly prefer
| keyboards like my Lenovo Legion's.
|
| I was hopeful when they announced an all-AMD laptop recently.
| But unfortunately it's too small / underpowered / non-
| upgradeable for my needs, and I couldn't tell from the pictures
| if the keyboard was more to my liking.
|
| To be fair, even Framework laptops don't have swappable
| keyboard types, AFAICT. So even a System76-Framework team-up
| wouldn't necessarily fit my needs.
| mardifoufs wrote:
| Weren't they working on making their own hardware a while ago
| (5 years ago, I think)? Have they ever given an update on that?
| showerst wrote:
| Yeah, they announced that in 2019 if not earlier. At some
| point they said it would be delayed, presumably due to the
| pandemic.
| cameronhowe wrote:
| You'll be happy to know that system76 pangolin laptops are not
| clevo.
|
| source: https://fosstodon.org/@soller/109677885135544538
| Finnucane wrote:
| I have a ~6-year-old Clevo laptop (from Mythlogic, which tells
| you something). After about five years, the keyboard kinda
| crapped out. Got a new keyboard, took about ten minutes to swap
| it in. The hard part was getting the part, had to order it from
| China.
| chrismorgan wrote:
| I have one from mid-2014 (base model W550SU, now-bankrupt
| distributor), used about as heavily as anyone would ever use
| one (probably averaging sixty hours a week). Its keyboard was
| not great within one year (spongy), and distinctly unpleasant
| after two years ( _very_ spongy), with its space bar becoming
| extremely unreliable during the third year. It became
| impossible to type at speed on it.
| blondin wrote:
| > I'm waiting for (probably far off) day when System76 makes
| its own laptops instead of using Clevo hardware. I just can't
| deal with that keyboard & trackpad quality.
|
| oh, i never knew that! i thought they made everything.
|
| for real though, who thought that having pgup and pgdn as mini
| keys on top of the left and right arrow keys was a good idea?
| and how did that get through quality assurance?
| JonathonW wrote:
| Page up and page down in that location is fairly common in
| business-class laptops; Lenovo, Dell, and HP all do it in at
| least some models.
| trinix912 wrote:
| IBM ThinkPads had Back/Forward buttons there. They acted
| like the back/forward buttons on mice these days. Very
| useful for browsing in Windows Explorer and IE. I loved
| them.
| qotgalaxy wrote:
| [dead]
| m000z0rz wrote:
| I vastly prefer pgup and pgdn there. Moving between tabs in a
| browser is Ctrl+PgDn / Ctrl+PgUp, and physically mapping it
| near left/right arrows matches my mental mapping.
| trelane wrote:
| It's really common. The term is ODM: https://en.wikipedia.org
| /wiki/List_of_laptop_brands_and_manu...
| mardifoufs wrote:
| They make their desktops but not their laptops. That's
| probably why their laptops can sometimes have some weird
| quirks (keyboard layouts, screen resolution options, etc).
| gowld wrote:
| Why don't Clevo's customers ask Clevo to upgrade the hardware
| and create a premium line?
| wilsonnb3 wrote:
| It's sold out now but they did a collab with HP called the Dev
| One. I haven't seen one in person but I hear the hardware
| quality is quite good.
|
| https://hpdevone.com/
| pmontra wrote:
| I don't get it: a Linux laptop with physical buttons on the
| touchpad but only two of them. I've been pasting text with
| the middle button all the time since forever and any time I
| had to use a two buttons mouse or touchpad it was hell. My
| ZBook has three buttons. It was one of the reasons I bought
| it.
|
| Less visible downsides: only 1 TB SSD (I have 3 TB now), 16
| GB RAM (I have 32) and the screen is smaller as the laptop is
| "12.73 x 8.44 x 0.75 in; 32.34 x 21.46 x 1.91 cm"
|
| The only good points are that it weights almost half of mine
| and it's numberpad free :-)
| slaw wrote:
| The reason I haven't bought HP Dev One is glossy screen.
| etrautmann wrote:
| I purchased a high end workstation and was incredibly
| disappointed by the case construction and extraordinarily weird
| design choices made in service of aesthetics or...something.
| CoastalCoder wrote:
| I'm surprised. I have a 2 year old Thelio, and I really like
| the internal layout for my use case.
| [deleted]
| Eeems wrote:
| what are some of the examples that you were dissatipointed
| by?
| Temporary_31337 wrote:
| I can't speak for the OP but just take a look at any
| $50-100 ATX PC case and see all the features it has in
| terms of cable management, connectivity, airflow/ cooling
| of all critical components and modularity. That in my view
| is the bar that a high end workstation should be better at.
| whalesalad wrote:
| "Pop!_OS" - the name of this distribution is also a potential
| name for a future Elon Musk offspring. Also probably a great
| forcing function for ensuring that all of their build tooling
| works with bizarre names lol.
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