Linux requires you to venture into the command line

No it doesn’t. I choose to use the command line because it’s more efficient which is entirely different.

It’s true. On the other hand distros like Zorin or Pop!_OS don’t need the command line and work “out of the box”.

The real problem being that, Linux users are nerds. And once you get use to power, you can’t imagine a time where you did not have that power. That is why when a newbie asks “what linux should I use”, the answers are never the right ones. It’s always : you can use that to do that, or that one is better for that aspect or […] omitting the simple fact that before all of that, to have more Linux users, the goal is NOT to scare them. Give them something easy, that works. They’ll eventually figure it out.

That’s the point of the article. It’s well written. It’s spot-on.

How long ago was this written? Sure it’s not perfect but you can run a lot of distributions like fedora, ubuntu, opensuse etc etc whatever exactly as described. Maybe this is a joke I didn’t understand lol. But in case it is not:

• No need to use command line if you don’t want to
• Drivers are installed automatically (okay this might depend on the distro but in OpenSUSE I recall this being possible in a GUI)
• There is a steam flatpak, and most user apps can be installed through a GUI, often as flatpaks
• For a user like this, I see no reason to interact with system packages other than choosing when to update.
• I’m a programmer and even I rarely edit ANYTHING in /etc on my desktop. Sure I edit stuff in ~/.config, but that is not stuff a “normal” user would need to do.

Now sure if you want to start customizing your login screen and this that and the other thing, eventually you will have to run something on the command line. But Windows doesn’t allow much customization beyond changing your desktop background, and pales in comparison to the amount of customization you can do with KDE, all through a GUI

The author of the blog post likes X, that’s why distro A is might be the perfect distro for them. While I like Y, which is why distro B is the perfect distro for me etc. What makes Linux -in a sense as a platform- perfect great is that it allows one to either find/install/build/configure the perfect system for them^[1]. Some prefer to be in full control from start to finish, while others just like sane defaults. The fact that Linux allows for such diversity is almost mind-blowing.

The degree of that diversity will only increase as time goes on and very likely at some point (purely as a side-effect of further diversification) very ‘dumped down’ versions of Linux might -and perhaps already have- arise. This is inevitable and -perhaps to a degree- essential. And no matter how ‘dumped down’ some Linux distros would have become by then, you can still bet your money that distros like Gentoo and Slackware will continue to do what they always have. So that everybody and their mom, but also the tinker-loving you, will be able to have their perfect distro.

Therefore I don’t see any merit/benefit in contributing to gatekeeping, elitism or whatever this is supposed to be. Instead, we should contribute in more meaningful ways; e.g. like by maintaining some packages you need in your perfect distro. And perhaps those changes will actually contribute to it becoming the perfect distro for others…

1. I’d argue Linux isn’t quite there yet, unfortunately. As some highly specialized systems just don’t exist yet… Regardless, l would reckon it allows one to get the closest to such systems.

ChromeOS right? Is that the answer to the blogs unanswered question? Of what if Linux but supported by a MAANG company made for people who don’t want to delve into computer science or engineering or tinkering.