I use the tools daily and the number of "invasive ads" is commensurate with what I saw in OSX.
And I'd use Linux for my desktop OS if it was at all suited to running on modern laptop hardware with:
1. Good battery life. Within 5% of what the targetted OS can deliver.
2. Good external display support (at least as good as windows, you plug it in and your projector/external monitor/video capture device works).
3. Good support for the common high density displays that laptops bundle now.
4. Without substantial configuration effort and the promise that my computer will NEVER brick its own update mechanism because it can't be bothered to sweep year old kernel images.
And having just tried AGAIN (again again again again x10) to get a Linux laptop working on 2 year old hardware *marketed as designed for linux, it failed.
I don't really care what excuses everyone offers. These are entirely reasonable requests and for most hardware, no desktop Linux will meet them without radically lowering your standards.
So yeah, I have to pay more for a competent experience. Too bad the Linux world refuses to deliver a free one, but I suppose that's because it's lots of effort.
I completely share your frustration with linux on laptops, I ran into similar problems. And the breadth of distributions makes it very hard to find help without being a linux specialist.
Which is also why I don't mind paying for Windows it itself. But I do not want an OS with ads and telemetry.
And it is highly ironic that Microsoft is distributing "signature" hardware that was meant to be free from the adware and spyware that the PC makers were installing by default, only for the windows team to embed this adware and spyware in windows 10 itself.
I am afraid you and the industry are at an impasse. You have no platform available to you that is both competent and does 0 telemetry.
Given the absurd price pressures on software, I don't know how any of us can ship things at scale with competitive cost without extensive telemetry.
> windows team to embed this adware and spyware in windows 10 itself.
This kind of language is both inflammatory and somewhat inaccurate. Windows 10 and even the Edge browser are _not_ Spyware and drawing a false equivalence here only serves to muddy the discussion.
Basic telemetry on use is not spyware. The Windows Store live tile is NOT adware and can be removed from the start menu if you find it's tiny window onto store promotions (something entirely relevant to a store app) to be offensive.
Yes, there have been a few inappropriate decisions on MS's part (notably offering overt ads over the free lockscreen art program). These are bad, but have been apologized for and rescinded. They do not constitute an OS that is "Adware and Spyware." Thank you.
I am sorry, when I make a clean install of Windows 10, it is full of "get office", "try skype", "install Netflix", "use candy crush soda" etc. How is it different from the "try McAffee" that I get on a non signature PC?
As for the data collection (enabled by default), I am sorry, this is nothing short of spyware. Quoting the EFF: location data, text input, voice input, touch input, webpages you visit, and telemetry data regarding your general usage of your computer, including which programs you run and for how long..
And that's in top of making it more difficult to change the default browser which users have to do manually instead of the browser being able to do it for you. This is really mean.
If Microsoft gets offended by their software being called spyware and adware, then they'd better not do it in the first place.
> As for the data collection (enabled by default), I am sorry, this is nothing short of spyware. Quoting the EFF: location data, text input, voice input, touch input, webpages you visit, and telemetry data regarding your general usage of your computer, including which programs you run and for how long..
This definition is politically motivated to classify nearly every Mobile Application, Webpage, and desktop application and OS besides Linux as "spyware."
"I am sorry" but that's an outrageous definition.
> If Microsoft gets offended by their software being called spyware and adware, then they'd better not do it in the first place.
I am not a Microsoft employee nor do I own stock in the company. I am just tired of any conceivable rhetoric being reached for to try and discredit the fact that Linux has overwhelmingly fallen behind on performance and quality besides competitors in the desktop space. What's more, it's now being threatened in the server space.
Linux's only mass success stories exist because of an impressive amount of enterprise funding which utterly eclipses any open source efforts prior. These themselves are littered with analytics signals which people use to further guide the use of linux, and all "consumer facing" variants of Linux have a store, have small adds, etc.
If that's what it takes to get a competent OS for consumer hardware, then the Linux community is at least partially to blame for failing to provide a credible alternative.
You may continue to excuse such incompetence with flowery and vibrant rhetoric about how what's yours is yours (even though the reality is much more complicated). I got bored with it 10 years ago.
If their idea that what customers are really after is a OS filled with ads, they are running into a wall with both feet on the accelerator.