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Comment by DavidPiper | Hacker News Reader

I like a lot of this article, and broadly agree that Linux Desktop _could_ take off in a bigger way if people like me and you started putting open source developer time into making good apps for it.

However, I think the author vastly overestimates the current state of the art by conflating Andriod and ChromeOS with Linux.

Yes these are technically Linux distros, but their entire environment is build on a stack (JVM or Web) whose purpose is to make the fact that it's a Linux distro as irrelevant as possible.

A world where JVM GUI apps or Web apps rule the desktop market is not quite the same thing as "Desktop Linux" taking off. However, web apps ruling the desktop market does have the interesting side-effect that it makes the barrier to using Linux a lot lower than it was in the past, so there's that. The fact that it implies "Desktop" is dying doesn't help, though.

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ChromeOS is clearly making moves to being more than just a frontend for Chrome with PWAs and an Android subsystem people only use under duress. Google wouldn't have added support for Linux applications and Steam if they wanted to keep it like it was.

>whose purpose is to make the fact that it's a Linux distro as irrelevant as possible

That's exactly how it should be. To most users noticing what operating system they're on means something has gone wrong, because what they care about is run software, they don't care what OS they're on, and they shouldn't. I want Linux to win because it's open source, not because so enthusiasts with penguin t-shirts can declare a sort of Sid Meier's Civilization's cultural victory. Android and ChromeOS to that end have done a fantastic job, as has the SteamDeck, because it simply works.

>However, I think the author vastly overestimates the current state of the art by conflating Andriod and ChromeOS with Linux.

>Yes these are technically Linux distros, but their entire environment is build on a stack (JVM or Web) whose purpose is to make the fact that it's a Linux distro as irrelevant as possible.

When the most successful consumer Linux distros are the ones that try to be as not-Linux as humanely possible, maybe the problem lies somewhere that many do not want to admit?

Linux is a massive foot-gun in the hands of someone random, it is built with certain assumptions in mind that don't bode well with how companies want to ship you stuff, and how they envision to "keep you safe".

Of course if a company wants to ship you something linux-based is going to be brutally adultetred, or otherwise you might even be able to really own the thing and do whatever you want with it, which is very much the opposite companies want when they sell you something.

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