It's interesting how the open source model and enshittification have pulled both OSes in opposite directions. I used to look forward to the newest version of Windows because it had cool useful stuff.
I've been occasionally giving Linux a shot since bubuntu 5.04 and it would never stick. I guess many things aligned at some point in 2017-18 when I just gave up on windows and microsoft in general. I've been sticking to my beloved gnome, fighting it to do things it wasn't built to.
And then came 2019 and sway 1.0 got released. It felt like reddit imploded. Decided to finally give this "tiling nonsense" a try. A week or so later it finally clicked and I've not been fighting my system anymore.
Fast forward a few years and I'm now a Gentoo, OpenRC, OpenRC-init and Hyprland nutter :)
I am also an on/off Linux user since Debian. Windows 10 has been fine for me and I would live here forever in the blissful ignorance of OS apathy but when support for it stops in 2025 and I am force marched into the Windows 11 I may jump ship and run off into the wilds of Linux again.
I use Linux because the Steam Deck convinced me that gaming on Linux is a thing. Before that i was hesitant to make the jump, even though I've used UNIX before Windows 3 even came out
It makes me happy to read this same basic message repeatedly. I've been a Linux enthusiast since the late 90s, but back then it definitely felt like it was never going to be a mainstream replacement for Windows due in large part to gaming.
I know Valve isn't getting nothing out of their investment, but all the same I'm so appreciative that they didn't abandon their Linux efforts after Steam Machines didn't catch on.
This is why I didn't switch until this year. Valve really did a great thing by driving this adoption and I feel like with Proton in the state it's in, there's really not much you're giving up by going to Linux these days.
The list of actual pain points is ever shrinking now. I can't imagine switching back in 95. You had to put up with so much inequity for a lot of that time.
Back around 95/96 I once untarred a etc directory from a Slackware install over a redhat etc directory. It booted and worked perfectly. It was really hard to update though. Redhat started out as Slackware.
I keep one machine with slackware installed. I use it for various purposes include light desktop use. I occasionally compile a kernel. Just to keep the skill. My daily drivers are Debian and Ubuntu machines though. These pretentious new users(arch, cough, cough) probably wish they had the patience to keep a Slackware installation going full time.
I'd just like to interject for a moment. What you're referring to as BSD, is in fact, FreeBSD/NetBSD/OpenBSD, or as I've recently taken to calling it, BSD-based operating systems. BSD is not an operating system unto itself, but rather another free component of a fully functioning BSD-based system made useful by the BSD kernel, libc, and other essential components of a complete OS.
Many computer users run a modified version of the BSD system every day, without realizing it. Through a peculiar turn of events, the version of BSD which is widely used today is often called "FreeBSD," and many of its users are not aware that it is basically the BSD system, developed by the FreeBSD Project.
There really is a BSD, and these people are using it, but it is just a part of the system they use. BSD is the kernel: the program in the system that allocates the machine's resources to the other programs that you run. The kernel is an essential part of an operating system, but useless by itself; it can only function in the context of a complete operating system. BSD is normally used in combination with the GNU operating system: the whole system is basically GNU with BSD added, or GNU/BSD. All the so-called "BSD" distributions are really distributions of GNU/BSD!
I had that attitude for a while too. Eventually you realise that having to reboot your system for a handful of games isn't worth it. Nowadays I just don't buy games that don't run on Linux.
Eventually we will reach a critical mass where game developers will actively develop for Linux, rather than being reliant on compatibility layers.
Yeah, about half of my library already runs on Linux.
The problem I have now is that, soon, I'm gonna want to do a reinstall so Linux can have more disk space. :) My PC's pretty fast, so the reboot doesn't really bug me all that much.
