The LQ Poll series continues. This time, an open ended question: What is still missing from Linux for you?

--jeremy

Honestly, for me it's just firmware updaters. Most companies that provide downloadable firmware updates for their devices (e.g. Logitech trackpads) provide installer for Windows and (almost as often) Mac. Never for Linux.

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Well, I want open source (free software) operating systems to become the most popular in the world. I don't count ChromeOS or Android because most such devices are locked down and don't give you the actual freedoms you would expect.

So I would say that Linux would benefit most from more device driver support and easier installation. In some fantasy dreamland, anyone can download any recent Linux distribution to a USB stick and plug it into any recent hardware with a USB port, install, and start using it. That's not our world today. Installing and using a Linux distribution is easier than it has ever been before, but newbies still have problems.

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A wife that will let me install it ;-)

More seriously, though...

An actual gaming ecosystem (not running PC games under wine). It's a spiral of shops not writing games because there aren't any people playing on linux because there aren't any games being written because there's nobody playing on linux, etc.

printing that doesn't suck

and most importantly, a cohesive, standardized platform for home use. The #1 issue with linux is the fact there are literally hundreds of distros. There's way too much fragmentation, which makes it hard for developers to standardize, which makes it hard to code for the "average" system. Sure, having choice is why we love linux, but that choice comes with a cost; there will never be a "standard" linux that covers the majority. Without that, it will never be anything other than a system to tinker on at home for the desktop space. By contrast, there's a pretty small subset of distros that are used as "enterprise server" installs from companies you can actually buy support from to help maintain 24/7 SLAs.

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rockdw raises a good point about printing. I would expand it to say hardware that doesn't require checking a hardware compatibility list before purchase/Linux installation.

I know this is a manufacturer problem, not a Linux problem, but one can dream.

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Linux mostly just Works.

Yes, when I buy a printer, TV tuner, usb wifi, or any other piece of hardware I need to make sure it's supported. Usually on the questions section of Amazon someone has tried it and leaves comments there.
I am having soooo much fun trying to install linux (any Linux) on a bay trail tablet.
Some of the sensors on my motherboard are available only to Windows.

But I will take that to the following:

Blue Screen of Death.

Forced updates (Windows 10) while on battery away from charger (battery dies in middle of update. Unusable computer. I love to reinstall the OS I really do. And it's really a plus if I lose my data.)

Forced updates (I get to work the computer reboots as soon as I login. 15 - 20 minutes wasted waiting for it.)

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Tax software.

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+1!

I've lived in places practicing social utopia, or "organisations" that just practice some form of social freedom.
So it's not just about Computers/Internet/Linux.
Anyhow, I soon realised one thing:
Fragmentation is the price you pay for freedom.
A democratic process is always more convoluted than a simple decree from a dictator.
It's a price I'll pay gladly anytime, in any context.

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A proper snapshot/rollback facility, installed by default.

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I think Linux has just about everything that most people require, but I will agree that fragmentation & hundreds of slightly different distros is holding it back from gaining ground in the desktop user market.

But I don't want a heavy GUI interface using up my ram, others have plenty & want everything they can install, 'after all it's free'.

Linux is like people, we're all different, & catering for this fact is actually its achilles heel.

I like OpenBSD because you get a fully working base system, with a GUI if wanted; then each person can add what they want on top of it to suit their needs.

There aren't many, (if any), Linux distros like that. The closest I have come is my distro of choice, & that is why I've been using it for several years.

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Among the various reasons why I prefer other operating systems are:

• The Linux operating system (either Busybox or GNU) lacks consistency. The fact that it is basically patchwork leads to unforeseen bugs, unstable behavior and security holes, not mentioning the cluttered UIs.
• There seems to be close to zero QA in a distribution. Even Canonical and the Debian team manage to add ridiculous issues in every release.
• The community should stop considering themselves to be "better" than other communities and acting like it. Honestly, you are not.

That said, I agree with what was said above as well: There is some software missing on Linux and it always will. But, honestly, why should anyone want to restrict himself to one operating system for just everything?

with Dugan.

Non-computer hardware (such as a satnav) that doesn't insist on only talking to windows.

As frankbell said earlier:

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Having worked on a true enterprise class operating system, one that was truly designed for enterprise operations, I can tell you that, with certain very limited exceptions, linux is primitive in comparison. (Windows more so!)

So, what I would want:
1) File and directory generation numbers.
2) The ability to use filestore, and place files, that is independent of the underlying hardware
- This allows files in one directory to be on different partitions, on different media types, even having some in off-line media that when you access, asks you to load the correct media.
3) True separation of the root user from the root directory. No one, and I really do mean no one, should ever be able to get to '\'. EVERYTHING, including the kernel and operating system should be owned by defined user accounts.
4) Having a single root user/account that can do absolutely everything is itself dangerous. Some aspects of this should be hived off into separate accounts/users to give transparency, security and most importantly audit trails of who and when.
5) Job journals.
6) A truly programmable shell. Bash is okay, but not a patch on a CLI language that allows block structuring (nested BEGIN and END), arrays, bool, string and int variables, full looping structures and conditions including CASE, and panoramic conditions. (WHENEVER condition THEN ... FI)
7) Better permissions handling. Linux is limited to read, write and execute. Here I can give a file world write access, but then override that by giving a particular user only read access, giving someone else delete (but not write) access, and then explicitly denying someone else any access at all.
8) For code security reasons, directories have to be designated as executable. Files must not be executable unless they are contained in such a directory.
9) File/directory aliases. Here they fall out of the extended permissions, but are idependently incredibly useful. Some similarities to sym-links, but here the alias and the 'target' are closer related. The 'target' file knows about all it's aliases, so if the target file gets deleted, all its aliases go as well. And aliases point to specific generation of the file or directory.

'My' OS doesn't have a GUI, and in fact doesn't even have graphics capablity, so in that respect linux is very much an improvement. But this improvement does not really address the enterprise side where in fact any graphis processing is handed off to client systems anyway. Lack of FGN's, Job journals, better permissions, and even file aliases are all show stoppers for many people who are wanting to convert to a 'cheaper' OS and hardware. This is especially true for companies and organisations that have millions of mega-bytes of personal (financial, medical, social) data that really does have to be kept secure and accurate.

Now I know I'm never going to get any of these, but you did ask

Dave

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The Linux kernel seems fairly complete to me. I'd say that it exceeds expectations in terms of what it provides, hardware it supports and architectures it runs on.
While the *BSDs for example, are typically a "complete OS", most of those wanting a desktop will still install all of the usual, X.org, GNU and freedesktop.org "patchwork" found in typical Linux distributions. Once they have set things up, the system will usually be indistinguishable from any given Linux.

To get a "complete" desktop or laptop OS, the most viable contenders are still proprietary or semi proprietary - and probably always will be.
I don't think any kind of meaningful QA is possible for Linux distributions aiming to distribute thousands of 3rd party packages. In the same way that e.g. FreeBSD ports doesn't really see any QA either an there is no kind of 'stable update model' (a la Debian, just 'updates' from upstream) nor package signing.

Even a proprietary OS such as macOS can only really QA audit it's own base system software and not 3rd party applications, nor the plethora of crap which can be installed from the web.

Linux distributions such as Debian, simply go above and beyond what would normally be expected.

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