Wrong even as a joke.

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You likely have not heard of a distro because there are so many, the sea can be rough but then finds shore.

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Windows
- Allows programs to hide from the task manager.

That feature alone sent me running for the hills over a decade ago.

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Good way around that is hardware, watch what you buy!

https://www.crowdsupply.com/sutajio-kosagi/novena

There were two desktop products called Windows.® The first was a GUI add-on to MS-DOS. Then, the whole thing was rebuilt using "NT = New Technology," with a true and fully-featured pre-emptive kernel and a large number of very-innovative ideas. All subsequent Windows implementations – and, the only ones of interest today – were built on the NT platform.

User interfaces, however, are a very interesting (and unique) feature of Linux/Unix. These are actually very old concepts and original implementations that were lifted straight from Unix. The so-called "XWindows" system (no relation ...), and later "XOrg," are client/server(!) windowing systems, upon which a great many very different GUI systems have been built. Some look very much like MS-Windows. Some most-decidedly do not. Unlike MS-Windows, you can have "windowing" without "a GUI." Unlike MS-Windows, you can run a "GUI session" against a remote machine that doesn't even have a graphics card. Also unlike MS-Windows, you can dispense with a GUI altogether and use a terminal-based command line. (Or, you can do both at once, without a "terminal window!")

It might well surprise you, also, that mainframe systems – IBM and otherwise – support GUIs today, also! They use the XWindows/XOrg approach to do so. IBM's venerable "3270 terminal" will never disappear, I'm quite sure, but today there are alternatives. (And if you've ever had a chance to watch Unix or Linux running on a "big iron" mainframe natively ... "holy smokes!" )

And as for the last paragraph, well, I'll just leave the "troll bait" where it lies, since the fact of the matter is that both systems are happily earning their keep, every day.

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Two desktop products?

The Windows desktop from version 1.0 through ME was run in user space just like all linux distributions. The video was moved to kernel space in version NT. For all the youngsters Windows 1.0 was basically Midnight Commander that ran on DOS 2.0. The ancient X Window System was designed in 1984 that eventually was implemented in linux has a few problems but IMHO not an afterthought. Since you have one Windows desktop I would expect it to just work.

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@jamison20000e, you've been around long enough to know some of the replies you've posted here (#11 as an example) are not appropriate for LQ.

--jeremy

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I would disagree. I have used linux, and I find using Windows to be quite difficult when I'm on it. It simply doesn't work the way I'm used to. MOST people, yes, will think the opposite. Doesn't actually mean either is difficult to use, it's simply DIFFERENT from what one is used to and so SEEMS difficult.

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When I first got started with Linux in what 2000 I could not have agreed more but it was fun though! Maybe even 5 years ago I would still have agreed.

Nowadays, pop in a Ubuntu, Manjaro, Mint DVD and within 30 minutes you've got a modern shiny desktop sat in front of you

I'd even go so far as to say that my beloved Arch, as long as you can read straightforward instructions and don't mind a little typing, ain't that bad to set up.

As for being difficult to use, again back then yes, these days not so much. A lot of the distros do a great job of handholding and 'GUIfying' the experience.

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Dumbing down is more like it.

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Not really, the options are still there for those of us who choose to use them.

What it does do is provide a simpler experience for people new to it which is a good thing.

So rather than being scared off by having to decipher a meaningless command line the new user can click a few options and get the same effect, he is happy and doesn't go 'f this back to windows for me!'

The more users Linux has, the stronger it becomes, new or old should feel welcome

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The notion of a client/server architecture of XWindows/XOrg, plus the fact that it runs as user-mode programs (either on the same computer, or different ones), is the thing that makes it truly distinct. There's none of the tomfoolery that "Windows remote desktop" has to fool around with – "schlepping bitmaps around" – because the client, wherever it may be, renders the bitmaps, itself. Furthermore, if the remote system is running only the "server" portion, the resource consumption of that portion is comparatively slight. If the chosen GUI is using OpenGL shape-drawing primitives, i.e. a "not-so Windows-like" look, then the communication between the two parties is "lean and mean." (A very considerable amount of Windows' CPU-time is spent drawing pretty pictures, and you can neither "turn that off" nor wedge it out of "kernel space" ... where, quite arguably, it never belonged.)

If your "headless" remote Linux box has no need for a GUI, you're not obligated to have one. But, on the other hand, you can, and if you do, it will be very efficient.

- - -

Being exposed to "something that doesn't work the way you've become accustomed to" is disruptive, no matter what "what you've become accustomed to" might be. Hell, I knew of (crotchety old ...) "character-mode Word Perfect users" who complained that GUIs "forced them to use a mouse."

And yet, millions of people use iPhones and Macintoshes and have no idea that there's Unix under there. Android users have no idea that their phones are (sort of ...) running Linux.

Linux is not that difficult to break. because all you got a do is type in the wrong rm command and everything is gone.

Where as going to the wrong website.?! Hi, I'm a 3rd party and I will get your money one way or another that's the agreement!

Jargon in computer terms is now cool but in politics and laws is for a long time coming not free... don't vote for people only policies!

In a most simple sense, an OS controls how a computer interacts between input and output.

At the machine level the actions are machine code. An OS controls how the machine code directs hardware. Windows and Linux and other OS's control machine by using different higher level coding.