Given all the game-related posts, I thought I'd post a work-related one:
In September, after beta testing the privacy nightmare that is W10, I dual-booted my work desktop and travel laptop. Since then, Mint has been my daily driver. This weekend, I deleted the Windows partition from my laptop and travel next week without the ability to fall back on Windows.
I have only booted into Windows twice since September. Once because I was on the road and needed to use PhotoShop for a minute tweak for a client. The second time was on Friday, figured I'd patch up before the trip, just in case. I don't know whether I only now noticed it but the update option no longer exists. You can't choose a time to patch, you just have to leave the computer running and wait. This is a mind-bogglingly stupid decision by Redmond. First, there's the telemetry without end. Now you can't choose a time to update? Goodbye.
Things I have learned:
- Libre Office 5 is a superb improvement over the previous release and is vitually as compatible with Office 2013 and 2016 as Office 2010. A win.
- Backups with rsync were a already godsend on servers. Now I have it native on my desktop. A big win. (Plus bash? Awesome!)
- Office 365 works the same across any OS. Chrome or Chromium does seem to work best. Gone are the days when Linux was an endless also-ran, so another win.
- Photoshop + Wine. When I need it, it works perfectly. A definite win.
- Dropbox and other cloud *aaS services just work. Win.
- Printers and scanners work as they should. A few tweaks can be needed but the manufacturers are shipping Linux drivers that pretty much just work. Gone are days of tweaking cups and hoping something prints someday. A big win.
- Lower attack surface is another win. Same is all the free, functional, and stable software.
The only thing I have yet to resolve is searching for text within .docx files. If anyone can recommend a tool that unzips the archive and permits direct searching the xml content I'll be at an all win. In a world of machines being eaten by ransomware, I wonder why organizations aren't moving in this direction?
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[–] Psylent 0 points 1 point 1 point (+1|-0) ago
We haven't made the move because there it's very hit and miss with solidworks - some people can get it to run on wine ok, (ok not 'well') - There are still some major drawbacks like nvidia drivers - if you install nvidia drivers from the site and upgrade your system chances are gnome will break - this requires some cli usage to get it working again.
I think the main issue really is that software developers just don't support it. Because there are just so many distros with so many differing issues that can arise it's a nightmare for support.
In saying that - the only distro I have actually got to function well enough to a point where I no longer have windows is fedora and even with it solidworks is just not happening.
Yes there are alternatives, but try telling your boss who forked out $14,000 for a bit of software that we can't use it anymore . . . .