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linux thoughts

Before switching to Linux, I used to acknowledge that Linux was 'probably' better than Windows, but I wasn't the targeted audience to use it. I'd imagine Linux users to be really well versed in how their computer works, and have the dedication to configure/modify things around in order to get simple applications to start working. I had preferred something that worked straight out of box, and besides my Windows setup works perfectly fine for me, so why should I switch?

Windows frustration

In school, we used Virtual Machines that were running on Linux for a bunch of CS classes, ex CS128, an introduction on cpp programming and CS225, which is data structures with cpp. In addition, up until this point, I was still doing competitive programming with Java on an IDE (IntelliJ). So I pretty much never had to set up a compiler/interpreter.

So I wanted to use cpp in a text editor for competitive programming, and especially since I was going to take CS491-CAP, a special topics course on competitive programming, I really should get this set up before the course starts.

But setting up the cpp compiler was actually so difficult on Windows, I don't even how. I think I was just trying to install MinGW compiler and was following the direct steps on the VSCode Docs and it still wasn't working. I don't know if I messed something up with user variables or PATH, or one of the other steps along the way. Maybe I'm just bad at using a computer but it cant just be me struggling considering that the windows installation is the only one that has 8+ steps and video tutorials. And also it keeps going from TUIs and GUIs like can we stay on one thing? Why must installation be so inconvenient and difficult?

So I ended up just installing a c/cpp IDE (CLion, continuing the JetBrains streak lol) and just using that for the course. And during the course, and even now (as a course assistant), I keep noticing other students using online cpp compilers. So it definitely wasn't just me!

Other miscellaneous windows frustrations I had after using windows on the same laptop for 5+ years:

surprise windows updates!

bluetooth randomly stopped working (could not recognize new devices)

new wifi networks were also 50-50 on whether they could be recgonized

Switching

So i first switched to Linux mint (cinnamon) just because I heard it was very beginner friendly (and I cant believe I'm saying this now but also "very similar to windows"). And it really was extremely easy to set up, all you needed was an 30-60mins, at least 100gb of free space, and a spare usb.

And yeah out of the box it was pretty visually similar to windows. Its like you get to use all the parts of windows that you are used to (GUIs, etc) but with none of the bloat + Bash.

In addition, switching wasn't as much of a commitment as I expected. With dual booting you can switch back to Windows whenever you want, you can access the same files regardless of OS. I ended up using Linux as my daily driver, but used Windows whenever I wanted to play a game that didnt have Linux support (I love my kernel access game league of legends!)

Lastly, APT package manager is just so nice, and I never had a single issue with it. The entire cpp fiasco mentioned earlier to fix took less than a minute to install on Linux and start using. Maybe gcc is just better and this wasn't an apt thing but point still stands !!!

Distro hopping

After a few months on Mint, I switched to Fedora. Mint is nice and ultimately if you just want something that "works" with zero configuration/need to ever touch code it's pretty much perfect.

I switched to Fedora because I got a new laptop (ThinkPad) and just wanted to try something new on it. Fedora is also extremely beginner friendly too in my opinion. If you don't want to configure things at all, visually, GNOME is very similar to MacOS and KDE is very similar to Windows. Also takes less than an hour to set up and start using.

Ultimately if you spend the time to configure things though, your OS can look like whatever your want!

This section's title is called "distro hopping" because when i first got my new thinkpad laptop, I was considering trying out a few other distros before settling down on one, but honestly I just stuck with Fedora cause it's just amazing. Maybe I'll add on more about Fedora and how AMAZING! it is another time but I'm just going to end this blog here.