Not everything actually requires a GUI, obviously. But anything that requires configuration, especially for controlling a hardware device, should have a fully functional GUI. I know Linux is all about being in control, and users should not be afraid to use the command line, but if you have to learn another bespoke command syntax and the location and structure of the related configuration files just to get something basic to work then the developer has frankly half arsed it. Developers need to provide GUI’s so that their software can be used by as many people as possible. GUI’s use a common language that everyone understands (is something on or off, what numeric values are allowed, what do the options mean).
Every 12 to 18 months I make an effort to switch to Linux. Right now I’m using Archlinux, and it has been a successful trip so far, except my audio is screwed, I can’t use my capture card at all, I had issues with my dual displays at the start, and the is no easy way to configure my AMD graphics card for over clocking or well anything basic at all.
I’m not looking for a windows clone, I love that I can choose different desktop environments and theme many of them to death. I even like the fact there are so many distros. Choice is a big part of linux, but there is clearly a desire to get more people moving away from Windows and until that path is 95% seamless most people just won’t. Right now I think Linux is 75% to 85% seamless depending on the use case and distro but adding more GUI front ends would, imho, push that well into the 90% zone.
GUI is not a dirty word, it is what makes using a new OS possible for more people.
EDIT: Good conversation all. This is genuinely not intended to be a troll post, I just feel it is good to share experiences especially on the frustations that arise from move between OSes.
I agree that having better GUI is a generally good thing and that most of us would benefit from it. However it’s false to state or believe that Linux in its totality is bereft of this. Distros like openSUSE, MX Linux and Garuda Linux have put in considerable effort into offering tools that enable one to config a lot of stuff through a GUI. However, it doesn’t make a lot of sense to complain about the lack of GUIs if you (or whosoever for that matter) don’t use one of these distros. Arch has minimalism as one of its design goals, so you either have to find the binaries/apps/packages (or whatsoever) that allow you to config through a GUI or you’re out of luck.
I was worried Arch would have me at the command line more than Mint or Fedora, but it hasn’t felt like that. I’m using KDE plasma so I’ve got all the same tools (or can install them if needed). The GUI elements missing in Arch are missing in Mint and Ubuntu, Fedora, PopOS, all of them. I happen to be struggling through an audio issue right now. Can you find an OS that lets you change the Audio sample and bit rates without messing with config files ? This is basic function, and the PulseAudio and Pipewire have been around long enough for a GUI to have been created, but no, it doesn’t exist.
The GUI elements missing in Arch are missing in Mint and Ubuntu, Fedora, PopOS, all of them.
I would agree that they’re roughly in the same ballpark as long as you had picked KDE Plasma on Arch. Though I would argue that Mint and PopOS have a noticeable lead, though I don’t think that point deserves more discussion. However, none of them come close to something like openSUSE’s YaST or MX’ Tools. That’s why I deliberately mentioned them. Perhaps worth a watch for those wondering how Windows compares to different Linux distros GUI-wise.
I happen to be struggling through an audio issue right now. Can you find an OS that lets you change the Audio sample and bit rates without messing with config files ? This is basic function, and the PulseAudio and Pipewire have been around long enough for a GUI to have been created, but no, it doesn’t exist.
I’m unfortunately unaware of any solution for that. Wish you good luck!
Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/watch?v=RSaUj_Okbnw
https://piped.video/watch?v=wZNgr9SWiAw
https://piped.video/watch?v=5-DD4AvtuyU
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source, check me out at GitHub.
as long as they are where you expect them
This has to be my number one gripe about Linux. How every package just spews binaries and libraries and config files all over the place. “Where the fuck is the actual executable and its configs? Is it in /usr/bin? /usr/sbin?/usr/local/sbin? Who the fuck knows.”
God help you when you uninstall and clean things up if you use compiled packages instead of ones from your repository.
edit: mixed you up with OP, but, meh, unaltered reply:
Where the fuck is the actual executable and its configs?
which ...with … being the name of the executable. Whyever it matters to you in which exact path an executale is …God help you when you uninstall and clean things up if you use compiled packages instead of ones from your repository.
make uninstallorxargs rm < install_manifest.txtwill usually do the trick. If neither is an option, observe the output ofmake -n installand undo the installation manually.Judging from your post and comments, you’d be much better off with a distro other than arch and using packages from a distros repository plus maybe flatpak or snap.
This has to be my number one gripe about Linux. How every package just spews binaries and libraries and config files all over the place.
99.9% of the times those places are pretty well defined and easy to look up. You seem to lack some basic knowledge about linux/unix conventions and make false assumptions about how things should be and then come to judgemental conclusions when they aren’t.
Finding the actual location of the executable is what the
whichcommand is for.If the package comes from the repo, you can uninstall it by the same name you used to install it. If it came from a .deb file (in case of debian), you can find out how the package calls itself and use that name to uninstall. Usually the package name is quite identical to the file name. And
dpkg -Lshows you which files came from the package and where they were installed.
I’m with you. I’m a seasoned newbie, and I’m ok with config as long as I can find something to help me get through it where I’m. It completely lost and the guide isn’t 30 pages of gibberish that only makes sense to someone helping build and maintain the source/branch.
I do love the familiarity of a gui as it lets me be “lazy”.
That said I started on Ubuntu, didn’t really like gnome, tried kububtu, was meh on it. Then got to dislike cannological. I’m currently using mint, and have tried several distros as a vm. Fedora and Debian are 2 I’m trying to understand better.
That said arch and gentoo both seem like distros beyond my skill set, and I think I’d struggle with them as I don’t feel like the communities align with my needs. I feel like I should get better at stripping out what I don’t need in my distro before I start bare and build up finding only what I need.
The cool part of Linux is it’s kinda hard to go wrong with the choice as a platform. Picking the distro has been a harder choice to find what community aligns to my needs. So virtualbox, ‘kinda’ to the rescue.
The GUI may have only a subset of the possible options, or be out-of-step with the config file—I’ve seen both.
If you want a gui, pick pop os, linux mint, etc. If you really like the arch package managers, install something like the KDE or GNOME flavors of endeavour or garuda. Stop deliberately choosing a terminal heavy distro.
I disagree. This year I’ve run through Fedoro, mint and ubuntu, (Skipped PopOS but tried it last year). Other than the installer, I don’t feel like I’ve needed to use the command line any more in Arch than I have in the other distros. It is the desktop environment that makes most of the difference anyway, and anything not present out of the box can be installed easily. Pamac is very good, and not hard to install, so there is an app store like feature if you want it.
At the end of the day, you can install practically anything on any distribution, and if anything, it’s significantly easier on Arch too. This however is not a GUI issue, but a knowledge issue. We’ve already seen that you can brick your entire installation somehow, by installing a Steam client.
This post feels a lot like a foreigner coming to someone’s country, and then screaming about how everything is wrong. You can either spend some time learning how everything works, or you can just… not use it
You get the GUI you pay for unfortunately.
Someone else must have paid for you :)
The “Devs, do this thing for me” attitude rubs me the wrong way. Everything in the OS world comes either from a labour of love, or someone paid someone else to make it happen. We have no right to demand anything, only politely request it.
(To be clear, not having a go at you, more directed at the OP)
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Try OpenSuse. Tumbleweed is a rolling release that is fairly stable and it has Yaast, which allows you to control everything with a GUI, even if it looks quite dated
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what command line options are you needing for audio? i use kubuntu, and the only reason i hit the CLI is to provide a special output so i can implement multiroom audio, with Snapcast.
Otherwise, i think i could install most stuff without it. OO, maybe spotify needed to add an apt repo, however i think there maybe a seperate installer (snap?) which would negate that.
i feel like you were not going for a vanilla instance if the latest kubuntu/ubuntu needed work.
I have a post about it here: https://lemmy.ml/post/3624730
Entitlement: the post!
https://gitlab.com/corectrl/corectrl
CoreCtrl is a Free and Open Source GNU/Linux application that allows you to control with ease your computer hardware using application profiles. It aims to be flexible, comfortable and accessible to regular users.
Hey Linux devs - Build a GUI or gtfo
No you can GTFO if that is your attitude towards people volunteering their time to bring you an open OS and all the tools you need for free.
Yes, there is still a lot of room for improvement but attacking devs for not providing a GUI is not a good way to interact with the community. If you really want to see improvements then you need to help make those improvements with constructive discussions not hostile statements. We owe you nothing.
My title was intentionally flipant.
No, your title was rude and condescending. “Flippant” is a different thing.
Flippantly insulating the Linux devs is not the way to improve things. It has evolved and continues to do so. There are far more GUI tools for managing things then there has ever been. The only thing you have mentioned in your post is AMD GPU overclocking - not something I would consider a novice task nor something most people are going to want to do. So the priority to get a GUI to do this is quite low. Hell, it looks like there are no userland tools at all - only raw kernel interfaces. So it is really something we are lacking any tooling at all - let along GUI tools.
Better to advocate for these tools than insult devs for not having yet created them.
Not evolving is a feature. I started using linux in the 90s, and you know what? About 90% of the stuff I learned then is still completely relevant.
I hate GUI apps for most things, because you have to search to figure out how to do anything. With CLI apps you read the man page and you know how to use it.
I was there during the early days. 93/94. Eternal September was in full swing, a year or two before the a.out / ELF Wars turned usenet into a bloody battlefield of technical debate. I was there when ‘make menuconfig’ was still new to the Kernel build process. Was hell of a lot easier than running ‘make config’ and answering 500 questions in a row. Back when the only way to install SLS/Slackware was to write 50 floppies and feed them all to your target system.
Even then there was a vocal, arrogant group who just didn’t get it. “Devs, if you do this, then Linux will be better”. That’s it. No offer to help, no offer to implement. Not a single line of code. Just long, irritating screeds to “do better”.
And you know, I was there for a bit, too. The sound drivers for my desktop didn’t work. What did I do? I figured it out, built out the appropriate drivers and became the maintainer for the soundcard drivers for about a year or so. Not only did I learn a lot about sound drivers in general, I learned the build process, how to submit patches and… And receive shit little comments from end users on how I could “do better”.
mhub, Linux “gets better” when “you make it better”. What have you done to help? You’re not even posting on the Archlinux boards or groups where someone might actually have an idea and can help. You’re whining and kicking your little heels on Lemmy/Kbin and providing nothing of value.
This is your wake-up call, dude. If you can’t figure it out, then Apple will be happy to sell you a good Un*x workstation. Otherwise, you get to learn along with the rest of us. You are not special. If you can’t figure it out, then write your own.
If I had the time I could probably learn the required languager and code my own solution. But that is never the point. You don’t need to gate keep an OS that is founded on the ideals of openness. The point of Linux is it can be what ever OS you need. The work done to make desktop enviroments more accessible and function is amazing, and if I’m able to help I will. For example, once I have the solution for my audio issue I’ll be posting my fix in a few places. I’ve done this before for Windows and Linux stuff, and believe in sharing the knowledge. I won’t give up until the answer is found, even if the answer is “it won’t work”. Pushing users away because they don’t want to spend days trying to figure out something as basic as audio is not really understnading the point of my post, or helpful to anyone really. Feel free to keep your knowledge to yourself.
If I had the time I could probably learn the required [SIC] languager and code my own solution.
Or… You know… Do anything like “ask a technical question” or even “use ArchLinux forums for support”. Something which would actually help yourself. Seems like you have plenty of time to complain about how developers have “…frankly half arsed it”
…You don’t need to gate keep an OS
I’m not “gatekeeping” a single thing. You never asked a single technical question. You sure as hell didn’t ask a single technical question in the correct venue. No, you spent your precious time pissing and moaning about developers delivering you a functioning Operating System (for free!) but its not “good enough” because you have sound problems. I had sound problems before too! And I fixed them. Sorry you can’t.
Feel free to keep your knowledge to yourself.
Oh man. This line is my personal fave. You have a technical problem. Instead of fixing it you run and bitch about developers on Kbin. Then you bitch about the lack of technical solutions to a problem you never described.
Here’s a free tip. Have you thought about shutting the fuck up and go get help from people who can actually help you?
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PowerUPP: GUI functional AMD GPU configurator for all voltage configuration, frequency tuning, SoC and memory frequency and voltage tuning
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CoreCtrl: GUI usually-functional AMD GPU configurator. Fan curves, over and under clocking, power profiles, frequency and voltage tuning
You have to enable ‘amd.ppfeaturemask=0xffffffff’ in your boot options, but that is clearly stated in the user guide.
For sound, PAVUcontrol or the KDE volume setting GUI have been able to fix 80%-90% of my audio issues. I haven’t used a command line for audio in a long time.
I agree that GUIs make it easier for mass-adoption but things not working out of the box and having to search for solution is just as much of a Windows problem as Linux. If someone has non-standard hardware, it is always a bigger problem to switch to another system. Windows still will randomly shut off my Yeti microphone input and switch to my monitor with no microphone as the system microphone on boot sometimes.
The difference is in windows for weird setups you have to run obscure possible virus runme.msi from 2015 where linux you have to put in an obscure command that you aren’t sure what it does from a forum post from 2015. The only one that has mostly nailed that down is OSX.
PowerUPP hasn’t appeared in my discovery so far. I’ll check that one out. CoreCtrl is the one I’m planning to test so I can’t comment yet. Hopefully they also offer more basic feature controls as well.
PAVUcontrol Doesn’t have a an option to set any of the sample or bit rates. At least not in the version I have.
The difference is in windows for weird setups you have to run obscure possible virus runme.msi from 2015 where linux you have to put in an obscure command that you aren’t sure what it does from a forum post from 2015. The only one that has mostly nailed that down is OSX. I agree with you here. OSX is annoyingly good.
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“Be the change you want to see in the world.”
But anything that requires configuration…should have a fully functional GUI.
Does this apply to ones with only 4 or 5 options to configure, where’s the cutoff? Configuration files set the default flags and arguments, and a lot of command line tools that are configurable are small and simple enough that making a GUI just to configure it is not worth the hassle, the increased complexity and codebase size. The idea is that if the software is one or a few executable binar(ies) with enough flexibility, then contributors who’s proficient with GUI toolkits can write the GUI wrapper (as a separate package), otherwise it’s actually just a waste of time for the main dev(s). If that sounds reasonable, then you could write it yourself, pay someone to do it, or wait for someone to volunteer their time.
To address the problem itself. Maybe you should explain what problems you have with editing the configuration files yourself? I know the cons are: (1) having to know or be able to read toml, yaml, json, ini, or some kind of config syntax (but I think they are designed to be generally quite easy to understand), (2) it takes a bit longer to find and open if you’re not used to it, (3) everything is a file so it’s linear, making it harder to see where things are, so longer configs are a PITA. Good tools I think benefit from a GUI or TUI is TLP, archive managers, calculators, volume controllers, font manager or viewer (kinda obvious), why would you want a GUI to configure, e.g., bat, pacman, i3, dunst, all the xorg stuff like xresources, xmodmap??
In return, the pros are: (1) if there are no external docs, the docs can stay inside the default or sample configuration in the form of comments, whereas for GUI you can’t possible include this information for every single toggle, (2) it’s harder to version control because of increased abstraction, (3) it’s not possible to translate every configuration field to a GUI if it’s beyond just a toggle, you would still have to type things in.
I think having an extra GUI wrapper is a matter of complex balance, and made into reality by contributors and volunteers (or eventually, the devs themselves). To say everything should have a FULLY functional GUI if you have to configure it is a bit of an exaggeration and overreach.
I agree there are times a GUI is just not needed, like for one off configurations that are straight forward and never touched again. I’m not a professional developer but I do write some code, and often the bit that does the work is a few lines and the inferface is a many more lines, just error correction / prevention adds more lines of code.
I have spent the last few days tackling an audio issue that is looking more like it will need me to start building my own kernel. I always do my own investigations and it is that process, the many years of taking the “lets try linux” trip, to realise the basics are what make the OS accessible. Things are so much better now than even 2 years ago, but Linux (all distros) is still missing some basics. Rather than relying on 3rd parties to make GUI’s the original developers should take the responsibility to provide a solid user interface.
Rather than relying on 3rd parties to make GUI’s the original developers should take the responsibility to provide a solid user interface.
The original developers are volunteers that made a tool they needed and shared it with the others of their own volition. They may or they may not make the effort to add anything extra on top of it. Demanding it from them is just unreasonable. If you don’t like their gift to the community, you can provide your own, with blackjack and GUIs.
Frontend and backend are different kinds of development. It’s like me expecting you to write a whole lot of unrelated code just because you want something else. Just because you don’t understand software architecture doesnt mean you can make wild claims with no basis in reality.
Simple one off configs are the easy ones to create GUIs for. The complex ones are a nightmare. That’s when you get very bad UX. Creating a good UX is a lot different for GUI and there are entire companies dedicated to only writing those and here you are claiming small time developers are under an obligation to give you what you want.
GUI seems easier to you because you learned it first. That does not mean it’s better.
How about you gtfo? Linux doesn’t need you and your whining.
But your whiny and lazy ass is better?
Good one
Not everything needs a GUI, but configs should definitely always be available as a consistent json file in a known location. I actually vastly prefer configuring settings in a text file where I can ctrl-f than most GUI’s.
