It’s easier to disable all the garbage than remove the garbage?
Lol, just today i noticed Copilot was on notepad, and rushed to disable that thing. Fuck Microsoft
Someone made a notepad++ package that runs through Wine, it’s on snap. Haven’t tried it though.
sudo snap install notepad-plus-plusnotepadqq is the “fan-made” linux version of notepad++ for linux
Sublime is pretty popular too but i dont like it
I like Kate.
This. Kate is awesome!
For those who want to stick with Windows, Notepad++ is far superior anyway.
Oddly enough, Notepad++ doesn’t really have a full featured native Linux alternative (as of my last deep search around June 2025).
I don’t know what you’d consider an alternative exactly, but Sublime Text is quite good and lightweight
I use Kate pretty much the same way I used Notepad++, except I think I like Kate better since it clicks with my brain. It also probably(?) has more features.
I can second Kate. It’s pretty good.
Same, I was using sublime text but it’s paid and I was just ignoring the messages so I switched to kate
Notepad++ sits at an odd place. It’s heavier than Vim or Emacs. It’s not as feature-rich as some IDEs. That’s why it failed in Linux where alternatives are many.
Oddly enough, Notepad++ doesn’t really have a full featured native Linux alternative
Geany and Notepad++ are built on the same text editing component.
I already use geany as my main DE! It’s got a lot of great features, but it’s not really a notepad app.
How’s Notepad++ compare to VS Code (or VSCodium) they seem pretty similar
Notepad++ is, at its heart, a text editor.
It’s lightweight, can run portably, and has some oddly specific but useful features such as dual window linked scrolling, syntax highlighting, and even allows regex for search/replace which is neat.
You can use it for coding (I use it for short python scripts), but that isn’t it’s main use.
VScode is, primarily, an IDE - not really something you use as a plain text editor.
I’m still looking for a Linux replacement with syntax highlighting like Notepad++. Kate is good, even better performance, but no UI for highlighting. The coding for syntax is way over my head from what I saw.
Kate does have syntax highlighting. You have to configure it once in a JSON and that’s it.
I have no clue where to start with that.
I’ve recently switched from np++ to Sublime for some non-standard issues – I would say that could be closer in performance & extensibility to Vim/Emacs; though limited to GUI and non-FOSS of course.
CudaText is pretty good replacement for notepad++
Never heard of it, so now I will take a look. Thanks for sharing.
I prefer to use Windows 10 and Linux. Seriously!
Gmail has started injecting a fat “Suggestions for responding to emails” feature into my composition space. Really fucking annoying when you’re trying to type something out on a phone. No idea how to begin disabling it, I couldn’t find configurations anywhere in the settings.
I’ve had this email address for over 20 years. Not looking forward to changing it. But enshitification won’t stop.
I access my gmail on my phone browser (I hate email apps because of how intrusive they can be), and for a while it was nice. I didn’t need to enable javascript, gmail just worked.
Then they got rid of the HTML-only frontend, and so I used the javascript frontend, and gmail just worked.
Then they started adding a “Please use the App” banner every Nth time I login. For now, it’s… fine.
Once they get rid of the mobile javascript frontend? Yes, I might have to try using email apps again
Thunderbird is ready to welcome you back. It never left. Email belongs in a dedicated apllication, not a web frontend
Because Linux is still an enormous hurdle for a lot of people, and completely incompatible with lots of proprietary hardware people actually need.
Stop pretending like you don’t understand why 98% of PC users still choose Windows. I’m not one of them, but let’s not delude ourselves, it is tiring.
98% of Windows users, use windows because that’s what the OS that came with the computer they could afford.
98% of windows users probably don’t know what version they are on or even what windows is
98% of Windows users, use windows because that’s what the OS that came with the computer
OEMs pay MS to put it on the computer. Why do you think that is?
they could afford
As if Linux PCs are more expensive?
Apple computers, which is a higher market share than Linux, are more expensive. That’s what I was getting at.
Windows became dominant because of enterprise software sales 20 years ago. Now everything runs in an electron wrapper that can run on any platform or in the browser.
PCs don’t even have optical drives anymore. No normal consumer even knows how to install a program today, let alone is considering legacy program compatibility when making a computer purchasing decision
I am qualifying my statements based on interactions with my coworkers of whom I deploy and manage their PCs. I could probably install mint on 50% of their PCs and the only reason they’d notice is because Microsoft office looks different and is called Libre Office for some reason
Now everything runs in an electron wrapper that can run on any platform or in the browser.
No. If it did Google would be winning with their incredibly weak Chromebooks.
No normal consumer even knows how to install a program today
What is a “normal consumer”? All of them? No. Enough of them that many platforms are dependent on that knowledge, yes.
I am qualifying my statements based on interactions with my coworkers
That sounds like an extreme bias.
Are 98% of PC users using proprietary hardware incompatible with Linux? That would be pretty crazy, considering that that list of hardware is miniscule.
Like, I get where you’re coming from, Linux isn’t a 100% perfect drop in replacement for Windows that covers every single scenario and edge case. But it’s never going to be that, and I don’t think it needs to be that. It’s still good enough to recommend over Windows. That hurdle won’t get any shorter if people don’t at least try using it.
Are 98% of PC users using proprietary hardware incompatible with Linux?
Hardware compatibility is just one of a long list of reasons. The primary of which is usability. Linux can be completely free of ads and pop-ups but it doesn’t matter if it can’t do the things you need it to do, or it’s too complicated to make it do them.
Linux isn’t a 100% perfect drop in replacement
I don’t know where you got this binary position. No, it doesn’t have to be, that’s not the point.
It’s still good enough to recommend over Windows.
You can recommend it all day, if it can’t do what the user needs it to do, you’re wasting your breath. Some of them aren’t mandatory but many of them are deal breakers.
That hurdle won’t get any shorter if people don’t at least try using it.
No one is suggesting anyone shouldn’t try it. But trying it also costs time and (probably) money.
No, it doesn’t have to be, that’s not the point.
Indeed
but you gotta admit it would help mass adoption.
i cannot install linux on my mothers pc, because all she needs is…
excel, and a browser.
and excel isn’t on linux.
and sure, i could show her libreoffice calc - i use that without issue - but she’s not interested in learning anything new these days
and sure, installing excel, specifically, isn’t super easy on windows. But generally, installing a piece of software on windows, is easier than linux. There’s often an installer package downloadable from the website - where as for linux you’re often greeted with a terminal command.
Thats not “mom friendly”, especially not for the stereotypical “mom” who doesn’t know tech.
Phones have made it super easy to install software - and the app stores for mac and windows are good solutions for these non-tech savvy people. Only a few distros have an alternative, as far as i know
There’s often an installer package downloadable from the website - where as for linux you’re often greeted with a terminal command.
Bingo. #1 biggest problem for Linux right there. And the particular terminal command you need will be different from whatever you find, depending on your distro. And the software itself is often not packaged for your distro either. And even if all of that is correct there’s still a good chance it won’t work. Some missing dependency or other generic error comes up with no useful information for even an experienced person to use to debug.
When everything you need can be found in the graphical package manager as a flatpak this will be a solved problem but until then…
Nearly every Linux distro nowadays comes with some sort of “app store” for installing programs, the notion that the only way to install things is via a terminal is outdated. And I’m sure if you slapped a Calc shortcut on the desktop and renamed it Excel, your mom would be none the wiser.
It doesn’t matter if it has an “app store” or not if the software you need isn’t in it.
Go respond to our other thread dude, you don’t get to dodge that one to stir up more bs here
Don’t know what you’re talking about. I am not “stirring up” anything. Just acknowledging the facts that so many Linux users intentionally ignore. They can’t understand why more people don’t use it but then deny the reasons when they’re told.
There’s absolutely no way KDE is “complicated to use” unless your brain is the size of a goldfish grown in a badly kept piece of Tupperware.
An Android phone’s default UI is significanty harder to navigate, compared to the standard Windows desktop metaphor, than KDE’s default UI. People handle Android just fine.
The DE is not the problem…
And what is the problem?
Most Linux distros these days are more usable and less complicated than Windows. It’s not difficult for most people to get it to do the things they need it to do. This view that Linux doesn’t have the software selection or features comparable to an Enterprise Operating System ™️ like Windows is largely outdated and misguided.
No one is suggesting anyone shouldn’t try it.
Mkay, sure, uh huh. You’re being awfully discouraging without explicitly telling people not to try Linux, but c’mon, we know what you’re doing.
Most Linux distros these days are more usable and less complicated than Windows.
Abso-fuckin-lutely not. You’re just lying.
This view that Linux doesn’t have the software selection or features comparable to an Enterprise Operating System ™️ like Windows is largely outdated and misguided.
It isn’t.
You’re being awfully discouraging
I am not discouraging anything. I am being realistic. You are not.
K you wanna try and actually substantiate any of your points, or are you just going to continue to give a “nuh uh, you’re wrong I’m right” argument?
I could but as a Linux user there’s no way you don’t already know this. You’re just in denial.
Could you? I don’t believe you.
LOL, I probs shouldn’t feed the trolls, but here goes nothing.
Abso-fuckin-lutely not. You’re just lying.
We just bought a new PC. And because my family members are kind of adamant on using Windows, we will probably install the latest iteration that M$ has offered.
Funny enough, I am also the techie within the family. As such, I am expected to set it up so that it works as conveniently as possible.
Oh boy… From my reading on the subject, it seems to have become a gargantuan effort to rid Windows 11 of all of its anti-consumer mishaps. Only after doing so, can I actually start setting it up for our use case.
By contrast, if I’d install any beginner-friendly Linux distro, i don’t have to undo anything; setting up starts right after the installation.
I can’t fathom why anyone would prefer the former over the latter, but please feel free to give your take on the matter.
It isn’t.
Stuff like Bazzite has literally become plug-and-play. And breaking it is harder than your average Windows install.
As for software: WinBoat is a very easy (almost) one-click installable piece of software that bridges whatever gap you’re imagining.
I can’t fathom why anyone would prefer the former over the latter
No one prefers it. No one uses Windows because they enjoy the setup process. However:
- The setup process in Windows is nothing but clicking buttons in a GUI. The same cannot be said for most Linux distributions. At minimum they require a software update to even function properly, and there’s no unified way to do this. Good fucking luck looking it up and not finding a bunch of terminal commands that no one even sees fit to explain how to use. And even if they did they probably wouldn’t work on your distro. The last one I used had 2 different software updaters and for the life of me I couldn’t figure out why. And it badgered me with notifications every 5 seconds that there was a new one.
- The setup process is not the problem. I don’t know why you’re still pretending to not understand why it’s difficult to use.
As for software: WinBoat is a very easy (almost) one-click installable piece of software
LOOOOLOLOL it is absolutely not. There’s even like 5 steps in the guided installer and each of them is incredibly convoluted. You’re still lying.
Anywhere they can record user input is considered fair game. They give not a smidge of care about user privacy at all
Remember, Windows will install updates without user intervention. If you remove things, it just puts them back.
Automatic updates are a good thing for the average EU, though. Otherwise they’d never update and their system would probably be compromised.
yeah but they’re not doing just security updates, they’re re-installing bloatware that I deleted a year ago
I don’t need Xbox gaming on my work computer
Then use Pro or Enterprise edition and GPO to disable those features, like every business environment should be doing.
If you can navigate Linux you can handle Group Policy, I promise.
Oh I absolutely think that our IT should be handling this, but that is a weak point at our company (just big enough to use an external company).
I’ve done my time as tech support for this company, I’m not doing that shit anymore.
and regardless of group policies being able to handle this, this shouldn’t be reinstalled anyways if I’ve already uninstalled it.
Automatic, yes.
Forced without consent with no option to disable them? No.
But you can disable them on Windows. It’s a bit more involved, but anyone with a legitimate need to not install updates will have enough knowledge to implement the fixes.
Can you, though?
Because when I was still using W10 a few years ago I tried every trick I could find and it still auto updated…
Yeah, the most permanent way is to mark your network connection as metered.
I like automatic updates when I explicitly turn them on myself. I do NOT like automatic updates when they happen during work hours, force me to close programs and/or restart my PC, and reinstall things that I explicitly removed from my PC.
I do NOT like automatic updates when they happen during work hours,
Windows doesn’t automatically update during work hours. By default it tries to figure out when you use your computer, and it won’t reboot during those hours. You can manually configure it too.
how about a wait and see model that i like with all megacorp pushed updates now. that way i can decide if i want their latest batch of ai bullshit, or read the headlines about which cpus their vibecoding bricked this time before it’s too late.
unfortunately automatic updates require a small amount of trust that the update will not break things or change things without permission. Microslop currently has negative trust.
maybe this is good for the average end user, but dissallowing powerusers from doing stuff like this is exactly what annoys me about apple. now microslop is even worse about it…
i just want to actualy control the things i own and not be told how to use my computer.
How about “it’s entirely possible to automatically delay updates by a month and have the computer give you a one week warning before they install where you can push things back by up to a week every time it pops up indefinitely, so you have the time to set whatever settings you need to not get the suck?”
It’s not ideal, but the reality of a properly configured Windows system is significantly less harrowing than everyone online would have you believe.
Come on, you know the big businesses wouldn’t put up with this shit, so just look up how Windows and these things are managed in Enterprise environments.
Windows sucks. It’s a corporate product made by people with incentives to make it suck. But they also have incentives to give businesses ways around the suck so they don’t lose their market position. So use those tools. If you can manage Linux you absolutely can manage Group Policy and a few lines of PowerShell.
True. At my tech helpdesk, I’ve seen people who keep their Macs on very old versions even if their hardware supports much newer (and non-Tahoe) versions and suffer problems because of it.
For instance, the other day, a woman’s Microsoft Office quit working because she was still on Ventura, which no longer gets security updates. This was on what I believe was a 2022 Macbook.
I think something is seriously wrong with Apple’s update system. I mean, the Windows approach is objectively wrong, but automatic update systems need to be at least a bit aggressive.
what does it matter if the companies are doing the ‘compromising’ instead
I think you mean fetch updates.
The work around it you set your networks to metered, it won’t install updates.
Then in updates menu you hit pause updates then unpause updates, it will check for all app updates and show you a list with “download and install” button next to each. You choose the ones you want.
With non metered networks, it will just force them all on you with no granularity
De-Reddit’ed
Re-reddited
I think the point of the reddit screenshot is to show what Windows users are putting up with, not to share the meme itself.
As you wish…and kept OP’s username.
Many people have a sort of learned helplessness. They don’t really know computer fundamentals, they get scared and stressed so they stop thinking, and then they don’t want to deal with it.
People aren’t rational. They’re emotional.
This take might make you feel a sense of superiority, but it’s a braindead take. It’s not “learned helplessness”, it’s simple convenience.
It’s convenient for the average user to not have to know computer fundamentals. It’s also convenient for users of any tech proficiency to be able to assume that the vast majority of programs will run on their OS with no fiddling required.
To the overwhelming majority of users, their PC is a tool to run programs. Convenience is king in that use-case, because any amount of time fiddling with the tool or any number of situations in which the tool doesn’t work outweighs the benefits in any other metric for the average person.
I dunno, a lot of the people in my life that aren’t tech savvy are inconvenienced. The ads pop up and block stuff. But they don’t know how to do anything about it.
I guess it’s easier to just do nothing and suffer than learn what adblock is. It’s easier to use the shitty defaults.
You need to look at it from their perspective when weighing the inconvenience. You know how to quickly install an adblocker, so it looks like the inconvenience of doing that would be small. But they don’t know how to install an adblocker. And they don’t have the skills to learn how to install an ablocker. They might not even know about the existence of adblockers.
The thing you need to weigh is the inconvenience of them putting in the effort to become tech savvy. That’s a big inconvenience. So, the inconvenience of dealing with ads and whatnot looks much smaller from their perspective.
Also, it’s worth noting that there are plenty of Windows users who are tech savvy. There is a lot of convenience that comes from using the dominant OS even if you have the proficiency to use others.
The thing you need to weigh is the inconvenience of them putting in the effort to become tech savvy. That’s a big inconvenience. So, the inconvenience of dealing with ads and whatnot looks much smaller from their perspective.
Yeah, I can follow the train of thought. They don’t know that like an hour of reading now will save them decades of pain, I guess.
Like, there’s degrees. Learning how to compile Firefox from source with custom changes is way more work than “search: how do I get rid of ads? Search: best adblocker. Click install on ublock.”
Which brings me back to what I was trying to say earlier. People imagine dealing with these problems is way harder than it actually is, so they don’t even look.
Something like this is coming up at work. They’re like “oh it’s going to be like weeks of work to get a linter for our code” and I’m like “it’s fifteen minutes please just let me help you”.
There’s actually a research that sometimes it’s just not in their brain capacity to be more technically savvy.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S107158192400137X
In my 20’s I had this worldview that anyone that wasn’t technically competent simply didn’t have the time or desire to be so. I figured anyone could learn. In my 30’s, in addition to my sysadmin work, I did some level2 helpdesk. OMG I was so wrong.
When they say 50% of the US reads below a 6th grade level, it’s not just reading.
Well that’s fascinating. I’m not sure what to do with this information. Maybe read the study more carefully when I have more time
No, let them keep pushing copilot everywhere.
What’s that word Satya Nadella wanted spread far and wide? Oh right, “Microslop”
How is this Linux related?
Because Windows bad.
IDK friend after 20 years I kinda wish I had the ignorance of the average Windows user. I don’t want to troubleshoot for 3 days, I wanna call a random IT helpline and let them deal with it, but alas, I unfortunately know what I’m doing.
I didn’t know one could call a random IT helpline and get stuff fixed on Windows.
My experience was, either find a workaround or a paid software that did the thing, or live with the bug.But my free security suite that found 358+ viruses and says I’m missing 200 DLLs said to call 1-800-NO-VIRUS and their technician will fix it over the internet!
You can’t, that’s not immediately obvious when the computer is telling you otherwise
Ed: spelling, also this is a pretty obvious joke… I’m not sure why I have to explain this.
So here’s the thing.
In my phone, when I type a phone number, it is a number and does not contain alphabetic characters.
So that thing that it is asking you to call, isn’t callable. Even if you have a fancy physical keypad that has both letters and numbers on the same keys, they still enter numbers when you try to type letters in the number field.Every dial pad I’ve ever seen, including old rotary phones, has numbers and letters on it. This is not new. This has been a thing for over 70 years now.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone_keypad#Letters
Based on this, your phone is the problem, not my phoneword.
Whoosh ?
Because its a phone number substitution set. You type by the letters on the dial pad but if fills in numbers for the phone number.
You could actually do the same on Linux, if you paid for ZorinOS. Not sure if the support is via phone though?
I don’t actually want that, but yeah that’s totally a thing. Zorin, RHEL, I’m certain there are others with support contracts.
Yeah,SUSE too. There’s even some that just offer Linux help regardless of distro
Most windows users call a relative or buy a new computer.
Notepad was the only thing I liked about windows 11.
Getting maybe 20% of the features of Notepad++ standard was nice out of the box. For a fleeting moment, I almost kept it as my default.
Kate is a thousand times better than Notepad and Notepad++
I actually prefer having multiple windows (not split-view) so I can review things side by side. KATE removed the ability to open multiple instances last time I needed to use an editor. So, it’s kwrite on Linux and notepad++ in windows.
Kate lets me open as many windows as I want. I’ve never had that issue before, when did you last try it?
Vim
: set scrollbind
So I recently gave an interview to which, the last question of the product manager cum tech-lead was about how I use AI.
He then specifically asked if I used CoPilot and my negative immediately made him start sighing all over the place.
There seems to be some kind of a push coming from somewhere for these things.Because a CEO hears MS or googles release statements and assumes that good stuff and tells next level down to implement a plan. They are mandated to do something and so start grasping for junk. And force it on lower levels.
Honestly, I would find it more easy to believe that this is a big ploy to stockpile computing and energy resources, while making the general public think that all the rich are fooling themselves.
I find it hard to understand how they can actually believe their hubris, by placing all NN and ML stuff into a single category, regardless of methodology and variation in resource consumption between previously successful and ongoing cash-grab projects.
Also, this company was making train controller HMI for another country. They were going on for hours, spewing buzzwords like, “secure”, “safe” and “mission critical”, but then somehow ended with AI.
Wait until they rename Windows to CoPilot!
Dunno if you saw, office.com now refers to Office (the “launcher” ?) as:
the Microsoft 365 Copilot App (formerly Office)
Can’t wait for
Copilot OS (formerly Windows)
