Wubuntu: The lovechild of Windows and Linux nobody asked for : technology

[–] [email protected] 197 points 2 weeks ago (14 children)

If you're trying to figure out who this is for, the answer is "My clients."

We deploy systems that have to run as servers, but need a UI because the people maintaining them are brain dead idiots. Windows Server isn't an option because each system sells at a fairly low price point; adding on the cost of a server license would kill our margins. So we need an OS that runs like Linux, but looks like Windows.

Now you might be thinking "Just use KDE? It's got a start menu, everything is still in basically the same places, and the only software anyone runs is a web browser." And you would be vastly underestimating the degree to which moving any component of the UI even the slightest bit causes the average user to shit their pants in terror and freeze up like a deer in the headlights. You'll point to the start menu and they move the mouse towards it like you just instructed them to defuse a bomb. Eyes closed, they'll instinctively lean back from the screen in sheer terror as they click.

These Windows alikes are useless for any Linux user, but incredibly helpful for people like me who have to turn Windows users into Linux users.

[–] [email protected] 75 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

I feel this so much it hurts.

Some people are TERRIFIED of devices.

They look at the UI like it's the cockpit of a fighter plane, with a thousand buttons, some of which make things explode.

Unless they know exactly what to do, they won't even try anything.

Nevermind that UIs are usually designed to allow a user to figure them out by just prodding at everything and seeing what it does.

[–] [email protected] 58 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I remember once seeing an explanation of how us tech people magically know what to do with any program that was like "We don't. We just look for something that seems vaguely familiar and try clicking it." Three bars in a hamburger shape? That's a menu. Oh, look, a cog, that always means settings, what we want is probably a setting. Etc.

[–] [email protected] 32 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

https://xkcd.com/627/

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 weeks ago

Y'know, it probably was that, now that I think about it.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Meanwhile give root access to a CEO because he demands it, and he'll happily copy and paste "sudo wget piped to bash" commands copied from some forum into your production server

idk, I'd rather have users fear a bomb is about to go off than people exploding a bomb without even hesitating to think if they should proceed

[–] [email protected] 42 points 2 weeks ago (4 children)

Just use KDE?

It is just KDE though. Its just a plasma skin. But what you get by installing Wubuntu instead of a proper distro, and then applying a skin, is supporting a developer with a history of bad security practices and poor behavior. Not to mention the potential copyright issues. This whole project will probably die when Microsoft realises that someone is using their name and trademarks to sell a competing project.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 weeks ago

Perfectly valid. I'm not endorsing the product, just explaining the use case.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Yeah, just install Mint or something with that skin installed.

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[–] [email protected] 26 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (2 children)

If you don't mind me asking, what sort of servers/clients do you work with?

[–] [email protected] 54 points 2 weeks ago (9 children)

I don't mind you asking the question, but the answer is "No comment."

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[–] [email protected] 24 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

While it might seem interesting for your usecase, please be careful which specific distro you use, especially when it comes to "windows-like" distros. Wubuntu (previously LinuxFX) has terrible security for your payment info, and the developers have made a ton of questionable decisions.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 weeks ago

Oh man, I feel that pain. But here's where I'm at: after so many decades of really trying, really trying to get them to learn what a file system is and how computers, y'know, work, I'm done.

Obviously I don't do that work for pay, but when I did I went with the assumption that people were just ignorant, not stupid. Now I think they're just incurious - which is a kind of stupidity. And since the vast majority of their lives are now controlled, monitored, or involve these systems they can't be bothered to learn - yeah, sucks to be them.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Lemmy needs a best comment section like reddit had

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 weeks ago

Be the change you want to see in the world:

[email protected]

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 weeks ago

Ooh, I'm a brain dead idiot, are your clients hiring?

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[–] [email protected] 63 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

Years ago I got my parents to switch from internet explorer to firefox by putting IE's icon over firefox...this has the same vibes. If you have someone technologically illiterate in your life who pretty much only uses the browser...yeah this idea could work.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

~Worked fine for my grandparents. The switch for them was about as annoying as switching windows versions

And it greatly reduced the spyware cleanup visits

[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 weeks ago

I did the exact same thing. IceWM with XP skin, Firefox with an extension that changed the name in the title bar to internet explorer + a IE theme. Then Thunderbird with an outlook theme. For years they used it like this and no longer did I have to clean out viruses or remove IEs additional toolbars that plagued that era.

Occasionally I would run some updates and that was it.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 weeks ago

I have an older friend that has no idea that his laptop uses Windows. He just wants to be able to browse Craigslist for cars and junk. Seems like he has to get a new laptop every two years because his "old one got too slow". I should do something like this for him. He'd never know the difference.

[–] [email protected] 41 points 2 weeks ago (4 children)

Here's the thing......IF it could do what it claims, it would be a game changer.

It tries to claim it's able to be a replacement for Windows, on Linux. It can run Windows native software. It does what Windows 11 does.

And that's the problem. Nobody wants Windows 11. Windows 10 installs are GROWING while Windows 11 are actually shrinking. People are uninstalling Windows 11, to install Windows 10. And you're going to mimic Winfows 11??? Ok. Bad move right out of the gate.

But lets see what it can do. Can it really run all Windows software and completely eliminate the need for microsoft?

In a word.....No. It's just Wine. Same Wine you can do on any other machine. With the same limitations. Nothing special here.

This is just a Windows 11 theme, which is hidden behind a $35 paywall. Yes the basic version is free, but if you came here, you came for the Windows. Part of the Windows apperance is hidden behind a liscense key fee.

So it's trying to be something everyone hates to begin with. Claims it can do something uniquely useful, but fails. Then has the gall to charge you money for the experience.

That's like making fake plastic dog shit, still having to use little baggies to clean it up, NOT getting to spend time with a dog afterwards, and then charging you money for the pleasure of cleaning up fake shit.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 2 weeks ago (7 children)

Lindows II: electric boogaloo.

This is not the first, btw.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (1 children)

Windows 10 installs are GROWING while Windows 11 are actually shrinking.

As someone whose been in the industry a long time I promise you that is not going to last. Starting in January the number of Windows 11 installations will start rising quickly while Windows 10s starts dropping off just as fast. With W10 going EoL in October anyone in a regulated industry will be forced to switch to a supported OS.

Yes I'm aware that you can hop to W10 LTSC for $30 but that is absolutely not going to change much since PC hardware from 2019/2020 is at or near EoL, both physically and from an accounting perspective, so it needs replacing anyway and that new hardware will come with Windows 11.

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[–] [email protected] 25 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Oh sweet, man-made horror beyond my compression

[–] [email protected] 20 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

.tar.gz or .zip?

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[–] [email protected] 25 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Cursed sibling of uwuntu

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

Stockholm Syndrome is real.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

If it doesn't contain a Windows Activation message with a link which leads to a kernel panic, I'm not interested...

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 weeks ago

Kill it before it lays eggs!

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 weeks ago

Michael MJD made a video on this. It’s pretty sketch.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (6 children)

People have been theming Linux to look like Windows for decades. The problem is, theming it doesn't overcome the main sticking point, which is that Linux doesn't run the software many people use for work. I use Linux for my main OS, but then I use Ableton Live, Capture One, the Affinity suite, Adobe Acrobat, Fusion 360, Visual Studio (for legacy .NET) and many people depend on other Adobe software and other professional software, none of which runs well on Linux. So I end up running both Linux and Windows. Theming just isn't the main issue here.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Um, what's the difference between this and Zorin OS?

It's Linux with Wine, that has a theme that looks like Windows. I'll be honest, I'm running Mint with Cinnamon, and since I was already heavily in the FOSS world for gaming, etc., when people see my current PC at a glance, they can't tell the difference between it and my Win10 PC (except for the LM logo on the start menu). I have Wine and DOSBox-X installed too, so I don't need VMWare or another VM set up.

Some people absolutely do want this. Some people even want it in a 'push-the-button' style solution. We call those people 'users'.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

I've never understood this. You go through all the trouble of switching OSes, presumably because you don't like something about it, and then proceed to make it look exactly like what you had?

I personally don't care what my desktop looks like, I hide as much of the desktop stuff so there's more space on screen for what I actually care about. I used GNOME for a year or so because he had a better Wayland implementation, and now I'm on KDE because I wanted to try out Plasma 6 (spoiler, it fixed my Wayland problems) and as long as I can use a key combo to type an app name to launch, I don't have a strong preference between them. I really don't care much between the two, I don't see much of the desktop anyway. I used to use a tiling WM, but I got tired of random apps messing stuff up and then Wayland scrambled the entire ecosystem up, so I bailed.

I admit I did install a "Windows XP" theme when I first switched to Linux, and again when the "aero" theme came out, but I only left it on for a couple days, and mostly to troll friends.

I'm glad the choice exists, I guess I just don't understand it.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

Sometimes the impetus to change OS is not UX related.

In my current case, it's got nothing whatsoever to do with liking or not liking Windows. I actually like Windows 9x, XP, 7, and 10. I bought a computer and wanted to install a clean OS on it (it came with Ubuntu, which I loathe visually and general UX-wise, because it feels like a Mac and seems like no matter what I do, something breaks). I had a choice: go through the effort on my other machine of pirating Win10, or just install Linux. I decided to go with Mint, because it supports the software I want and there's a feeling of familiarity, so muscle memory still works. I had to learn things like using Alt+F2 rather than Win+R, but I feel like I'm in a safer environment to learn than just "here's a new OS, good luck", because I can access those things in the GUI until I learn to do otherwise. Having Wine and DOSBox-X are because I have software that's for Windows or DOS that I like. I still haven't found a solid replacement for Notepad++, for example; and that's not including games.

There's also the "use Linux to make old machines work better and safer" use-case, especially for older people. My mom, for instance, is almost 80. She knew DOS, and she's been acclimated to Windows over 30-odd years. If I want to make her older machine safer and more efficient, I'd install Mint on it compared to something else (I actually can't, because her tax software is Windows-only and does not work correctly in Wine), because again, she'll feel that she's in a safer environment. She already uses OpenOffice (specifically not LibreOffice, because of the print layout differences - seemingly small things like kerning and the like can have a significant effect), and Firefox. She was using Thunderbird for a while but switched to webmail, just for simplicity. I'd have to walk her through PySol, AisleRiot, or another solitaire program, but I'm pretty confident that I could do that. So it should work like Windows for her, except for all the things she won't use.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I've never understood this. You go through all the trouble of switching OSes, presumably because you don't like something about it, and then proceed to make it look exactly like what you had?

What's hard to understand about familiarity?

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

"Dogs and cats sleeping together!"

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

They do, and they are super cute. This thing, instead...

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 weeks ago

There's no Snap, which some will see as a win, but there is Flatpak

You heard it here first, folks! Uninstall Snap and install Flatpak to make your distro more like Windows!

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 weeks ago

Uwubuntu

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

But why KDE? Even LXDE/Qt would suffice to emulate Windows 11' taskbar.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 weeks ago

Why not?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 weeks ago

damn, this is like cancer with hypertumor, instead of destroying and overtaking the parent tumor, they coexisted in a much nastier state.

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