TheHarpyEagle

The Wayback Machine shows it was missing at one point.

http://web.archive.org/web/20240829000336/https://discuss.python.org/t/should-we-consider-ranked-choice-voting-for-sc-elections/61880/

Hard to say why exactly it was hidden, but it’s a bad look for sure.

I think that’s a little too simplistic. I definitely agree that “we can’t show you the evidence of why we made this decision but trust us” isn’t going to instill confidence in the community, but it’s not like the steering council is some unrelated board of executives. They’re all core developers, theoretically chosen for their dedication and contributions to Python as a whole, and it seems their granted power has made them anxious about showing favoritism among the most seasoned at the expense of upholding the community guidelines that keep the Python community a positive and welcoming place.

I think a flawed decision was made, or at least the way it was presented was flawed, and that should be considered for the next election. Maybe the council does need to be totally overhauled, that’s a valid position. But this is their work, too, and imply they have no skin in the game is disingenuous.

Dude can pry my debugger from my cold, dead hands.

To be fair even the most technically adept person can have tunnel vision where they start digging before ruling out all the simple stuff. Yes it can feel tedious and a little condescending to follow all those steps, but you get humbled the first time it really is just an unplugged cable.

I feel like there’s a specific peak between total technical ignorance and a weary understanding of how fickle technology can be. On this peak is the height of arrogance, where you believe you’ve really got everything figured out. Part of learning is understanding that, yes, sometimes you really did just forget to plug the modem in.

I think the rub here is that most developers aren’t developing/publishing their own software, but honing their skills on writing proprietary code while also putting food on the table. To that end, a permissively licensed library is better because the company will actually use it and the developer will gain experience with it that they can then use outside of the proprietary environment to contribute to FOSS projects (some of which may well use GPL). If a GPL end user product gets popular enough, it will eventually be able to use all of that gained experience to compete with the propriety alternatives, so I do think the two can work in tandem.

Indeed, I think it’s just two philosophies that don’t necessarily need to be at odds. Permissive licenses help speed the adoption of languages and libraries, which ultimately feeds into the slowly building momentum of the copyleft projects that use them.

The problem is that a lot of users aren’t building a new machine for Linux, but converting an existing Windows laptop or desktop. In my case, I’d already bought an Nvidia card about a year before I decided to switch to Linux for gaming. Not ideal, of course, but it work a good 95% of the time and I can’t really afford to get a different card right now. I’ll definitely keep it in mind for my next pc upgrade, though.

I know this is just adding to your problem, but I wanna add to the majority and say go with Mint. It’s based on Ubuntu, which in turn is based on Debian, so most anything you can do on Debian, you can do on Mint. This is handy to know whenever you see a “.deb” file.

One of the things that makes it an easier transition from windows is that it’s a lot less strict about including proprietary drivers and codecs (though apparently Debian now includes a few by default). It also includes a few more GUI tools by default, like the package update manager.

I also have found Mint’s Cinnamon desktop environment to be the easiest transition from a Windows environment. KDE is also a good choice in that regard and it’s what I use now, but its plethora of options can be overwhelming for new users.

The distro wars can be pretty overwhelming, but I’d say pick whatever appeals most and go with it. If you get to a point where you can’t do something that you want to do, you can always come back and ask for advice and maybe switch up a different OS.

Honestly I still struggle a lot with this. I can click around a UI and feel what might confuse a user, but building a UI from scratch feels like such a shot in the dark.

I mean, there’s something to be said about adhering to an industry standard. Of course no project has to do so if they don’t want to, but people trying to get on with their work don’t want to spend a bunch of time relearning everything. I think Blender really thrived when they loosened up a little on their ideas of what a workflow should be and gave people industry standard options out of the gate.

Whether we like it or not, GIMP isn’t going to be most people’s first experience with image manipulation. Whether they had a free PS license through school/work, had a subscription at some point, or once got it through ahem alternative means, people will be coming into GIMP with certain expectation of what the workflow should look like and will get frustrated pretty quickly.

You take that back, python is my homie!

In all seriousness, I freely admit that I’m biased towards python because it was my first language and remains my favorite. I use an IDE for anything but the simplest scripts, so I’ve very rarely had any issues with spacing.

The truth is that most people don’t really care. A lot of them don’t even know what an OS is, they just need a machine that lets them browse the internet, write documents, and maybe play some games. An ad is maybe an annoyance to them, but not one that’s going to make them install a new OS. It’s not because they’re dumb or ignorant, it just doesn’t rank that high on their list of priorities (even if we think it should). I think being in these communities kind of makes us forget that a lot of people don’t think that much about tech.

I do think that easy to install/use Linux distros could one day start changing some minds, but that distro won’t be one that’s popular with current Linux users. You’d basically need something that very rarely requires you to touch a terminal, even for troubleshooting, because that’s where people will nope right out.

On the other hand, this is why stuff like that “look at all the data Google has on you” video are important. For us it’s a yeah duh moment, but the average Chromebook user probably has no idea and is rightly surprised about it. Reach people in terms they can understand.

I tried it for a moment, made games stutter like hell, switched back. I know I need to go in and figure it out at some point, but it’s hard to muster the energy when X, for the most part, works fine.

From what I’ve seen, it probably has to do with my Nvidia GPU.

It’s a rough balance when you’re trying to convince people unfamiliar with the internals (let alone non technical people) to make the switch. Saying “Linux is safe, but not bulletproof” may scare them back to the devil they know even if there’s no greater guarantee of safety there.

I have no horse in this race, I don’t have strong feelings about it either way as long as it works. But I can’t help but notice that OP skipped replying to me.

What is the benefit of no systemd?

I’m learning that I’m just enough of a front end dev to make a very ugly site. Navigating all the various CSS and JS frameworks feels like pulling teeth.

At our company, the person who specializes in that is dubbed Software Architect. Every dev is expected to uphold those values to a certain degree.

I used to be like Jarvis here, but I’m a convert. I actually was tired of using my mouse all the time, so one day while writing up some docs, I decided to give Vim a try.

Honestly, I hate to say it but, I can’t go back. It’s so nice to be able to do so much from the keyboard alone.