Why the Linux ecosystem cannot be considered “standardized”, unlike Windows and Mac?
Same reason “clothes” cannot be considered standardized. Someone will think standard is jeans and T-shirt, for others it’s a suit, and for others a dress, some will change clothes regularly, and others will only wear Nike shoes. If you try to define what everyone should wear you’ll get people pissed off, and they will still wear what they want.
I guess it depends on how “standard” is defined. Ie, its pretty standard for shirts to have 2 arm holes, one head/neck hole, and one body hole and therefore they work for the vast majority of users.
Yes, but that’s like saying “it’s pretty standard for DE to have one minimize button, one maximize button and a close button”. I chose clothes because they can’t be standardized for the same reason as Linux, i.e. they’re modular and people have different tastes on each of the modules, so the full thing can never be standardized even if some of the modules are quite similar among themselves.
You could consider Ubuntu, Red Hat Linux and Oracle Linux to be about as standardized as Windows or Mac. These distributions are usually what larger enterprises use for servers and sometimes for software development, IT operations etc. These are about as standardized things get in the linux world.
Now when it comes to using Linux as daily driver there are so many options out there and none of the distributions have really yet hit the mainstream. For my understanding it’s been long been battle between Ubuntu and Fedora with their derivatives but with SteamOS using Arch Linux would not be surprised if some sort of Arch based distribution with maximum Proton combatibility would gain popularity.
Arch itself seems too minimal to be considered as “standardized” operating system.
battle between Ubuntu and Fedora with their derivative
Agreed in general. Except that Ubuntu is itself a derivative, of Debian. Technically it’s Debian that’s the peer of Fedora.
Mentioned Ubuntu since its backed by Canocial and fairly popular desktop distro. Mentioned Fedora instead of RHEL because RHEL is mostly used for servers and maybe in schools or high security environments.
There isn’t any one single entity calling the shots like Microsoft or Apple.
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Because linux doesn’t have an “ecosystem”. You have to either make your existing ecosystem work with linux or center your ecosystem around apps and things that work with linux. I do that and I’d say it’s more standardized than both the windows and the mac ones…
Who says it can’t? I don’t accept your premise.
I don’t understand the question. There are definitely standards like POSIX that exist.
Because it’s not, in my opinion.
Linux has standards, but virtually none of them are all-encompassing across all the installs. For example: Which distribution? Which desktop manager? Which package manager? Which kernel version?
A Windows install at one location looks and feels — and has the same code and dependencies and is compatible with the same installs and management functions — as any other location, barring specific policy considerations. Same for macOS. Not for Linux.
One can build a Linux standard for their environment, yes; but in my opinion considering Linux itself as “standardized” just isn’t there.
To me I’d consider Linux not standardized since anything outside the kernel can be swapped out. Want a GUI? There are competing standards, X vs Wayland, with multiple implementations with different feature sets. Want audio? There’s ALSA or OSS, then on top of those there is pulse audio, or jack, or pipewire. Multiple desktop environments, which don’t just change the look and feel but also how apps need to be written. Heck there are even multiple C/POSIX libraries that can be used.
It certainly can be a strength for flexibility, and distros attempt to create a stable and reliable setup of one set of systems.
It all comes down to
- User Interface (linux is just not as easy to use as e.g. MacOS)
- Applications/Software (yes there is a flatpack (and others) store but it‘s not nearly as usable as Mac App store/windows store
- Installation (Most laptops/desktops don‘t have linux as base Model Option)
- Security and setup - in Mac or Windows the UI is a base component you mostly cannot destroy using one line of Terminal code
- the most user „friendly“ Part of Windows/mac you don‘t have to use terminal, but for linux you Most likely have to
i love mac, but windows in comparison to linux is still more „user friendly“ sadly
There was a the POSIX standard…
Because freedom.
Windows is one OS, with limited ability to customize. Mac is one OS, with limited ability to customize.
Linux, as a core concept, is hundreds of OSes that anyone can customize any of, at will, to meet their requirements. Different versions of Linux diverge because different people/projects want different things.
It is standardized. Just tge circles need to be drawn differently. Microsoft DOS was not the only DOS, and they had compatibility issues.
Red Hat Enterprise Linux is one standard. Mac OS Unix. Ubuntu Linux. Microsoft Windows OS. OS/2 Warp OS.
All different, all standardized, often not compatible or interchangeable.
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The attraction of Linux is precisely that it isn’t one of the two ‘standards’. Your working environment doesn’t get determined by some product manager in a far-away office, who has a set of target users in mind, which he’s given fictional names, biographies and mugshots.
