HN user
Absolutely does provide a RAD front-end. It's actually a spectacularly well-provisioned development tool with which you can build Gnome/KDE/terminal apps, and even provides a web forms engine for deploying much the same apps via HTTP.
Its only real issue is that it's a great tool for client-side-first RAD development in an era when much of software development has moved to web-side-first.
Enjoy
Obligatory: if using Linux and want the open source equivalent:
https://gambaswiki.org/website/
GAMBAS is a free development environment and a full powerful object-oriented language and development platform based on a Basic interpreter with optional just-in-time compilation, as easy as Visual Basic™ was.
I worry about this too. I wonder if this same fear was felt by those who lived through the shift in Western Europe from village to industrial town life two centuries ago, and those who likewise lived through the era of post-war growth and leveling of society towards the expanded middle-class into the cut-throat selfishness of the Reagan and Thatcher-era economic rationalism which would in turn foment today's populist backlash.
You state: "My advice as a Linux user of 32 years for normal people is to buy a Mac."
And as a Linux user since the the MCC Interim distro[0] was made available through the floppy-distribution network in 1992, my advice is for most normal users to begin the process of migrating to Linux.
Why? Because even if the Mac has some current advantages over Linux for some normal users today, in the long run, Apple cannot ever be trusted any more than Microsoft can. If you believe that they can be, you're delusional. Whatever enshitifaction process Windows has undergone, whatever further reductions in user rights and freedoms Microsoft has introduced since it became platform hegemon, Apple will do the same. This is almost a law of nature.
Here's an example of this:
https://www.wired.com/story/bytedance-apps-are-no-longer-ava...
No, it is time for everyone to understand that in the long run, if we want a free and open society, the only way that that can be achieved is through free and open software. And as software comes to dominate the operation of society, then this becomes critical.
So, the sooner most every normal user bites the bullet and begins the migration to Linux, the less painless it will be for them in the long run, and the safer for humanity.
Cheers.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MCC_Interim_Linux
[EDIT: Typo.]
Re: "I don't know why I am still perpetually shocked that the default assumption is that humans are somehow unique."
Perhaps this might better help you understand why this assumption still holds: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orchestrated_objective_reducti...
Re: "The Hardware Root of Trust and the binary blobs would still be compiled by a firm that Western governments view as a fundamental supply-chain risk."
Sorry to break it to you, but all of the US hardware firms have now fallen into this same trust-abyss. Trump's USA is now seen in many parts as as big, if not a bigger, digital sovereignty threat as China's communist party is.
Re: "Europe is not doing fine: Europe is definitely a declining, unstable (lots of far-right vs far-left parties opposing themselves in elections in many EU countries now) empire."
If this is reality in Europe, which is perhaps likely, then by comparison, the US has devolved into failed-state status. Better a slow decline than a catastrophic fall into the constitutional/regulatory/legal/technological/scientific abyss.
Even if Europe has insurmountable problems, its best move forward is to decouple strategically from the US, and these days, all things strategic are underpinned by information technology. The fact that Europe (soon to be followed by Canada, Australia and New Zealand) is heading down this path is why the US has hit the panic button[0].
Re: "The US is the US and in three years there's going to be another president. But the EU's problems are much deeper."
The US may have another president or even another style of president, but that wont stop this migration away from American technological/strategic hegemony; because at this level and at this scale, complete trust by former allies, once lost, will never be regained. The US century is now over.
Thankfully open source software is there as an alternative to that US software. I guess it's no co-incidence that LibreOffice and Linux both have their roots in Europe.
[0]https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulat...
OpenBSD and FreeBSD are great. This is coming from someone who used BSD 4.2 on a Vax 11/780 in the mid-80s. They don't lack in terms of 'technical architecture'.
What these dialects of the Unix operating system do lack is a licence which ensured their success.
Linux won in the end as much from its copyleft licence as from its development methodology or personalities involved.
The thing about copyleft FOSS however is that the code is almost certainly available, can be vetted by any nation, and accepted into any digital sovereignty framework.
If what we were talking about here are proprietary (or "closable" non-copyleft) codebases atop proprietary protocols, then yes, we're doomed.
You say: "My concern at this point is what the picture will look like with embargoes around software development and FOSS"
Can you elaborate on this point?
To my mind, there is no better warranty mechanism for digital sovereignty than FOSS, even if that means each nation has to fork the software tools that they're embargoed from.
From the fine article: "$12.2 million, representing a 149 percent increase."
One wonders just how much of a price hike - or how much of a digital sovereignty threat from the Trump regime - it would take to have the Australian government public sector shift to alternative solutions, like this one:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxmox_Virtual_Environment
[EDIT] Formatting
Re: "Or can I use the built-in Software Manager (FWIW, I really like the one in Mint, except when stuff isn't available on it.)"
I think this (built-in Software Manager) is probably the right track for most normal users. Last time I checked, the Debian software repo had over 120,000 packages, so for most normal users, the bulk of what they need is likely there and thus likely easier to install than apps on MacOS or Windows. My usual track record for installing a new desktop for family members, including the top 100 apps they likely need, is under 30 minutes for Linux. The last time I tried this with Windows, it took days of effort and frustration and to some extent opened the computer up to security risks because of the multitude of binary sources I had to trust.
But yes, once you start needing specialist software, then your-mileage-may-vary. Having said that, apps like Blender are already in the Ubuntu repo, which should mean they are also in the Mint Software Manager, and thus a single-click away from installation.
In general, I would consider Linux to be the easiest platform to install software on for the most common 80% of the software that normal users need. It's certainly the easiest to maintain and update that commonly used software of any of the mainstream desktop OSes.
Again, I think a lot of the mismatch of norms & experiences comes down to what someone becomes accustomed to. If you're accustomed to downloading an installation binary (EXE/MSI) and double-clicking that to install on Windows, then you can become accustomed to downloading an installation binary (DEB/RPM) and double-clicking that to install on Linux (viz: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOPQPrzmnw0).
Cheers.
You can try to stop using technology, but that wont stop the technology from using you:
https://www.authoritarian-stack.info/?2
The only safe and sane path for humanity is community built software. All other roads lead to serfdom.
Re: "if you want Linux to win with non-experts, it needs to target being a better experience for non-experts than the alternatives"
I agree in broad terms, but let me re-capitulate this. Which OS do you think would offer a better experience for non-experts when installing on bare-metal? By my reckoning, Windows is a nightmare to install afresh on random hardware, and MacOS wont work on most-all random hardware. Users think that Windows is easier because they almost never have to install it from scratch.
Also, do you factor in the ever-increasing nuisances (AI, ads, spyware)[0][1][2][4] that Microsoft and Apple are injecting into their operating systems, and the move towards digital sovereignty which is accelerating in every nation outside of the US in any computation of what is a 'better experience'?
[0]https://au.pcmag.com/migrated-15175-windows-10/104927/micros... [1]https://www.techradar.com/news/is-windows-11-spying-on-you-n... [2]https://www.itnews.com.au/news/apple-delays-image-scanning-f... [4]https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/microslop-infuriat...
Re: "Or maybe the operating system should just work reliably for (at least) the basics?"
So, out of curiosity, if I tried installing MacOS on any of the 15+ computers I have at home, what are the likely chances that this "operating system should just work reliably for (at least) the basics?"
I can tell you that my success rate with Linux is 100%.
Or, you could help accelerate the move away from proprietary platforms, even if there is a small hit to you personally. This is how we help save society, rather than having others do all the work, no?
In the end, it's in your best interests that Linux and open platforms improve in the direction you want them to, and the best way to achieve that is by joining the effort now.
Re: "I gave up and have been using a MacBook ever since lol."
I'm curious. What will you do when Apple too starts shoehorning AI into every part of MacOS and when Apple introduces increasingly unpalatable or government-mandated surveillance functionality like Microsoft is doing with Recall?
What will you do then?
I can't tell if you're missing the key information or merely trolling.
Steam on Linux went from 1.4% at the start of 2025 and hit 3.58% at the end of that year. That's a 156% increase in device adoption in a single year. Most platforms would be happy with such growth.
The more important point is this: look at the growth trajectory. Windows11 and - I'm being told they've changed their name to Microslop, can anyone confirm? - are on the nose. Linux growth at the current rates would see a ~10% adoption rate in 2026. That then establishes a serious threat to the current gaming platform hegemony.
Why do you classify the BSDs as Unix and not Linux as a Unix? Linux has about as much right to be called a Unix as the BSDs do, as those BSDs have had to be stripped of pretty much all Unix code in order to comply with the AT&T v. BSDi court case from 35 years ago[0].
Further, the BSDs were more popular than Linux at a point in time. There's a very good reason why Linux won the platform wars, and a very large part of that reason is because of the GPL - a difference with the BSDs which wont be going away.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNIX_System_Laboratories%2C_In....
[EDIT: Typo. Added citation.]
I disagree with this assessment.
Franklin didn't have the tools and process for determining the structure of DNA, only Watson and Crick did, because they used actual physical models to measure the angles and positions of the molecular components.
Further, by the time Watson and Crick did their work, Franklin had already left to work on the tobacco mosaic virus (TMV)[0].
That Watson and Crick could only nail the structure of DNA because of her crystallography work is almost certain. That she would have discovered the structure of DNA without them and their process/approach is a furphy[1]. It's their combined efforts which made it possible, with Franklin's work being the pointer in the right direction and confirmation, but Watson and Crick's being the bulk of the heavy-lifting necessary to map the molecule structure.
In the end, she probably didn't share in the Nobel because she died before the prize was awarded for the research.
[0] https://www.cinz.nz/posts/rosalind-elsie-franklin-1920-1958 [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furphy
The BBC is consistently at or near the top of the "world's most trusted news sources"[0]. It's also one of the oldest news sources.
"August BBC" therefore makes perfect sense and is a defensible claim.
[0] https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/trust-news-sites/
[EDIT] typo.
In part, yes. Have updated my earlier comment with additional research.
In short, it's complicated. And because of that complication, anyone with a vested interest or political slant can skew representation any-which-way.
However, climate disruption is driving a trend-change in mid-Atlantic hurricanes, wrong-footing the attempt by Michael Shellenberger to hint otherwise by sleight-of-hand.
Contrast with this analysis published in Nature:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-27364-8.epdf
"Historical records of Atlantic hurricane activity, extending back to 1851, show increasing activity over time, but much or all of this trend has been attributed to lack of observations in the early portion of the record. Here we use a tropical cyclone downscaling model driven by three global climate analyses that are based mostly on sea surface temperature and surface pressure data. The results support earlier statistically-based inferences that storms were undercounted in the 19th century, but in contrast to earlier work, show increasing tropical cyclone activity through the period, interrupted by a prominent hurricane drought in the 1970s and 80 s that we attribute to anthropogenic aerosols. In agreement with earlier work, we show that most of the variability of North Atlantic tropical cyclone activity over the last century was directly related to regional rather than global climate change. Most metrics of tropical cyclones downscaled over all the tropics show weak and/or insignificant trends over the last century, illustrating the special nature of North Atlantic tropical cyclone climatology."
Ditto:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-24268-5
"Atlantic hurricanes are a major hazard to life and property, and a topic of intense scientific interest. Historical changes in observing practices limit the utility of century-scale records of Atlantic major hurricane frequency. To evaluate past changes in frequency, we have here developed a homogenization method for Atlantic hurricane and major hurricane frequency over 1851–2019. We find that recorded century-scale increases in Atlantic hurricane and major hurricane frequency, and associated decrease in USA hurricanes strike fraction, are consistent with changes in observing practices and not likely a true climate trend. After homogenization, increases in basin-wide hurricane and major hurricane activity since the 1970s are not part of a century-scale increase, but a recovery from a deep minimum in the 1960s–1980s. We suggest internal (e.g., Atlantic multidecadal) climate variability and aerosol-induced mid-to-late-20th century major hurricane frequency reductions have probably masked century-scale greenhouse-gas warming contributions to North Atlantic major hurricane frequency."
EDIT: Additional citation.
Definition is necessary. What's 'progressive'?
Is post-modernism (and associated Social Justice Activism, identity politics and focus on culture-wars) 'progressive', or is 'progressive' defined as old-school, 'social democratic' politics, social justice, rights/freedoms and classic liberalism? These are almost diametrically opposed viewpoints.
The numbers are even starker when you consider:
1) Only 86 out of the 330 million Americans have been infected by COVID-19[0]
2) Over 279,000 American deaths were prevented by the COVID vaccines as of July, 2021, and obviously more since then.[1]
So, if we re-run the numbers with these changes to inputs, we get:
Number of Americans who died (or would otherwise - without vaccines - have died) from COVID-19 / Number of Americans who were infected by COVID.
This gives a case fatality rate of (1,013,651 + 279,000) / 86,693,081 = 0.014910659 ~ 15/1000
This compares to 1/5000 chance of a serious side effect is defined as requiring hospitalization, life-threatening, or life-changing, but not deaths, per-se.
So, taking pot-luck chance with COVID is 75 times more likely to cause you death than an mRNA vaccine is to cause you a serious side-effect.
[0] https://usafacts.org/visualizations/coronavirus-covid-19-spr...
[1] https://thehill.com/changing-america/well-being/longevity/56...
Apropos to respond with this:
About Cynical Theories Have you heard that language is violence and that science is sexist? Have you read that certain people shouldn’t practice yoga or cook Chinese food? Or been told that being obese is healthy, that there is no such thing as biological sex, or that only white people can be racist? Are you confused by these ideas, and do you wonder how they have managed so quickly to challenge the very logic of Western society? In this probing and intrepid volume, Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay document the evolution of the dogma that informs these ideas, from its coarse origins in French postmodernism to its refinement within activist academic fields. Today this dogma is recognizable as much by its effects, such as cancel culture and social-media dogpiles, as by its tenets, which are all too often embraced as axiomatic in mainstream media: knowledge is a social construct; science and reason are tools of oppression; all human interactions are sites of oppressive power play; and language is dangerous. As Pluckrose and Lindsay warn, the unchecked proliferation of these anti-Enlightenment beliefs present a threat not only to liberal democracy but also to modernity itself. While acknowledging the need to challenge the complacency of those who think a just society has been fully achieved, Pluckrose and Lindsay break down how this often-radical activist scholarship does far more harm than good, not least to those marginalized communities it claims to champion. They also detail its alarmingly inconsistent and illiberal ethics. Only through a proper understanding of the evolution of these ideas, they conclude, can those who value science, reason, and consistently liberal ethics successfully challenge this harmful and authoritarian orthodoxy—in the academy, in culture, and beyond.
It's sad to see the level of political polarisation on public health topics in the US. Would Americans trust the UK or Finnish health authorities more than their own?
[EDIT: clarification.]
Why not unfollow all who present material that you find egregious or banal? Try and connect with people who are more interesting or more sympatico with respect to interests/fields/profession?