A month ago I installed Linux as the main OS. What problems have arisen? I'm telling you
In 1.5 years, support for Windows 10 ends, and 11th is not suitable for me, because it is impossible to place the taskbar vertically (see screenshot of how everything is organized on two screens). So I decided to try moving to Linux. I don’t use any tricky Windows programs; Linux definitely has it all: Firefox, Thunderbird, Telegram, Skype, LibreOffice for local documents, Google Docs for others, a calculator, a simple image editor, OneDrive and Yandex.Disk; perhaps that's all.
I chose the KDE environment for myself as it is most similar to Windows. A big update just came out – 6.0. I chose Fedora as a distribution, because within one version it is updated to more recent software (KDE, kernel, etc.), which I prefer. For example, Kubuntu 23.10 runs on the old version of KDE 5.27.8, although the update 5.27.11 was released a long time ago; and even the just released version of “Kubunta” 24.04 did not receive KDE 6.x.
First, I installed “Fedora” 39 with KDE 5.27 on an old laptop and used it as a bed for Internet access. Although the laptop is old and noticeably slows down (it can’t even handle 1080 video), I honestly suffered for the sake of science. 🙂 I started studying how and what it works, how to configure this red-eyed “Linux” and what problems there might be. In fact, it turned out that everything is set up simply and even without editing the code or compiling anything. 🙂
When the beta of Fedora 40 came out, I immediately updated it, and there was already KDE 6.0. And on a slow beech, KDE 6.0 really works faster.
I used it this way for several months and realized that, in general, it is possible to live on Linux, although there are some unpleasant problems. I decided to install it on a separate screw on my desktop computer with two monitors and use it in combat mode. And nothing bad happened either, it’s quite possible to use it. If it were not for a couple of mistakes described below, you might not be able to tell the difference from working in Windows.
Bottom line: we can recommend installing “Linux” for people who use the computer only for the Internet and documents, and click exclusively with the mouse, then they will not notice the difference at all (the icons are slightly different). I will no longer buy Windows for my employees for office work – that’s a fact.
For those who use keyboard shortcuts and a mouse with several customizable buttons, there are really sore spots, you can get used to them and hope that they will eventually fix them.
I will list these evil problems:
1. (for all environments) If you use the usual CTRL-Shift to switch languages, then the CTRL-Shift+letter key combinations stupidly do not work in programs (for example, in Firefox CTRL-Shift-T – open a previously closed tab). For ALT-Shift the problem is the same, but with combinations with ALT.
This is explained by the fact that the system does not wait for the letter to be pressed, but immediately processes the CTRL-Shift combination (switching the language) and waits for new commands. This is the standard…
This is where I got the error: https://github.com/xkbcommon/libxkbcommon/issues/420 – I ask for your support, to show that the problem affects many users, please put a like there.
In the meantime, I got around the problem by assigning Caps Lock to switch the language, in which case the keyboard shortcuts work.
2. (only for KDE?) If you assign a program launch to a key combination, for example, I set CTRL-Shift-> (the closest key to the left shift) to launch the calculator, then when switching languages it will not work, because different layouts have different symbols on this button (EN and RU – does not work). But there is a way out for this: you assign combinations to run the program in different languages, fortunately KDE can do this.
3. (only for KDE?) The same problem with assigning mouse buttons. I set one mouse button to ALT-F4 – close the program, the second to CTRL-W – close the tab. So, CTRL-W does not work with the Russian keyboard layout; the system does not understand that these are the same key. Despite the fact that using the CTRL-C keyboard closes the tab.
https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/xkeyboard-config/xkeyboard-config/-/issues/416 – here you can vote for a solution to this problem.
Perhaps these are all my global complaints about Linux. Other problems, such as huge icons when expanding the taskbar in KDE (the “Start” button and the weather at the bottom of the taskbar in my screenshot), are not critical, I expect them to be fixed: https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=467004
I will be happy to listen to your advice and opinions.
