I needed to retrieve something from the trash in OpenSuse but by default, it didn’t have a trash icon on the desktop. I found a setting to enable the trash icon to show which is just a link to the trash.
Today I discovered that the trash was available by going to Places in the main menu. Now I wanted to delete the trash from the desktop. All I had to do was right-click on it and delete the trash. That is superior to how Windows/Mac handles icons on the desktop.
Just using this OS as a normal user is delightful. I don’t have to go to an obscure menu that Mac will change and Windows doesn’t allow you to change. I can do anything I want. I can move anything anywhere, and change the UI in any way that I want. Why am I making such a big deal about the UI? Imagine how productive you will be when things are set up in how they make sense to you and not what a focus group with Apple/Windows says. Instead of your tools being determined for you, you determine your tools.
Now I can hear some of you saying, but I can hack Windows/Mac to change it to what I want. This is true for power/advanced users. They can modify some things, but like I said Windows 11 is increasingly limiting what is possible to be modified. More importantly when you make changing the UI easy, then the average person can modify it to be efficient. If I was the average person the freedom from change would appeal to me greatly to use Linux.
I think we are seeing a reversal of what used to happen with computers. Instead of new computers being bought because the OS slowed it down, we are seeing computers fail because they are still useful from the OS that people are using. This is why people are buying computers less. They have less reason to buy them when they can use them productively and not be forced to the Mac/windows upgrade cycle. If I were Apple/MS I would be very worried about Linux.