A big one for me is Microsoft office (desktop), Libreoffice and other FOSS alternatives just simply don’t come close, and feature wise are 20 years behind. Especially since I basically mastered MS office 2007+'s drawing features, which the FOSS alternatives don’t replicate very well.
And of course Microsoft loves to push Office 365. I don’t pay for that and just use desktop office, but Microsoft prefers you don’t know that you can do this.
And I’m going to get shit on by Lemmy big time for this but while Linux is great and has made vast improvements in recent years, I still use Windows, not only because of MS office, but because a lot of games tend to only support Windows. I know that wine and proton exist but they’re not perfect and don’t feel quite the same as running native.
I wish an operating system existed with a hybridized Linux and clone NT kernel (using code from FOSS Wine and ReactOS of course) so that the numerous back catalog of NT software can run similar to as intended while also interacting with Linux programs better and using a shared environment. Since it would probably become vulnerable to viruses for windows as well, maybe? (my programming knowledge is extremely rusty) an antivirus similar to Windows defender is bundled with the operating system. Hopefully if someone makes such an operating system it can be a Windows killer and would switch immediately
Screenreaders.
The one half-decent libre screenreader is Orca, and it only works by hacking X into doing things X was never intended to do. Wayland is much cleaner and more sensible, which means that Orca doesn’t work on it at all. This means blind and visually impaired users are physically unable to use modern Linuxes or BSDs.
And Orca was only half-decent.
Obd2 software so I can diagnose and repair my car. This is more than a dtc scanner, I need to be able to trend values and flash/program modules without a $15k tablet with $50k of yearly software.
So far I’ve just been using the basic obd2 Bluetooth things but the apps available are very limited. I’ve been able to do some custom PIDs for some of my vehicles, and others you can often find tools that allow you to do some specific programming but it lacks a lot. I’ve been considering some of the ones you can find for around $400 from China but I’m not sure if those are anywhere near the same level as the 10k snap on ones.
Libreoffice and other FOSS alternatives just simply don’t come close
I really only use Word and Excel, and I find the FOSS alternatives just fine. I can understand if power-users might find the newer features worthwhile, but for basic word processing and spreadsheets the FOSS options are good enough.
It’s not. Writer will start crashing at 50 pages, it become a pretty much unusable as you add more text.
That’s disappointing. Which one has this issue?
Fwiw, I have used OpenOffice and OnlyOffice. I actually haven’t used LibreOffice specifically.
I’m not sure I follow. LibreOffice is at least as good (if not better) than Offics365 unless maybe if you’re doing advanced shit in Excel, or need specifically coded macros.
Considering Microsoft’s push to make everything into a webwrapped application, I think LibreOffice is only going to be a better and better alternative as time moves on.
I mean LO is pretty good, but it is a bit rough to find what you want. At a min its more difficult to format your sheets in LO.
For excel stuff, https://www.visidata.org/ is way, way better than excel assuming the data is tabular (which, frankly, it should be anyway). Like it’s not even close.
The entire phone-based ecosystem.
I guess it depends a lot on what you think of as “an alternative”. I’m really happy using FOSS because I generally try to find a different angle on things, and it allows me to do that.
Luckily I’m not dependent on using common office software, the few spreadsheet tasks that I need can be done with online tools, either open or proprietary. For documents I usually use markdown and pandoc. For music making, I use my own software or Ardour for mastering, etc. For modeling and 3D printing I started using OpenSCAD.
There’s also many things that proprietary software just can’t do. Like, my day-to-day workflow is based on a minimalist approach to computing, with the most common operations being very easy to perform (browser, editor, terminal) … MacOS is always hailed for their great UI but honestly, it seems slow and clunky to me even though I used it daily for a long time …
@VirusMaster3073 music DAWs. I think the only real option is Ardour, but I tried it and was struggling to just figure out how to create a couple instrument tracks. Could be skill issue, but honestly I’m pretty good at figuring out UIs so if I was struggling a lot with the basics, it’s probably not just me. So I’m still on garageband for now which doesn’t get in my way when I’m trying to make music
Reaper is awesome. It is dirt cheap. Also runs on linux. But then you have the VST issue
@RouxBru oh VSTs don’t work on Linux?
I don’t use Linux, so very limited knowledge. But there are workarounds. Apparently Yabridge works on most, but not all VSTs
Give reaper a shot. I honestly don’t know if it’s FOSS but it runs in donations and is pretty good imo
Hmm I think the issue is that Ardour is more focused on recording than electronic music production … There’s more intuitive DAWs out there but I suppose in terms of what it can do it doesn’t have to stand back … compared to ProTools I’d say it’s still quite intuitive (not a high bar for sure).
Totally agree. The DAW space is depressingly neglected as FOSS and I can’t imagine why. 15 years ago I was certain there would one day be a FOSS DAW that had the same love put into it as Blender.
I wish there was a good FOSS (or just works on Linux) alternative to adobe lightroom so I could stop fixing broken windows shit on my wife’s computer.
She’s a photographer and does a lot of heavy editing stuff. I know there’s some alternatives but she says nothing comes close for what she needs to do, and from the few examples she showed me I agree.
I don’t know what the fuck Microsoft is doing but almost everytime there’s an update something breaks on her laptop. The only thing she does is use lightroom, occasionally Photoshop and Firefox.
I recently had to use her laptop to make a windows installer USB for someone and Rufus was cool. When installing windows though it just didn’t see any of the drives in the laptop? Apparently I had to load storage drivers specific to that laptop, which weren’t available anywhere online I could find. I managed to get it working by loading a bunch of unrelated drivers for a different HP model laptop, none of them related to storage. I think it was the Bluetooth driver that got it working, after it installed nothing was working, no mouse, speakers, USB ports. I had to install all of those same drivers again for some reason. Before that just to make sure the drive wasn’t bad I installed Debian on there and what do you know, it just did it, because of course it did, and everything worked.
I got way off topic, but again what the fuck is microsoft doing?
A decent alternative to Adobe InDesign or Affinity Publisher
I’m sorry but… 20 years behind? What new features has, say, Word even offered in the past 20 years beside that damn ribbon?
Adobe After Effects!! PLEASE DEAR GOD
This is the singular thing still keeping me using Adobe software. If this was replaced then I could be FREEE
I’m curious how DaVinci resolve’s fusion page compares?
I can’t answer that, but the reason I’m typing this from Windows is that getting DiVinci to reliably work in linux has been a pain in my ass.
Oh yes. I can’t comment but I’ve heard that from other sources as well. Bummer
I had it working, upgraded Mint, and it broke. I had already been fighting to get that upgrade done for a couple hours at that point (there were issues), so I was just over it after researching and trying a few things. People have got it working but, as a dude with two jobs, I ain’t got time for that.
Yea of course. As professionals our window to do tech support is limited.
3D CAD software. There are a few options out there (FreeCAD, LibreCAD, etc) and Blender is a thing that exists for more artistic 3D modeling. But they simply don’t hold a candle to the features and capabilities of the paid packages, which typically have costs in the 4-to-5-digit range. And I’m not talking the crazy high-end simulation options - those I understand, they’re hard - but basic modeling features.
Hell, I’d even settle for a CAD package that had some solid basic features and had a reasonable purchase cost. Unfortunately the few providers have the industry by the throat, and so your options are “free but terrible” and “you need a mortgage to use this”.
FreeCAD is getting better but it would really benefit for a big improvement in stability and UX
I use solidworks for makers which is actually affordable for private use. I prefer paying $50 a year over having to deal with freecad and I dont even use CAD software that often.
I’m in a similar boat right now - I use the Student Edition ($60-100 a year, depending on sales, locally installed vs. using the cloud-based 3Dexperience).
It’s not a bad deal by any means, but I do wish I didn’t have to deal with annual reinstalls and perpetually worrying Dassault is going to decide to take it away.
You beat me to it. The moment someone makes a FOSS cad program where the ui doesn’t suck a donkeys ball they will be the goat
I grew up learning organic modeling in blender and ever since I got a 3D printer, it’s just been so easy to make things with it as opposed to learning CAD. I’m getting better thanks to OnShape and FreeCAD 1.0 but I keep finding myself going back to blender because “it just works” once you understand how to setup scaling and snapping for manipulating vertices. Basically just setup your world measurements to metric and scale it to 0.001 and then every unit will be 1mm (helps me work within the 250^3mm space of my print bed, mentally) and export as stl.
There’s even a 3D printer toolbox add on that lets you analyze and fix problems like manifold edges and additional mesh tools like manifold extrude that speed up the process for good quality parts. CAD’s biggest advantage is the non linear history editing which is super powerful but you can definitely do non-destructive editing in blender using modifiers that only get applied at export time so you even have a functional equivalent if you’re organized and plan ahead a little.
I guess what I’m saying is, blender is amazing software and absolutely capable as a workhorse for 3D printing. You’re right that the multi-digit costing proprietary software is leagues better for designing digital parts and assemblies but blender is extremely flexible and not just for the more artistic side of things, you can make extremely technical parts with blender.
Yeah, I struggle with Organic modeling. I think it’s because I was trained in parametric for engineering, but I just mind-blank when approaching “how do I make this complex shape?” in Blender. CAD’s approach feels very straightforward and intuitive; I know where each feature is defined and can tweak it fairly easily. Blender… doesn’t. And I know it’s definitely not me, because I’ve seen people do very powerful things with it.
Like, I’ve run through a lot of the tutorials, and every time they get to “Okay, time for you to make this simple shape on your own!”, I immediately slip back into CAD modeling mindset, which isn’t really compatible with Blender.
MS Office isn’t better than LibreOffice and OnlyOffice, they all do the same task of making docs, spreadsheets, and presentations with very similar UI. It’s a no brainer to use the one that doesn’t bug you to use OneDrive.
Linux gaming has come a long way, especially with the introduction of things like Proton and popularisation of it by the Steam Deck. If you can play games on the Steam Deck, those games run on Linux :D
The main reasons (mind you, not only reasons) why people don’t just switch to Linux is:
- it’s different (humans naturally gravitate towards things they are familiar with)
- partly because Linux has a few things that are unintuitive to the average user (e.g. using terminal), but distros like Mint have mostly solved this issue
- Switching itself is really annoying (I would say I’m in this boat, but I’ve installed Linux on my old computers and will definitely do it again if I ever get a new computer)
Tax filing software
This seems like asking for faster horses. Your taxes should just be filed for you, then you can verify it, no?
It’s the only reason I keep a windows VM around. Windows is getting so naggy though. Every time I boot it up, it wants me to update it, install virus scanner and ser up my user on microsoft vs local.
Not as in “FOSS alternative”, as it is already open, but simply a Linux version: Tortoise SVN, the file manager integrated UI for SVN. That is actually one of the two things missing in the Linux portfolio. The other being a native port of Notepad++, although this at least runs fine under wine.
these guys are doing Notepad++ in Qt: https://notepadqq.com/s/
