Poor support
When is Linux support going to get better? I don’t mean software running on Linux because, on the whole, there’s everything I’d ever need, but when is Linux going to get better customer support? If you ring up about a problem with your broadband, say, and mention you’re using Linux, after a pause the response usually is, “Oh, we don’t support that.” I’m a paying customer – they should at least be able to offer the basic support script for Ubuntu or similar. Sid Otter
Neil says…
This is certainly a big issue for mainstream Linux acceptance – almost as big as being able to buy PCs with Linux pre-installed for your average user. Maybe the issue for manufacturers is “too many versions of Linux”… but there’s Windows XP, Vista, 7, 8, 10, 11 still being run, so you’d think a Debian/Ubuntu/Mint with Fedora would cover most bases for support.
LXF is wrong shocker
Have ya’ll thought about how many resources you’re wasting when your sample problems recurse rather than iterate – for example, Fibonacci sequence code? Each call in the stack has a cost – even if the programmer never has to notice. If you don’t want to carry an array of Fibonacci numbers, use three variables Fibonacci variables (n -1, n, n+1), ripple them, and iterate outward for efficiency (requiring a fourth variable for ‘current step’, and a fifth for ‘target step’). When you recurse, all the outer instances of the function (with all their variables) have to exist at the same time as the innermost.
More importantly in a recent article introducing V, the programming language, there’s a repeated bug. Either the ->trimspace invoke is modifying the object itself, or the error report indicates failure to retrieve from a different location than was actually attempted. Bugs in the error reporting system are always nasty! Also, the text claims that the images contain “full” code, when they don’t – although “code from the beginning” might be correct.
Michael Cronquist
Neil says…
All our coding tutorials are aimed at beginners, so we’re publishing code that (should be) easier to understand. Though I get your point. But we shouldn’t be including bugs so that’s a bit poor and we’ll try better in the future. The “full code” were badly chosen words. We supply the full code, so we’re expecting people to follow along with that, not from the grabs, which are just for illustration.
Touch me!
I have a small touchscreen laptop running Windows 10 that I wanted to use for taking notes, but it can’t handle running Windows and a touchscreen. I was planning to switch to a light Linux distro, but figured I’d write in, to see if someone more experienced had a better suggestion. I don’t care too much about the UI as long as I can take notes and send them over Google Drive or some other service.
John Quaid
Neil says…
I have very little experience with touchscreen use with Linux desktops, laptops or tablets other than I know it works! Choosing a distro with a Gnome desktop is going to be favourite, because that comes with touch baked in. Pop!_OS, Fedora and Ubuntu would all be good choices and I see people online saying this is good for many devices – do check that the device’s touchscreen drivers are in the kernel or else generally available.
Android dreams
In LXF289 (“Letter of the month” section) you asked if readers might like to see more on Android. I would
absolutely like to see that. I mention this because I come from a large family who consume an even larger amount of fruit-related phones/tables/laptops from a particular vendor (I’m equally guilty).
From an economic and environmental perspective, I’m very curious about adopting Android. I like the opportunity to extend the life of a device by adopting other ROMs once support is officially discontinued. In the same vein. I’m also reluctant, and perhaps a little fearful given all the malware reportedly hosted on the various app stores. Perhaps I just need some good-old fashioned Android security lessons and how to be smart with Android devices?
Rick Hanser, Virginia, USA
Neil says…
I’m going to get into trouble if I say Android isn’t a distro… For sure, open source is a great way to extend the life of older mobile devices. Jonni still has his original Bq Ubuntu phone running UBports and an ancient (in phone years) Motorola G Falcon limping along with Lineage OS, which would be our go-to choice for most devices. Again, my daughter has a OnePlus Two running Lineage Android 10. It’s years past the last official update that was available and ended with Android 6, a year after the original release, which is pretty poor.
So if anything, taking control of your Android device makes it more secure, as you’ll still get the security release from Google. That is, until the dedicated people at Lineage OS leave the device by the wayside, too.