this post was submitted on 27 Mar 2025
992 points (90.7% liked)

linuxmemes

24143 readers
2173 users here now

Hint: :q!


Sister communities:


Community rules (click to expand)

1. Follow the site-wide rules

2. Be civil
  • Understand the difference between a joke and an insult.
  • Do not harrass or attack users for any reason. This includes using blanket terms, like "every user of thing".
  • Don't get baited into back-and-forth insults. We are not animals.
  • Leave remarks of "peasantry" to the PCMR community. If you dislike an OS/service/application, attack the thing you dislike, not the individuals who use it. Some people may not have a choice.
  • Bigotry will not be tolerated.
  • 3. Post Linux-related content
  • Including Unix and BSD.
  • Non-Linux content is acceptable as long as it makes a reference to Linux. For example, the poorly made mockery of sudo in Windows.
  • No porn, no politics, no trolling or ragebaiting.
  • 4. No recent reposts
  • Everybody uses Arch btw, can't quit Vim, <loves/tolerates/hates> systemd, and wants to interject for a moment. You can stop now.
  • 5. πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§ Language/язык/Sprache
  • This is primarily an English-speaking community. πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§πŸ‡¦πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡ΊπŸ‡Έ
  • Comments written in other languages are allowed.
  • The substance of a post should be comprehensible for people who only speak English.
  • Titles and post bodies written in other languages will be allowed, but only as long as the above rule is observed.
  • 6. (NEW!) Regarding public figuresWe all have our opinions, and certain public figures can be divisive. Keep in mind that this is a community for memes and light-hearted fun, not for airing grievances or leveling accusations.
  • Keep discussions polite and free of disparagement.
  • We are never in possession of all of the facts. Defamatory comments will not be tolerated.
  • Discussions that get too heated will be locked and offending comments removed.
  •  

    Please report posts and comments that break these rules!


    Important: never execute code or follow advice that you don't understand or can't verify, especially here. The word of the day is credibility. This is a meme community -- even the most helpful comments might just be shitposts that can damage your system. Be aware, be smart, don't remove France.

    founded 2 years ago
    MODERATORS
     
    top 50 comments
    sorted by: hot top controversial new old
    [–] TheOakTree@lemm.ee 11 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

    GUI is a generic swiss army knife. It's easy to introduce to someone, and it has a whole array of tools ready for use. However, each of those tools is only half-decent at its job at best, and all of the tools are unwieldy. The manual is included, but it mostly tells you how to do things that are pretty obvious.

    CLI is a toolbox full of quality tools and gadgets. Most people who open the box for the first time don't even know which tools they're looking for. In addition, each tool has a set of instructions that must be followed to a T. Those who know how to use the tools can get things done super quickly, but those who don't know will inevitably cause some problems. Oh, but the high-detail manuals for all the tools are in the side compartment of the toolbox too.

    [–] MonkeMischief@lemmy.today 9 points 2 days ago

    People can do whatever they like, and heck I find CLI intimidating sometimes, but I'm always learning something new a little bit at a time.

    I'm tired of seeing it in every field of interest that has any kind of payoff, whether art or FOSS.

    "I'm [(almost always) a guy] who (maybe has kids and) has a job. I stopped learning anything after I got my job-paper / degree / highschool diploma. I shouldn't have to learn anything anymore. I am happy to shell out disposable sad-salary-man money (and maybe my soul idk) to any mega-corp that offers me a "create desired outcome button" without me having to think too much. It's [current year]! I shouldn't have to think anymore! Therefore Linux is super behind and only for nerds and I desire its benefits so much that I leave this complaint anywhere these folks gather so they know what I deserve."

    Agh. I gotta go before this rant gets too long lol

    Tbh the terminal is super convenient. No random UI placement. Most things follow one of several conventions so less to get used to. It’s easy to output the results of one command into another making automation obvious, no possibility for ads. It’s pretty sweet

    [–] Thcdenton@lemmy.world 20 points 3 days ago

    Terminal is fun. I like being hackerman

    [–] Honytawk@lemmy.zip 24 points 3 days ago (8 children)

    Nothing wrong with CLI. It is fast and responsive.

    Unless you want mainstream use. Because the majority of people can't even use a UI effectively. And CLI is much worse.

    load more comments (8 replies)
    [–] Tin@lemmy.world 20 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

    I do most of my work at the command line, my co-workers do think I'm nuts for doing it, but one of our recent projects required us all to log into a client's systems, and a significant portion of the tasks must be done via bash prompt. Suddenly, I'm no longer the team weirdo, I'm a subject matter expert.

    load more comments (1 replies)
    [–] callyral@pawb.social 134 points 4 days ago (24 children)

    " i shouldn't have to memorize commands"

    the up arrow:

    [–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 87 points 4 days ago (11 children)

    The commands: ls cp mv...

    Meanwhile you get Windows people who memorize things like Get-AllUsersHereNowExtraLongJohn

    load more comments (11 replies)
    load more comments (23 replies)
    [–] LovableSidekick@lemmy.world 26 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (16 children)

    Having started out in programming before the GUI era, typing commands just feels good to me. But tbh Linux commands really are ridiculously cryptic - and needlessly so. In the 1980s and 90s there was a great OS called VMS whose commands and options were all English words (I don't know if it was localized). It was amazingly intuitive. For example, to print 3 copies of a file in landscape orientation the command would be PRINT /COPIES=3 /ORIENTATION=LANDSCAPE. And you could abbreviate anything any way you wanted as long as it was still unambiguous. So PRI /COP=3 /OR=LAND would work, and if you really hated typing you could probably get away with PR /C=3 /O=L. And it wasn't even case-sensitive, I'm just using uppercase for illustration.

    The point is, there's no reason to make everybody remember some programmer's individual decision about how to abbreviate something - "chmod o+rwx" could have been "setmode /other=read,write,execute" or something equally easy for newbies. The original developers of Unix and its descendants just thought the way they thought. Terseness was partly just computer culture of that era. Since computers were small with tight resources, filenames on many systems were limited to 8 characters with 3-char extension. This was still true even for DOS. Variables in older languages were often single characters or a letter + digit. As late as 1991 I remember having to debug an ancient accounting program whose variables were all like A1, A2, B5... with no comments. It was a freaking nightmare.

    Anyway, I'm just saying the crypticness is largely cultural and unnecessary. If there is some kind of CLI "skin" that lets you interact with Linux at the command line using normal words, I'd love to know about it.

    load more comments (16 replies)
    [–] BoiBy@sh.itjust.works 45 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (10 children)

    I use Linux and I prefer GUIs. I'm the kind of person that would rather open a filemanager as superuser and drag and drop system files than type commands and addresses. I hope you hax0rs won't forget that we mere mortals exist too and you'll make GUIs for us πŸ™πŸ™πŸ™

    [–] Lv_InSaNe_vL@lemmy.world 24 points 3 days ago (7 children)

    Tbf, the file explorer is actually one really good argument for GUIs over terminals. Same with editing text. Its either simple enough to use Nano or I need a proper text editor. I don't mess around with vim or anything like that that.

    Its all tools. Some things are easier in a file manager, some things are easier in a GUI.

    load more comments (7 replies)
    load more comments (9 replies)
    [–] fluffykittycat@slrpnk.net 4 points 2 days ago

    I feel like a lot more people be comfortable using the terminal if the text displayed when it was first opened gave you a list of commands to try. There is a very steep initial learning curve immediately which discourages experimentation, and I think that with a little bit of effort you could get a lot of people over that hump and then they could enjoy terminal Bliss.

    [–] lightnsfw@reddthat.com 14 points 3 days ago

    Did a process last week that took me 13 steps in the command line that took about an hour. If I'd have done it manually it would have taken days. After I worked out how to do it I trimed it down to 6 steps and sent it to my coworker that also needs that information. His eyes glazed over on step two of explaining it to him and he's just going to keep doing it his way....

    [–] Macaroni_ninja@lemmy.world 58 points 4 days ago (32 children)

    Are there people who are mad at other people for using the terminal? Is this really a thing that exists?

    [–] BuboScandiacus@mander.xyz 41 points 3 days ago

    Usually it’s the other way around

    [–] 3xBork@lemmy.world 34 points 3 days ago (3 children)

    Not really. But you know, gotta find ways to feel smarter than other people so here we go.

    load more comments (3 replies)
    [–] ftbd@feddit.org 29 points 3 days ago (18 children)

    There are definitely people who think it is reasonable to memorize button locations and 10 levels of menus in GUI programs but would rather go into cardiac arrest than use something like program --option input-file output-file.

    load more comments (18 replies)
    load more comments (29 replies)
    [–] umbrella@lemmy.ml 50 points 3 days ago (2 children)

    i dont use the terminal to be productive, i use it to feel like a hacker

    [–] renzev@lemmy.world 37 points 3 days ago (4 children)

    Setting the colorscheme to green on black increases hacker rating by 20%

    load more comments (4 replies)
    load more comments (1 replies)
    [–] gamermanh@lemmy.dbzer0.com 30 points 3 days ago (8 children)

    Lol, meme's backwards

    CLI evangelists try to shit on GUI constantly, as though it makes them better at computers. It doesn't, kids

    Can see it in this very thread

    load more comments (8 replies)
    [–] shortrounddev@lemmy.world 3 points 2 days ago (2 children)

    I have literally never seen whatever this post is referring to

    [–] PresidentCamacho@lemm.ee 2 points 2 days ago

    This meme format never shows a scenario that isn't made up anymore.

    [–] dalekcaan@lemm.ee 21 points 3 days ago

    It's all a matter of preference anyway (assuming you have both options anyway). CLI is less intuitive and takes longer to learn, but can be wicked fast if you know what you're doing. GUI is more intuitive and faster to pick up, but digging through the interface is usually slower than what a power user can accomplish in the CLI.

    It depends on what your use case is and how you prefer your work flow. The only dumb move is judging how other people like their setup.

    [–] forrcaho@lemmy.world 23 points 3 days ago (15 children)

    CLI is being able to speak a language to tell your computer what to do; GUI is only being able to point and grunt.

    load more comments (15 replies)
    [–] udc@lemmy.world 11 points 3 days ago (6 children)

    Didn't even know there were such a thing as evangelists for Windows

    [–] doomcanoe@sh.itjust.works 6 points 2 days ago

    It's an odd sort of evangelism. They almost never try to convince you Windows is good, just that everything else is worse.

    load more comments (5 replies)
    [–] Kuranashi@lemmy.world 12 points 3 days ago (2 children)

    I've never met any windows evangelists to be honest. Lots of Apple evangelists though who will spend forever talking about windows. Every developer I've met who uses Windows always had a tongue in cheek sort of "well it kind of sucks in some ways but it's what I'm used to, one day maybe I'll get off my ass and change OS".

    Reminds me of the "I use Arch Linux btw" meme which doesn't really happen as much anymore other than as a joke. Also, I use Arch Linux btw

    [–] Zink@programming.dev 3 points 2 days ago

    Every developer I've met who uses Windows always had a tongue in cheek sort of "well it kind of sucks in some ways but it's what I'm used to, one day maybe I'll get off my ass and change OS".

    This used to be me, kind of. I've been an engineer for over 20 years, with the last couple being full time "developer."

    But I finally made that switch at work over a year ago (booting into Linux instead of using a VM) and at home a few months ago. This probably goes without saying, but I am never going back! It's one thing to know there are options out there that people like you prefer, but it's another entirely to get used to the better option then try the enshittified one again.

    [–] shortrounddev@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago (4 children)

    Im not an evangelist for windows (I won't try to convert you) but I'm unashamed of being a software engineer who uses Windows as my main dev platform

    load more comments (4 replies)
    [–] TootSweet@lemmy.world 64 points 4 days ago (7 children)

    The only thing worse than reading documentation/tutorials about how to do things in GUIs is writing documentation about how to do things in GUIs. It's just screenshot after screenshot. And following it is like playing a ScummVM game, only less fun and lots more alt+tabbing.

    load more comments (7 replies)
    [–] phoenixarise@lemmy.world 3 points 2 days ago

    There are Windows evangelists?? πŸ€¦πŸ½β€β™€οΈ

    [–] Randelung@lemmy.world 33 points 3 days ago (3 children)

    CLI is effective because every command serves a specific purpose. UIs are the opposite, you have to imagine all possible intentions the user could have at any given point and then indicate possible actions, intuitively block impossible actions, and recover from pretty much any error.

    load more comments (3 replies)
    [–] ianhclark510@lemmy.blahaj.zone 74 points 4 days ago (12 children)

    That’s it, I need to hook up a controller to my PC so I can open Htop with a button press

    load more comments (12 replies)
    [–] Eyedust@lemmy.dbzer0.com 21 points 3 days ago (6 children)

    CLI this, GUI that. Where are my TUI degens?

    load more comments (6 replies)
    [–] _____@lemm.ee 44 points 4 days ago (6 children)

    meanwhile Windows users: let me drop into this random strangers discord who claims he will make my PC faster by dropping this .bat file that will run thousands of commands to "debloat" my install. also let me edit the registry and add random values to keys that I don't know what they're used for. this process is basically irreversible because I will inevitably forget which keys I've edited over time, wow windows is so simple and easy and intuitive 🀑

    load more comments (6 replies)

    Just the other day, I was trying to run a CLI program, one I won't name.

    I'm trying out a new immutable distro, and couldn't install it, so I said hey these new flatpaks are supposed to be all a guy could ever need.

    So I downloaded an app that uses this unnamed CLI program as its core. It was a GUI app. And while it worked just fine, I also had very little control over what exactly was gonna happen and how it would happen. I wanted to do some specific things I knew the core program could do, but there was no way to do it.

    Eventually I dug deeper and realized I'm an idiot and the CLI program can run without installing it or any dependencies, so it was fine to use natively. I was able to accomplish my task quickly and efficiently after that, happy as a clam.

    CLI and GUI both have their place. I prefer GUI most the time, honestly. But having some CLI chops can be extremely useful at times.

    [–] Nyadia@lemmy.blahaj.zone 18 points 3 days ago (18 children)

    Perception: "the CLI is scary and hard to use" Reality: "computer, install gimp" "yessir, that'll be 141MB, is that okay?"

    load more comments (18 replies)
    [–] Itdidnttrickledown@lemmy.world 24 points 3 days ago (3 children)

    Yesterday I showed a local business owner how he could set up the signboards and menus in his shop using a raspberry pi. The guy is a windows guy. the second he saw the boot screen he balked. I told him they needed to be set up one time and the rest of the time he could manage them with a windows program (winscp). I don't expect to hear back.

    They fear CLI.

    Another local guy had a huge archive of forestry images. They were all folders that had been renamed for the location and time they were taken but underneath they were all the standard filenames you get from a digital camera. It was nearly twenty years of pictures and he was getting five figure quotes to rename them all to match the folder names. I told him I could build a script to do it so he brought me one of his backups and I promptly did it using CLI before I was going to build a script. The next day he calls to say he talked it over with one of his vendors and they decided to drop their price down to a two thousand dollars. He wasn't interesting in me doing it. I hung up and a few years later when he called me to come fix something someone had messed up I hung up again.

    I have no doubt the people he was talking to did something similar probably using bash scripts. So now when I tell someone I can sort out their file naming or some other sorting task I don't let them see how I do it.

    load more comments (3 replies)
    [–] IsThisAnAI@lemmy.world 5 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

    My guy, it's because you're the vegans of tech.

    Nobody cares. It doesn't need to be your personality.

    [–] fluffykittycat@slrpnk.net 3 points 2 days ago

    You're not really wrong, but at the same time having technical knowledge is essential to getting us out of the tech dystopia big corporations have us trapped in, and a lot more computer knowledge would not only help people be more productive but it would help them make better choices about the stuff they use. One would assume that as computer technology only becomes more essential to our lives that interest in the technical side would follow, and it doesn't seem to have been the case as much as we are expecting. I mean your average Generation Z person understands that you have to connect your computer to the internet to use the web browser and they're capable of turning the device on but there doesn't seem to be an easy on-ramp from the basic knowledge of how to operate the thing to more advanced topics. I wouldn't even say I'm all that good and I did half a computer science degree

    [–] fmtx@lemmy.blahaj.zone 20 points 3 days ago (2 children)

    I'm more impressed that they can use a gamepad for CLI input.

    load more comments (2 replies)
    load more comments
    view more: next β€Ί