2019-12-24-new-world-of-software.html (4346B) - raw
1 <!-- title: A new world of software --> 2 <!-- slug: new-world-of-software --> 3 <!-- categories: FOSS, Miscellany --> 4 <!-- date: 2019-12-24T00:00:00Z --> 5 6 <p> 7 As I have said before, I was a big user of big tech companies' services. I also used macOS (and 8 Windows before that) and proprietary software for mostly everything. I didn't really know what 9 free<sup id="fnref1"><a href="#fn1">1</a></sup> software was and, if I was running any, it was by 10 coincidence.</p> 11 <!-- /p --> 12 13 <p> 14 At college, I discovered the world of GNU/Linux. I had an old computer that was very slow and 15 someone promised that GNU/Linux would make it significantly faster, so I installed Debian next to 16 macOS. This way, every time I turned on my computer I would be able to choose which operating 17 system I wanted to use, and if something happened to my GNU partition, I could still use the 18 computer as before. Even with Debian installed, the computer eventually started to become too slow 19 for my needs and I bought a new computer where I also installed Debian next to the default OS. As 20 for the old computer, I eventually erased both partitions and installed Manjaro with XFCE instead, 21 I don't use it much anymore because of its limitations.</p> 22 <!-- /p --> 23 24 <p> 25 Progressively, I learned more and more about free software and I decided to use the Debian 26 partition nearly-exclusively. Ultimately, I got used to the new desktop environment, the new tools 27 (the terminal!) and all the new different things you find in GNU/Linux. There has been an 28 interesting side effect of using Debian as my daily operative system: most of the software I now 29 run is free/libre as a result of it.</p> 30 <!-- /p --> 31 32 <p> 33 I always thought free software was either worse than the proprietary alternative or non-existent 34 for a given task. What I have realized is that there are free options for most of the use cases 35 and that once you are used to the terminal, they can even be easier to work with, work faster and 36 be more reliable. Moreover, they normally<sup id="fnref2"><a href="#fn2">2</a></sup> are also 37 lighter programs, use fewer resources and generally follow standards (whereas proprietary software 38 creates its own protocols/file types more frequently).</p> 39 <!-- /p --> 40 41 <p> 42 Don't get me wrong, there are advantages to proprietary software. It can sometimes work better, be 43 nicer or more intuitive. Maybe it just suits your needs better because it's what you are used to. 44 There may be commodities we are familiar with in proprietary software that are hard to let go of. 45 However, in my case, it has gotten to the point that it is the other way around. It is hard to let 46 go the easy installation process of free software, without license complications, the fact that it 47 is available for GNU/Linux operative systems, the community around the software, the minimalism of 48 the tools that get the job done, without the need of thousands of extra features.</p> 49 <!-- /p --> 50 51 <p> 52 There is a whole world of efficient and useful software that I had never <em>really</em> explored 53 and I now see why so many people use it. I no longer look for free/libre <em>alternatives</em> to 54 a proprietary program, but it is the only kind of software that I look for. Dealing with closed 55 source and proprietary software is now my plan B, when everything else fails.</p> 56 <!-- /p --> 57 58 <h2>Final note</h2> 59 60 <p> 61 Firstly, in this post I claim certain qualities of both free and proprietary software. It is 62 always spoken from my experience and perspective, your experience may be different. They are also 63 qualities that I commonly find, instead of a claim that all software on a given category has them. 64 Secondly, I deliberately left aside the ethical component of free software, as it wasn't what I 65 wanted to talk about, however, you might be interested in reading more about it.</p> 66 <!-- /p --> 67 68 <!-- footnotes --> 69 <hr /> 70 71 <ol> 72 <li id="fn1"> 73 Here (and throughout the post) I am talking about <a 74 href="https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html">free as in freedom</a> software. <a 75 href="#fnref1" title="Jump back to footnote 1 in the text">↩</a></li> 76 <!-- /li --> 77 <li id="fn2"> 78 That is generally in my experience. <a href="#fnref2" title="Jump back to footnote 2 in the 79 text">↩</a></li> 80 <!-- /li --> 81 </ol>