Windows 7 users are switching to forks that still support the OS, like r3dfox, Pale Moon, Mypal, and Supermium. Home users stuck with 7 and 8 probably won’t upgrade or try Linux, they didn’t even update to 10 for some reason (and it was free!) .
I mean… if they’re still on Windows 7, they’ll likely keep using Firefox anyway?
thats so weird. if someone is forced to be on win7, no way they gonna change to linux. there has to be some compatibility issue in the background.
Probably hard to support old platforms if the entire toolchain, predominantly owned by Microsoft isn’t supporting them either.
I’m still afraid to switch to Linux because I’ve used Windows since i was a kid with Windows 95. It’s gotten progressively worse, and I’m still reluctantly camped out on Windows 10, but the thought of firing up a new operating system and going back to being a confused adolescent who doesn’t know how to get around (with or without accidentally making an older woman crouching in red lingerie the desktop wallpaper on my family computer and then denying any knowledge of it) makes me really uneasy.
Please, Linux whisperers. Calm my woes. 😓
Linux is way more similar and familiar than you likely imagine.
Of course, learning is inevitable going to Linux for the first time. But learning is not scary or bad. There are helpful docs and the community. Everyone here was once where you are now.
Also, try Linux risk-free on Windows in a virtual machine.
Next you can dual boot.
Next, you can resort to running Windows apps via Wine and other virtual evironments.
And only last but not least, can you go 100% pure Linux.
So there is a gentle and gradual migration path available. It’s not an all or nothing commitment right upfront.
You only have your chains to lose.
You could do what I did: Install a second drive in your computer and install Linux (e.g. Linux Mint) on it. That way you can always go back to Windows should you come to the conclusion that Linux isn’t for you . But I have to say, being a recent switcher from Windows to Linux myself, the transition was really easier than I initially thought.
Most distro’s have a live bootable install. You download a .iso and burn it to a flash drive. Plug it in and boot from it, doesn’t touch or change anything with your current Windows install.
This lets you try out the OS before fully installing it. Give it a whirl.
I personally recommend Fedora KDE. https://fedoraproject.org/kde/
Instead of burning the ISO to the flash drive, I recommend burning Ventoy to your flashdrive. Then you can drag and drop ISOs for every distro you want to try without having to burn them every time.
Ventoy is so freaking cool!
I’ve used Windows since i was a kid
substitute “Windows” with “computer”. If you have any history of resolving “this doesn’t work for me” on your own (as opposed to waiting for someone else do to it for you), you will be fine. Just be sure not to jump into unknown when you have urgent important things to do :)
Before Windows 11, I told people to switch to Linux because open source software is better for the soul. Now, I tell people because the user experience is just better. I used XP/Vista/7 throughout my childhood, and modern Linux desktop environments really do feel closer to that experience than Windows 11. I use Win11 for work, and I can confidently say that it has the worst settings menu I’ve ever used.
If you know the basics of using a desktop computer, most things won’t feel that weird or foreign to you. The hardest part will probably be learning Linux-compatible alternatives for apps that only work on Windows. What kind of programs do you typically use on your Windows system?
I did what Lawnman23 mentioned, downloaded the latest Mint release and flashed it on an usb stick. booted into Linux Mint, and all my hardware did function right away from the start. Including my old printer, all my usb devices, bluetooth devices and no problems with my Nvidia graphics card. After that i installed linux mint next to my windows as a dual boot. I installed it on different SSD drive tho. Linux Mint is now the OS i always use, i got all my programs and games working on Linux, and now am deleting Windows from my pc.
You’ve got a very relatable situation. Switching to Linux can be a gradual thing. -Keep your windows main, and get a flash drive boot
- make a folder on you C:/ or D:/ to store your Linux user files (like downloads and documents). This keeps your windows files more separate from your Linux files. It also let’s you keep files across boots. You can delete the Linux folder if you don’t want to keep it around.
- Open up Firefox, and have a browse of your favourite sites. See about logging in and getting your account logged in.
- what’s it like? Is it different to windows? Is the vibe different?
- try installing your favourite app or game.
- get curious!
- too much? Your windows is still right there.
Baby steps! And remember, you don’t need to see the whole staircase, just take the first step :)
If you’re still hanging on to old hardware. Linux is the way to go baby
At this point, if you have hardware, Linux is a good choice. New or old. The older it is might change which distro, but still a good choice.
Already on Linux.
Life is good 👍
Made the switch when Windows 7 went EOL. Helped plenty of others make the switch now before 10 was killed off. Life is good indeed.
One of the main places windows is used, like it or not, are organizations and companies. Especially small ones. Specially ones that are not in wealthy countries. And the only thing that keeps them from switching to linux is microsoft office. (Most importantly Word, excel).
My company has ~20 people and I would switch them over to linux if it wasn’t for word and excel.
While libreoffice is great on it’s own, companies send eachother xlsx and docx files. And libreoffice isnt great at reading or writing them. Specially complex ones. I don’t think it’s much of libre office’s fault, but more the shitty incompatible, unstandardized microsoft formats.
Currently I’m the only Linux user in the team, and I constantly advocate Linux, but I know if anybody switches, compatibility with microsoft office is going to be a problem. I can take the risk with the tech team but not the office section (hr, sales, secretary accounting etc.) really.
Try onlyoffice and slowly try to shift to libreoffice with open document formats. Or just skip that part and move everyone to the web versions of office. Also if you guys are on office 2010, the last time I ran it via wine, it worked completely fine.
No you cannot shift to open document formats because you can’t send an odt file to another company. They will not know what it is. In the enterprise world you have to “send them the word” or “the excel”.
Man I feel you and I know it’s just how things are. But I often ask myself the following question: Why are lots of office workers so bad with computers? It’s the tool they use for 1/3 of working day in their life. Just like a craftsman should learn to use their tools. No, instead they always act like it’s something only tech guys should know about.
An electrician drives around in their van full of their tools. They are expert in their tools, but some can’t even change a tire on the van.
It’s the same with office jobs. You use a bunch of tools on the computer, but the computer isn’t necessarily a part of your tool set, it’s your vehicle.
Pretty sure Mozilla has the numbers on how many installations each OS has, so it’s probably a legitimate decision. HOWEVER, if they want to maintain their position on Linux, I highly recommend changing the default behavior of Ctrl+Shift+C to match how it works in Helium, where it simply copies the selected content instead of opening Developer Mode, which cannot be closed again using the same keystroke.
You can change that in about:keyboard in the new Firefox versions
Absolutely, all behavior can be changed somehow. But the default defines the product :)
Ah the classic Linux community response to any complaint.
- The default either actively ignores what every other software does or purposely uses something other than everything else for no apparent reason.
- Someone brings up the fact that it makes no sense why it’s different and how it makes the user experience worse.
- Someone else recommends a half baked solution that still doesn’t really solve the problem and doesn’t address the fact that the specific weirdness being default is the issue. So it ignores the actual complaint and only provides a half solution.
- Nothing is ever done to address the issue and it remains for decades constantly annoying new users and being one of thousands of small issues that turn potential curious new users away as they accumulate.
What’s wrong with Ctrl+C to copy? Its the default shortcut on pretty much everything except terminals.
Whats wrong with using the metric system to represent quantities? Its the default on pretty much everything except fueling planes or operating satellites. /s
The conflict arises from having two different defaults for the same action. Since users frequently switch between these environments, the lack of a universal shortcut causes constant friction.
The key issue is that the request is to change behavior in one place (browser) to match that of a rare case (terminal), causing a mismatch with the frequent case (office suites, mail programs, …). The terminal is the odd one out, not the browser, and ought be the one to change the default for the reason you provide.
In practice, a terminal is a special case and not just a text input window, and current convention is that Ctrl + C aborts / cancels.
(You could of course have a duplicate hotkey, but now you are inconsistent w.r.t. other browsers, and there will be someone else who will be annoyed by the difference)
Actually, Ctrl+C is the ASCII Code for the control character ETX (End of Text) since the early 60s. This is not a hotkey but a control character. To change this system, you’d have to change not only dozends of terminal emulators and the kernels of all unixoid operating systems, but at least ANSI, Unicode and Posix, too. And Windows, by the way - even Microsoft uses ctrl+c in both cmd.exe and powershell to kill the running process.
To be similarly pedantic: Ctrl+C is a hotkey that sends the corresponding ASCII code / codepoint to signal something, it is not an ASCII code itself.
You could have the same character be sent by using Ctrl+Q (if you were to remap it), and not break compatibility with other processes while doing so: the codepoint being sent would be the same. From a technological perspective there is nothing special about the key combination Ctrl+C specifically, but altering this behavior in a terminal absolutely wreak havoc on the muscle memory of terminal users, and altering it’s behavior in a text editor on everyone else’s.
I doubt they’ll change that, since Ctrl+Shift+C also opens the dev console on chromium based browsers on Windows (just tried it with Chrome and Edge). Not sure if that’s the behavior on Linux, since I only use Firefox there.
Also, I really doubt that Ctrl+Shift+C behavior is going to factor into people’s decision anyway. That’s a very niche problem to have.
Can confirm ctrl-shift-c opens dev console
I keep mixing up the shortcuts because ctrl-shift-c is copy in the KDE terminal
I’m not very techie, so when I took my brand new Lenovo (cheap) laptop from w11 to Linux mint, it really felt like an achievement. I haven’t used a command terminal since college, and I straight up made a bootable usb and wiped w11
Nice!!! But I feel those entry distros could do a lot more to be more user friendly, there are many edge cases where you still need to use a terminal and have some understanding of the OS. We need a truly GUI only distro with more wizards, and automatic repair so more people flee to Gnu/Linux
TBH i really like that i had to get a bit techie again to make the switch. learning to use the terminal a little bit has ignited something in me, and the fact that linux doesnt track my shit has made me way more privacy conscious
Edge cases are well, on the edge and sometimes you just need to let them go. You can’t always be everything to everyone.
Well, as an addition to all the calls for switching to Linux:
Its completely doable to install Windows 11 on unsupported Hardware, using an official ISO from Microsoft and letting the Rufus imager apply a few changes and Win 11 should run on hardware that is about 10 years old or a bit older (i think i have heard Microsoft has removed support for the Core2 generation of CPUs). If you want to get a really clean install the best tool is - i think - tiny11builder which cleans up an official ISO and makes the whole experience of running this OS on older hardware way more pleasant.
Currently i have a test system (a laptop) with an Celeron N3010 and 4 GB RAM on my desk at work running Windows 11 modified by tiny11builder and it is - while not exactly fast - absolutely useable for classical office tasks.
The PC Gamer article’s title also says “upgrade or”. That’s a heck of a detail to editorialize out of the title.
From the Mozilla post it cites:
After this, no security updates will be provided and you are strongly encouraged to upgrade to a supported Microsoft Windows version.
Or, if your current hardware can’t handle Windows 10 or higher for some reason, you can switch to a Linux-based operating system. The vast majority of Linux distributions come with Firefox as the default browser.
I agree switching to Linux is the better option. I want to try Bazzite.
If you’re still using those old and bugged versions then you probably don’t care about unpatched software. Big security issues. Hope no one is using them.
NGL, I have Win 7 on a Mac that I play old as hell PC games with and FF has been a disaster on it for a long time - to the point where I get most of the downloads of games and the various drivers they need with the macOS install…
95 was the last good windows i said what i said
98SE enters the chat
I did like 98SE a lot, was impressed by 95 and loved 3.1, but the first really great, stable, modern windows was 2k
I had all the above but I had 2k the longest. I miss it.
Since most of Lemmy users are Linux fans, this headline sounds nice but is a bit misleading if you read the original post from Mozilla:
How can I get the newest features of Firefox?
If you want to keep your Firefox up to date, with all the latest features and security updates, you need to upgrade your operating system to Windows 10 or higher. In some cases, Microsoft may require newer hardware in order to support the newer operating system. After upgrading, you can easily reinstall Firefox and keep all of your settings.
Or, if your current hardware can’t handle Windows 10 or higher for some reason, you can switch to a Linux-based operating system. The vast majority of Linux distributions come with Firefox as the default browser. Please see the support websites for the version of Linux that you’re interested in.
sounds nice but is a bit misleading
To me it even sounds kind of scary. If they are telling users you need to switch your OS to continue using our app, that is going to isolate users and further decrease user base and market share. And apps that no one uses usually die. So for people who like Firefox, it doesn’t sound so nice. I’m also a Linux user, but I’m not sure if this is a positive way to drive users to Linux. (Thought it does mention windows 10 upgrade hardware requirement limitations, which might be a positive way to drive users to Linux, thanks Microsoft.)
Market share for Win 7-8.1 is, no joke, 0.69% (nice). And how many of those users are running FireFox?
Get on Linux anyway. You have no privacy whatsoever on Windows.
However, if you (like me) have to dual-boot, remember that O&O ShutUp can help you easily turn off Windows’ insidious tracking measures and delete Copilot off your system.
I don’t recommend dual-boot on the same disk. Windows likes to fuck up the bootmanager with updates every so often so you can’t boot into linux anymore.
Yeah, I like OS installed on separate drives and selecting the one I want to boot off of in BIOS. Gets trickier on laptop though that doesn’t have multiple drives.
