I’m visiting my parents for the holidays and convinced them to let me switch them to Linux.

They use their computer for the typical basic stuff; email, YouTube, Word, Facebook, and occasionally printing/scanning.

I promised my mom that everything would look the same and work the same. I used Linux Mint and customized the theme to look like Windows 10. I even replaced the Mint “Start” button with the Windows logo.

So far they like it and everything runs great. Plus it’s snappier now that Windows isn’t hogging all the system resources.

  • Steve@lemmy.todayEnglish
    411·
    11 months ago

    An excellent choice to use Linux Mint! If my parents allowed me to switch their computers to Linux, I would’ve chosen Linux Mint as well for them. But, I probably wouldn’t give them the Windows 10 look.

  • Grass@sh.itjust.works
    27·
    11 months ago

    Welcome to the club. It’s the don’t need to remove malware from the parents computers every week club.

    • TimeSquirrel@kbin.social
      132·
      11 months ago

      And that’s the thing. It’s great for casual users who do simple computing tasks, and it’s great for the programmers, hackers, and IT professionals. But there’s no middle ground for power users who know a bit more than the average users but can’t be bothered to learn shell scripting.

      • kpw@kbin.social
        9·
        11 months ago

        I’m using Linux ten years now and I never learned shell scripting. Or do you mean running commands in the shell?

      • MiddledAgedGuy@beehaw.org
        3·
        11 months ago

        I don’t agree with your exact reasoning on the middle ground, but I think there’s truth in the underlying sentiment.

        I do think that users that are are competent with technology but unfamiliar with Linux are pretty likely to get frustrated with it. I had this discussion with a friend just yesterday. They want to try out Linux because of frustration with Windows 11’s restrictive hardware requirements. But they also want to ease in to it. I think that’s wise. In this specific case, I think if they tried to dump Windows in it’s entirety and try to use Arch right off the bat, they’d get frustrated and give up. But if they tried a user friendly distro on a secondary piece of hardware? I think that has a good chance of creating a new Linux user.

        I guess the point of that rambling paragraph is that that type of a user is a challenge, but there is middle ground to be had.

        • SterbenDeathGun@lemmy.ml
          4·
          11 months ago

          It was hard for me too, but PopOS made my life easy back in the day when I first tried.

          No drivers needed, everything worked out of the box, including the Nvidia GeForce 2060 Mobile. So I just needed to get comfortable with the OS in general.

        • Semperverus@lemmy.worldEnglish
          7·
          11 months ago

          I play AAA titles all the time on linux. Just not ones that come bundled with viruses and rootkitskernel-level invasive anticheat.

  • Holzkohlen@feddit.de
    21·
    11 months ago

    Got my dad on Mint for a few years now. That me reminds me I have to check which version he is on. He might still be on 20 something.

  • wabafee@lemm.ee
    211·
    11 months ago

    Get ready to address hard to debug issues in the future op.

  • SigHunter@feddit.de
    211·
    11 months ago

    I switched my mothers Laptop to Gentoo with KDE some time ago and she did not even notice, because I placed the firefox icon at the same location it was in windows … 😜 she noticed only that the wallpaper is different

  • KE0VVT@midwest.social
    255·
    11 months ago

    I don’t believe in making GNU/Linux look exactly like Windows. It’s a different OS, and any attempt to fool users will be in vain.

    I tell family members: “I don’t know anything about Windows/macOS.” (Because I don’t, at this point.) “I can only help you if you use what I use.” Usually, they stop asking me for help, and that’s great for me. If they say yes, I install Fedora with GNOME and whatever applications they expect to use. After a brief explanation of how GNOME works, people generally get used to it and are satisfied.

    I share my laptop with Mom. It runs GNU Guix System with GNOME. She uses it to run Chrome for stuff she can’t get on her tablet. She’s used to it at this point.

  • fhang@lemmy.world
    19·
    11 months ago

    I did the same thing with my Dad. He’s been using Linux Mint for a bit over 2 years now.

    Linux Mint is more than enough for his usage: Email, internet browsing and word processing.

  • Yerbouti@lemmy.ml
    15·
    11 months ago

    My dad has a Surface Go. I’ve installed Fedora on one of those and it works really well. Dad is still unsure about this but I will try to convince him during the holydays.