Going from Windows to Linux then back to windows sucks.
Edit; Going through the comments it seems it doesn’t matter so long as IT supports the operating system, which is fair, in my scenario I’m not involved with our systems-management/IT/developers unless it’s an update to the software we use.
My desktop at work is still Windows 10 and while it works, kinda, my keyboard shortcuts are almost entirely different, I’ve encountered numerous moments where switching tab either by alt-tabbing or by the taskbar not working at all forcing me to minimize everything till I find that tab, couple times it wouldn’t even boot.
I started unplugging the Ethernet cable when I leave for work so IT can’t do any behind the scenes when I’m away.
I dredd the day they force a win 11 desktop on me.
What is your job?
Quality Control for a Metal Fabrication shop.
Yes, the company OS policy doesn’t specify which OS to use as long as it actively supported and the security tooling can be installed.
I reckon the latter part might be the problem for a lot of people.
A lot of enterprise security software has a Linux version, because a lot of servers run Linux, and they need to have the software for compliance. There is no shortage in that space.
Yeah. I also have GrapheneOS on my work tablet
Small company, I’m friends with IT dude so he told me I could do it as long as I didn’t go to him for tech support. He then came to me asking for help installing linux on his machine. LMAO
Uno reverse
For sure. I worked in IT for a long time. After we switched from the mainframe to os/2 I ran it for a decade on my desktop while the company went to Windows. Then once I couldn’t run os/2 anymore due to newer hardware I switched to Linux. Ran it from the late 90s until my retirement 5 years ago.
I had to support it all myself but they let me since I was also the security guy and they realized that Windows sucked.
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Me too, I have also refused job offers to places that don’t allow Linux on the workstations.
Yea but what distro ? Yes you will be judged!
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youll need to update your work desktop for the first time soon
I got to update my WSL on my work machine to Debian 13. Very exciting.
That’s really dependent on how your work manages user workstations. If your employer is big enough to have managed endpoints, you’ll need to convince your IT department, not just your boss. They’ll have to be able to officially support it (compatibility, updates, security, legal, etc.) and that also requires approval from higher ups.
To me it’s the opposite, my boss (and owner of the company) is frustrated that we cannot install linux due to some technical requirements. It is possible to change that, but this will require reshaping of the entire work process
Usually it’s some proprietary or commercial app unavailable for Linux. I have a fairly powerful workstation and ran Windows on a VM with GPU pass thru for those use cases, but at some point I upgraded my MacBook and use that for most work. The Linux machine effectively operates as a server. I haven’t used Windows for work in many months and recently removed a GPU to save power and heat.
Most places I’ve been at have only OS restrictions when the corporate IT doesn’t support it. To be honest, while not perfect, WSL on Windows is great.
It’s certainly better than none Linux
found an old unused laptop in my office the week i got the job. that week, i nuked it and installed deb12. i’ve since installed an inventory server in a virtual machine, and i’m afraid to break everything so i guess it’s gonna run deb12 for the forseeable future.
I’ve been thinking about swapping my work laptop to Linux too.
The difference is I’m in IT and I know what all things I need to put on my computer to make it compliant with all our policies and all the software I need to do my job.
I’ve been experimenting by running some Linux VMs with all the EDR, patching, and logging software we need. But by the time I’m doing all that, there’s really no point in using Linux except for the CLI which WSL has been great for that.
In a large organization, IT team/Organization policy will never allow to let you use Linux as your OS unless it is required for project or mandated by client.
With ransomware attacks on ever rise, IT will always try to control all aspects of your office laptop/desktop. As they think they got it sorted for Windows, they will fight tooth and nail if you ever submit it ticket to get your OS replaced with Linux without project requirements.
In my view, as long as I’m allowed to install whatever on my personal devices even while working from home, I’m fine.
Office devices aren’t really my property. For me, Windows during office hours, and Linux thereafter.
yeah this isn’t necessarily true. I work at a large company and run Linux full time.
they are not all the same.
we even have dedicated Linux IT
Is it a product based or service based company?
I would say service based
Good to know that that practice exists in service based organizations.
There is dedicated resources to Linux solely because it is the personal preference of some of the workers? It isn’t some sort of business requirement?
Many of us find ourselves to be more effective on Linux. There is some business requirement in terms of the service runs on Linux, but they didn’t have to let people have it on their personal workstations
You deserve to have an OS that doesnt spy on you. As well if you install linux then your company can’t spy on you either.
that’s not true if it’s company managed
All it takes to be true is one little USB stick 😉
Yeah, go ahead and install your own Linux distro. Now you can’t authenticate to the internal network or use any of the services.
At the end of the day, corporate being able to manage Linux is what makes it possible to be used in an enterprise environment. There are regulatory and auditing requirements that would otherwise make Linux not an option.
I authenticate just fine. Most of our stuff is in the cloud and web based. There’s Teams for Linux, OneDrive for Linux. I use LibreOffice, and then the rest I just use the web version.
Outlook, I use the web version. Same with all the shares and print stuff.
I’m glad it works for you, but this would not work at my company. We have much stricter network controls
Managed devices usually have software installed to track all such “events” that gets periodically uploaded to IT team, or gets automatically flagged to IT team based on security policies of the organization.
If you are using a managed devices, in all likelihood, all of your actions are getting automatically logged/tracked.
Installing Linux would remove all of that software. Your computer essentially disappears from/stops reporting to their systems. It would likely get removed after a while of inactivity as the lists are cleaned up. All IT jobs ive worked they like to keep the list of computers as alive as possible so that means cleaning up dead or unresponsive computers.
Would a vm work? What about live environment on a usb?
You mean 99% of companies out there?
Large companies will surely have that locked down. Most companies don’t
At my workplace all the devs are on either Mac OS or Linux, with Mac OS being more common among Web/PHP guys and Linux among the backend devs (like me). As it turns out, given the choice, nobody actually prefers Windows. I’m still baffled by Mac OS being so common, though, at least among devs.
This works because our whole IT infrastructure is designed to be accessible via the web-browser, most of it even without VPN, via two-factor authenticated single-sign-on, most of it self-hosted (all except Teams, which obviously also needs its own authentication). This gives people the freedom to run whatever OS they like on their computers and set it up themselves, with the only requirement being to use FDE with a strong password and regularly do backups to the remote storage. We’re also allowed (if not encouraged) to use the laptops for private stuff and get to keep them when they’re replaced.
And as far as I can tell IT problems because of this diverse environment are surprisingly minimal and mostly with those aforementioned web services.
To be fair to macOS, it’s still Unix-based, which at least makes it less miserable for development than Windows.
I would still go for Linux any time, though.
That and i hear macbook battery life is absolute black magic fuckery
The battery life on my MacBook M1 Max is better than the machine it replaced but nothing to write home about. I bought my wife an M4 MacBook Air and honestly she will misplace her charging cord for days because she didn’t need it. It’s remarkable. For most devs, a powerful Linux desktop (or cloud server) and a MacBook Air is a very powerful combination.
