break a lot of backwards compatibility or radically change the current way of doing things

Plan 9. We can still have textual interfaces without emulating the ancient use of teletypewriters.

The things I’ve read (admittedly mostly from the OpenBSD camp) from BSD devs, they seem to not worry about corporations building from their source that much, instead they actively try to get rid of GPL code because it isn’t permissive enough for their standards.

Theo wrote "GPL fans said the great problem we would face is that companies would take our BSD code, modify it, and not give back. Nope—the great problem we face is that people would wrap the GPL around our code, and lock us out in the same way that these supposed companies would lock us out. Just like the Linux community, we have many companies giving us code back, all the time.

But once the code is GPL’d, we cannot get it back."

The option to not set a root password and instead let the regular user use sudo seems to be mentioned in the installer for the first time around 2007, so it’s been there for a while.

Also OpenBSD use different versions, I’m guessing their vi is the original since it can’t handle utf-8. And iirc ex(1) is also a vim variant on Linux. I’ve never met anyone who actually uses ex though. ed(1) I think is just GNU ed. I am not certain about these versions though.

The original vi has not been maintained for many years. Most distributions, including Debian, Fedora, etc, use a version of Vim which (mostly) is similar to how Vi was.

From Fedoras wiki:
“On Fedora, Vim (specifically the vim-minimal package) is also used to provide /bin/vi. This vi command provides no syntax highlighting for opened files, by default, just like the original vi editor. The vim-minimal package comes pre-installed on Fedora.”

From the vim-tiny package description on Debian:
“This package contains a minimal version of Vim compiled with no GUI and a small subset of features. This package’s sole purpose is to provide the vi binary for base installations.”

It is, they have the same text.

Nowadays vi is just a symlink to vim.tiny, so you’re actually running vim (in vi mode).

https://www.maketecheasier.com/assets/uploads/2020/08/debian-install-set-password.png.webp

Third paragraph. I’m not trying to be a smart-ass, I also installed Debian a few times without seeing it.

The installer says this when it asks you to type a root password. I don’t know why, but for some reason the information is both right there and easy to miss.

A good act does not wash out the bad, nor a bad act the good. Each should have its own reward.

There is something “clunky” about the website, but to be fair, the first page has a big button to download the installer, which leads to a page where the first link is the version most people want, the second link leads to instructions how to get it onto a usb (or cd/dvd) for linux/windows/mac, and clearly visible a link to all the other versions of the installer that people might want, with explanations what they are for.
For me it’s hard to put my finger on why the website is bad, all the information is there. I do agree that it just somehow feels bad, but I don’t understand why.

I am not trying to gatekeep. It could be that I’m blind to why debian is hard to install, I think it’s about the same as ubuntu or mint or fedora etc. Which means I’m not the right person to improve this area. I do want to lower the thresholds, and currently I’m helping out with that in other areas. This discussion started with the claim that it was hard to find the iso, which I disagree with, and now I’m not sure what we’re disagreeing about.

Would a normie Windows user know how to install Windows on a computer without OS? Of course, this hypothetical user doesn’t have to, because he/she probably bought a computer with Windows pre-installed. Is there any OS in the world that is easy to install if you don’t know what an iso file is? Which measurement are we using when the claim is that Debian is difficult to install? What is an easy install?

I see, so then there are two options: 1) Make the full offline installer the default, or 2) put all options side by side and explain the difference.

The first option isn’t good because any default will not fit everyone, there will always be someone looking for what isn’t the default. The second option would just be confusing for the person who knows nothing about computers. “I have to read a wall of text to decide what to download? This is too much!”

I mean, there’s no way to win here. Is there any OS avaliable that can have one installer that fits exactly everyone, or a way to have a list to choose from if the user knows nothing about the choices?

You’re describing that you want something that isn’t the standard installer, with the ability to do offline installs. A new user with no clue about anything would probably just use the top link and run the graphic installer, ending up with the same system as if he/she had downloaded the dvd version. Is your criticism that internet is a requirement for the standard installer?

As an experiment you could go to debian.org and see if you find the download link.

If you can understand written english well, there’s translation/internationalization that isn’t too scary. What is your native language?

While I do agree that the website is bad, nowadays the main iso includes non-free firmware, and it’s the same installer for all DEs.

People will say “use this editor” or “use that window manager”, but honestly it’s just personal preference. There’s no award for using ed to edit files, and almost anything you can do with one distro you can do with any other distro. You might get an urge to distrohop and compile the kernel, and that’s fine, but imho far more useful is to learn how pipes work and what you can do with regular expressions. A tutorial for bash is always useful.

I’ve started to reconsider how I do things online. For such a long time it’s been the norm to expect things for free (gratis), and users became the product. If the choice now is being bombarded with ads or paying for a service, I’d rather pay a reasonable price. If I want online storage to keep my files backed up and available, then a small sum is acceptable to me. The important thing is to choose providers who believe in the open spirit of the internet, using free software, respecting privacy. I’ve submitted a couple of patches to the operating system I use. Etc. I want the internet to be a cooperative, friendly place.