I was going to put this in the General topic, but since it is really a question about philosophy and not a suggestion that FreeBSD change, I put it in Off-Topic
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In the many discussions about FreeBSD user share, whether it needs a standard desktop to woo Windows refugees, and stuff like that, it is often assumed that the slick graphic screens of Windows make life easier for users. They certainly reduce complexity and clutter, but that is not necessarily the same thing.
Sometimes on Windows, you get a Blue Screen Of Death and a STOP code. So you look up the STOP code on the 'Web, and there are 456 posts on various forums, with various "solutions" that may or may not work, including the ever popular "Reinstall Windows and see if that fixes it". Maybe this is the best you can do for the completely computer-illiterate user, but for one that is even a little bit computer-savvy, it would be much more useful to have a hint about what happened. If it is a device driver problem, the user can think about what new devices they really installed; that sort of thing. With just the STOP code, the solutions vary all over the place, and some almost seem like it was a random error that a reboot fixed, and the "post hoc ergo propter hoc" fallacy was in play.
It you have a boot problem, you can boot up recovery mode, and it has a tool to try to repair the problem. More often than not, it ends saying "We could not fix your problem", with no information about why it couldn't fix it. Same thing with the network troubleshooter.
FreeBSD, most Linuxes, and even my alma matter, MVS on the IBM mainframe, display a bunch of messages during the bootup process, and they are very useful in troubleshooting. For example, when I was installing FreeBSD on an Alder Lake CPU, the installer would hang during boot, just after a message about a bad UART. I asked about it in the forums, and was immediately pointed to a solution that involved setting up a hint to ignore the bad UART. If messages were hidden like Windows does, I would just be posting "I am trying to install FreeBSD and it hangs", which would be useless for troubleshooting.
FreeBSD takes the approach of showing you all the messages, whether you need them or not. I am very happy with this approach, since I spent 45 years watching the messages when MVS systems were booting up. But this is overwhelming to non-computer-savvy folks, especially considering that there are several messages that say this or that is not working, or not configured correctly and this just means it isn't going to be used by the system, not that there is a catastrophe. Perhaps a STOP screen should display the last 20 console messages and say "When you report or look up this error, please include these messages" or something like that. (Actually, as far as I know, Windows doesn't have a console log, it has the event log, which is sort of a database. The data is all nicely structured, but it is harder to follow the sequence of events, because you have to select each log entry and look at it. So maybe they would have to reformat them for the BSOD page.)
So when we talk about how Windows is easier to set up and use, that may be true when everything is working fine. But when there is a problem, it gives you few tools to help yourself. FreeBSD gives you all the tools you need, but can be overwhelming for the beginner.
Another thing is the installer. The graphic installers, with flashy graphics, and selecting options via mouse are pretty, and comforting to the newcomer. On the other hand, the clunky FreeBSD installer works the same whether you are installing on a device with a high-end GPU or a device with just a serial console which is a very useful thing.
I don't thing FreeBSD should tie itself in knots trying to chase Windows users, because that is not its core playing field. But I think it should be remembered that when we are comparing things to Windows, Windows is *not* the paragon of user-friendliness that some think it is.
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In the many discussions about FreeBSD user share, whether it needs a standard desktop to woo Windows refugees, and stuff like that, it is often assumed that the slick graphic screens of Windows make life easier for users. They certainly reduce complexity and clutter, but that is not necessarily the same thing.
Sometimes on Windows, you get a Blue Screen Of Death and a STOP code. So you look up the STOP code on the 'Web, and there are 456 posts on various forums, with various "solutions" that may or may not work, including the ever popular "Reinstall Windows and see if that fixes it". Maybe this is the best you can do for the completely computer-illiterate user, but for one that is even a little bit computer-savvy, it would be much more useful to have a hint about what happened. If it is a device driver problem, the user can think about what new devices they really installed; that sort of thing. With just the STOP code, the solutions vary all over the place, and some almost seem like it was a random error that a reboot fixed, and the "post hoc ergo propter hoc" fallacy was in play.
It you have a boot problem, you can boot up recovery mode, and it has a tool to try to repair the problem. More often than not, it ends saying "We could not fix your problem", with no information about why it couldn't fix it. Same thing with the network troubleshooter.
FreeBSD, most Linuxes, and even my alma matter, MVS on the IBM mainframe, display a bunch of messages during the bootup process, and they are very useful in troubleshooting. For example, when I was installing FreeBSD on an Alder Lake CPU, the installer would hang during boot, just after a message about a bad UART. I asked about it in the forums, and was immediately pointed to a solution that involved setting up a hint to ignore the bad UART. If messages were hidden like Windows does, I would just be posting "I am trying to install FreeBSD and it hangs", which would be useless for troubleshooting.
FreeBSD takes the approach of showing you all the messages, whether you need them or not. I am very happy with this approach, since I spent 45 years watching the messages when MVS systems were booting up. But this is overwhelming to non-computer-savvy folks, especially considering that there are several messages that say this or that is not working, or not configured correctly and this just means it isn't going to be used by the system, not that there is a catastrophe. Perhaps a STOP screen should display the last 20 console messages and say "When you report or look up this error, please include these messages" or something like that. (Actually, as far as I know, Windows doesn't have a console log, it has the event log, which is sort of a database. The data is all nicely structured, but it is harder to follow the sequence of events, because you have to select each log entry and look at it. So maybe they would have to reformat them for the BSOD page.)
So when we talk about how Windows is easier to set up and use, that may be true when everything is working fine. But when there is a problem, it gives you few tools to help yourself. FreeBSD gives you all the tools you need, but can be overwhelming for the beginner.
Another thing is the installer. The graphic installers, with flashy graphics, and selecting options via mouse are pretty, and comforting to the newcomer. On the other hand, the clunky FreeBSD installer works the same whether you are installing on a device with a high-end GPU or a device with just a serial console which is a very useful thing.
I don't thing FreeBSD should tie itself in knots trying to chase Windows users, because that is not its core playing field. But I think it should be remembered that when we are comparing things to Windows, Windows is *not* the paragon of user-friendliness that some think it is.