The former. You use one DE, typeahead triggers full text search. You use another, no metadata like image width/height when selecting images. You use a third one, no folder thumbnails.

Well yeah, different tools are different. That’s the point. You use the one you like. Do you think there is no good file manager available for Linux?

It's baffling that you can't see that what OP is getting at is that there is not in fact any 'file manager he likes'. 50 half baked solutions are just that - half baked solutions.

"Just learn hundreds of different tools, spend dozens of hours reading all their man pages, understand all their limitations, and pick the correct one before starting your task, all so you can accomplish something completely ancillary to the task you actually want done. Geez, it's not hard."

If you don't like something on Linux, it has alternatives you can use instead.

If you don't like something on a proprietary OS, you can save a lot of time by having no way to change it and suffering the problems permanently.

Unfortunately, just because you have choices that doesn't mean those choices are good.

I was forced to the file explorer on Windows, and the file explorer was good so I didn't mind. I was also forced to use MS Paint. And it was good for a long time, until they added layers. Now my primary use case of it (pasting an image and cropping it) doesn't work as well as it used to.

On Linux I don't even have that choice. There are choices, yes, but none of them do what I want anyway.

What truly drives me insane is that if you say "I just want what Windows does" people tell you that it's not Windows, it's "different(tm)." Then you ask why do Linux software sucks in comparison to Windows, and you get told "well, it's because Windows has $ to spend in R&D." So it's double-think. Developers are aware proprietary software spends tons of money they don't have in R&D, and yet they shy away from just copying the results because they don't want to be Windows.

I just want Windows, but with freedom. I don't want "different" if it's not going to be better.

> Then you ask why do Linux software sucks in comparison to Windows, and you get told "well, it's because Windows has $ to spend in R&D."

Are there actually people who claim this? Microsoft has plenty of money but the premise that they use it to improve the user experience seems contrary to evidence.

When something sucks on Linux with no alternatives it's usually because most people don't use the feature you want, e.g. because there is another way to do the same thing and more people are doing it that way, and then no one bothers to make thing you want because their desire to have that is already being satisfied by something else.

Of course, one of the choices you have is to build the thing you want yourself, which is why it works out that way. The chances of someone having done that go up the more people want it to exist. When the number is low, you have to decide if you want it enough for the person who makes it for everyone to be you. And it's fine if your answer is no, but now you know why that thing doesn't exist.

Microsoft actually doesn't have to improve anything because people have been using it for decades. It is muscle memory.

"Choice is bad because I might have opinions and then instead of the computer saying no I might switch to software that better suits my preferences. I just want a corporation to tell me what to want"

It’s more like, “I already have opinions and preferences and despite the various options available, none of them suit me well and so choosing any one results in a high degree of compromise, and so the next best thing is using a different one depending on the circumstance which brings its own compromises.”