GUI is a generic swiss army knife. It’s easy to introduce to someone, and it has a whole array of tools ready for use. However, each of those tools is only half-decent at its job at best, and all of the tools are unwieldy. The manual is included, but it mostly tells you how to do things that are pretty obvious.
CLI is a toolbox full of quality tools and gadgets. Most people who open the box for the first time don’t even know which tools they’re looking for. In addition, each tool has a set of instructions that must be followed to a T. Those who know how to use the tools can get things done super quickly, but those who don’t know will inevitably cause some problems. Oh, but the high-detail manuals for all the tools are in the side compartment of the toolbox too.
I use Linux and I prefer GUIs. I’m the kind of person that would rather open a filemanager as superuser and drag and drop system files than type commands and addresses. I hope you hax0rs won’t forget that we mere mortals exist too and you’ll make GUIs for us 🙏🙏🙏
Tbf, the file explorer is actually one really good argument for GUIs over terminals. Same with editing text. Its either simple enough to use Nano or I need a proper text editor. I don’t mess around with vim or anything like that that.
Its all tools. Some things are easier in a file manager, some things are easier in a GUI.
You’ve angered the Emacs gods 😨
Good. They need to be humbled haha
I think it depends, if I have a simple file structure and know where stuff is, it’s pretty efficient to do operations in the terminal.
If I have a billion files to go through a file manager might be easier.
Nano, the best text editor
Yeah I prefer fancy text editor too. And my biggest heartbreak was learning that I can’t just
sudo kate(there’s a way to use Kate to edit with higher privileges but I never remember how, edit: apparently it’s opensuse specific problem).Born to Kate, forced to nano
The problem is running GUI code as root as it’s never been vetted for that. What you want, effectively, is to have
EDITORvariable of your session set tokateand open system files usingsudoedit. I’m a terminal guy myself, so this exact thing is enough for me. Having said that - I’m sure someone will chime in with a plugin/addon/extension/etc that adds this to the right click context for what I assume is KDE. Or you can try looking for that om your favourite search engine.You can edit system files with a GUI text editor by opening the containing folder as root in a GUI file manager, then opening the file you want to edit from there.
I use both, depends a bit on the task at hand. Generally simple tasks GUI and complex ones CLI. Especially if I want anything automated.
I tried to learn superfile thinking it could make terminal more exciting but nah.
Gimme that comfy file explorer gui.
Totally agree.
It depends. But yeah I’d rather use something like Handbrake than raw dog FFmpeg.
FWIW I do use the file browser too when I’m looking for a file with a useful preview, e.g. images.
When I do have to handle a large amount of files though (e.g. more than a dozen) and so something “to them”, rather than just move them around, then the CLI becomes very powerful.
It’s not because one uses the CLI that one never used a file browser.
Yeah, when I need to inspect lots of images I just open the folder in gwenview.
For peeking at a single picture or two through you can hold down control and click/hover on the filename when using Konsole. Love that feature. You can even listen to
.wavfiles this way.Very nice, I don’t seem to have that option available but I can right-click on a filename to open the file manager in the current directory. Good to know!
I once did
rm \*accidentally lol. I now have a program that just moves files to trash aliased as “rm” just in case. I just don’t feel confident moving files in CLIYeah it happened to all of us. The console is powerful and it means when you mess up, it will have BIG consequences. One learns to test first before globbing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glob_(programming) too much!
I would say “why not, to each their own” if not the thought about what else the filemanager is going to do with root access (like downloading data from web for file preview). But the general sentiment still stands, it is absurd to think that computer must be used only in one way by all people
Are there people who are mad at other people for using the terminal? Is this really a thing that exists?
Usually it’s the other way around
Not really. But you know, gotta find ways to feel smarter than other people so here we go.
And those Windows evangelists! Don’t we all know 'em with their strong opinions about operating systems? *shakes fist at cloud*
Yeah you just can’t be in a server room anymore without some dude trying to sell you on Office365 and Cortana, sigh.
Do you have a moment to talk about our Lord and savior, the Microsoft App Store, and his enlightened prophet, Candy Crush Saga?
It’s not that they are mad others use CLI, it’s that they’re mad that Linux devs regularly stop creating P&CI features, instead opting for CLI with no P&CI equivalent action.
It’s kind of obvious why - CLI is already very flexible right out of the box, and it takes much less work to add functionality within CLI rather than creating it for the P&CI.
At the same time, I understand the P&CI folk’s frustration, since one of biggest obstacles to getting more people on Linux is the lack of P&CI solutions, and the fact that many actions on Linux are explained solely via CLI.
CLI folks have invested the time to use terminals effectively and view overuse of the P&CI as beneath them, and P&CI folks have no interest in dumping time into learning CLI to do something they could do on Windows with P&CI.
Pardon my ignorance but what does P&CI stand for?
Edit: nvm got it I think it’s Point & Click Interface
Correct, point and click interface
Linux is the terminal.
The GUI applications are just terminal applications where you press buttons instead of typing. Creating the buttons and UI is extra overhead for developers.
CLI folks have invested the time to use terminals effectively and view overuse of the P&CI as beneath them, and P&CI folks have no interest in dumping time into learning CLI to do something they could do on Windows with P&CI.
There are people who have learned to use Linux, using whatever tools are best for the job and people who have decided that the only way to interact with a computer is with a mouse and refuse to learn anything else.
You don’t have to swap away from Windows. But, if you choose to, know that you will have to learn a new operating system and, on Linux, this means becoming familiar with the terminal.
If you’re going to artificially limit yourself, despite the chorus of Linux users telling you otherwise, by deciding that any terminal use indicates a failure of the OS or of developers, then you should not use Linux.
It’s hard enough to learn a new OS. Artificially restricting yourself to only using your mouse is going to severely limit your ability to function.
Obviously I’m talking about the DE packages, not the kernel or CLI base. We are talking about windows users switching to linux-based DEs, which are directly trying to compete with Windows and iOS.
This is not me having issue with CLIs. I’ve been on Linux for decades. I am pointing out the perspective of those that are frustrated with Linux DEs being blatantly unready for mass-adoption, specifically because they expect layman users to learn CLI. See my previous comment and this comment for more details.
I do understand their perspective.
It’s just that their expectations do not align with reality and they’re only going to hurt their experience by thinking that there is a path to using Linux without using the terminal. Some distros do a really good job of creating something that seems like a pure GUI experience, but that illusion only lasts right up until there is a problem that the UI designers didn’t anticipate and the only way forward is to type terminal commands.
I’m not trying to be an asshole when I say this kind of thing.
It’s just disingenuous for people to recommend Linux and also say ‘Don’t worry, you won’t need the terminal’ or to foster the illusion, in new users, that their fear of the terminal is justified. I get that, of all things Linux, the most alien thing from a Windows/Smartphone user’s perspective, is a text-based interface.
It seems difficult and social media is full of people acting like the terminal is incredibly difficult to learn so people believe that they can simply opt out of using the terminal. You can’t, and trying to do so is going to make users have a horrible experience. It’d be like telling people that Windows doesn’t require a mouse, that’s possibly true but if a person artificially limits themselves in that way, they’re going to have a much harder time than they would have if they’d spend the time to use the OS properly.
This is kind of erasing the author with your description of the issue. The reason that apps eventually require CLI to complete tasks is because devs think of CLI first and then produce a stop-gap P&CI over top of it. It is explicitly how devs in the Linux environment operate which creates a gap between CLI and P&CI. If apps were developed with P&CI in mind first, with CLI added after, this would not be a problem - and we know this because of every app developed for both Windows and Linux, which lack these gaps in functionality - or lack CLI entirely.
Your stance also de-emphasizes the difficulty of learning CLI for the first time. It’s not the most difficult thing ever, but it can be fairly frustrating. It’s not something you want to deal with when just trying to unwind after work on your PC, or while you’re trying to do your job at work. I think it’s pretty reasonable most people don’t want to have to learn yet another paradigm just to do what they’ve already figured out how to with a P&CI.
Being realistic, of course, this paradigm shift is not going to happen. Linux will continue to be only a small portion of total computers used by end users because of this, and various other reasons it’s found unpalatable.
I’ve heard that KDE and GNOME, however, are both at a level now where P&CIs are all you really need. I have not tried them myself, though.
The CLI is first because Linux is, first and foremost, an operating system built for terminal access. It was based on Unix, a mainframe operating system that served terminals.
I’ve heard that KDE and GNOME, however, are both at a level now where P&CIs are all you really need. I have not tried them myself, though.
Between all of my devices at home and work, I use KDE, XFCE and hyprland.
KDE has a pretty comprehensive GUI, but to say that they’re all you need is a gross exaggeration. Sure, you can connect your bluetooth device via the GUI but if there is any problem with it the GUI is woefully insufficient for troubleshooting. Similarly, you can adjust the volume in the GUI… but if your device is using the wrong bitrate or you want to do anything more complicated than control the device that sound is sent to, then you’re going to be editing dot files and using the terminal.
In Linux, the GUI applications are a convenience but the core of the system is the terminal interface. That’s what everything has been designed for since the beginning. Graphical Desktop environments are not, at all, a replacement for the terminal.
Your stance also de-emphasizes the difficulty of learning CLI for the first time. It’s not the most difficult thing ever, but it can be fairly frustrating. It’s not something you want to deal with when just trying to unwind after work on your PC, or while you’re trying to do your job at work. I think it’s pretty reasonable most people don’t want to have to learn yet another paradigm just to do what they’ve already figured out how to with a P&CI.
I don’t think that it is reasonable to want to swap operating systems without learning the new operating system.
If a person has decided that they never want to use anything but a mouse to solve their problems then Linux is not the OS for them. Learning a new operating system means learning how the operating system works, not declaring how you think it should work and declaring anything outside of your expectations as unreasonable.
If you’re coming into this with the idea that you’re going to swap to Linux but only use your Windows/Mac knowledge to puzzle through a GUI and also refuse to touch anything that is in the terminal then you should not use Linux. If you’re asking for help and then telling the people trying to help you that you’re not going to use the terminal, you’re going to face a lot of negative responses.
they’re mad that Linux devs regularly stop creating P&CI features, instead opting for CLI with no P&CI equivalent action.
I’ve never seen this?
It’s typically a completely different developer who creates the CLI first, and then one of us adds a P&C after.
So if something is brand new, sure there might be no P&C, yet.
I promise There’s no conspiracy to not have nice things. Haha.
I was specifically trying to not sound conspiratorial. I’m pointing out that it’s a matter of having learned a paradigm vs having to learn a new paradigm.
Devs have already gotten used to CLI and very rarely make full P&CI suites because of it. Even if the original Dev only did CLI for the app and someone came back and made a P&CI for that app, those P&CI interfaces are still fairly barebones. This is both a mix of devs knowing how good CLI can be and because it’s all open source volunteer work.
Layman users of P&CI-focused DEs actively avoid CLI so they don’t have to learn it. This means that using most Linux apps are something to be avoided for most Windows users, making the OS base mostly unusable for them.
To be clear, when I am talking about P&CI-focused DEs, like windows and iOS, I mean that if you cannot perform an action with the P&CI, then that action essentially does not exist for the average user. Contrast that with Linux DEs, where it’s quite common to have to directly edit configs or use the CLI to perform various actions.
As a veteran user, CLI does not bother me. I do understand the frustration of those who want some Linux DEs to become as default as Windows and iOS, because lack of P&CI does damage that effort.
This is not every app in Linux obvi, but the ones that are best at making sure the P&CI is full-flddged, are the apps that develop for windows and iOS as well as Linux - Blender, LibreOffice, Logseq, Godot, etc. The most common offenders are the utility apps, such as those that handle drivers, sound systems, DE functions, etc.
This means that using most Linux apps are something to be avoided for most Windows users, making the OS base mostly unusable for them.
I take your point. And this was very much the case for a long time.
But it’s worth pointing out that Gnome and KDE are both done, now.
I haven’t been forced to reach for command line to change something - anything - on either of my last couple of Linux installs.
Edit: I almost didn’t notice, but it feels worth celebrating and raising awareness.
In a pretty high end high tech company, there’s still lots of people who see a terminal and think “ha hah, they are still stuck in old mainframe stuff like you used to see in the movies”.
My team determined long ago that we have to have two user experiences for our team to be taken seriously.
A GUI to mostly convince our own managers that it’s serious stuff. Also to convince clients who have execs make the purchasing decisions without consulting the people that will actually use it.
An API, mostly to appease people who say they want API, occasionally used.
A CLI to wrap that API, which is what 99% of the customers use 95% of the time (this target demographic is niche.
Admittedly, there’s a couple of GUI elements we created that are handy compared to what we can do from CLI, from visualizations to a quicker UI to iterate on some domain specific data. But most of the “get stuff done” is just so much more straightforward to do in CLI.
I don’t think so, but I do criticize not having an option, that is why I stopped using Cisco personally and professionally, some things are fast using the cli, some things just need an Ui, you need both.
A cli is a ui. I know that’s pedantic but this is Linux memes
another name for CLI is the TUI (Terminal User Interface)
See, in my mind, a CLI is a line buffer-based interface, whereas a TUI is an interactive character-based interface.
sedorbashis CLI andviorrogueis TUI.You make a fair point
I think of tui as “text user interface” and use it as a broad category but mostly for more advanced clis that have a graphical quality to them despite being text based, such as ranger or slack-term. Some tuis even have mouse controls!
Like I get and appreciate the CLI and for networking, that’s pretty much all I’m using anyway, but I am shocked that enterprise networking doesn’t even bother to do any GUI. Once upon a time Mellanox Onyx bothered to do a GUI and I could see some people light up, finally an enterprise switch that would let them do some stuff from a GUI. Then nVidia bought them and Cumulus and ditched their GUI.
There’s this kind of weird “turn in your geek card” culture about rejecting GUIs, but there’s a good amount of the market that want at least the option, even if they frankly are a bit ashamed to admit it. You definitely have to move beyond GUI if you want your tasks to scale, but not every engagement witih the technology needs to scale.
To me apt is confusing but that’s because I’ve become so used to pacman. The only package manager that comes close to pacman for me is xbps.
Yeah apt tends to shit itself very often. I don’t like how it’s actually two different programs (dpkg and apt) glued together with perl and python. It all feels too fragile. A friend once tried updating a package, and it failed because… he was issuing the apt command from with a python virtual environment. Can’t say for pacman because I’ve never used arch, but xbps is just one set of self-contained binaries, which feels much more robust. Alpine’s APK fits that bill as well, lovely little package manager. Tho I guess apt predates both of those, so it’s not a fair comparison. Someone had to make those mistakes for the first time.
I also really dislike the Debian/Ubuntu culture of fucking around with the sources file to add other people’s repositories on top of the distro-default ones (ubuntu calls this PPA). It’s a good idea in theory, but in practice those third party repos always fuck up in some way and brick your package manager. Just search for “apt Failed to fetch” in your favourite internet search engine, and you will see hundreds of people confused about it. You can do it with almost any package manager, but for some reason it’s mainly the debian/ubuntu people who like shooting themselves in the foot like this.
I think you linked the wrong post
I have a coworker that likes to pick fun at my usage of CLI tools. He said it’s confusing “why would I use a terminal when the GUI was made after?”. They vehemently hate anytime they have to work with CLI.
I watched them use an FTP program to download and change one value in a .conf file. Like they downloaded the file, opened it in notepad++, changed one thing, saved it, reuploaded / overretten the original. I tried to show them how to just use nano and got told their way was “better since you could ensure the file was replaced”. Its okay, I’ve secretly caught them using it a couple times lol
Fortunately, Linux terminals are gorgeous and easy to use. I never wanted to use Windows’ com because it was so ugly and user-hostile. I know Powershell is a thing now, but it still looks ugly to me.
Yes, that’s a real thing. They use it as an excuse to dog on linux distros & say “Muh linux not great yet”
Maybe I misinterpreted the meme, I thought the yelling guy is also a Linux user.
Speaking from experience… Yes. Absolutely yes.
i dont use the terminal to be productive, i use it to feel like a hacker
Setting the colorscheme to green on black increases hacker rating by 20%
I would recommend Cool retro term for that, but you need to run it on a CRT to make it full.
courier gets you another 15%Change font into hack gives another 20%
cmatrix -rf
Nothing wrong with CLI. It is fast and responsive.
Unless you want mainstream use. Because the majority of people can’t even use a UI effectively. And CLI is much worse.
Having started out in programming before the GUI era, typing commands just feels good to me. But tbh Linux commands really are ridiculously cryptic - and needlessly so. In the 1980s and 90s there was a great OS called VMS whose commands and options were all English words (I don’t know if it was localized). It was amazingly intuitive. For example, to print 3 copies of a file in landscape orientation the command would be PRINT /COPIES=3 /ORIENTATION=LANDSCAPE. And you could abbreviate anything any way you wanted as long as it was still unambiguous. So PRI /COP=3 /OR=LAND would work, and if you really hated typing you could probably get away with PR /C=3 /O=L. And it wasn’t even case-sensitive, I’m just using uppercase for illustration.
The point is, there’s no reason to make everybody remember some programmer’s individual decision about how to abbreviate something - “chmod o+rwx” could have been “setmode /other=read,write,execute” or something equally easy for newbies. The original developers of Unix and its descendants just thought the way they thought. Terseness was partly just computer culture of that era. Since computers were small with tight resources, filenames on many systems were limited to 8 characters with 3-char extension. This was still true even for DOS. Variables in older languages were often single characters or a letter + digit. As late as 1991 I remember having to debug an ancient accounting program whose variables were all like A1, A2, B5… with no comments. It was a freaking nightmare.
Anyway, I’m just saying the crypticness is largely cultural and unnecessary. If there is some kind of CLI “skin” that lets you interact with Linux at the command line using normal words, I’d love to know about it.
Terminal is fun. I like being hackerman
Lol, meme’s backwards
CLI evangelists try to shit on GUI constantly, as though it makes them better at computers. It doesn’t, kids
Can see it in this very thread
Was gonna say, never had anyone tell me to use a GUI over CLI
but definitely had the other way around
Was gonna say, never had anyone tell me to use a GUI over CLI
Do you ever use the CLI, though?
Yes
Lol no. Many posts in this community recently making fun of gimp. Do you see anyone in the comments going WELL ACTUALLY IF YOU JUST USE IMAGEMAGICK? No. Plenty of things to complain about in the big DE’s like KDE and Gnome. But do you see people saying “just use tty”? Also no. Meanwhile you mention terminal once and you get at least two randos going on about how ThIs Is WhY LiNuX IsNt ReAdY. The meme is not backwards, your perception of reality is.
Many posts in this community recently making fun of gimp. Do you see anyone in the comments going WELL ACTUALLY IF YOU JUST USE IMAGEMAGICK? No.
You really don’t see why people would suggest using other GUI alternatives for image manipulation? image manipulation?
Plenty of things to complain about in the big DE’s like KDE and Gnome. But do you see people saying “just use tty”? Also no
“People don’t recommend entirely dropping GUI over one or two GUI issues!” Shocker, wow. They do condescendingly say 'just go into terminal and do x,y,z" though, like I said
It isn’t condescending. It’s the easiest and simplest way to do a thing. Additionally, there’s a wide variety in GUI options on Linux, so if I’m helping somebody out, I’m going to give the terminal commands. Not because I’m a terminal elitist or some nonsense, but because I know it will work regardless of whatever their GUI setup is. I might know where to go in KDE, but I don’t know where it would be in GNOME or any other desktop environment I’m unfamiliar with. The terminal command is going to be the same for everybody, though.
But that’s what you’re doing too. Making the meme the correct way round.
Nope, I encourage people to learn CLI but to also use GUI if it does what they need it to. The insult was only to people who think they’re superior for using CLI cuz that’s a silly stance
Just laughing at the meme being backwards from my own personal experience
I do most of my work at the command line, my co-workers do think I’m nuts for doing it, but one of our recent projects required us all to log into a client’s systems, and a significant portion of the tasks must be done via bash prompt. Suddenly, I’m no longer the team weirdo, I’m a subject matter expert.
CLI is effective because every command serves a specific purpose. UIs are the opposite, you have to imagine all possible intentions the user could have at any given point and then indicate possible actions, intuitively block impossible actions, and recover from pretty much any error.
CLI is effective also because of its history (i.e. one can go back, repeat a command as-is or edit it then repeat) but also the composability of its components. If one made a useful command before, it can be combined with another useful command.
Rinse & repeat and it makes for a very powerful tool.
The Unix principle of piping between two or even multiple programs, together with “all data should be in the simplest common format possible” (that is, largely unformatted strings), was a really clever invention to be popularized. As proven by the fact it is still so useful decades later on a myriad of computers unimaginably more powerful than what they had back then.
It’s not perfect by any means (alternative title: why something like Nushell exists), but it’s pretty good all things considered I dare say.
Absolutely. I learned about that decades ago as a teenager and never would I have thought it would still be useful today… yet, in 2025 if you want to do anything powerful, in the cloud, on your phone, even in your XR headset, it is STILL relevant!
PS: I project I’m contributing to on the topic https://nlnet.nl/project/xrsh/ ideas welcomed!
It’s all a matter of preference anyway (assuming you have both options anyway). CLI is less intuitive and takes longer to learn, but can be wicked fast if you know what you’re doing. GUI is more intuitive and faster to pick up, but digging through the interface is usually slower than what a power user can accomplish in the CLI.
It depends on what your use case is and how you prefer your work flow. The only dumb move is judging how other people like their setup.
CLI is being able to speak a language to tell your computer what to do; GUI is only being able to point and grunt.
Sometimes you just want to move a file from folder to another.
Shit. I wish we had that option (dragging files between folders) on Linux. Maybe someday.
(This is a joke, about how it feels like a lot of folks with strong opinions about Linux haven’t tried Linux in a long while.)
People can do whatever they like, and heck I find CLI intimidating sometimes, but I’m always learning something new a little bit at a time.
I’m tired of seeing it in every field of interest that has any kind of payoff, whether art or FOSS.
“I’m [(almost always) a guy] who (maybe has kids and) has a job. I stopped learning anything after I got my job-paper / degree / highschool diploma. I shouldn’t have to learn anything anymore. I am happy to shell out disposable sad-salary-man money (and maybe my soul idk) to any mega-corp that offers me a “create desired outcome button” without me having to think too much. It’s [current year]! I shouldn’t have to think anymore! Therefore Linux is super behind and only for nerds and I desire its benefits so much that I leave this complaint anywhere these folks gather so they know what I deserve.”
Agh. I gotta go before this rant gets too long lol
CLI this, GUI that. Where are my TUI degens?
Htop is TUI indeed
I love btop, too, though I tried out gotop and it was actually pretty slick.
Then there’s my love, Midnight Commander, but Yazi, Ranger, and Superfile are all great alternatives. TUI file managers are the best compromise between the dangerous
sudo rmand the sometimes overbearing GUI file managers.I use GUI and CLI evenly and TUI really hits that sweet spot for me.
My TUI would be better if I could remember how to spell ncmpcpp without tab completion
- nc - ncurses
- mpc - music player client
- cpp - C plus plus
My brain knows, but my fingers get lost along the way.
TUI gang rise up
Did a process last week that took me 13 steps in the command line that took about an hour. If I’d have done it manually it would have taken days. After I worked out how to do it I trimed it down to 6 steps and sent it to my coworker that also needs that information. His eyes glazed over on step two of explaining it to him and he’s just going to keep doing it his way…
