A big one for me is Microsoft office (desktop), Libreoffice and other FOSS alternatives just simply don’t come close, and feature wise are 20 years behind. Especially since I basically mastered MS office 2007+'s drawing features, which the FOSS alternatives don’t replicate very well.
And of course Microsoft loves to push Office 365. I don’t pay for that and just use desktop office, but Microsoft prefers you don’t know that you can do this.
And I’m going to get shit on by Lemmy big time for this but while Linux is great and has made vast improvements in recent years, I still use Windows, not only because of MS office, but because a lot of games tend to only support Windows. I know that wine and proton exist but they’re not perfect and don’t feel quite the same as running native.
I wish an operating system existed with a hybridized Linux and clone NT kernel (using code from FOSS Wine and ReactOS of course) so that the numerous back catalog of NT software can run similar to as intended while also interacting with Linux programs better and using a shared environment. Since it would probably become vulnerable to viruses for windows as well, maybe? (my programming knowledge is extremely rusty) an antivirus similar to Windows defender is bundled with the operating system. Hopefully if someone makes such an operating system it can be a Windows killer and would switch immediately
3D CAD software. There are a few options out there (FreeCAD, LibreCAD, etc) and Blender is a thing that exists for more artistic 3D modeling. But they simply don’t hold a candle to the features and capabilities of the paid packages, which typically have costs in the 4-to-5-digit range. And I’m not talking the crazy high-end simulation options - those I understand, they’re hard - but basic modeling features.
Hell, I’d even settle for a CAD package that had some solid basic features and had a reasonable purchase cost. Unfortunately the few providers have the industry by the throat, and so your options are “free but terrible” and “you need a mortgage to use this”.
You beat me to it. The moment someone makes a FOSS cad program where the ui doesn’t suck a donkeys ball they will be the goat
I have been using OpenSCAD to make models for 3D-printing. I know this is a specific use case, and I have no experience with the “real” CAD software, but OpenSCAD makes sense to me as a programmer.
It’s really aimed at programmers, but for someone who is used to the better known proprietary versions (so with sketching and “shaping” with a mouse,), it’s barely useable.
I grew up learning organic modeling in blender and ever since I got a 3D printer, it’s just been so easy to make things with it as opposed to learning CAD. I’m getting better thanks to OnShape and FreeCAD 1.0 but I keep finding myself going back to blender because “it just works” once you understand how to setup scaling and snapping for manipulating vertices. Basically just setup your world measurements to metric and scale it to 0.001 and then every unit will be 1mm (helps me work within the 250^3mm space of my print bed, mentally) and export as stl.
There’s even a 3D printer toolbox add on that lets you analyze and fix problems like manifold edges and additional mesh tools like manifold extrude that speed up the process for good quality parts. CAD’s biggest advantage is the non linear history editing which is super powerful but you can definitely do non-destructive editing in blender using modifiers that only get applied at export time so you even have a functional equivalent if you’re organized and plan ahead a little.
I guess what I’m saying is, blender is amazing software and absolutely capable as a workhorse for 3D printing. You’re right that the multi-digit costing proprietary software is leagues better for designing digital parts and assemblies but blender is extremely flexible and not just for the more artistic side of things, you can make extremely technical parts with blender.