But wait, there's a solution.
All I have to do is follow these simple instructions to download a random script off GitHub and run it with no indication given whatsoever for how exactly to run a script.
Even the process of downloading it was unintuitive. And I know GitHub is for developers and not for end users, but it's really hard to hide behind that shield when it took me less than two days to run into a situation where I HAD to use it.
I mean, at that point, if GitHub is only for developers, then desktop Linux is only for developers. You can't have it both ways.
This is NOT going Well… Linux Gaming Challenge Pt.2, "Nov 23, 2021" [https://youtu.be/3E8IGy6I9Wo?t=251] (accessed 2024-12-09)
Context of the Quote
Have you ever heard about "Linus Tech Tips" or LTT? It's a Youtube channel made by a guy called Linus. This isn't Linus Torvalds, the creator of git, by the way—that's a different Linus—we're talking about Linus Gabriel Sebastian, the youtuber with a channel that teaches a lot of people about computers, how to use their PCs and perform maintenance, technology reviews, etc. This is someone who knows how to use a computer. This is someone who is a gamer.
But a gamer isn't a programmer, and many of the "tech-savvy" users you can imagine in your head don't know how to write a FizzBuzz algorithm. They know how to perform all basic tasks in a computer, they're comfortable with installing applications and trying new software. The advanced ones know how to troubleshoot computers and how to avoid suspicious files that may be viruses. But they aren't programmers.
LTT did a video about him trying to use Linux, which highlighted the usability issues with Linux. Besides managing to uninstall his desktop environment within 15 minutes, and distrohopping right away from Pop_OS! to Manjaro as a true Linux newcomer [youtu.be/0506yDSgU7M?t=770], he also needed to go to GitHub to solve one of his issues with lack of hardware support, where he ended up trying to download a .sh file (a shell script) in a manner so wrong that you have to be a user to get it this wrong.
On the GitHub's repository main page, where you see a list of files like a normal directory, with file extensions and everything, Linus right-cliked on a file to display its context menu, and clicked "Save Target As...". This option appears when you right click on a link, and it lets you download the resource located at the linked URL. I'm assuming Linus does know how this option works, so the reason why he thought it WOULD work is because he thought that the links were direct links to the files. The URL of a install.sh file on GitHub would end with install.sh, and he would be able to see it in the overlay that appears at the bottom of the web browser (where a statusbar used to be) when you hover over a link. That should make the links look like they are direct links to files to anyone who has never clicked on that link before, but they are actually webpages full of buttons and metadata about the file, such as which commit you are viewing. Consequently, Linus ended up downloading the HTML code of the webpage, which happened to include the shell script's code in it.
During the video, Linus said something I believe to be very important: "if GitHub is only for developers, then desktop Linux is only for developers."
Opinion
Personally, I believe that if you are a developer and a user is confused about your software, that's your fault.
You're the one who made the software. You're the one who decided to link to your GitHub repository instead of creating a basic user-facing website on GitHub pages. You are the expert. If they can't figure it out, if they're asking where the .exe is, that's your fault.
It's not the user who has an skill issue for not being able to use your software. It's YOU who have a skill issue for not being able to create intuitive software.
I'm not saying you need to fix it, but it's insanity to think it's not your own incompetency that created this whole situation. You weren't good enough, now people don't know how to use the program you made. You can ignore this or take this as an opportunity to improve yourself.
And I say this as someone who has created a huge mess of a website myself. I'm not good enough to create a comprehensible navigation for this website right now. I'd probably be able to do it if it had only 3 pages, but it has almost one thousand articles currently and the number grows every day. It is my lack of competency that creates this mess and I hope one day I figure out a way to fix it.
Why are your users confused? Because you used GitHub. Stop using GitHub as your website! Why did you even think that was a good idea? If the PNG library can have a website [libpng.org], so you can your project.