[Feature request] User friendly way of installing propietary Nvidia drivers

[davidct]

Hi @einer,

Thank you for your welcome

@einer

I have been using Linux in various flavors for about 30 years, and UNIX longer than that …

Wow, that’s a long time. It’s an honor to be talking to someone as committed as you.

@einer

The main thing about both of these OS is that the command line is pretty much king … you will find, as you gain more experience with Linux, that you can do things with/on the command line that there is no replacement for in a GUI style, point-and-click interface, like begin able to fix what broke the GUI desktop for example

I don’t doubt that the command line is more versatile. However, for a regular user like me, most of the time it is totally unnecessary. I just use the basic functions: browsing the web, chatting, video conferencing, and perhaps gaming a bit (though lately, less and less). As mentioned before, except (for) (a) (few) (hiccups), I didn’t have to deal with the underlying software structure. I don’t know if that is a good or a bad thing (perhaps worth it of another thread, as many youth today grew up with systems with almost no rabbit holes to the world of software), but the thing is that you guys did such a good job creating this system that now fedora “Just Works”

@einer

Now, as for Nvidia, and frankly pretty much any graphics card mfgr, the manufacturer of the device is usually the one that decides to make their product easier for the end-user to install and use their product. Nvidia and AMD(used to be ATI) have a long history of picking and choosing what they will support, M$ OS’s being their preferred due to market share.

For profit corporations do whatever they believe that will bring them profit. They do not care about open source or the four freedoms, they care about profit. And yes, as you say, if an OS has a bigger market share, they will take care of that market because it is aligned with their interest.

There are some points to consider: (a) there are official Nvidia drivers for Linux (closed source, but still); (b) making it easier to install them could increase Fedora’s user base, at least of users who want a simple install process (debatable if that is the kind of users that the community wants to attract or not); (c) currently other proprietary software programs, like Slack or Discord, are available for anyone to freely and easily install from the Plasma Discover “app store”.

In light of those circumstances, allowing for an easy installation of the proprietary Nvidia drivers seems more like a political decision. Nothing against that, in the end each community has to find its ethos to maximize well-being and growth, but my user experience is being collaterally damaged in that war of principles that you guys are waging against Nvidia.
What is the end goal of this conflict besides wanting Nvidia to improve their already existing Linux drivers? That they open source their drivers? And if that is so important, why to allow proprietary software to run at all? Should each person or company have the freedom to decide how they publish and run their software on the Fedora platform?

@einer

Also, the fact that there are those in the Linux/Unix community that are willing to get those drivers from Nvidia, test them, package them and find a way to distribute them to the community says a lot about the people that make up that community … one of the reasons I picked Fedora by the way …

Here you will need to help me understand because I’m a bit lost. What does it say about the Fedora community to not provide a graphical installation method of the proprietary Nvidia drivers?

@einer

So, David, what have “You” done to make it easier to get someone up and running lately?

Well, I started this thread which it might help other users like me understand why they are forced by the community to have a worse user experience than they potentially could. And that, if you ask me, is not an easy task