Ask Lemmy

Computer science is just mathematics, you can do it with pen and paper. The actual IT jobs where you don't have to touch windows are plentiful, although it might be a bit of a red flag if you're vehemently refusing to touch some specific software (be it windows, or any other program, or programming language).

If you are a complete hard-liner, you're going to run into one very particular, and peripheral, obstacle: your employer will almost certainly issue you a Windows laptop. It may not be a large part of your job, but it will be there. Very few companies will offer a Mac, and even fewer will offer Linux.

You might have to work as a freelancer, taking on tasks that can be done without Windows. But even something like web dev will require testing on Windows.

I did not touch Windows during or after my CS degree. No clue what people are on about needing Windows. It was a challenge on my first job where they preferred us to use VMs instead (I did not and it became the norm because it is better).

Graduated in Europe. We had a bunch going through the same. Campus computers were running Linux too. You need someone to champion it in the year and others will join.

Meh, if you're competent enough a degree really isn't worth anything.

Your portfolio is more important.

Absolutely not. Unless you get into a really niche career of IT pretty much everything you do will be accessed via a windows device.

you have to understand how that OS will interact with your app and the App’s UI.

As an It professional you need to embrace Windows. it is what pays the bills.

Not really.

I couldn't take a linux foundation cert exam with my arch Linux computer. It misidentified my X11 as Wayland and refused to start. They never gave me a refund.

Backend programming is almost all Linux. I have two computer science degrees and have only ever used Windows for gaming.

I had an Apple laptop at the time, didn’t dual boot but did have to use some workarounds using Wine. I guess that’s kind of acknowledging Windows, but at least you’re not actually running it I guess? Basically it’s close to the way I use my Linux machine nowadays.

Chances are however that things have somewhat changed in the last 12 years and chances are it varies between (sub)degrees and universities. However I can guarantee you: you won’t be alone in not wanting to use windows. Being very OS picky is a tried and true tradition in the field. Find your kind of people and I’m sure you can troubleshoot any issues you encounter together.

Don't think in term of IT. Look at R&D for big tech/cloud companies or even startups Devops or SRE type work

Source: 23 years doing sys admin, devops or SRE for major corps, still don't have a bachelor or touched windows

You absolute can become a professional computer toucher without having to engage with Windows. If you look at operating systems for cloud servers you will see that 90% of them are running on some Linux variant.

If you want to use your experience to work with linux desktop machines then that might be tricky. You will have to find a company that mandates to use linux machines. I think your best chances might be a tech startup that has not yet fallen into the windows trap.

You want to just work in a cellar? /j /obligatory

I would say yes, I haven't dealt with windows in a professional way in over 20 years.

Also cert, lpic maybe? Feel free to follow up.

honestly you have no business working in your field if that’s your approach to a fundamental facet of your job. that’s like a farmer refusing to use a spade because they prefer shovels.

Theoretically? Probably, I rarely touched windows outside of Windows centric shops. Practically, you're going to have to make that a much more blurry line

There's going to be times you have to deal with Windows. That can be as little as "effectively never" depending on your path and choices, but if you're a hardliner it's going to close doors on you just for picking a dumb hill to die on

I think if you work in a server farm, that's very possible

No 🤣

Get over yourself, you're getting paid more than 95% of the planet being in IT.

I did it, but that was 32 years ago.

Edit: got the degree and started my career. I've had to deal with windows since then.

Your best bet might be working in university research centers. You will still have to work with windows, but most researchers are trying to save pennies and you can't do that using Windows.

I was hired 25 years ago as a systems admin. At the time I was hired, the organization used Macs in offices. Servers were running Linux, Solaris, and OpenVMS, all of which I had been supporting since college. I was valued for most of the 25 years because I could solve problems no one else could, and I did that by writing code on Linux servers.

Now I've got a manager who doesn't believe in writing code to support our users and thinks Linux is a bad word that we should never use because we might have to support it. Still, he's gung-ho for us to support every new bullshit AI that comes down the pike.

I've got 25 years of code on a Linux server that made lives easier, but I have to eliminate it all because linux is bad. At the same time every AI project our group installs needs new Linux servers set up.

Yes. However, you're looking for a unicorn in a very tight market.

I have over 10 years as a software engineer, and the vast majority of that was Linux. The only two exceptions are my current job where we develop a software that runs on Windows so I need a Windows build box for it (although my laptop is Linux), and my previous job that had a weird windows only policy (didn't stay too much after that got enforced). So it's very much doable, depending on what you work with.

Probably varies a lot between countries and universities. In my university, you were better off, if you were on Linux. But I've heard horror stories from the US before, where Windows was mandatory...

I want to say no.

I have a few friends heavy into IT, years of experience, numerous jobs from big tech to startups. They've all had to touch windows.

As a contract engineer with over 30 gigs in my career, every single one also touched windows.

So...can you? Probably, but it'll make the entire grind harder.

Frankly, my goal is to milk the corporations for as much money as possible - foregoing my own opinions - so I can gtfo this capitalist ride. That means playing nice with Microsoft, unfortunately.