Linux has no design
Linus Torvalds has said that Linux does not have a design, and will never have. Instead, big parts are rewritten all the time, so we iterate to a better version. Just like nature evolved humans from apes. This "rewrite and throw everything all the time" is superior to a stable design - according to Linus.
This leads to big parts of the code being in beta stage all the time. The code never has time to mature, so it is unstable all the time. Just read all the threads here on problems when upgrading. Linux is very fragile, upgrade it and chances are big it won't work. But hey, people said that Windows is the best system for years. So there will be people saying that Linux is the best system.
Linux is the new Windows, fragile and sloppy code. Another big problem is that the internal Linux ABIs are frequently changed so you need to modify your device drivers, and recompile them. New kernel releases might trigger recompilations and modifications. Depending on which kernel you use, you need to use the corresponding device version. That is one of the reason this article was written. Big OEM vendors have large problems updating all device drivers every time the Linux ABIs are changed. They need to employ developers doing this. Say HP has 1.000 drivers, and they have 10 developers doing nothing but this. Then they have to fix 1000 drivers each. How long will it take to modify and recompile 1000 drivers for a single programmer? Say he does 10 drivers a day, it will take 100 days. But before that, Linus Torvalds has chagned the ABIs again.
No other OS has this broken device driver model as Linux has. Within a windows version, your drivers will work. Within XP, your driver will work no matter you run XP SP1, SP2 or SP3. With Win8, your drivers will work no matter you run 8.1 or 8 SP1 or SP2, etc. Only Linux has this broken model. And that is the reason you get problems when you upgrade Linux. And this article could be written.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
