I disagree. Sure, they are able to stick the drive to machine and use some easy tool (would need to be easier than Rufus) to write some data to it.
But then comes a big hurdle if USB boot is not the default: What is BIOS/UEFI? What key to press to get there? When do I press it? What are these text things? How do I navigate here? What exactly should I change? What is what of these drives listed? How to change the order? How to save? (Have witnessed this struggle a dozen times)
And IF they get through that step, then depending on distro they have very different kind of installation UI, all sorts of options they know nothing about, and they no longer have their browser and guide page open that they had when they started the operation.
We should not merely target the ”average person” but also, to a degree, the dumb masses below them. Look how simple the Windows 10 to Windows 11 installation has been made, there really is no way you can mess it up. If I remember correct, even upgrading from 7 to 10 was just: download ISO, double click to mount it, run setup.exe, click next a few times, and let it reboot and do its thing.
Installing an iso from a usb drive and installing an iso after mounting it as a virtual drive seem like they involve roughly the same level of technical skill to me. Booting from cd or usb was a routine school or business activity for decades. Mounting an iso as a drive has been built into Windows for a much shorter period of time. The last time I used Windows, you needed third party software for that. I would bet on a random person off the street to be able to do the first one more reliably than the second. But, more installation options are always better.
I disagree. Sure, they are able to stick the drive to machine and use some easy tool (would need to be easier than Rufus) to write some data to it.
But then comes a big hurdle if USB boot is not the default: What is BIOS/UEFI? What key to press to get there? When do I press it? What are these text things? How do I navigate here? What exactly should I change? What is what of these drives listed? How to change the order? How to save? (Have witnessed this struggle a dozen times)
And IF they get through that step, then depending on distro they have very different kind of installation UI, all sorts of options they know nothing about, and they no longer have their browser and guide page open that they had when they started the operation.
We should not merely target the ”average person” but also, to a degree, the dumb masses below them. Look how simple the Windows 10 to Windows 11 installation has been made, there really is no way you can mess it up. If I remember correct, even upgrading from 7 to 10 was just: download ISO, double click to mount it, run setup.exe, click next a few times, and let it reboot and do its thing.
Installing an iso from a usb drive and installing an iso after mounting it as a virtual drive seem like they involve roughly the same level of technical skill to me. Booting from cd or usb was a routine school or business activity for decades. Mounting an iso as a drive has been built into Windows for a much shorter period of time. The last time I used Windows, you needed third party software for that. I would bet on a random person off the street to be able to do the first one more reliably than the second. But, more installation options are always better.