As a user who gradually migrated from Windows to being, at home, a 95% Linux (Mint) user (it's an Ubuntu variant), I just don't understand your post. I have never compiled a Linux program in my life, nor do I ever intend to. In Software Manager, I find 30,492 packages. Do you seriously believe any casual user would be forced to rove the Internet for programs? I don't. I go to the major website for a later edition of VirtualBox or Wine or Adobe flash. Other than that, the Software Manager or Synaptic has just about every application I could imagine, and many that I can't. Just click to select, then click to Install. That's it. And you are even notified when the program is updated, so you can automatically load the latest updates. I never got that from Windows. Only gradually are Windows programmers coming around to that good idea.