I’ve enrolled in Varmints University to learn compute. 
I haven’t used Windows as my primary OS in ten years. My professor wants to expose us to Linux. Cool.
The class is to submit assignments to the department’s Linux server, and remotely run a few commands on it.
Cool. I use rsync and ssh every day (the instructions involve Windows utilities like PuTTY and FileZilla, but whatever).
A VPN connection is required to connect to the department’s Linux server.
Cool. I use OpenVPN every day. Just give me the config details, chief!
Not so fast. A proprietary 2FA utility is required to connect to the uni VPN, and the IT department informed me by email that it runs on Windows and Mac only. 
So now, what would be the simplest part of this class is the most fucking complicated. Instead of just using my terminal, I have to have had to:
- Install VirtualBox
- Create a Windoze 11 VM
- Create a Microsoft account
- Install the 2FA utility on VM
- Install cygwin Linux utilities on VM
- Install rsync and ssh modules on Cygwin
Just to have a Linux terminal that does what this class requires! 
i go to a public university and i expect that a public institution does not force you to use a specific commercial software if there are alternatives. i understand the hesitation for providing instructions for GoobleOS (although if someone approached me for a problem i would try to help them as best as i can) but Ubuntu is not GoobleOS and most people use Ubuntu or other debian based distros which instructions for Ubuntu usually generalize to them as well, so it wouldn’t kill them to provide instructions for Ubuntu if they are already doing it for windows or macOS. im not using a debian based distro before asking.
if you can’t relate and/or don’t care then don’t leave condescending comments that deal psychic damage to everyone that reads them.