I grew up with Windows. My jobs used Unix/Linux and I switched to Mac at home before Vista came out. I got a job using Windows during the Windows 8-10 transition. During that 10 year gap I'd help friends and family setup printers and stuff. I was aghast at the things that hadn't changed in the 10+ years. I really wished I had written it up because I fell back into things quickly. One thing I still remember is how often you get updates requiring a reboot--in macOS it's a few times a year and in Linux it's only when a specific component (like the kernel) gets updated.
For example, setting your computer’s IP or gateway. Control panel -> Network -> right-click on the “IP interfaces” among a list of 5 abscon names -> Details -> Advanced -> Details -> And you can’t freely type the new IP, you have to use their fields with 4 numbers separated by dots.
Everything was like this. Installing Maven? You need to set a system property, it’s 15 clicks including 6 on a “Details” or “Advanced settings” button. They wanted to hide complexity behind “Advanced” buttons but they hid the wrong things, because each dialog was full of info you’d never use, and what you wanted was inevitably under the “Advanced” button.
Installing new software? Welcome to the installation assistant. We’ll guide you through the 20 clicks, including the mass-unticking of additional software we’ll inevitably select by default, notably the Ask Toolbar when you install Java. If you’re setting up a dev machine you had a dozen programs to set up, each of them requiring a dozen steps of a dozen clicks.
I haven't really paid much attention, but I'm pretty sure CentOS/RHEL only do kernel updates with distro updates. If so, it's about once or twice a year: https://access.redhat.com/articles/3078
In practice, my companies have done them less frequently. Kernel packages are less often about security patches and more often around a magic combination of kernel+GPU driver+software--I think one of them paid Red Hat for custom cuts.
As for maintaining a personal machine, that distro would probably suggest rebooting more often than RHEL (you'd also have to effectively logout/"restart" for any core package for your Desktop Environment or X). I haven't measured, but I feel like my Synology gets updated every few months.
As for the impact of rebooting. Windows Updates (and macOS updates) are more than just a reboot. It's often an unknown amount of time. Even for a normal reboot, it's really really nice to just leave everything open so you can pick up where you left off. Personal or work it's more than just a browser, but terminals I have open, shell history, vim sessions.
If I have a few tens of applications open that all have their own separate state that is lost on reboot, then it’s fairly annoying to reboot because one thing updated.
Maybe it's what exactly you do then/how. I.e. apart from a REPL session in which I maually typed a bunch of commands, I don't seem to have that problem. Editors/IDEs/browsers all persist open documents/view state etc between runs.
