My first computer was a Macintosh LC that had about as much RAM as a modern toaster oven. But I learned how to do stuff on a GUI.

So naturally, I wanted to learn Linux on a nice GUI, and Ubuntu reminded me so much of a Mac I couldn't imagine why I'd use a command line.

Software development forced my hand.

Just managing paths alone requires, in my opinion, that you get comfortable with configs and finding stuff via the command line. And there are lots of dev environments where you need to know whether to do local or global installs on stuff.

I'm retired now, but even on my last Mac I was using the command line a LOT. It may seem funny to say, but it's actually easier for me to get around from the command line than the GUI for a lot of tasks.

I don't imagine there are any programmers in the world who don't use the command line, though, so from a casual user perspective I can't say much about it. I'd sure hate to break something if I was a casual user. But are there any casual users on Linux? Seems like most Linux users love to tinker.