Yeah I installed that one you’re thinking of.

  • randint@lemmy.frozeninferno.xyzEnglish
    1·
    7 days ago

    I’m using openSUSE Tumbleweed with Gnome as of now, but plan on switching to Fedora on my next laptop. I would continue using Tumbleweed if it were not for that every 5 system updates (zypper dup) or so Konsole and some 20 other related k-packages gets automatically installed for some reason. This started happening like 1 year ago and the only solutions I were able to find were just to keep removing (zypper rm -u) it every time or just lock (zypper addlock) it.

  • slothrop@lemmy.caEnglish
    130·
    8 days ago

    I dual boot Arch and Arch, and I run an Arch hypervisor as well as an Arch vm in each Arch instance.

  • Broadfern@lemmy.worldEnglish
    46·
    8 days ago

    The one that makes you happy.

    ^Or at least overrides the desire to grab a sledgehammer when troubleshooting^

  • DFX4509B@lemmy.wtfEnglish
    261·
    8 days ago

    Mint is pretty much the de facto recommendation for absolute beginners freshly moving away from Windows right now, but LMDE especially will be subject to dealing with older software.

    Otoh, any of the Puppy distros are a great option for genuinely old hardware; think AM2+/775 or older, that a lot of heavier distros may or may not struggle on.

    • JustARegularNerd@lemmy.dbzer0.com
      6·
      8 days ago

      Having Socket 775, Puppy Linux and genuinely old hardware in the sentence shook me.

      I still remember being in high school playing Minecraft on those Optiplexes, and even before that playing Poptropica and CoolMathGames…

        • JustARegularNerd@lemmy.dbzer0.com
          1·
          7 days ago

          Yeah, I’m not disagreeing with you, more so making a comment on how it never occurred to me they were that old today.

          That being said, by the time I was playing with 775 computers they were pretty out of date (2013) and by 2015 all of those machines were replaced at my school. So in a rational sense that explains the time disparity I feel for Socket 775.

    • Valmond@lemmy.dbzer0.com
      1·
      8 days ago

      The only thing I would like to add to mint is more folder colors.

      It’s soo solid, good and stable (as it’s Linux eh), I’m still a recovering windozer.

    • Bobo The Great@startrek.website
      1·
      8 days ago

      but LMDE especially will be subject to dealing with older software

      Are you sure about this? As far as I know, debian modernized their repos quite a bit even compared to ubuntu, that also sparked some controversy from debian long time fans especially because they wanted more dated, stable software. Never used LMDE though, so I’m not sure if it applies

    • Ooops@feddit.org
      1·
      7 days ago

      rolling release (for gaming)

      Seriously… after all these years without some pesky version upgrade screwing things up I couldn’t bring myself to install a non-rolling distro on any device I actively use.

  • Rhaedas@fedia.io
    18·
    8 days ago

    Good analogy by using cars. You can test drive a car. Since a lot (all?) distros have a way to run off a USB, so you can get the general “feel” of it. Then you can go from there. Or if you have room to work with, setting up dual boot isn’t that hard (outside of how Windows acts sometimes about it). Asking a lot of people what flavor ice cream they prefer isn’t going to help you decide your own.

    • wltr@discuss.tchncs.de
      4·
      8 days ago

      The easiest way would be getting the cheapest SSD (even 30 GB is enough for most distros), swap your current disk with it, play around, and return where you were, if you don’t like anything.

  • TrackinDaKraken@lemmy.worldEnglish
    14·
    8 days ago

    I just want it to work and not spy on me. It’s not part of my self-image, I don’t even own a Tux shirt. It’s just a tool.

    I run Mint. It works. I’m happy.

    • slothrop@lemmy.caEnglish
      29·
      8 days ago

      I started my first Gentoo install in 2002.
      It’s almost finished compiling.

    • palordrolap@fedia.io
      22·
      8 days ago

      “I like to rebuild my kit sports car every time I want to take it out for a drive. Anyone who does otherwise is a pleb.”

    • evol@lemmy.todayEnglish
      3·
      8 days ago

      I used this for a few months but I just don’t really see the upside in compiling my own code lol

  • evol@lemmy.todayEnglish
    142·
    8 days ago

    Unless its like arch or gentoo does the distro matter that much? Like its mostly just the default settings which you can tweak. I feel like 90% of distrohopping is just wanting to try a new UI which can you just install yourself.

    The main difference is package management so rolling release vs LTS vs 6 month cycle.

    In practice we really need to stop using dynamic dependencies/package managers for most applications, for desktop usecase its just not a good pattern anymore, honestly I feel its like 99% of the reason the linux desktop never took off, app dev is just a pain. Thankfully stuff like flatpak and appimage exist now

    • sin_free_for_00_days@sopuli.xyzEnglish
      71·
      8 days ago

      I can’t express how much I disagree with you and further I can not fucking stand flatpacks and the like. Unless I’m running a server, I don’t want that crap on my box at all.

      • evol@lemmy.todayEnglish
        8·
        8 days ago

        Why would you want flatpak on a server, server feels like ideal for dynamic dependencies as you have some highly used, static build (Debian 13 or Ubuntu LTS) where problems can be easily tested and fixes distributed out. The dependencies don’t change too much aswell as the usecase for the server stays static. Security features can then be patched in when needed. Desktop usecase all people want is an up to date latest app that works, security rarely matters, and the dependency graph is highly volatile as people constantly update and add new software

        • sin_free_for_00_days@sopuli.xyzEnglish
          21·
          8 days ago

          So keep the different server processes somewhat isolated without going full VM. If I was admining production boxes for a company, I’d go with VMs. I’m talking about home servers running a couple services, and about desktops at home. Being retired, I haven’t had to really do real sysadmin work for years.

          I haven’t had any issues, that I can think of at least, updating my desktop install which is going on about 10 years now. I’ve not been stuck in some type of dependency hell for even longer than that. To each their own, if they work for you, great. I can’t stand the extra layer that flatpaks bring to me. Seems like back in the day they would have been really useful…but thinking about past hard drive space, processor speeds, and internet speeds, maybe not.

          • bus_factor@lemmy.world
            8·
            8 days ago

            Are you confusing flatpaks and other containerization solutions like docker? Flatpaks are specifically for UI applications, and that doesn’t make much sense on a server.

      • evol@lemmy.todayEnglish
        2·
        8 days ago

        Arch is harder so install to as a recommendation its harder than the others. Though I think the last time I installed it was years ago ik theirs like a graphical installer now??? How the mighty have fallen

        But yeah Gentoo is like in a league of its own

        • Ricaz@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
          3·
          8 days ago

          There’s no graphical installer officially, no. There are many Arch derivatives with installers though, like CachyOS.

          Installing Arch is literally running like 10 commands, and it’s all very well documented.

          1. Put your Archiso USB stick in and reboot
          2. Format your disks if needed, mkfs
          3. Mount root and boot partitions
          4. Run pacstrap to install base system
          5. Generate fstab
          6. In chroot, set time and locale(s), set password, install bootloader
          7. Choose/install a network manager, like systemd-networkd
          8. Reboot

          Now you’re running Arch. Make a user and install a DE, optionally.

          • Kristell@herbicide.fallcounty.omg.lol
            4·
            8 days ago

            It’s even simpler now: Plug in stick, reboot

            Select the stick as the boot media

            “archinstall”

            Configure

            Done.

            I don’t recommend it to first timers, because the install process does get you a good feel of what you’ll be expected to know, but I’ve been running arch for years I’m not doing that manually anymore xD

            • mech@feddit.org
              1·
              8 days ago

              It used to be a lot more difficult.
              On my first Arch install, I had to edit xorg.conf blindly, because the screen didn’t show anything due to an error in xorg.conf.

    • BCsven@lemmy.ca
      2·
      8 days ago

      Distro can alter how it behaves on your hardware. I tried every Debian derivative out there on a 2010 laptop. They would fail install or fail boot due to some hardware error, but fedora or opensuse were fine, and weirdly nixos. All those acknowledged the error and worked around it.

      Also, not sure if other distros are this easy (because I didn’t experiment) but opensuse let’s you install as many DEs as you like with their pattern selections, and you can flipflop between them at the login screen.

      I thought that was a good tool for a beginner just wanting to try out each DE without reinstalling as you change your mind.

      • evol@lemmy.todayEnglish
        2·
        8 days ago

        Pretty much all the distros I use if I install like kde or hyprland it appears as an option in the login screen. Its a little cluttered since you have overlapping gnome and kde apps but I feel like people distrohop alot when they could just install a new DE