Started with ubuntu, tried mint, then crunchbang, then became an archfag regrettably but then finally installed gentoo...

The fact that updates for testing and unstable tend to completely freeze as per the whims of the devel community is enough to keep me away. Also why would you use Debian on a server over CentOS?

Testing freezes predictably (though annoyingly) to prepare for a stable release.
I'm not sure what you're talking about in the case of unstable.

Started with Ubuntu. Tried Mint and then Manjaro. Finally settled on Debian Stable and have been using it for the last 4 years. Have bought a X220 and am currently trying out Pure OS on it.

Except there is no predictability. Debian's release schedule boils down to "when we feel like it". That simply isn't good enough when preparing for downtime on a critical system. You also notice that in that 6-month feature freeze period, Sid also stops getting regular updates, since there isn't a dedicated Sid team and the guys who usually keep it up to date are busy hardening the next Stable release. It's purely a lack of leadership, which is expected for an internet club.

Really? Is it that bad?

Started with Ubuntu, Kubuntu, dyne:bolic, Gentoo, Sabayon, SliTaz, VLOS, Austrumi and a bunch of others, settled with Mandriva for 6 months, then tried Fedora, was completely blown away, held on to it for 5 years straight. Had to switch to macOS for 2 years. Homesick for Linux, tried my goody ol' Fedora but it's gone to shit.

I've been using Gentoo for maybe 5 years now, it's my true love

what was the point of this thread

To give me a place to complain about Deepin. It's so absolutely chinky and I don't know if I love it or hate it.

Started with linux 1993 -> (redhat/suse/whatever) -> debian -> debian get a bad case of redhat -> *bsd

Degenerates out

I use Trisquel too. Packages are signed properly. Something is fucked up in your installation.

Good thing I'm not retarded and found out that it's only the package manager and packages that matters.

the least trustworthy OS i know.

That's literally what a distro is, what are you trying to say?

yeah, I know it's an antisemitism but it feels so good.

That's not necessarily true. If your distro comes with a particularly shitty wallpaper you have to take time out of your day finding one that doesn't suck. If the theme is an eyesore a new one has to find another, and what if the desktop environment isn't one that many theme creators support? What if the fonts aren't acceptable? Time is money, friend.

Wallpapers are packaged.
Themes are packaged.
Fonts and default font configuration are packaged.
It's all packages, which is why the post you're replying to is incoherent.

Why would you package a JPEG? And if you did, how would you know if it was the one you wanted, being packaged? You'd have to download all the packages and try out each one for yourself. How is that any easier than what you have to do now?

Because some retards think ubuntu is shit because it's ubuntu has spyware even though it's only for unity if I recall. Or how xubuntu is magically better.

I just make a gray image and use that as a wallpaper, worked for my laptop. Change desktop environments if I'm pent up about themes. If the fonts are bad, that does actually eat up half a day depending on the situation like removing/adding certain features like hinting but if I was just changing a font, then I would change the font or add in a new font from some font repository.
If I wanted something that works, I would use debian, if I wanted to use something that would work hundred percent of the time, I would use windows (But that's completely last-resort).

You would package a JPEG the same way you package other files. The desktop background that came with your distro was installed via a package. Distros are only packages.
Some Debian packages that contain desktop backgrounds are xfdesktop4-data, mate-backgrounds, neurodebian-desktop, and bluebird-gtk-theme. They put them in /usr/share/backgrounds/.

K KEEP ME POSTED

Yeah I know that, but how is that easier than going to the images section your preferred search engine, typing "fluffy duckling wallpaper", filtering the results by your display resolution, right-clicking the picture, and selecting "Set as Desktop Background"?

I'd just like to interject for a moment. What you’re referring to as Linux, is in fact, GNU/Linux, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, GNU plus Linux. Linux is not an operating system unto itself, but rather another free component of a fully functioning GNU system made useful by the GNU corelibs, shell utilities and vital system components comprising a full OS as defined by POSIX.
Many computer users run a modified version of the GNU system every day, without realizing it. Through a peculiar turn of events, the version of GNU which is widely used today is often called “Linux”, and many of its users are not aware that it is basically the GNU system, developed by the GNU Project. There really is a Linux, and these people are using it, but it is just a part of the system they use.
Linux is the kernel: the program in the system that allocates the machine’s resources to the other programs that you run. The kernel is an essential part of an operating system, but useless by itself; it can only function in the context of a complete operating system. Linux is normally used in combination with the GNU operating system: the whole system is basically GNU with Linux added, or GNU/Linux. All the so-called “Linux” distributions are really distributions of GNU/Linux.

It isn't, why do you ask?

I'm asking it because you presented it as a solution to the hassle of fixing a carelessly composed desktop Linux distribution.

I didn't. I said that a desktop Linux distribution being carelessly composed is a packaging problem.

>mx linux sexy devuan since for 5 months
Did I do good?

I don't see how, given that before themes get distributed they first have to be created, and the decision has to be made to have the installer select one package over another. It's not a packaging problem, it's a people problem.

No, you put off using Linux until just now, and immediately got convinced that systemd was something to be avoided. You probably only chose Debian because it was the one that has the least points from which to make fun of it.

There is literally nothing wrong with systemd.

Windows -> Redhat/SUSE -> OpenBSD -> (MacOS | FreeBSD | Ubuntu)

ugh, actually I'm older than that. I started with DOS.

I was the same until I switched to Solus (Budgie). I have been using it for a year now, no complaints. Everything just works, weekly updates (rolling release), but never any regressions due to great testing before pushing updates. Software center is actually decent and I have never had to use a terminal. Didnt even switch icon/gtk theme since the default rice is so nice and consistent.

windows>ubuntu>xubuntu>arch
My main pet peve with arch currently is systemd.
Reverting to an older version of a package or installing two packages of different versions side by side is a bit of a pain as well. So far I haven't had the need to revert a package from cache or install two packages of different versions but I think it would be a neat feature to have in case of emergency.

As far as systemd is concerened, everything works fine for now and it is fairly easy to use but I dislike how it is strays from the unix philosophy.
I've read a bit about it and would prefer having a more modular system especially when dealing with pid 1.

I'll try gentoo in a VM at somepoint with OpenRC.
My gripe with gentoo is having to compile absolutely everything.
I have haswell i7 but even then I think it would put a lot of needless strain on my cpu and take a lot of time to compile certain packages.
For instance I was compiling rpcs3 from AUR and webkitgtk, took forever and a half to compile them at -j8.

My biggest deterrent to switching is the amount of time I would have to invest into learning a different set of tools and system upkeep.
In arch the most I have to do every update is check the wiki for any manual intervention which I have already lessened the hassle off by integrating an RSS reader into my update alias.
I also worry that by switching to openRC certain applications might use systemd as a hard dependency requiring tedious workarounds if lucky. I might be over-blowing this issue.

It took me a fair while to arrive at my current configuration in arch, most of my scripts would be simple to port over to a new system.
Aside from the new package manager, I'd have to learn how to use cron to port my automated backup script which shouldn't take very long.
Setting up GPU passthrough again will be a massive hassle, along with recompiling all the software at my disposal.
I'll have to try gentoo in a VM first and see for myself how much upkeep is required. If I have to constantly babysit it once I have set it up to my satisfaction, forget it.

Switching to openRC with my current OS and just reverting to an older backup if shit hits the fan is an option as well, there are a few guides out there.

It really irritates me how anti-systemd shills have memed this shit. The whole modern Linux desktop has very little in common with unix philosophy, mostly due to being pragmatic instead of ideological. It is hilarious to me how *BSD people often cite muh unix philosophy and then use ported drivers made for Linux, GUI software made by Linux people, etc etc. To each their own, but that "unix philosophy" is really ridiculous primary standard to look for in a modern desktop system.
I don't like systemd simply because I have to rely on Red Hat putting "the people" before business and since the size of systemd and its components are hard to easily replace, which puts me in a position that I have to eat the shit Red Hat puts out or gitgut. It's not like there is no alternative, so it is my fault that's why I don't bitch about it on forums.

I heard good things about Void Linux by people who used to use Arch. Never tried it myself.

There is no need to worry. People are just being over dramatic, literally NO ground braking software that cant be replaced has a hard dependency on systemd. Go for it!

If you can't maintain an Arch system, you have no business using Linux at all.

This isn't a big thing though. When you first set up your system, you do have to spend time compiling stuff. I don't know about you, but it's not every day when I install new software. When I do install new software, it typically doesn't take that long to compile and even then, your only have to compile something once unless you forgot to configure it right.

What about updating the system?

...

pfft. n00b.

You'll just need to recompile it then. Note that it isn't necessary to get every upgrade imminently. If it is working how you like, there isn't really a good reason to update it ignoring security patches.

Seriously, though. Who the fuck is jeff?!?

Ubuntu > Fedora > Elementary > OpenSUSE Tumbleweed > Gentoo > Debian.
npm is not available in Stretch for some weird reason, but you could upgrade to Debian Unstable and then install it. It would be certainly faster and easier on your hard drive than to install a whole new distro.

Fuck off, Richard, it's "Linux", and everybody knows it.

Speak for yourself, my distro is maintained by RedHat engineers.

i feel ya bro - got a dooal bewt mashine with ubuntu and kali

People know it that way because this mistake was taught to them that way. Please don't make the mistake of overloading names to mean multiple things at the same time.

Not an Ubuntu/mint fag here professional systems engineer - jerking off over distros is autistic and I have never so much as heard someone who uses linux professionally even use the word "distro" but my understanding is that mint is basically Ubuntu with the most glaring botnet aspects removed. Why on earth would you install Ubuntu in favor of mint?

That's because they are usually called releases. It would be confusing to call them distros because you really only "distributing" one thing: Linux, the kernel.

The kernel is not "GNU/Linux", now hit the road.

Are you telling me was homesick for the kernel?

Are you retarded, desu?

That post was using "Linux" to denote distributions of the GNU/Linux operating system. It was most likely talking about a more complete system, not just the kernel. For example, Android wouldn't qualify, even though it contains just as much "Linux" as Xubuntu does.

I'm pretty sure Xubuntu contains more Linux, but you probably meant that as a figurative statement.

Does it? I guess if you count firmware.

I'd figure it would include more kernel modules / drivers, where Android would have more binary blobs instead of Linux drivers.

Posted this in the technical questions thread, but seeing a distro thread here, I will ask the question again:

I have been using Ubuntu Mate as my first linux distro since2-3 months. And with it I have been used it for internet, try Wine as much as possible, installing stuff by terminal/Synaptic, etc... nothing heavy overall, so undesrtand that im not an expert in computers. And is that, since testing in virtual box & looking at videos, Im interesed in jumping to an Arch-based distro. Because the easy to use pacman, the AUR & yaourt, and the continuous update make it really interesing. So im between jumping to Antergos, or go to the (in theory) safer Manjaro.

Antergos is said by many as the recommended Arch distro to choose overall, having a versatile installer, and it have pamac with yaourt already, so I dont see the point of Manjaro "easy to use" because just because it have some stuff preinstalled (that might not be good/not like it), while I could choose to install manually the stuff I want. But on one side, the fear that one update/upgrade screw up my distro, and not being an expert would fuck me up, and so Manjaro delayed & safer upgrade method looks appealing.

Which of these two would you recommend me?

Pacman is actually less powerful and intuitive than apt, and the quality of the AUR tends to be low. I would recommend switching to Debian if you want something more "advanced", or just sticking to Ubuntu Mate because it lets you do pretty much everything more advanced distros let you do, without forcing you to. Most distro elitism isn't sensible.
If you really want to use something Arch-based, also consider using Arch itself.

same question

The point of Arch is to install only shit what you want. Another good thing is that you can easily get obscure packages by user submitted AUR. Other than that there is nothing special to Arch. The elitism and shilling makes people think more of it.

So there is no point in using Antergos/Manjaro because if you can't even read the basic instructions and are not willing to learn the basics concepts, then Arch is not for you. Manjaro maintainers especially do really poor job. They let simple shit like SSL cert to expire and you need to revert time in order to fix it. Stupid shit like this.

Rolling release is not unique to Arch, you have OpenSUSE Tumbleweed, Fedora Rawhide, Debian Sid...

If you are ricer and want to shit your installation with random widgets and conky shit, using tiling WM (because you want to be like all those cool kids on UnixPorn reddit) while using urxvt terminal emulator because your autism tells it is somehow better than using VTE-based terminals, then go for Arch.

If you are happy with good default and would prefer "good enough" over wasting 100 hours of your life, then stick to Ubuntu based distros or yet better use something like Solus Project.

Instructions for correctly burning ISO (dd mode):
solus-project.com/articles/installation/preparing-to-install/en/

oecd-nea.org/dbdata/jeff/

Arch is actually really bad at this. Its packages constantly contain things you don't want, such as development headers for every library, and packages often have dependencies that aren't strictly needed. If you actually want to do this, either use Alpine, for true minimalism, or use a minimal Debian install configured not to add recommended packages, because they split their packages properly.
The point of Arch is a certain style of minimalism that is more about making things easy for maintainers than about keeping systems small.

And what about Void Linux? Just curious, because some said it is good, and im testing it and the xbps packmanager is simple and also intuitive. Just barely starting testing in VM, thought.

I agree with this, but what I meant by "only shit you want" is that instead of using distro that already comes with bloat that you have to then remove manually. Well obviously there are netinstalls like Debian and Ubuntu, but in general I personally prefer Arch to those.

You certainly can make lean Debian installation just need to be care you dont install those meta packages, cause some of them are retarded as fuck. Why does Cinnamon (desktop environment) have hard dependency on Nemo (file manager) for example? The maintainers answer was cause everybody is going to is it with Cinnamon so I will keep hard dependency. wtf

If you don't want to use systemd then Void is good choice, but other than that I don't it has anything special to offer over other distros.

careful
use

Most distros offer this, Arch is special in being too lazy to offer anything else. I would never describe it as a reason to use Arch.
Nemo is part of Cinnamon. That's why the package "cinnamon" depends on it. You might be confused about what a desktop environment is.
The Arch package for Cinnamon also depends on Nemo.
archlinux.org/packages/community/x86_64/cinnamon/

Not all desktop environments depend on file manager.

Sorry, you are right. Cinnamon has hard dependency in Nemo in general for desktop icons and shit like that. I was talking about this, but somehow confused it for Nemo bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=771418

But in general I have encountered few meta packages in Debian that make weird hard dependencies and you are told to install each packages individually. But basically cinnamon-desktop-environment specifically was the packages installed that you pick in the installation I think which is horrible UX imo.

Also forgot to add: I know this shit is pointless nitpick, but it bothered me 3 years ago when I was using Debian. Maybe Arch is just as bad, I don't remember because I don't use it anymore.

Nemo is developed as part of Cinnamon, and it integrates well with the rest of it (presumably, I haven't used Cinnamon in years).
I use GNOME. While I could use GNOME without Nautilus, using Nautilus means that my file manager has the consistent look and feel of GNOME, and gives me access to GNOME's integrated filesystem functionality. Using GNOME without Nautilus is not fundamentally different from using Xfce without xfce4-panel (which I've done in the past). I could do it, but then I wouldn't be using all of GNOME.
If you don't want the full desktop environment, but just a usable desktop, then Debian provides -core packages (gnome-core, lxde-core, cinnamon-core, etcetera). I think they provide what you expect.

Yeah I understand that, but the point was that the default netinstall gives you on option to pick desktop environment and cinnamon-desktop-environment package was installed which means you are stuck using Pidgin or remove and install core package and each package individually. All can be solved if they only put that shit to "recommends" instead of "depends".

I get what you mean by using the desktop environment parts that are developed under same roof and I agree with that in general. But you also have desktop environments that don't have their own tools like Budgie or Unity7 for example. They default to GNOME applications, but I don't think that must be necessary.

Why I wanted to get rid of Nemo was because I hate it with passion and 3 years ago Cinnamon was the best desktop environment around, everything else was buggy or GTK2.

Manjaro -> Archbang -> Arch -> Gentoo (not leaving)

Tell us about it, then. What makes it good? any disadvantages? Im curious.

Have been using Antergos for the last 6 months. No issues whatsoever. Only had to use the terminal once.

It is the best just works out-of-the-box distribution in my opinion. Every time I tried any other distro like Ubuntu based it always feels like some random guy just picked out packages and a theme. I am kind of autistic person who loses their shit if there are 2 terminal emulator .desktop entries in menu. In Solus the only setting I had to tweak was that screen doesn't lock (password protect) after it blanks out.

Solus Budgie feels like a proper OS. It has a very nice software center that even has 1 click install for third party packages like Android Studio, Intellij IDEs, Chrome, Sublime Text, Spotify and many more. Basically stuff that cant be distributed via main repository.
It is rolling release that updates weekly and I personally never had any regressions ever.
Behind the scenes Solus makes shitload of tooling to improve the infrastructure and configuration of the system. github.com/solus-project
The main dev works full time on the project and has actually left his job at Intel to work on Solus full time.
Main dev is really nice person and dedicated to the project. For example, he was creating a MATE ISO of Solus and the main menu options of MATE were so shitty in code quality, he made his own in like two weeks and now it is included in Ubuntu MATE as an option, probably as a default in future.

There are lots of things I forgot.

Disadvantages:
- it doesn't have many packages. It 100% guaranteed not going to have some abandoned obscure application that random Linux person is too fucking attached to even though there are better alternatives. It has all packages I need, but I all my applications are very common and popular.
- It is not meant for ricing. Basically you chose the desktop environment ISO from main website and use that. You are not gonna rice some random WM on it. You can but there is no point, since Solus focuses on delivering GUI desktop experience to certain standard. You won't find xfce, Cinnamon, Pantheon, lxde in the repositories.
- the team is working on a million different code projects at the same time, which means some things don't get polished for a long time. They promised new version of Budgie DE this year, but haven't even started because they created 10 different cli utilities for infrastructure work.
- their website doesn't really say what they are about, some random marketing speak
- it doesn't have any optimizations for VM, so you kinda have to test it on real hardware
- main dev is a normalfag with awful music taste

Oh yeah and it is not based on any other distribution, which is a huge plus because you don't bring some baggage that distribution doesn't want to get rid of.

Why is making proprietary easier to install a good thing?

Because the point is to be pragmatic instead of ideologic. Those third-party proprietary stuff is basically just collection of links that offer .deb file and it gets converted for Solus.
It also isn't only proprietary applications. You can legally distribute open source Intellij IDEs without signing some kind of key and making it publically avaipable, same thing for Chromium.

Sorry, typo correction: you can't legally distribute

[Citation Needed]

IntelliJ IDEA is Apache Licensed free software.

Chromium is licensed under a mixed number of licenses.

ubuntu, debian, crunchbang, debian, win10

Redistributing the binary is not just about the licence. Just like you can't change stuff in Firefox and use their branding without explicit permission. This problem was in Debian if I remember correctly.
But I am not a distro maintainer nor a lawyer, you gotta make your own research. I am only forwarding what I heard first hand from distribution maintainer.

Maybe this can help somewhat: chromium.org/developers/how-tos/api-keys

If I remember correctly Chromium wasn't available in Fedora main repo for a very long time.

Who is tattoo man?

i came here to ask this as well

Cool Miko!

Crunchbang -> Mint (briefly) -> Debian -> Manjaro

Reverse image search is in chingchong

tw.news.appledaily.com/politics/realtime/20171022/1226966/

My path to enlightenment: Wangblows->Ubuntu->Debian->Arch->Gentoo
Been using Gentoo for 2 months now. I bought a new laptop, and switched from Arch. I like it a lot. No issues to report on openrc vs systemd. Installation took me 2,5 days, but most time is spend waiting for shit to compile. If you disable bindist use flag you build everything from source (except the *-bin packages, like ff or virtualbox or something), but recompiling the kernel is fast af (to add features). Emerge is the shit, layman is ez, the wiki is clear af, support on irc and forums is a thumbs up. Im very glad I switched, because shit that doesn't work is highly likely your own dumb ass fault and forces you to learn shit.
I switched because systemdwdh and I wanted more freedoms on builds. I find Debian way too restrictive. Try installing a recent version of youtube-dl on that piece of crap.
My laptop is a I7-7700hq and got a video card and nvme ssd and all that new shit, but everything works like a charm

You missplelled "OMG MY SJW FEELS OS"

o boy
What did they do now?

windows for work, Qubes for shitposting

Messed around for two days on and off in a VM following the handbook and managed to install stage3 and get it booting just fine on my first try without any issues.
Compiling on an i7 was pretty swift at most it seemed to take about half an hour for the entire process, most of my time was occupied reading various bits and bobs in the handbook and searching for some information about some settings in the kernel that I did not understand.

Too early to comment about gentoo in general but there is one thing I can comment on, the gentoo handbook is fantastic.
I like how the information is presented, I found it a little more insightful than the arch wiki and easier to follow.
I was quite worried about the kernel configuration section expecting it to be difficult but it seemed similar to navigating and configuring settings in bios with the menuconfig.
Now I just need to read through the other 3 sections to understand how to manage the system, not in a rush so I will pick away at it on and off.

If I end up liking gentoo I am thinking of dual booting it quick and dirty on bare metal with arch for now, I have an Nvme drive lying around don't want to fiddle with the partitions on the ssd with arch installed since I intend to replace that cheap Kingston SSD with the Nvme anyways.
My plan is to install gentoo on the Nvme and ease my transition into it until my configuration is on par with what I currently have on my arch install after which I will wipe the arch drive and dedicate that SSD to VMs so they can start up a little faster.
Yet to read up on grub2 with regards to dual booting on two separate drives each with their own boot partition containing grub, I am hoping that grub will play nicely without conflicting.
Certainly not an elegant way of doing things as I have a redundant boot partition but if it works I can easily revert to one OS by nuking one of the drives.

It should be pretty simple to set up. Grub2 literally just werks.

I'll give it a shot now, just need to do some preliminary tests to see if my Nvme works after fitting it.
Gonna have a read on the LiveUSB guide, if it turns out to be too time consuming I'll just burn the iso and proceed from there.
It was easy for arch, I used dd back then most likely the same for gentoo.

Nigger what?

Fucked up big time, my efi boot partition got corrupted after failing to boot from the liveUSB, grub-rescue failed to recognize the filesystem afterwards.
I think it was because I had arch on it prior and copied gentoo on top with dd without wipefs --all as the arch wiki states.
Took me a good while to get my system back up, realized that I had not performed a backup of the EFI boot partition since my rsync script does not cross filesystem boundaries.
Shit my pants for a while but managed to get everything back the way it was by reformatting efi and partially reinstalling arch.

Guess I'll try again tommorrow, the gentoo liveUSB works now.

That's how every distro feels to me after running Gentoo.

There you go. Stop complaining.

Literally went to rg3.github.io/youtube-dl/download.html and followed the instructions. It is completely self-contained and updateable.
Ironic how you speak of "learning shit" as a reason to use Gentoo when you probably failed at setting up your Python environment properly or something. I can't imagine any other reason for you failing to install youtube-dl of all things.
You must be literally retarded