this post was submitted on 10 Sep 2024
67 points (94.7% liked)

Linux

47314 readers
561 users here now

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

Rules

Related Communities

Community icon by Alpár-Etele Méder, licensed under CC BY 3.0

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
67
submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
 

What do you consider to be the "Goldilocks" distro? the one that balances ease of install and use, up-to-date, stability, speed, etc... You get the idea.

I'm not a newb, these last few years I've lived in the Debian and derivatives side of things, but I've used RH, Slackware, Puppy :), and older stuff, like mandrake/mandriva and others. Never tried Suse or Arch, and while Nix looks appealing, I need something to put in production rapidly. I have tried Kinoite in a VM, but I couldn't install something (which I can't remember), and that turned me off.

Oh I'm on Mint right now, because lazy, but it's acting up with a couple of VMs, which I need, I really don't have the time or desire to maybe spend two days troubleshooting, and I'm a bit fed up with out of date pkgs.

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 19 points 6 days ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago

Up to date and stable. Best of both worlds.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Sounds like you want EndeavourOS.

Installs in a few minutes to a fully configured and usable desktop environment of your choice. It is Arch ( uses the same packages, uses the same kernel, has access to the AUR ). A huge benefit of the Arch repos is the up-to-date package universe as well everything you are likely to want being in the repo or AUR.

Don’t underestimate the maintenance and reliability benefits of not having to cobble stuff together from multiple sources.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 days ago

EndeavourOS was my 3rd repo and has been my go-to ever sense.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 days ago (2 children)

NixOS. Declarative system management is just so unbelievably simple and reliable that I couldn’t ever see myself going back to a traditional Linux system.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 days ago

NixOS is too different and poorly documented for me to call it the true goldilocks distro, but man am I loving it

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

I’m building a batteries included desktop OS based on NixOS. A bit like ZorinOS, ChromeOS or Mint but with NixOS as a base. It’s a bit ambitious and still in an early stage, but it’s been great fun for me using the Nix package manager as a solid tool to build stuff. Check it out at https://nixup.io/ or https://github.com/nixup-io/desk-os if you’re curious. Anyone with the nix package manager installed and flakes enabled can just execute nix run github:nixup-up/desk-os to spin up a VM with a demo.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 days ago

If it wasn't in the experimental stage I'd say openSUSE Slowroll.

https://en.opensuse.org/Portal:Slowroll

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Debian Stable + flatpaks. If I were to install it again, I would probably use spiral Linux.

I've moved to cachyOS, I've been getting into running local AI, and they offer an optional prebuilt SDK.

(with Debian I would have to install CUDA myself, which would cause issues on kernel updates)

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 days ago

love debian stable but ive veen wanting to try kicksecure

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 days ago

Maybe Fedora?

Personally, though, I’m a Debian guy - Testing on my desktop and stable with Flatpaks and a few backports on my laptop.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 days ago

Popos for me. It's my daily driver.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

NixOS is super easy. It gets a bit complicated when you use flakes, but you don't need to to start.

You just put the system packages into the configuration so you can replicate that system everywhere.

But if you don't care, just install everything to the user profile! It just works like any distro then, no config files to mess with

The first power spike you will experience is actually setting up a service like Jellyfin by just editing the configuration.nix, though. It's so much easier than having to mess with the configuration yourself (someone already did the work for you)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago

Aeon Desktops it is

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago (1 children)

For me it was Gentoo. I am not sure what it is but for my work it just works better. Tests shows it runs faster for my work and comes with all the tools I need to compile things. I really like the package naming scheme and use flags. I also like the custom-ability of it as well. Tried arch and others but hated it. Also I think the documentation on Gentoo is insanely good.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 days ago

My main distro is arch but I installed gentoo on a spare laptop and im really enjoying the granular control and the choices available, like if I want to use the binaries I can, or I can use a bunch of USE flags, it's very nice. Emerge is slightly slower than pacman for me but I can live with that. I should learn to write some ebuilds though.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago

Fedora. Installer is a bit rubbish (being replaced soon) but it's not difficult.

In terms of speed, stability, and being up-to-date it's been exceptional IMO.

load more comments
view more: next ›