this post was submitted on 10 Jan 2024
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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.
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IMO you're thinking too much as an advanced user for a simple user. The only point I agree on is the NVIDIA GPU. If you feel up to it, contribute. The website's code is on Github https://github.com/distrochooser/distrochooser
I've never heard of nor used Garuda. As I said, feel free to contribute.
Never heard of DistroSea. It seem like a good complement to DistroChooser. It works for most usecases:
DistroWatch as useful as statista.com for suggesting your next travel destination. If you had to travel somewhere and had a list of criteria, but didn't want to spend all day researching, would you go to a travel agent or open an encyclopedia?
I think many in the community, like yourself, have forgotten what it's like to give just enough of a fuck to change something but not to want to be too invested. A beginner isn't going to want to understand why a system is stable or not: they just want a stable system. You don't have to explain to them "Yeah, so the configuration is a file, you see? Only you edit that file. Then you run this command that interprets the file and build a dependency tree, downloads everything necessary, to a partition that's temporarily mounted as read-write, symlinks to....". Nobody cares. The average user DGAF.
Imagine if you just wanted to get a vacuum cleaner at the store with 3 criteria. Imagine you don't give a rat's ass about vacuum cleaner. You just want to point the thing at the ground, let it succ all the bits, but as quietly as possible, and not break down in 2 years to force you back out here. But the sales person you get harps on about the genius of the person who invented some internal component you've never heard of, goes on to explain why, ideologically, getting a certain brand is the only way because blablablabla. Maybe you'd buy a vacuum cleaner just to shut them up or walk out of the store.
My optimal experience would be the sales person listening to me, lining up the best candidates, and explaining, in bullet points, why they are there. Then finally, ask me if I have a favorite and to give me a test environment. If I don't understand something, I can ask more questions.
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Thank you for your response. But our conversation seems so far somewhat inefficient. And I fear it might be due to reasons related to the XY problem. Therefore, before I reply to the points made in the above comment, I would like to ask you if you could state the following:
Thank you in advance!
There have been complaints in posts about people asking for advice on which disto to use, that there are too many such posts.
Provide users the tools to possibly answer the question themselves before creating a post.
DistroChooser is a self-help tool for that purpose.
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XY problem confirmed. Thank you OP!
This is a legit concern.Thank you for trying to tackle this!
Noble. And in its essence, it makes a lot of sense.
As a self-help tool it's very bad. Sorry*. I actually hoped that you would mention how it might be used as a basic requirement for anyone that asks which distro to use. The enforcement could be done with a bot which simply scans if any link to distrochooser is present in a post that remotely resembles one that asks for advice on which distro to use. I would actually even argue against this, but I think we might be able to reach an agreement on which questions are actually worth keeping around for further use...
Honestly, this is better than to limit newbies to strictly stick to Distrochooser for asking which distro they should use 🤣.
I haven't got any experience with building a bot, but I suppose it works by scanning for words in posts. In that case, simply 'flagging' everything that contains the words "which" or "what" in combination with "distro(s)" or "distribution(s)" and ask them to refer their questions to a dedicated Lemmy community in which they can ask would already solve a lot.
You don't have to find an alternative website. Nor write one yourself. As it stands, as far as I'm aware, there's simply nothing that satisfies the basic needs for this.
So what do I propose? Relegating these questions to their own dedicated Lemmy community is probably a great and easy solution. If something like a test/algorithm/flowchart/quiz/whatever has to be created, then that one might need substantial effort to get off the ground. However, perhaps comments like these might be helpful as a blueprint.