this post was submitted on 08 Oct 2023
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SpiralLinux - It's really Debian underneath the hood! (lemmy.ca)
submitted 1 year ago by GravelPieceOfSword@lemmy.ca to c/linux@lemmy.ml
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I recently ran across SpiralLinux - GitHub page, and found the concept of how the maintainer is packaging it very cool.

The maintainer has been maintaining Gecko Linux for a while now - it has the same underlying concept.

The gist is - you're basically installing Debian, but with customizations that the maintainer(s) thought would be very helpful. Basically - better out of the box experience for new users, but also less work to do even for experienced users, and it comes with different download flavors - Gnome, Plasma, XFCE, Mate, etc.

Bit more detail by the maintainer in this Reddit comment:

Exactly. It's like I went over to your house and installed and configured Debian on your computer, and then you kicked me out of your house as soon as I finished. ;-) The installed system no longer has any connection whatsoever with me or the SpiralLinux project, which is good because you wouldn't want your entire system to depend on a random single developer maintaining it.

(original Reddit comment has more details).

I thought this was pretty cool. I'm still trying to read up online on trying to find how the package lists are maintained, etc., and I might be interested in contributing if I'm able to in the future.

Just wanted to share!

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[–] sb56637@lemmy.ca 56 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Hi everyone, SpiralLinux creator here. Another thing that motivated the creation of this set of spins is the diversity of hardware, even in my own machines. I personally don't like having to switch to a completely different distro for a specific computer just because of hardware support issues. Some devices might need a newer kernel for certain components to work, whereas other hardware works better with the older kernel from Debian Stable. So SpiralLinux offers a hybrid approach, Debian Stable base system with the Debian Stable kernel included on the live ISO, but the much newer kernel version from Debian Backports is also available on the ISO. This can make the difference between the image booting or not, or between having internet connectivity or not, and it makes it more likely that SpiralLinux will work across the entire range of a user's computers.

[–] flyos@jlai.lu 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Nice seeing you on Lemmy! Does this mean you're not using OpenSUSE anymore? Or are you still working on GeckLinux as well?

[–] sb56637@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Nice seeing you on Lemmy! Does this mean you’re not using OpenSUSE anymore? Or are you still working on GeckLinux as well?

Hi there, thanks! For my personal needs and for the users that I support, it's important that the system not be a rolling release, and the Cinnamon desktop works extremely well for almost all use cases. SUSE and openSUSE are trying to move away from the conventional Linux OS paradigm and transition to a new buzzword-compliant immutable/atomic-updating/containerized OS, and they're going to pull the plug on openSUSE Leap in the not-too-distant future. For users that need/want a rolling distro I still think that Tumbleweed is the best option out there, but unfortunately Cinnamon has been unmaintained for almost 2 years in Tumbleweed and it's currently broken despite my attempts to submit updated packages. So I'm not going to invest time into updating the GeckoLinux Rolling ISOs until/unless the Cinnamon desktop is fixed and properly maintained for openSUSE Tumbleweed, and since Leap is going away I have dropped the Static and NEXT editions from GeckoLinux and recommend SpiralLinux for users that don't need a rolling release.

[–] flyos@jlai.lu 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah, it's a shame that Leap is supposed to go away (I think it's not entirely decided yet, is it? It depends whether some people want to offer a Leap-like solution or not in the future). Tumbleweed is super great, but it's not for every usecase...

[–] sb56637@lemmy.ca 7 points 1 year ago

I think it’s not entirely decided yet, is it? It depends whether some people want to offer a Leap-like solution or not in the future

Well, yes, in theory a group of people could offer a Leap-like distro in the future. But that's a big if, because even now with SUSE doing the lion's share of the heavy lifting in SLE there are very few contributors to Leap. And those are only for additional Leap community packages, as the core of Leap is a binary copy of SLE. It's very important to note that SUSE itself will be de-emphasizing SLE as a sort of legacy product in maintenance mode for long contracts, and they will aggressively push customers toward ALP. So as I see it, SUSE's plans are considerably more radical than all of the drama at Redhat, because Redhat is still focusing on RHEL as its core product and is planning future major releases. Although they made it more difficult for the clones, the upstream product is still there. Whereas SUSE is actually trying to move its core upstream product to something completely different. So a theoretical Leap replacement would have to take on a huge burden of maintaining the entire core system with no upstream to base it on (unless they use SUSE's clone of RHEL as the base, which would be a weirdly convoluted thing from a conceptual viewpoint). It looks like the more likely openSUSE offering to replace Leap will be a LTS offering known as "Linarite", but its upstream will be ALP, not SLE, and its scope will probably be mainly for servers. As you say, nothing is certain yet. But that's actually the biggest issue for me, when we talk about the "stability" of a distro we're not just referring to "not crashing"; a big part of "stability" is predictability and long-term viability. It feels like SUSE is going through a midlife crisis, and they seem to recognize that the move to ALP is a gamble. I don't like feeling as if my desktop OS or worse still my server OS is on life support and I'll eventually have to migrate it to something completely different. So I appreciate the slow plodding predictability of Debian, and knowing that it will still be there for me and work approximately the same for the N+1 release and probably the N+10 release as well.

[–] aksdb@feddit.de 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Do you consider SpiralLinux something I could throw on my grandma's computer and she will be fine for the next 5 years? (when Bookworm runs out of updates)

Will updates be installed automatically or will the potential user have to know a little bit what they are doing?

What about upgrades? Once the current Debian release is EOL, how easy will it be to jump to the next one?

Thanks for your efforts!

[–] sb56637@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Do you consider SpiralLinux something I could throw on my grandma’s computer and she will be fine for the next 5 years? (when Bookworm runs out of updates)

Hi there, yes, this is exactly the intended use case. For users that would be confused by updates and changes, and also for experienced users that simply need to get work done on a reliable low-maintenance system that always works the same way.

Will updates be installed automatically or will the potential user have to know a little bit what they are doing?

No automatic updates, I recommend doing this every once in a while:

https://github.com/SpiralLinux/SpiralLinux-project/wiki#updates-within-a-debian-stable-release-lifecycle

I've never used it myself, but Debian does offer a daemon for automatic installation of updates, so that might be an option to consider for grandma's installation. But I'm not too paranoid about applying updates on a Linux system that is behind a standard broadband router running NAT and a firewall; in practice personal home Linux systems like that just aren't being compromised. Frankly the biggest danger by far for grandma would be social engineering attacks and scam call centers.

What about upgrades? Once the current Debian release is EOL, how easy will it be to jump to the next one?

It's pretty easy and very reliable in my experience and from what SpiralLinux 11 users have commented about their upgrade to Debian 12. This is the recommended method:

https://github.com/SpiralLinux/SpiralLinux-project/wiki#upgrading-to-a-major-new-debian-stable-release

[–] aksdb@feddit.de 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I completely missed the Wiki 🤦‍♂️. Sorry for the redundant questions.

I am actually not that much concerned with general OS updates - as you say, those systems are not heavily used and more or less isolated. BUT they are still used for web browsing. So the browser should be patched as good as possible.

I'll give SpiralLinux a try in a VM to get a feeling for it. Maybe paired with the automatic update daemon I could then forget about the PC(s) in question for the next few years until a major version change is necessary (which then hopefully can be done remote as per your Wiki page).

[–] sb56637@lemmy.ca 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Another option might be to uninstall the DEB version of Firefox and install a browser from Flathub, and configure Gnome Software or KDE Discover to automatically download and install updates for Flatpaks.

[–] aksdb@feddit.de 2 points 1 year ago

Uh, clever idea. Thanks!

[–] winety 20 points 1 year ago (6 children)

Cool concept. I really appreciate the "independence" from the project after the installation. It would be cool, if the author preconfigured some less common DE/WM alongside the ones they package now. I yearn for a distro with a preconfigured tiling WM, so I wouldn't have to use my half broken i3wm setup.

[–] ardent_abysm@lemm.ee 10 points 1 year ago

SwayOS might be worth looking at. It is basically just an installation script for a pre-configured Sway setup.

Some things are pulled from GitHub, so it is probably a good idea to look into the packages it is downloading.

[–] ryannathans@aussie.zone 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

8 DEs aren't enough for you?

Also pop os has a preconfigured tiling window manager called pop shell

[–] winety 3 points 1 year ago

8 DEs aren't enough for you?

They are, but a man can dream. And thanks for the tip!

[–] njinx@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The PopOS tiling window manager sadly doesn't compare to a proper one.

[–] ryannathans@aussie.zone 1 points 1 year ago

What functionality are you missing?

[–] sb56637@lemmy.ca 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It would be cool, if the author preconfigured some less common DE/WM alongside the ones they package now

Hi there, SpiralLinux creator here. I'm not opposed to adding more desktop environments as long as they are packaged for Debian, since the SpiralLinux project does not create or modify any packages. But I do try to make all the editions viable for "regular" people, so things like tiling window managers are probably outside of the scope of the project.

[–] winety 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)
  1. Keep up the good work. Your project reminds me of small "old school" distros from the noughties and I love the vibe!
  2. I get the aim at "regular" people. I'd wager there's an interest for a somewhat polished tiling experience; perhaps not among regular people, but among the a bit experienced (and a bit lazy) crowd of Linux users, which is definitely numerous.

Anyway, I'm just spitballing. Good luck with your project!

[–] sb56637@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 year ago

Thanks for the kind words! Glad you like the project.

[–] dai@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That's why I love Nix, moving my hyprland configuration from my laptop to my desktop was almost seamless. All my keybinds, wallpapers and applications were up and running with a couple of commands.

There are a couple of hardware specific configs for my laptop and desktop but once I split those out it's smooth sailing.

[–] GravelPieceOfSword@lemmy.ca 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I have Nixos on a laptop, and have a love//hate relationship with it.

I love the customizability and declarative setup.

I hate the number of times I've sunk down rabbitholes trying to set specific things up on it.

The updates being done via switch are a bit inconvenient, but cool enough.

The fact that I can't customize everything, particularly on kde, is slightly sad.

All in all, I really like it, but wouldn't recommend it for my less technical friends, who I'd normally install Ubuntu for. This has gone up my list, close to Opensuse slowroll and Linux mint Debian edition now.

[–] dai@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

Yeah since using NIX for a couple of months now I moved away from KDE, you could customize KDE with home-manager however you would be writing out stacks of home.file lines as KDE is all over the shop when it comes to configuration. IIRC there is a module for KDE to help however it looked like a bigger time sink than I wanted.

For example my hyprpaper config is as such:

home.file."dots/config/hypr/hyprpaper.conf" = {
    text = ''
      preload = ~/nixos/wallpaper/1.jpg
      preload = ~/nixos/wallpaper/2.jpg
      preload = ~/nixos/wallpaper/3.jpg
      preload = ~/nixos/wallpaper/4.jpg
      wallpaper = eDP-1, ~/nixos/wallpaper/1.jpg
    '';
  };

Same can be done for KDE's config however you'll run into issues changing settings manually from memory. I'm quite happy with hyprland as there are less moving parts compared to a complete package (gnome / kde), everything that's installed (probably) has a purpose for my use-case.

[–] mhz@lemm.ee 2 points 1 year ago

OpenSUSEway is pattern you can install in opensuse which install an opensuse themed sway/waybar/wofi/greetd and a notification center i cant recall its name. It is what I use on Opensuse Slowroll for a less agressive rolling release.

[–] piexil@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Regolith

[–] winety 1 points 1 year ago

I have my eye on Regolith. Sadly it seems to be only available on Ubuntu and its derivatives, because they rely on apt.

[–] backhdlp@lemmy.blahaj.zone 11 points 1 year ago (2 children)

So like most Arch-based distros but Debian?

[–] sb56637@lemmy.ca 10 points 1 year ago

So like most Arch-based distros but Debian?

Hi there, SpiralLinux creator here. I would say that compared to most derivative distros, no, SpiralLinux isn't quite the same thing. Most of those derivatives also maintain some of their own package repositories, whereas I strictly avoid that with SpiralLinux to avoid users' systems depending on me for maintenance and updates and continuity of the system.

[–] GravelPieceOfSword@lemmy.ca 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That's not right. Debian/suse are no less out of the box user friendly than Arch - not counting endeavouros/Manjaro, they're more friendly.

Arch still needs extra setup and configuration after install. Endeavouros makes it a bit simpler, but there's still configuration (and ricing) invoice. Auto-discovery of printers (cups, avahi), graphical configuration tools out of the box, user permissions/group membership setup out of the box in a way that new users (or even power users) can just set things up graphically... all of that needs extra work.

That's the extra configuration that this is providing.

[–] backhdlp@lemmy.blahaj.zone 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I was saying that there are many Arch-based distros that are essentially Arch (down to the repos sometimes), but with a (graphical) installer and rice, and that Spiral Linux seems like exactly that but replace Arch with Debian.

[–] GravelPieceOfSword@lemmy.ca 3 points 1 year ago

I see, you're right from that perspective.

For this 'distro', I like the emphasis the maintainer put on out of the box usability, including proprietary codecs, extra repositories that are not enabled/added by default, but widely used, flatpak setup out of the box, printer permissions relaxing etc.

[–] AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.world 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So it’s more like a customizable installer than a separate distro?

[–] GravelPieceOfSword@lemmy.ca 11 points 1 year ago

Yes, an opinionated customized installer that seems to be aligned with my own thoughts of great out of the box usage.

[–] spider@lemmy.nz 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

The gist is - you're basically installing Debian, but with customizations that the maintainer(s) thought would be very helpful. Basically - better out of the box experience for new users, but also less work to do even for experienced users

Also describes Q4OS, which I've been using for five years.

[–] sorrybookbroke@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 year ago

That's neat, so kinda like what peppermintOS was doing but taken a bit further? I like the concept

[–] asperagus@feddit.de 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

No aarch64 support?

[–] sb56637@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Hi there, no, sorry, I don't own any aarch64 devices to test it on.

[–] ikidd@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Someone send this guy a Pinephone or Raspberry Pi.

[–] Franzia@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

you wouldn't want your entire system to depend on a random single developer maintaining it.

Running Nobara and I am new to desktop linux. Am I okay? Should I make a change?

[–] GravelPieceOfSword@lemmy.ca 2 points 1 year ago

You're fine.

Most distributions/derivative distributions are fine for very long periods.

It's just that when the base distribution itself (Debian, Fedora in your case, Opensuse, etc) are themselves nicely customized out of the box to address user concerns, that's a very attractive prospect to long time users like myself.

Debian has a lot of history and stability, so if I can use it for myself, family, friends without an additional layer or more of other parties, that's very appealing.