yala

Thank you for your reply!

If you’ve ever “held broken packages” you’ll know what I mean by robust. I’ve had an entire distro upgrade break in Debian, it seems with a Debian system, eventually, you’re wiping and reinstalling because something broke. I have had this happen to every single Debian system I’ve installed since the gnome2 days.

I'm relatively new Linux user (just over two years now), so please bear with me. But, did I understand you correctly, that you hint towards the curious observation that rolling distros in general are technically 'immortal' while point-release distros eventually implode on themselves? If so, wouldn't it be more correct to attribute this to the release model (i.e. point vs rolling) instead? Because, IIRC, this issue persists on openSUSE Leap, but doesn't on openSUSE Tumbleweed. While both utilize zypper as their package manager.

When I talk about Debian and arch, I’m also talking of their downstream distros. So Mint would be a desktop oriented downstream distro for Debian. It inherits all the problems that come along with Debian, just as Manjaro or EndeavorOS would inherit anything that comes along with running arch. This is all in addition to any issues caused by those distros themselves.

But, if you noticed, I didn't actually explicitly mention Arch's install or its unopinionatedness as its downfall; which are indeed solved by its derivatives. The problem is with updates. At least on Debian and Ubuntu LTS, packages are (mostly) frozen and thus updates are in general non-existent and thus are not able to cause issues. The inevitable implosion happens once every two years at worst. Is that bad? Sure. But does it cause any trouble within those two years? Nope. And honestly, I don't blame anyone that simply prefers to worry about updates once every two years instead of daily.

I wouldn’t recommend any new person install arch, in fact I don’t even do it because I get tired of the installation process. I’d recommend someone install EndeavorOS, which is just arch without the installation issues. If someone wants a Debian based system, I’ll recommend Linux Mint, but if you don’t already know why you want a Debian based system, if you’re just looking for a desktop that works, I’ll recommend EndeavorOS because the underlying Arch system is just IMO better than a Debian system.

Once again, installation is not the problem. I would like to kindly remind you that I haven't even mentioned it once in my previous comment.

But they rely on rpmfusion, an external repo packaging the proprietary NVIDIA stuff for Fedora. The repo is not supported by Fedora, and the drivers cannot be fixed by anyone.

Not sure what you're trying to say here. Would you mind elaborating? FWIW, Bazzite's model (by default) allows automatic fixes to be applied to a broken driver without requiring any manual intervention from its user.

In your case it's still an excellent choice.

Though, other opinionated images by uBlue (like e.g. Aurora and Bluefin) do deserve a mention. I'm on Bluefin (through secureblue to be more precise) as I desired more hardening than what Fedora offers by default.

The excellent part is also that it's possible to rebase to another branch without reinstalling. So, let's say you're actually interested in experiencing these different images without going through the installation process over and over again. Then, you simple enter the following command:

rpm-ostree rebase ...

With ... being replaced by whatever is required for the image and/or branch you're interested in. Then, simply reboot, (pro-tip: make a new user account and through the new user account) experience the other image. Rinse and repeat to your heart's content.

Why are you even considering Manjaro?

If gaming is the priority, then I honestly don't think anything out there can beat Bazzite in terms of ease of use, 'hands-off'-ness, robustness and stability.

Honorable mentions include: Nobara and Pop!_OS.

Ubuntu is no longer the user friendly everyman’s desktop system anymore.

Agreed.

Arch is extremely user friendly, just not the installation process.

I do wonder what your definition of user friendly is. Cuz I can't fathom how you can think that a distro that subscribes to what's quoted below can (by any stretch of the imagination) be considered user friendly.

"Note: It is imperative to keep up to date with changes in Arch Linux that require manual intervention before upgrading your system. Subscribe to the arch-announce mailing list or the recent news RSS feed. Alternatively, check the front page Arch news every time before you update."

Which simple means that you have to check if you can update before you actually perform an update. That's just wild.

And you know what's most curious about this, we've actually solved (within Linux) issues related to updating your system. You read that correct, it's a solved problem. And I hope that you'll benefit from these advancements even if you continue to use Arch.

Btw, please don't come to me with packages that automatically pop up in terminal to inform you about manual intervention. On my system, updates occur automatically in the background and with some black magic shenanigans (or just great engineering) it 'fixes' itself without requiring any manual intervention from me. That pop-up message in terminal can't compete with that.

I find it to be much less of a pain in the ass to use than Debian based systems.

That's subjective, but sure; you're absolutely free to think that.

For one, you have the Arch User Repository, so you’re very unlikely to need to not be able to find some software you want, and more importantly, so many packages in Debian are out of date and they take forever to update them, stuff often breaks because the version needed as a dependency for something else is not in the repositories.

Distrobox exists. Moving on.

and pacman is so much more robust than apt.

What do you mean with robust here? And what makes you think that pacman is much more robust than apt? Thank you in advance for clarifying/elaborating!

I get frustrated online when I see people saying “Ubuntu is the most user friendly distro” or “arch is not for noobs”, this stuff was true like 10 years ago, that’s no longer the case. Ubuntu is user hostile, and there are arch derivatives that are basically arch with a graphical installer, which is the only part of using arch that is hard for people who aren’t hardcore nerds.

Honestly, I actually agree with you. Ubuntu has indeed lost all of its credibility. And Arch is absolutely not as bad as people make it out to be. But! In an environment in which Linux Mint, Zorin OS, Pop!_OS, Bazzite are mentioned; Arch simply is (by contrast) the lesser option in terms easy of use etc. So, while in absolute terms, it's definitely not as bad as peeps make it out to be. It is, compared to the earlier mentioned distros, simply less newbie friendly.

It’s not like Gentoo or Void or Alpine or Nix or running a BSD system or something advanced like that.

Thankfully, no one ever bothers to recommend these to new users 😉.

So, to be clear, these are clearly too advanced and thankfully people never recommend these to newer users. However, while Arch isn't that bad and thus can be used by some newbie users, it should IMO only very very carefully be recommended to new users. If it's the kind of person that likes to learn as they go and enjoys reading documentation, then (by all means) it's absolutely fine to recommend it. But you won't find them that frequently...

So I have a two monitor setup, and I really dislike how gnome only lets you have the bar on the primary screen unless you install a plugin that is very outdated and I cannot get working on the latest version of gnome or use dash to dock, and I am not a fan of the dock style…

I believe both Dash to Panel and V-Shell are capable of resolving this issue in a way that should suit your needs IF you wish to continue using GNOME.

I just wanted to offer some nuance to the table. After everything has been learned, enabling some (otherwise complex and obscure) features can be accomplished by a single line in your NixOS config. Like, this efficiency can not and should not be ignored.

You can find some of my thoughts on Fedora Atomic in another comment found under this post. Spoiler alert; for a lot of people, it's what they seek from NixOS but (by contrast) with excellent delivery. I won't ignore that it doesn't have some of the more insane/interesting functionalities that NixOS provides. But, some just want atomicity, reproducibility and (some) declarativity; and Fedora Atomic does deliver on those without requiring you to go into the deep and learn an entire new language that's only used for managing your distro 😅.

is PopOS! still the popular choice for desktop gaming?

Pop!_OS was pretty good for two reasons:

• System76 sells devices installed with it. Thus, onboarding (potentially new) users is something they put significant efforts into. As a result, it was a pretty polished experience that offers some unique functionality like factory reset and
• Easiest install for proprietary Nvidia drivers on the market

But, the Linux landscape is always on the move. And while the engineers behind Pop!_OS have put their hearts and souls into COSMIC (a new Desktop Environment), the current available version of Pop!_OS has seen only relatively timid changes. Thus, it has become less competitive over time.

For example, over the past two years, distros have erupted that come with built-in Nvidia drivers (pre-installed).

So, Pop!_OS has gone slightly out of favor. But, if you liked what you had back then, then it's still perfectly reasonable to continue using it.

But..., if you're actually interested in the latest and greatest Linux for desktop gaming, then we'd have to mention the following:

• Bazzite; built-on technologies made possible through Fedora Atomic. This is one of the few distros that, based on its installer, come with built-in Nvidia drivers pre-installed. Rock-solid atomic system that comes with all the bells and whistles without sacrificing any general functionality nor high security standards. Offers decent documentation (please consider to read up on it) and has thought up great onboarding solutions. All-in-all, it's (probably) the most hands-off gaming experience on Linux.
• ChimeraOS; this is more of a couch-gaming/console experience. Unfortunately, only supports AMD. Definitely worth mentioning still.

Honorable mentions:

• Nobara; Glorious Eggroll's (will be abbreviated to GE) distro. GE is well known for providing all kinds of gaming related goodies. For example, a popular set of Proton releases/derivatives is Proton-GE and it's often recommended over the others. So, the community was very excited when GE announced (and shortly after) released its contribution to Linux distros for gaming; a Fedora-based distro called Nobara. It did a lot of good things and still does. However, as a former Nobara user, I have to say that updates for major releases are pretty hit or (mostly) miss. This is not GE's fault; it's the nature of the beast. Reproducible distros (like Bazzite) are able to circumvent these issues with help of incredible engineering that goes on in the background. But, this is not Nobara's stronghold. (And let's not even talk about the bus factor.) If you're fine with potentially reinstalling every once in a while, then, by all means proceed. But, if you'd rather not, then other options are better.
• Linux Mint (Edge ISO); this is just the goodness we've come to appreciate from Linux Mint but with a more up-to-date kernel. Kernel updates often come with improvements to performance. So, with this, you won't be missing out. Like Pop!_OS, it's based on Ubuntu. The only caveat with Mint is the fact that it's not enabled to game from the get-go. The required steps to get it all setup aren't very hard, but it's great to just have everything setup for gaming from the start.

I agree that Fedora Atomic, especially if you consume it through uBlue, provides (somehow) even less headache with only a fraction of the investment.

I say this as a very happy user of Fedora Atomic; who has (almost) exclusively been using Fedora Atomic on all of their systems (read: 1 laptop) for over two years.

I would argue that NixOS absolutely is the OS you get if your time is worthless

Hard disagree. Does it require you to climb through heaps of trash documentation? Absolutely. But, if you persevere, you got yourself a rock solid system that will even make Debian Stable jealous; all while requiring no maintenance.

1. Better documentation has been made available since relatively recently.

Why does your brother use NixOS in the first place?

Don't get me wrong; I think NixOS is a very interesting project with a very bright future. It probably wouldn't be an exaggeration if I said that NixOS has single-handedly inspired the current immutable revolution. However, it's also a distro that wants you to learn and digest its ways before it will return the favor.

But, based on my reading/understanding of your comment, your brother doesn't strike me as a seasoned Linux user. Am I right? Btw, NixOS is hard unbeknownst of how many experiences you got with other distros. However, I would simply never recommend a new user to use (Gentoo, Guix System or) NixOS. There are definitely outliers, but they would have to find it themselves then.

Furthermore, a CLI instruction is DE-agnostic. So you don't need to cover the same topic with explanations for at least 3/4 desktop environments. GUI instructions also change a lot faster than their CLI counterparts; so by providing the commands one provides the method with the best longevity. Overall, it's just so much more efficient.