Which distro do you believe deserves more recognition?

For me it’s PeppermintOS.

I started my Linux adventure a few years ago, and haven’t owned a Windows PC since.

I currently use Arch on my main rig, and I wanted to install Linux on two old laptops that I found laying around in my house

I then remembered the first distro I ever used, which is PeppermintOS, and I was amazed at the latest updates they released.

They even have a mini ISO now to do a net-install with no bloat, with a Debian or Devuan base.

Sadly, I believe the founder passed away a few years ago, which is why I was really happy to see the continuation of this amazing project.

registrert,
@registrert@lemmy.sambands.net avatar

I’m the boring old type that think the best distros are generally the most promoted ones.

Except Ubuntu. They have a special place in my heart. I had to fight their Snap system exactly like I had to fight the telemetry in Windows7, and eventually I got worn out and moved on.

The WebApp system that PeppermintOS uses is fantastic though and deserves more both recognition and use!

aleq,
@aleq@lemmy.world avatar

I generally don’t understand why people go for the smaller ones at all. I guess it’s good that someone does to prevent the whole scene being dominated by a single distro, but with some exceptions (e.g. you hate systemd for some reason and really want systemd-less arch, or you have a super niche preferences). For 99% of distros it makes very little difference which one you use, except that you’ll have fewer resources at your disposal (fewer packages, fewer stack overflow threads, fewer everything).

ares35,
@ares35@kbin.social avatar

ubuntu pushing snap is what pushed me away. i had used it since warty and was a regular contributor in the official forums. i went back to pure debian, and have since added mint and manjaro (yes i know about its history) desktops, and a few dietpi on x64 (no sbc here), two of which run my piholes.

Caboose12000,

I don’t know about it’s history, can you enlighten me?

cerement,
@cerement@slrpnk.net avatar

main source is ManjarNo

Pantherina,
@Pantherina@feddit.de avatar

Doing changes right is a bit hard. With immutable Distros, some changes are easier like adding or removing packages, bur core OS adaptions are harder.

But for example how would you convert regular Ubuntu to

  • unsnap
  • KDE Desktop, no GNOME at all
  • rolling mesa and more
  • …

This all gets messy, so people choose small distros

aleq,
@aleq@lemmy.world avatar

I’m on arch, which I consider one of the larger distros, where most such configuration is very simple. Not sure what rolling mesa is. I probably wouldn’t recommend Ubuntu to anyone who is against using Snap, but there are many distros to choose from if you want KDE as well? It’s more a question of why people would go for Hannah Montana Linux (figuratively speaking, some very niche distro).

But to respond to your core point, sure. If you do have a lot of customization needs for whatever reason, then by all means. (I still don’t get it)

Pantherina,
@Pantherina@feddit.de avatar

I meant that its not easy to customize deep system changes and keep them working well, on your own.

There are Forks of Ubuntu like TuxedoOS, PopOS (?) and more that do rather big changes that could break things. So its best to have a community support them.

But I agree on your point. Currently I am on Fedora Kinoite but still dont switch to ublue, as I can do the changes on my own, on the official base.

If I had an NVIDIA card though, I think ublue is the only Distro thats reliable enough (if an update would break, you simply dont get it)

circuitfarmer,
@circuitfarmer@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

The nature of FOSS suggests (make that extra italic) that the most popular distros should be those that actually work the best. Totally agree that Ubuntu is an outlier, and even that is because of choices Canonical made – and corporate decisions really aren’t typically a part of FOSS.

That said, I truly enjoy smaller distros for hobbyism. I don’t necessarily see a use case where they should be chosen over a larger one, except for the really annoying fact that distros with corporate backing will always also tend to get quicker adoption.

registrert,
@registrert@lemmy.sambands.net avatar

I like to be able to browse docs and forum posts when I run into issues. Ubuntu sucks but is great at this, Mint is great but they suck at this.

rizoid,
@rizoid@midwest.social avatar

Honestly I’ve really enjoyed Zorin. It’s made life simple when it comes to migrating friends and family to Linux. Specifically the way they handle fonts and scaling in office programs when opening Microsoft files. It’s been easy to get my wife to get off of windows after they started bombarding her with adds on her fuckin desktop screen.

mfat,

Can you send a screenshot please? I’m curious how the fonts look.

GustavoM,
@GustavoM@lemmy.world avatar

Maybe it’s just me, but folks seem to hate ZorinOS for some reason. Which imo, is a perfect distro as is for baby penguins.

netchami,

All distributions of free, open-source and user-empowering software like Linux are great and deserve recognition. Whether it’s simple, new user-friendly distros like Linux Mint that make the transition process from proprietary garbage like Windows as easy as possible or advanced distros that are meant for power users like Gentoo, Arch or Void Linux. But these specifically deserve more recognition in my opinion:

Gentoo. People hate it for being hard to install or because it’s source based, but it allows you to customize everything, including build options for programs etc. It empowers users and teaches them a little about how their system works. Gentoo doesn’t tell the user what to do, the user is in full control of their system. ChromeOS is based on it, because it offers infinite flexibility and customizability.

Also, Tails OS. It’s what keeps many oppressed journalists and activists anonymous and secure, and it’s what Edward Snowden used to inform the public about the horrible things going on at the NSA. The same goes for Qubes OS and Whonix.

Chobbes,

I don’t get the sense that people hate Gentoo, I think it’s mostly just people joking about it. That said gentoo is really cool and doesn’t always get the respect it deserves, but I think most people who actually follow through with it have some appreciation for it!

intrepid,

Void Linux for the arch and gentoo crowd. It’s a system that can be assembled more cohesively.

Nix and Guix - the ideas they bring to the table are revolutionary. I prefer Guix due to its use of Scheme (guile). But Nix is more mature and has more packages.

nik282000,
@nik282000@lemmy.ca avatar

I’ve used Debian for years but tried Void on a really low spec netbook and it’s pretty nice. The install is pretty painless and not having systemd is an interesting change for me.

rodbiren,

Mint is surprisingly loved and disliked from what I have seen. Having used it since 2007 I am in the category that likes it for what it is. But I am somewhat surprised by the open hostility it gets for simply existing. Main arguments being that it is a dinosaur, uses X11, should not exist because anything not KDE or GNOME is just diluting desktop Linux and is part of the problem. It has no fancy corporate sponsor, it has a small team, and it for sure has warts, but you can claw Linux Mint from my cold dead hard drive because I have distro hopped like an addict and it just checks the boxes for me. It shows up and works, even on newer hardware with a little tweaking here and there, but I can use Nvidia, find network printers without effort, scan, install and update flatpak, backup the system, game, and get actual work done that is not fiddle farting around with esoteric configs all the time. I can post on actual forums with actual users on it and not some discord where someone will just post memes over my questions. I have a strong feeling it will exist for a long while given it’s history. And it is mind numbingly borning as an OS. I just sit down and compute, what a concept.

jennraeross,

If there was only a way to get automatic tiling on cinnamon it’d be my favorite desktop by far. Everything you need, nothing you don’t, sensible by default. It’s the right option for most people I think

glue_snorter,

Excellent - I’m about to install it for my aged mother, because windows keeps moving her cheese.

I want something that doesn’t change the workflows once she’s learned how to do a task, and that local techs can help her with, and that I can VNC to when I have to.

rodbiren,

You can configure the system for backup and auto updates which is handy to keep it secure without any interaction. Only reason I ever had it fail was entirely me screwing it up, usually by distro hopping and formatting wrong.

notaviking,

How can someone speak such truth. Agree it is not perfect. But it just works and really well. Only big controversy I can think of is the website being hacked a couple of years ago, but they were open and transparent in my opinion about the hole thing. Also disto hoped a lot but I am always brought back to “green Ubuntu”. Can Mint team get ontop of Wayland please

Stillhart,

Speaking as a relative linux noob, Mint is probably the most recommended distro I’ve seen now that Ubuntu jumped the shark. Not sure how anyone could think it needs more recognition.

hottari,

Arch. Some of its users take this distro for granted a lot of times but it only goes downhill from here once you start looking at other distros.

Tumbleweed. Solid, Automated QA testing.

Chimera Linux. Security-related compilation flags go brrr. No systemd.

Maybe we’ll see SerpentOS sometime before this decade ends but who knows.

On a side note. Aeon 1.0 if/when released, can’t wait to see how it all turns out. Especially if they manage to integrate BTRFS snapshots with systemd-boot entries.

CrabAndBroom,

Yeah using Arch (btw) cured me of my distro hopping. Although NixOS is looking tempting…

LeFantome,

Wow. Great to see Chimera Linux on this list, though I do not think it is even out of Alpha yet.

Chimera Linux and Vanilla Linux are two of the distributions that I am most interested in at the moment.

I am also a huge fan of Arch but I typically install EndeavourOS these days. Out of the 80,000 or so Arch packages, EndeavourOS adds only about two dozen more but many of them are great. Installing yay by default is a great decision as well.

SatyrSack,

Wow. Great to see Chimera Linux on this list, though I do not think it is even out of Alpha yet.

This had me confused for a bit, but I see now that Chimera Linux and ChimeraOS are two different things.

kucing,

EndeavorOS btw.

just_another_person,

SteamOS

jsdz,

MX

nossaquesapao,

It’s a nice one for low end machines

visnudeva,
@visnudeva@lemmy.ml avatar

All of them, thanks a lot for all the Devs hard work, I’ve tried and loved so many distros that I can’t choose any of them but lately I have been using cachyos which is a clean and fast arch based distro.

molochthagod,

deleted_by_author

    •
    worldofgeese, (edited )
    @worldofgeese@lemmy.world avatar

    The old homegrown Pardus was really something special with its Kaptan system configuration tool and PiSi package manager.

    Tundra,

    Plain ol Debian

    cerement,
    @cerement@slrpnk.net avatar

    been thinking about moving on from Pop_OS and doing the usual looking around – was going to be a toss up between NixOS, Void, Alpine, and Debian Sid – but recently caught Veronica Explains talking about Debian and realizing enough with all the noise – simple, stable, boring, ubiquitous sounds REALLY appealing …

    samsy,

    Using it over years and discovered the expert installer a few months ago. Really good stuff, especially since they decide to build an extra repo for non-free-firmware, because a lot of people ditch Debian when their shitty WiFi doesn’t get recognized immediately after install because it needs a non-free-firmware.

    dan, (edited )
    @dan@upvote.au avatar

    I’ve been using it on servers for over 20 years. It’s a great distro.

    It’s a community project. Every member of the Debian project has equal rights and vote on major decisions. It’s not owned by a large company so it’s mostly avoided any controversy due to bad decisions (for comparison, see the controversy around CentOS Stream).

    They mostly don’t change things if they work fine as-is. The network configuration in /etc/network/interfaces is essentially the same format as it was 20 years ago. (for comparison, see Ubuntu deciding to change how it does things every few years). Probably the biggest recent change was switching to systemd in 2015, but even today they have a compatibility layer to convert packages with sysvinit-style services to systemd, and you can still switch back to sysvinit and completely get rid of systemd.

    You can upgrade to the next version in-place - just edit the apt repository config to point to the next version, apt update, apt full-upgrade, and reboot into new kernel version. Most upgrades are seamless (but it’s still best to read the release notes).

    Most packages include a README.Debian file in /usr/share/docs somewhere that usually includes very brief instructions on how to get started with the program.

    It supports practically every system architecture. They still make an i686 build that works with processors as old as the Pentium 4. They also had an i386 build that worked on systems as old as the original Pentium, and only dropped it this year with Debian 12. Supporting an architecture doesn’t just mean the base OS - it also includes most of the packages too.

    ghostfiresmoke,
    @ghostfiresmoke@mastodon.social avatar

    @dan what is the name of the distro.please tell me I am switching to Linux from windows and I don't want to use Ubuntu.

    dan,
    @dan@upvote.au avatar

    I’m talking about Debian :)

    dallen,

    What I love about Debian is there are always instructions regardless of whatever random package I want to use or Linux thing I’m trying to do.

    ultra,

    Bedrock

    lupec,

    Bedrock looks crazy impressive and ambitious but, adding to your point, I have to admit I keep forgetting it exists.

    On that note, I’ll add Vanilla OS.

    theshatterstone54,

    I tried it once, and it was hella impressive, but I didn’t stick with it, I don’t know why. It just seems a little too much for me.

    ultra,

    It kinda fucks up your FS (not in a data-loss way, but it gets really messy): it was showing 3.2TB… on a 509gb partition of a 1tb ssd. Heck, I only have 3TB in my whole PC

    backhdlp,
    @backhdlp@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

    reminds me of /proc always being 128TB for no reason

    lupec,

    Bazzite, a gaming-oriented immutable distro with up to date Fedora packages and kernel, a lot of the kernel patches you’d want for gaming, automatic daily updates in the background, the option of installing the Nix package manager and Distrobox out of the box. They even have a Steam Deck version that works just like stock UI/UX wise but with all the added goodies.

    Plus, on rpm-ostree/ublue-os as a whole, it just amazes me to no end you can basically look at deploying a distro as if it’s a git repo these days. Wanna try Gnome? Rebase to the corresponding image and reboot, your data is still there. Don’t like it? Quickly rollback or just pick the previous entry on GRUB. Incredible stuff, I’m sticking with those if I can help it for the foreseeable future.

    Guenther_Amanita,
    @Guenther_Amanita@feddit.de avatar

    +1 here. I wanted to write the same. Silverblue/ uBlue in particular has a huge potential.

    It already is extremely user friendly, but if someone could develop an even more “noob”-friendly version with a great welcome-starter that shows you how to install stuff, a good looking KDE rice, and sells it as extra-distro with it’s own website and iso, then it could easily replace Mint as the #1 best beginner distro!

    lupec,

    Heck, Bazzite is most of the way there. With how quickly it’s been improving, wouldn’t surprise me if it had all that pretty soon.

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