I thought a more advanced distro, that is still stable, would be good overall. However, not getting new software for a long time sounds quite annoying.
Arch is actually not as bad as many say. It’s pretty stable nowadays, I even run Arch on some servers and I never had any issues. It gives you the benefits that you can basically find any package in the AUR and everything is up-to-date. Try it out, if you don’t like it, you can still switch to something else.
I’m wanting to challenge myself to get much better with Linux, partitioning, CLI, CLI tools
The best way to learn the CLI is to use it. Try not to use your graphical file manager for a while and only interact with the file system through the terminal, that teaches you a lot.
I’ve been considering installing Arch the traditional way, on my X220, as a way to force myself to improve. Is this a good way to learn more about Linux and a Linux system in general?
Yes.
I always hear good things about the Arch Wiki.
It is truly fantastic.
Is there any other tips someone can give me, to sharpen my Linux skills?
Use the system, don’t be shy, try different things out. If you are scared that you might break something, try it out in a VM. Break your VM and try to fix it. That teaches you a lot.
I was even considering trying out Gentoo on my X220, but the compiling times sound painful.
I would not recommend that, updating packages will take ages, it’s not a great experience.
I’d rather avoid a Linux distro that’s implementing something like ads or telemetry…if that’s even a thing that’s happening?
Fedora has some telemetry, but as far as I know, you can turn it off during the installation. Some desktop environments like KDE Plasma also have options for telemetry but it’s disabled by default. If you want it, you manually have to enable it in the settings.
Should I avoid OpenSUSE
Some software might not be available on openSUSE
or KDE Plasma
Not really, Plasma has a shitload of features and customization options, if many options tend to overwhelm you, you might be better of with a different desktop environment, if you are fine with customization options, Plasma is great for you.
Are there any ‘10 things to do first when installing Linux for the first time’ recommendations?
Media corporations won’t solve that either. They will simply take your money and put it in their pockets while pretending that they care about artists.
But they can’t really do anything about it, unless they start requiring you to log in in order to watch videos…
They sent a cease and desist letter to Invidious, but that’s all they can do. It’s practically impossible to block Invidious because it’s completely decentralized. The Invidious instances only pull metadata, the video stream is actually pulled in by the client.
I mean, yeah, that’s true. But I haven’t heard of many big YouTube/Odysee creators uploading their videos on PeerTube or even entirely switching to PeerTube.
Piped has some issues because Google tries to IP-ban all Piped instances, but Invidious actually pulls the content through the client, not on the server so it should work flawlessly. I also never had any issues with FreeTube.
Personally, I use deemix with Deezer Premium ARLs to download my Music in full 320kbps. Works like a dream. You can accomplish the same thing on Android with Murglar. This section of the Firehawk52 guide explains it pretty well.
I’ve seen this recommendation a couple of times. In my opinion, the MotionBox UI just looks terrible. I prefer Piped or Invidious for watching YouTube. You can use these in combination with LibRedirect to automatically redirect all YouTube links to these alternative front-ends. FreeTube is pretty good if you need a desktop app. I love LibreTube on Android, NewPipe is another option. There’s also Yattee with this guide on iOS and SmartTubeNext on Android TV.
Using Signal with disappearing messages set to a really short time is probably the closest thing you can get. You can use a VOIP number from Cloaked behind a VPN to sign up anonymously.