South Korean history from the immediate post-WW2 period through to the 1980s is completely ignored in the western world. Syngman Rhee in particular was a true villain.
Per an email sent to Columbia Business School faculty on Wednesday morning from Dean Costis Maglaras and obtained by The Intercept, the vocal pro-Israel business school assistant professor made the decision to leave the school.
Several students, including Mahmoud Khalil and Mohsen Mahdawi, have also alleged that Davidai targeted them and called for them to be deported in the lead-up to their arrests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Davidai was also a member of a prominent WhatsApp group of Columbia alumni, parents and professors that strategized about how to deport pro-Palestine students, The Intercept reported. He has noted that he does not have tenure at the school.
Davidai posted that he had been cleared of allegations filed against him last year. He was previously suspended after he was accused of harassment and intimidation.
Vladimir Nezhdanov, an expert at the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, commented on the statement by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on the need to stop China’s support for Russia in the programme ‘Opin…
EADaily, July 9th, 2025. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, speaking in the Bundestag, said that Russia is questioning the right of an entire nation to exist and is beginning to destroy political freedom on the entire European continent.
EADaily, July 9th, 2025. Kiev at the end of June received the first aircraft of the SharkU1 type — an upgraded ultralight vehicle developed in the Czech Republic and Slovakia and designed for electronic warfare.
That is what is proper after all? The Nazi regime that renamed it was illegally propped up by the US empire, none of us should be spelling it the way the occupiers want us to
Or you can open your mind a little to the lies you have been fed, leave the right-wing instance and come on over to lemmy.ml, much more welcoming of non-western non-empire approved sources than the Zionists over there and you'll see through the empire's programming quickly
Hi Mozilla community, I’m a long time Mozilla supporter, I’ve published free (as in freedom) and open-source software, and I desperately want Mozilla to charge for Firefox. If that sounds like a contradiction, please keep reading.
Google is paying a pittance to achieve vendor lock-in.
The training may be free but there will be other services which will not be free and the other services will integrate better with the existing 'free' Google services better than anything else.
In practice, SUSE's Sovereign Premium Support is tailored for enterprises and public sector organizations that require strict data residency, privacy, and operational control within the EU. The service ensures that:
All support personnel and data are based in the EU, with named premium support engineers and service delivery managers assigned to each customer.
Customer support data is stored exclusively on EU-located networks and servers, addressing both regulatory and geopolitical concerns.
Access to sensitive data is strictly limited to EU-based staff, with a commitment to encrypting all data required for troubleshooting.
Agreed. I hope this gains even more traction. Building a digital economy around support and service of free open source software with the requirement of personnel being local seems like the best way for Europe to finally become competitive.
I mean in the server space Linux has already won and is doing just fine. Imo it is actually the reverse and sad that it needs this level of turmoil to get Europe to even think about software and digital infrastructure as fundamental. And even with all that's going on they are just dipping their toes into it rather than properly comitting to a radical shift. Hell, even with all that's going on some parts of the police here in Germany are still getting into bed with companies like Palantir.
Look, folks, I’ve been hearing a lot, a lot, about this thing called Linux. Ever heard of it? Sounds European, doesn’t it? Probably invented in Brussels, or Sweden, maybe Russia, I don't know. Total disaster. I call it Socialist Windows, because that’s what it is! It’s chaotic, no one’s in charge. Total mess. Bernie Sanders running an IT department, terrible. Meanwhile, Windows, great American company, by the way, very successful, very strong.
That's a joke...I remember downloading opensuse, there was a warning that forbids me to use if I was in a country targeted by the USA something like that 😆 IMO, If you really want independance dont use things from corporations. Many people complains about overstaffing in administrations, so why not have them work on a distro from scratch ?
I made the unfortunate post about asking why people liked Arch so much (RIP my inbox I'm learning a lot from the comments) But, what is the best distro for each reason?
RIP my inbox again. I appreciate this knowledge a lot. Thank you everyone for responding. You all make this such a great community.
Imo, the best one is the one that fits the user's needs the best. Though it sounds like a non-answer, distros are usually tailored for specific needs, so not necessarily the features or lack thereof from one distro disregard another.
My Debian is the best for my work laptop My Arch is the best for my private laptop My Asahi is the best so that I don't have to deal with f*cling macos crap
Why my distro (pop!_os) is the best? Well it's probably not, but here's why I went with it:
ubuntu based, so lots of applicable tech support online
looks nice out of the box (imo)
comes with nvidia drivers. Not a major point cause they aren't hard to get, but it was one of the things I considered when I unintentionally ended up with with nvidia
tiling (the big one imo)
Aand that's kinda it :3.. at the moment it's kinda behind all the other stuff cause they're working on the new COSMIC DE, which im hoping is gonna be an upgrade to the GNOME with extensions the current version has
While COSMIC is certainly an upgrade, current gnome extensions won’t be compatible. COSMIC uses applets instead of extensions. Fortunately, there’s already an ecosystem of applets for COSMIC, many of which have been ported from GNOME extensions.
Ye :3.. honestly as someone who doesn't use that many extensions other than the pop-shell ones, im not too worried about the extensions, since basically all of that is coming as a base part of COSMIC's interface.. I think the only extension that im hoping gets a COSMIC applet soon after release is KDEconnect lol
Same. I think there’s one extension I run in my top bar that lets me individually stop, start, or restart specific system services. It’s very handy, and I’ll miss it.
Aeon desktop is the best indeed: - Crazy fast install. - System configuration is done on the first boot. - Supports ignition and combustion. - The install USB can become a $HOME backup if you re-install. - Full disk encryption by default and mandatory. - Latest GNOME, looks clean and pretty. - Rolling. - Immutable, with Distrobox by default.
As far as desktop Linux goes, I don't see why I would use anything else atm. Give it a try!
I just want to learn more about what are the differences between distros, so that they will be better or worse? Are all the distros having the same GNU/Linux kernel so that if I replace all the Arch userland files into Debian's, the system will become Debian?
Are all the distros having the same GNU/Linux kernel
Yes. Different distros have different versions, patches and so on, but the underlying kernel is the same.
if I replace all the Arch userland files into Debian’s, the system will become Debian?
If by "userland" you mean files which your normal non-root user can touch, then no. There's differences on how distributions build directory trees, file locations, binaries, versions and so on. You can of course replace all the files on the system and change distribution that way, a convenient way to do that is to use distros installer but technically speaking you can also replace them manually by hand (which I don't recommend).
Arch is the best, the arch wiki is massive, pacman is just amazing, no nvidia drivers bullshitting, and rolling release has only broken one thing once, life under the arch is pretty great
Also PKGBUILD's are the superior packaging format. Back in the day people use to talk about preferring debian or redhat based distros based on how much they liked debs or rpms. Building packages on Arch is easier than pretty much any distro I have ever tried to build packages on.
I recently needed to build newer versions of some packages for Debian. Now, they're go based so the official packaging is super complicated and eventually I decided to try and make my own from scratch. After a few more hours of messing with the official tooling I start thinking "there must be a better way."
And sure enough, after a bit of searching I found makedeb which allows you to make debs from (almost) regular PKGFILEs. Made the task a million times simpler.
Sorry, I misread your comment on my first reply. Yes, you can have gnome and hyprland installed side by side, you would just use SDDM to choose what session you’re starting at login.
But is it also possible to have the gnome login screen (so after startup) and then automatically login using Hyprland? Because I dislike any other login screen. (The gnome one is pretty asf)
My choice of distro is just a compromise and close enough to serving my needs. All distros have pros and cons, and I use different distros for different use cases.
I'm vegan, german and into fitness. There really was no other choice. /s?
Also, it's lightweight, you always get the most recent software, pacman is superb and it's super stable. In about 10 years on multiple systems, I never had anything break. The worst of it are simple problems during updates, which are always explained on their website.
Lastly, there is the wiki. The single best source of Linux information out there. Might as well be using the distro that's directly explained there, albeit a lot of information can be used on other ones as well.
With arch-install, you don't even need to learn much, but learning is never a bad idea and will be great if something does break. Every system can break. Arch prepares you for that.
having tried many distros over the years, Arch (and most derivatives) is best for me pacman is the best i've used, packages are very up to date, and it's pretty easy to troubleshoot with the enormous amount of info on the wiki and elsewhere
I (maybe) ended distrohopping last year when I gave NixOS a shot. I can't recommend it for beginners but once you understand generally how things work on Linux (and have an interest in programming) it's a superpower to be able to define your entire setup as a single git repository. If something ever breaks, I can reboot into an older commit and keep using my computer, or branch off in a different direction... I've only scratched the surface of NixOS and yet I can already make a live USB containing my setup with a single command, or deploy it ("infect") to another machine and manage e.g my work desktop and my personal laptop sharing most settings. Also it taught me about Nix (the package manager, which also runs on any distro and macOS independent of NixOS) which I now use to set up perfect development environments for each of my projects... if I set up dependencies once (as a flake.nix shell), it'll work forever and anywhere.
Same for me. I distro-hopped for about 20 years with OpenSuse, Ubuntu, Debian, Arch and Fedora being the most memorable desktop setups for me. While all that was a valuable experience, NixOS feels like graduation.
For the Nix-curious: I wish someone would have told me not to bother with the classic config and build a flake-based system immediately. They're "experimental" in name only, very stable and super useful in practice.
Absolutely +1 for flakes. It's got some annoying UX sometimes (make sure you git add any new files before building!) but absolutely makes up for it by its features.
Same for me, I stopped distro-hoping 2 years ago when I moved to NixOS.
It was tough at first, setting it up took a while and i genuinely felt stupid like i haven't felt for a while; but now I love having the same config on my two laptops. I have one that stays at work and another one for traveling. With one word/line added into my config I can as a software, configure the VPN, change the wallpaper on both my laptop, or not. Some stuff like gaming goes only on the traveling laptop.
Also, another big thing for me is the feeling of having a cleanly built system all the time. I haven't felt the urge to do a clean reinstall since I started with NixOS.
Some more points about Nix: - It's a fast way to get to a specific setup, like a particular DE or Vulkan gaming support, thanks to abstraction that NixOS modules provide - There are tons of packages - Because packages are installed by adding a config entry you don't accumulate random software you forgot you installed - Immutable updates and rollbacks - this is similar to benefits of atomic ostree distros, but the nix solutions are more general, so you have one system that does more things with a consistent interface - in addition to updating the base system, rollbacks also roll back user-installed packages, and configurations if those are managed via Nix - devshells provide per-directory packages and configuration using the same package repos as the host system, without needing to manage docker images - Nix is portable - much of what it does on NixOS can also be used in other distros, or even on Macos or Windows with the Linux subsystem - Configurations often combine NixOS and Home Manager parts. The Home Manager part can be used à la carte on other OSes is a way that is fully isolated from the host OS package management. For example on Macos this is a much nicer alternative to Homebrew. - devshells also work on other OSes - similar to Guix - but NixOS uses systemd, and is (from what I understand) more tolerant of non-free software (whether these are pros or cons is up to individual interpretation)
Nixos Is my first distro I use on desktop. I’m not sure why but I guess the fact that it won’t build till it checks Is a huge plus for me. I love to f up things to learn from them but I don’t like broken things and oh boy. Nix keeps me in the clean, safe. Don’t get me wrong im doing stupid stuff all the time but just cus i have a few configs written down i can learn a lot. Or a little that amazes me lol
Endeavour OS is the best because you get all the benefits of Arch combined with a familiar and friendly installer, a good out of the box setup with the desktop of your choice. Not to mention the outstanding community that's built up around it.
I really like CachyOS: 1. Arch based a. Pacman package manager b. AUR c. Rolling release distro 2. Graphical installer 3. Extensive software repo. Things that I used to only be able to get as a flatpak are available in the repo, such as SurfShark VPN as an example 4. Super fast. 5. Updates are tested before they are made available and the delay is only a few days.
Mint. It just works and Cinnamon is a good DE (ui design peaked in the Windows XP days). Plus you also get all the software built and tested for Ubuntu without the bullshit of using Ubuntu.
For my server I use NixOS, because having one unified configuration is so nice.
MX Linux (Debian based), using it for almost 10 years now (before, it was Ubuntu). Based on Debian, very stable, always up to date for every kernel/apps, use native .deb no snap no flatpak no systemd. Also it is using Xfce by default, the best DE.
For your info, it was a kind of "square" picture, I used yce.perfectcorp.com/ai-image-e… to extend it left and right, it created new clouds/flowers, not bad
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My way of thinking and working is incompatible with most premade automatism, it utterly confuses me when a system is doing something on its own without me configuring it that way.
That's why I have issues with many of the "easy" distributions like Ubuntu. Those want to be to helpful for my taste. Don't take me wrong, I am not against automatism or helper tools/functions, not at all. I just want to have full knowledge and full control of them.
I used Gentoo for years and it was heaven for me, the possibility to turn every knob exactly like I wanted them to be was so great, but in the end was the time spend compiling everything not worth it.
That's why I changed to Arch Linux. The bare bone nature of the base install and the high flexibility of pacman and the AUR are ideal for me. I love that Arch by default is not easy, that it doesn't try to anticipate what I want to do. If something happens automatically it is because I configured the system to behave that way.
Linux is so great, because there is a distribution for nearly everyone out there (unless you are blind, then things are not that great apparently, but it seems to get better).
I switched from pop os to Fedora a while back. I did like pop, but it gave me problems regularly and I think it just needs to cook for a few more years probably. Fedora fixed every issue I was having 👍
Seeing all the arch praise here is definitely giving me distro fomo though. Lol
With Guix you have reproducibility, freedom, good docs and peace of mind, also when configuring things more deeply. You also have a powerful programming language (Scheme / Lisp) with which to define your system config as well as your dotfiles. This is my insight after years of GNU/Linux usage. I run Guix on laptops, desktops and servers, and I never have configuration drift, as well as the benefit that I have a self documenting system.
By default it is, but there are many non-free channels you can use to add the OG Linux kernel to your Guix install as well as nonfree drivers. A famous one is nonguix, which i also use in my config. They also make custom ISOs with the Linux kernel, which helps some hardware indeed. So the libre only policy is a non issue if you read into it a little, but unfortunately most people stay at surface level
Arch. I tried other distros and always came back to Arch. Other distros are very bloated and honestly I can't be bothered with removing them manually. I also love the AUR and the wiki.
Another interesting distro was NixOS, but that is a bit of a pain in the ass to learn.
For newbies, Fedora KDE Plasma edition or Mint Cinnamon is my recommendation. Kinoite is Fedora KDE Plasma edition but immutable for the ones that keep breaking the system because they keep following some absurd guide online for whatever.
With x11 gnome it can run the Rustdesk client and pass all the keys properly to the Windows host. And it doesn't boot to a black screen like many other distros on my Asus laptop.
Was on Fedora with similar results but it started taking ages to boot looking for a non existent tpm chip.
Mine is the best for me because I like it the best. It does what I need with a minimum of configuration or customization. My needs and preferences are probably different from yours though, so Linux Mint Debian Edition with Cinnamon desktop environment might not be the best for you.
I use fedora silverblue for a couple reasons. After jumping from elementary to Ubuntu to Manjaro to Artix I got tired of dealing with distro specific modifications and weird issues. With the Ubuntu based distro I never enjoyed how out of date some packages were. I’d hear about a cool new update for a program I use and realize it would be a while till that would be in my repos.
I really liked artix and Arch’s rolling release nature and I would probably enjoy arch if I still used my computer daily like I used to but now I can be away from it for a couple months at a time and I need updates to be stable.
I’ve found Fedora (silverblue in particular) to be a perfect middle ground between rolling release and having a more regular update schedule. I use silverblue because I never wanted to have to worry about an update breaking my install ever again.
I will admit that because silverblue uses flatpaks almost exclusively, my appreciation for software being up to date could be achieved on almost any other distro, but the vanilla style of fedora is what keeps me now. I’m a big fan of vanilla gnome and not too many distros ship it like that.
Honestly, having tried both atomic and regular Fedora, I ended up with regular, as it allows you to do all the same things without limiting you to them.
Install flatpak? Sure. Use Distrobox? Of course. But if you have to use native package, you can simply install it without jumping through the hoops with rpm-ostree (which doesn't even always work properly).
Fedora itself is great, though - a healthy release cycle, high stability, and mature base.
ZorinOS is the best for me, because it works out of the box, looks a lot like Windows which i'm used to, is relatively configurable and is free (the paid version is just cosmetics and prebundled additional software). I consider looking into Arch though, thanks to your post and the comments there ;)
Gentoo works best for me because I'm a control freak. It lets me tune my system in any way I want, and I don't mind leaving my computer on while I'm asleep so that it can compile its way through libreoffice, webkit, and a couple of browsers. Plus, based on complaints I hear from people using other distros, Portage beats other package managers in every way except speed.
This doesn't mean that it's best for everyone, mind you, just that it's best for me.
I use Fedora. I like that it's very up to date and that it doesn't change the GNOME defaults. It also has a big community and many resources to look into if anything goes wrong.
Any RPM-based system has exemplary validation and, as long as we don't throw it out with flatsnappimages, it presents a very clean and maintainable install.
Extra points for PCLinuxOS which has avoided lennart's cancer.
No points for SuSE as they continue to exist as the over engineered bastard child of slackware and RPM, like slackware met 73deJeff on a trip and let the tequila do the talking. Mamma mia!
It's my plan. Not in the mood to distro-hop on my laptop right now, and I got to get through my Epic Games backlog (and also the Steam demos I can't be bothered downloading again) before I swap over my Windows 10 desktop.
Arch. I think when people say "bloat" they don't mean it in the traditional sense of the word. Most people are installing plasma or gnome and pulling all the "bloat" that comes with them. To me at least it's more that no one is deciding what they think you're likely to need/do, and overall that makes the system feel much more "predictable". Less likely to work against what I'm trying to do.
Ignore all the comments about Arch being hard to install or "not for beginners". That view is outdated. When I first installed Arch when you had to follow the wiki and install via the chroot method. Now it's dead simple to install with the script and running it isn't any more difficult than any other distro.
Since I'm old and need to deal with administrating a bunch of machines for work, I settled on the most dull and unsurprising distros of all: debian. Sure, when I was younger and eager to learn and with much time on my hands, I used gentoo (basically what is now arch) and all the others too.
Tumbleweed is the only bleeding-edge rolling release distribution that just works and never fails and is super easy to install and manage without any expertise. And it is massively underrated and forgotten for no good reason.
All Tumbleweed packages go through extensive and to this day unrivaled automatic system testing that ensures no package is ever gonna bork itself or your system.
If you're still worried about stability, there is Slowroll - currently testing, but in my experience very stable distribution. It makes rolling release updates...a bit slower, so that they're only pushed after Tumbleweed users absolutely ensure everything is great and stable (not that it's ever otherwise). It does the same job as Manjaro, but this time around it actually works without a hitch.
Both deliver great experience and will suit novice users.
Why? - I guess I'm too lazy for distro hopping now 🙁
Besides, this was the 1st Linux distro I tried back in 2005. After the usual ditro hopping phase was over, I settled on it; somehow (irrespective of snap and other controversies) I feel at home.
I agree. I tried Fedora first, then Pop!OS, and then settled on Kubuntu.
Kubuntu has been the most stable so far, no big issues. I chose it for that and its Wayland support. Snaps can be disabled or even have auto update turned off which is what I did and I had no real issues with Ubuntu past that so overall a good distro.
Widely supported, plenty of tutorials, has my favorite DE as a spin, it just does what I need it to.
Everybody think they are a special snowflake who needs bleeding edge, or a specific package manager or DE or whatever. Truth is 99.99% do not. They just like to believe they do, claim they do, try it, inflict self pain for longer than they need, convince themselves that truly they are, because of the pain, special.
As someone who ran Debian Stable for a while, this is not a distro for "99.99%".
First, Debian, while very stable in its core, commonly has same random issues within DE's and even programs that may likely just sit there until the next release comes along.
Second, a release cycle of 2 years is actually a giant and incredibly noticeable lag. You may love your system when it just releases, but over time, you will realize your system is old, like, very damn old. It will look old, it will act old, and the only thing you can do is install flatpaks for your preferred programs so that they'd be up to date.
This isn't just programs. It is your desktop environment. It is Wine (gamers, you're gonna cry a lot unless you work it around with flatpaks like Bottles, which will feel like insane workaround you wouldn't have to have with a better fitting distro).
It is the damn kernel, so you may not even be able to install Debian on newest hardware without unsupported and potentially unstable backporting tricks.
Don't get me wrong, Debian is absolutely great in what it does, and that is providing a rock solid environment where nothing changes. But recommending it for everyone? Nope.
I feel like a lot of your points were true at one point, but are becoming lest relevant.
For one, at least with XFCE, I found myself not really running into DE bugs.
Also, I don't think two years is as obnoxious anymore. During the era of the GTK 4 transition a couple, it drove me nuts, but now that a lot of APIs like that have stabilized, I really don't notice much of a difference between Debian Testing and Stable. I installed and daily drove Bookworm late in its lifecycle on my laptop, and in terms of DE and applications, I haven't noticed anything. I get the feeling Debian's gotten better at maintenance in the past few years - I especially see this with Firefox ESR. There was a time where the version was several months behind the latest major release of ESR, but usually it now only takes a month or two for a new ESR Firefox to come to Debian Stable, well within the support window of the older release.
Also, I don't think Flatpaks are a huge dealbreaker anyway - no matter what distro you're using, you're probably going to end up with some of them at some point because there's some application that is the best at what it does and is only distributed as a Flatpak.
Frankly, I probably am a terrible reference for gaming, as I'm a very casual gamer, but I've found Steam usually eliminates most of these issues, even on Debian.
Also, the official backports repository has gotten really easy. My laptop had an unsupported Wi-Fi chipset (it was brand new), so I just installed over ethernet, added the repo, and the install went smoothly. There were a few bugs, but none of these were specific to Debian. Stability has been great as ever.
In conclusion, I think right around Bookworm, Debian went from being the stable savant to just being an all-around good distro. I'll elaborate more on why I actually like Debian in a comment directly replying to the main post.
I might disagree with 99.999% like you - maybe I'd put it in the 50-75% range.
As a KDE fan, I had some bugs on some devices (like on one of the laptops, wallpapers did not install correctly and the setting to always show battery charge didn't work) even on Debian 12.
XFCE is well-known for stability, but seems to be increasingly irrelevant for the average/newbie user because the interface looks outdated and configuring is relatively complicated.
Interesting you mentioned Firefox ESR - iirc, even at release the version shipped with Debian 12 was considered very old, prompting many to install Firefox as a flatpak. Two years later, it's two years older.
Flatpaks are good and suitable options for many tasks - no argument here! But some things are just better installed natively, and there Debian just...shows.
Steam is a godsend, but there are many non-Steam games and, importantly, programs out there, and launching them through Steam often feels like yet another bloated and slow workaround; besides, you cannot choose Wine over Proton, and sometimes (granted: rarely) you may want to use Wine specifically.
To conclude - it's alright to choose Debian anyway, it is good! But I just feel like newbies and casual users could save a lot of trouble and frustration simply going with something that doesn't require all that - say, Fedora (non-atomic), or OpenSUSE, and then go from there to whatever they like. There are plenty of distributions that are stable, reliable, but without the tradeoffs Debian sets.
If you feel like stability is your absolutely biggest priority ever, and you have experience managing Linux systems - by all means, go Debian. But by that point you'll already know what you want.
Debian Stable actually updates Firefox ESR through the typically on by default security channel.
The current ESR version in there is 128, which is about a year old, which replaced the 115 that came with Debian 12 by default.
The newest ESR, 140 just came out 2 weeks ago. 128 still has 2 months of security updates, and 140 has already been packaged for sid. I have no doubts 140 will come before those 2 months are up.
even programs that may likely just sit there until the next release comes along. ... the only thing you can do is install flatpaks for your preferred programs so that they’d be up to date. ... Wine (gamers, you’re gonna cry a lot unless you work it around with flatpaks
I already posted on this a while ago but that's is a recurring misconception. No distribution, literally 0, provides all software to the latest version or to the version one expects. Consequently IMHO it is perfectly acceptable to go beyond what the official package manager of the distribution offers. It can be flatpaks, am, build from source, etc but the point precisely is that the distribution is about a shared practical common ground to build on top of. A distribution is how to efficiently get to a good place. I also run Debian stable on my desktop and for gaming, I use Steam. It allows me to get Wine, yes, but also Proton and even ProtonFix so that I basically point and click to run games. I do NOT tinker to play Elden Ring, Baldur's Gate 3, Clair Obscur, etc and my hardware is well supported.
So... sure if you consider a distribution as something you must accept as-is and NOT rely on any of the available tools to get the latest software you actually need, can be games but can be tools e.g. Blender, Cura, etc, then you WILL have a tough time but that's the case for all distributions anyway.
TL;DR: a distribution is the base layer to build on. Its package manager, on Debian and elsewhere, is not the mandatory and sole way to get the software you need.
Debian. Truly the universal operating system. Runs on all of my laptops, desktops, servers, and NAS with no fuss and no need to keep track of distro-specific differences. If something has a Linux version, it probably works on Debian.
Granted, I am a bit biased. All of my hardware is at least 5 years old. Also came from Windows, where I kept only the OS and browser up to date, couldn't be bothered with shiny new features. A package manager is already a huge luxury.
Because I don't have a fickle heart, and My distro is the best, right now, for me. There's nothing more to it. I do like Mint - but a few apps are out of date, and that's annoying. But it's stable, looks great, and works like a charm.
NixOS. - I have access to more packages than with any other package manager. - everything to get my setup in the exact state I want is in my config, which is 90% useable on any other distro thanks to home manager - My config is all in one place and easy to share - If I ever break something, I can always roll back - I don't need Docker
slackware the og linux distro. super stable, sane package management etc. i've wanted to try void/arch/gentoo/crux for a pretty long time but still haven't because this just works perfectly
IDGAF if it's the best (mint), it was easy to install, easy to transition to from Windows, and in 6 months hasn't given me any trouble. I just wanna use my computer.
Yeah I was gonna say, I dunno if my distro is the best (Arch BTW) but it's the best for me. Doesn't give me any nonsense and lets me tinker as much as I want. Other people just want their OS to get out of their way, which of course is equally valid. Whatever works for you!
NixOS makes me feel so safe making low-level changes to Linux and making sure that my work laptop, gaming desktop, and personal laptop all have the exact same shit on them and I'm gonna use them the exact same way.
I wish that nixlang was decoupled from the concept of a build system bc it's such a great DAG config DSL and I can think of so many cooler uses for it but I just don't have time to focus on it.
Hopefully none, why do you like Gnome? I thought it was okay, but I really love KDE more. I don't hate Gnome. It seems really good for anyone who uses a touchpad or touchscreen.
I can't speak for anyone else but I can tell you what I personally love about Gnome.
I like that it's Spartan. I like that it looks good without me having to customize a thousand different settings.
I like that It has client side decorations, so every window doesn't have to have an obscene, chunky, mostly useless title bar.
I don't miss every single application having 100 different options packed into a menu bar. Once you get used to it, you realize that it was mostly getting in the way the whole time.
It's just a really streamlined workflow for 98% of what you do. The problem is that 2% where it's too spartan and God do you wish you had some options.
But I also think KDE is a great desktop environment. If I were more of a gamer I'd be using KDE. I think XFCE is an excellent desktop environment for aging hardware and Windows converts. It is very much a matter of taste, Use cases, and your preferred workflow.
I've discovered that I don't much care which distro I'm using, it's the DE that matters most. I have Fedora GNOME, Debian GNOME, and openSUSE GNOME running on different machines. I can't really tell much difference until I enter the command line or package manager, and even then, it's the front end of the command that changes while the backend stays mostly the same. Flatpak has made the difference between distros even fewer.
While I still care somewhat of distro differences for functional reasons, I completely agree that DE's are the most important part in terms of user experience.
Both my machines use KDE, and while they run two different distros, they look and feel pretty much the same since I use a very similar layout on both of them. This, along with file sync through my NAS and similar apps, makes switching from one computer to the other a breeze (pun not intended), despite some differences under the hood.
I've been using Ubuntu for years and I like KDE, so I'm using Neon. Ubuntu is familiar, easy to fix, easy to find out how to fix, and neon doesn't come with snaps.
EndeavorOS. It runs smooth, i dont get errors, all my games work, the taskbar and notifications work like I would expect them too. Switching from Windows 2 months ago, I cycled through a few distros but they all were giving something up until i found EoS.
I wanted the awesomeness of pacman and like the way Gardua comes pre-configured as well as packages it installs from the get go. The only thing I hate about it is the "gamer" universal KDE theme it comes with.
Man, I wanted to try Garuda a couple of weeks ago and the thing would never even boot into the live environment. Went ahead and installed Cachy OS and it's been great.
Mint Cinnamon. All my hardware works, and it can do the few things I require my work PC to do. It even remembers things like my default audio device - something Ubuntu refused to do for years.
I like the way Pop!_OS looks. Not gonna pretend it's the best. But as far as default UIs, it clicked with the most. Default gnome seemed too spartan and all of the Windows-like DEs remind me too much of Windows. Which I don't like. If that makes sense.
Most packages have sane defaults, and it's so stable. It's true that it sometimes means older software versions, but there's also something to be said for behavior staying the same for two years at a time.
If hardware support is an issue, using the backports repo is really easy - I've been using it on my laptop for almost a year with no problems that don't exist on other distros. If you really need the shiniest new application, Flatpak isn't that bad.
It also feels in a nice position - not so corporate as to not give a darn about its community, but with enough funding and backing the important stuff gets maintained.
I just moved to Debian trixie (soon to be stable) because I needed an upgrade after ~15 years of Gentoo.
I was a proud Gentoo user. I learned a lot about systemd and kernel configuration. Many advances in portage made it possible to find the time to maintain my Gentoo setup. On my laptop I gave up Gentoo even earlier, because updating my system was just too time consuming. I actually learned less and less about the software I was using, because I was trapped in dependency conflict management. The new binary repos did save some compile time, but the actual time sinks are decision for your systems, use flags and the forementioned dependencies.
So, I installed Debian on my main workstation (two days ago). I am already using Debian on on my Raspberry Pis. I did choose a more challenging way using debootstrap, because I want to use systemd-boot, encrypted btrfs and have working hibernation. I am still busy with configuring everything.
One could argue, that I could've used the time on Gentoo to solve my current python_targets_python3_13 issues and do a proper world update. No, this is a future investment. I want the time to configure new stuff, not wait for dependency resolution or waste time solving blocking packages.
The main reason to switch from Gentoo to Debian is being able to install security updates fast without blocking packages in the same slot.
Obligatory "There is not a single distro that's the absolute best for each and every one." disclaimer aside, my personal favorite is definitely secureblue for being a hardened-by-default distro that adheres to the ~~'immutable'~~ reprovisionable, anti-hysteresis paradigm while enjoying a healthy stream of improvements pushed out by an active group of contributors.
I love Pop OS because it got me back into Linux after ditching it for windows for the last 10 years, partly to do .net development and partly because I hated the state of Ubuntu/Unity.
As soon as cosmic is stable and easy to install on Nix I'll switch to it.
I used to use Determinate Nix on Pop!_OS before I switched to NixOS for good. You can still get a lot out of Nix on a traditional distro, granted you have to deal with few things manually (nixGL being one of them). But it still works, especially for development; it's just unparalleled.
Arch btw, only been using it for a couple of weeks, only installed it because of the meme. Got my hands on a few years old thinkpad for practically free, so why not. It's actually quite good so far, been struggling a bit with external monitors, but I don't miss windows
Arch, everything it does provide works extremely well, I can configure everything how I want it without having to fight a distro maintainer trying to be clever, I get new features and bugfixes whenever they go in without having to worry about a distro maintainer deciding whether it’s relevant or whether I should just live with crashes and security issues for another two years because they figured it wasn’t important or critical enough.
OpenSUSE tumbleweed: Up-to-date, unbreakable due to Btrfs+snapper, very secure defaults (firewall), based in Germany. It works perfectly on my Thinkpad, so I couldn't ask for better.
Linux Mint because it's extremely simple and has caused me no issues for over a year. It's the best distribution to get someone who is afraid to switch from Windows or MacOS to understand that using Linux can be just as easy.
I use Kubuntu. It is defintly not the best Distro. I am just used to it and too lazy to get used to another distro. My days as a distro jumper lie 15 years back...
Tbh though, I might switch to Debian stable whenever Trixie comes out.
It isn't. I'm on PopOS 24.04 Alpha 7 (soon to be Beta 1), because of COSMIC (and because I was having some bugs with Fedora a few months back).
I recently wanted to tinker with a piece of software that wasn't packaged, and I couldn't compile it because of outdated libraries. I could return to Fedora specifically to tinker with it but as an ex-distrohopper, I know it isn't worth the effort.
Even though Fedora or some version of it will likely be my forever distro, I will stick to PopOS for now because I can't be bothered to distrohop and back up months' worth of files, including game saves and a ton of stuff in my Downloads directory.
I was a Nix user (more specifically, nix-darwin user) but after being away from the computer for like one year (to study for the university entrance exam), I completely forgot how to use it and resulted in erasing the computer. Nix/NixOS is fun, but it was too complicated for me.
I use Nobara with KDE for my gaming computer, Mint with Cinnamon for pretty much everything else.
Mint is the closest to a "Just Works" experience for me. Cinnamon is rock stable, especially on Mint Debian Edition. I don't remember the last time Cinnamon crashed or had any major bugs for me.
I use Debian for most of my servers, stable and simple. Arch on a junker Thinkpad to test and mess around with new programs and window managers.
Tumbleweed. Rolling release with automated testing (openQA), snapper properly setup out of the box.
Honestly the entire openSUSE ecosystem. Tumbleweed on my main PC that often has some of the latest hardware, Slowroll on my (Framework) laptop because it's rolling but slower (monthly feature updates, only fixes in-between), and Leap for servers where stability (as in version/compatibility stability, not "it doesn't crash" stability) is appreciated.
openSUSE also comes in atomic flavors for those interested. And it's European should you care.
With all that being said, I don't really care much about what distro I'm using. What I do with it could be replicated with pretty much any distro. For me it's mostly just a means to an end.
Gentoo because it is as stable as Debian, less bloated than Arch, has more packages than Ubuntu, is rolling release, can mix and match stable, testing and unstable on a whim.
Even its one downside, compile times, is now gone if you just choose to use binary packages.
And less stable than Arch, and more bloated than Ubuntu... If that is something you want for whatever reason! It is the most versatile distro in existance because it's literally anything you want it to be - clean and nice, or total chaos. What is there not to love?
Since I mostly use computers for entertainment these days I keep coming back to Bazzite. It’s fast, stable, kept up to date, reliable, and “just works”. I’ve created custom rpm-ostree layers to faff around, but it’s not actually necessary for anything I need.
I used to keep a second Kubuntu Minimal partition around but I realized I just don’t need it. If I wasn’t so happy with Bazzite, I would probably go with openSUSE or Endeavor.
Yes, but also I had to run through proton off steam and the modding process is less streamlined. I unironically have had a less complicated time running windows and dealing with its "special" features than running Linux and having a custom setup for every other game.
I've been using (X)Ubuntu for ages. I just wanted something that "just works". Tired of too much tinkering and there's plenty of (non commercial) support. Mixing it with i3 as my window manager.
For me it's openSUSE Tumbleweed on my Desktops/Laptops and openSuse Leap on my Servers. The killing Feature for me was the propper BTRFS integration with Snapper for seamless rollbacks in case I borked the system in some way.
One "downside" for me is the mix of Gnome Settings and Yast on my Desktop. But I like yast on my servers for managing everything (enabling ports in firewall, network config, enable autoamtic isntall of security updates, etc.). Also openSuse is not that common, so sometimes it is hard to find a solution if you have a distribution specific question.
Personally never looked to closely into openSuse Build Services (OBS). But I know some people who really like it.
I am using Bluefin, based on Fedora Silverblue. I realized that I was already exclusively using flatpaks for everything except one random app, so I thought why not go all-in?
Haven't had to worry about updates or system breakages since, and it's been great so far.
I used to use Debian Stable, but since doing SysAdmin work I've just become used to the way Fedora / RHEL does things.
I think linux distros are a coinflip on if they like your hardware or not, sometimes it feels like they just don't like you individually as a person.
When I use fedora for example, everything that can go wrong does go wrong. It's in theory not any more complicated than debian, but I've never had good luck keeping a fedora system healthy.
With Debian, usually the best troubleshooting tip I can give people is try installing testing instead of stable. Sometimes the kernel in stable is just too damn old for the hardware you want to install on.
Lots of projects claim to be the “smallest” or “simplest” Kubernetes, but they never provide data to back it up. Let’s look at how these distributions compare to Talos Linux.
Keep in mind that this post is by a company that offers one of the options they compare. So there is an obvious conflict of interest, and I wouldn't trust the conclusions that were reached
And obviously their option is the "best". From the conclusion:
Talos Linux is unique. It’s the only option that includes OS management in a purpose-built distribution for running Kubernetes. There’s no compromise for scaling up or down. In terms of small-scale numbers, it “wins” in several of the examined categories, including memory usage, disk r/w, and installation size. But all of these metrics are side effects of Talos Linux’s defining characteristic: It’s simple.
I find this comparison unfair becuase k3s is a much more batteries included distro than the others, coming with an ingress controller (traefik) and a few other services not in talos or k0s.
But I do think Talos will end up the lighest overall because Talos is not just a k8s distro, but also a extremely stripped down linux distro. They don’t use systemd to start k8s, they have their own tiny init system.
It should be noted that Sidero Labs is the creator of Talos Linux, which another commenter pointed out.
I've been looking at K3s deployed on FCOS, but I have no clue how I'm supposed to use Terraform to deploy FCOS.
My understanding is that FCOS is supposed to be ephemeral and re-deployed every so often, which would imply the use of a hypervisor like Proxmox on the host, but Proxmox does not play well with Terraform.
I also considered OpenStack, but it's way over my head. I have a very simple single-node Kubernetes setup to deploy using GitOps, and nothing seems to fit the bill.
My understanding of Keybase is that it was some kind identity aggregator. You were able to link identities not just by keys, but also by external services, like Twitter (at a time), email and other things.
Is the data and public keys being replicated in the communication between instances? it's not made clear how the federation actually works, because "enabling users on different servers to share data with end-to-end encryption" (from foks.pub/) is something all services with TLS / HTTPS support already do...
Also.. one big plus for the OpenPGP HKP protocol is that technically you can self-host your own key in a static HTTPS server with predefined responses and be able to have it interact with other servers and clients without issue. I'm expecting the more complex nature of FOKS might make self-hosting in this way difficult. I'd rather minimize the dynamic services I expose to the outside publicly if I'm self hosting.
journalctl is the one part of systemd I really do not like. For whatever reason, it's insanely slow, taking multiple seconds before it gets around to display anything. It also has all the wrong defaults, displaying error messages from a year ago first, while scrolling to the bottom again also takes forever and consumes 100% CPU while doing so.
There are flags to filter and display only the relevant parts, but not only are none of them intuitive, doing a mistake there just gives you "-- No entries --", not an error. So you can never quite tell if you typed it wrong or if were are no messages.
Maybe it all makes more sense when studying the man page in depths and learned all the quirks, but /var/log/ kind of just worked and was fast, without any extra learning.
I totally agree. I used to hate systemd for breaking the traditional Unix philosophy, but the reality is that a tight init and service-tracking integration tool really was required. I work with and appreciate systemd every day now. It certainly didn't make things simplier and easier to debug, but it goes a long way towards making a Linux system predictable and consistent.
Poettering can go fuck himself though - and for PulseAudio too. I suspect half of the hate systemd attracted over the years was really because of this idiot.
Is it really breaking it? As far as I'm aware, it's more like gnu. It has components and you can select what you use (here meaning distros and packagers).
People mistake this for a monolith because it's all named systemd-thing. Integration, like you said, was and is needed. But what if all those separate utilities and services are actually disconnected and speak some protocol different to pipe? Does it make it less unixy?
And poettering is an absolute good guy here. Pulseaudio wasn't perfect, but did it improve things compared to what was there before? Sure it did. Even now, pulesaudio protocol is used within pipewire and it works just fine.
Perfect is the enemy of good. And while all these tools might not be perfect, they are the best in the Linux world.
Agreed. But he's also an abrasive know-it-all. A modicum of social skills and respect goes a long way towards making others accept your pet projects.
pulesaudio protocol is used within pipewire and it works just fine.
I wasn't talking about the protocol, I was talking about the implementation: PulseAudio is a crashy, unstable POS. I can't count the number of hours this turd made me waste, until PipeWire came along.
I always assumed that Poettering is an arse to people because of the hate he got for systemd. I imagine it's hard to see the best in people when there's a crowd of haters everywhere you go. Though I have no idea what he was like beforehand.
Everybody who is hated and popular gets death threats. Hell, even the nicest actors get death threats.
They are easy to write and send, and there's 0.01% of the population that is mentally unstable enough to actually do so. You and I don't get death threats because we aren't popular enough.
Nah bugger that. Famous actors are known by a vast majority of people. It is not normal for open source programmers to receive abuse to the level of death threats. That only happens when you get the attention of kiwi farms types.
I feel that generally, when the issue is that the person is an arse, then the complaints are often not about the software. You might see people campaigning to boicot the software out of spite, but they won't give you a technical reason, other than them not wanting the creator to get any credit for it.
When the complaints are about discrepancies in the way the software is designed (like it was with systemd), there's no reason to expect the person to be an arse. Though him not being an arse does not make the criticism about his software invalid... in the same way as him being an arse would not have made the software technically worthless. Don't fall for the ad-hominem.
Pulseaudio was introduced in 2004. How come it took almost 20y for it to be replaced if it was that bad?
Implementation, being what it is, improved the situation compared to alsa and other things before it. Again, while not perfect it made things better for everyone.
It's funny that this is a thing attributed to poettering as bad since things before were way worse... why not throw Sticks and stones at those people?
I really don't get it.
And all of these things are optional. The fact that distro people and companies select them is because they solve real world problems.
things before were way worse… why not throw Sticks and stones at those people?
My earliest memories of Linux audio were in Slackware in the mid 90s, reading and re-reading the HOWTO that started off with a bunch of attitude about how real computer users don't need audio, but we can do it anyway "so, if you must hear Biff bark..." and then a bunch of very unhelpful things to try following that never ever worked on any system I ever tried to use them on. Diverse systems that, of course, all played audio through Windows flawlessly.
Agreed. But he’s also an abrasive know-it-all. A modicum of social skills and respect goes a long way towards making others accept your pet projects.
This isn't what I get when reading bug reports he interacts in. Yeah, sometimes he asks if something can't be done another way – but he seems also very open to new ideas. I rather think that this opinion of him is very selective, there are cases where he comes off as smug, but I never got the impression this is the majority of cases.
I wasn’t talking about the protocol, I was talking about the implementation: PulseAudio is a crashy, unstable POS. I can’t count the number of hours this turd made me waste, until PipeWire came along.
PipeWire for audio couldn't exist nowadays without PulseAudio though, in fact it was originally created as "PulseAudio for Video"; Pulse exposed a lot of bugs in the lower levels of the Linux audio stack. And I do agree that PipeWire is better than PulseAudio. But it's important to see it in the context of the time it was created in, and Linux audio back then was certainly different. OSS was actually something a significant amount of people used…
From what i understand the problem is that while systemd is technically split up into different components, you can't really use it with the stuff you don't want ripped out.
You obviously weren't actually around when he was granted mini-king status and acted like a jackass to literally anyone who objected to pulse or systemd. As a result, redhat, canonical, and Debian had to eat criticism over pushing these before they were ready... because of "superstar" poettering.
You are correct. GNU has the bad habit of only working with itself as well. Systemd only works with Glibc so it fits in well.
The reality is that GNU is just a subset of the Red Hat Linux platform these days. Systemd is another part. GNOME is the other big chunk. They are all designed to work with each other and do not care if they work with anything else.
I don't know why they are downvoting you, it's true. I'm dealing with this kind of problem currently.. sometimes the boot lasts forever to the point that I have to use AltGr+SysRq commands to force kill everything.. other times it simply boots as normal. It's not consistent at all.
At least before with the old init it was relatively simple to dig into the scripts and make changes to them.. I feel now with systemd it's a lot more opaque and harder to deal with. I wouldn't even know how to approach the problem, systemd-analyze blame does not help, since the times I actually get to boot look normal. But I do believe it must have to do with the mountpoints because often they are what takes the longest. Any advice on what should I do would be welcome.
Also, I have a separate Bazzite install in my living room TV, and while that one does not get locked, sometimes NetworkManager simply is not running after boot... I got fed up to the point that I wrote a workaround by creating a rc.local script to have it run, so I can have it available reliably when the system starts (that fixed it.. though some cifs mountpoints often do not get mounted.. so I'm considering adding the mount command to the same rc.local script too....).
You can play around with the mount option nofail, if that's set, systemd will not wait for the mount point to be ready and continue booting normally. Can be useful with HDDs that take a while to spin up and aren't needed for the boot process (e.g. backup drives, etc.).
Another thing to look out for: SDCards or USB flash drives that might randomly fail to "spin up" and hang, unplugging those helps.
Linux audio has been a cluster^$%< of epic proportions since the mid 1990s. At least you can make single application systems work well these days, but Windows has really whipped the llamas ass on the audio front for 30+ years now, in terms of "it just works" user experience - without being hyper-draconian on the application ecosystem.
It definitely depends on what you are trying to get out of it.
I'll grant: low lag audio performance in Windows is... dismal. Which is why everyone had conference call lag adjustment issues in 2020, "go ahead", "no you go ahead", "ok" - both start talking simultaneously again... It seems better these days, I'm sure that's at least in part due to training of the conference participants, but maybe they have been working on getting the lag down without too many dropout / stutters.
We have a bespoke low lag audio system that was specifically implemented in Linux even though we put the GUI in Windows because of those lag / stutter issues, years back the audio was done on a dedicated DSP chip, but a Core i7 is more than up to the task on Linux these days.
The Linux audio pains I refer to were: A) audio just doesn't work at all, and B) audio works, until you start to try to use two audio applications simultaneously - then they start to mess each other up. Both of those were better in Windows long before Linux came up to speed. But a lot of how Windows audio gets acceptable performance is big laggy buffers.
I totally agree with the functionality of systemd. We need that. But the implementation… Why the fuck do we need to cram everything into pid 1? At least delegate the parsing into another process, god damn. And could we all just agree that ’systemd-{networkd,resolved,homed}’ don’t really have a reason to exist, and definitely not that coupled to a fucking init system. Systemd-timers are wonderful, but why are we running cron-but-better in pid 1?
We have an init-system where the developers are afraid of using things like processes and separation of privileges. I’m just tired of patching fleets of servers in panic every time Pöttering’s bad design decisions hit the fan with their CVEs and consequences.
The coupling in PID 1 is a bit much. I actually quite like systemd-networkd for some use cases, though. It lets me declaratively manage the network interfaces on my headless servers in a way that's very similar to how I'm managing the services. Sure, it's coupled to systemd, but it's mostly one-way coupling; if I want to use NetworkManager (which I do on my laptop), I can switch over, and nothing in the init system breaks.
I'd say the main bad part of systemd is how it's used and now expected everywhere.
If you search for some Linux guides or install something complicated or whatnot, they always expect you to have systemd. Otherwise, you're on your own figuring how things work on your system.
This shouldn't really happen. Otherwise, yes, it's great, it integrates neatly, and is least pain to use.
There is no authority delegating responsibilities of writing tutorials for Linux. It is the responsibility of nobody and everybody. If you can't find one for your problem, write it yourself when you have figured it out.
If you think so and that this is important, maybe you could be the one that makes it happen. Start a project and gather like-minded people. That is how Linux, FOSS and community driven efforts operate. It's useless to complain that nobody else makes the effort if you have the capabilities but can't be arsed making an attempt yourself.
I have struggled with Fedora for couple of years (graphics drivers after major updates), then Ubuntu got me down a couple of times (snaps and other malice).
Zero issues with Gentoo after the initial setup. You build it, update it, and IT WORKS. Also you can easily remove parts of software you're building with USE flags. -telemetry, -x11, and you never care about it anymore.
I must assume Gentoo does require manual intervention here and there, and updates must take eternity for packages that are not precompiled, ain't it so?
I have an 8 core CPU, but I have to admit I don't use any DE.
Updates can take several hours if I don't upgrade for a while, but PC is usable during them (you can set number of build threads).
Manual intervention is what I've said needed way more in Fedora, which left me without any video after updates, or Ubuntu which broke integrations or replaced my software.
Gentoo just... is.
There are sometimes updates that would require intervention if you do something special, nothing too difficult though, and you get a link to Wiki with working solutions.
I like systemd overall. The ease of use, uniform interface and nice documentation is awesome.
Though each time I try to run it on outdated hardware (say, my Thinkpad X100e, which is, well, a life choice xD) — it makes whole system much slower. IMO, openrc is not as bad, and in some ways it gives some capabiilties of systemd these days.
I'm over here still using OpenRC. Mostly because I want to. Some servers I run have systemd on them. systemd is generally nice. OpenRC has finally gained the ability to run user services, which is also very nice.
I hate to admit I didn't want anything to do with systemd because it took me forever to get somewhat familiar with some other mainstream init systems.
Then, I didn't care for a while until I developed software that had to keep running using some sort of init system. The obvious choice was whatever the default I had (systemd) and I fell in love with the convenience of systemd (templates, timers, ..). I started shipping sample systemd with the things I provide & yes, you are on your own if you use something else.
I've been using systemd on most of my systems since it was released; I was an early jumper to upstart as well.
The thing I don't like about systemd is how pervasive in the OS it is. It violates the "do one thing, do it well" Unix philosophy, and when systemd went from an init system to starting to take everything over, I started liking it less.
My issues with systemd is that it isn't an unmitigated success, for me. journald is horrible: it's slow and doesn't seem to catch everything (the latter is extremely rare, but that it happens occasionally makes me nervous). There are several gotchas in running user services, such as getting in-session services working correctly (so that user services can access the user session kernel keyring).
Recently I've been using dinit on a system, and I'm pretty happy with it. I may switch all of my systems over to it; I'm running Arch everywhere, and while migrating Arch to Artix was scary the first time, in the end it went fairly smoothly.
Fundamentally, systemd is a monolithic OS system. It make Linux into more of a Windows or MacOS, where a bunch of different systems are consolidated under a single piece of software. While it violates the Unix philosophy, it has been successful because monolithic systems tend to be easier to use: users really only have to learn two command-line tools, vs a dozen. Is it categorically better, just because the user interface is easier for new Linux users?
Systemd is modular not monolithic. Distros choose which parts of system d to implement and it just happens to be most of it since its really good at what it does.
It is not modular. This is a lie Poettering keeps pushing to defend building a huge edifice of interdependent systems.
Look at the effort required to factor out logind. It can't just be used in it's own; it has a hard dependency on systemd and needs code changes to decouple.
I will repeat that journald is really bad at what it does, and further assert that you can not run systemd without journald, or vice versa. That you can not run systemd without getting timed job control. Even if you chose not to use it, it's in there. And you can not get time job control without the init part. In most unix systems, init and cron are utterly decoupled and can be individually swapped with other systems.
Systemd is not modular if you can't swap parts out for other software. Systemd's modularity is a bald-faced lie.
The one exceptions are homed and resolvd, which are relatively new and were addedlong after systemd came under fire for being monolithic. And, ironically, they're the components most distributions don't use by default.
Systemd boot, Systemd network and elogind I'm pretty sure can be decoupled. There's 69 modules so I'm not entirely sure about all of them just the ones ive encountered.
I know logind can't easily be, because I ran Artix for a while and they were using a decoupled version of it, and there was a big discussion about swapping it for something else because it was so hard to maintain.
You cannot even decouple SystemD from Glibc, never mind separating the various components from each other. It is a bunch of processes but it is designed as a monolith.
It's refreshing to read to someone that actually says "I was so wrong"
I was wrong also with systemd, I hated it mainly because I already knew init.d, where files are, where configs where etc. Some years later hate is gone, I'm not a power user, but I just now know how to handle my things with systemd and all is good.
I see most often that it's the people who live in init.d - interact with it multiple times a day - who are most vocal about systemd hate. I'm going to call "old dogs don't like new tricks" on that one.
I do get into that layer of system maintenance, but it's maybe 1-2% of my time, mostly a set-it and forget-it kind of relationship. There was a time when the old ways were easier due to more documentation and guides on the internet, which I lean on heavily because I interact with this stuff so rarely. Those days passed, for me, 8-10 years back.
You do realize that it's not a binary between systemd and SysV, right? There are modern replacements for SysV other than systemd, like dinit, OpenRC, s6 and they all strive to address the shortcomings of SysV
I decided to finally lean into using systemd more while i've been using NixOS, since the OS already relies heavily on it anyway. Created targets for my window managers, starting all my programs with services instead of autostart scripts, etc. And it worked fine for the most part, except for some reason, in qtile the systray widget refuses to load the nm-applet when it's started through systemd. Waybar does not have this problem. I can't help notice that systemd is not just a little slower, which isn't the biggest deal in the world, but it also tends to hang more often when shutting down, which is a bit annoying and reminds me of windows lol. Before NixOS i used Void, and while i never really cared too much about what init system i'm running, i can't help but really appreciate runit for being so simple and fast. I'm thinking of moving back to Void but using the Nix package manager on top. I recently found a solution to the nix driver problem when using it on other distros, so now i should be able to combine the best of both worlds.
I've never used any other init system since I'm relatively new to Linux (8 years of use). So, systemd is all I know. I don't mind it, but I have this one major issue with it. That "stop job for UID 1000......" Or whatever it says. It's hands down the most annoying thing I have ever experienced in Linux. Making me wait for 3 minutes sometimes is just insane. I know I can go in and make it wait for 5 seconds /etc/systemd/system.conf or whatever, but why? Also, another one usually pops up.
Other than that, I really like how I can make timers. I like how I can make scripts run on boot, logout or login. And I like how I can make an app a background service that can auto start if they ever crashed. Maybe all of this can be done with other init systems? I wouldn't know, but I like these in systemd
I use it because I'm frankly too dumb to use something else, but if that wasnt the case, i dont think id be speaking fondly of it.
I'm a ram usage fetishist, I absolutely disagree with the "unused ram is wasted ram" phrase that has caught on with people.
I see some of these distros running a graphical environment with only 90mb ram usage and i cream myself. All of them run something other than systemd, usually avoid GNU stuff, and...require you basically to be a developer to use them.
I already run a half broken, hacked together system due to my stubborness, I can't imagine how fucked I'd be if I tried one of these cool kid minimalist distros.
So you just like having ram doing nothing? Unused ram is wasted ram. Distros cache a lot in ram because they can. I mean why hav RAM is you just want to stare at it and say ohh look at all the free RAM.
Even a system that uses 90mb of ram on a cold boot will accumulate gigs of stuff in cache if you're using it. (assuming it has the memory for it) That isn't what people have a problem with though.
Maybe this is an incorrect use of language on my part, but I feel like I'm not the only person who means "memory actively being used by a process" when referring to memory usage. I understand the whole linux ate my ram thing. That just isn't what I or what I assume a lot of people mean when talking about this.
When I boot up my system, pull up my terminal, run htop, and see 800-1200mb being used just by processes (not in buffer, not in cache), that doesn't raise any flags or anything, but I also know that some people have gotten their systems so streamlined they use 10x less than that. That's all memory that could be used by other things. That could be the difference between a low memory system running a web browser or not. Could be the difference maker in a game someone wants to play on their system. There are endless possibilities.
Could be the difference maker in a game someone wants to play on their system.
One reality of the world is: the developers choose what hardware/OS configurations they target. If the makers of your game don't target your RAM efficient system, you're outta luck. Developers make their choices for their own reasons, but even with the ever-growing FOSS communities, the majority of developers work for a paycheck, that paycheck comes from profitable businesses and those businesses have very strong influence on what the developers work toward. The businesses only exist because they are profitable... FOSS may not be bound by those realities, but it lives in a world dominated by them.
If you're in a system where 256mb of RAM is the limit, sure - go for the RAM efficient OS options, they're out there.
Can you even buy less than 2GB of RAM in a desktop system anymore? Even the Raspberry Pi 5 starts at 2GB (and, yes, the older models have less, but I did say desktop system, implying: reasonable desktop performance.) Maybe if you feel the need to use a RasPi 3 as a desktop for something then you should dig around for one of your more efficient OS configurations, but I'll note... back when RasPi 3 was the new model, Raspbian came default without systemd, but offered a systemd option. The systemd option booted from power off to the desktop (such as it was) in about 1/3 the time.
Unused memory IS wasted memory and my Linux machines, AFAICR, always have buffered everything possible since twenty years ago, it's not a systemd thing. It also speeds up things, why the long face?
I hated it and still do because for a period of years every weird, difficult to find issue on a bunch of servers was caused by systemd. It may be fine now, but I switched to Devuan and have had incredible stability. Poettering's response to security issues was also terrible and honestly the dude seems like a real piece of shit.
Ok I see. Without any intention to sound offensive, 5 servers is not enough to really see the pro cons of either init system. People handling 50 times those numbers encounter issues where it starts to matter, and those people tend to claim that, while it ain't perfect, it is a lot better than any alternative
You see, I scaled down a little in recent years because that is not my primary job any more. But, I am working as an admin from 1998. so my word should have some weight, right?
All words from any it admin have weight, that is not what I meant.
Its just that init scripts and weird boot requirements are really crap to manage at scale and my job, like many others became a lot easier with systemd, that is why almost everyone uses it now. In my experience those that complain either never encountered these issues because they never scaled enough and like to use what they were used to, or prefer to write a script over a config file and make this a religious issue for some reason.
I think it strongly detracts from the post. I basically skipped right to the comments without clicking the link because I'm assuming it's AI slop, and I'm hoping the comments are interesting.
People would be less mad if you straight up used a stock image with a watermark so I don't understand why people go out of their way to use AI when they know people will comment on it and it will detract from the point of the article.
Also, using AI in the thumbnail makes people automatically assume you're using AI in the text as well. And if you're not doing that, why would you lessen the perceived value of your writing by making it seem like you are?
It just seems pointless and actively harms your actual goals because people will get hung up on the fact that you used AI and ignore your actual valid points. Especially when you're writing about open source projects when most people interested in open source are vehemently anti-AI, it really just shows you don't know your target audience.
While I mostly agree with you (and 100% on it distracting from the article), I think you’re not thinking about image rights.
If you’re a serious blogger with a good sized blog, a lawsuit or DMCA or otherwise is potentially a killer outcome of using an image you don’t 100% sure have the rights to. With AI, you can be 100% sure you can use the image however you want, without any repercussions. I’d imagine that’s huge in the considerations for a blogger.
I dont think this is a reasomable counterpoint because the target audience in question would also vastly prefer shit as simple as an mspaint illustration or a dithered irl image.
Also, it is quite feasible to find royalty free images, and I have no idea where you're getting the impression it is not. There are a host of images that provide licensing metadata. Google image search and co. can find these. It's simply a matter of verifying the license authenticity.
Any idea how well verified the images are on those sites? What's the chance that one with copyright gets uploaded and I get hit with a giant fine for using it?
Dunno. I feel like if you've used an image from a reputable source under the proviso that you're licensed for it, and it turns out you're not... you may be able to blame Unsplash etc. and just swap the image out.
Personally I think it's fallen out of fashion. For my blog I'd either use a meme or other dump picture for each post. When generated images first came out I used a few for blog posts, it was new and interesting and said "I'm interested in technology and like playing around with new things".
Nowadays I'm back on the meme pics. I feel now it's so much easier to generate images, it more says "I want to look professional but also spend no money and have no standards".
i’m downvoting ai slop every chance i get. i’m sure it’s just as futile as downvoting every post that used the acronym ‘FAFO’. i hated that one because i think the people who used it thought they sounded sooo cool.
if you’ll excuse me, i’ve got some clouds outside i need to go shake my fist at.
I don't appreciate the attitude and arrogance of the guy behind systemd because he actually believes what he produces can replace everything that already "just works". He wants to push out systemd-homed because "why not". He wants to replace grub. He wants to replace a myriad of things that just flat out don't need to get replaced. autofs, cron, you name it! That kind of thinking and one-size-fits-all mentality is backwards and does not benefit the community in any way. All it does is stuff everything into one bin and so long as influencers like this guy continue to restrict what works or doesn't work according to their own work, the community and its users will not be able to freely develop FOSS. Gnome is a good example of something that creates too much of a dependency on systemd and so when you're trying to use something like Gentoo, it becomes very difficult to get that done and hacks have to made in order to get it working. FOSS shouldn't work like that. He'll keep stripping away legit projects from major distros until IBM/Red Hat finally decide to seal the deal and lock everyone out for good. Sorry if I can't rejoice in the woah whiplash.
So, I don't like the guy either, but for a little devil's advocacy:
The stuff that already "just works" was developed during a very different era in terms of computing power, tasking of the computers which were running the systems, etc. Nobody (serious, and he is serious) develops something different because "why not?" they, at least from their perspective, feel that they are improving on the status quo, at least for the use cases they are considering.
one-size-fits-all mentality is
being decided by the distro maintainers, not the developers. Sure, developers promote their product, but if a distro thinks that multiple flavors are a better path, they distribute multiple flavors. It's not like the systemd developers are filling billion dollar war chests with profit because they're using strong-arm tactics to coerce distro maintainers to adopt their products.
stuff everything into one bin
When one bin serves the purpose, it's a lot easier to maintain, modernize, security harden, etc. than ten bins.
the community and its users will ~~not~~ always be able to freely develop FOSS.
Fork it and your loyal users will follow.
Gnome is a good example of something that creates too much of a dependency
Agreed, I was never happy with GNOME, and starting about 5 years back I have been migrating my systems, personal and professional, off of it. That's the nature of FOSS, no contracts to negotiate, make the choices that make sense for your use cases and execute them.
FOSS shouldn’t work like that.
FOSS, by its very nature, should be expected to work all the ways. If a particular way can't get enough developer traction, it stagnates but never really dies, not until the ecosystem it is dependent upon can no longer find hardware to run on and users willing to run it.
IBM/Red Hat finally decide to seal the deal and lock everyone out for good.
I am very glad that I walked away from CentOS about 8 years back, its proximity to Red Hat never made me happy. I have been trying to walk away from Canonical (toward Debian) for about 3 years now, but it still has some hooks that keep our professional team happier than Debian. If the unhappy ever outweighs the happy, we'll execute the move.
Sorry if I can’t rejoice
Never asked you to. End of devil's advocacy. I still don't like the guy, but I never really interact with him. I do interact with his products and the alternatives, and in my use cases the products speak for themselves. There's nothing about systemd that makes me dig around for systemd free alternatives - they are out there, but for my use cases I don't care. YMMV.
Gnome is a good example of something that creates too much of a dependency
Agreed, I was never happy with GNOME, and starting about 5 years back I have been migrating my systems, personal and professional, off of it. That’s the nature of FOSS, no contracts to negotiate, make the choices that make sense for your use cases and execute them.
Does Gnome have too much dependency on Gnome: yes or no?
Absolutely. If you don't mind using Gnome exactly as Gnome wants you to - this year - then it's usually a pretty refined desktop experience, but if I wanted to be told what to like, how to like it, and to shut up and be happy, I'd use a Mac.
I prefer XFCE for its modularity... don't want a launcher bar? Don't run the launcher; nothing else misses it when it's gone.
Mess around with Gnome too much and it becomes a nightmare mess of dependencies.
Well, it is not one bin. There is no monolithic systemd bin that does everything. There are a lot of separate bin files for all the different tasks. Well and if you don't want to use timers, then don't and just use cron instead. If you don't want to use journald, then just don't and use rsyslog or whatever you want. Don't need systemd-homed? Well, then don't use it. You want to configure your network with something else then systemd-networkd? Great, do it if you want.
The Poettering Army will not come and force you to enable all the options 😜
Ah but you see, you have to understand the FOSS community a little more than just "using a license that FSF and OSI endorsed".
In terms of inter-project politics, systemd is almost wholly owned by IBM. They can override any will they want, they can change anything they want, all while fucking the community over. In short, IBM, using systemd as a massive octopus growing it's tentacles all over mainstream Linux distros, is gaining considerable weight to pull in the Linux world.
They can essentially dictate matters to everyone they want, because you don't want your distro to stop being supported, do you? And now, another IBM-majority project, GNOME, is almost dependent on systemd (despite the very good word of both gnome and systemd that this wouldn't happen, IT HAS) and KDE is also being slowly pulled in that direction, with DrKonqi becoming systemd only in it's latest update.
Essentially, we are handing over 30 years of work in FOSS to IBM, literally the caricature of evil tech company, and now they control the mainstream and can dictate their will.
Allow me to remind you that this same IBM almost immediately after taking over RedHat, started closing down the source sharing of RHEL, which is it's own whole thing so I digress.
Let my final word be this, R.M.S as much of a problematic piece of shit he is, correctly predicted we being fucked over by DRM and subscription services 20 years ago and was ridiculed for it.
Don't you think it's time to take a fucking hint? You don't have to be an anarchist to see where this is going.
I have seen with Oracle Java and OpenOffice (as two examples) that the open source community is very good in just leaving and forking a project if the current owners fuck up.
The same will happen with systemd if needed. Red Hat may be the primary source behind systemd now, but they don't own it. All the code is fully open source, none of your ramblings have any hint of facts or any real foreseeable danger behind it. I asked for facts, for anything with some kind of real information behind it.
There is nothing that powers the claim that RedHat or IBM could take over Linux with systemd. How would they do it? They can't, because even if IBM would tomorrow change the license to a closed one and would want money. Who cares, everyone will just fork the version before the license change and good is.
Just as it happened back then with Xorg (I mean the change 15 or so years ago, not the current strange fork), like it happened a short while ago with Redis, and there are so many examples more.
If it breaks it is, in my experience as a grub user for over 20 years and as a guy working in server hosting for 15 years, either because of failing HDD/SSD or because of user error. People don't read when the updater tells them that running "grub-install" is needed (or they perform it on the wrong drive/partition) and then blame grub when it fails on the next boot.
The crappy bootloader that comes with systemd very often, in my experience, fails to register that a new Kernel was installed and boots the old one (or fails to boot if the package manager removed the old Kernel).
Oh and GRUB has so many useful features, like booting a ISO image. GRUB is a piece of programmer art!
I'd just like to interject for a moment. What you're refering to as Linux, is in fact, GNU/systemd/Linux, or as I've recently taken to calling it, GNU plus systemd Linux.
Because people here accuse Poettering of being an asshole: I've read some of his blogposts and seen some talks of his and him doing Q&A: He answered professionally, did his best to answer truthfully, did acknowledge when he didn't know something. No rants, no opining on things he didn't know about, no taking questions in bad faith.
As far as I can tell all the people declaring him some kind of asshole are full of shit.
He is not that bad, the issue is that, as all foss devs, he is not interested in solving problems he does not feel like are important.
The problem is, he disapproves when resources are allocated in his project to those problems and one main area he is not a fan of is support for legacy stuff.
It just happens that legacy stuff is the majority of the industry, as production environment of half the globe needs to run legacy software and a lot of it on legacy hardware
What tips about setting up my stock Android phone would you give me? It's not factory unlocked so I'm sticking with Google Android.
Things I've done: - Stopped and disabled all apps that I don't use or need. - Replaced all apps that I can with FOSS alternatives from github using Obtainium. - Not installed things that I can just check on my laptop like email.
Is there anything else that I can do? Thanks in advance
Edit I've also: - Changed my DNS to Mullvad DNS - Restricted app permissions to only what they need - Not signed into the phone. I don't even have Gmail account.
I assume you are using F-droid app manager, and also added IzzyonDroid repo to it? There you can get a lot of apps, like firewalls to block apps that call home when you don't really use them. Replace most of your apps with open source alternatives from F-droid. Get an email hosting alternative that isn't one of the big (spy, data mining) companies. Use decentralized privacy focused social media options. What type of phone manufacturer do you use and is it unlocked? You could use an android privacy rom like CalyxOS, that is what I use, completely de-googled, uses MicroG instead of Google Play services. A VPN would be my last option to add, especially when connecting to outside wifi.
So one of the gotchas about stopped/disabled apps is that other apps can still call and launch them. I frequently saw my apps pop back up even after being disabled, since I used SuperFreezZ to monitor them. f-droid.org/packages/superfree…
The alternative to that would be an ADB disable. IIRC it takes the app away from userspace completely. It doesn't touch the system-level though, so a factory reset will bring it back.
If you can't handle setting up ADB and it's hoops, there is an app combo that can set up a bridge and run the ADB disable for you: f-droid.org/en/packages/io.git…
With Shizuku and Canta, you can remove the spying system apps. You can break your phone though (fixable with a factory reset), so do be careful. If you want to play it safe, use the recommended list in Canta. These should be safe to remove.
I like NetGuard, but think that TrackerControl is a bit more privacy focused. It had tracker detection, includes a traffic log as a free feature (NG requires purchase), and a few of the other NG Pro features are implemented in TC as well. In the end having either is better than neither.
Rethink DNS is both a firewall app, and you can run a VPN at the same time using a wireguard configuration.
I use a VPN system wide, and for some apps like Fennec or a Torrent app (yes I torrent on my phone lol), I use a different wireguard config for each one of these apps. For the systemwide VPN, its using a server in my country, for individual apps, it goes to switzerland or iceland (So the IP used to check for system updates isn't correlated to the IP used for everyday browsing, watch youtube videos, or torrenting). I block everything from internet access unless it needs internet to function, like a phone app for example (for VoLTE). Enable "block connections without VPN".
Mullvad has the cheapest VPN at €5 Euro per month, and ProtonVPN have some free servers, but free servers have slower speeds.
As I said, it doesn't protect, it changes who can see the data.
Your ISP might not be able to see it, but your VPN provider will instead. VPN providers are hardly ever under any kind of regulation, except those run by secret services, of which there are many.
And there are more than enough VPNs that sell customer data while claiming to be amazing for your privacy.
I''d argue changing who can see your data from either a large group to a smaller one or one you do trust vs one you do not trust precisely is protecting your privacy.
Also FWIW you can host your VPN, you do not have to rely on a commercial VPN provider.
I’'d argue changing who can see your data from either a large group to a smaller one or one you do trust vs one you do not trust precisely is protecting your privacy.
It's always astounding to me that people put more trust in an intangible rando from the internet than into organizations governed by law. Like those people who don't accept mainstream medicine but eat random supplements they imported from India by the kilogram.
Also FWIW you can host your VPN, you do not have to rely on a commercial VPN provider.
Sure you can. And where does that traffic go?
If you e.g. host a VPN in your home network and you connect to it from your phone, and then you use this connection to access the internet, then your traffic will just be visible to your home network's ISP instead of your phone's ISP.
No idea what your analogy about non conventional medicine is about. Feel free to explain.
just be visible to your home network’s ISP instead of your phone’s ISP.
Indeed, which is already what I mentioned, namely another group. It's about the threat model namely if you trust one ISP more than another. I believe your understood that but chose not to acknowledge it and I'm not sure why but maybe it related to your analogy that I didn't get.
Edit: if you and others are interested in the topic I recommend splintercon.net/ plenty of resources on the topic.
PS: FWIW I didn't suggest VPN is the solution to all problems but they do alleviate some. The point is one must understand both how they work and their OWN threat model rather than an idealized one.
The analogy is that on the one hand you have a corporation where you know who they are, where you know which laws they are governed by, where you know how to file a privacy complaint, where you know who to sue in case something goes wrong. And you don't trust them.
Instead you choose to trust some rando from the internet. Where anyone with a sane mind knows they will get screwed over.
Even if you have encrypted your traffic with a VPN, advanced traffic analysis is a growing threat against your privacy. Therefore, we have developed DAITA – a feature available in our VPN app.
You can't. Some might say that the less adversaries monitor you the better. But you will never be private unless you ditch all the proprietary software and practice good opsec on the internet and in real life. Hate to break it to you, but privacy is fundamentally a binary thing: you are either spied upon or you are not, regardless if it's one hundred companies or just one.
To the extent that you still need to use standard apps, consider disabling your advertising ID. EFF has a guide to this at eff.org/deeplinks/2022/05/how-…
This won't stop google of course. You should probably also install a firewall, like other people here have suggested. And keep in mind, disabling features entirely is different from not using them. For example, if location services is turned off, then even google maps doesn't know your location (in theory anyway), whereas if it is merely unused then google will still check periodically.
Myanmar is ruled by an illegitimate military junta which literally seized power by simply jailing its democratically elected leader in 2021 and declaring "no more democracy". Rebel forces have been fighting against the junta since. In the northernmost state of Kachin, China is putting pressure on a rebel group to stop fighting the junta. China wants access to the region's heavy rare earth minerals. Unrest and instability make that more difficult.
Oh, I'm not putting this on any individual citizen, I'm genuinely sorry if it came out that way!
Sharing is virtuous, and everyone should most certainly try to share more (within their means, of course!), but the game was rigged long before those who are alive now ever existed. Unfortunately, as long as the system itself doesn't change, individual action can only achieve so much in terms of offering fair conditions and opportunities for everyone...
Again, no such issue, I'd actually have a bit more respect for LLMs were they this eloquent and pleasant!😀) Glad to have generated a crumb of something good!😁
To be perfectly frank, I can relate... Not gonna give up trying, just that I've never had much use for optimism given how things have been going overall.
Nope... zero. It's just what I feel is the right thing to do, regardless of results. And, on a more self-serving note, I will at least die with a clear conscience knowing that I did all I could do to follow and respect my principles, to be at least a quasi-decent human being.
What did they say? They deleted their account, so we all feel like assholes trying to figure out what you are replying to.
Don't feel obligated to respond, you aren't the "c u next Tuesday" in this situation
Edit: go figure, they didn't delete their account, just whatever they said. This is an incredibly META thing for someone with an 'umbrella emoji as a username' to do.
That's not enitirely true. The American Dream was (and is) settler-colonialism. Early settlers were promised free land if they killed indigenous peoples living there already, which led to a mostly self-sufficient labor class that could use its self-farmed land as a means to support themselves while bargaining for higher wages. If you were a white man, this dream was attainable, period, even if it meant enslaving and genociding millions of people.
Then came the post-war period. The wartime economy was still fairly planned, and aimed at full employment. Further, the US was emerging as world hegemon and de-facto empire. Imperialism and social safety nets largely expanded due to needing to provide better metrics than the Soviet Union was providing again kept the white men of the US living in the American Dream.
Now that imperialism is decaying, and social safety nets have been gutted along with the fall of the USSR as the main rival power, even white men are starting to fall into genuine proletarianization at large. The US is still a settler-colony, but its one where finance capital has dictatorial control yet imperialism is waning, and where many industries have been hollowed out and shipped overseas because imperialism was more profitable. The US is working its way to its own demise.
Agreed, that was the "advertised" goal, and the overall shape things took once it was set into motion. But looking at things now, in retrospect, I genuinely believe that's just what everyone was told to sell them on the idea, with the actual plan being very different for those who had access backstage, y'know?
I mean, it's much easier to motivate people to uproot their lives (regardless of how abysmal their living conditions were at the time) by promising a Land of Opportunity For Everyone, instead of telling them "yeah, we're a bunch of rich guys who want to get even richer, and we need cheap labour to get things started, then work for us, so that we may accumulate all of the wealth."
My point is that, initially, labor-power wasn't cheap. That's why there were slaves and indentured servants, to make up for the fact that the commodity labor-power was pricier. That's what's so dangerous about settler-colonialism, it "works" for a far larger portion of society, which is why it has led to some of the most horrendous crimes of all time.
It's only now that the system is starting to genuinely unravel, but the US Empire's history as one of the most far-right and brutal countries ever is directly tied to its large settler-colonial class relations.
Well, yeah, it's the pyramid scheme to end all pyramid schemes, not arguing against that. But that was the Dream.
And "not cheap" as in "had a wage," as opposed to not being paid at all as a slave (although there were some costs involved with that as well, so not entirely free - I am not arguing for slavery in any way, I was just boiling down the expenditure). But wealth was clearly still pooled at the top, while most people were no better off than they are now, when talking strictly about wealth distribution ratios.
Edit: the only advantage they had was that land was "free for the taking" (if they were willing to do a little genocide beforehand), but even that ended up pooling around a handful of people once things and people settled in.
The disparity is actually skyrocketing moreso now, and steadily has been for the last century. The New Deal, as a response to the USSR, did manage to temporarily lower inequality, but corporations weren't nearly as monopolized. The status we are in today took a long time, and for hundreds of years, disparity was actually much lower than England and other countries that had started capitalism in earnest. The semi-yeoman worker in the US had bargaining power and land, which slowed down tge process of disparity.
None of this is in defense of settler-colonialism. I bring it up because it points to the class character of the US, and helps explain why it's so far-right and reactionary, as well as why leftist radicalization is increasing rapidly.
Yet again, I agree! But wouldn't you also agree that the system always had this in-built inequality? What I meant to say was that, while it was less immediately obvious at the start, the subsequent pooling and acceleration of said pooling were always going to happen within this system.
And that's why I suspect that this was the plan all along, because it has been visible from the start, it didn't require a retrospective if one was paying enough attention. And those who did got very, very rich.
But even if everyone would have been paying attention*, there would be no room for equality, otherwise the entire pyramid would collapse, taking everyone's "more than" with it.
Yes, I absolutely agree that the disparity we see today is a direct result of the former social relations. The agrarian slave-driven economy in the south was certainly going to result in conflict with the industrial economy based on wage labor in the north, especially as the north needed new wage laborers to expand industrially. Historical progression is a process of endless spirals, tendencies and trajectories accumulate over time until a quantitative buildup results in a qualitative change.
However, I don't see it as something that was intentionally planned. Capital doesn't think that way. Capitalist production is an ever-expanding circuit that must constantly be repeated, anything going against that system of voracious profit gets dashed. Long-term planning is characteristic of socialism, not capitalism, nor the semi-yeoman style of settler-colonial capitalism or slave driven agrarian economy.
This is important, because understanding how we got here today can tell us where we are headed. The historic task of the US proletariat in the age of dying imperialism is to topple the capitalist state and replace it with a socialist state, focusing on decolonization and anti-imperialism. The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born. This is only increasingly possible because the US working class is becoming increasingly proletarianized due to monopolist capture of the land, and imperialism is weakening to the point where we cannot be bribed as much by its spoils.
We aren't here because of some 5-D chess from the old bourgeoisie, nor did the settlers have ignorance of the system. The US settler class was bribed using the spoils of genocide, and its only increasingly true now that there isn't really a semi-yeoman class. The immense brutality of settler-colonialism can't keep the US afloat anymore, nor can imperialism.
I'm just trying to help provide a Marxist perspective, as it genuinely gives us a chance of completing the US proletariat's historic duty. I'm a Marxist-Leninist.
Maybe you're right, maybe I'm just so completely lacking any faith in greedy humans that I now suspect everything was a ploy. I dunno, maybe it's one of the pitfalls of hindsight, that it can easily seem to have intentionality when the string of failures is so smooth and perfect. I mean, at the end of the day, Capitalism is, to my mind, uniquely insidious as a system.
Either way, I really don't want you to think I was disagreeing with you about anything else, whether planned or not, it is most certainly worth learning everything we can from its evolution. As you've said, we need to have the future in mind, because this thing'll be around for at least a bit longer...
Sincerely thank you for the theory! I'm not as versed in these aspects for now, so I don't know where I'd land on the political/philosophical spectrum exactly. All I know is that I sincerely want everyone to have a truly fair chance at life without having to worry about being persecuted for who they are, without having to be relatively rich to afford basic healthcare (I'm including the various hormone therapies here because it's well past time we grew the fuck up and stopped obsessing about other people's genitals, as... uuh... someone smarter than me put it) and without the fear that they may starve or become homeless, ffs... And I also know that what we've been doing so far obviously ain't it...
Modes of production are historical phenomena, guided by technological advancements. Capitalism wasn't a choice, but a result of growing industrial bourgeois production resolving its contradiction with feudal agrarian production. The steam engine is what accelerated this process. Zooming out, capital is the real master of capitalists, capitalists are merely the high priests of capital best guessing at what it wants, but ultimately are slaves to the profit motive and how to best extract it.
And no worries! One thing that's helpful, is that the centralization of capitalism over time is exactly what creates a large class capable of collectively planning and running production in the interests of all. The profit motive destroys the profit motive. I try to maintain revolutionary optimism, doomerism is more of a product of the capitalist class trying to remove revolutionary fervor.
Based on your final paragraph, you'd do well with reading leftist theory! I already said I'm a Marxist-Leninist, I actually made an introductory Marxist-Leninist reading list if you want to spend some time on theory, but you can explore whatever leftist tendencies you want to. The two biggest umbrellas are anarchism and Marxism, the former being about decentralization and horizontalism, the latter being about centralization and collectivization (to massively oversimplify), and the biggest tendency in Marxism is Marxism-Leninism. If you want to learn more about what makes these distinct, feel free to ask, I used to be an anarchist myself.
Also, if you can, join an org! If you're US-based, I recommend something like The Party for Socialism and Liberation. There are probably other orgs local to you, though, so do some shopping around. Getting organized is the only way out of this mess, and into the new. A better world is possible!
It's time to read theory, comrades! As Lenin says, "Despair is typical of those who do not understand the causes of evil, see no way out, and are incapable of struggle." Reading theory helps us identify the core contradictions within modern society, analyze their trajectories, and gives us the tools to break free. Marxism-Leninism is broken into 3 major components, as noted by Lenin in his pamphlet The Three Sources and Three Component Parts of Marxism: | Audiobook
Dialectical and Historical Materialism
Critique of Capitalism along the lines of Marx's Law of Value
Advocacy for Revolutionary and Scientific Socialism
As such, I created the following list to take you from no knowledge whatsoever of Leftist theory, and leave you with a strong understanding of the critical fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism in an order that builds up as you read. Let's get started!
Section I: Getting Started
What the heck is Communism, anyways? For that matter, what is fascism?
Breaks down fascism and its mortal enemy, Communism, as well as their antagonistic relationship. Understanding what fascism is, where and when it rises, why it does so, and how to banish it forever is critical. Parenti also helps debunk common anti-Communist myths, from both the "left" and the right, in a quick-witted writing style. This is also an excellent time to watch the famous speech.
Section II: Historical and Dialectical Materialism
By far my favorite primer on Marxist philosophy. By understanding Dialectical and Historical Materialism first, you make it easier to understand the rest of Marxism-Leninism. Don't be intimidated!
Further reading on Dialectical and Historical Materialism, but crucially introduces the why of Scientific Socialism, explaining how Capitalism itself prepares the conditions for public ownership and planning by centralizing itself into monopolist syndicates. This is also where Engels talks about the failures of previous "Utopian" Socialists.
Section III: Political Economy
That's right, it's time for the Law of Value and a deep-dive into Imperialism. If we are to defeat Capitalism, we must learn it's mechanisms, tendencies, contradictions, and laws.
Best taken as a pair, these essays simplify the most important parts of the Law of Value. Marx is targetting those not trained in economics here, but you might want to keep a pen and some paper to follow along if you are a visual person.
Absolutely crucial and the most important work for understanding the modern era and its primary contradictions. Marxist-Leninists understand that Imperialism is the greatest contradiction in the modern era, which cascades downward into all manner of related contradictions. Knowing what dying Capitalism looks like, and how it behaves, means we can kill it.
Section IV: Revolutionary and Scientific Socialism
Can we defeat Capitalism at the ballot box? What about just defeating fascism? What about the role of the state?
If Marxists believed reforming Capitalist society was possible, we would be the first in line for it. Sadly, it isn't possible, which Luxemburg proves in this monumental writing.
Excellent refutation of revisionists and Social Democrats who think the State can be reformed, without needing to be replaced with one that is run by the workers, in their own interests.
Section V: Intersectionality and Solidarity
The revolution will not be fought by atomized individuals, but by an intersectional, international working class movement. Intersectionality is critical, because it allows different marginalized groups to work together in collective interest, unifying into a broad movement.
Critical reading on understanding misogyny, transphobia, enbyphobia, pluralphobia, and homophobia, as well as how to move beyond the base subject of "gender." Uses the foundations built up in the previous works to analyze gender theory from a Historical Materialist perspective.
De-colonialism is essential to Marxism. Without having a strong, de-colonial, internationalist stance, we have no path to victory nor a path to justice. Fanon analyzes Colonialism's dehumanizing effects, and lays out how to form a de-colonial movement, as well as its necessity.
Solidarity and intersectionality are the key to any social movement. When different social groups fight for liberation together along intersectional lines, the movements are emboldened and empowered ever-further.
Section VI: Putting it into Practice!
It's not enough to endlessly read, you must put theory to practice. That is how you can improve yourself and the movements you support. Touch grass!
Mao wrote simply and directly, targeting peasant soldiers during the Revolutionary War in China. This pair of essays equip the reader with the ability to apply the analytical tools of Dialectical Materialism to their every day practice, and better understand problems.
Congratulations, you completed your introductory reading course!
With your new understanding and knowledge of Marxism-Leninism, here is a mini What is to be Done? of your own to follow, and take with you as practical advice.
Get organized. Join a Leftist org, find solidarity with fellow comrades, and protect each other. The Dems will not save you, it is up to us to protect ourselves. The Party for Socialism and Liberation and Freedom Road Socialist Organization both organize year round, every year, because the battle for progress is a constant struggle, not a single election. See if there is a chapter near you, or start one! Or, see if there's an org you like more near you and join it.
Read theory. Don't think that you are done now! Just because you have the basics, doesn't mean you know more than you do. If you have not investigated a subject, don't speak on it! Don't speak nonsense, but listen!
Aggressively combat white supremacy, misogyny, queerphobia, and other attacks on marginalized communities. Cede no ground, let nobody be forgotten or left behind. There is strength in numbers, when one marginalized group is targeted, many more are sure to follow.
Be industrious, and self-sufficient. Take up gardening, home repair, tinkering. It is through practice that you elevate your problem-solving capabilities. Not only will you improve your skill at one subject, but your general problem-solving muscles get strengthened as well.
Learn self-defense. Get armed, if practical. Be ready to protect yourself and others. Liberals will not save us, we must save each other.
Be persistent. If you feel like a single water droplet against a mountain, think of canyons and valleys. Oh, how our efforts pile up! With consistency, every rock, boulder, even mountain, can be drilled through with nothing but steady and persistent water droplets.
"Everything under heaven is in utter chaos; the situation is excellent."
Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO) is a national organization of revolutionaries fighting for socialism in the United States. Our home is in the working class.
Most definitely have a lot of Leftist reading to do! If nothing else, I at least know I'm well Left of Center:))
Now that I've mulled it over some more, I think it feels very intentional to me because I do see a lot of similarities between it and Feudalism, yes! It's like Capitalism is comprised of multiple smaller monarchies, referring to Corporations and any organisation/person with a large amount of capital at their disposal, and thus influence. But, yeah, we're talking orders of magitude of complexity above traditional feudalism, so it would stand to reason that it's most likely just a mathematical whirlpool of sorts. I do agree that capital is the main point of power in Capitalism and that everything else has formed around it.
Which, on a personal side note, is so sad when looking at the big picture! It means that the people in power aren't actually driven by anything concretely Human™, so to speak, they've ceeded full control of themselves and their lives over to the accumulation of something entirely fictitious... It'd be lamentable if it wasn't so damned dangerous...
Thank you so much for the reading list! It's so nice to have a quasi-curriculum for these things! And I probably will drop a line or two once I get started with the reading! Truth be told, I'm at the point where I know enough to understand just how little I know about the subject, so I can't even think of relevant questions at the moment. I've focused more on existential philosophy and such so far, needed to fix myself first:))
As for joining an org, that's in my 2-year plan (life got upended, again, so it's running alongside several other need-to-do stuff). I will lean very heavily into volunteer work, hopefully that'll open up some political networks as well. If nothing else, it is urgently clear that it's time to act as a citizen. Thank Christ we've managed to pull another 4 years of European Union (Romanian)... We have a lukewarm Centrist now, but at least it's not a raging Fascist...
Yep! Marx himself said that the history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles, after all. Feudalism does have a lot in common with capitalism, but what makes Marx interesting is how he analyzed how capitalism is different. Many leftists of his era were focused on the similarity between capitalism and feudalism, Marx focused on the opposite, how it's different, and this is what propelled him into scientific socialism, socialism as it emerges from capitalism.
And no problem for the reading list! It's designed to be completed in order, and is focused on taking someone freshly radicalized but with no experience with leftist theory, and leave them as someone with a firm grasp on the fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism and how to behave as an organized leftist! It also has audiobooks, queer and feminist theory, a good dose of basic history, and more. Since you mentioned philosophy, the 2nd section goes over Dialectical Materialism, so it might be a really good fit for you if that's your current interest! Still read section 1 before 2, but 2 is a fun section once you get there!
And great to hear you plan on getting organized! Really, that's step 1, but obviously not everyone can do so immediately due to life events and whatnot. Just do what you can!
Yep, that makes a lot of sense. I mean, it's much easier to change things if said change is built upon what's useful from the old. No use throwing out the things which actually do work (whether by design or incidentally, doesn't matter, happy accidents are still happy), plus it has the added benefit of maintaining some degree of familiarity, so I would imagine that makes the pill easier to swallow.
I'll most definitely take it in the order given, the new is always prioritised:)) Sounds delectably thorough, my brain will be happy, thank you! And, yeah, that's pretty much the basis on which I've started pulling hard to the Left (used to be Undecided, a.k.a. I'm Severely Depressed And Don't Have The Space For It). Existentialism steered me toward an understanding of what a satisfying life means for the human psyche, which then shoved me into "well, hey! Sounds like something which would be nice for everyone!" Then I finally saw the world for what it is and... yeah...
Completely agreed, change starts from home, always. It looks daunting, but the fact that so many people remember that Fascism is objectively bad, actually, means it's not impossible.
Thanks so much once again, both for the resources and the conversation! And sorry again if I came off as hostile, I've been struggling to manage a hefty case of misanthropy for the past almost-decade.
No worries, and have fun with it! Feel free to ask any questions or give feedback for it if you want to. It's also an intro list, there's a ton you can read beyond it once you finish, but you should be able to figure out what you want to read when you finish it.
Saw this video on another platform and I thought let me go to YouTube so I can share it, only to hear AI voices. I'm like WTF? I investigate and find out that it's auto dubbed and that there's no option to disable it. Huh?
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A 19-year-old Lviv resident was detained in Zakarpattia for the thirteenth time attempting to illegally cross the border. He was
trying to get to Hungary, seeking better living conditions.
Don't forget to thank our Lord and Saviour Mr. Zelensky (and the brave heroes protecting Ukraine's borders!) that this criminal was caught!
Just imagine what would happen if he actually managed to escape, and god-forbid lived a happy life instead of being kidnapped in a few years (or earlier..) off the streets and sent into meat grinder to die? That would be terrible!
God bless western democracy.
And some people are really surprised how can people say that Russia is liberating Ukraine... Yeah, those must be tankies. Obviously freedom is slavery.
imagine the pandimonium taking place if all of these criminals got away scott free to live the rest of their lives instead of patriotically dying in the war that the united states fooled the country into starting with russia.
and just like the american ice agents, the border guards don't want the public to know what their faces look like.
War sucks but lets not elevate Russia from starting this invasion. They have the possibility to end the meat grinder. Even if the US had a hand in it, starting war can never be the correct awnser. In the end the regular people suffer for the rich oligarchs power games.
Disclaimer: The article linked is from a single source with a single perspective. Make sure to cross-check information against multiple sources to get a comprehensive view on the situation.
I have never seen security and privacy checklists used for any other purpose but deception. After pondering this observation, I’m left seriously doubting if comparison checklists have any val…
Interesting article, and I feel that it's pretty fair. At first, I thought they were talking about this checklist, but I see they're different. The version I followed doesn't seem to have the same issues (lists jurisdiction but doesn't give it a rating, doesn't list or rate encryption methods at all, no summary at the beginning, etc.).
I think checklists/matrices still have their place, as listing all the branches/options might get too cluttered for a diagram, but I do understand why flowcharts (or the neat venn diagrams that get posted here often) can express information better. I don't think checklists are inherently biased, I just think you need a good decision maker behind the list.
I think the article was an interesting read. From a laymen's perspective it felt like it got to side tracked by the examples mentioned in the intro (the initial list example and signal vs mls).
When I initially started reading I had thought there would be more information for how someone that is new to a subject could spot and differentiate these lists from the ones the author says the article isn't about without being an expert.
Instead it feels like the title of the article ends up being more of a sub header and the sub header "How Do You Compare Signal to MLS?" was actually a more appropriate title.
If you tend towards conspiracy theory-type thinking, you might wonder if the Chinese government is directing its AI sector to use open-source AI to undermine US AI efforts. If they aren't, is it just a coincidence that this is what is happening?
Two things seem inevitable to me if the trend of Chinese open-source AI equalling Western efforts keeps up. A) - It will eventually bankrupt the Western AI companies and their investors, as the hundreds of billions poured into them will never be realized in profits. B) The 21st century will be built on Chinese AI, as it will be what most of the world uses.
The former seems more dramatic in the short term, but the latter is what will be more significant in the long term.
Three sites used by Cambodia’s brutal Khmer Rouge regime as torture and execution sites 50 years ago have been added by UNESCO to its World Heritage List.
Disclaimer: The article linked is from a single source with a single perspective. Make sure to cross-check information against multiple sources to get a comprehensive view on the situation.
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What fucking america are you living in? That might be true in some cozy suburb of Burlington, Vermont, but as someone who’s lived in Chicago and St Louis, the “Le Indians” reality is FAR closer to the american experience
Once I was crossing a signalised intersection in Canada while the pedestrian light was on, and some jackass turning left on red (which is the most illegal way to run a red light btw) almost hit me and had to slam on the brakes, but what shocked me the most was that the driver behind them, also intending to turn left on red, fucking honked at the first driver for having the audacity to stop and get in their way instead of running me over.
I've also had multiple instances where I was about to cross an uncontrolled intersection and a driver (who's usually speeding to the point where I could tell with just my eyes) honks at me to get back on the sidewalk because they don't intend on stopping for me when the laws require them to. Also seen drivers turning right on red (which is legal here in BC for some reason) honking at pedestrians crossing with the light and demanding to go first when the laws say you're definitely supposed to wait until the cross walk clears.
This is why I hate drivers. They call cyclists and pedestrians entitled while doing shit like this.
I think so. I lost count of the little things, it really was death by a thousand paper cuts.
I was a pretty rabid fan of Ubuntu, still have an x86 and ppc CD of 5.04 somewhere.
But by the time snaps started appearing, and then Ubuntu pro, Ubuntu decided to revert some of my customized configs in /etc after an upgrade, I had had enough. When snaps were reinstalled after an upgrade in 2021, I just flipped over to Debian, which has come a long way in being usable out of the box.
I have been using ffmpeg to convert audio files to MP3 format for my commercial web service and have found out that ffmpeg is no longer available in my version (12.
At the time, canonical was throwing its weight around and essentially bullying Debian upstream repos. Around this time, there was a mass exodus of the Debian leadership over this kind of thing.
The old guard of Debian wasn't as... enthusiastic about systemd either, but look what they use now.
Firefox has instructions on their website for adding their PPA and pinning it over Ubuntu's. I find it interesting that they made an official response that seems to say "yeah nonconsensual snaps are bad, here's another option"
I switched from Ubuntu to Debian, and it's basically the same thing, just faster since it uses native packages instead of Snaps. Ubuntu might as well run all it's apps in Docker containers.
You could rebrand Debian to Ubuntu and most users wouldn't even notice.
I've been enjoying CachyOS as well. I haven't gone digging into documentation too much but when I search I typically end up on Arch related forums. Chatgpt helps a lot too.
Arch requires reading the manual to install it, so installing it successfully is an accomplishment.
It's rolling release with a large repo which fits perfectly for regularly used systems which require up-to-date drivers. In that sense it's quite unique as e.g. OpenSUSE Tumbleweed has less packages.
It has basically any desktop available without any preference or customisations by default.
They have a great short name and solid logo.
Arch is community-based and is quite pragmatic when it comes to packaging. E.g. they don't remove proprietary codecs like e.g. Fedora.
Ubuntu is made by a company and Canonical wants to shape their OS and user experience as they think is best. This makes them develop things like snap to work for them (as it's their project) instead of using e.g. flatpak (which is only an alternative for a subset of snaps features). This corporate mindset clashes with the terminally online Linux desktop community.
Also, they seem to focus more on their enterprise server experience, as that is where their income stream comes from.
But like always, people with strong opinions are those voicing them loudly. Most Linux users don't care and use what works best for them. For that crowd Ubuntu is a good default without any major downsides.
Edit: A major advantage of Ubuntu are their extended security updates not found on any other distro (others simply do not patch them). Those are locked behind a subscription for companies and a free account for a few devices for personal use.
Not really with archiinstall, but indeed as you say reading the manual is an expectation. Their philosophy is "creating an environment that is straightforward and relatively easy for the user to understand directly, rather than providing polished point-and-click style management tools", as well-summarized by Wikipedia.
wants to shape their OS and user experience as they think is best
tbh that goes for every distro. It's just that Canonical is more hands-on with its approach. The major complaint with Snap besides performance issues is Canonical making it so that only the Snap versions of popular apps (most famously, the bundled Firefox) are available by default.
I don't know about everyone else, but the last couple of years has had the most unstable Ubuntu releases, with the most unrecoverable releases when issues happen.
I've since moved to Fedora for desktop and straight Debian for server.
I used it a little way back in 2005-2006ish, and decided to give it a try again after a third reinstall of ubuntu within a year last year.
though, I'm about to get a "new" laptop and may toy around with Arch on the old one. I had previously tried setting up Arch in a VM but that's not supported and ended poorly.
I can't speak to Arch but I use Ubuntu every day. I hate on Ubuntu because I use it every day. They make terrible choices. They've got common, serious issues people have reported at least as far back as 2009 with no acknowledgement or plan to address. I'm on LTS and they push through multiple reboot requiring sets of updates a week, heedless of the impacts.
I don't feel like learning a totally new environment so I'll be switching my main computer to Mint whenever I get the time. So I can deal with someone else's annoying decisions for a while.
I feel your pain with Ubuntu, though last time I used it was about a decade ago. As bad as it is (relative to some other distros), it's still miles ahead of Windows. So, you've got that going for you!
I like arch because: - it is rolling release and I like having up to date software and not having to deal with distro upgrades breaking things - it is community run and not beholden to a company - packages are mostly unmodified from their upstream - the wiki and forums are the best of any distro
the wiki ~~and forums~~ are the best of any distro
If you don't participate in it that is. If you veer only a little off of their strict rules, then Arch forum will ban you and they won't allow you to even read the forum.
I don't really have a concise answer, but allow me to ramble from personal experience for a bit:
I'm a sysadmin that was VERY heavily invested in the Microsoft ecosystem. It was all I worked with professionally and really all I had ever used personally as well. I grew up with Windows 3.1 and just kept on from there, although I did mess with Linux from time to time.
Microsoft continues to enshittify Windows in many well-documented ways. From small things like not letting you customize the Start menu and task bar, to things like microstuttering from all the data it's trying to load over the web, to the ads it keeps trying to shove into various corners. A million little splinters that add up over time. Still, I considered myself a power user, someone able to make registry tweaks and PowerShell scripts to suit my needs.
Arch isn't particularly difficult for anyone who is comfortable with OSes and has excellent documentation. After installation it is extremely minimal, coming with a relatively bare set of applications to keep it functioning. Using the documentation to make small decisions for yourself like which photo viewer or paint app to install feels empowering. Having all those splinters from Windows disappear at once and be replaced with a system that feels both personal and trustworthy does, in a weird way, kind of border on an almost religious experience. You can laugh, but these are the tools that a lot of us live our daily lives on, for both work and play. Removing a bloated corporation from that chain of trust does feel liberating.
As to why particularly Arch? I think it's just that level of control. I admit it's not for everyone, but again, if you're at least somewhat technically inclined, I absolutely believe it can be a great first distro, especially for learning. Ubuntu has made some bad decisions recently, but even before that, I always found myself tinkering with every install until it became some sort of Franken-Debian monster. And I like pacman way better than apt, fight me, nerds.
Arch has a very in-depth wiki that's the go-to resource for a lot of Linux users, and it offers a community-driven way to have access to literally anything that's ever landed on Linux ever through the AUR. It's also nice to have an OS that you never have to reinstall (assuming all things go well).
Why that turned into such a cult-meme is anyone's guess though.
About 10 years ago it was The Distro for first time linux users to prove they were a True Linux Enjoyer. Think a bunch of channers bragging about how they are the true linux master race because they edited a grub config.
Before Arch that role belonged to Gentoo. Since then that role has transitioned to NixOS who aren't nearly as toxic but still culty. "Way of the future" etc.
All three of have high bars of entry so everyone has to take pride in the effort they put in to learn how to install their distro. Like getting hazed into a frat except you actually learn something.
The Ubuntu hatred is completely unrelated. That has to do with them being a corporate distro that keep making bad design decisions. And their ubiquity means everyone has to deal with their bad decisions. (snap bad)
This is it mostly for sure. I used to be that True Linux Enjoyer. I still install arch sometimes but I only ever use an arch-derived distribution now that comes with an installer. I already feel like there’s not enough time in the day without having to manually copy files off a USB stick
I have a similar need for a "niche" install. I need Arch for it. I'm doing a laptop installation with LUKS2, TPM2, Secure Boot, systemd-boot with UKI, BTFRS, Apparmor and it has a Oculink eGPU dock station.
Last time I used EndeavourOS, I managed to get the graphical installer to install BTRFS on LUKS, it did require custom partitioning in the graphical installer, snapper just worked after that.
Zram (or was it Zswap?) was pretty easy to enable after installatiok
The bootloader might be beyond what the graphical installer can do though... I never really bothered switching...
To add, before the change the Gentoo wiki was a top resource when it came to Linux questions. Even if you didn't use Gentoo you could find detailed information on how various parts of Linux worked.
One day the Gentoo wiki died. It got temporary mirrors quickly, but it took a long time to get up and working again. This left a huge opening for another wiki, the Arch wiki, to become the new top resource.
I suspect, for a number of reasons, Arch was always going to replace Gentoo as the "True Linux Explorer", but the wiki outage accelerated it.
And here I am, just planning on going to Mint or something whenever win 10 support finally actually ends. I had Ubuntu like 15 years ago for a while, but I'm at a point where I want to do less learning about my operating system.
The way I see it, you can have an OS that breaks less often and is hard to fix, or an OS that breaks a little more often that is easy to fix. I choose the latter. 99/100 times, when something breaks with an update, it's on the front page of archlinux.org with a fix.
The problems I've faced with other distros or windows is the solution is often "reinstall, lol", which is like a 3 hour session of nails on a chalkboard for me.
How user friendly is the installation process? I've never tried, so I don't know. I'm curious now; just based on how people talk about it, I always perceived it as as distro that requires a lot of technical knowledge to use like Gentoo, which I unsuccessfully tried to install way back in 2010. I'm more knowledgeable and patient these days, so I may be able to work with arch.
You can use archinstall and it is dummy simple. Just have another computer or phone around to look things up and go down the menu like a checklist. My admittedly limited arch experience has so far been "run archinstall, use pacman to install tools as I run into things I'd like to have". I have a Framework 16 with the built in GPU, I imagine some hardware complicates this process but just look stuff up it's all out there unless you're on some really wild hardware. Even without archinstall you can follow the arch wiki and you're basically replicating what the tool does but using the wiki as your checklist and needing to type more
Well, Ubuntu uses Snap, which is a rather poor packaging solution that basically no other distro has adopted. By default it's a little bloated, it's made some controversial decisions (rust coreutils), and other distros just do what Ubuntu does better (like Mint)
People that got into Linux when most of the main distributions were easier to install than windows in most cases. Some people wanted to show off that they can install a Linux like it was when we did it back in the 90s for some reason I still don't understand till this day. I do like their wiki though. Works great for debian as well as arch.
I've been a slackware user since the late 90s. I take for granted how easy it is to install today. I've been tinkering with a socket 7 build, and nothing is easy. Installing slackware 8 is a pain in the ass. I can't even get half my hardware working on win95! It's not like riding a bicycle.
It's funny because I see the same cult behavior, but for Fedora. I've never understood the point of this distribution that has never worked well for me.
I'm on Manjaro by the way, because I love everything about Arch except the release style.
Funnily enough, I feel the opposite. Manjaro never worked reliably for me, but Fedora works great for my use case. Is it perfect? Fuck if I know. But it's a good, no-nonsense, extremely low maintenance, super reliable distro that I use daily with zero issues.
Also, they pioneered the atomic distro concept that has amazing use cases, and some fantastic projects are based on this technology. My gaming PC runs Bazzite for a zero-maintenance, immediate gaming experience. My dads laptop runs Bluefin and he hasn't broken it yet, and he's capable of breaking every single OS.
That said, never heard of fedora being a cult at all. Hell I feel it gets far less recognition than it should honestly for being cutting edge and stable.
But you're still getting updates every day, just two weeks later than Arch. The "testing" is just two other branches somewhat closer to the Arch package releases.
I'm using Fedora, but I'm not going to say it's my favorite. I liked MX and OpenSUSE a lot. Just had a hard time with running them on a computer. Fedora just worked out the box.
When I got fed up with windows 8.1 (and windows update bricked it), I first used ubuntu. How well or not it worked depended on the version. In version 19 it got some ugly white message boxes. I searched for how to change their color and found an angry dev saying no you cant change that. This was the final bullshit. Then I switched to arch, which lets me choose how my stuff looks and doesn't have the whole 3/4 versions are buggy thing. It works and ubuntu does not.
Arch is amazing for what it is, hence the love. It’s what you make of it; by default there’s nothing and you design your own system from scratch. This leads to a very passionate and enthusiastic community who do great work for one another, for everybody’s benefit. Anything under the sun can be found in the AUR, the distro repos are fresh and reliable, and every issue that arises has a hundred people documenting the fix before it’s patched.
Ubuntu has a bad reputation for inconsistency, privacy invasive choices, etc. I don’t think all the hate is deserved, as they corrected course after the Amazon search fiasco, but I still won’t use it because of Snaps. They have a proprietary backend, so even if I wanted to put up with their other strange design decisions I can’t unless I wanted closed source repos. That goes against my whole philosophy and reasoning for being on Linux to begin with, and many feel the same.
Normal people who use Arch don't bring it up much, because they're all sick of the memes and are really, REALLY tired of immediately being called rude elitist neckbeard cultists every time they mention it.
The Ubuntu hate is because Canonical has a long history of making weird, controversial decisions that split the Linux community for no good reason.
Unity would be the first example, and although Unity was actually a good DE, it was too bloated and almost non-modifiable.
People jumped ship to Linux Mint that had its priorities straight.
Mir and Snap were bigger issues though as Wayland and Flatpak were great replacements for X11 and AppImage and did not need another competitor.
But the privacy issues were the straw that broke the camel's back. People left windows for linux so they wouldn't have to deal with this kind of nonsense.
I actually jumped when Ubuntu jumped to Gnome 3. Gnome 3 was too bloated for me and it looked ugly.
I decided to see what Arch Linux was about and eventually settled for Manjaro Linux. Arch + Xfce for the win.
I left Ubuntu after Unity, it could have been the greatest thing ever, but Canonical deciding what was best for me felt too much like Microsoft just shoving whatever garbage they wanted to my system.
I'm quite experienced in Linux but I wouldn't use either. Arch is great if you like to tinker, Ubuntu sucks for the not so libre approach , corporate ties, telemetry etc. I distrohopped before but today I just install my debian based distro and shit works.. Ubuntu I've installed twice before when I was new to Linux, and have had a major issues every time due to official updates that broke internet drivers and other things, that's a fun one when you only have one PC . Not to mention its so bloated that shitty computers that I like to thinker with it have a hard time catching up. The arch thing is also mostly a kind of meme, targeting the more unbearable nerds. People I hated when I was a noob (they will let you know you are) But they are found everywhere and in general I don't think there's more of those people in arch community than anywhere else. It's more of a stab at elitism than arch specifically.
I feel like it isn't really specific to arch, every distro has a following, but some are more "passionate" about it than others. I think arch, NixOS, and gentoo are the most notable.
It has: - a great wiki - many packages, enough for anything you want to do - its the only distros that is beetween everything done for you and gentoo-like fuck you. - and the Memes.
pacman, seriously, I don't hear enough of how great pacman is. Being able to search easily for files within a package is a godsend when some app refuses to work giving you an error message "lib_obscure.so.1 cannot be found". I haven't had such issues in a long time, but when I do, I don't have to worry about doing a ten hour search, if I'm lucky, for where this obscure library file is supposed to be located and in what package it should be part of.
rolling release. Non-rolling Ubuntu half-year releases have broken my OS in the past around 33% of the time. And lots of apps in the past had essential updates I needed, but required me to wait 5 months for the OS to catch up.
Hmm, finding what package a file is in is absolutely possible on Ubuntu/Debian too. You can use the online Ubuntu/Debian packages search, or use apt-file.
"I run Arch btw" became a meme because until install scripts became commonplace you had to have a reasonable understanding of the terminal and ability to read and follow instructions to install Arch Linux to a usable state. "Look at my l33t skills."
Dislike of Ubuntu comes from Canonical...well...petting the cat backwards. They go against the grain a lot. They're increasingly corporate, they did a sketchy sponsorship thing with Amazon at one point, around ten years ago they were in the midst of this whole "Not Invented Here" thing; all tech had to be invented in-house, instead of systemd they made and abandoned Upstart, instead of working on Wayland they pissed away time on Mir, instead of Gnome or KDE they made Unity, and instead of APT they decided to build Snap. Which is the one they're still clinging to.
For desktop users there are a lot better distros than Ubuntu these days.
I left Ubuntu for Arch because I got sick of Arch having everything I wanted and Ubuntu taking ages to finally get it. I was tired of compiling shit all the time just to keep up to date.
Honestly glad I made the change, too. Arch has been so much better all around. Less bloat and far fewer problems.
I installed arch before there was the official install script. It's not that is was THAT difficult, but it does provide a great sense of accomplishment, you learn a lot, customize everything, and you literally only install things you know you want. (Fun story: I had to start over twice: the first time I forgot to install sudo, the second I forgot to install the package needed to have an internet connection)
All of this combined mean that the users have a sense of pride for being an arch user so they talk about it more that the rest. There is no pride in clicking your way though an installer that makes all the choices for you
IMO Despite some unjustified rumors Arch is a very stable distro. For me it feels the same as Debian stability wise while still being on the cutting edge side. The Arch wiki is the second most important reason.
The problem there is that stable vs unstable distro uses a slightly different meaning of the word stable than you would use to talk about a stable vs unstable system.
In distro speak, a stable distro is one that changes very little over time, and an unstable one is one that changes constantly. That's sort of tangentially related to reliability, in that if your system is reliable and doesn't change then it's likely to stay that way, but it's not the same thing as reliability.
I think Arch is so popular because its considered a middle of the road distro. Even if not exactly true, Ubuntu is seen as more of a pre-packaged distro. Arch would be more al a carte with what you are actually running. I started with Slackware back in the day when everything was a lot more complicated to get setup, and there was even then this notation that ease of access and customization were separate and you can't have both. Either the OS controls everything and its easy or you control everything and its hard. To some extent that's always going to be true, but there's no reason you can't or shouldn't try to strike a balance between the two. I think Arch fits nicely into that space.
I also wouldn't use the term "cultists" as much as "aholes". If you've ever been on the Arch forums you know what I'm talking about. There is a certain kind of dickish behavior that occurs there, but it somewhat is understandable. A lot of problems are vaguely posted (several times over) with no backing logs or info to determine anything. Just "Something just happened. Tell me how to fix it?". And on top of that, those asking for help refuse to read the wiki or participate in the problem solving. They just want an online PC repair shop basically.
I'm not sure either. I think arch used to be one of the less popular distros (because of the more involved install process, solved now by the arch-based distros with friendly installers), despite having some of the best features, so it required more "evangelism", that's unecessary now. Arch-based distros are now some of the most popular ones, so its not necessary.
Others have commented on why its so great, but the AUR + Rolling releases + stability means that arch is one of the "stable end states". You might hop around a lot, but its one of the ones you end up landing on, and have no reason to change from.
That is the main reason I use Arch. I am not a Linux expert but I am able to solve most of my problems reading the wiki. I used to use Ubuntu and Mint but those ended with me copy pasting stuff into the terminal and not really learning anything. When I switched back to Linux this time I went with Arch.
Because there are still people who have not yet seen the light. Once everyone has joined the fold they will not be able to remember why anyone resisted in the first place.
There are a lot of different reasons that people hate Ubuntu. Most of them Not great reasons.
Ubuntu became popular by making desktop Linux approachable to normal people. Some of the abnormal people already using Linux hated this.
In November 2010, Ubuntu switched from GNOME as their default desktop to Unity. This made many users furious.
Then in 2017, Ubuntu switched from Unity to Gnome. This made many users furious.
There's also a graveyard of products and services that infuriated users when canonical started them, then infuriated users when they discontinued them.
And the Amazon "scandal".
And then there's the telemetry stuff.
Meanwhile. Arch has always been the bad boy that dares you to love him... unapproachable and edgy.
Nix is great but not the saving grace I thought it would be. I daily it. Like it. Run cinnamon coming from Mint. But to be fair. It takes real effort and time to setup your config file, comment it thoroughly and then master the system. Once it's fully automated backups and all you can hop machine to machine and it's like you never left your OG machine. There's pros and cons for sure.
If there was a simple Debian based distro that I could declaratively manage via a single config file, I think I'd try it. I.e. not using Puppet or Chef that can only bootstrap a system state, but something to truly manage a system's entire life cycle, including removing packages and anything littering the system file tree. But since there isn't, I'm using NixOS instead.
Having a DSL to declare my entire system install, that I can revision control like any other software project, has been convenient for self documenting my setup and changes/fixes over time. Modularizing that config has been great for managing multiple host machines synchronously, so both my laptop and desktop feel the same without extra admin work.
Nixpkgs also bolsters a lot of bleeding edge releases for the majority of FOSS packages I use, which I'm still getting used to. And because of how the packaging works, it's also trivial to config the packages to build from customer sources or with custom features. E.g. enabling load monitoring for Nvidia GPUs from btop that many distros don't ship by default.
I've started with ubuntu/mint and it was always a matter of time before something broke then i tried everything from then all the major distros and found that I loved being on a rolling release with openSUSE Tubleweed (gaming and most new software works better) and BTRFS on Fedora (BTRFS let's you have boot time snapshots you can go back to if anything breaks).
After some research I found I can get both with arch so installed arch as a learning process via the outstanding wiki and have never looked back. Nowadays I just install endevourOS because it's just an arch distro with easy BTRFS setup and easy gui installer was almost exactly like my custom arch cofigs and it uses official arch repos so you update just like arch (unlike manjaro). It's been more stable than windows 10 for me.
Tldr: arch let's you pick exactly what you want in a distro and is updated with the latest software something important if you game with nvidia GPU for example.
I had moved from Slackware to Debian but by 2004 the long release cycles of Debian were making it very hard to use any Debian with current hardware or desktop environments. I was using Sid and dealing with the breakages. Ubuntu promised a reskinned Debian with 6 month release cycles synced to Gnome. Then they over delivered with a live cd and easy installation and it was a deserved phenomenon. I very enthusiastically installed Warty Warthog. Even bought some merch.
When Ubuntu launched it was promoted as a community distro, "humanity towards others" etc despite being privately funded. Naked people holding hands. Lots of very good community outreach etc.
The problem for Ubuntu was it wasn't really a community distro at all. It was Canonical building on the hard work of Debian volunteers. Unlike Redhat, Canonical had a bad case of not invented here projects that never got adopted elsewhere like upstart, unity, mir, snaps and leaving their users with half-arsed experiments that then got dropped. Also Mint exists so you can have the Ubuntu usability enhancements of Debian run by a community like Debian. I guess there is a perception now that Ubuntu is a mid corpo-linux stuck between two great community deb-based systems so from the perspective of others in the Linux community a lot of us don't get why people would use it.
Arch would be just another community distro but for a lot of people they got the formula right. Great documentation, reasonably painless rolling release, and very little deviation from upstream. Debian maintainers have a very nasty habit of adding lots of patches even to gold standard security projects from openbsd . They broke ssh key generation. Then they linked ssh with systemd libs making vulnerable to a state actor via the xz backdoor. Arch maintainers don't do this bullshit.
Everything else is stereotypes. Always feeling like you have to justify using arch, which is a very nice stable, pure linux experience, just because it doesn't have a super friendly installer. Or having to justify Ubuntu which just works for a lot of people despite it not really being all that popular with the rest of the linux community.
I don't really understand either. Where are the Gentoo and LFS elitists? It seams like there should be more of those than arch elitests. Maybe it's just because more people use arch.
Ok, I think I can provide some insight into this that I think it's missed on other replies.
I switched to Arch back when Arch had an installer, yup, that's right, Arch used to have an installer, then they removed it and you had to do most of the process manually (yes, I know pacstrap is technically an installer, but I'm talking about the original ncurses installer here).
After Arch removed its installer it began to attract more purists, and with that the meme was born, people online would be discussing stuff and someone would explain something simple and the other would reply with "I use arch BTW", which meant you didn't need to explain trivial stuff because the person had a good idea on how their system works.
Then Arch started to suffer from being too good of a distro, see those of us that were using it consistently saw posts with people complaining about issues on their distros that never affected us, so a sort of "it doesn't happen on my distro" effect started to grow, putting that together with the excellent wiki that people were linking left and right (even for non Arch users) and lots of people became interested.
This new wave of users was relatively new to Linux, they thought that by following a tutorial and running a couple of command lines when installing arch they had become complete experts in Linux, and they saw the "I use Arch btw" replies and thought they meant "I know more than you because I use Arch", so they started to repeat that. And it became common to see posts with people being L337 H4ck3r5 with no clue whatsoever using "I use Arch btw".
That's when the sort of cult mentality formed, you had experienced people who liked Arch because it was a good distro that didn't break on its own with good documentation to help when you screw up, these people suffered a bit from this and told newbies that they should use Arch. Together with that you had the other group who thought because they installed Arch they were hackers telling people Arch was waaaay too hard, and that only true Linux experts should use it. From the outside this must have felt that we were hiding something, you had several people telling you to come to our side or they couldn't help you, or pointing at documentation that looked specific for their distro, and others saying you weren't cool enough for it probably felt like a cult recruiting.
At the end of the day Arch is a very cool distro, I've tried lots of them but prefer Arch because it's a breeze to maintain in the long run. And the installation process is not something you want to throw at a person who just wants to install Linux to check it out, but it's also not complicated at all. There are experts using Ubuntu or other "noob" distros because at the end of the day it's all the same under the hood, using Arch will not make you better at Linux, it will just force you to learn basic concepts to finish the installation that if you had been using Linux for a while you probably already know them (e.g. fstab or locale).
As for Ubuntu, part of it stems from the same "I use Arch btw" guys dumping on Ubuntu for being "noob", other part is because Canonical has a history of not adoption community stuff and instead try to develop their own thing, also they sent your search queries to Amazon at some point which obviously went very badly for their image in the community.
I used Ubuntu as my first distro out of curiosity sometime around 2006. I've tried others (Mint, Pop OS, Debian, Fedora) but mostly settled with Ubuntu because it was just kind of ok for me and as another user said, there was a lot of articles that helped with getting things working because it became popular.
I had heard of Arch and to your point the it's complicated thing very much kept me away from it even though I have been using computers for around 30 years and was comfortable using a terminal.
The other thing is gaming, I consistently had problems with the nvidia cards that I've had over the years and never really cared to dig into trying to get things to work so Linux was kind of my testing ground for other things and just general learning about how things work.
Then I finally just had enough of Windows a couple of years ago, and with gaming support getting better I went back to Ubuntu and it just didn't feel good, I wanted something different that was setup how I wanted it so I looked into Arch.
I tried a couple of times to manually install it but my attention span (ADHD) kept me from focusing on the documentation enough to actually learn what I was doing. In comes the archinstall script, it was basic enough for me to follow and understand to get my system up and running.
I went through roughly 3-4 installs using it and testing stuff after I had it running and breaking stuff and just doing a fresh install since the script made it very easy. Since then I have learned a good bit more, and honestly don't think I will ever use another distro for my desktop. Just the ability to make it exactly what you want and things just work. Not to mention the documentation is massive and the AUR is awesome.
I do use Pop OS on my wife's laptop since it decided to automatically upgrade to W11 which crippled it and I just wanted something that I could just drop on there that would work with no real configuration since the only thing it needs is Citrix which works ootb and she can use all her office tools through that and has libre office if she wants to do something locally.
I do have a separate drive with W11 on my desktop, its used for one thing, SolidWorks. Which I use enough to merit having windows.
Arch was and still kind of is seen as the "I use Arch BTW" crowd, but it really shouldn't be that way. The install script isn't fancy, but it works. I think that would be one of the biggest barriers to break that mindset and open it to more people that are still fresh to Linux. I think that having even the most basic "GUI" for installing Arch would do wonders.
I don't use either now. I have tried both. When I started with Ubuntu i was great; fast, light, all the good stuff. Then it started to get bloated and wouldn't run on my old machine... So I moved to Arch and it saved me and I used it for years.
My way of thinking and working is incompatible with most premade automatism, it utterly confuses me when a system is doing something on its own without me configuring it that way.
That's why I have issues with many of the "easy" distributions like Ubuntu. Those want to be to helpful for my taste. Don't take me wrong, I am not against automatism or helper tools/functions, not at all. I just want to have full knowledge and full control of them.
I used Gentoo for years and it was heaven for me, the possibility to turn every knob exactly like I wanted them to be was so great, but in the end was the time spend compiling everything not worth it.
That's why I changed to Arch Linux. The bare bone nature of the base install and the high flexibility of pacman and the AUR are ideal for me. I love that Arch is not easy, that it doesn't try to anticipate what I want to do. If something happens automatically it is because I configured the system do behave that way.
Ubuntu? Its a can't make up its mind what it is trying to be while always becoming a crashy mess. When it first came out I remember trying it and immediately broke it.
The last time I installed it recently it had issues out of the box.
So I love Debian but it prides itself on stability so packages tend to be older. I think this is good for a server but probably not great for a desktop. Ubuntu came along and was like we'll be like Debian but newer packages. Everything was cool for a while but then they started doing shitty things. The first that I can think of was ads in the terminal. This was not great for an open source app. Then when you did apt install firefox it installed Firefox as a snap. WTF?!?!? (apt should install .deb files, not snaps). Because of this, lately I've decided to avoid Ubuntu.
I used Gentoo for a while and it was great but configuring and compiling everything took forever. I'm getting too old for that. Arch seems like a good alternative for people who want to mess with their system. So it's become a way for people to claim they know what they are doing without having to recompile everything. (Note: I haven't used Arch, this is just my perception)
Recently I got a new laptop and I had decided to put Linux on it and had to decide what distro. Arch was in consideration but I ended up going with OpenSUSE Tumbleweed because it's got the latest but I don't really have to configure anything. If I had more time, I might go with something like Arch but I don't really want to do that much fiddling right now.
I wonder if it's just me or if other people who were around before Ubuntu feel the same way but the reason I hate Ubuntu is that it seemed to take over the Linux world.
A lot of the information about how to do something in Linux was drowned out by how to do it in Ubuntu. When searching for information you have to scroll down in the search results for something that sounds unrelated to Ubuntu.
Ubuntu material was often titled "how to do it in Linux" and you thought you had a good long tutorial until you read a few paragraphs in and realized it was for Ubuntu and wouldn't work for you for whatever reason.
Even some software that says it's available on Windows and Linux just means they have a Ubuntu package and if you're really good there's a chance you might be able to figure out how to use it on a non Ubuntu system.
It's like when Ubuntu came out, people just assumed that Linux was Ubuntu. I've never used Ubuntu so a lot of the information I've came across regarding it has just been in the way of me finding useful information.
Arch has a cult like following because it emphasizes simplicity and customizability. If you have the time to fully administer your own system, there is no better choice.
Ubuntu is corporate, frequently out of date, and sometimes incompetent. They got big a long time ago when they were a significantly easier option than their competitors, but I really don't think there's compelling reason for a new user to install Ubuntu today.
To add to the arch management, after a while you learn the golden rule - set it and don't fiddle with it too much. Nowadays there is very little maintenance to it. I run an update followed by shutdown. Once every 2-3 months there is some issue, that takes a forum search to fix and once a year it breaks to the level where I need about half an hour to an hour to fix it.
Maybe it's masochism, but I like Arch because it forces me to make mistakes and learn. No default DE, several network management choices, lots of configuration for non-defaults. These are all decisions I have to make, and if I try to cut corners I usually get punished for it.
However, I think the real reason I stick with arch is because this paradigm means that I always feel capable of fixing issues. As people solve the issues they face, forum posts and wiki articles (and sometimes big fixes) get pushed out, and knowledge is shared. That sense of community and building on something I feel like Arch promotes.
For me, Ubuntu is ugly as all hell and comes with so much I dont need. It also ran slow on the first machine I ever installed it on. I like Arch because I got my feet wet there. It was my classroom.
The Arch users being so vocal is more of a trope to me. Never fails to make me smile.
Ubuntu started as a great endeavour. They made Linux much more approachable to the less tech inclined user.
It is an achievement to get a distro capable of basically work out of the box that hides the hard/technical stuff under the hood and delivers a working machine, and they did it and popularized Linux in the process.
Unfortunately, they abused the good faith they garnered. The Amazon partnership, their desktop that nobody really enjoyed, the Snap push. These are the ones I was made aware of but I risk there were more issues.
I was a user of Ubuntu for less than six months. Strange as it may sound, after trying SUSE and Debian, when I actively searched for a more friendly distro, I rolled back to Debian exactly because Ubuntu felt awkward.
Ubuntu is still a strong contributor but unless they grow a spine and actually create a product people will want to pay for, with no unpopular or weird options on the direction the OS "must" take, they won't get much support from the wide user community.
I don't know if that ever was true but I definitely disagree with that nowadays because Arch is in my opinion significantly more approachable and easier to daily-drive than Gentoo.
I have to use Zoom for a online class and I was wondering how I can make my Zoom experience more private? Is there a Zoom client that I can use like how there are privacy-focused Discord clients? What privacy tips would you recommend?
Not much really. Separate profile on your machine or run it in a VM. Then maybe use a vpn. But that doesn’t really hide anything from zoom itself. Maybe use a throwaway email.
I refuse to use the Zoom client on my computer and instead use the web client. There might not be 1:1 feature parity, but it's never been a problem for me with other people.
I'm in the process of getting a new printer and since I recently (December 2024) switched to Linux it would be nice if it would be Linux compatible. So far I've decided on the Canon PIXMA G550 printer but I can't find anything about it's compatibility so I figured I would just ask here in the hopes someone might have the same printer or knows someone who has the same printer and can tell me if this printer works with Linux. If all else fails I could still use the printer with my tablet or phone using Canons app but using it with my desktop would be much more comfortable.
I think network printer made by big manufacturer recent years should be fine with IPP driverless. They found Printer Working Group of IEEE, this organization maintains IPP standard and IPP Everywhere™ Certification. AirPrint can be treated as Apple version of IPP Everywhere, the difference between them is AirPrint requires Apple Raster but IPP Everywhere requires PWG Raster (and JPEG JFIF file format if color printer).
Ah, so they are actually differences between IPP Everywhere and AirPrint (apart from AirPrint including the whole autodiscovery stuff)? Good to know. The latter is usually more prominently advertised though which is why that’s the one I mentioned.
But yeah, it should be very common for these to be supported with anything remotely recent.
IPP Everywhere also include full autodiscovery stuff (mDNS and DNS-SD, of course, Apple call this combination as Bonjour). So I said raster is the only difference.
Raster is unimportant in Linux situation because CUPS support both PWG Raster (It's actually a subset of original CUPS Raster) and Apple Raster. Whichever one your device supports, CUPS will work fine.
When you say proprietary drivers, I assume that means they are only available for x86_64 platform... leaving ARM64/aarch64 devices, like Pi's and such, out of luck?
Something I've experienced with similar printer drivers. Hence the ask.
I've currently been messing around trying to make the Switch 2 Pro Controller work on Linux using the raw HID commands from this website, to potentially build into a driver as a bit of a project to get better at C. However, seemingly nothing I use can send any commands properly, or at least in a way that makes the controller work. I've tried both echo, sending bytes to the /dev/hidraw6 device (that device at least on my system, may vary on others), as well as hidapitester (a wrapper for hidapi). I know the device works, as a WebUSB tool that uses the same commands makes the controller work on this system. Is anyone more familiar with this, and can point me in the right direction? I'm on Fedora Linux 42 if that info helps.
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Far less useful, far more dangerous, but maaan the people love it. 🤷🏼♂️ I guess, like the OG monkey bars and swing-set over old concrete slabs... it can stay. The people've spoken.
Expect a steep learning curve even if you know Linux inside out. Don't assume things work the way they did on Arch (or most other distros). If your hardware doesn't work well, or you otherwise need some proprietary stuff, check out gitlab.com/nonguix/nonguix. Good luck!
Guix channel for packages that can't be included upstream. Please do NOT promote or refer to this repository on any official Guix communication channels.
Yep. Totally using nonguix. I'm trying out Guix for the reproducibility and system management, not (just) for the FOSS software.
From my initial research, I thought that Guix was only going to allow 100% FOSS software. But I've learned that's not the case. It's actually pretty easy to add additional channels in order to install non-FOSS software. The third-party channels integrate nicely!
I've not used Guix but I don't think any distro has anything close to number of desirable available packages as arch--- so be prepared for that. My ventures into debian, suse and fedora were made quite annoying by having to work around the many missing packages. Including user-facing applications, dependencies and background programs. I never quite got down with distrobox, maybe that's the cure.
this chart on wikipedia gives the impression that Debian has more packages but that's not the way it feels when you are looking for something. Maybe they have a lot of dot matrix printer libraries from 1992 or something which bring the number up.
Arch includes a lot of not-at-all-free packages (which it is impossible to distinguish in pacman or other tool as far as I can find), orphaned, new packages that haven't yet made it into other repos, and packages where no attempt has been made to submit them to other repos.
On arch I have virtually never had to go outside the repos for packages. It's very hard to give up once you are used to it. (Even though it's better to use properly libre/free stuff and other benefits of a more curated approach like security, stability and quality.)
The thing about Guix (and Nix) is that there doesnt need to be a package in the repos. You can either make your system automatically compile from source (which is how many AUR packages work) or use something like distrobox, bottles, flatpak to run extra software
You also need to source ~/.guix-profile/etc/profile.d/flatpak.sh in order to get the desktop icons to show up in the GNOME app launcher. (Using guix home for that!)
Need to work on getting distrobox setup next. I was able to guix install distrobox, but it requires some extra configuration apparently.
Btw, here's the guix home configuration file I used to add the contents of flatpak.sh into my ~/.profile, in order to update the XDG_DATA_HOME env var.
Neat. Although, I wanted to go through the installation ~~pain~~ experience. Eventually, I'm hoping to run Guix on a server. I'm starting with my laptop first.
– Hardware must be well supported in fully-libre-land - I was trying to install on a Mac Mini and had to go nonguix pretty much right away. That kind of spoiled the whole effort.
– Profound meditation and enlightenment on the essence of Scheme is a must. I had one of those 'no, this is where you don't want a closing brace' moments and my zen was blown out of the water.
I would have soldiered on, but personally I like Arch first and foremost because I can (and do) have a local repo by rsyncing a rotation of mirrors couple of times a week. Just in case the Internet dies one day, you know. I realised Guix was not really suitable for the apocalypse use case, so after that brace episode I decided to stick with what my spine already knows.
After all that is said – I really hope you fare better 😁
Hardware must be well supported in fully-libre-land ... had to go nonguix pretty much right away.
Yep, same here. I started with nonguix. I didn't realize it was easy to add additional channels.
Profound meditation and enlightenment on the essence of Scheme is a must. I had one of those ‘no, this is where you don’t want a closing brace’ moments and my zen was blown out of the water.
Aaaah. I juuuust had this happen to me. Took me a bit to balance the parens again! 😂 Although, so far Scheme seems nicer than Nixlang. I've also had curiosity to learn a functional language, so Guix gives me a reason to learn about functional programming.
personally I like Arch first and foremost because I can (and do) have a local repo by rsyncing a rotation of mirrors couple of times a week.
Are these mirrors for prebuilt packages? If not, you should be able to pull from other channels, create your own channel and include all your packages while building them locally.
Sure, but then I'd be downloading every single source 'package' and compiling for both x86 and ARM - not exactly feasible. Keeping just the sources might be an option though. The point is to have the whole repo, not just the packages I use, so that in the SHTF scenario I can help others install Arch and any software they may need on their machines. Muhahaha, Arch will prevail 👻
I've also wanted to try out Guix for a while.. part of the reason I'm leaving a comment is just so I can recheck these posts later 😛
But when I do I for sure will start out from nonguix because I'm quite confident that my hardware won't be supported (I even have a recently purchased Wifi 7 card that relies on ath12k module that I'm quite sure won't be in the official Guix repo.. maybe I'd even need to compile it myself..)
I see in the nonguix readme that there's a way to generate an iso that includes already a nonguix kernel, so I'll have a look at that.
It even looks like you can create a writeable image to run from a USB thumbdrive, which looks very interesting, I gotta try that!
I've been burnt by Arch before which is what has got me into exploring other distros. I might ultimately end up again in Arch like you, who knows, but it looks like the way Guix works is well suited for hosting your own repo too.. I think I've seen before someone hosting their own Guix repo in github, including also a bunch of configuration for their system, which got me curious.
Guix channel for packages that can't be included upstream. Please do NOT promote or refer to this repository on any official Guix communication channels.
I love it especially because of the guix shell and guix shell container for dev environment isolation. It is a whole different ecosystem from the ground up though so it's not an easy ride. But those two features make it worth it for me. Also it's GNU distro which imo is a plus.
guix shell and guix shell container for dev environment isolation
Yeah! This is one of the features I'm most interested in. I haven't gotten to using this feature yet, but I was curious about it.
Let's say I'm working on a project that requires Go, Node, maybe some C library, and GNU Make. Seems like I would be able to use guix shell for this, right? Great.
Now if a friend wanted to work on the project, could I share my guix shell configuration with him? (Assuming he's also a Guix user.)
I'm currently using distrobox.ini plus distrobox assemble for this kind of workflow, but of course this isn't totally reproducible.
Let's say I'm working on a project that requires Go, Node, maybe some C library, and GNU Make. Seems like I would be able to use guix shell for this, right? Great.
Iirc guix shell is for one off package or programs you want to test, say you want to quickly format a drive to exfat or so, when you exit the sub-shell, the installed packages are discarded
guix shell containers would work best for your scenario but I have little experience with them
yes, you would share with him guix manifest which is a file that specifies which packages should be present. What is important to note are inferiors which is a mechanism to version lock the packages.
thats it 😀 Now you need to pin package versions to guix versions via inferior so that you can share the manifest and be sure you have exact same stuff on the other machine. Otherwise the specified packages get updated everytime you update your system. I learned that the hard way by having to wait for latex to download everytime I updated my system.
You need to edit your /etc/config.scm or where ever you store your system config. Import the right modules/services, add your user to cgroup, add iptables-service-type to your services, add rootless-podman-service-type and configure it.
(use-service-modules containers networking …)
(use-modules (gnu system accounts)) ;for 'subid-range'
(operating-system
;; …
(users (cons (user-account
(name "alice")
(comment "Bob's sister")
(group "users")
;; Adding the account to the "cgroup" group
;; makes it possible to run podman commands.
(supplementary-groups '("cgroup" "wheel"
"audio" "video")))
%base-user-accounts))
(services
(append (list (service iptables-service-type)
(service rootless-podman-service-type
(rootless-podman-configuration
(subgids
(list (subid-range (name "alice"))))
(subuids
(list (subid-range (name "alice")))))))
%base-services)))
Then of course you run guix system reconfigure /etc/config.scm.
Now you can do a simple guix install distrobox. If you install distrobox first, you don't end up using rootless podman and you run into more problems that way. (You have to use distrobox --root.)
After that command, everything should work like normal. Enjoy. 🍻
distrobox create --image docker.io/library/archlinux:latest --name arch-dev
distrobox enter arch-dev
Btw, here's how you configure HiDPI for GNOME. Unfortunately, my laptop has a hydeepeeay display, so it's not fully compatible with Linux. (It's 3840x2160, so at least 2x scaling is possible, hypothetically.)
Commands from the Arch Wiki, but also adds cursor scaling:
$ gsettings set org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.xsettings overrides "[{'Gdk/WindowScalingFactor', <2>}, {'Gtk/CursorThemeSize', <48>}]"
$ gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface scaling-factor 2
The default GNOME configuration is some how missing that. I didn't have to do that in Arch, but I do in Guix. IDK. Anyway, if you don't run those commands certain apps will be tiny, including a tiny mouse cursor.
I want to love Guix (both the package manager and the distro). I want to love Scheme. But I can never find any good tutorials for Scheme and using it with Guix. The GNU documentation is more of a reference than a tutorial. I use Emacs on the daily, and I just can't get into Scheme.
Israel’s war in Gaza is chipping away at so much of what we – in the United States but also internationally – had agreed upon as acceptable, from the rules governing our freedom of speech to the very laws of armed conflict. It seems no exaggeration to say that the foundation of the international order of the last 77 years is threatened by this change in the obligations governing our legal and political responsibilities to each other.
The rules of the institutions that define our lives bend like reeds when it comes to Israel – so much that the whole global order is on the verge of collapse
Yeah but alliances like NATO and the UN weren't built to prevent genocide. They were built to protect certain power structures and to keep certain nations in control. Stopping genocide was sometimes useful in accomplishing this but nothing more. They never actually cared about people and never will.
That's so true. 30 years ago the US, with the help of it's vassals, hid its Imperial wars and resource extraction under the banner of globalization and human rights.
BANGKOK (AP) — China said Sunday that European medical device companies will be barred from selling to the Chinese government as a countermeasure for the European Union’s restrictions on the sale of similar products from China.
After the commission found that China has asymmetrical trade barriers for EU medical devices, it recommended some actions. For the past year EU was trying to negotiate China opening their medical market to the same level EUs market is open to China. It failed.
More symmetrical tarrifs incoming (from both sides).
La Social Web Foundation ha partecipato al 20° Internet Governance Forum delle Nazioni Unite in Norvegia .
Abbiamo ospitato il workshop "Privacy Preserving Interoperability and the Fediverse", che ha riunito sviluppatori, esperti di policy e organizzatori di community per esplorare la crescente importanza – e complessità – della privacy nelle piattaforme social decentralizzate di Meta, Data Transfer Initiative e Social Web Foundation. Con l'espansione globale dell'adozione di Fediverse, questa sessione si è concentrata su come raggiungere l'interoperabilità senza compromettere la privacy e l'autonomia degli utenti.
Aside from the Ars Technica article in the xpost, there's a lot of "it depends."
It depends on not just the OS, but if it's a custom image built for Dell or HP or Asus etc. computers, what settings are on, what settings were on by default, what bloatware is pre-installed, etc.
Typically, all MS or Apple really want are to know what apps you have installed, zip code, email address, IP address, crash reports, and possibly keywords they can associate with advertising. That's their baseline wish list, which is all advertising fodder, and depending on your settings, that can quickly expand to "anonymized" (it's not) cookie use, tracking of websites visited, etc.
If you have a custom image (i.e. a Dell specific version of Windows) the laptop manufacturer will look for access to roughly the same data.
With the whole Copilot fiasco, recording things like keystrokes and screenshots really are potentially in play now. But, again, only if you have foolishly installed Copilot and turned that stuff on. And that only after huge public outcry. So there's always a non-zero risk of that, but do your due diligence to know you settings.
Can you strip out bloatware and tighten down Windows to a reasonable degree? Sure. But because MS can and does change system settings without your consent, you might find in 6 months an article about a setting you turned off, that they turned back on and you had no idea.
Even if you turn off the setting and it stays off in subsequent updates, how can you know that the setting actually does anything at all? That is to say how can you trust Microsoft does not ignore the setting and just gathers the data always.
It might be not sending any extra data - which can be verified via packet sniffing like Wireshark - but how do you confirm they are not saving the legit requests you do and collect it silently at the backend? It cannot be proven (beyond reasonable doubt).
Since they are closed source, we can't know. We can find out that messages are being sent at certain moments, but not what data is being contained in the messages, communications carrying this sort of data are always encrypted (for obvious reasons).
For legal reasons they often include some vague allusion in the terms of service about collecting information.. but they are never very clear on what data exactly they take when and how, so it's left up to interpretation.
There is so so so much, and they do get caught, and when they do we keep a peek into how invasive they are. As someone who has had to worry about being targeted by intelligence agencies and nation-states, I was completely blindsided by corporate/capitalist surveillance.
for example, look at this action by Meta, where they broke out of security sandboxes and exploited protocols in order to tie your browsing history (even private browsing) back to your identify saved in their databases back in meta land
the amount of data that is being harvested and sold, and resold, is absurd, and the greater threat is not just that they are exploiting you, its that they dont care who the data gets sold to. Bad actors (criminals, etc) can and will purchase information they can use against you.
So, consider the unintentional ramifications of all that info being harvested and available in addition to the intentional ramifications of hyper greed, and couple that with the amount of available compute and you will see that you do not need to be a person of interest, everyone is a data point that can be and will be exploited.
I would encourage everyone to take their privacy seriously.
I swear meta is just built different in terms on spying on people compared to everyone else. It's like they have a team of ex non ethical elite hackers to find security vulnerabilities in everything and exploit everything as much as possible.
This is the real issue. It's not so much the intentional sale of your info for profit, or, for the majority of people, the threat of surveillance states finding out you're one of their enemies of the month. Most people are hit by criminals using the info to target them. For example, if they know your adult child's information and have samples of their voice data from social media, they can make an AI bot to impersonate them and ask for money. Or, if robbers happen to be targeting a neighborhood, they can use your location information to determine when you aren't home. These are much more complex than most of these scams, though. Most are much simpler, but using some combination of info from social media, security breach data, location data, etc. All of that data is being bought and sold now. Mostly by "legitimate" companies. Things like that are the major consequences for the majority of people.
not sure about win/mac, but for android yes they do keep record of stuff like what apps are being launched and upload/sync to google account. it's not hidden though.. it is(was) literally available on google account history or something (was about 7 years ago)
regarding keystrokes there was a case of a famous chinese keyboard app doing dubious stuff. not sure if i can say it's on a os level but i'm pretty sure more than a few chinese phones ship with that. citizenlab.ca/2023/08/vulnerab…
In this report, we analyze the Windows, Android, and iOS versions of Tencent’s Sogou Input Method, the most popular Chinese-language input method in China.
Few people can be sure of that, because it would require digging in their assembly code which can take a lot of time, but they have a financial incentive to do that and they love money, so all sane people assume that they very much do. And they also get caught sometimes (multiple times!), so thinking they would just stop would be foolish.
Samsuma
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