I've got the complete opposite to you. I'm in a household of 3 gaming desktops and 3 laptops, plus family who need help. I've been daily driving Linux for about a decade now and keep duel boot around just for Adobe products.
On all these machines, Linux hs been rock solid and never had issues that wasn't user caused. Windows on the other hand drives me crazy with how much it fucks out. I have next to no control over it. It updates when it wants. I have no control over what's updated. I hate the gods damn ads (and that's on Windows 10) despite running de-crappifying software. I hate how many errors it has and how long it takes t troubleshoot them. I hate that if the system borks itself enough, it's faster and less insanity inducing to just reinstall the whole os than try and fix it. I hate that Windows just gets progressively slower and laggier over time whereas my 6 year running Arch install was as fast as the day I installed it.
They haven’t particularly made a comment on the situation so much as acknowledged it’s happening. They seem to be going with the story that they had nothing to do with it and this is news to them. Hope to hear more from them soon so we can find out more about the situation, how and why this happened, etc....
”Finding a co-maintainer or passing the projects completely to someone else has been in my mind a long time but it’s not a trivial thing to do. For example, someone would need to have the skills, time, and enough long-term interest specifically for this.” - https://www.mail-archive.com/xz-devel@tukaani.org/msg00571.html
As someone who runs a charity almost completely solo because of a lack of volunteers, I feel this so much in my bones. It's one thing to say, "Hey folks, I can't run this on my own, I need help" but it's another to find people who actually have the level of skill, committent, passion and integrity to contribute in a meaningful way. I can get people putting their hands up but I've lost count of the number of people who have then turned around and said, "Oh, actually I realise now I don't have time for this" or start in great and then just ghost me. It also takes more of my own time and energy, on top of what I'm already doing' to onboard and train people and it sucks so hard when I do that and then people disappear shortly after - I constantly have to question whether the time it takes to do that will be worth it vs just continuing the struggle by myself.
When you get consumers being arrogant and demanding, getting angry at you for taking too long to respond to their messages or not work fast enough.... it's soul crushing. Way too many people take volunteer work for granted or assume you're getting paid for your time and can therefore treat you like a working-class pleb or are plain just fucking rude and entitled. :( APPRECIATE YOUR VOLUNTEERS FOLKS! We need more volunteers, and appreciation. Many hands makes light work.
Actually being paid is one of the biggest reasons for a lack in volunteers (the other is people working more than they used to). So many volunteers have been replaced with paid workers. Many charities aren't volunteer run organisations anymore but run more like not-for-profit businesses. As a result it's harder to get funding and donations. And people are less interested in volunteering unless they can be paid for it.
It's a vicious cycle and I'm watching more and more local, community organisations get eaten up by massive, centralised non-profits; and more and more local volunteer organisatns struggling to get off the ground. 😞
What was the first ever distro you installed and used? For me, it was Mint as I seemed like the closest thing to Windows minus all the forced updates and chappy changes....
Red Hat back in the 1990s. I had to buy it from a local stationary shop because being in a small, isolated country and the internet being in it's infancy, it was all I could find. Came with a manual bigger than a phone book and cost about the equivalent to these days $200.
Also can confirm. Been using Arch, which most people consider requires more fiddling than other distros, for almost 10 years now and have had few issues with it. I've had to fix my Windows install more than my Linux.
No offence, but I used to think Windows had good font rendering while I was using it. That was until I started using Linux distros. Now every time I boot into Windows, I again remember how awful Windows looks in comparison - washed out, pixelated, gives me eye strain....
I have the inverse - where Windows is so fine and pixelated it looks blurry. Linux is sharp and legible. It may be to do with with sub-pixel rendering. And this has been the case for across multiple computers and laptops, windows versions and Linux distros.
You could look at dual boot instead of WSL. YouTube has some pretty decent tutorial. Just make sure you take all tutorials with a pinch of salt; don't EVER run a command without looking it up first and checking out what it does; and try to find the most recent tutorials you can.
You may also have a local Linux club that can help you get started too 🙂
So the thing with Debian and any Debian based distro like Ubuntu or Linux Mint is there is no big centralized software repo like the AUR. Yes there is the apt repository but if you want something that’s not in there, get ready to read the documentation or follow random guides....
I've been using Arch almost a decade now (after distro hopping between various Debian based distros), installed it on a bunch of different devices and never once had to read about selinux.
Arch maintainers take care of stuff too. If you don't want to update much, then update every three months or however long you like 🤷🏻♀️
Because there's still unfortunately a heap of Arch FUD and myths floating around.
FWIW, I agree with you. I ended up using Arch for the past almost decade now in part because of the repos and pacman.
I distro hopped a lot when I first moved to Linux (from Windows) before settling on Mint. Faffing about with adding repos didn't feel like an improvement over the Windows experience of having to go to various websites to download files.
I was still pretty much a Linux noob when I moved to Arch. I'm glad I didn't listen to all the FUD then about it being hard and terrible. It's been so much easier to use and maintain than other distros I've used (or installed for other folks).
I've been using Arch as my daily driver for almost a decade. I think I might know how much tinkering it requires lol. You can look at Arch News and you'll see there's bugger all interventions required. I don't bother to tinker with anything and haven't in about three years because I'm happy with what I have. I don't need to tinker if I don't want to. 🤷🏻♀️
In that almost decade, I could count on one hand the number of times my system has broken and most of those was basic user error.
And I never said it was the easiest distro. You gotta stop making strawman arguments.
EDIT: I am tired, in pain and was feeling grumpy when I wrote this this morning. I'm being a hypocrite and not coming to your level with compassion, kindness and patience like I should. So I'm going to bow out of this conversation and say agree to disagree. I'll keep helping folks move to Linux like I have been for years and put my energy where I want it to go.
::: spoiler Original reply
You think I'm flexing? Interesting. And you want to tell me I'm extrapolating (projecting)?
Guessed I should have 'flexed' more and also explained that my experience is not just with my own PC but multiple PC's, laptops and.... not all mine. Yep, I'm 'flexing' about all the people I've helped install Linux (all Arch based oh no) with my years of flexing volunteer experience.
With all my years of years of volunteer work and helping countless people (including in a very vulnerable area of society) I only ever talk down to people yep. I totally don't encourage everyone to come to people at their level with compassion, kindness and patience.
I'm just all bout the flex. 😂🤦🏻♀️
Maybe don't make assumptions about someone's motivations, experience and qualifications when you don't actually know them?
:::
As others have said, you can install Endeavour instead. If you want a gui installer, you can still install pamac (Manjaro's gui for pacman and AUR).
I'm on Arch and I still find pamac useful at times.
The Arch Wiki is excellent. Endeavour has a great community that will help out if you get stuck.
There's plenty of tutorial videos that can help get you started.
I highly recommend using the man command. Appending --help is also great for when you're not quite sure what a pacman (or any other command for that matter) works.
I have the inverse where I found pacman intuitive and apt confusing. I distro hopped before settling on Arch and it was pacman that was like a light bulb for me.
I did have notes (a cheatsheet if you will) on the different parts of pacman switches but, at least for me, know what each letter stood for mde things much easier to remember.
You do realise that mobile data is non-existent or limited in some counties right? Even here in New Zealand mobile data is still limited or expensive and the main communication, especially between people who don't know each other, is SMS. Some encryption is still better than nothing.
You don't get people's problems because I'm going to hazard a guess that it's not a problem for you and therefore you don't actually have any lived experience with the issue. Or not currently anyway. But given you don't seem to be too interested in peoples actual experiences and seem more interested in talking over people and insisting that your eristic arguments are the only right answer, I'm going to leave this conversation here and continue to have a hard time converting family and friends to Signal because they still use SMS and Signal doesn't give a shit about people in countries where SMS dominates.
Once upon a time, I totally would have agreed with you. But I have increasingly severe Memory and Cognitive Impairment that now makes comprehending text based instructive really difficult. I can however pick up demonstrated instructions very easily which means I'm now mostly reliant on these sorts of videos.
So while it may be annoying or not useful to you, it's essential to folks like me.
I’ve had this issue for a while now, since I thought I could fix it myself. Almost all my programs have lost their icon image, which is not fixable by applying a different icon theme unfortunately. Just installed the Reversal icon pack to test that. My settings are attached here, sorry for the german:...
If the computer is part of the means of production for everyone, then sure,everyone owns the computer. If the computer is your personal computer, then no, it's your computer.
Mozilla Firefox 126.0.1 Fixes Drag and Drop Quirk on Linux (www.omgubuntu.co.uk)
2024: The Year Linux Dethrones Windows on the Desktop – Are You Ready? (lemmy.ca)
NTSync coming in Kernel 6.11 for better Wine/Proton game performance and porting....
Lasse Collin, the other xz maintainer, has acknowledged the backdoor (tukaani.org)
They haven’t particularly made a comment on the situation so much as acknowledged it’s happening. They seem to be going with the story that they had nothing to do with it and this is news to them. Hope to hear more from them soon so we can find out more about the situation, how and why this happened, etc....
DistroWatch has been banned in Turkey (lemmy.world)
It is possible that it is related to how Turkey has been flagging Linux software as malware.
Your first distribution
What was the first ever distro you installed and used? For me, it was Mint as I seemed like the closest thing to Windows minus all the forced updates and chappy changes....
I need a distro that can work right out the box without too much hassle to configure it, which one would you recommend?
Thx in advice.
thinking of trying linux,
My current issue is i see you guys constantly having issues, editing files etc....
Firefox looks so much better than Chrome (tux.social)
A little admiration of how easy UI customization is on Firefox, and how shitty Chromium looks.
Linux hits 4% on the desktop 🐧 📈 (gs.statcounter.com)
Arch is Easier to Use than Debian
So the thing with Debian and any Debian based distro like Ubuntu or Linux Mint is there is no big centralized software repo like the AUR. Yes there is the apt repository but if you want something that’s not in there, get ready to read the documentation or follow random guides....
Does anyone has a Ubuntu --> Manjaro transition guide
Hi All,...
Signal usage survey, what versions do you use? Wanted for potential Flatpak adoption (community.signalusers.org)
There are big wishes for Signal to adopt the perfectly working Flatpak....
The History of X11 (youtu.be)
With Wayland becoming more and more popular, it’s interesting to look at the around 40 year history of X.
Desktop icons not loading (lemmy.blahaj.zone)
I’ve had this issue for a while now, since I thought I could fix it myself. Almost all my programs have lost their icon image, which is not fixable by applying a different icon theme unfortunately. Just installed the Reversal icon pack to test that. My settings are attached here, sorry for the german:...
I had a journey (lemmy.ml)
Reading about FOSS philosophy, degoogling, becoming against corporations, and now a full-blown woke communist (like Linus Torvalds)