• folaht@lemmy.ml
        10 months

        Can I tell you off from Arch Linux?

        There are around three Linux families to choose a derivative Linux OS from,
        some are more obscure ones and then some really obscure ones.
        Choose one of the Linux family OSes and choose the most popular derivative of that one.
        So for example Aurora is a derivative of Fedora, which is a derivative of RHEL (derivative-(in)ception).

        The reasons to choose derative OSes and not one of the basic main three is that:

        1. The Linux derative OSes have bells and whistles build on top of the parent OS. This is especially true for the extremely bare bones Arch Linux, that will throw you back into 1985.
        2. And this is most important… community support! You will at some point have issues and a forum where developers and experienced users can help you out are a godsend. Derivatives tend to have better community support than the bare bone ones. I’ve experienced this with the Arch Linux community. I’m not sure if Debian or RHEL communities would haved fared better, but to me this community felt like having a conversation with a real life Sheldon Cooper. I am really thankful for the excellent expert level help I did get there, but I will not go there back again. And I don’t know if I even can, because the last time I was there, I got banned for a third time.
          I’ve had great experiences on the Ubuntu, Linux Mint and Manjaro communities. Other communities from less popular Linux OSes have been too small in my experience to get help on time.

        For Debian, the most popular one right now is Linux Mint, a derivative of Ubuntu (derivative-(in)ception). It used to be Ubuntu, but Ubuntu tends to take big moves and risks that don’t always pay off.
        Linux Mint I consider to be the safe option for beginners.
        Debian is known for stability.

        For Redhat it’s Fedora. I haven’t used it that much.
        Redhat is known for good security.

        For Arch it’s Endeavour OS and recently Cachy OS.
        It used to be Manjaro, but they fumbled a lot on security issues.
        Arch is known for having the best documentation,
        and the largest amount of software available,
        especially made by fellow users,
        and if I may add myself, having the best package manager.

        I still use Manjaro myself, because I don’t feel enough need to switch to a new one,
        and I like the community there.

  • JustOneMoreCat@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
    10 months

    Not so much help but hope: I got rid of Windows 11 and switched fully to Linux Mint a few weeks ago. I had no idea what I was doing but I tested things on USB and also on a very old laptop I had laying around before I made it my daily driver.

    I’m not particularly a tech person. I own a small creative business and have a toddler, but I figured out what I needed to quickly. I don’t game and didnt use Winsows exclusive software so have no opinions about that.

    What I didn’t expect: to actually be genuinely interested in my computer again for the first time since I was a teenager (which was not recent…). I love customizing my desktop. I love discovering new open source software. I’m learning more than I expected and it’s just a totally different relationship with the tech I use every day, in a nice way. And no more BS ads / bloat when I’m just trying to exist on my computer.

  • traches@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    10 months
    • before you switch, sort out your apps. Look at what you use on windows, see if it runs on Linux. If not, find a replacement that does and test it out.
    • Most Linux distros can boot into a desktop from a thumb drive. You can play and test without touching your windows installation.
    • in that vein, ventoy is neat. You can make a bootable drive and drop ISOs in a folder to boot from. No messing with etcher or whatever it’s called
    • desktop environment matters as much as the distro. Check out gnome, KDE, and cinnamon.
      • Caveman@lemmy.world
        10 months

        TL;DR: Try installing some on virtual box, by all means try Linux mint cinnamon but also try Ubuntu and Fedora KDE.

        Linux has some jargon and since you want to learn I’ll give you a quick rundown of how a variation of Linux is composed.

        “Kernel” is what makes Linux Linux. It’s a way of interacting with the hardware.

        A “distribution” or “distro” is a one of the many flavors of Linux.

        They are usually “based” on a common foundation like Ubuntu, Fedora, Arch, Nix and whatever. These also work like an onion where Mint is based on Ubuntu which in turn is based on Debian, all of which use some version of the Linux kernel.

        A that’s just a base will just get you a terminal (also called a shell or console) and is very useful to make a server for example.

        What most people think of as an OS is the user interface (i.e. clickable shit). The terminology in Linux for that is “desktop environment” (DE).

        You’ll see a lot of distributions mix and watch between a base and a desktop environment such as Fedora with KDE, Ubuntu (Ubuntu with Gnome), Kubuntu (Ubuntu with KDE), Bazzite (Fedora silverblue base with either gnome, KDE or deck DE).

        You mentioned Cinnamon. Cinnamon is a desktop environment for Mint so a Linux Mint Cinnamon contains the code of the following:

        Linux kernel, Debian, Ubuntu and Mint as a base and Cinnamon to interact with it by using a mouse and keyboard.

        There are currently three bases that are really popular right now, Ubuntu, Fedora and Arch. In the DE there are currently two that are most advanced, namely KDE and Gnome but Cinnamon is not far behind.

        In all honestly, none of this matters all too much, just install a couple of popular distros on a virtual machine like Virtual Bok and do a vibe check.

        Take a couple of these, install some programs and fuck around with the settings for a bit, install themes and whatever or watch a quick YouTube video on it:

        • Ubuntu (gets hate for being corporate but is solid, uses Gnome)
        • Linux mint Cinnamon
        • Fedora KDE
        • EndavourOS (an arch based distro that’s supposedly easy, haven’t tried it)
        • Bazzite (weird way to install programs through the package manager but hard to fuck up beyond repair)
        • Something with the Xfce DE just to see the “lightweight” look.
      • Captain Aggravated@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        10 months

        Okay, so the Linux ecosystem is more modular than Windows. Windows is synonymous with its Graphical User Interface (GUI) for reasons I’ll get into later.

        With Linux, there are several GUIs available to choose from. These tend to fall into two main categories: Tiling Window Managers, and Desktop Environments.

        Tiling Window Managers have minimal on-screen UI elements, usually they’re meant to be used with keyboard combos with little usage of the mouse. A major feature is everything that is running is visible on the screen, when you open a new window, another window divides in half to give it room, “tiling” the screen. Some examples of TWMs include i3 and Awesome.

        Desktop Environments are going to be more familiar to newcomers from Windows or MacOS. They’re made more for mouse control, several have what you would recognize as a taskbar, start menu and system tray. Windows can be stacked on top of each other like papers on a desktop, exactly like MS Windows does. Some more closely resemble MacOS though none behave exactly the same way. Some examples of DEs include Gnome, KDE, MATE, and Cinnamon.

        Cinnamon is a DE made by the Linux Mint development community, and the default/flagship DE for Linux Mint. It is designed to be familiar and easy to use for Windows users. KDE’s Plasma DE is similar in many ways to Mint although it’s based on different tech; KDE is based on qt, Cinnamon is a distant fork of Gnome and based on GTK. Some are designed to be more minimal so they take up less system resources, like xfce and LXDE, others are trying mostly to resemble MacOS, like ElementaryOS’ Pantheon DE. Then there’s Gnome, which I goddamn hate.

        For a beginner, the choice of DE is going to present most of the differences you’ll notice when trying out distros. It can be instructive to try, say, Kubuntu and Fedora KDE. Both ship with the KDE Plasma desktop, but the underlying OSes are different. Then try out, say, Fedora Workstation (with the Gnome desktop) and Fedora KDE. That exercise will give you a good understanding of distro vs DE.

        Edit to add: It’s kind of like launchers on Android. You can go in the Google Play store and install a different launcher on your phone, you can make a Samsung Galaxy look like a Google Pixel. Linux DEs work the same way, you can install KDE or Cinnamon the same way you’d install a normal app, you can have multiple and switch between them. It’s not a great idea but you can.

  • obsoleteacct@lemmy.zip
    10 months

    You don’t need a high level of technical skill. You can learn everything you need to get started in a few minutes of tutorials or walk throughs. The rest you learn as you go.

    Bear in mind no every linux user has memorized every terminal command and the whole file structure. Lots of people are just casual users who learn what they need.

    One of the things I wish someone had told me at the start of using linux is that initially your desktop environment will effect how you feel about linux more than the distribution or specific architecture of the OS.

    The good news is they’re all free. Try a few things and see what you like. IMO Fedora is a great, beginner friendly Gnome or KDE experience. Mint has an excellent Cinnamon and XFCE desktop either of which will feel somewhat familiar to a windows user. Mint will also run on just about anything.

    Also, it’s not binary. You can dual boot. If there’s something you need windows for you can use it. Over time you’ll eventually find that you don’t really need windows anymore.

  • rescue_toaster@lemmy.zip
    10 months

    There’s tons of youtube videos / tutorials on how to create a live usb of a distro, such as linux mint. This will allow you to boot into linux and play around without installing anything and get a feel for linux. It’s nowhere as tech wizardry as you think.

    And if all your games are on steam and don’t have anti cheat things, they’ll probably just all work with proton (linux compatibility tool in steam).

  • Kongar@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
    10 months

    Lots of good advice here. I’ll add a bit about dual booting.

    1. the problem with dual booting is when you use the same physical hard drive. Windows doesn’t play nice sometimes on the same drive. Just do yourself a favor and buy a second ssd. Then you can break linux six ways to Sunday and always have a windows backup. (And if you want to be extra safe - you can just unplug your windows drive during Linux install and you can’t f up and pick the wrong drive by accident)

    2. dual booting is nice just in case something doesn’t work - you can easily switch back to windows.

    3. dual booting sucks because there’s very few things that don’t work in Linux - it just requires a little elbow grease to figure out. But having a windows partition right there leads to many people giving up way too early with fixing their issues.

    My recommendation is always to have more than one drive in your computer. It’s YOUR computer. Regardless of what you pick as your “main” OS, you always have another spot to screw around in. Distro hop, extra storage, set up a hiveos miner, whatever. Its flexibility and screwing around with other things helps you understand what’s YOUR computer vs what is Microsoft’s OS.

    • Dagnet@lemmy.world
      10 months

      I say unplug the windows drive always, even if you don’t fuck up your Linux install may nuke your windows boot partition and it’s massive PITA to get it back

        • Dagnet@lemmy.world
          10 months

          This is not a debate whether one is better or the other, just saying to unplug your windows drive to install Linux, no need to defend linux

            • Dagnet@lemmy.world
              10 months

              Nobody here is talking about updating windows, you should at least write the context for your previous message

  • ordinarylove@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    10 months

    you are going to be fine! linux has better compat than windows now unless you use a ton of proprietary, locked software. your average linux distro can do steam gaming pretty well, and there are distros like bazzite and garuda and popos that do some or all of the configuration for you (based on your hardware and usage).

  • LandedGentry@lemmy.zipEnglish
    10 months

    Bazzite. Set it and forget it. 2mo on my new PC build, has only ever had bazzite. Runs like a dream.

  • hperrin@lemmy.caEnglish
    10 months

    I take it you’ve never even tried Linux before. Both of those things are not things that will hold you back. My mom uses Linux, and she barely knows what “right click” means.

    With regard to your Steam games, as long as you don’t play games that use restrictive anticheat, you’ll be fine.

  • ter_maxima@jlai.lu
    10 months

    Check your games on ProtonDB

    The only games in my library that don’t work are entirely the publisher’s fault for blacklisting Linux in their anticheat, and it’s very few games even then.

  • dingus@lemmy.worldEnglish
    10 months

    If your library is on steam, then there’s nothing to worry about! Works natively on Linux. If your library is on other platforms, I’d honestly think twice about switching full time. Dual booting might be a better option. My library is split amongst multiple platforms and I decided that it wasn’t working well enough for me. Steam games will work great though!

    Many distros are easy enough to install and navigate as a newbie. My go to for years now has been Linux Mint! It’s based on Ubuntu which is based on Debian.

    • TimewornTraveler@lemmy.dbzer0.com
      10 months

      oh that’s cool. nope, whole library is on windows on one PC right now.

      I was thinking about trying out dual booting to get a feel for it. my understanding was that many programs wont work with linux or require complicated fixes to get them running. so id hate to be left downstream without a paddle, so to speak

      • INeedMana@lemmy.world
        10 months

        Depends which programs. Also, it’s very possible that there are open source alternatives

        But if you are dead set on using exactly the same program, https://appdb.winehq.org/ is a database of if and how to make them run on Linux. Wine’s core focus is games, but many programs are covered there too

      • MentalEdge@sopuli.xyz
        10 months

        They mean other platforms like GOG or Epic, not stuff like consoles.

        Steam games mostly work, with some exceptions. You can check out ProtonDB to see more precisely what games work, which ones straight up don’t, and which ones need a fix. ProtonDB will usually also tell you what that fix is, which is handy.

        But most of the time, you can just hit play and not worry about it.

        A note on dualbooting. Linux uses different filesystems from windows. It can access windows NTFS partitions, but it’s not a smooth experience.

        A common pitfall is trying use your game library while it is still on a windows filesystem, from linux. Since you can see the folders, and even add them in steam, it’ll seem like it should work. But you’ll run into issues actually running the games. It’s technically possible, but not worth the hassle.

        Generally you really want to either format your storage and redownload your games, or if you have the space, copy them over to a fully supported file system.

        • TimewornTraveler@lemmy.dbzer0.com
          10 months

          thank you for that tip. I currently run all my games and docs from external HDs. (my pc itself only has a small amount of SSD storage used only for booting etc, and i dont know how to install a new hard drive yet…) I would have definitely tried to just plug in my HD and tried to run it through steam lol

  • monovergent@lemmy.ml
    10 months

    Absolutely. I likewise moved to Linux more out of frustration with Windows than any of my own tech ability. It needn’t be a concerted effort either. I had it on a separate SSD (for a more stable dual-boot) and dabbled for a couple of years until I found myself gradually booting into Linux instead of Windows more and more.

  • twinnie@feddit.uk
    10 months

    Linux is way easier than it was even 10 years ago and many games run better on Linux than they do on Windows. There’s gaming distros but I’m not sure what the benefit is other than the built-in NVIDIA drivers. I just game on Fedora. You need to enable Proton stuff in the settings and you’re off.

  • cRazi_man@europe.pub
    10 months

    I was you 18 months ago. It’s certainly achievable, even with a crazy busy schedule. Highly recommended that you go for it.

    Here are the unpopular opinions that attract downvotes:

    • adopting Linux is painful. Stuff breaks. Stuff doesnt work. You will be battling uphill, but hopefully you’ll find it worthwhile in the end.
    • moving to Linux permanently wouldn’t have been possible for me without AI. Now you can ask AI and it will almost always solve the problem for you. In the old days, you’d just have forum posts saying “just compile the driver and do a 10 step process with terminal that you need to figure out from the wiki…noob”. But now, these previously system breaking problems are now easily solvable without spending the whole weekend on a single issue.
    • don’t let go of Windows to start with. Put Linux on a secondary machine. Do not dual boot, you will break your installation and won’t be able to troubleshoot it and will have to do a full wipe (along with the time and data loss that comes with that).
    • Don’t get caught up in the distro wars. Pick Linux Mint, or a similar very beginner friendly distro. I prefer KDE desktop so I would recommend something else… But don’t go for anything with even moderate difficulty.
    • Check protondB.com for the games you play. Some don’t work on Linux (e.g. Apex Legends).
    • NewNewAugustEast@lemmy.zip
      10 months

      There might be a reason they are unpopular.

      Stuff breaks? What breaks? I don’t have stuff that breaks. Windows has been far more breaky to me over the last decade than Linux has ever been. What have you been doing? This may have been true 20 years ago, but not today.

      AI? Look, I helped a friend fix a new install. It wasn’t Linux fault, it was a setting in the bios that needed to be changed. But the AI had them trying all sorts of things that were unrelated, and was never going to help. Use with a grain of salt. You shouldn’t really need to do much if you can get through the install anyways.

      I am really curious what “system breaking problems” you have? My latest laptop over the last 2+ years has been so uneventful and boring. Never used a command line on it, but don’t forget when you see people share command line fixes, it is because it is the easiest way to directly share information. Not the only way to do something. My desktop has had a few hiccups over the last 5, but that is what I get for running Arch on it.

      • cRazi_man@europe.pub
        10 months

        I’m glad it worked smoothly for you and it sometimes is a smooth effortless experience for some people; but if you want to “convert” people then you’ve got to be honest about the fact that people commonly face difficulties. I’ve commented about my Linux issues before and I can paste the comment again here to give an example:

        One of the first issues I had problems with was figuring out what was wrong with Street Fighter 6 giving ultra low frame rates in multiplayer, but working fine in single player. It needed disabling of split lock protections in the CPU.

        A recent update in OpenSUSE made the computer fail to boot half the time and made the image on the right half of the screen garbled. I rolled back to before the update and am using it without updating for a few weeks to see if the GPU driver problem gets ironed out (AMD GPU).

        I installed VMware Horizon for my job’s remote work login and it fucked up my Steam big picture mode and controller detection. I didn’t bother trying to figure that out and just uninstalled VMware remote desktop.

        I managed to install my printer driver, but manually finding the correct RPM file to install would not be tolerable for normies. Update: I’m using CachyOS now and the Brother website says Arch plainly isn’t supported. When I install the driver from AUR that’s specific to my printer, then it doesnt print and just spews out endless blank pages.

        I still can’t get my Dualshock 3 controller to pair via Bluetooth despite instructions on the OpenSUSE wiki. I’ve stopped trying to troubleshoot that and use my 8BitDo controller instead.

        I still can’t find a horizontal page scrolling PDF app.

        Figuring out how to edit fstab to automount my secondary drives is not a process normies would be able to execute. I still can’t figure out how to use this to auto-mount my Synology NAS.

        Plasma added monitor brightness controls to software and these seem to have disappeared for me now, and I can’t figure out why. It reappears intermittently, but then disappears when it feels like.

        My KDE Plasma task bar widgets for monitoring CPU/GPU temp worked till I reinstalled OpenSUSE, and I can’t figure out why they’ve decided to not work on this fresh install. System monitor can see the temperature sensors just fine still. Update: this seems to have fixed itself (maybe through am update?).

        Flatpak Steam app wouldn’t pick up controllers for some reason. Minor issue, but unnecessary jankiness.

        My laptop fingerprint reader plainly isn’t supported.

        Trying to set up dual boot kept destroying (I.e. making unbeatable) either the Linux install or the Windows install. I have up eventually as I couldn’t figure out how to fix GRUB from the command line.

        I’ve been trying to find a solution for keeping a downloaded synchronised copy of my online storage (Mailbox.org). Can’t figure out rsync. I get an error with Celeste and it doesn’t sync after the initial file install. Having a 2 way sync for online storage could be considered a pretty basic requirement these days and something Mailbox can easily suggest an app for in Windows.

        People do not tolerate this amount of jankiness. And this doesn’t include the discomfort with relearning minor design differences between OS’s when switching. Linux is a bit of a battle with relearning and troubleshooting things that would never be problematic on Windows. I know we all love Linux, but allow people to be honest rather than being dismissive. I had over 2 decades of experience with Windows and it had its quirks and problems, but my preexisting familiarity with it made it much easier to use and troubleshoot.

        Sure I know I’m a noob and not doing this right. But that’s the point…can someone with limited knowleddge still work this OS?

        • NewNewAugustEast@lemmy.zip
          10 months

          I agree that computers can have issues. But none of these are linux only. Windows does all this stupid shit too. My printer wont work with windows, only linux (how the hell this can be true is beyond me). Bluetooth drops in windows, works fine in linux. The latest nvidia update on windows broke all games making it black screen until I used some regedit fixes. A windows update broke my firmware on a video card for a while, almost got RMA’d. I could go on, talk about Jankiness. I don’t use windows as my main computer due to it being so all over the place. I say this as a MSDN dev and windows server and azure dev and support person. I remote entirely from Linux, I need to have an OS that works.

          My point is windows does this shit too.

          But: That is your issues are a long list that seems to have a repeating theme: OpenSuse.

          You don’t need to edit FSTAB to add a drive, there is a gui for that, for whatever that’s worth.

          I have not had any of these issues on the 5 or so linux computers I use daily. I have had a few upgrades in Arch cause me to update grub or roll back, but that is about it.

          Over the last two years I have found Fedora KDE has been amazingly easy to use and update.

          I still can’t find a horizontal page scrolling PDF app.

          That one has me curious: what is that? (I mean by definition - scroll - that can’t be a thing, lol) But I am sure it is, got examples?

          • cRazi_man@europe.pubEnglish
            10 months

            I’m glad it works well for you.

            OpenSUSE is what helped me get past even more basic problems with getting my PC up and running, that’s why I stuck with it because I couldn’t even get this far on other distros. I’m on CachyOS now and can manage better now that I’ve learnt to troubleshoot some of the main issues.

            Horizontal page scrolling. I want to be able to read massive documents by scrolling through side-by-side pages rather than scrolling up/down.

            • NewNewAugustEast@lemmy.zip
              10 months

              Okular can be set to do that, but it doesnt have a scroll bar, which you might not like. Firefox can do that as well, but I concede that browser PDF viewers are not ideal.