The solution I’ve sort-of found is to go to communities of Arch-based systems instead of Arch itself. The same solution should work in most cases*, and the communities are more newbie-friendly.
*Depends on how close to Arch the distro is in this aspect/subsystem. The Manjaro community is probably less likely to offer AUR based solutions, since the AUR can be unreliable/unsafe on Manjaro.
It did. I must have mixed them up. Not sure about the desktop/gaming divide, I mostly get my info from random articles.
Based on a brief search, you may be correct on both counts. I’ll fix my post. Thanks for pointing it out.
If Windows works fine for you and does not annoy you, there is no need to migrate.
Personally, I’ve been mostly happy using Linux as my sole desktop OS for ~15 years. However, I only switched because Windows kept breaking and reinstalling no longer fixed it. I couldn’t imagine going back now, but a big part is probably being used to it.
These days most major Linux distributions should be fine for desktop use.
Linux Mint Cinnamon use to be the go-to beginner distribution. Its design is apparently somewhat similar to Windows, giving you some initial familiarity. Linux Mint is also based on Ubuntu, which used to be so widespread that many support pages and simple how-to instruction still default to explaining it for Ubuntu.
(This can still lead to confusion if you search for “install [Windows program] Linux” and the instructions work for Ubuntu based distribution only, not for any other distros.)
The last few years, I’ve seen a switch to Arch-based distributions around. Valve itself switched away from Ubuntu to Arch in some ways. (On Steam, the system requirements still use Ubuntu as default.) SteamOS used to be based on Debian, which Ubuntu is related to, until the Steam Deck. Now it is based on Arch. More specifically, Valve seems to default to:
Base: Arch
Desktop environment: KDE Plasma (more powerful/options than Cinnamon)
Compositor base: Wayland for gaming, old X11 for Steam Deck’s desktop. (Apparently Wayland isn’t quite ready yet for that in their opinion.)
EDIT: Fixed thanks to feedback.
Arch itself is seen as a more technical distribution. There are extremely many support pages for every issue or question you may have, similar to Ubuntu, but some may be more difficult to understand. Still, support systems improve as the user base grows and Arch is growing.
For specific distributions, EndeavourOS is the one I’ve heard about being the most friendly. Manjaro is also beginner-friendly, but the folks who maintain it have some serious issues with seriously fucking things up sometimes.
https://itsfoss.com/arch-based-linux-distros/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVlD17OjFAc (Video compiling Manjaro fuckups.)
It failed to boot for me, too. Only worked when I stopped asking it to encrypt the hard drive.
To be honest, only laziness is stopping me from switching to another OS, though. Very poor experience so far.
Yay, more heat. Looking forward to my skin melting off soon.
With how cyclical heat seems to be, probably the hottest year until ~4 years from now.
Just long enough for sceptics to dismiss it again, because any day without high heat means climate change is fake.
OsmAnd is my family’s go-to app for navigation. I didn’t notice it missing information compared to Google Maps. The opposite really, with several hiking trails or small side-roads not being on Google some years ago. The only issue it has is navigation for more than ~200km at a time. Often, it just times out if you try that. That’s why Google Maps is still installed on some devices.
I haven’t added anything actively. I think I might have enabled an option to send location data to improve the accuracy of the streets or something at some point, but I’m very unsure about that one.
Sadly, not that easy, since “income” no longer accounts for the huge wealth gap. Until stocks and assets are counted and taxed appropriately, the top 0.1% will remain just as wealthy.
It might work on parts of the 1% to 0.1%, though.
Doesn’t even have to be a “class of idiots”. It would be enough if stuff didn’t just sometimes break, seemingly randomly. (It’s not quite random, obviously.)
Recent example: I had OpenSuse TW recommended because of its reliability. First tip: install codecs, which requires adding the Packman repository. Now, simply updating threw up errors several times because Packman and the other repositories are apparently not in sync, and some dependencies would break if I updated. (Waiting a few days “fixed” it, but still shouldn’t happen.)
Depending on which update method you use (Yast/Discovery/zypper/update widget) you get different error messages, most of which are not informative. This is for an established distribution known for its reliability, and this alone would keep me from ever recommending it to normal users, even moderately tech-savvy ones.
Things are getting better, but I’m still shopping around for a distro that just works. Perhaps that new Fedora version, or one of the immutable ones, now that they are getting popular.
I’ve had issues since kernel 6.4. Since early December, one pair of Bluetooth headphones works again (mostly, with occasional connection issues), but the AirPods still fail to pair at all.