Hm.... I am a software engineer. I always follow the mindset that something should be able to function right out of the box without too much tweaking but customizable enough that I can tweak all parts of it if needed. At work, I would often import third party module and libraries and I always ask do they do things I need without needing me to reinvent the wheels and write all the apis from scratch? Can it do the things I need it to do differently in another way? If no, how easier is it for me to extend it and implement the functionalities I need? Customization just for the sake of customization is a waste of time and often result in more headaches(namely bugs) compare to out of the box modules which already passed QA and work as intended. Linux desktops are more or less the same. If you need to replace a desktop or mod it extensively then go ahead. However, if you have no reason other than for the aesthetic, then don't. The desktop shipped out of the box are thoroughly tested by it's maintainers and are as reliable as it gets. Can't say the same for whatever you plan on replacing them with however.
When you want software that was released yesterday and not a year ago , and when you want your laptop touchpad drivers and wifi card drivers to work , then you would choose arch
@@vim1729 no thanks.. been there done that...not for me. It's good until something borks up, then it is tinker, tinker trying to fix it. I need uptime, I need a working computer. Time is money and i don't have the time to play with a distro, i want it working for me.
One fun fact about distro reviews on youtube is that 95% of them are actually desktop environment reviews. Since the distro doesn't affect your workflow in any significant way, there's nothing to show.
"You're not going to have the absolute latest package of everything on Debian." A common criticism I've heard made and, I'll be honest, as long as there aren't excessive delays before things release on Debian, I don't see how it's a bad thing? Stability trumps early adoption every time for me. It's one of the reasons I moved to Linux.
There are sometimes long periods (~1week) without using my computer at home. I'll never put any bleeding edge rolling distro on it... I don't want to update every few days I don't turn it on. I do use Arch in other settings, but tools for jobs and etc
I agree it's not necessarily a bad thing, but it is something you ought to bear in mind when making your decision. However, I'm yet to see noticeable stability differences between MX and Manjaro.
@@prgnify I have a small Intel NUC. I tried a lot of distributions (MX Linux, Manjaro, Ubuntu Mate, Garuda, ...): they were all not very stable. I had to reboot my desktop once or twice an hour because of my screen freezing. The only distribution that has been stable is Linux Mint LMDE with XCFE (Cinnamon exhibits some bugs). So for me, all these distros are definitely not the same in terms of stability. Debian is still the most stable distro and this really matters. Restarting your PC every now and then is a very annoying thing.
A Mint User here. I've distro hopped a lot and i found Mint the most practical and adequate for my workflow. I did some changes using some tips on your videos... thanks for the awesome content.
Hi DT, Wise words. Presently using Artix Runit (arch-based) with an overlay of xinit (startx), X, Picom, OpenBox, Nitrogen, Conky, URXVT, TMUX, NeoVim and LibreWolf (web browser). It works like a champ. Keep spreading the word and all the best.
I have been using debian for a very long time, but sometime i think that the release are king of slow, once you installed the latest debian released version you installation is just almost old ... at the same time the other end arch might be too bleeding edge. Still thinking about if i should be using such distribution
@@williamwu3457 Yes official Debian is slow...STABLE as a rock but slow. On my main daily driver notebook, I have used apt pinning (apt pin priority) to get more up to date packages. Using pinning, my main system uses the Stable repository, but for certain programs it will use the Unstable (or sometimes the developers nightly builds). On another notebook, I run Siduction Linux which is Debian using Sid (modified to work correctly and have few bugs)
@@williamwu3457 Tried Arch and it was okay as far as stability. Recently installed Gentoo though and I feel it's the perfect mix of stability and bleeding edge. You can mix and match stable and unstable packages however you want. Portage (the package management system Gentoo uses) is really great at doing this and you can even install specific versions of packages. Definitely worth taking a look at!
I use Ubuntu 20.04. I have Dash to Dock, tmux, fish shell, Doom Emacs, the icons same as Garuda, and I’m genuinely happy with it all. I have been using Linux for about 6 months and your videos have definitely helped me out so much!
It's really heart warming to hear that from you. At the start of my Linux journey I was paralised through analysis and wasn't sure where I wanted to go. I was lost in the ocean of distributions. Now I'm happy with my set up using Gentoo with plasma and do not care too much about bloat anymore. Plasma is my favorite DE and as far as window managers go, I like DMW and i3 but still I can not go away from Kde. There may come the time when my Gentoo machine breaks and I wouldn't have any problem using Kubuntu or Arch with Kde. Nice content as always!
I run Manjaro XFCE and I think I have very simple needs. I made my panels to look a little like Mac and I can't imagine needing a lot more customizing, or hopping - but I do love hearing about all the things you cover, DT.
Just discovered your channel and really loving it. Incredibly informative! I’m learning a great deal and you’re excellent at communicating info in an engaging way. I just wanted to thank you for getting me excited about Linux again… for me, it’s been an on-and-off love/hate relationship since 1999ish. I think it’s time to give it another whirl!
Great video DT! I was planning to comment about the important things to consider and the areas in which the distro you choose does matter. You covered that well roughly 5 minutes later.
From wikipedia: "Mx Linux is based on Debian stable...with antiX components, with additional software created or packaged by the MX community. It was developed as a cooperative venture between the antiX and former MEPIS communities."
19:16 "Anyone who can read can install Arch" Well, not completely. I reinstalled arch yesterday, using the manual. It's perfectly easy to follow it until you get to "Boot loader" ( just before reboot, but it's kind of important). Whereas in the previous sections it nicely outlines the commands you have to type to get a default working installation, in this section it's like they couldn't be bothered. It literally just says : "Choose and install a Linux-capable boot loader. If you have an Intel or AMD CPU, enable microcode updates in addition." And then you can click on "boot loader" which just presents you with a matrix of what you could install. Of course, knowing that GRUB would be a good option I installed that. But if you don't know that, you'd be kind of stuck at that point unsure what to pick. Or worse you'd just skip the step thinking it's option and end up with system that won't boot.
According to DT, distro's do not matter, so the Arch install manual doesn't matter, hey it just don't matter so you should have no problems choosing what ever you want for the boot loader because it doesn't matter, in fact I think DT should move his family members over to Gentoo because distro's do not matter...
@@andrasbiro6604 "Present Windows" by specific workspace or all workspace and filtering/searching window by its title. I open lot of browser tabs and sort them them in lots of windows so this features saves me a lot of time. krunner can also switch to browser tabs. Screen corner shortcuts, Wine Games actually being playable on plasma Wayland. ...etc. Since plasma 5.21, plasma Wayland is more stable and usable (at least when running wine) than sway for me.
I have KDE and Qtile on Arch, depending on needs I switch back and forth, like for casual movie watching, browsing, maintenance and stuff I'll login with KDE, for development or other productive stuff only I prefer using Qtile. Personally I don't really enjoy the tiling in KDE.
I have found that my g502 mouse reduces the strain on my wrist to a large degree. Part of it may be that the mouse is the right size for my hand and lets me click the buttons with much less force than I was used to on cheap mice.
Derek I use a trackball which fixes a lot of the issues you mentioned with a mouse. But, I've grown more and more in love with opensuse. Not sure why but gosh the appeal of btrfs snapshots setupbout of the box on a rolling release is great.
As you grow older, the tiles get less and bigger. Finally you end up fullscreen and using keyboard short cuts. So in the long run the desktop environment does not matter at all. xD
For me it's Xubuntu minimal + Compiz-reloaded (and Cairo-dock). I'm not that much into tiling WMs (the 2x2 grid of Compiz or XFWM is enough for me) but man am I into animation, transparency and blur.
I thought that already. I felt like it was "the only right thing" to use KDE Plasma... But I couldn't adapt anymore after experiencing i3. Then I accepted my fate and stuck with the tiling wm
you can technically integrate i3 in Plasma, replacing the default Kwin window manager, so you keep the tiling, gaps and shortcuts from i3 but also the neat tools KDE provides.
@@mi2-c035 i tried too. It's confuse (for me) and not similar with i3 tiling techniques, which i prefer. I think a tiling mode would fit better in plasmashell if was built and well integrated by the KDE team themselves. Something like the System76 did with popshell
Also, I think that for those who wish to customize it Manjaro’s “Architect” system is a good choice (though I personally like the idea of NixOS more, since it is Emacs done right [running as the system, rather than as an application on it], but it still needs to mature a bit before mainstream) in the Arch family.
distro doesn't matter if you've seen or used over 500 different distros. and yes, window managers and desktop environments are the only factors we should care. btw I'm only a normal desktop user not a server one and I love Lumina DE the most for some reason. my start is actually Crunchbang so I also love openbox.
As everyone I started on Ubuntu. The thing is, after a few years I ended up back on Ubuntu again. I used Solus and truly loved it until one day it wouldn't boot. So I hopped over to Manjaro, which took some getting used to and I ended up loving that too until one day it just wouldn't boot. So now I'm back on Ubuntu where I've never had an issue like that.
The first distro I ever heard of and looked at was technically Linux Mint, but the first distro I ever used was Pop! OS then I moved to Zorin, Then I moved to Manjaro Gaming Edition for about a half a second, then Immediately switched to Linux Mint. I now use both Linux Mint and regular Manjaro. Weirdly I never heard of Ubuntu before switching a few distros, and when I did find out about it I didn't like it at all.
@Fyren Manjaro may break if you mess with the system. Once my wifi icon disappeared. And once my panel disappeared after I typed kill xfce4-panel. Reboot didn't fix it. So I use timeshift for backup
"If the desktop environment doesn't really matter, then you don't need a desktop environment" Adding more utilities and editing configs to achieve basic functionality/settings is fine for advanced users, but the average power user still needs solid defaults to encourage keybinds. That's why Pop!OS's keybinds are awesome - I don't agree with everything they do, but it's THE noob-friendly keybind experience.
DT, Hi! Can you make a video with everything you need to install alongside your Tiling Window Manager? You've mentioned something about some Daemons and I don't know where to search for this type of information. I think many people would be happy to see a video like that.
I can witness to the statement made about Mouse use giving Carpal Tunnel. I've lost most feeling in my right index finger and about 50% feeling in my right thumb. I have transitioned to using a Trackball Logitech ERGO for gaming, and a Keymecher Desktop Touchpad for everything else. I'm also moving to using more and more keyboard shortcuts and text entry for everything. Although the numbness in my hand has also effected my typing accuracy. Do not wait to start this transition! Even just moving some of your stuff away from the mouse can help. On distro, I use OpenSUSE Tumbleweed with the Gnome Desktop on Wayland & Pipewire. The simplicity of Gnome makes it real easy to control with the hand gestures built into Wayland on my touchpad. I miss KDE, but its harder to control with gestures. Adding Pipewire with Wayland allows me to screen share.
It's taken me a looong ass-time to figure this out, but so long as I have a shell, something the GNU tool-chain, Emacs and a browser, I'm happy. All operating systems are merely Emacs delivery vectors anyway. (BTW... I for one appreciate your using org mode!)
I agree with most of ur thoughts but I have never come across gentoo users that are rude to others. Infact they are very calm and welcoming to noobs which is why I like them
I remember one 🤣 he called people who use mice "rodent users" or something and had a lot of derisive things to say about various configuration schemes and software, but I've forgotten what most of them were. Tbf it was a user on a non-Gentoo forum, but he seemed to prefer Gentoo. I'm also sure such users could be found who favor any particular system: Debian, NetBSD, seL4, Minix, OSX, Windows, etc.
@AstroCat although most of it seemed to be genuine sentiment rather than trolling, based on all the configs etc the poster was sharing: some people who aren't trolls strongly hate things like "systemd" for example, not just to flame or get a rise out of people.
I think the main take-away from this video is that as far as distro's go... It's all comes down to the availability of packages. I wasn't aware just how fortunate I was on Manjaro until watching this. The AUR has been helpful from time-to-time, but 99.99% of the time I don't even need it. Packages are on point with Arch.
All very good advice. One thing to be careful of with testing ins VMs from a Linux host though is some keybindings may not work properly as even if the VM has the keyboard captured, the super key still generally tends to go directly to the Linux host, at least in my experience. I admittedly haven't try to find a way to fix that yet though if there is a way.
As so often, I agree with you, @DT . Personally, for my own use case as a somewhat experienced user and with my personal esthetic preferences and workflow, I'd recommend Manjaro KDE. I've tried one or two window managers, but they seem to me to be such a hassle to set up right. With KDE it took me about an hour to get it to look and behave just the way I want. Plus, the KRunner to me appears to be the perfect middle ground or halfway house between key bindings for applications and a menu: you type a tad more, but you don't have to set up and remember all those key combinations -just a few for apps you use very often, if you want to. All personal impressions no more, but I do think that Manjaro KDE does indeed provide a very comfortable place for a user who knows their way around but isn't exactly a real power user.
arcolinux xfce looks really good (has unique sardi icons set that suits xfce nicely), i would rather prefer to use or recommend it to others rather than manjaro xfce version. arcolinux supports over 20 desktop environments, so distrohopping could come to an end, there would be left desktop environment hopping rather. there are many things to learn.
What a wholesome video this is. This is what people need to hear, and they should be reminded of this, periodically throughout the decade. Plus, no one should feel that they're too good for a distro they're constantly using. If it becomes "easy" then you don't have to worry about much. You can just breeze through things with that [beginner] distro. One thing though, becoming a power user will take time. Depending on how much time investment someone partakes to make their life quicker and more convenient.
Been using Kubuntu and many other Debian based distros since 2007. I'll continue running them. I love Linux and learning but at the end of the day, I want a distro where I can expect it to continue working so I'm fine with older, stable packages. I think it would be nice to build your own distro from Arch and just modify it as you see fit but, that would take time and you may break many things along the way. "Noob" distros just work. Nobody should feel shame about running any Linux distro. We're all on the same kernel (more or less).
you make distro hopping sound easy, but it is a lot of work. in the best case you have home on a separate mount point and know about every configuration you did in etc. and even then it takes days
2:30 dunno about that. Using the keyboard puts much more strain on my finger-joints; In particular my left pinky, which I use to actuate the caps-lock ‐and other modifier keys- with, is strained from the lateral motion of the hand whilst holding down said modifier keys. I use semi-light linear switches in my main keyboard at work and at home. Never had the slightest problems with my wrist using the mouse.
A standard mouse and a standard Keyboard both has really bad ergo for your joints and can cause carpet tunnel, best practice with a none ergomatic mouse is to use your whole arm and not the wrist to mitigate it, for keyboards your only option is to invest in a proper splited ergo keyboard with the proper spacing for your shoulder. There isnt a really good way to mitigate it with a standard keyboard. So i have no idea why he thinks its "better" in this part when thats not the case, if it was a point of "productivity" then he has a bit more valid claim.
Actually, for a long time, the only thing that I paid attention to while choosing a distro to install was its desktop environment and its reconfiguration of that DE and the looks of it.
For me always Arch as the base and I like both Gnome and Cinnamon setup and fully customised to my liking. That way when I get bored of Cinnamon I log in to my Gnome desktop.
Obviously I am FAR more of a newbie than I had thought or even hoped! Because this all made perfect sense to me (conceptually), but you lost me at around 5:00, when you went straight into a distro I had never *heard* of and extensions which were even less familiar! Thanks for the basic advice, but I think I need to stick to less technical contributions for now.
In a broad sense. The only thing a distro offers is a package repositiory, and some system level tooling. Like a package manager. Of course some distros like Ubuntu have a lot of pre-configured programs and what not ontop of the default experience. But in the end of the day it's primarily the community and packaging infrastructure that matters.
Gnome has an overview, which I can access via hotcorner. This allows me to comfortably use my desktop both keyboard-only and mouth-only. Afaik gnome has the best mouth-only support, so I use it with my custom shortcuts with JustPerfection extention to disable most UI features.
Great for you. I have a co-worker that needs text-to-speech to perform her job duties. It is one of the reasons we have to keep a MS Office system up and running. Say what you will about MS, they have had voice recognition in MS Office for almost 20yrs now...working. We have examined and used many of the Linux text to speech applications, but none have performed as MS..
Some great points were brought up and hit close to home. I wouldn't call myself a power user by any means, but definitely not a noob when it comes to Linux distros. I've used it on and off for the best part of 2 decades. I can definitely relate to not wanting to use Linux Mint as it's geared towards new users. That said, I've always found it just worked with the least amount of headaches whenever I've installed and used it. Still think the greens butt ugly 🤣. I did like the blue edition they put out years ago. The only thing I disliked was that it did use much older versions of apps. But pretty stable. As for the if it's not broke don't fix it mentality on distros, it's a good way to be. I used Manjaro for quite a while until I had too many issues lately (updates breaking things), so tried some other distros out. Many others have worked just as well if not better (and some not so much LOL). These days when I'm looking for a distribution to replace another it's more to do as you said DT with what included and whats not. And that you can get all your programs in the repos.
I use to have that with qtile but I just had to install a specific dependency but it’s not really that big of a deal. Not all window managers have support for mouse cursors sometimes.
I don't consider myself a power user. I've tried a few distributions over the last year and a half. The community and support of Ubuntu have been great. I really like Ubuntu Studio, which I installed on my old laptop that I use to record my band rehearsals. I think Linux users get overwhelmed by choice at times because there's always someone pushing one distro over the other. Find a system you like stick with it and actually use your computer to do interesting things. The system you use is less important than what you actually do or create with your computer.
Great video DT. Yes Linux Manjaro based on Arch Linux with xfce4 is good. I really like xfce4 and I use it on my primer pure Arch Linux base installs. And yes I have used xmonad, dwm and i3 (I like and know how to configure them all) but my wife is lost without a desktop environment and the point click of a mouse is something that works for her. Gentoo is a great source code install Linux and is one of those under used Linux distribution with many possibilities. I would recommend having a good grasp on a Linux command line basics for disk partitioning, formatting, mounting, chroot , wget to grab stage three tarball for the initial base install. The Linux commands are much different for a Gentoo install, the emerge command, editing a make.conf file with use flags, compile options for processor cores. I have several computer systems now running Gentoo one with xfce4 and another running a WM called spectrwm. With Gentoo I install those systems and my pure Arch Linux systems using secure shell (ssh) via a network terminal target machine from a up running host machine by copying and paste long commands directly into a terminal connect to a boot usb or iso. Even still it could be days to get xfce4 compiled on Gentoo with some slow machines. Gentoo base installs with a desktop are time consuming but one can learn a lot about Linux (Portage System) .....
I feel like Spectrwm always gets overlooked as an easy to use WM with sane defaults. It doesn't get nearly as much love as it should on RUclips, etc...
@@ararattempest-lingua Comparatively I think Herbsluft gets much more attention. The sheer number difference of youtube videos is a testament to that. Although that being said I3, Awesome and DWM get all the glory.
@@themroc8231 yeah, i3 users still dominate the scene... but I don't really get the point of how special i3 is, it's just another tiling wm for me lol.
I have tried several different distros and as a semi-noob I have come to the conclusion that I really need the most vanilla mainstream distro. I choose Arch with KDE. The most important is the amount of software and the ability to get help on the net. It's not hard, there is even a GUI installer now. However, there are challenges, like installing VirtualBox with extension pack, guest utils and additions...oh boy...that's an exercise in Googling where a mainstream distro is a must, but I guess that goes for any distro...
Arch was the first linux distro I installed. It wasn't hard at all. It took about 3 days of research to make sure I fully understood what the hell I was doing. But I've been using linux for about 6 months now, I'm currently on popOS, and I can install arch now pretty quickly with just the install page on arch wiki. I still prefer to use an ubuntu base for the stability. But that's where my comfort level sits. Use what works for you.
I've been dealing with this since 2009, I even opened a RUclips debunking channel about astronomy, Nibiru etc. Things haven't changed a bit, it's only getting worse. People are more and more prone to fall for anything and get fanatical about their nonsensical beliefs. Btw massive kudos to you for this video that stands out from the Linux ones, all very informative indeed.
Good subject. The distro matters, simply because most of them suck. The desktop matters much more. I use Cinnamon on all distros, whether they offer it or not.
Hi DT community/family ! Indeed Arch is nice and moreover it is a rolling release but I will stick with Debian SID. In the end of the day, distribution does not matter at all but only our Freedom to use any of them. Peace :)
I spent some good time in i3 wm and now I am using GNOME just because I lost my config file (mybad) and I don't want to config all that from scratch again. I really like the tiling wm workflow, but I'm ok with someone else picking all the stuff for me. But the thing is: I don't think distros that come with a tiling window manager pre-configured are good, I have tried endeavourOS i3 edition and Arco Awesome edition and they look and feel more bloated than even ubuntu. I understand that having control over everything in your computer is a good thing, but I also like the integration between the elements in the mainstream desktop environments. So, in my opinion, if you don't use a tiling wm, there is no reason why you would dig into a non desktop environment jurney aside for leaning, cause it's kinda hard to have to figure out every single thing to get things working. But if you would like to learn, you should definitely install vanilla arch and have some fun using window manager only.
You can take a supposedly noob distro like mint and do anything you like with it. I type this on a mint 19 machine running bspwm and polybar. You may have to compile software not in your repos but it can be done without too much fuss.
if the desktop env doesn't really matter, then choose the leanest desktop that will use the least computing / CPU resources, least memory resource, least cycles to load. Those resources can now b channeled 2 your applications
hmm, that's pretty true, you can think in a GNU/Linux distro as a collection of software ... choose your init-system, libC, X/Wayland, WM/Compositor, a shell, an editor, some command line utilities and some extra fancy software in flatpak/snap/appimage
Use whatever *you* are comfortable with. If you are reliant on GUI programs and pre-built desktop environments, that's fine. Cinnamon, MATE, XFCE, and most others are really versatile, with plenty of different customization options. You can do a lot of things you can do with standalone window managers in those DEs, like assign keybinds, tile windows, etc. Personally, I find setting up a standalone WM pretty intimidating. I've been working on an Awesome WM configuration for a while now, and while I absolutely love the look and feel of it for the most part, there are some things I just haven't been able to figure out. I've been meaning to find a configuration that's a bit more developed I could build off of, but haven't had the time. Usually, I'd rather just use Cinnamon though, it's what I know and love and the workflow is more comfortable to me. While tiling window managers have some really good concepts, I more often just have one window maximized, and when I need to work on two things at once, I tile using Cinnamon's tiling functionality.
DT thanks for every day upload and opening our minds and eyes for wm's in many many videos :) yeah it's hard argument for many people, but hey people are different and not everyone is minimal fanatic :D
Depends, if you use something like KDE or Cinnamon, then the distro doesn't matter. If you use something like i3-gaps with a bunch of AUR packages, I would say to only use Arch.
I'm currently running completely suckless (dwm/surf/dmenu/st) and this setup has been a gateway to learning and experimentation with bash scripting. Also, I know exactly how my setup works, and it will not change without me choosing to change it, and then I upload my builds and dotfiles to github, and I can replicate my setup on any computer, and basically any varient of arch. I think this is the advantage of being a 'poweruser'
It really does matter what distro you use because most of the testing for software is concentrated in a few distros. As soon as you want to do anything uncommon the distro you use will affect your experience.
Linux distros, while they can be customized to look like everything else: there are two considerations that you use use to decide what is best. One is peripheral support. If you are trying to support a driver for say a printer or a scanner, you'd be better off with Debian because everyone makes Linux drivers for Debian. The other is rolling release: if you are looking for the latest and greatest Arch will be great for you. If you are looking for a simple install that has things made for you: Ubuntu, Mx Linux or Manjaro. Largely many distros cater to niches in the sense that they are preconfigured for security for example. But of course Linux is Linux,the question is do you have the patience to learn and install what you need.
I think a lot of Linux users have this notion that just because a distro is good for new users it must mean that it’s only for new users, which is an odd misconception. I’ve been using Linux for 18 years and I’ve ran probably 30-40 different distros over the years, including a 3 year stint on Arch. Nowadays I run Linux Mint with a tiling window manager setup nearly identical to what I used on Arch. I run Mint for a handful of reasons, and never once has it crossed my mind that I’m running a “noob” distro. In my eyes, I’m running a solid, stable distro in which I can fulfill all my software needs while still running my own tiling window manager environment.
Choose the desktop environment (DE) or window manager (WM) take works for you today. If you have more flexbility and a gradual ramp up of productivity is acceptable - your livelihood is not on the line - consider choosing the DE or WM that you ultimately want to use daily, but might not be comfortable with yet. As DT said, experiment with various options within individual virtual machines to help make a decision.
Can you make a video about FAI and how to properly use it? I'm tired of installing a distro and customize it to my needs every time i use a different computer. FAI looks like the answer but I'm not that experienced to use it properly
I know this is an older video, but pretty great rant all around. I'm 100% a Linux noob. I've learned that basically the only true difference in distros is in the package manager and the repositories. Personally I'm a big fan of Arch, although I'm probably the worst type of Arch user. I use the archinstall script. Ironically I love how easy it is to setup, while still being super configurable. I love being able to pick my kernels, pipewire, file system, desktop environments, and get a very baseline system the way I want it with minimal effort.
Derek, I’m really curious for an answer to my question. My name is Robert and I’m 15. I want to start using Linux and start supporting open-source software. I am now starting to think about starting my own RUclips Channel “Technox”. My question for you is making videos on Linux for a “new user” be difficult? I am familiar with Manjaro, Mint, Ubuntu etc. Where would be a good start to creating a tech-Linux based channel? Is there a specific distribution that would be easier to cover for a new RUclipsr?
I consider myself an intermediate Linux user since 2011, and off and on between 2009 and 2011. Several times I have tried to create an Openbox configuration I could live with. Each time I fail. I just don't have the time to devote to configuring Openbox. I always go back to Cinnamon.
About 3: There's repository stability and system stability. Repository stability isn't something you want on a personal system, but system stability is. I want frequent updates that work, not old, dusty packages.
@@PhilipOlesen Stability is unified to the average User (System & Software Repositories). And Apps that work, no matter if they are new or old. There are old Apps that are better, lighter and safer than new Apps. We use Computers to run Apps. If our Apps do the job, the System is stable and they both remain stable after updates, then Mission Accomplished!
@@ilinuxos-easy.beautiful.po762 What I said is that to desktop users, system stability is is more important than repository stability. But for server use, repository stability is just as important for uptime and compatibility reasons.
Yeah for some reason it’s not available in Ubuntu or Debians repos so you have to compile it from source or install it using pythons package manager pip as long as you have the dependencies it requires. They tell you how on their website.
![Felix "Unfair" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Oswujxm2Ag0/mqdefault.jpg)
hey Derek, very nice of you to make this video to point the newbies in the right direction. I would have loved to have this when I first started
Thanks!
Hm.... I am a software engineer. I always follow the mindset that something should be able to function right out of the box without too much tweaking but customizable enough that I can tweak all parts of it if needed.
At work, I would often import third party module and libraries and I always ask do they do things I need without needing me to reinvent the wheels and write all the apis from scratch? Can it do the things I need it to do differently in another way? If no, how easier is it for me to extend it and implement the functionalities I need?
Customization just for the sake of customization is a waste of time and often result in more headaches(namely bugs) compare to out of the box modules which already passed QA and work as intended.
Linux desktops are more or less the same. If you need to replace a desktop or mod it extensively then go ahead. However, if you have no reason other than for the aesthetic, then don't. The desktop shipped out of the box are thoroughly tested by it's maintainers and are as reliable as it gets. Can't say the same for whatever you plan on replacing them with however.
"Anyone who can read can install Arch"... DT hasn't met my family. ;).
Anyone who has installed Linux From Scratch can install Linux From Scratch. 🤭
Why someome should choose arch over debían?
When you want software that was released yesterday and not a year ago , and when you want your laptop touchpad drivers and wifi card drivers to work , then you would choose arch
@@vim1729 Debian Sid go brrrr.
@@vim1729 no thanks.. been there done that...not for me. It's good until something borks up, then it is tinker, tinker trying to fix it. I need uptime, I need a working computer. Time is money and i don't have the time to play with a distro, i want it working for me.
Does mainstream distros matter? No.
Does a well-configured distro matter? Hell yes.
One fun fact about distro reviews on youtube is that 95% of them are actually desktop environment reviews. Since the distro doesn't affect your workflow in any significant way, there's nothing to show.
wow cool :D
eh, your package manager can. and stable vs unstable distros can REALLY disrupt your workflow
"You're not going to have the absolute latest package of everything on Debian."
A common criticism I've heard made and, I'll be honest, as long as there aren't excessive delays before things release on Debian, I don't see how it's a bad thing?
Stability trumps early adoption every time for me. It's one of the reasons I moved to Linux.
To be fair, he likely refers to Debian Stable’s glacial release schedule.
There are sometimes long periods (~1week) without using my computer at home. I'll never put any bleeding edge rolling distro on it... I don't want to update every few days I don't turn it on.
I do use Arch in other settings, but tools for jobs and etc
I agree it's not necessarily a bad thing, but it is something you ought to bear in mind when making your decision.
However, I'm yet to see noticeable stability differences between MX and Manjaro.
@@prgnify I have a small Intel NUC. I tried a lot of distributions (MX Linux, Manjaro, Ubuntu Mate, Garuda, ...): they were all not very stable. I had to reboot my desktop once or twice an hour because of my screen freezing. The only distribution that has been stable is Linux Mint LMDE with XCFE (Cinnamon exhibits some bugs). So for me, all these distros are definitely not the same in terms of stability. Debian is still the most stable distro and this really matters. Restarting your PC every now and then is a very annoying thing.
@@johnstanp9692 probably you don't installed nvidia drivers
Dude I swear his Patreon credits makes him sound like he is rapping! It's sick!
Agreed
I bet he secretly practices it!
I bet he's a hoot at poetry slams. :)
A Mint User here. I've distro hopped a lot and i found Mint the most practical and adequate for my workflow. I did some changes using some tips on your videos... thanks for the awesome content.
Hi DT, Wise words. Presently using Artix Runit (arch-based) with an overlay of xinit (startx), X, Picom, OpenBox, Nitrogen, Conky, URXVT, TMUX, NeoVim and LibreWolf (web browser). It works like a champ. Keep spreading the word and all the best.
I use Debian XFCE because its simple, stable, has lot of suppott and will work the same in five months.
same, debian is a "just werks" distro
I have been using debian for a very long time, but sometime i think that the release are king of slow, once you installed the latest debian released version you installation is just almost old ... at the same time the other end arch might be too bleeding edge. Still thinking about if i should be using such distribution
@@williamwu3457 Yes official Debian is slow...STABLE as a rock but slow. On my main daily driver notebook, I have used apt pinning (apt pin priority) to get more up to date packages. Using pinning, my main system uses the Stable repository, but for certain programs it will use the Unstable (or sometimes the developers nightly builds). On another notebook, I run Siduction Linux which is Debian using Sid (modified to work correctly and have few bugs)
enjoy your outdated packages
@@williamwu3457 Tried Arch and it was okay as far as stability. Recently installed Gentoo though and I feel it's the perfect mix of stability and bleeding edge. You can mix and match stable and unstable packages however you want. Portage (the package management system Gentoo uses) is really great at doing this and you can even install specific versions of packages. Definitely worth taking a look at!
I use Ubuntu 20.04. I have Dash to Dock, tmux, fish shell, Doom Emacs, the icons same as Garuda, and I’m genuinely happy with it all. I have been using Linux for about 6 months and your videos have definitely helped me out so much!
Mint is dope af. Don't be ashamed of using it. You can do whatever you want to do with it like in any other Distro..
I use Arch btw
@@fenn_fren Yes Manjaro is awesome too
yeah mint is pretty great
EDIT: mint BTW
@@ThylineTheGay my backup machine been running mint since 2018. Mint is like Ubuntu but on Steroids. The team behind this distro are awesome af.
I triple booted Mint, Arch and Windows, btw
@@nandoxus 20.1 has black screen issues
It's really heart warming to hear that from you. At the start of my Linux journey I was paralised through analysis and wasn't sure where I wanted to go. I was lost in the ocean of distributions. Now I'm happy with my set up using Gentoo with plasma and do not care too much about bloat anymore. Plasma is my favorite DE and as far as window managers go, I like DMW and i3 but still I can not go away from Kde. There may come the time when my Gentoo machine breaks and I wouldn't have any problem using Kubuntu or Arch with Kde.
Nice content as always!
I run Manjaro XFCE and I think I have very simple needs. I made my panels to look a little like Mac and I can't imagine needing a lot more customizing, or hopping - but I do love hearing about all the things you cover, DT.
You would love dwm if your into minimalism. Window Manager >> Desktop environment
8:10 If you like floating WM -> Awesome
If you like tiling WM -> Awesome
Me : Linux for life
Also me : Mac theme KDE with beautiful animations , shadows etc .
Linux is not about the themes.... It's about the freedom.
Do you use other non default animations when you say beautiful? If yes then can you name them please?
Hey, it's fine. When I use Xfce4 I make it look like Windows95. Kde is Windows95 with dark icons and animated wallpapers
this actually totally shows the power of linux. It can be lean and run on 50MB RAM, then also can have as much animations, shadows as you want.
Thats what they did in gaming version of garuda Linux.. Consume too much resources meh
Just discovered your channel and really loving it. Incredibly informative! I’m learning a great deal and you’re excellent at communicating info in an engaging way. I just wanted to thank you for getting me excited about Linux again… for me, it’s been an on-and-off love/hate relationship since 1999ish. I think it’s time to give it another whirl!
Great video DT! I was planning to comment about the important things to consider and the areas in which the distro you choose does matter. You covered that well roughly 5 minutes later.
18:03 "Anytime someone tells you what distribution to run [...] ignore those people" Absolutely correct! Very well said DT, great video
From wikipedia: "Mx Linux is based on Debian stable...with antiX components, with additional software created or packaged by the MX community. It was developed as a cooperative venture between the antiX and former MEPIS communities."
19:16 "Anyone who can read can install Arch"
Well, not completely. I reinstalled arch yesterday, using the manual.
It's perfectly easy to follow it until you get to "Boot loader" ( just before reboot, but it's kind of important).
Whereas in the previous sections it nicely outlines the commands you have to type to get a default working installation, in this section it's like they couldn't be bothered. It literally just says :
"Choose and install a Linux-capable boot loader. If you have an Intel or AMD CPU, enable microcode updates in addition."
And then you can click on "boot loader" which just presents you with a matrix of what you could install.
Of course, knowing that GRUB would be a good option I installed that. But if you don't know that, you'd be kind of stuck at that point unsure what to pick. Or worse you'd just skip the step thinking it's option and end up with system that won't boot.
According to DT, distro's do not matter, so the Arch install manual doesn't matter, hey it just don't matter so you should have no problems choosing what ever you want for the boot loader because it doesn't matter, in fact I think DT should move his family members over to Gentoo because distro's do not matter...
I tried sway but came back to KDE cause All things I could do in sway, I can also do in KDE (including tiling) but not the other way around.
yes. a lot of power users use plasma.
I am actually curious :) Could you give some examples?
@@andrasbiro6604 "Present Windows" by specific workspace or all workspace and filtering/searching window by its title. I open lot of browser tabs and sort them them in lots of windows so this features saves me a lot of time. krunner can also switch to browser tabs.
Screen corner shortcuts,
Wine Games actually being playable on plasma Wayland. ...etc. Since plasma 5.21, plasma Wayland is more stable and usable (at least when running wine) than sway for me.
yeah, but simplicity is also a benefit, at least for some people.
I have KDE and Qtile on Arch, depending on needs I switch back and forth, like for casual movie watching, browsing, maintenance and stuff I'll login with KDE, for development or other productive stuff only I prefer using Qtile. Personally I don't really enjoy the tiling in KDE.
I have found that my g502 mouse reduces the strain on my wrist to a large degree. Part of it may be that the mouse is the right size for my hand and lets me click the buttons with much less force than I was used to on cheap mice.
Derek I use a trackball which fixes a lot of the issues you mentioned with a mouse.
But, I've grown more and more in love with opensuse. Not sure why but gosh the appeal of btrfs snapshots setupbout of the box on a rolling release is great.
This is the reason why you are my favorite Linux channel!
As you grow older, the tiles get less and bigger. Finally you end up fullscreen and using keyboard short cuts. So in the long run the desktop environment does not matter at all. xD
For me it's Xubuntu minimal + Compiz-reloaded (and Cairo-dock). I'm not that much into tiling WMs (the 2x2 grid of Compiz or XFWM is enough for me) but man am I into animation, transparency and blur.
I admit I'm still hooked on my wobbly windows. It seems boring to shift an open window around that doesn't wobble.
I thought that already. I felt like it was "the only right thing" to use KDE Plasma... But I couldn't adapt anymore after experiencing i3. Then I accepted my fate and stuck with the tiling wm
you can technically integrate i3 in Plasma, replacing the default Kwin window manager, so you keep the tiling, gaps and shortcuts from i3 but also the neat tools KDE provides.
@@mi2-c035 i tried. It becomes a mess. i3 wasn't made to be used within plasmashell, and Plasma wasn't made to work without Kwin
@@edupazz They have khronkite, which turns Kwin into tiling,never tried personally.
@@mi2-c035 i tried too. It's confuse (for me) and not similar with i3 tiling techniques, which i prefer.
I think a tiling mode would fit better in plasmashell if was built and well integrated by the KDE team themselves. Something like the System76 did with popshell
@@edupazz I've been using Krohnkite with KDE for 5 months already. Saw no reason to switch to tilling wm like i3. I get to enjoy both of worlds.
Hey Dt, as a software engineer I like Manjaro, it's mainstream but ticks all the rights boxes for me. KDE version
I use the xfce version , manjaro is easily one of the greatest linux distro of all time
@@vim1729 It's my first distro and I don't se switching any time soon!
I love it too!
Also, I think that for those who wish to customize it Manjaro’s “Architect” system is a good choice (though I personally like the idea of NixOS more, since it is Emacs done right [running as the system, rather than as an application on it], but it still needs to mature a bit before mainstream) in the Arch family.
The i3 community version of Manjaro is great too.
distro doesn't matter if you've seen or used over 500 different distros. and yes, window managers and desktop environments are the only factors we should care.
btw I'm only a normal desktop user not a server one and I love Lumina DE the most for some reason. my start is actually Crunchbang so I also love openbox.
Happy 200k subs, congrats
As everyone I started on Ubuntu. The thing is, after a few years I ended up back on Ubuntu again. I used Solus and truly loved it until one day it wouldn't boot. So I hopped over to Manjaro, which took some getting used to and I ended up loving that too until one day it just wouldn't boot. So now I'm back on Ubuntu where I've never had an issue like that.
Each distro teaches us new things, like manjari taught me timeshift is important.
The first distro I ever heard of and looked at was technically Linux Mint, but the first distro I ever used was Pop! OS then I moved to Zorin, Then I moved to Manjaro Gaming Edition for about a half a second, then Immediately switched to Linux Mint. I now use both Linux Mint and regular Manjaro. Weirdly I never heard of Ubuntu before switching a few distros, and when I did find out about it I didn't like it at all.
@@omlachake2551 Same
@Fyren Manjaro may break if you mess with the system. Once my wifi icon disappeared. And once my panel disappeared after I typed kill xfce4-panel.
Reboot didn't fix it. So I use timeshift for backup
Your problems are probably because of your hard drive being loose or updating with other programs open
Thanks DT for this video
"If the desktop environment doesn't really matter, then you don't need a desktop environment"
Adding more utilities and editing configs to achieve basic functionality/settings is fine for advanced users, but the average power user still needs solid defaults to encourage keybinds. That's why Pop!OS's keybinds are awesome - I don't agree with everything they do, but it's THE noob-friendly keybind experience.
DT, Hi! Can you make a video with everything you need to install alongside your Tiling Window Manager? You've mentioned something about some Daemons and I don't know where to search for this type of information. I think many people would be happy to see a video like that.
Hey DT, just want to say thanks for all the great content.
I can witness to the statement made about Mouse use giving Carpal Tunnel. I've lost most feeling in my right index finger and about 50% feeling in my right thumb. I have transitioned to using a Trackball Logitech ERGO for gaming, and a Keymecher Desktop Touchpad for everything else. I'm also moving to using more and more keyboard shortcuts and text entry for everything. Although the numbness in my hand has also effected my typing accuracy.
Do not wait to start this transition! Even just moving some of your stuff away from the mouse can help.
On distro, I use OpenSUSE Tumbleweed with the Gnome Desktop on Wayland & Pipewire. The simplicity of Gnome makes it real easy to control with the hand gestures built into Wayland on my touchpad. I miss KDE, but its harder to control with gestures. Adding Pipewire with Wayland allows me to screen share.
It's taken me a looong ass-time to figure this out, but so long as I have a shell, something the GNU tool-chain, Emacs and a browser, I'm happy. All operating systems are merely Emacs delivery vectors anyway.
(BTW... I for one appreciate your using org mode!)
I agree with most of ur thoughts but I have never come across gentoo users that are rude to others. Infact they are very calm and welcoming to noobs which is why I like them
that's because they have to wait to compile everything, so they have learned patience! Lulz
I remember one 🤣 he called people who use mice "rodent users" or something and had a lot of derisive things to say about various configuration schemes and software, but I've forgotten what most of them were. Tbf it was a user on a non-Gentoo forum, but he seemed to prefer Gentoo. I'm also sure such users could be found who favor any particular system: Debian, NetBSD, seL4, Minix, OSX, Windows, etc.
@AstroCat although most of it seemed to be genuine sentiment rather than trolling, based on all the configs etc the poster was sharing: some people who aren't trolls strongly hate things like "systemd" for example, not just to flame or get a rise out of people.
The word Gentoo in my language translate to whore or prostitute don't know any that uses that distribution in my Country lol.
@@sheldon6786 Trolls like u shouldn't be using linux at all. Cuz its people like u who dont understand the philisophy of diffrent distros
I think the main take-away from this video is that as far as distro's go... It's all comes down to the availability of packages. I wasn't aware just how fortunate I was on Manjaro until watching this. The AUR has been helpful from time-to-time, but 99.99% of the time I don't even need it. Packages are on point with Arch.
Well explained. Enjoyed this explanation.
All very good advice. One thing to be careful of with testing ins VMs from a Linux host though is some keybindings may not work properly as even if the VM has the keyboard captured, the super key still generally tends to go directly to the Linux host, at least in my experience. I admittedly haven't try to find a way to fix that yet though if there is a way.
The truly intellection answer is no if you're just gonna end up living in emacs anyways.
As so often, I agree with you, @DT . Personally, for my own use case as a somewhat experienced user and with my personal esthetic preferences and workflow, I'd recommend Manjaro KDE. I've tried one or two window managers, but they seem to me to be such a hassle to set up right. With KDE it took me about an hour to get it to look and behave just the way I want. Plus, the KRunner to me appears to be the perfect middle ground or halfway house between key bindings for applications and a menu: you type a tad more, but you don't have to set up and remember all those key combinations -just a few for apps you use very often, if you want to.
All personal impressions no more, but I do think that Manjaro KDE does indeed provide a very comfortable place for a user who knows their way around but isn't exactly a real power user.
arcolinux xfce looks really good (has unique sardi icons set that suits xfce nicely), i would rather prefer to use or recommend it to others rather than manjaro xfce version. arcolinux supports over 20 desktop environments, so distrohopping could come to an end, there would be left desktop environment hopping rather. there are many things to learn.
What a wholesome video this is. This is what people need to hear, and they should be reminded of this, periodically throughout the decade. Plus, no one should feel that they're too good for a distro they're constantly using. If it becomes "easy" then you don't have to worry about much. You can just breeze through things with that [beginner] distro.
One thing though, becoming a power user will take time. Depending on how much time investment someone partakes to make their life quicker and more convenient.
Been using Kubuntu and many other Debian based distros since 2007. I'll continue running them. I love Linux and learning but at the end of the day, I want a distro where I can expect it to continue working so I'm fine with older, stable packages. I think it would be nice to build your own distro from Arch and just modify it as you see fit but, that would take time and you may break many things along the way. "Noob" distros just work. Nobody should feel shame about running any Linux distro. We're all on the same kernel (more or less).
you make distro hopping sound easy, but it is a lot of work. in the best case you have home on a separate mount point and know about every configuration you did in etc. and even then it takes days
2:30 dunno about that. Using the keyboard puts much more strain on my finger-joints; In particular my left pinky, which I use to actuate the caps-lock ‐and other modifier keys- with, is strained from the lateral motion of the hand whilst holding down said modifier keys. I use semi-light linear switches in my main keyboard at work and at home. Never had the slightest problems with my wrist using the mouse.
A standard mouse and a standard Keyboard both has really bad ergo for your joints and can cause carpet tunnel, best practice with a none ergomatic mouse is to use your whole arm and not the wrist to mitigate it, for keyboards your only option is to invest in a proper splited ergo keyboard with the proper spacing for your shoulder. There isnt a really good way to mitigate it with a standard keyboard. So i have no idea why he thinks its "better" in this part when thats not the case, if it was a point of "productivity" then he has a bit more valid claim.
Actually, for a long time, the only thing that I paid attention to while choosing a distro to install was its desktop environment and its reconfiguration of that DE and the looks of it.
For me always Arch as the base and I like both Gnome and Cinnamon setup and fully customised to my liking. That way when I get bored of Cinnamon I log in to my Gnome desktop.
Hey DT can you feature a vid on a distro that uses "Wayfire" as the WM/DE.. Garuda Wayfire is one such but there must be others out there....
Lately to install Arch you just need to type archinstall. Easy mode.
Obviously I am FAR more of a newbie than I had thought or even hoped! Because this all made perfect sense to me (conceptually), but you lost me at around 5:00, when you went straight into a distro I had never *heard* of and extensions which were even less familiar! Thanks for the basic advice, but I think I need to stick to less technical contributions for now.
In a broad sense. The only thing a distro offers is a package repositiory, and some system level tooling. Like a package manager.
Of course some distros like Ubuntu have a lot of pre-configured programs and what not ontop of the default experience.
But in the end of the day it's primarily the community and packaging infrastructure that matters.
Gnome has an overview, which I can access via hotcorner. This allows me to comfortably use my desktop both keyboard-only and mouth-only. Afaik gnome has the best mouth-only support, so I use it with my custom shortcuts with JustPerfection extention to disable most UI features.
Great for you. I have a co-worker that needs text-to-speech to perform her job duties. It is one of the reasons we have to keep a MS Office system up and running. Say what you will about MS, they have had voice recognition in MS Office for almost 20yrs now...working. We have examined and used many of the Linux text to speech applications, but none have performed as MS..
An excellent video👍 Thank you Agree that if you know Linux it's best to use a base distro w/ WM + apps I actually need to use.
Some great points were brought up and hit close to home. I wouldn't call myself a power user by any means, but definitely not a noob when it comes to Linux distros. I've used it on and off for the best part of 2 decades.
I can definitely relate to not wanting to use Linux Mint as it's geared towards new users. That said, I've always found it just worked with the least amount of headaches whenever I've installed and used it. Still think the greens butt ugly 🤣. I did like the blue edition they put out years ago. The only thing I disliked was that it did use much older versions of apps. But pretty stable.
As for the if it's not broke don't fix it mentality on distros, it's a good way to be. I used Manjaro for quite a while until I had too many issues lately (updates breaking things), so tried some other distros out. Many others have worked just as well if not better (and some not so much LOL).
These days when I'm looking for a distribution to replace another it's more to do as you said DT with what included and whats not. And that you can get all your programs in the repos.
Best distro for new Linux user is Linux from Scratch, Bedrock Linux, Gentoo & Arch
I try to keep people away from linux, plan9 is better
@Fsociety 00 I’ve been wanting to do that actually lol, I just don’t know how. I don’t even know how to replace gnu with busybox or toy box
gentoo is great
Real Linux users rewrite the kernel from scratch and go from there. Without an operating system installed.
@@bigpod arch isn’t that bad lol
BTW have you noticed that your mouse icon change when you hover to the panel
I use to have that with qtile but I just had to install a specific dependency but it’s not really that big of a deal. Not all window managers have support for mouse cursors sometimes.
@Deepak Negi I am not saying all window managers don’t but some of the more minimal ones might not.
I don't consider myself a power user. I've tried a few distributions over the last year and a half. The community and support of Ubuntu have been great. I really like Ubuntu Studio, which I installed on my old laptop that I use to record my band rehearsals. I think Linux users get overwhelmed by choice at times because there's always someone pushing one distro over the other. Find a system you like stick with it and actually use your computer to do interesting things. The system you use is less important than what you actually do or create with your computer.
Great video DT. Yes Linux Manjaro based on Arch Linux with xfce4 is good. I really like xfce4 and I use it on my primer pure Arch Linux base installs. And yes I have used xmonad, dwm and i3 (I like and know how to configure them all) but my wife is lost without a desktop environment and the point click of a mouse is something that works for her. Gentoo is a great source code install Linux and is one of those under used Linux distribution with many possibilities. I would recommend having a good grasp on a Linux command line basics for disk partitioning, formatting, mounting, chroot , wget to grab stage three tarball for the initial base install. The Linux commands are much different for a Gentoo install, the emerge command, editing a make.conf file with use flags, compile options for processor cores. I have several computer systems now running Gentoo one with xfce4 and another running a WM called spectrwm. With Gentoo I install those systems and my pure Arch Linux systems using secure shell (ssh) via a network terminal target machine from a up running host machine by copying and paste long commands directly into a terminal connect to a boot usb or iso. Even still it could be days to get xfce4 compiled on Gentoo with some slow machines. Gentoo base installs with a desktop are time consuming but one can learn a lot about Linux (Portage System) .....
hello derek can you make a video for making own custom linux distro or create an iso for current setup?
I feel like Spectrwm always gets overlooked as an easy to use WM with sane defaults. It doesn't get nearly as much love as it should on RUclips, etc...
also the same goes herbstluftwm I think.
@@ararattempest-lingua Comparatively I think Herbsluft gets much more attention. The sheer number difference of youtube videos is a testament to that. Although that being said I3, Awesome and DWM get all the glory.
@@themroc8231 yeah, i3 users still dominate the scene... but I don't really get the point of how special i3 is, it's just another tiling wm for me lol.
I have tried several different distros and as a semi-noob I have come to the conclusion that I really need the most vanilla mainstream distro. I choose Arch with KDE. The most important is the amount of software and the ability to get help on the net. It's not hard, there is even a GUI installer now. However, there are challenges, like installing VirtualBox with extension pack, guest utils and additions...oh boy...that's an exercise in Googling where a mainstream distro is a must, but I guess that goes for any distro...
Arch was the first linux distro I installed. It wasn't hard at all. It took about 3 days of research to make sure I fully understood what the hell I was doing. But I've been using linux for about 6 months now, I'm currently on popOS, and I can install arch now pretty quickly with just the install page on arch wiki. I still prefer to use an ubuntu base for the stability. But that's where my comfort level sits. Use what works for you.
I've been dealing with this since 2009, I even opened a RUclips debunking channel about astronomy, Nibiru etc. Things haven't changed a bit, it's only getting worse. People are more and more prone to fall for anything and get fanatical about their nonsensical beliefs. Btw massive kudos to you for this video that stands out from the Linux ones, all very informative indeed.
Good subject. The distro matters, simply because most of them suck. The desktop matters much more. I use Cinnamon on all distros, whether they offer it or not.
I usually like Gnome but recently I have developed more liking towards Cinnamon as well. I like how clean and coherent it is.
Hi DT community/family !
Indeed Arch is nice and moreover it is a rolling release but I will stick with Debian SID.
In the end of the day, distribution does not matter at all but only our Freedom to use any of them.
Peace :)
I am setting wallpaper with imagemagick. No need for additional dependencies if you have imagemagick already.
The distribution is the tool you start with. Depending on your needs it does matter. Certain desktops in my case, are missing vrr and stuff like that.
I spent some good time in i3 wm and now I am using GNOME just because I lost my config file (mybad) and I don't want to config all that from scratch again. I really like the tiling wm workflow, but I'm ok with someone else picking all the stuff for me. But the thing is: I don't think distros that come with a tiling window manager pre-configured are good, I have tried endeavourOS i3 edition and Arco Awesome edition and they look and feel more bloated than even ubuntu. I understand that having control over everything in your computer is a good thing, but I also like the integration between the elements in the mainstream desktop environments. So, in my opinion, if you don't use a tiling wm, there is no reason why you would dig into a non desktop environment jurney aside for leaning, cause it's kinda hard to have to figure out every single thing to get things working. But if you would like to learn, you should definitely install vanilla arch and have some fun using window manager only.
Any thoughts on doing a video on Bedrock Linux?
You can take a supposedly noob distro like mint and do anything you like with it. I type this on a mint 19 machine running bspwm and polybar. You may have to compile software not in your repos but it can be done without too much fuss.
How he gets outputs of the skull, other printings after opening the terminal ?
if the desktop env doesn't really matter, then choose the leanest desktop that will use the least computing / CPU resources, least memory resource, least cycles to load. Those resources can now b channeled 2 your applications
Unfettered Freedom MUST RETURN!
hmm, that's pretty true, you can think in a GNU/Linux distro as a collection of software ... choose your init-system, libC, X/Wayland, WM/Compositor, a shell, an editor, some command line utilities and some extra fancy software in flatpak/snap/appimage
Use whatever *you* are comfortable with. If you are reliant on GUI programs and pre-built desktop environments, that's fine. Cinnamon, MATE, XFCE, and most others are really versatile, with plenty of different customization options. You can do a lot of things you can do with standalone window managers in those DEs, like assign keybinds, tile windows, etc. Personally, I find setting up a standalone WM pretty intimidating. I've been working on an Awesome WM configuration for a while now, and while I absolutely love the look and feel of it for the most part, there are some things I just haven't been able to figure out. I've been meaning to find a configuration that's a bit more developed I could build off of, but haven't had the time. Usually, I'd rather just use Cinnamon though, it's what I know and love and the workflow is more comfortable to me. While tiling window managers have some really good concepts, I more often just have one window maximized, and when I need to work on two things at once, I tile using Cinnamon's tiling functionality.
As a power user I prefer Plasma, it has almost everything an advanced user needs
Go Arch and never look back. :)
DT thanks for every day upload and opening our minds and eyes for wm's in many many videos :) yeah it's hard argument for many people, but hey people are different and not everyone is minimal fanatic :D
What terminal email client do you use?
Depends, if you use something like KDE or Cinnamon, then the distro doesn't matter. If you use something like i3-gaps with a bunch of AUR packages, I would say to only use Arch.
I'm currently running completely suckless (dwm/surf/dmenu/st) and this setup has been a gateway to learning and experimentation with bash scripting. Also, I know exactly how my setup works, and it will not change without me choosing to change it, and then I upload my builds and dotfiles to github, and I can replicate my setup on any computer, and basically any varient of arch. I think this is the advantage of being a 'poweruser'
It really does matter what distro you use because most of the testing for software is concentrated in a few distros. As soon as you want to do anything uncommon the distro you use will affect your experience.
Linux distros, while they can be customized to look like everything else: there are two considerations that you use use to decide what is best. One is peripheral support. If you are trying to support a driver for say a printer or a scanner, you'd be better off with Debian because everyone makes Linux drivers for Debian. The other is rolling release: if you are looking for the latest and greatest Arch will be great for you. If you are looking for a simple install that has things made for you: Ubuntu, Mx Linux or Manjaro. Largely many distros cater to niches in the sense that they are preconfigured for security for example.
But of course Linux is Linux,the question is do you have the patience to learn and install what you need.
I’ve been on Mankaro for the past two years and I love it
I think a lot of Linux users have this notion that just because a distro is good for new users it must mean that it’s only for new users, which is an odd misconception. I’ve been using Linux for 18 years and I’ve ran probably 30-40 different distros over the years, including a 3 year stint on Arch. Nowadays I run Linux Mint with a tiling window manager setup nearly identical to what I used on Arch. I run Mint for a handful of reasons, and never once has it crossed my mind that I’m running a “noob” distro. In my eyes, I’m running a solid, stable distro in which I can fulfill all my software needs while still running my own tiling window manager environment.
Choose the desktop environment (DE) or window manager (WM) take works for you today. If you have more flexbility and a gradual ramp up of productivity is acceptable - your livelihood is not on the line - consider choosing the DE or WM that you ultimately want to use daily, but might not be comfortable with yet. As DT said, experiment with various options within individual virtual machines to help make a decision.
I would say disto matters a bit when it comes to software package availability. Number of packages and latest versions. Unless you build from source.
Even if you build from the source code, sometimes it is a PITA. I tried to compile Krita. I'm still not done.
Actually, as I became more experienced with linux, I moved from arch to debian stable. True story
A wise man once said, "Arch is great if you don't value your time"
Can you make a video about FAI and how to properly use it? I'm tired of installing a distro and customize it to my needs every time i use a different computer. FAI looks like the answer but I'm not that experienced to use it properly
I don't like updating anything so I chose Debian.
Noob question, where to get those ASCII art in the terminal?
Neofetch
I know this is an older video, but pretty great rant all around. I'm 100% a Linux noob. I've learned that basically the only true difference in distros is in the package manager and the repositories. Personally I'm a big fan of Arch, although I'm probably the worst type of Arch user. I use the archinstall script. Ironically I love how easy it is to setup, while still being super configurable. I love being able to pick my kernels, pipewire, file system, desktop environments, and get a very baseline system the way I want it with minimal effort.
how did you make openbox menu transclucent???
Derek, I’m really curious for an answer to my question. My name is Robert and I’m 15. I want to start using Linux and start supporting open-source software. I am now starting to think about starting my own RUclips Channel “Technox”. My question for you is making videos on Linux for a “new user” be difficult? I am familiar with Manjaro, Mint, Ubuntu etc. Where would be a good start to creating a tech-Linux based channel? Is there a specific distribution that would be easier to cover for a new RUclipsr?
I consider myself an intermediate Linux user since 2011, and off and on between 2009 and 2011. Several times I have tried to create an Openbox configuration I could live with. Each time I fail. I just don't have the time to devote to configuring Openbox. I always go back to Cinnamon.
What matters:
1) User Interface.
2) Available Apps.
3) Stability.
About 3: There's repository stability and system stability. Repository stability isn't something you want on a personal system, but system stability is. I want frequent updates that work, not old, dusty packages.
@@PhilipOlesen Stability is unified to the average User (System & Software Repositories). And Apps that work, no matter if they are new or old. There are old Apps that are better, lighter and safer than new Apps. We use Computers to run Apps. If our Apps do the job, the System is stable and they both remain stable after updates, then Mission Accomplished!
@@ilinuxos-easy.beautiful.po762 Indeed, system stability is the important one to desktop users.
@@PhilipOlesen System stability is important to every User of every device. Desktop, Laptop, Phone, Tablet etc. Not only Desktops. :-)
@@ilinuxos-easy.beautiful.po762 What I said is that to desktop users, system stability is is more important than repository stability. But for server use, repository stability is just as important for uptime and compatibility reasons.
18:50 you can't get qtile in debian based distros
Yeah for some reason it’s not available in Ubuntu or Debians repos so you have to compile it from source or install it using pythons package manager pip as long as you have the dependencies it requires. They tell you how on their website.
@Deepak Negi Ah alright makes sense. I also saw somewhere that it was really out of date could be wrong about that.
@@warhawk_yt I think it still uses python2
@@himanshushukla787 I am pretty sure it’s python 3.
@@warhawk_yt Okay