/tech/ - Technology

>>24658
all archlinux does is tail debian and fedora while fumbling it with their own atrocious release model (i.e. none). it has all of the problems of the current systemd stack and only a fraction of the testing that goes into the software on the other distros.

mint or fedora I guess. Be prepared to learn how to fix shit regardless of distro

>>24660
>wojak meme
>in video form with unfunny voiceover
why did i decide to watch this
>>24661
rolling release is weird but whatever
>systemd bad
meh. i doubt a new linux user cares about init implementation politics

>>19683
Honestly, every distro is the beginner distro depending on what you want to do with it. If you're impatient or my mom then you install Ubuntu and forget about it. But if you want to enable some cool features, whether for security, privacy, customization or just less bloat and more performance then you're better off with less beginner-friendly distros. Obviously sticking with just vanilla Ubuntu is not recommended but if you're a Windows user who hates spending time with a computer on anything other than WORK-WORK-WORK then it's good enough. Better than Windows I guess.

>>19683
>Hello, I've been wanting to switch to Linux for awhile now, but I'm not sure which distro I should use. What distro would you anons recommend I use?
Unless you are forced to by your work (be a redhat sysadmin and get RHCSA certified), then i'd choose a debian based distro, if not just Debian itself. Google runs gLinux internally which is essentially just Debian with a cinnamon desktop and a few slight modifications.

Debian has stood the test of time. its the ur-linux distro. If you are really brand brand new Linux then i recommend Debian-derived Ubuntu + Ubuntu derivates like Linux Mint, Pop Os, Kubuntu, etc.

>>19684
FPBP. My left, microsoft hating, non technically savvy friends use mint with no trouble. Cinammon is a comfy traditional DE. It also won't pull in snaps by default. I like Pop for the GNOME extensions and Scheduler, but I have a hard time recommending it to new users.

>>19687
>IMO you can start with any "advanced" distro if you give yourself the time to learn it.
People don't want a learning curve on their email and web browsing machine.

>>24868
>People don't want a learning curve on their email and web browsing machine.
Email and web browsing aren't a distro thing, unless you want every program preinstalled like ur mom. The only questions are whether a distro has a graphical package manager and whether it carries niche options like palemoon and ungoogled-chromium or you need to compile them yourself.

When i was using arch, for the first few month my workflow consisted purely of searching for programs, installing programs with a command and typing the program name in a terminal to launch it. Occasionally i would install a toolbar for launching programs or edit my wm rightclick menu. Anyone with a weekend to spare can get used to this!

The tipping point in complexity for using a distro with scant sysadmin knowledge comes when you need to manually build system software or write your own initscripts. Before that everything is a point, click and write a couple lines you memorized from a wiki affair.

>>24870
Onboarding and upkeep ARE a distro thing and the more complicated they are the more they get in the way of using the computer to do things. For some reason Linux attracts sparetime sysadmin LARPers who think they're the penguin's tits for telling new users to suck it up and learn their 1970s paradigms. It is perfectly reasonable to expect a good email client, web browser, and office suite to be preinstalled. Ubuntu got big by being an easier Debian and doing precisely that before they sold out to Amazon. Mint continues that legacy.

Aside: Arch sucks and deserves its reputation for breaking. It is absurd to be proud of spending "a few months" on setting up a basic DE with the essentials. Furthermore, Nix eats AUR's lunch in terms of stability, package count, and package freshness: https://repology.org/repositories/statistics/newest. Usually there's only a handful of programs I need the latest and greatest version of and I'm perfectly comfortable building them by hand on a more stable distro.

>>24879
>It is absurd to be proud of spending "a few months" on setting up a basic DE with the essentials.
Learn to read. I was talking about the workflow i had for a few months before i started getting comfortable in the terminal. It mostly involved typing package install commands and graphical program names into terminals, which is imo a foolproof way to use a distro without a preinstalled desktop environment after adding something like openbox or fvwm to xinitrc.
>Arch sucks and deserves its reputation for breaking.
I agree. Read >>19687 again.

Linux is Only Free if Your Time is Worthless

>>24891
Time is not worthless. Time is actually more worth than money.

>>24892
Linux is a kernel, not an OS. And i see many people getting that wrong here, if we compare Linux, the Kernel, to something like NT or Darwin, it's clear which is better. Linux is much, much, MUCH better than anything Microsoft or Apple have created, and this is the simple truth. Linux distributions greatly vary, and if you go into Linux expecting an Experience similar to windows like alot of people here, you're in to get disappointed. The Linux philosophy of "Everything is a file" is alot better than the Registry way of doing things in Windows, which is chaotic and cluttered at the very best. Package Managers that manage your packages for you are superior to every single way of installing apps on Windows, as you can run kernel updates and install all your apps through them. I see many people here afraid of using the terminal, yet another way Windows has caused brain-damage. Why the terminal is used soo often in Linux is because it simply is the superior way of doing things. It's faster and more efficient, it isn't something you should be afraid of using, it's an integral part of the OS and is a very powerful tool. The Heirarchal File System linux uses makes it much more secure, if there is a new vunerability in OpenCL, I'd have to update every single app in windows that uses the vunerable version, whilst on linux only the OpenCL package itself has to be updated. linux has one blaring issue and it's the reason why it hasn't taken over and that issue is Software-support. driver issues are long gone with distros like Pop!_OS and Manjaro that make both easy. I personally used windows for many years and because of how used to the way it does things, I had a very difficult learning curve when switching to Linux, but I did see the sense in the way Linux did things, and unlike many people here, I didn't rage quit because something didn't work the way it does on Windows. if you prefer windows, that's your opinion and it's as valid as any other. But if you hate Linux for not doing things like windows, you're braindead.

>>24891
muh time is money
got any more bourgeois aphorisms for us to yawn to

>>24894
>Linux is much, much, MUCH better than anything Microsoft or Apple have created, and this is the simple truth.
we have no basis to say that because we dont have access to those kernels, being proprietary. In any case I don't think it really is. Monolithic Kernel is a 1960s paradigm, linux only caught on due to being unix like and free. Even Windows NT is a hybrid kernel.

We aren't going to start over and we are likely stuck with linux so its a moot point, but if you had to start over something like Redox OS's microkernel is far superior. Saying Linux monolithic 1960s style kernel is a good idea is basically just cope.

>>24894
the terminal is inferior to a graphical interface for most things an end user would actually want to do. its vulnerability to typos and semantic pedantry is fatal in a society with the level of literacy that we've got - and that's on principle, without even getting into the love of over-shortening commands in unix-derived systems. (list > ls, 50% efficiency gain!)
clicking the wrong button, hitting back/cancel and trying again is simply less tedious than having the computer spit out some wanky error message because you forgot to close your quotation marks. the first step gives you feedback every step of the way, the second leaves it to the end to announce that you have fucked up. the more i dwell on this, the more i wonder why attempts to fix it aren't more prominent: why not dynamically parse what's typed and print, in a little box, an explanation of what will happen if you hit enter? or why not allow commands to be assembled out of Scratch-like code blocks, with only valid options appearing? there are countless attempts to make a distro where you don't have to touch the terminal (doomed for any user who wants to do more than browse the web) but there seem to be few prominent attempts to advance the new user experience of the terminal beyond the 1980s (when someone had the bold, innovative idea of putting it in a window on a GUI system.)

>>24901
linux being fully customizable automatically makes it better than windows or macos to me

>>24902
GUI is a waste of electricity and processing power for server systems considering no ones looking at it 99% of the time. Half the time the server admin doesn't even login he just writes a script to automatically manage it en masse (i.e. using ansible, etc.)

>>20716
sexy color scheme tho. i like manjaro and gruvbox schemes the most with nord a distant third

>>24902
>>24904
As a programmer this is so fucking funny to me. Yeah waste your time developing a GUI when a command or even an ncurses interface will do the same job without introducing even more potential bugs.

>>24904
most end users do not want to run a sever.
>>24908
"as a programmer i'm a lazy elitist who most likely writes software of use only to programmers, server admins, and so on." forgive the aggressive paraphrasing but: we know, the type is not uncommon. write a program the end-user would actually want to use before bragging that you make no effort to let them do so.

>>24910
>most end users do not want to run a sever.
most end users of *linux* actually are running a server. desktop linux users are a small percentage of overall linux users.

>>24910
Incredibly Karen behavior. And you feel fucking proud of it.

>>24917
given my post was not even specifically about linux, but about the terminal in general, this conversation is unlikely to go anywhere useful. it is built on a foundation of stand. enjoy the rest of your day.

>>24918
if i was wrong you would be rubbing it in my face, bragging about how actually you write word processors and image editors, spreadsheet software and 3d modelling programs, video capturing and editing software, screen readers for the blind, automatic subtitling for the deaf, and color-profile-changers for the color-blind, but i am not wrong and so can offer only this incoherent outburst. (karen? really? that's the best you've got?)
here's a program you can write that someone might want to use, one that you can feel like a special little boy for making terminal only: an insult generator.

>>24910
some programs don't need a GUI, why waste time on a GUI no one is going to use anyways? learning a GUI is just as tedious(if not harder sometimes) as just learning a command. dare I say the command line is easier than GUI sometimes

>>24902
>the terminal is inferior to a graphical interface for most things an end user would actually want to do.
not necessarily, the modern gen/ of tech's jus been raised on the standard of the gui.
>its vulnerability to typos
can't speak for other distros, bu Arch recommends similar commands from typos. not rly a devastatin problem imo. lemme kno if u got any specific ex's tho anon.
>semantic pedantry is fatal in a society with the level of literacy that we've got
in the nicest way possibl, then myb the internet wasn't designed for everyone. i dont kno all the commands on linux, bu there all listed under /bin, an i dont use half of them on a daily basis. it aint too complex of a level of literacy, an if its rly that bad they aint got it, i got a simple solution: android.
>clicking the wrong button, hitting back/cancel and trying again is simply less tedious than having the computer spit out some wanky error message
there r undo commands on terminals aswell anon, an not sure wht distro ur usin where the error messages are "wanky". myb python? i was workin on a python script this evenin an i was reminded how retarded debuggin processes is for the language. other than that no nothin comes to mind, again, feel free to give ex's.
>the more i dwell on this, the more i wonder why attempts to fix it aren't more prominent: why not dynamically parse what's typed and print, in a little box, an explanation of what will happen if you hit enter?
–help.
>or why not allow commands to be assembled out of Scratch-like code blocks, with only valid options appearing?
mad-storage-dependent.
>there are countless attempts to make a distro where you don't have to touch the terminal (doomed for any user who wants to do more than browse the web) but there seem to be few prominent attempts to advance the new user experience of the terminal beyond the 1980s (when someone had the bold, innovative idea of putting it in a window on a GUI system.)
idk i think its quite simple, if it aint broke dont fix. operatin systems (good ones atleast) shld be designed 2 b efficent, not simple.
>>24910
>"as a programmer i'm a lazy elitist who most likely writes software of use only to programmers, server admins, and so on."
that's not wht anon was sayin, gui's do take a shitton more resources, its not the same. a good example off the top of my head'd be endeavour os's iso images: the non-gui iso (in the stable version) is 3gb less than the gui-iso. i might be wron bu am pretty sure this is the case. anyway, here's my takeway from my rant: always consider memory allocation and space, and cuttin out what aint necessariy. myb its the repacker and rust-programmar in me, idk, bu sum things r jus too bloaty that a system dont necessarily use. for instance, i own a latitude d420 that was made in 2001, an i'd love to run a "jus-works" distro like mint-cinammon, bu the gui shit jus slows the bitch down by suchhhh a degree, i jus had to bite the bullet and downloa minimal packages via arch. i gotta imagine its the same for other users, guis can jus b bloaty sumtimes, it aint jus a server developer issue.

>>24902
I think you don't hate the terminal so much as how the UNIX shell works. Unix specifically is terrible because all it knows is strings, and thus shit breaks constantly due to formatting errors, and you have to fuck with regex constantly. Read the Unix Hater's Handbook, research Lisp machines and Lisp REPLs, learn about old mainframe OSes and Multics, learn about JSON and semantic web tech and ways to pass around typed data.

a similar problem is with programming where most tools are extremely primitive and only deal with plaintext, and use a large chain of parsers to gradually convert the plaintext into something with an abstract structure. this prevents any tools being able to have an idea of what you're trying to do while you're programming, and using that info to aid you at all. and also necessitates writing an entire language parser any time you want to extract data out of that plaintext, which is a massive pain in the ass.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Ab3ArE8W3s

unix's obsession with text is a sin and is one of the worst ideas in computer science.

>>24920
>here's a program you can write that someone might want to use, one that you can feel like a special little boy for making terminal only: an insult generator.
lel
I think instead of getting angry at "IT" (half-formed homunculi) from now on I'll say "I'm not angry, just disappointed"

>>24926
lisp machines are cool but I dont really see the point of them in the modern era

Linux Mint is easy to install and use. Debian is also good.
Tip: Use Linux hardware database to check Linux compatibility.
https://linux-hardware.org/

Before you install Linux, keep this dark truth in mind.

>>24967
gentoo works on any hardware and architecture + is the fastest and most stable distrodoesnt matter if it is rolling release
install gentoo: https://gentoo.org
>>24970
they are just sponsors

also beginners must suffer, they should be forced to begin with LFS actually

imo you should all switch to gentoo, it is simply superior in all aspects compared to any other distro. even beginners should go for gentoo if they want quite literally the best system in the world

>>24972
>they are just sponsors

COPE.

>>24972
and why are they sponsoring? how does a corporation, with fiduciary duty to its shareholders, justify that?

>>24978
>>24975
mostly they are just paying for the LF to manage the development of linux because they use linux themselves?

>>24975
>>24978
idk but linux still remains libre software(GPL2) and possibly richard stallman approved so no there's no possible spooks behind the sponsors aside from just >>24979 also linux-libre is a thing if you want a completely despooked kernel, assuming that there is no backdoor hidden in plain sight like the xz backdoor

>>24981
we're all fked anyway because of proprietary hardware backdoors

>>25010
not me, I have both core2duo and AMD FX computers, idk if risc-v phones are a thing though

>spend like 4 hours on the clock configuring GNOME to use pop-shell on NixOS
>post nix clarity hits
>realize I should have just installed nix on pop OS instead and not had the hassle
Should I just accept defeat and go back to pop or double down now that it's 80% working how I want. I didn't want it to be like this, I just wanted to write haskell…

>>25020
GNOME is meant to be configured by autistic maintainers who do it for free. Try setting up a window manager with various standalone widgets and your setup will become far more simple and comprehensible.

>>25011
But anon, your OS is possibly having a backdoor.

>>25023
>Try setting up a window manager with various standalone widgets and your setup will become far more simple and comprehensible.
I left my ricing days behind when I started working anon. I just want out of the box tiling with vim controls and all the DE niceties. GNOME with pop-shell is the closest right now, but I'll probably switch to cosmic when it's stable.

bump im gonna hop distros tomorrow, so someone choose for me.

>>25027
NixOS. Suffer with me.

>>25027
endeavour cuz space

>>25027
openbsd

>>25030
only good 4 servers imo.

>>25027
https://gentoo.org
>>25024
after that xz backdoor scandal anything is possible when it comes to backdoors imo

>>25026
Fvwm-crystal has a lot of DE functionality working mostly out of the box, including desktop icons. Fvwm in general also has some tiling options.
>>25027
http://sabo.xyz