this post was submitted on 20 Nov 2024
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Linux

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

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[–] Icecreamface@lemmy.ml 3 points 4 hours ago

It's kind of crazy how windows get exponentially shittier every release.

[–] Mwa@lemm.ee 2 points 7 hours ago

Even it's not windows 10 eol, having windows 10 feels useless.

[–] limelight79@lemm.ee 1 points 8 hours ago

I need to do this with my gaming computer yet. I run Linux on my other machines (and have for many years), but this one is Windows. I bought the computer in 2021, but it doesn't have the trusted computing module, so I can't upgrade it to Windows 11 even if I wanted to.

Last night I tried to add an SSD that I had from a laptop that died, figuring I'll put a fresh install of Linux on the second SSD and not touch the original drive. Unfortunately, the computer didn't want to boot off the original drive any more - even when I changed the boot priority to the original drive, I still got grub from the new drive. I had to disconnect the new SSD to get the computer to boot Windows on the original drive (I wasn't ready to do the Linux install and might need Windows in the mean time).

I know it's a temporary issue at worst, as the installer will likely pick up that Windows installation and make it an option in grub. But it was a setback I wasn't expecting. I figured I'd put in the drive and have it just idling there until I had time to run the Linux installation.

[–] PushButton@lemmy.world 15 points 19 hours ago

I upvote for a non-AI thumbnail.

God I am tired of them!

[–] A_Union_of_Kobolds@lemmy.world 34 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Took my first steps last night, I flashed a USB stick with Mint Cinnamon and gave it a spin. Looks like it'll handle everything I need to just fine, so imma start partitioning and backing up the next couple evenings and just go for it. I've installed Linux before, but only really as temporary solutions. I'm looking forward to making it my daily driver and learning the system.

[–] Libb@jlai.lu 16 points 1 day ago

Took my first steps last night, I flashed a USB stick with Mint Cinnamon and gave it a spin.

Happily using Mint myself, welcome onboard ;)

[–] Nergon@piefed.social 9 points 1 day ago

Welcome aboard! Linux Mint was the first distro I daily drove, so it still has a special place in my heart even though I haven't used it in years. One quick tip, check out SaveDesktop It's not a proper backup utility, but it makes it very quick and easy to restore all your apps, settings, and layouts if something ever breaks / you switch distros / you want to experiment with multiple desktop layouts.

[–] thatsnothowyoudoit@lemmy.ca 6 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

Longtime every OS user. But have been using Linux since the days of Mandrake in ‘96. Switched to Debian shortly thereafter though mostly as a server/SDN device. Then a long spell on Ubuntu starting with 8.something. While I don’t use Linux on the desktop as my primary work OS, I do use it daily.

Recently, annoyed with windows, which I only used/booted up for gaming, I gave gaming on Linux a try. It’s been mostly flawless even when the games aren’t Linux-native. Hilariously Ubuntu was awful and I couldn’t get it working so I’ve switched to something more gaming specific and couldn't happier.

[–] Baggie@lemmy.zip 5 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

What are you using now? I've been thinking of switching to popos but I'm keeping my eyes open for options.

[–] thatsnothowyoudoit@lemmy.ca 1 points 10 hours ago* (last edited 10 hours ago)

Garuda.

I’d never used Arch or Arch derivatives but if this is the experience I understand the memes a little more.

The package management is easy and very up to date. I like the BTRFS snapshots, and it had everything game-related available right out of the box. My Nvidia graphics card, which was the thing I couldn’t get working on Ubuntu, performed as well or better than under windows.

The only thing that didn’t work for me was ZFS - but because everything else was working well, I just went another route.

[–] jjlinux@lemmy.ml 12 points 1 day ago (4 children)

OpenSUSE is hardly what I would consider noob friendly, but it certainly beats remaining under Microsoft's oppressing thumb.

[–] data1701d@startrek.website 10 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I mean YaST is kind of snazzy, though not enough to pull me from Debian for the moment.

[–] jjlinux@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 day ago

Yeah, I'm basically married to Fedora at this point.

[–] muhyb@programming.dev 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Leap is surely noob-friendly.

[–] ReversalHatchery@beehaw.org 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

how do they do regular updates? how do they do major version upgrades?

I think both of these is a big pain point.

[–] muhyb@programming.dev 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

They're fine for a stable release I think. Nvidia is on 550 for example. For Major updates, ping me next year since I'll try it then, when new Leap arrived.

[–] ReversalHatchery@beehaw.org 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I don't understand, sorry. what I meant is the way you as the user do upgrades. you grab a terminal, elevate and run the system update command (zypper refresh, zypper update). major version upgrades are more complicated.

I can do this sure. But this is not noob friendly the slightest. and the YaST graphical tools don't make it much better either.
I won't say that the update system of windows is good because why the fuck does searching for updates minutes, and other reasons. but the UI of it is much better. it tells you what will it update, it has a button for starting the process, an automatism for it too. there's also a menu for the update history.

[–] muhyb@programming.dev 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Not sure when the last time you used openSUSE but the reason why I think it's noob-friendly is you don't need a terminal to update the system (talking about the KDE version here). When there is an update a notification pops up, you go to system tray, click on the icon and do the updates. You can even see a list what's been updating. It doesn't even ask a password, probably thanks to polkit.

[–] jjlinux@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Could that be my issue? I've always done Gnome. WiFi is always broken. Network in general really.

[–] muhyb@programming.dev 3 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

To be fair, that sounds like a driver issue rather than a desktop environment. But you can try though.

[–] jjlinux@lemmy.ml 2 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Could be. What blows my mind is that both my PC and laptop work on Fedora, PopOS, Endeavour, and Bazzite out of the box, but network is fully broken, LAN and WiFi.

[–] muhyb@programming.dev 2 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

Does network work on those distros but not on openSUSE, or network doesn't work at all?

Maybe it's a switch issue? Can you try sudo rfkill and see what's the output?

[–] jjlinux@lemmy.ml 1 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

They work on any other distro I've tried. OpenSUSE is the only one that never gets an address. Static or DHCP, doesn't make a difference. I'll try again with your suggestion from a USB drive, since I don't remember all the things I tried that did nothing to help. Thanks.

[–] muhyb@programming.dev 1 points 7 hours ago

No problem.

Hmm, if there was a soft-block or a hard-block that would affect all the other distros as well. In that case, trying from a Live ISO would indeed help. Maybe this could be something related to Network Manager. Can you check interfaces with ip a?

Also check if Network Manager running with systemctl status NetworkManager. If it doesn't work, start it with sudo systemctl start NetworkManager, then chekc your connection again.

[–] twinnie@feddit.uk 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I use it at home just because I wanted to try something different on my laptop, I really don’t understand what some people love about it so much. It’s bot terrible or anything, I just find it a bit clunky and there’s nothing remarkably good.

[–] that_leaflet@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago

The big thing it has going for it is that they set up btrfs snapshots out of the box so you can rollback if necessary.

They also do more automated testing than Arch so theoretically it should be more stable.

[–] eldavi@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

opensuse was my shortest experiment when i used to distro hop because of how old their software seemed to be. (ie old like debian stable).

this was almost 20 years; has it gotten better?

[–] muhyb@programming.dev 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

My first experiment with openSUSE was also not ended well back then but nowadays it's in my top 3 list when I'm suggesting distros to people.

[–] eldavi@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

... nowadays it’s in my top 3 list when I’m suggesting distros to people

same here; but only because of the support like red hat's and canonical's

[–] jjlinux@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I've tried it a few times over the years, but always find it clunky when coming from Fedora, so I end up jumping right back. It's also a real shitshow with my System 76 laptop WiFi, just doesn't play nice and takes to much work to make it functional.

[–] eldavi@lemmy.ml 2 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

i take back what i said; i just discovered that suse isn't going to support opensuse anymore.

[–] lancalot@discuss.online 2 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

I tried to find sources on that but failed. Could you help me out?

[–] eldavi@lemmy.ml 3 points 5 hours ago* (last edited 5 hours ago) (1 children)

i was wrong. i misread the article thinking that opensuse was going to turn into an analogue similar to centos stream ending up with suse eventually sun setting opensuse like red hat is doing with centos; but no, they're ARE doing a centos stream like model but it's going to be back and forth between opensuse leap and opensuse tumbleweed.

opensuse is back on the recommended list. lol

[–] lancalot@discuss.online 3 points 4 hours ago

Thank you for the clarification 😊!

[–] passiveaggressivesonar@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago (4 children)

Why did we all collectively choose mint?

[–] Grass@sh.itjust.works 15 points 1 day ago

its easy, less gross than ubuntu/canonical, if mint specific instructions aren't available for something then ubuntu or debian instructions will generally work without much adaptation if any, etc.

[–] tee9000@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago

I dont need my OS to be a challenge or a flex.

[–] Zink@programming.dev 2 points 20 hours ago

It’s polished and easy to use, it leverages all the work that goes into Debian and Ubuntu, but it’s still Linux under the hood and doesn’t forbid you from getting into the weeds.

I run Mint Cinnamon on my work machine, developing software for embedded Linux products, and I haven’t had any regrets.

Because common advice isbto use Mint for beginners.