Distro-hoppers anonymous

Colonel Panic · 2023-09-13 19:23:18

Thanks for the information unklar, though I'm a bit tired at the moment so will give your suggestions a try later.

As for being the only one with this problem, one of the first things I do when I have a difficulty of this kind is google it to see whether or not other people have had the same problem and there's a quick and easy fix for it (and when there is, I've usually posted it in the "Tips" section of this website).

What I've noticed this time is that it has cropped up several times on other distros' forums and usually with distros that use very up-to-date software (such as Manjaro). No easy fixes though as far as I can see unfortunately.

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2023-09-13 19:35:21)

or1o9 · 2023-09-17 08:28:13

I am very sidetracked at the moment by Rhino Linux, Xfce based on the Ubuntu devel repositories. Comes with the "Unicorn desktop", which is a couple of things of their own on top of Xfce. Comes with rhino-pkg their own pkg manager that covers apt, pacstall, snap e t c, nala and some other stuff. Personally this have been a very interesting experience for me. Link to website below for more information about it.

https://rhinolinux.org/landing/

Unfortunately this has made me skip the alpha iso of Boron. But I sincerely hope to have time and energy for the beta/rc when that time comes.

Nili · 2023-09-18 07:35:40

My next target would be Fedora 40/KDE next year. With the release of Plasma 6, I want to test it with this OS from scratch on my real hardware.

Until then, Tumbleweed it has served me wonderfully for about a year. Really stable distro for a rolling release.

Colonel Panic · 2023-09-21 22:47:46

Another good distro; Spiral, by the same dev (I think it's only one) who brought you the Gecko set of distros based on OpenSUSE.

I downloaded the XFce version.Spiral is based on Debian and from running the update it looks like oldstable as well (but still nothing wrong with that).

https://spirallinux.github.io/

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2023-09-21 22:49:29)

Martin · 2023-09-22 05:54:22

Installed Spiral XFCE on my Lenovo X230 a month or so ago. Works just fine but I am mostly in i3 rather than XFCE.

/Martin

Colonel Panic · 2023-09-25 10:49:21

Martin wrote:

Installed Spiral XFCE on my Lenovo X230 a month or so ago. Works just fine but I am mostly in i3 rather than XFCE.
/Martin

Great! There's also one called Debian Easy that I've just seen on the Spiral forums and which is based on Spiral but with a few additional features for ease of use, extra repositories, and uses Btrfs as its default file system.

It doesn't really qualify as a full additional distro though; it's more of a spin or fork of Spiral.

https://debianeasy.github.io/

Martin · 2023-09-25 17:39:48

I took a look at Debian Easy too but decided to go for Spiral. Spiral also uses Btrfs as default file system.

/Martin

Colonel Panic · 2023-09-26 18:55:22

Fair enough. It probably doesn't matter much for most of us here; the distro is aimed at people who are new to Linux (and Debian).

The Spiral dev is (as most people here know) the same one who is responsible for Gecko, and they've said on the Gecko forum that they're moving away from OpenSUSE and are going to be concentrating on Debian and Spiral in future.

Incidentally, I've tended to shy away from Btrfs recently because of a bad experience I had a while back where the utility which deleted old restore points didn't work and I ended up having to do it all manually instead (which got to be a pain). I use ext4 practically always now and don't see a good reason to change; it basically stays out of my way and, on the occasions when something goes wrong with it, it is quick and easy to put right.

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2023-09-26 19:12:39)

or1o9 · 2023-10-02 18:56:41

Spiral Linux 12.231001 release has arrived.

https://github.com/SpiralLinux/SpiralLi … t/releases

Rhino Linux 2023.3

https://rhinolinux.org/news

Last edited by or1o9 (2023-10-02 19:13:48)

Colonel Panic · 2023-10-13 19:28:35

I've been getting a problem with OpenSUSE Leap recently, where any attempt to boot it up hangs at the message "A start job is running for (device) /no limit," and the distro fails to boot.

I've found a solution that works, for the time being anyway; boot the distro from the option labelled "Advanced options for OpenSUSE 15.5" and, at the next menu, boot from "OpenSUSE (recovery mode)". Then the distro boots and works normally.

In other news; I've installed Debian 12.1 from a cover disk of a Linux magazine and it's working well. I also downloaded Voyager 23.10 beta accidentally (don't ask how that happened), so I decided to go ahead and install it. It's working fine though I can't seem to warm to it; I don't really like any version or derivative of Ubuntu apart from Mint, which this computer came with (Edit: the versions of Bodhi I tried were good too though I haven't downloaded any recent ones).

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2023-10-16 22:24:36)

Martin · 2023-10-14 07:35:13

unklar wrote:

Martin wrote:
unklar wrote:
The result of the installation on bare metal.
I am also testing dk on bare metal, on my side-kick Lenovo X230. Right now it is running i3 as I have not had time to make audio volume and screen brightness adjustments work.
/Martin
i3 is cool

Are you still using dk?
I still havn't got audio volume and screen brightness adjustments buttons to work so some leads wouldn't be out of the way.

/Martin

unklar · 2023-10-14 11:58:23

Martin wrote:

unklar wrote:
Martin wrote:
I am also testing dk on bare metal, on my side-kick Lenovo X230. Right now it is running i3 as I have not had time to make audio volume and screen brightness adjustments work.
/Martin
i3 is cool
Are you still using dk?
I still havn't got audio volume and screen brightness adjustments buttons to work so some leads wouldn't be out of the way.
/Martin

Yes.
dk has replaced plasma in siduction for me.
However, this is a desktop installation.

I still have dk in @cog's 'pecos' on a ThinkPad 500.
Here the brightness and volume buttons work fine, without my intervention. It uses pipewire and wireplumber.

Colonel Panic · 2023-10-29 18:30:41

I've just installed the latest version (38) of Ultramarine, a distro which is based on Fedora and which describes itself as a successor to Korora (which was also based on Fedora, and which I used to like).

The flagship edition (which is the one I have) uses Budgie as its window manager, has a very cool looking ice blue theme and works well enough but it doesn't come with a particularly wide range of software for a 1.9 GB download (there's no E-mail program included, for example).

Fedora 39 is due to be released any day now, but updating Fedora to its latest version is straightforward provided it's from the immediately previous one (so it should be fine).

EDIT: I've just updated Nobara which is also based on Fedora; it was a 1.8 GB download, which is par for the course with any Fedora-based distro. You need either a fast connection or a lot of time and patience to manage any of them.

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2023-10-30 13:06:27)

unklar · 2023-11-08 18:57:04

I found another pearl today... with Hyprland and Sway, on archlinux.

A few ISO-Live pictures (I already made some space on my HDD's)

You can find them here.

Colonel Panic · 2023-11-08 22:18:14

unklar wrote:

I found another pearl today... with Hyprland and Sway, on archlinux.
A few ISO-Live pictures (I already made some space on my HDD's)
https://i.imgur.com/xXaqiZOt.jpg https://i.imgur.com/gkV91yqt.png https://i.imgur.com/WIVuiNmt.jpg https://i.imgur.com/vqlPp33t.png
You can find them here.

Excellent! I like the listed key bindings as well.

Edit: In other news, Nobara crashed for no obvious reason after I'd upgraded it so I deleted it and installed Exton's latest spin of Fedora Rawhide instead.

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2023-11-11 22:04:06)

unklar · 2023-11-14 09:14:56

Colonel Panic wrote:

unklar wrote:
I found another pearl today... with Hyprland and Sway, on archlinux.
A few ISO-Live pictures (I already made some space on my HDD's)
https://i.imgur.com/xXaqiZOt.jpg https://i.imgur.com/gkV91yqt.png https://i.imgur.com/WIVuiNmt.jpg https://i.imgur.com/vqlPp33t.png
You can find them here.
Excellent! I like the listed key bindings as well.
Edit: In other news, Nobara crashed for no obvious reason after I'd upgraded it so I deleted it and installed Exton's latest spin of Fedora Rawhide instead.

For those interested:

I needed two installation attempts on the desktop computer.

Initially, the localization didn't work properly. The main problem, however, was that I didn't understand this 'archinstall.script' at first.
I just couldn't understand why a /boot partition with fat32 and flag had to be created at the beginning of a bios-only system.

If you leave the automatic installation to the script, it will flatten everything on the disk in the usual M$ manner. In wise foresight I therefore 'only' had the test HDD in the computer. Goodbye, nox with BL-Boron

The script did not accept the partitioning with MB, MiB, GB or GiB specifications. It wanted the start and end sectors. One advantage is that you can always go back until it fits.

This was then accepted:

During the first run, I noticed that something was permanently writing to the .xsession-errors. Within 20 minutes it easily reached ~700KB. Only from another system was I able to find the cause, namely the missing backlight and battery.
After unchecking the corresponding panel settings, it behaves normally.

Hyprland and Sway hang up quickly, especially when working with applications across several workspaces. As a rule, "Exit Compositor" and restart helps here. Sway also has problems with the windows fitting into the screen area and not reaching into the panels at the top and bottom.

However, this may also be due to the computer being overtaxed by the computing power. (This is because the T500 laptop with integrated and discrete graphics already fails the live operation of the ISO.)

All in all, this is excellent work with the nwg-shell. It prevents the .json files 'behind' it from being edited by hand (which they don't like at all).

Colonel Panic · 2023-11-21 00:13:50

I've just upgraded Voyager 23.10, based on Ubuntu of the same version number (so not the LTS version); it went well, but was another very big download (1,132 MB), so it's perhaps not the best distro for those with slow connections. Here's a review of it;

https://www.zdnet.com/article/voyager-2 … p-to-date/

I'm also experimenting with tiling inside stacking window managers such as Budgie, which has an add-on program available called Window Shuffler that does basic window tiling based on the four quadrants of the desktop. It can apparently be set up to produce other grids than the 2x2 one, but that is more complicated.

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2023-11-21 00:30:19)

Martin · 2023-11-25 18:09:36

Any sane Ubuntu derivatives out there? By sane I mean 'de-Canonicaled' and with good defaults for file systems, snapshots/backup and safety. On the Debian side of the Linux woods we have Spiral and MX-23 for instance.

The reason for asking is I have a brand new computer and one thing I plan to do with it is to dive into the world of open source finite element analysis. Most such programs are available for both Debian and Ubuntu but maybe with a more options for Ubuntu users (I am still investigating, currently following these tutorials http://tuxriders.com/videos/setup/ ).

If I find I am better off with Ubuntu I would like to avoid 'vanilla' Ubuntu. I have multi-year experience of that at work and I can live with it but if I have a choice I prefer something else.

There is Linux Mint and that is where I came from when I started using Crunch Bang Linux. I remember I felt good about that move but don't remember what issue I had with Mint. It is some 15 years ago so it is perhaps not valid today anyway.

Then we have PopOS and Tuxedo OS 2 but I have a problem with written and video reviews. They focus too much on what things look and feel like and mostly ignore what happens behind the scenes. Things like the file system set-up and back-up preparation done in Spiral Linux. One review of Tuxedo OS 2 looks a bit on that and it looks interesting.

Any else?

Live OS testing suffers from the same limitation as most published reviews. You only get a sense of the looks and feeling but not the other things I mentioned above.

/Martin

Colonel Panic · 2023-11-25 20:02:42

Hi Martin,

Not sure what you mean by "sane". I mostly avoid sandbox-based utilities such as snap and flatpack, and I can manage just fine in either Voyager or Mint (the two Ubuntu-based distros I've got at the moment) without using them. It's also easy to install either one to your hard drive with the partition formatted with ext4 if you want to avoid btrfs as I do.

I've got a live DVD of Pop! somewhere but haven;t installed it. There's a reasonably informative factsheet about it though;

https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/differenc … vs-pop_os/

I agree with you about most distro reviews by the way. I like Liam Proven on The Register; he does at least try and install things. Here's a link to his page;

https://www.theregister.com/Author/Liam-Proven

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2023-11-25 20:39:21)

Martin · 2023-11-25 21:56:21

Colonel Panic wrote:

Hi Martin,
Not sure what you mean by "sane". I mostly avoid sandbox-based utilities such as snap and flatpack, and I can manage just fine in either Voyager or Mint (the two Ubuntu-based distros I've got at the moment) without using them. It's also easy to install either one to your hard drive with the partition formatted with ext4 if you want to avoid btrfs as I do.
I've got a live DVD of Pop! somewhere but haven;t installed it. There's a reasonably informative factsheet about it though;
https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/differenc … vs-pop_os/
I agree with you about most distro reviews by the way. I like Liam Proven on The Register; he does at least try and install things. Here's a link to his page;
https://www.theregister.com/Author/Liam-Proven

Thanks for this input.

I downloaded a Voyager ISO a few days ago but it refuses to boot for some reason.

I have problems with Tuxedo OS 2 as well.

These are the only Linux ISOs that have caused me grief ever.

Btw, I have used btrfs since 2015 or so and is fully satisfied with how that has worked. On my old (current) machine virtual machine disk images live on a separate ext4 partition and for the life of me I can't remember why :-) More on that in a separate thread if I can't figure it out.

/Martin

#2081 2023-09-13 19:23:18

Re: Distro-hoppers anonymous

#2082 2023-09-17 08:28:13

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#2083 2023-09-18 07:35:40

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#2084 2023-09-21 22:47:46

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#2085 2023-09-22 05:54:22

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#2086 2023-09-25 10:49:21

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#2087 2023-09-25 17:39:48

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#2088 2023-09-26 18:55:22

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#2089 2023-10-02 18:56:41

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#2090 2023-10-13 19:28:35

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#2091 2023-10-14 07:35:13

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#2092 2023-10-14 11:58:23

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#2093 2023-10-29 18:30:41

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#2094 2023-11-08 18:57:04

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#2095 2023-11-08 22:18:14

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#2096 2023-11-14 09:14:56

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#2098 2023-11-25 18:09:36

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