I have tried Linux as a DD on and off for years but about a year ago I decided to commit to it no matter the cost. First with Mint, then Ubuntu and a few others sprinkled in briefly. Both are “mainstream” “beginner friendly” distros, right? I don’t want anything too advanced, right?
Well, ubuntu recently updated and it broke my second monitor (Ubuntu detected it but the monitor had “no signal”). After trying to fix it for a week, I decided to wipe it and reinstall. No luck. I tried a few other distros that had the same issue and I started to wonder if it was a hardware issue but I tried a Windows PC and the monitor worked no problem.
Finally, just to see what would happen I tried a distro very very different than what I’m used to: Fedora (Kinoite). And not only did everything “just work” flawlessly, but it’s so much faster and more polished than I ever knew Linux to be!
Credit where it’s due, a lot of the polish is due to KDE plasma. I’d never strayed from Gnome because I’m not an expert and people recommend GNOME to Linux newbies because it’s “simple” and “customizable” but WOW is KDE SO MUCH SIMPLER AND STILL CUSTOMIZEABLE. Gnome is only “simple” in that it doesn’t allow you to do much via the GUI. With Fedora Kinode I think I needed to use the terminal maybe once during setup? With other distros I was constantly needed to use the terminal (yes its helped me learn Linux but that curve is STEEP).
The atomic updates are fantastic too. I have not crashed once in the two weeks of setup whereas before I would have a crash maybe 1-2 times per week.
I am FULLY prepared for the responses demanding to know what I did to make it crash and telling me how I was using it wrong blah blah blah but let me tell you, if you are experienced with Windows but want to learn Linux and getting frustrated by all the “beginner” distros that get recommended, do yourself a favor and try Fedora Kinoite!
edit: i am DYING at the number of “you’re using it wrong” comments here. never change people.
(CONTINUED)
This second comment only exists because all I wanted to say didn’t fit in the previous one.
So without further a due.
“However, it seems to be less ambitious in scope and vision.”
I will not commit to a rigorous comparison in which their respective PR talks or points related to ambition, scope and vision are mentioned. Instead, I’ll put forward reasons for why I believe this to be the case.
- Fedora has mentioned (two and a half years ago) that they want for Fedora Atomic to be the default. openSUSE has yet to make similarly ambitious statements regarding MicroOS. At best, we’ve Richard Brown (lead MicroOS Desktop) that states that he thinks Linux (or openSUSE) (can’t remember the exact statement) should only be consumed as MicroOS (Desktop). However, this is only the preference laid out by the project lead. This is especially interesting when one considers how much more logical it is for openSUSE Aeon to be the future of openSUSE Tumbleweed compared to Fedora Atomic to be the future of Fedora. Yet, less ambition…
- From inception, Fedora Atomic was very ambitious. The image that represents the system is created from ‘scratch’, layers are applied through
rpm-ostree, for the container workflow Toolbx’ inception is materialized. Reproducibility (to a very significant degree) is achieved. And, as mentioned earlier, it can even start boasting about being declarative (to a degree). By contrast, where does openSUSE Aeon stand? It’s only achieved atomicity. That’s it. No mention of reproducibility. No mention of the ambition to be declarative. Nothing. Their commitment to container workflows didn’t even lead to building in-house tooling. Instead, they "outsourced’ it by using an existing solution (first Toolbx and then Distrobox) that was derived (but ultimately became more of a superset) of Toolbx; i.e. Distrobox. Don’t get me wrong; I have preferred Distrobox over Toolbx (and will probably continue to do so). However, isn’t it painfully obvious that one is inferior (in ambition) when its has to rely on tooling provided by the other? - The debacle of Kalpa. Like, how is it possible that it has remained in Alpha with no positivity surrounding it for over a year. Additionally, there doesn’t seem to be any effort in helping the clearly struggling single maintainer of the project. Meanwhile Fedora Atomic is working on its ARM/Asahi remix and the one with COSMIC as its DE. And, honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised if Fedora releases those two before Kalpa leaves Alpha…
- Container-based, but limited in scope. openSUSE is (as they proclaim) committed to the container-based workflow. However, their base system continues to be one relying on btrfs snapshots rather than OCI or whatever container-based solution is out there. Heck, Vanilla OS and blendOS were using something similar with their original inception; ABRoot for Vanilla OS*. But, somehow, a group of developers from Vanilla OS were able to erect a f*ck tonne of tooling for (effectively) their reimagining of Fedora’s model. Like, how can this group of developers succeed where openSUSE seems to fail? I literally fail to understand. Heck, the same could be said for blendOS that’s headed by a (very talented) teenager. Somehow, even Fedora seems to be more committed to the container workflow. At least, their efforts suggest as such.
- In over two years since I’m on Fedora Atomic, I’ve seen so many developments; it’s actually astonishing. OCI has been adopted for updates. And even
bootchas been successfully created to tackle some problems. The ambition is clear. Meanwhile, I just don’t see the same advancements for openSUSE MicroOS. Heck, even YaST, one of openSUSE’s killer features is absent. Why? One of the reasons is because it allows for too much customization… Peculiar. Because I thought that openSUSE’s reliance on btrfs snapshots would allow them to customize a lot more easily. But, unfortunately, this doesn’t seem to be the case. - Like how all of these efforts are inspired from NixOS, we see that a lot of projects are also inspired by Fedora Atomic. They take over their ways and allow themselves to be inspired by them. Vanilla OS’ maintainers (among others) have basically accepted doing this as well. We don’t see this (to that degree) for openSUSE. The only thing I’ve seen is atomic upgrades through btrfs snapshots. That’s it. It’s unfortunate, but that’s literally it.
- For some reason, MicroOS Desktop was an afterthought until Richard Brown brought it up in 2019. By contrast, at that point, Fedora had released its Fedora Atomic Workstation (what would eventually become Fedora Silverblue) for over a year.
The writing above was a lot more ramble-y and unorganized compared to what I write usually. Blame my aching wrist. Regardless, it should be more than enough. However, if you disagree or if I’m wrong, then I’d love to hear about it.
And, if you somehow believe that openSUSE Aeon is more ambitious than Fedora Atomic, then please feel free to state why you think that to be the case.
Edit: I just noticed how I missed a question:
I am not sure I understand what you mean by:
Consider checking up on where Wayland, systemd, PipeWire, PulseAudio etc first appeared; so on which particular distro.
So, it was meant for you to notice the trend of how new, (r)evolutionary and crucial tech (i.e. software) are first adopted on Fedora. For each one of them, if you look at their respective wiki page, you can check how it’s adopted and from which distro it started out. This trend has been going on for quite some time and will continue to be the case.
Btw, I apologize for the insane info dump 😅.
