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My main dev PC is running on Arch as well, and I have no intention to switch, but I'll disagree with many of the sibling comments: Arch breaks all the time. On

My main dev PC is running on Arch as well, and I have no intention to switch, but I'll disagree with many of the sibling comments: Arch breaks all the time. One day, a Gnome update breaks all plugins, in one case making login in X impossible unless you manually deactivate stuff using the shell. The next time, a kernel update makes sound stop working after waking up from standby. It's mostly small regressions, and they usually get fixed a week later, but something temporarily stops working at least once every 2 months. However, Arch also makes it much, much easier to run recent versions of, basically everything. You never have to fiddle around with 3rd-party package repos, you just install stuff and it works. It's how package managers are supposed to work, but not the experience I've ever had with Debian and Ubuntu. Of course, the fact that Pacman is fantastically fast compared to apt doesn't hurt either. I love Arch. In aggregate, I think it prevents more headaches than it causes. But you have to be prepared for some unexpected problems and fiddling around.

gchamonlive 6y ago
That can be minimized by understanding the update first, and searching for known compatibility issues. That can be automated by using the pacmatic wrapper.
pimeys 6y ago
I've been using Arch for at least 10 years now, but my home workstation is for some reason Ubuntu. Been thinking of updating to Arch there too, but this time using ZFS and doing snapshots before any update. Now when the next gen Radeons are coming, running the latest kernel starts to make sense again...
technion 6y ago
Every time I hear such a story, it involves Gnome or X or some similar GUI issue. I run Arch on headless servers and can't relate - maybe there's a connection there.
- ghthor 6y ago
  I've had none of those types of issues using XFCE and GPUs with in kernel drivers. Avoid gnome, avoid Closed source GPUs and I think you avoid 90% of these issues
ohazi 6y ago
> One day, a Gnome update breaks all plugins lol, that's just Gnome for you. For a long time, deliberately breaking plugins and themes was an officially stated policy of the Gnome developers, with the goal of forcing users into the extension-free Adwaita monoculture by attrition.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
mishoo 6y ago
This isn't an Arch problem, it's a Gnome problem. Extensions break all the time because in order to do anything non-trivial they must use "undocumented" APIs (well, there's no documentation anyway, just a hello world tutorial and then may the source be with you). I know it because I wrote my own extension [1] in order to make this desktop bearable. After a while, though, I switched to KDE and life's good again. [1] https://github.com/mishoo/boring-gnome-mishoo.github.com https://github.com/mishoo/boring-gnome-mishoo.github.com

gchamonlive 6y ago

That can be minimized by understanding the update first, and searching for known compatibility issues. That can be automated by using the pacmatic wrapper.

pimeys 6y ago

I've been using Arch for at least 10 years now, but my home workstation is for some reason Ubuntu. Been thinking of updating to Arch there too, but this time using ZFS and doing snapshots before any update. Now when the next gen Radeons are coming, running the latest kernel starts to make sense again...

technion 6y ago

Every time I hear such a story, it involves Gnome or X or some similar GUI issue. I run Arch on headless servers and can't relate - maybe there's a connection there.

ghthor 6y ago
I've had none of those types of issues using XFCE and GPUs with in kernel drivers. Avoid gnome, avoid Closed source GPUs and I think you avoid 90% of these issues

ohazi 6y ago

> One day, a Gnome update breaks all plugins lol, that's just Gnome for you. For a long time, deliberately breaking plugins and themes was an officially stated policy of the Gnome developers, with the goal of forcing users into the extension-free Adwaita monoculture by attrition.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

mishoo 6y ago

This isn't an Arch problem, it's a Gnome problem. Extensions break all the time because in order to do anything non-trivial they must use "undocumented" APIs (well, there's no documentation anyway, just a hello world tutorial and then may the source be with you). I know it because I wrote my own extension [1] in order to make this desktop bearable. After a while, though, I switched to KDE and life's good again. [1] https://github.com/mishoo/boring-gnome-mishoo.github.com https://github.com/mishoo/boring-gnome-mishoo.github.com