7 ms·

Props to those of you still slugging it out in the “Get my fav niche distro to work like a basic desktop OS” trenches. Did a lot of that in my twenties.

pxc 3y ago
When I was a teenager, I guess I spent some time like that, wrangling the GNU userland into coherence on Gentoo. But after a couple years, I came out the other side, and that's why I chose to run niche distros as my main OS. I knew that whatever was disagreeable, I could swap out for something else. I knew that whatever was missing, I could package it myself. And at some point, it really did stop being a problem. One of my biggest frustrations at work, where my only choices currently are macOS and Windows, is that they can't seem to provide me a workstation that functions reliably and predictably compared to what I've gotten used to on my 'fav niche distro'. It boggles my mind how unstable contemporary proprietary desktops are, especially when you tack on the meddling of corporate IT with obscure policy tweaks and a host of corporate spyware. I've even found hardware compatibility and integration pretty lacking on both systems compared to NixOS.
drakerossman 3y ago
Thank you for your comment velcrovan, but I don't agree with this sentiment. I've been using Ubuntu for personal laptop for a decade, and whatever for a given corporate laptop, and was reluctant to dig into NixOS, until it clicked - the point is to have it done once, and you won't have to do it ever again! NixOS is the only one that allows so.
- WastingMyTime89 3y ago
  > the point is to have it done once, and you won't have to do it ever again! NixOS is the only one that allows so. Until the tooling introduces a breaking change or new cooler way to do things appear and people stop supporting the old way because "everyone switched anyway". Been there, done that.
  - Ericson2314 3y ago
    When you upgrade NixOS there are always warnings on anything deprecated telling you what to do.
    - WastingMyTime89 3y ago
      I guessed so. So it’s not at all done once, never done again as the OP suggested but rather done once, now keep redoing something slightly different every fortnight and enjoy your constantly half-broken system. In a way, it’s reassuring to see that niche Linux distributions have changed so little in the decade since I last used one.
      - mksybr 3y ago
        this is presumably why guix calls itself "an advanced packaging management system". if you don't want to futz around with that kind of thing theres always ubuntu which mostly just works and even comes prebaked with activedirectory support so you can argue with your IT department about it :)
      - yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
        > now keep redoing something slightly different every fortnight and enjoy your constantly half-broken system. Yeah, if any of that is even remotely true then something is horribly wrong with your system.
      - Ericson2314 3y ago
        I only yet this once every 6 months. And the issues are resolved in minutes following the printed instructions (as opposed to crawling through arch wiki or whatever). Most of the time the deprecations require no action on my part, I simply rather keep things tidy and make the warnings go away. > In a way, it’s reassuring to see that niche Linux distributions have changed so little in the decade since I last used one. You are misunderstanding what I am saying. The situation is very different. There are still Linux/Wayland/NVidia/Whatever issues, but configuring NixOS is not among them.
- mksybr 3y ago
  I don't think NixOS is the only distro that has this property, what prevents someone from making a shell script that installs your applications and dotfiles? Blow away your OS install and get your set up back in one line is my experience and I don't run Nix or Guix for most of my applications
  - ParetoOptimal 3y ago
    > what prevents someone from making a shell script that installs your applications and dotfiles The reproducibility of that would not be nearly as high. For example, if the source of those applications is apt the versions of packages would change over time.
    - mksybr 3y ago
      yes, i am fine with that personally and its hard for me to grok what benefits reproducibility in the guix sense would get me here
      - rgoulter 3y ago
        One example was "I want to run an old version of Hugo". In the time since running the old version of hugo, enough about the system had changed: - The OS had changed significantly (so re-running an old build didn't work). - The compiler had changed significantly (so compiling from source would have been difficult). https://jvns.ca/blog/2023/02/28/some-notes-on-using-nix/ https://jvns.ca/blog/2023/02/28/some-notes-on-using-nix/
        mksybr 3y ago
        Great example! Managing old or multiple versions of software is actually a great usecase for Guix.
      - ParetoOptimal 3y ago
        > i am fine with that personally and its hard for me to grok what benefits reproducibility in the guix sense would get me here I read this as: > i am fine with the lack of reproducibility of apt-update personally and its hard for me to grok what benefits reproducibility in the guix sense would get me here To which my answer is: Guix gets you the reproducibility benefit of not having the reproducibility harming apt-update. Does this help answer your question or confuse things more?
- jt2190 3y ago
  > … I don't agree with this sentiment. Not the parent poster… I’m unclear what sentiment you’re disagreeing with: Are you inferring that velcrovan is against tinkering with niche distros?
  - yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
    I read it that way; it reads as "have fun playing with your broken, useless, toy OS". Traditionally followed by some comment about how they use a Real OS for Serious Work that definitely never breaks (conveniently skipping over the ways it breaks that they have to deal with).
    - velcrovan 3y ago
      Sorry, I should have included a /nosarcasm tag or something, that is definitely not how I meant it. I still enjoy the level of sleuthing and tinkering shown in the original linked post, I just choose to spend my time/energy budget on other kinds of challenges, rather than on my personal machine’s operating system. If I had the level of free time I had in my twenties I’m sure I would still be on Linux.
      - yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
        Okay, that does help to know. It's a weird position IMO (you really spend less time/energy on another OS's quirks?), but it's nice to know that it wasn't intended condescendingly.
- xyproto 3y ago
  Then the protocol changes from X to Wayland, python changes from 2 to 3, gtk changes from 2 to 4 and systemd replaces core services...
  - pxc 3y ago
    NixOS actually navigated a change from OpenRC to systemd many years ago. You didn't generally have to change your service configurations because NixOS puts a bit of abstraction between you and the service management system.
  - yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
    You don't actually have to switch to Wayland, you can keep using X like for the last couple decades. The python change was annoying, but it took like a decade and I'm not sure it was actually user impacting; most distros switched packages over invisibly. Same for GTK and systemd; they were annoying for tinkerers and maintainers, but would an end user actually notice?
    - xyproto 3y ago
      End users can stay at old versions and old distros for as long as they like. Most users can benefit from security updates, though. They might also (maybe) get better performance, new features and a smoother user experience.
      - yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
        Okay? That has very little to do with anything I wrote. Xorg is maintained, python2 was maintained for a long time into 3's lifecycle, and GTK and systemd shouldn't have broken anything for users. None of this requires foregoing updates.
chrissoundz 3y ago
Props to those of you still at the mercy of your OS publishers (Windows, Ubuntu, Mac) who dictate your software, updates, how your hardware is used and general freedom. Did a lot of that in my teens. I boot my pc, login, press win+p, type in "fir" which autocompletes to firefox and it starts firefox. And I don't think this process will change much for the rest of my life. The alternative is a constantly changing menu UI, intrusive popups/notifications, deprecations, and a "oh wait sorry Firefox now has to be Certified from the app store", random telemetry data being sent over, strange unknown but necessary "computation" happening and what else have I missed?
- jswny 3y ago
  All of that sounds a lot better than spending an entire afternoon getting basic graphics to work for a desktop environment
- eviks 3y ago
  > what else have I missed You've missed the part where you can press win+r to launch Firefox immediately (or open if it's already launched, but inactive, or hide if it's active without any autocompletion) on any of those systems ignoring all of the menu UI nonsense, which is also workflow that can remain stable for the rest of your life (also, Firefox is also sending random telemetry data)

pxc 3y ago

When I was a teenager, I guess I spent some time like that, wrangling the GNU userland into coherence on Gentoo. But after a couple years, I came out the other side, and that's why I chose to run niche distros as my main OS. I knew that whatever was disagreeable, I could swap out for something else. I knew that whatever was missing, I could package it myself. And at some point, it really did stop being a problem. One of my biggest frustrations at work, where my only choices currently are macOS and Windows, is that they can't seem to provide me a workstation that functions reliably and predictably compared to what I've gotten used to on my 'fav niche distro'. It boggles my mind how unstable contemporary proprietary desktops are, especially when you tack on the meddling of corporate IT with obscure policy tweaks and a host of corporate spyware. I've even found hardware compatibility and integration pretty lacking on both systems compared to NixOS.

drakerossman 3y ago

Thank you for your comment velcrovan, but I don't agree with this sentiment. I've been using Ubuntu for personal laptop for a decade, and whatever for a given corporate laptop, and was reluctant to dig into NixOS, until it clicked - the point is to have it done once, and you won't have to do it ever again! NixOS is the only one that allows so.

WastingMyTime89 3y ago
> the point is to have it done once, and you won't have to do it ever again! NixOS is the only one that allows so. Until the tooling introduces a breaking change or new cooler way to do things appear and people stop supporting the old way because "everyone switched anyway". Been there, done that.
- Ericson2314 3y ago
  When you upgrade NixOS there are always warnings on anything deprecated telling you what to do.
  - WastingMyTime89 3y ago
    I guessed so. So it’s not at all done once, never done again as the OP suggested but rather done once, now keep redoing something slightly different every fortnight and enjoy your constantly half-broken system. In a way, it’s reassuring to see that niche Linux distributions have changed so little in the decade since I last used one.
    - mksybr 3y ago
      this is presumably why guix calls itself "an advanced packaging management system". if you don't want to futz around with that kind of thing theres always ubuntu which mostly just works and even comes prebaked with activedirectory support so you can argue with your IT department about it :)
    - yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
      > now keep redoing something slightly different every fortnight and enjoy your constantly half-broken system. Yeah, if any of that is even remotely true then something is horribly wrong with your system.
    - Ericson2314 3y ago
      I only yet this once every 6 months. And the issues are resolved in minutes following the printed instructions (as opposed to crawling through arch wiki or whatever). Most of the time the deprecations require no action on my part, I simply rather keep things tidy and make the warnings go away. > In a way, it’s reassuring to see that niche Linux distributions have changed so little in the decade since I last used one. You are misunderstanding what I am saying. The situation is very different. There are still Linux/Wayland/NVidia/Whatever issues, but configuring NixOS is not among them.
mksybr 3y ago
I don't think NixOS is the only distro that has this property, what prevents someone from making a shell script that installs your applications and dotfiles? Blow away your OS install and get your set up back in one line is my experience and I don't run Nix or Guix for most of my applications
- ParetoOptimal 3y ago
  > what prevents someone from making a shell script that installs your applications and dotfiles The reproducibility of that would not be nearly as high. For example, if the source of those applications is apt the versions of packages would change over time.
  - mksybr 3y ago
    yes, i am fine with that personally and its hard for me to grok what benefits reproducibility in the guix sense would get me here
    - rgoulter 3y ago
      One example was "I want to run an old version of Hugo". In the time since running the old version of hugo, enough about the system had changed: - The OS had changed significantly (so re-running an old build didn't work). - The compiler had changed significantly (so compiling from source would have been difficult). https://jvns.ca/blog/2023/02/28/some-notes-on-using-nix/ https://jvns.ca/blog/2023/02/28/some-notes-on-using-nix/
      - mksybr 3y ago
        Great example! Managing old or multiple versions of software is actually a great usecase for Guix.
    - ParetoOptimal 3y ago
      > i am fine with that personally and its hard for me to grok what benefits reproducibility in the guix sense would get me here I read this as: > i am fine with the lack of reproducibility of apt-update personally and its hard for me to grok what benefits reproducibility in the guix sense would get me here To which my answer is: Guix gets you the reproducibility benefit of not having the reproducibility harming apt-update. Does this help answer your question or confuse things more?
jt2190 3y ago
> … I don't agree with this sentiment. Not the parent poster… I’m unclear what sentiment you’re disagreeing with: Are you inferring that velcrovan is against tinkering with niche distros?
- yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
  I read it that way; it reads as "have fun playing with your broken, useless, toy OS". Traditionally followed by some comment about how they use a Real OS for Serious Work that definitely never breaks (conveniently skipping over the ways it breaks that they have to deal with).
  - velcrovan 3y ago
    Sorry, I should have included a /nosarcasm tag or something, that is definitely not how I meant it. I still enjoy the level of sleuthing and tinkering shown in the original linked post, I just choose to spend my time/energy budget on other kinds of challenges, rather than on my personal machine’s operating system. If I had the level of free time I had in my twenties I’m sure I would still be on Linux.
    - yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
      Okay, that does help to know. It's a weird position IMO (you really spend less time/energy on another OS's quirks?), but it's nice to know that it wasn't intended condescendingly.
xyproto 3y ago
Then the protocol changes from X to Wayland, python changes from 2 to 3, gtk changes from 2 to 4 and systemd replaces core services...
- pxc 3y ago
  NixOS actually navigated a change from OpenRC to systemd many years ago. You didn't generally have to change your service configurations because NixOS puts a bit of abstraction between you and the service management system.
- yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
  You don't actually have to switch to Wayland, you can keep using X like for the last couple decades. The python change was annoying, but it took like a decade and I'm not sure it was actually user impacting; most distros switched packages over invisibly. Same for GTK and systemd; they were annoying for tinkerers and maintainers, but would an end user actually notice?
  - xyproto 3y ago
    End users can stay at old versions and old distros for as long as they like. Most users can benefit from security updates, though. They might also (maybe) get better performance, new features and a smoother user experience.
    - yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
      Okay? That has very little to do with anything I wrote. Xorg is maintained, python2 was maintained for a long time into 3's lifecycle, and GTK and systemd shouldn't have broken anything for users. None of this requires foregoing updates.

chrissoundz 3y ago

Props to those of you still at the mercy of your OS publishers (Windows, Ubuntu, Mac) who dictate your software, updates, how your hardware is used and general freedom. Did a lot of that in my teens. I boot my pc, login, press win+p, type in "fir" which autocompletes to firefox and it starts firefox. And I don't think this process will change much for the rest of my life. The alternative is a constantly changing menu UI, intrusive popups/notifications, deprecations, and a "oh wait sorry Firefox now has to be Certified from the app store", random telemetry data being sent over, strange unknown but necessary "computation" happening and what else have I missed?

jswny 3y ago
All of that sounds a lot better than spending an entire afternoon getting basic graphics to work for a desktop environment
eviks 3y ago
> what else have I missed You've missed the part where you can press win+r to launch Firefox immediately (or open if it's already launched, but inactive, or hide if it's active without any autocompletion) on any of those systems ignoring all of the menu UI nonsense, which is also workflow that can remain stable for the rest of your life (also, Firefox is also sending random telemetry data)