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I used Debian as a student when I had time to endlessly edit config files. What's the state today? Is it possible to just use it to get work done, say, on a T

I used Debian as a student when I had time to endlessly edit config files. What's the state today? Is it possible to just use it to get work done, say, on a Thinkpad?

Nursie 3y ago
Yes, there’s not really any more editing config files than on any other distro.
hiq 3y ago
What is "work" in this context? Why were you editing config files all the time? I find Debian very user-friendly, there shouldn't be much config file tinkering, especially if the machine is well supported by Linux. The situation is probably better than a few years ago, but overall I think that's been the case for some time now.
- tmalsburg2 3y ago
  > What is "work" in this context? I'm primarily interested in 1. having all hardware work out of the box, 2. working suspend to disk/RAM, 3. not having to edit `Xorg.conf`, 4. relatively painless upgrades. Ubuntu gives me all of that and has served me well for 15 years. But their transition to snap forces me to look for something else.
  - chaosite 3y ago
    1 & 2 really depend on what hardware you have. But if you get 1 & 2 today from Ubuntu, I'm willing to bet that you'll get exactly that from Debian as well. 3 hasn't been a thing for a few years now. `Xorg.conf` technically still exists, but the normal display configuration flow doesn't touch it. 4 is better in Debian than it is in Ubuntu, in my opinion. Updates are really painless and well done. But notice that the cycle is different: Ubuntu gives you 6 months release cycles and an LTS every 2 years. Debian gives you a "when it's ready" release cycle with a expected time of 3-4 years, and two rolling releases. That is, "stable" is like a LTS release. If you're running a desktop system, you should probably use "testing", despite the name.
    - hiq 3y ago
      > If you're running a desktop system, you should probably use "testing", despite the name. I'm not sure I agree, maybe a better compromise is: * run stable by default * if at one point there are too many packages that you find outdated and which have a suitable version in testing, upgrade to testing, pinning the distribution name, so that you're back to (the new) stable once it's promoted Testing changes a lot right after a release, so I find it better to avoid it during that phase if I don't strictly need it. There are also more upgrades in testing and unstable than in stable, and the less upgrades, the less I need to reboot (or at least close my user session) which is a plus.
      - chaosite 3y ago
        > Testing changes a lot right after a release You're right. But, to be honest: my solution to that is to run unstable.
IE6 3y ago
It's not for everyone but I transitioned to ChromeOS for this exact reason. You still have a debian environment you can work in (run CLI, GUI apps) but the base desktop environment is ChromeOS which "just works" as they say.
Qem 3y ago
You can try SpiralLinux, that is just Debian with a lot of drivers included: https://distrowatch.com/table-mobile.php?distribution=spiral https://distrowatch.com/table-mobile.php?distribution=spiral
- hoppyhoppy2 3y ago
  Not yet updated for Debian 12, though you could upgrade it manually after installing
  - UncleSlacky 3y ago
    MX Linux updated to Debian 12 a couple of weeks ago.
yaantc 3y ago
If you're comfortable with Linux definitely, I'm using Debian stable both at work (Latitude) and home (Thinkpad) for several years now. One issue with Debian was the lack of support for proprietary firmware in the stock installer from the Debian web site. A lot of people trying Debian and not aware of this ended up stuck with no WiFi support during installation for example. But this has been fixed, the Debian Bookworm stock disk image includes firmware now.
neilv 3y ago
The Debian default desktop environment seems more polished out of the box than it used to. It's very dumbed-down corporate Gnome non-power-user, but you can just GUI click for your settings, and everything works. Yes, you can just get work done with it on ThinkPads (both modern ones, and many older ones). Debian also offers you a few other desktop environment options, some of which will need more tweaking than the default. Personally, I ignore all of these, and did my config files tweaking atop Xorg and Xmonad, years ago, and keep using mostly the same setup with each major Debian version since then. (So far, Debian hasn't forced ads onto my start menu, reverted my explicit opt-outs, spied on me, manipulated me against my interests to suit someone else's business or promotion criteria, etc.)
space_ghost 3y ago
Debian installs perfectly on my Thinkpad x61, and works great out of the box. (x)Ubuntu's installer won't even boot on this hardware.

I used Debian as a student when I had time to endlessly edit config files. What's the state today? Is it possible to just use it to get work done, say, on a Thinkpad?

Nursie 3y ago

Yes, there’s not really any more editing config files than on any other distro.

hiq 3y ago

What is "work" in this context? Why were you editing config files all the time? I find Debian very user-friendly, there shouldn't be much config file tinkering, especially if the machine is well supported by Linux. The situation is probably better than a few years ago, but overall I think that's been the case for some time now.

tmalsburg2 3y ago
> What is "work" in this context? I'm primarily interested in 1. having all hardware work out of the box, 2. working suspend to disk/RAM, 3. not having to edit `Xorg.conf`, 4. relatively painless upgrades. Ubuntu gives me all of that and has served me well for 15 years. But their transition to snap forces me to look for something else.
- chaosite 3y ago
  1 & 2 really depend on what hardware you have. But if you get 1 & 2 today from Ubuntu, I'm willing to bet that you'll get exactly that from Debian as well. 3 hasn't been a thing for a few years now. `Xorg.conf` technically still exists, but the normal display configuration flow doesn't touch it. 4 is better in Debian than it is in Ubuntu, in my opinion. Updates are really painless and well done. But notice that the cycle is different: Ubuntu gives you 6 months release cycles and an LTS every 2 years. Debian gives you a "when it's ready" release cycle with a expected time of 3-4 years, and two rolling releases. That is, "stable" is like a LTS release. If you're running a desktop system, you should probably use "testing", despite the name.
  - hiq 3y ago
    > If you're running a desktop system, you should probably use "testing", despite the name. I'm not sure I agree, maybe a better compromise is: * run stable by default * if at one point there are too many packages that you find outdated and which have a suitable version in testing, upgrade to testing, pinning the distribution name, so that you're back to (the new) stable once it's promoted Testing changes a lot right after a release, so I find it better to avoid it during that phase if I don't strictly need it. There are also more upgrades in testing and unstable than in stable, and the less upgrades, the less I need to reboot (or at least close my user session) which is a plus.
    - chaosite 3y ago
      > Testing changes a lot right after a release You're right. But, to be honest: my solution to that is to run unstable.

IE6 3y ago

It's not for everyone but I transitioned to ChromeOS for this exact reason. You still have a debian environment you can work in (run CLI, GUI apps) but the base desktop environment is ChromeOS which "just works" as they say.

Qem 3y ago

You can try SpiralLinux, that is just Debian with a lot of drivers included: https://distrowatch.com/table-mobile.php?distribution=spiral https://distrowatch.com/table-mobile.php?distribution=spiral

hoppyhoppy2 3y ago
Not yet updated for Debian 12, though you could upgrade it manually after installing
- UncleSlacky 3y ago
  MX Linux updated to Debian 12 a couple of weeks ago.

yaantc 3y ago

If you're comfortable with Linux definitely, I'm using Debian stable both at work (Latitude) and home (Thinkpad) for several years now. One issue with Debian was the lack of support for proprietary firmware in the stock installer from the Debian web site. A lot of people trying Debian and not aware of this ended up stuck with no WiFi support during installation for example. But this has been fixed, the Debian Bookworm stock disk image includes firmware now.

neilv 3y ago

The Debian default desktop environment seems more polished out of the box than it used to. It's very dumbed-down corporate Gnome non-power-user, but you can just GUI click for your settings, and everything works. Yes, you can just get work done with it on ThinkPads (both modern ones, and many older ones). Debian also offers you a few other desktop environment options, some of which will need more tweaking than the default. Personally, I ignore all of these, and did my config files tweaking atop Xorg and Xmonad, years ago, and keep using mostly the same setup with each major Debian version since then. (So far, Debian hasn't forced ads onto my start menu, reverted my explicit opt-outs, spied on me, manipulated me against my interests to suit someone else's business or promotion criteria, etc.)

space_ghost 3y ago

Debian installs perfectly on my Thinkpad x61, and works great out of the box. (x)Ubuntu's installer won't even boot on this hardware.