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I liked the days when Ubuntu was a nice, simple distro that I could recommend to beginners. Nowadays, every desktop distro is becoming more and more of an "isla

by kudu 13y ago

I liked the days when Ubuntu was a nice, simple distro that I could recommend to beginners. Nowadays, every desktop distro is becoming more and more of an "island". The main "alternative" to Ubuntu, Linux Mint, is also replacing pretty much every piece of the OS with its own (NIH). I would actually like for there to be a nice, simple distro that anybody could use, with only general, vanilla Linux software.

akerl_ 13y ago
I'm sure that there's going to be plenty of dissent on this, but Arch is a pretty simple distro and attempts to keep packages as vanilla as possible. Their wiki is also an awesome resource (I find myself using it even when troubleshooting things on non-Arch systems, to great effect). It's definitely not a one-click deployment, and they've made some design decisions I'm not a fan of, but as far as simple systems go, they're on a great track.
phaer 13y ago
> I would actually like for there to be a nice, simple distro that anybody could use, with only general, vanilla Linux software. Your are looking, depending on your use case, either for Debian or Fedora.
w1ntermute 13y ago
Try Xubuntu. The interface is about boring and rock solid as it gets - it hasn't changed in years. And you still get Ubuntu's excellent hardware support.
dombili 13y ago
Try elementary OS.
- mcintyre1994 13y ago
  Elementary is amazing but isn't it one of the most NIH-inflicted distros? Custom DE, app manager, dock, I think every app it ships with is theirs, etc. I guess it's a bit more vanilla than the Ubuntu it builds on, but it's all very NIH.
  - dombili 13y ago
    Yes, but I recommended elementary OS because the person I was replying to wanted "a simple, nice OS anybody could use". I've used a lot of Linux distros over the years (I have a "Linux computer" and I often install different distros just for fun) and when someone asks me the same question my answer is usually "either install Xubuntu or elementary OS". I could be considered a power user, but even I'm using elementary OS right now because it's so hassle free and it just works. Xubuntu is the same, but it's a bit boring compare to elementary OS.
dman 13y ago
Try debian.
jsz0 13y ago
If you want a very reliable/stable desktop OS and are not set on using Linux you might want to consider FreeBSD or PCBSD instead. The perpetual alpha/beta quality of most popular Linux distros plus increasingly fragmentation between makes BSD a better choice for me these days.

by kudu 13y ago

akerl_ 13y ago

I'm sure that there's going to be plenty of dissent on this, but Arch is a pretty simple distro and attempts to keep packages as vanilla as possible. Their wiki is also an awesome resource (I find myself using it even when troubleshooting things on non-Arch systems, to great effect). It's definitely not a one-click deployment, and they've made some design decisions I'm not a fan of, but as far as simple systems go, they're on a great track.

phaer 13y ago

> I would actually like for there to be a nice, simple distro that anybody could use, with only general, vanilla Linux software. Your are looking, depending on your use case, either for Debian or Fedora.

w1ntermute 13y ago

Try Xubuntu. The interface is about boring and rock solid as it gets - it hasn't changed in years. And you still get Ubuntu's excellent hardware support.

dombili 13y ago

Try elementary OS.

mcintyre1994 13y ago
Elementary is amazing but isn't it one of the most NIH-inflicted distros? Custom DE, app manager, dock, I think every app it ships with is theirs, etc. I guess it's a bit more vanilla than the Ubuntu it builds on, but it's all very NIH.
- dombili 13y ago
  Yes, but I recommended elementary OS because the person I was replying to wanted "a simple, nice OS anybody could use". I've used a lot of Linux distros over the years (I have a "Linux computer" and I often install different distros just for fun) and when someone asks me the same question my answer is usually "either install Xubuntu or elementary OS". I could be considered a power user, but even I'm using elementary OS right now because it's so hassle free and it just works. Xubuntu is the same, but it's a bit boring compare to elementary OS.

dman 13y ago

Try debian.

jsz0 13y ago

If you want a very reliable/stable desktop OS and are not set on using Linux you might want to consider FreeBSD or PCBSD instead. The perpetual alpha/beta quality of most popular Linux distros plus increasingly fragmentation between makes BSD a better choice for me these days.