Looking for new distro

[bad sector]

I like to set my desktops up all much the same in plasma or xfce (just
trying to tame plasma6 actually)

https://imgur.com/b9tejnh

Since I'm removing one of the distros from my stable I'm looking for a
replacement (no systemd thank you). Any suggestions that would fit well
in my decor?

I tried what I thought was the PcLinux installer but on boot see no way
to start an actual install and signing up to their forum don't seem to
work either.

[Johnny]

On Sat, 16 Mar 2024 08:53:15 -0400

Post by bad sector
I like to set my desktops up all much the same in plasma or xfce
(just trying to tame plasma6 actually)
https://imgur.com/b9tejnh
Since I'm removing one of the distros from my stable I'm looking
for a replacement (no systemd thank you). Any suggestions that
would fit well in my decor?
I tried what I thought was the PcLinux installer but on boot see no
way to start an actual install and signing up to their forum don't
seem to work either.

https://mxlinux.org/

The best and the only one I use.

You can use MX Tweak in the menu to move the panel to the bottom.

[andal]

Post by bad sector
I like to set my desktops up all much the same in plasma or xfce (just
trying to tame plasma6 actually)
https://imgur.com/b9tejnh
Since I'm removing one of the distros from my stable I'm looking for a
replacement (no systemd thank you). Any suggestions that would fit well
in my decor?
I tried what I thought was the PcLinux installer but on boot see no way
to start an actual install and signing up to their forum don't seem to
work either.

try

https://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php

it was working this morning

i use this distro since its birthday, never had problems and i am only a
user, literaly user

[bad sector]

Post by andal

Post by bad sector
I like to set my desktops up all much the same in plasma or xfce (just
trying to tame plasma6 actually)
https://imgur.com/b9tejnh
Since I'm removing one of the distros from my stable I'm looking for a
replacement (no systemd thank you). Any suggestions that would fit well
in my decor?
I tried what I thought was the PcLinux installer but on boot see no way
to start an actual install and signing up to their forum don't seem to
work either.

try
https://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php
it was working this morning
i use this distro since its birthday, never had problems and i am only a
user, literaly user

https://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php?action=register

"Sorry, automatic is currently disabled. Please email (first.polack at
gmail.com) with your desired nickame and password"

I did that days ago, no reply. Is PcLinux actively maintained? If so
then I'll keep an eye out.

[andal]

Post by bad sector

Post by andal

Post by bad sector
I like to set my desktops up all much the same in plasma or xfce (just
trying to tame plasma6 actually)
https://imgur.com/b9tejnh
Since I'm removing one of the distros from my stable I'm looking for a
replacement (no systemd thank you). Any suggestions that would fit
well in my decor?
I tried what I thought was the PcLinux installer but on boot see no
way to start an actual install and signing up to their forum don't
seem to work either.

try
https://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php
it was working this morning
i use this distro since its birthday, never had problems and i am only
a user, literaly user

https://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php?action=register
"Sorry, automatic is currently disabled. Please email (first.polack at
gmail.com) with your desired nickame and password"
I did that days ago, no reply. Is PcLinux actively maintained? If so
then I'll keep an eye out.

I get all updates including kernel whenever new

You still may search forums

[J.O. Aho]

Post by bad sector
I like to set my desktops up all much the same in plasma or xfce (just
trying to tame plasma6 actually)
I'm looking for a
replacement (no systemd thank you). Any suggestions that would fit well
in my decor?

Have you tried one of these:

- Artix Linux: https://artixlinux.org
- Gentoo Binary:
https://www.gentoo.org/news/2023/12/29/Gentoo-binary.html (needs a bit
reading)
- Redcore Linux: https://redcorelinux.org

[bad sector]

Post by bad sector
I like to set my desktops up all much the same in plasma or xfce (just
trying to tame plasma6 actually)
I'm looking for a replacement (no systemd thank you). Any suggestions
that would fit well in my decor?

 - Artix Linux: https://artixlinux.org
https://www.gentoo.org/news/2023/12/29/Gentoo-binary.html (needs a bit
reading)
 - Redcore Linux: https://redcorelinux.org

Been running Artix for about two years now, very happy with it and with
support on the forum (from the perpspective of a clueless gringo). Tried
Gentoo but that one is really over my head, I mean like in the Titan
just before the implosion. Redcore is news to me, is that an easier
version of Gentoo, is it more robustly maintained/developed than MX?
I've BEEN using AvLinux which is a Debian/MX mix of sorts but with
systemd, MX itself sounds like something that might replace it, they
'provide' systemd but disabled. I'll keep Suse as the only with systemd
..for now.

[J.O. Aho]

Post by bad sector

Post by bad sector
I like to set my desktops up all much the same in plasma or xfce
(just trying to tame plasma6 actually)
I'm looking for a replacement (no systemd thank you). Any suggestions
that would fit well in my decor?

  - Artix Linux: https://artixlinux.org
https://www.gentoo.org/news/2023/12/29/Gentoo-binary.html (needs a bit
reading)
  - Redcore Linux: https://redcorelinux.org

Been running Artix for about two years now, very happy with it and with
support on the forum (from the perpspective of a clueless gringo). Tried
Gentoo but that one is really over my head, I mean like in the Titan
just before the implosion.

Sure Gentoo has it's difficulties, but if you follow the binary setup
and don't change USE flags, then you should have a lot easier than when
building things from source, but of course there are times you need to
be a bit more hands on when there may be major changes.
Gentoo is one of my favorites, the only draw back has been the long
build times and things break while building, so my solution to simplify
things was to have a lxc which I used as the portage source and of
course where I built binary packages, when things had finished building,
then I did do the updates on the other machines, saved a lot of head
aches and never had a broken install on the machines I used.

Post by bad sector
Redcore is news to me, is that an easier
version of Gentoo, is it more robustly maintained/developed than MX?

It's a while since I used Redcore myself, it was mostly quite straight
forward, no hiccups until they made a fundamental change which made
things potentially break for those with older installs. You can still
use portage to install packages that's not supplied in Redcore, wasn't
that many that I missed so that worked fine for me.

Post by bad sector
I've BEEN using AvLinux which is a Debian/MX mix of sorts but with
systemd, MX itself sounds like something that might replace it, they
'provide' systemd but disabled. I'll keep Suse as the only with systemd
..for now.

I had Suse at my previous work, worked quite well and they had back then
picked just to use systemd partially. It's not fully up to my standards
for home use as the repositories do not supply everything I want to have.

[bad sector]

Post by J.O. Aho

Post by bad sector

Post by bad sector
I like to set my desktops up all much the same in plasma or xfce
(just trying to tame plasma6 actually)
I'm looking for a replacement (no systemd thank you). Any
suggestions that would fit well in my decor?

  - Artix Linux: https://artixlinux.org
https://www.gentoo.org/news/2023/12/29/Gentoo-binary.html (needs a
bit reading)
  - Redcore Linux: https://redcorelinux.org

Been running Artix for about two years now, very happy with it and
with support on the forum (from the perpspective of a clueless
gringo). Tried Gentoo but that one is really over my head, I mean like
in the Titan just before the implosion.

Sure Gentoo has it's difficulties, but if you follow the binary setup
and don't change USE flags, then you should have a lot easier than when
building things from source, but of course there are times you need to
be a bit more hands on when there may be major changes.
Gentoo is one of my favorites, the only draw back has been the long
build times and things break while building, so my solution to simplify
things was to have a lxc which I used as the portage source and of
course where I built binary packages, when things had finished building,
then I did do the updates on the other machines, saved a lot of head
aches and never had a broken install on the machines I used.

Post by bad sector
Redcore is news to me, is that an easier version of Gentoo, is it more
robustly maintained/developed than MX?

It's a while since I used Redcore myself, it was mostly quite straight
forward, no hiccups until they made a fundamental change which made
things potentially break for those with older installs. You can still
use portage to install packages that's not supplied in Redcore, wasn't
that many that I missed so that worked fine for me.

Post by bad sector
I've BEEN using AvLinux which is a Debian/MX mix of sorts but with
systemd, MX itself sounds like something that might replace it, they
'provide' systemd but disabled. I'll keep Suse as the only with
systemd ..for now.

I had Suse at my previous work, worked quite well and they had back then
picked just to use systemd partially. It's not fully up to my standards
for home use as the repositories do not supply everything I want to have.

Thanks for the heads-up, I'm already too many hours a week into
OS-fixing and am not prepared to increase that by one second. I liked
Gentoo but it was really just too much of time-sink for me. I'm 80 and
the only real use I have for computers is enjoyable or *at least*
productive guitar sessions. I had started with Suse right after it
forked off Slackware and it does have it's share of fubars but it's BEEN
my go2 OS, it's now downgraded to the only OS still with systemd in my
box. Just last night I tried my first install of their microOS to see if
Audacity would work on that (becasue they've got pulse/pipewire screwed
up on every other one of their platforms) but it failed to boot at all :-)

[J.O. Aho]

Post by bad sector
Thanks for the heads-up, I'm already too many hours a week into
OS-fixing and am not prepared to increase that by one second. I liked
Gentoo but it was really just too much of time-sink for me.

Yes, that is the drawback with Gentoo, build times are time consuming
and then if something fails, the work to figure out why and fix it to
continue, at least your don't have that issue with Redcore.

Post by bad sector
Just last night I tried my first install of their microOS to see if
Audacity would work on that (becasue they've got pulse/pipewire screwed
up on every other one of their platforms) but it failed to boot at all :-)

I switched to pipewire yesterday, the only drawback is that plasma don't
auto start it in the same ways as pulseaudio, but making your own script
for starting stuff and then add it to the plasma startup and it's fixed.

I did first install: pipewire pipewire-pulse pipewire-alsa pipewire-jack
wireplumber

sudo echo <<EOF > /usr/bin/start-pipewire
#!/bin/bash
/usr/bin/pipewire & /usr/bin/pipewire-pulse & /usr/bin/wireplumber
EOF
sudo chmod 755 /usr/bin/start-pipewire

then open System Settings and select System/Autostart and click on
+Add... and pick Add application and then add /usr/bin/start-pipewire

and that is, just logout and the in again, sound should autostart.

Just keep in mind to not have pulseaudio installed at the same time,
depending on the distribution, when installing pipewire-pulse should
remove the pulseaudio, but if it don't just remove it yourself.

[J.O. Aho]

Post by J.O. Aho
sudo echo <<EOF > /usr/bin/start-pipewire
#!/bin/bash
/usr/bin/pipewire & /usr/bin/pipewire-pulse & /usr/bin/wireplumber
EOF
sudo chmod 755 /usr/bin/start-pipewire

Sorry, made the neebie mistake, the sudo echo will not work as the
unprivileged user has no right to pipe to /usr/bin


sudo echo <<EOF > start-pipewire
#!/bin/bash
/usr/bin/pipewire & /usr/bin/pipewire-pulse & /usr/bin/wireplumber
EOF
sudo mv start-pipewire /usr/bin/start-pipewire
sudo chmod 755 /usr/bin/start-pipewire
sudo chown root:root /usr/bin/start-pipewire

will solve the problem.

[bad sector]

Post by J.O. Aho

Post by bad sector
Thanks for the heads-up, I'm already too many hours a week into
OS-fixing and am not prepared to increase that by one second. I liked
Gentoo but it was really just too much of time-sink for me.

Yes, that is the drawback with Gentoo, build times are time consuming
and then if something fails, the work to figure out why and fix it to
continue, at least your don't have that issue with Redcore.

Post by bad sector
Just last night I tried my first install of their microOS to see if
Audacity would work on that (becasue they've got pulse/pipewire
screwed up on every other one of their platforms) but it failed to
boot at all :-)

I switched to pipewire yesterday, the only drawback is that plasma don't
auto start it in the same ways as pulseaudio, but making your own script
for starting stuff and then add it to the plasma startup and it's fixed.
I did first install: pipewire pipewire-pulse pipewire-alsa pipewire-jack
wireplumber
sudo echo <<EOF > /usr/bin/start-pipewire
#!/bin/bash
/usr/bin/pipewire & /usr/bin/pipewire-pulse & /usr/bin/wireplumber
EOF
sudo chmod 755 /usr/bin/start-pipewire
then open System Settings and select System/Autostart and click on
+Add... and pick Add application and then add /usr/bin/start-pipewire
and that is, just logout and the in again, sound should autostart.
Just keep in mind to not have pulseaudio installed at the same time,
depending on the distribution, when installing pipewire-pulse should
remove the pulseaudio, but if it don't just remove it yourself.

there's an ongoing thread about this on the suse list, I'll drop a link
there

[Mike Easter]

Post by bad sector
I've BEEN using AvLinux which is a Debian/MX mix of sorts but with
systemd, MX itself sounds like something that might replace it, they
'provide' systemd but disabled. I'll keep Suse as the only with systemd
..for now.

I think that if I were 'mostly' anti-systemd, but 'open' (or at least
not 'close-minded') to the 'idea' and I were experiencing multiple
different distro/s, I would be using systemd on 'half' or some of them
for the experience of using some systemd 'features' to see if I were
really as strongly against it as I tho't I was.

It (there being quite a lot of 'it') has significant and worthwhile
value, whatever one might think about the philosophy of 'it' trying to
take over more than one or some like.

[bad sector]

Post by Mike Easter

Post by bad sector
I've BEEN using AvLinux which is a Debian/MX mix of sorts but with
systemd, MX itself sounds like something that might replace it, they
'provide' systemd but disabled. I'll keep Suse as the only with
systemd ..for now.

I think that if I were 'mostly' anti-systemd, but 'open' (or at least
not 'close-minded') to the 'idea' and I were experiencing multiple
different distro/s, I would be using systemd on 'half' or some of them
for the experience of using some systemd 'features' to see if I were
really as strongly against it as I tho't I was.
It (there being quite a lot of 'it') has significant and worthwhile
value, whatever one might think about the philosophy of 'it' trying to
take over more than one or some like.

It ain't systemd VS all-others, it's more like all inits where systemd
is one of many. I might keep 2 suse, that's already double the just and
democratic allotment :-)

As for more than one 'mere utility' that seems to be jockeying to become
a kernel or an almost-OS, my attitude is rapidly hardening. The danger
as far as I'm concerned is that one of thsese becomes too big for its
hide and starts dictating kernel development which would mean the end of
freedom Linux.

[Mike Easter]

Post by bad sector
It ain't systemd VS all-others, it's more like all inits where systemd
is one of many. I might keep 2 suse, that's already double the just and
democratic allotment :-)
As for more than one 'mere utility' that seems to be jockeying to become
a kernel or an almost-OS, my attitude is rapidly hardening. The danger
as far as I'm concerned is that one of thsese becomes too big for its
hide and starts dictating kernel development which would mean the end of
freedom Linux.

In some imaginary scenario, there would be some 'optimal' balance
between the freedom to innovate another way of doing things and the
'negative' effects of a lot of fractured directions in which the
fracturing or innovations aren't resulting in a trend toward 'mostly'
good.

FreeBSD vs linux, systemd vs non-systemd vs systemd+shim, various DEs &
WMs awaiting the dev of a Rust Cosmic and so forth.

I'm not exactly saying there are too many DEs or that there shouldn't be
a systemd schism, just that it - the mulitiplicity - isn't ALL good;
there is good and bad to the divisions and fractures.

[bad sector]

Post by Mike Easter

Post by bad sector
It ain't systemd VS all-others, it's more like all inits where systemd
is one of many. I might keep 2 suse, that's already double the just
and democratic allotment :-)
As for more than one 'mere utility' that seems to be jockeying to
become a kernel or an almost-OS, my attitude is rapidly hardening. The
danger as far as I'm concerned is that one of thsese becomes too big
for its hide and starts dictating kernel development which would mean
the end of freedom Linux.

In some imaginary scenario, there would be some 'optimal' balance
between the freedom to innovate another way of doing things and the
'negative' effects of a lot of fractured directions in which the
fracturing or innovations aren't resulting in a trend toward 'mostly' good.
FreeBSD vs linux, systemd vs non-systemd vs systemd+shim, various DEs &
WMs awaiting the dev of a Rust Cosmic and so forth.
I'm not exactly saying there are too many DEs or that there shouldn't be
a systemd schism, just that it - the mulitiplicity - isn't ALL good;
there is good and bad to the divisions and fractures.

That yes. The world of compuke is about where cars were at the turn of
the previous century; there were far to many models in the US alone,
most of them were either extremely expensive or useless or both, and if
you didn't know how to repair and change a tire, set points or
hand-crank then you were in deep shit. Eventually it got sorted out,
until China entered the fray, now Elon Musk the great prophet of free
enterprise and mindless competition wants them locked out :-))))

[J.O. Aho]

Post by bad sector
As for more than one 'mere utility' that seems to be jockeying to become
a kernel or an almost-OS, my attitude is rapidly hardening. The danger
as far as I'm concerned is that one of thsese becomes too big for its
hide and starts dictating kernel development which would mean the end of
freedom Linux.

They did try with the namespace-controversy where they demanded the
Linux kernel developers to change the name iof a namespace for they had
picked to use the same spacename. I think much of the bad attitude came
from Lennart Poettering and lets hope there will be a "pipewire" for
systemd too.

For me it's been more of the security concern, they assume quite a lot
of things in the code without really knowing and the more code they have
in systemd the more risk for security issues and they already top
numbers of critical security issues compared with the other init systems
(I think it's quite same to say combined).

[bad sector]

Post by J.O. Aho

Post by bad sector
As for more than one 'mere utility' that seems to be jockeying to
become a kernel or an almost-OS, my attitude is rapidly hardening. The
danger as far as I'm concerned is that one of thsese becomes too big
for its hide and starts dictating kernel development which would mean
the end of freedom Linux.

They did try with the namespace-controversy where they demanded the
Linux kernel developers to change the name iof a namespace for they had
picked to use the same spacename. I think much of the bad attitude came
from Lennart Poettering and lets hope there will be a "pipewire" for
systemd too.
For me it's been more of the security concern, they assume quite a lot
of things in the code without really knowing and the more code they have
in systemd the more risk for security issues and they already top
numbers of critical security issues compared with the other init systems
(I think it's quite same to say combined).

No doubt, I mean Linux always was about KISS if anything, systemd is
anything but that. X and Wayland are big too but they more or less have
to be, all others should be kept to the smallest possible footprint
each, beginning with the 'zilas which are also starting to bloat
dangerously (in 'reach'). I'm minded of the once much discussed IRA, not
that I had anythingto do with it, their 'distributed' security was a
hard nut to crack according to many :-)