 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 680, 26 September 2016 |
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Welcome to this year's 39th issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
Free and open source software is not just a development model which allows for the sharing of code, it is also a security feature. Being able to audit and change the code running on a computer gives users an advantage when it comes to security. Fixes can be applied more quickly and it is harder for errors or back doors to hide in the code. This week we talk about one distribution which strives to maintain a completely open and auditable system, Uruk GNU/Linux. Uruk ships with free and open source packages exclusively and we explore the distribution in our Feature Story. In our News section we talk about a new device shipping the Snappy Ubuntu Core operating system and a new solution for streaming video services using an open source web browser. We also cover a recent controversy involving Lenovo laptops which will block Linux installations. In this week's Questions and Answers column we discuss blocking applications from accessing the Internet. Plus we offer a list of the distributions released last week and share the torrents we are seeding. In our Opinion Poll we discuss where people use Linux and we share a graphic featuring the names of popular open source operating systems. We wish you all wonderful week and happy reading!
Content:
Listen to the Podcast edition of this week's DistroWatch Weekly in OGG (25MB) and MP3 (35MB) formats
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| Feature Story (by Jesse Smith) |
Uruk GNU/Linux 1.0
One of the more recent additions to the DistroWatch database is Uruk GNU/Linux (or simply Uruk as I will refer to it). According to the distribution's website, Uruk can be described as follows:
Uruk GNU/Linux is a distribution of the GNU operating system, with the Linux-libre kernel. It comes ready for home and office use, and programs are easy to find and install. Uruk GNU/Linux is currently based on the Trisquel GNU/Linux core.
Uruk ships with MATE as the default desktop environment and includes free software only. Uruk uses Trisquel as a base. Trisquel is, in turn, based on Ubuntu. In this case, Uruk is indirectly based on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS and is binary compatible with its grandparent distribution. The Uruk website claims the distribution can work with .rpm package files and can install software directly from source code. The website also mentions Uruk may be able to work with other package formats besides .deb and .rpm, but I was unable to find any documentation to indicate how this feature works.
Uruk version 1.0 is available in 32-bit and 64-bit builds for the x86 architecture. I downloaded the ISO file for the 64-bit build which is 1.2GB in size. Booting from this media brings up the MATE desktop. At the upper-left corner of the screen we find a single application menu. A clock sits at top-centre and the system tray is present in the upper-right corner. At the bottom of the screen is a launch panel with a handful of application quick-launch buttons. I found moving open windows toward the bottom of the screen would push the launch panel down and off the display. Raising the window toward the top of the screen would pull the panel back up. This action feels surprisingly nature and I like how the panel quietly gets out of the way when we need the extra screen space. On the desktop we find icons which open the file manager and launch the system installer.
A feature I found unhelpful was the way the month part of dates would always display in Arabic. The clock and the available calendar application displayed month names in Arabic while all other applications and menus displayed text in English. This quirk continued after I had installed Uruk on my hard drive and only the calendar application and clock were affected.
Uruk uses the Ubiquity system installer which people who have worked with Ubuntu or Trisquel will find familiar. The graphical installer begins by asking us to select our preferred language from a list. We are given a link to the project's on-line release notes, but this link was broken at the time of writing. Ubiquity's next screen offers to download updates during the installation process. Since Uruk supplies free software exclusively, there is no option in the installer to download third-party items such as proprietary drivers or Adobe's Flash player. The installer then asks if we would like to make use of guided or manual partitioning. The manual option supports working with Btrfs, JFS, XFS and the ext2/3/4 file systems. I found partitioning to be pleasantly straight forward. The next few screens get us to confirm our time zone, select a keyboard layout and create a user account for ourselves. We can, during the account creation process, opt to encrypt our user's home folder. The installer then finishes copying its files to our hard drive and offers to reboot the computer or return us to the live MATE desktop.
Something I noticed while proceeding through the installer was that it used a theme that made borders difficult to see. Most of the time this was not an issue, but on any screen that involved check boxes or radio buttons the interactive elements were invisible. The only indication I had the boxes were available was the indentation of the text next to where the buttons should appear.
Uruk GNU/Linux 1.0 -- Running the MATE desktop
(full image size: 292kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
The locally installed copy of Uruk boots to a graphical login screen. There are two session options available: MATE and Trisquel Mini. Selecting either session signs us into the MATE desktop. I tried running Uruk in two test environments, one was a VirtualBox instance and the other was a desktop computer. Uruk worked well on the physical desktop machine, correctly piping sound through my speakers, setting up a network connection and setting my display to its full resolution. I found Uruk needed about 350MB of memory to login to the MATE desktop. The distribution also ran smoothly in the VirtualBox environment and was stable. However, Uruk did not integrate with VirtualBox and was unable to make use of my host computer's full screen resolution when running in the virtual environment. To make matters worse, Uruk does not feature VirtualBox modules in the distribution's software repositories. This means our best solution for working with Uruk in a VirtualBox environment is to get the necessary modules from the VirtualBox website or Ubuntu's repositories.
Shortly after signing into Uruk, I noticed an icon in the system tray which let me know there were software updates available. Clicking on this icon brings up the Linux Mint update manager. The update manager displays a list of available software updates and assigns a safety rating to each package. Packages with a rating of 1, 2 or 3 are marked as being safe to install while ratings of 4 or 5 indicate packages which may break system functionality if they are installed. The first day I was using Uruk there were six updates listed, totalling 55MB in size. These updates were downloaded from Trisquel's software repositories and they installed without any problems.
Once I had installed the first round of updates, it occurred to me that six updates was a fairly small number and checked the update manager's settings. I found that while packages given a rating of 1, 2 and 3 are all considered to be safe (with most security updates being assigned a rating of 3), only packages with a rating of 1 or 2 were displayed by default. While this means the updates we install are almost guaranteed to be completely stable, Uruk's update manager filters out the majority of software updates, even ones which should be stable. I enabled level 3 updates and found there were another 79 updates available, totalling 198MB in size. These were also downloaded and installed without any problems.
On the topic of software packages, Uruk provides users with a software manager (labelled Add/Remove Applications in the application menu). The first time I opened the software manager a message appeared and reported the repository information I had was out of date and I was asked if it was okay for the software manager to update its information. The software manager window is divided into two main sections. On the left are several software categories, such as Internet and Office. On the right we find a list of applications in the selected category. Each application entry includes the package's name, a brief description and many entries include an icon. We can select packages we wish to install or remove.
Uruk GNU/Linux 1.0 -- The graphical software manager
(full image size: 241kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
Most of the time the software manager worked well for me, but I did run into an unusual bug. Sometimes when trying to download a new package, the software manager would report it had run into an error. The error message said the selected package could not be removed because it was a dependency of another package. This struck me as strange since I was installing a new package, not removing an existing item. Switching to the command line and using the apt-get command line package manager worked around the issue.
Uruk ships with quite a useful collection of free and open source applications. The Abrowser web browser is featured. This is essentially a de-branded version of Firefox. Flash support is provided in Abrowser via the Gnash free software implementation of Flash. The Icedove (Thunderbird) e-mail application is featured too. The Deluge bittorrent client is included along with the Liferea RSS reader and the Pidgin messaging software. LibreOffice is installed for us along with a dictionary, a calendar application and the Atril document viewer. The GNU Image Manipulation Program and the Eye of MATE image viewer are featured too. Uruk ships with a media file converter, the VLC multimedia player and the Xfburn disc burning software. I found the distribution would play most video and audio files. Uruk ships with a calculator, archive manager and the Rose Crypt file encryption software. Network Manager is available to help us set up an Internet connection. The distribution provides users with Java and the GNU Compiler Collection. Upstart 1.12 is the distribution's default init software and, in the background, we find version 4.2.0 of the Linux kernel.
Uruk GNU/Linux 1.0 -- Running various desktop applications
(full image size: 518kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
I like the application menu Uruk uses. I'm not keen on the usual three-menu approach used by MATE and I like that this distribution is using a different menu style. It is pleasantly straight forward to rearrange the menu's Favourites area, and we can add or remove favourite items by right-clicking on a menu entry.
One application which stood out was the Rose Crypt program. I do not recall using Rose Crypt before, it is a simple desktop application with just a File menu to control its actions. Rose Crypt will let us encrypt or decrypt a file using a password. The original files are kept, making the encryption method relatively safe. While I like it when developers provide an easy way to work with encryption, I have two concerns when it comes to Rose Crypt. The first is the user's password is displayed on the screen as it is typed. There does not appear to be any way to replace the plain-text password with stars or simply not show any characters. The other issue I had was encrypted files are the same size as the originals, which suggests me to Rose Crypt probably does not pad data, possibly making it more vulnerable to attack.
Uruk ships with lots of configuration tools and it is probably easiest to access them through the control panel. We can open the control panel from the launch bar at the bottom of the screen or by pressing the Power button in the upper-right corner of the desktop. The control panel is more or less divided into two parts. The first group of modules, at the top of the panel, deal with tweaking the look and behaviour of the desktop. Modules toward the bottom of the panel deal with software updates, power management, partitioning disks, enabling background services and creating user accounts. The control panel is nicely laid out and features a search function to help us find what we need. I found all the modules worked well, with the exception of the Software & Updates module. For some reason this module failed to launch. All other modules worked quickly and I found them easy to navigate.
Uruk GNU/Linux 1.0 -- Desktop and system settings
(full image size: 217kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
One of the key features of the distribution, as described by the project's website, is the handling of .rpm and source archives. There are two command line tools, u-src and u-rpmi, for installing source archives and .rpm packages. I gave these a try, starting with u-src. The u-src utility is actually just a small shell script. The u-src script unpacks a given .tar.gz archive and runs the commands "sudo configure", "make" and "sudo make install". Then the script attempts (and fails) to clean up the unpacked directory. The script fails the clean-up process because configure is run with root privileges, making the resulting output owned by root, which our regular user cannot delete.
In some circumstances u-src can successfully install software from source code. Assuming the source code is in a tar archive compressed with gzip and the archive contains source code which can be built using configure and make and assuming we already have all the necessary dependencies installed on our operating system, then u-src can work. The resulting software does not get packaged or work with our software manager, but it will be installed on our system. However, if we are dealing with a different type of archive, or software that uses qmake or cmake or Java or if we do not have the necessary dependencies installed, then u-src will fail.
I next tried u-rpmi with less favourable results. Like u-src, u-rpmi is a small shell script which simply runs a tool called alien to install the given package. The alien utility tries to convert a .rpm archive into a .deb archive so we can install it. The alien tool can work in some situations, but doesn't do well with more complex archives. However, the big hurdle here is the alien package is not installed on Uruk by default. Running u-rpmi simply produces an error saying "alien: command not found". Of course we can install the alien software and that will allow us to install some .rpm archives, but we may need to hunt down dependencies ourselves as .rpm files tend to name dependencies differently than .deb files. In the end, I did not find either u-rpmi or u-src to be useful as there is a ways to go before they live up to their expected behaviour.
Conclusions
Uruk GNU/Linux appears to be a fairly young project with some lofty goals, but some rough edges and unusual characteristics. I applaud the developers' attempts to provide a pure free software distribution, particularly their use of Gnash to provide a pretty good stand-in for Adobe's Flash player. Gnash is not perfect, but it should work well enough for most people.
On the other hand, Uruk does not appear to offer much above and beyond what Trisquel provides. Uruk uses Trisquel's repositories and maintains the same free software only stance, but does not appear to provide a lot that Trisquel on its own does not already offer. Uruk does feature some add-ons from Linux Mint, like the update manager. However, this tends to work against the distribution as the update manager hides most security updates by default while Mint usually shows all updates, minus just the ones known to cause problems with stability.
As I mentioned above, the package compatibility tools talked about on the Uruk website do not really deliver and are hampered by the missing alien package in the default installation. The build-from-source u-src tool may be handy in some limited cases, but it only works in very simple scenarios with specific archive types and build processes. Hopefully these package compatibility tools will be expanded for future releases.
Right now I'm not sure Uruk provides much above what Trisquel 7.0 provided two years ago. The project is still young and may grow in time. This is a 1.0 release and I would hold off trying the distribution until it has time to build toward its goals.
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Hardware used in this review
My physical test equipment for this review was a desktop HP Pavilon p6 Series with the following specifications:
- Processor: Dual-core 2.8GHz AMD A4-3420 APU
- Storage: 500GB Hitachi hard drive
- Memory: 6GB of RAM
- Networking: Realtek RTL8111 wired network card
- Display: AMD Radeon HD 6410D video card
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
Snappy Ubuntu Core finds a home on Nextcloud Box, Linux users have more video streaming options, Lenovo controversy
The Nextcloud Box is a storage and file synchronization appliance which ships with a 1TB hard drive, Nextcloud 10 and a microSD card with Ubuntu pre-installed. Specifically, the device runs Snappy Ubuntu Core and may be the first such device to ship with the Snappy edition of the Ubuntu operating system. The one thing which is missing from the Box is a single-board computer, such as a Raspberry Pi or similar small computing device to make the whole thing run. "'We have always believed that collaboration brings out the best in communities and companies alike,' said Jane Silber, CEO at Canonical. 'Together with WDLabs and Nextcloud we are able to bring the first Ubuntu Core-enabled device, as an app-enabled IoT gateway, to the market and to people's homes.'" More information on the Nextcloud box can be found on the OMG Ubuntu and Nextcloud websites.
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Linux users who wish to participate in video streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon Video will be happy to know these services will soon be available to people running the open source Firefox web browser. Previously, Linux users typically had to run a closed source browser, such as Chrome, or perform technical workarounds to access these services. Firefox 49 introduces a new plugin which provides the code necessary to stream videos from Netflix and Amazon. The Ghacks website reports: "Firefox 49 on Linux will support plug-in free playback on Netflix and Amazon video. This is done through the integration of Google Widevine CDM for Linux. This means that Linux users don't need Adobe Flash or a Silverlight alternative for that anymore." At the time of writing, it may still be necessary to change Firefox's user agent identification text in order to access streaming services.
Last week a story made the rounds which talked about certain Lenovo laptops blocking the installation of Linux-based operating systems. While it is true Linux cannot be installed on a particular Lenovo laptop model, the problem appears to be more of an issue with missing drivers and questionable firmware settings than a deliberate attempt to prevent Linux from running on the computer. Matthew Garrett has a nice summary of the situation: "There's a story going round that Lenovo have signed an agreement with Microsoft that prevents installing free operating systems. This is sensationalist, untrue and distracts from a genuine problem. The background is straightforward. Intel platforms allow the storage to be configured in two different ways - "standard" (normal AHCI on SATA systems, normal NVMe on NVMe systems) or "RAID". "RAID" mode is typically just changing the PCI IDs so that the normal drivers won't bind, ensuring that drivers that support the software RAID mode are used. Intel have not submitted any patches to Linux to support the "RAID" mode. In this specific case, Lenovo's firmware defaults to "RAID" mode and doesn't allow you to change that. Since Linux has no support for the hardware when configured this way, you can't install Linux (distribution installers will boot, but won't find any storage device to install the OS to)." Further explanation can be found in Garrett's blog post.
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These and other news stories can be found on our Headlines page.
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| Questions and Answers (by Jesse Smith) |
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Blocking applications at the firewall
Blocking-apps asks: All the default firewall apps on Linux block ports and IP addresses, but not specific applications. Is there a firewall app that will let me block programs instead of port numbers? Preferably something simple and with a GUI.
DistroWatch answers: There are a few programs for Linux which will block an application, regardless of which ports it uses, rather than filtering specific service ports. The Douane and Leopard Flower utilities are designed with this situation in mind. That is the good news. The bad news is not many distributions have packaged these utilities yet, so you may need to follow the documentation to build your own copy from the provided source code for the two aforementioned programs.
Another way to go would be to isolate your untrusted applications, cutting them off from the network. This can be accomplished by setting up a virtual machine and installing the untrusted program in the virtual environment. Once the virtual environment has been set up, the virtual machine's network interface can be disabled, cutting the application off from the Internet.
For people who do not like the idea of running a full virtual machine with all the extra overhead, there is another option. The Firejail sandboxing software is very lightweight and can be used to cut off an application's network connection. For example, if we wanted to run the Rhythmbox audio player and block its network access we could run
firejail --net=none rhytmbox
Using sandboxes and virtual machines gives us the added bonus of isolating untrusted applications not only from the network, but also from interacting with other programs or files on our computer.
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For more questions and answers, visit our Questions and Answers archive.
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| Torrent Corner |
Weekly Torrents
Bittorrent is a great way to transfer large files, particularly open source operating system images, from one place to another. Most bittorrent clients recover from dropped connections automatically, check the integrity of files and can re-download corrupted bits of data without starting a download over from scratch. These characteristics make bittorrent well suited for distributing open source operating systems, particularly to regions where Internet connections are slow or unstable.
Many Linux and BSD projects offer bittorrent as a download option, partly for the reasons listed above and partly because bittorrent's peer-to-peer nature takes some of the strain off the project's servers. However, some projects do not offer bittorrent as a download option. There can be several reasons for excluding bittorrent as an option. Some projects do not have enough time or volunteers, some may be restricted by their web host provider's terms of service. Whatever the reason, the lack of a bittorrent option puts more strain on a distribution's bandwidth and may prevent some people from downloading their preferred open source operating system.
With this in mind, DistroWatch plans to give back to the open source community by hosting and seeding bittorrent files. For now, we are hosting a small number of distribution torrents, listed below. The list of torrents offered will be updated each week and we invite readers to e-mail us with suggestions as to which distributions we should be hosting. When you message us, please place the word "Torrent" in the subject line, make sure to include a link to the ISO file you want us to seed. To help us maintain and grow this free service, please consider making a donation.
The table below provides a list of torrents we currently host. If you do not currently have a bittorrent client capable of handling the linked files, we suggest installing either the Transmission or KTorrent bittorrent clients.
Archives of our previously seeded torrents may be found here. All torrents we make available here are also listed on the very useful Linux Tracker website. Thanks to Linux Tracker we are able to share the following torrent statistics.
Torrent Corner statistics:
- Total torrents seeded: 240
- Total data uploaded: 44.8TB
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| Released Last Week |
Absolute Linux 14.2
Paul Sherman has announced the release of Absolute Linux 14.2, a new version of the project's Slackware-based distribution featuring the lightweight IceWM window manager as the default desktop user interface: "Absolute Linux 14.2 released, based on Slackware 14.2. It comes in a 32-bit and a 64-bit variants. Same basic functionality, but most everything updated under the hood. No longer fits on a single CD - the usual installation method is a USB stick. With this size-constraint removed, larger applications like LibreOffice and Calibre are now included in the base installation. Both installers have an 'Autoinstall' option, which partitions and formats your drive. The 64-bit edition will make GPT partitions if you are booting EFI. But just as with Slackware, you need to turn off Secure Boot in the BIOS if it is set. The applications and development libraries are more extensive than previous releases." Visit the distribution's home page to read the full release announcement and see also the changelog for minute details.
Absolute Linux 14.2 -- Default desktop environment
(full image size: 620kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
Tails 2.6
The Amnesic Incognito Live System (Tails) project has released a new version of the Debian-based privacy oriented distribution. Tails allows the user to direct network traffic through the Tor anonymizing network and provides a number of privacy utilities. The latest release, Tails 2.6, includes such security features as memory address randomization and higher entropy for generating random numbers. The Tor software has been updated to version 0.2.8.7 and the Tor Browser has been updated to version 6.0.5. "New features: We enabled address space layout randomization in the Linux kernel (kASLR) to improve protection from buffer overflow attacks. We installed rngd to improve the entropy of the random numbers generated on computers that have a hardware random number generator." A problem with setting up GMail accounts has been fixed and the "disable all networking" option has been improved. Additional information on Tails 2.6 along with known issues can be found in the project's release announcement.
Robolinux 8.6
Robolinux is a Debian-based desktop distribution which features many security and entertainment packages. The Robolinux project has released an update to the distribution's 8.x series: Robolinux 8.6. The new version is available in four editions (Cinnamon, LXDE, MATE and Xfce) and can be run on 32-bit and 64bit x86 processors. "As usual all four of the upgraded 32-bit & 64-bit Robolinux Raptor version 8.6 operating system editions come with over 120 custom built wifi, video & printer drivers and can run Windows XP, 7 & 10 virus free inside. Every version is loaded with many popular one-click installer applications such as the Tor browser, I2P, several very popular multimedia apps, Google Chrome, Google Earth, Skype & VirtualBox, plus 12 incredibly powerful security and privacy apps to keep our users safe!" Some older (pre-2008) video cards are no longer supported. The release announcement contain further information.
Apricity OS 09.2016
Alex Gajewski has announced the availability of a new release of the Apricity OS Linux distribution. The new version, Apricity OS 09.2016, includes a few new features. This release includes builds for 64-bit and 32-bit computers. The new 32-bit builds use Firefox as the default web browser and all editions include various EFI fixes. "We're very excited to announce the very first release of Apricity OS that includes a (development) 32-bit version, labelled i686 in the downloads section of this site. We're also trying out in the 32-bit versions a switch to Firefox as the default browser, a very frequently requested change. This month the Calamares installer has been updated to version 2.4.1 (from 2.3), bringing many bug fixes, improved timezone and partition interfaces, and a couple EFI fixes." The full announcement can be found in the project's blog post.
Apricity OS 09.2016 -- Running the Cinnamon desktop
(full image size: 968kB, resolution: 1366x768 pixels)
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Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases
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| Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
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Summary of expected upcoming releases
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| Opinion Poll |
Where do you use Linux?
Linux-based operating systems are all around us. Linux runs on many of our phones, laptops, servers and even appliances around the home. Linux distributions power Raspberry Pis, TiVo boxes and super computers.
Still, not all of us run Linux all the time. Some of us might run Linux on servers at work, but not at home. Or perhaps you use Linux at home, but need to use company computers running a different operating system for work. This week we would like to know where do you use Linux?
You can see the results of our previous poll on open source project names here. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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Where do you use Linux?
| I run Linux on my home PCs or devices: | 1728 (63%) |
| I run Linux on work PCs or servers: | 67 (2%) |
| I run Linux at home and at work: | 858 (31%) |
| I run Linux in another environment: | 30 (1%) |
| I do not currently run Linux: | 70 (3%) |
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| DistroWatch.com News |
Top 100 most visited projects on DistroWatch
The DistroWatch page hit ranking (PHR) statistics keep track of the number of people who visit a distribution's information page each day. While not a direct measure of popularity, the PHR statistics can provide visitors to this site with an idea of which distributions are attracting attention at the moment.
This past week the Denholm's Dead website published a poster which features the names of the top 100 ranked projects on DistroWatch. The names are arranged in and around a heart shape, reflecting our feelings toward the open source community. We are sharing a copy of the image here with permission from the author.
Top 100 PHR poster
(full image size: 2.7MB, resolution: 4,000x5,658 pixels)
Distributions added to waiting list
- Smart Enterprise Linux Desktop. Smart Enterprise Linux Desktop is a Linux distribution based on openSUSE Leap which uses the KDE desktop by default.
- ClonOS. ClonOS is a minimal FreeBSD-based operating system for working with virtual hosts and appliances.
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DistroWatch database summary
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This concludes this week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly. The next instalment will be published on Monday, 3 October 2016. To contact the authors please send e-mail to:
- Jesse Smith (feedback, questions and suggestions: distribution reviews/submissions, questions and answers, tips and tricks)
- Ladislav Bodnar (feedback, questions, donations, comments)
- Bruce Patterson (podcast)
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| Reader Comments • Jump to last comment |
1 • Linux (by BILL S. on 2016-09-26 00:14:18 GMT from United States)
I use Linux everywhere, home, work, laptop. If my wife wasn't a SIMS addict, she would only use Linux too. Now, I'm busy converting family members and friends.
Love Linux!!
2 • Linux Heart Art (by Jordan on 2016-09-26 00:38:53 GMT from United States)
lol the Manjaro and Korora names jumped out at me from that image right away.
Nice piece of artwork. A keeper. Has a 3-D look.
3 • Lenovo laptop debacle (by Linux is my OS on 2016-09-26 01:25:12 GMT from United States)
for now on i will only be buying new hardware with Linux pre-installed and make sure there is not extra proprietary layers of hardware preventing me from switching distributions of Linux, i can not afford hundreds or thousands of dollars worth of hardware turning in to a brick
4 • Linux (by argent on 2016-09-26 01:28:14 GMT from United States)
Use Linux exclusively now, work, home and play! Have 3 desktops, and 2 laptops and nothing running Windows.
Everything I need to accomplish can be done with Linux and that happened 4 years ago!
Devuan,my distribution preference for all my devices.
5 • LINUX (by bigsky on 2016-09-26 01:44:58 GMT from Slovakia)
Having used Linux for over 20 years now it seems odd to me that people still use a Microsoft product. Or anything else for that matter. If this is off topic so be it. Thanks
6 • Linux (by BeGo on 2016-09-26 03:21:57 GMT from United States)
Lubuntu Laptop, LXLE Server, Bodhi PC, 2 Android Mobile Phone :)
7 • Linux (by seacat on 2016-09-26 03:43:55 GMT from Argentina)
PC: Debian
Laptop: Sparkylinux
Mobile: Android
8 • Linux (by Ghostdawg on 2016-09-26 04:06:43 GMT from United States)
PC Mageia 5, Debian Testing & Salix 13.2
Laptop Mageia 5, Debian Testing
Mobile Android
9 • Where are we running Linux... (by Bobbie Sellers on 2016-09-26 04:48:19 GMT from United States)
I am retired.
When I was able to work we filled out data entry sheets for the typists to copy
into medical records and print out and send back to us.
When I gave up nursing I did the same chore for a advocacy group
and wondered aloud why we did not cut the data entry step out of
the work and have our own computers.
I started using Linux in about 2006 and joined a LUG to find out more about
the internals. Now I host bi-monthly meetings at a local coffee shop with WiFi.
Now I will put Linux on the computer of anyone interested enough to allow
this. I wish I could put it on my old Amiga 2000b-060, but I got into x86
just before I got into Linux.
This box runs Linux 24/7 as well as the sequestered W8.1
bliss
10 • Lenovo debacle (by Kleer Kut on 2016-09-26 06:51:32 GMT from United States)
I saw this Lenovo issue shortly after it started and turned into a wildfire of people pro/anti Linux/Windows which was a complete distraction. The person who got upset and the representative who replied were both less than knowledgeable about what they were trying to communicate.
The real issue that got distracted from is Lenovo pulling another anti-user move by blocking access to BIOS. Why on earth do people keep giving Lenovo their money and expecting anything less than this level of nonsense? People keep throwing their money at them; Of course they are going to continue their behavior!
11 • Lenovo and stuff (by Andy Mender on 2016-09-26 07:26:38 GMT from Austria)
@10,
Well, it was somewhat expected that a conspiracy theory would pop up quickly, considering the past problems with Secure Boot and UEFI implementations preventing some GNU/Linux installs. Lenovo being a rather technical company, makes quite the strange move on the users. Blocked BIOS access? Default RAID setup? Why would anyone ever need implicit RAID support on a laptop?
I often yearn for the good ol' BIOS days when one could load whatever operating system one wanted and configure almost everything properly.
12 • Only Linux (by Paraquat on 2016-09-26 07:46:40 GMT from Taiwan)
I have two amd64 computers, plus a couple Raspberry Pi's. Everything is running Linux. Even on the Intel computers, I didn't buy Windows - I got them new without an OS.
Several different versions of Linux have come and gone, but right now it's Devuan, plus Refracta (a Devuan-based spin).
The Raspis are running Rasbian and OSMC.
13 • Linux use (by paul on 2016-09-26 08:02:10 GMT from United States)
Been using linux for years, got rid or windows during 10 update last year have not looked back, nor do I care to.
14 • Linux use (by Dave on 2016-09-26 08:27:56 GMT from United States)
I use Linux and OS X exclusively. I'm not particularly fond of Apple though. I gave up Windows right after I bought my first computer with ME on it.
@12
How did you go about buying your computer without an operating system? I'm interested and would like to do this also.
15 • RE: Linux use (by Andy Mender on 2016-09-26 08:37:53 GMT from Austria)
@14,
It's not strictly without an operating system, though many vendors list it as such, because the staff members are too young to know DOS :). At least in Europe, the minimum requirement is Doctor DOS or FreeDOS. Due to some EU regulations computers must be sold with an operating system, otherwise consumers don't know (supposedly) whether the hardware is fully operational.
Usually it's the cheapest or off-sale models that you can buy without Windows. Try on newegg.com or Wallmart for instance ;).
16 • Computer Without OS installed (by KC1DI on 2016-09-26 08:56:31 GMT from United States)
@14 & 15 -- Dell will sell you a computer without OS. But you have to bug them.
Also New egg has them sometimes. and thought this list is a bit old some of them are still available. http://lxer.com/module/forums/t/23168/
cheers!
17 • Love Linux (by Voncloft on 2016-09-26 10:10:37 GMT from United States)
I love using Gentoo Linux, I created my own router from it, it is a host of servers all rolled into one a PDC, NAS, Firewall, Cron, Apache WebServer Server, etc.
A Desktop I own uses Gentoo, and my Laptop on the other hand is a tripple boot system used for entertainment (has a hauppauge 2255 tv tuner card with an antenna at the moment) - using a projector and a wall to see it.
(windows 7 *yuck* (barely ever used - matter of fact I still need to activate it lol), GENTOO, and Kodibuntu) which is currently hooked up to my TV in the bedroom via HDMI to stream from my Router that has its own NAS.
18 • RE: Love Linux (by Andy Mender on 2016-09-26 10:20:17 GMT from Austria)
@17,
Great to see another Gentoo user around. I too enjoy the incredible flexibility and hands-on nature of this GNU/Linux distro ;). Cannot get enough of it.
Right now I've managed to "de-taint" a legacy MacBook late-2009 laptop with Gentoo, though I am planning to transfer this system into a bigger desktop 'husk'.
Per topic, I use various GNU/Linux and BSD distributions at home and exclusively Cent OS 7 on workstations at work.
19 • Linux Usage (by Danil on 2016-09-26 10:21:56 GMT from United States)
I have permenently been running Linux since XP went out of support. Been off/on linux since back in the days with Red Hat Linux. Linux has grown and just gets better.
20 • RE: Linux use (by snowdust on 2016-09-26 10:28:24 GMT from Canada)
Laptop #1: triple boot w/ SolusOS + Apricity + KaOS
Laptop #2: dual boot w/ Debian Jessie Mate + VeltOS
Desktop #1: Mint Betsy Mate
Desktop #2: Mint Sarah 18 KDE + PeppermintOS
Bought laptop #1 two months ago; used Gparted and Gdisk to get rid of Windows 10 and modify the partition table. Prior to using Linux, I ran BeOS long after the Be Inc. went belly up. NT4 was the last MS product I used ... and that was a loooooong time ago.
21 • Linux Usage (by Xutie on 2016-09-26 10:52:09 GMT from Europe)
Desktop/server: Manjaro KDE / OpenSUSE Tumbleweed
Laptops: Manjaro jwm, Manjaro Cinnamon
Mobile: Android
22 • No operating system (by bigsky on 2016-09-26 11:09:54 GMT from United States)
@14 @16 If your in North America there is a company called Memory Express that have over 40 computer choices without an OS. Have bought several and loving it. LINUX ROCKS !!!
23 • Linux Usage (by fox on 2016-09-26 11:17:44 GMT from Canada)
I was extensively a Mac user, but in the last year, my home and office computers have been running Linux in a dual boot setup, with the Mac side used only for software I cannot run in Linux. Running primarily Ubuntu 16.04, but I have one old PC laptop reserved for distro-hopping (has Fedora 24, Bunsenlabs, Cub and Remix OS on it). Macs running Linux: 2013 iMac, 2009 and 2012 Mac mini.
24 • My Way or No Way (by Waiting on 2016-09-26 11:53:36 GMT from United States)
Nowhere anymore... the desktops suck in comparison to a commercial operation system and the mainstream servers have been contaminated with systemd. Moved to macOS and FreeBSD.
25 • Linux (by mandog on 2016-09-26 11:57:30 GMT from Peru)
Arch Linux since 2005 tried all the rest on separate partitions, but nothing comes close to Arch as a workhorse giving nutyx a spin at the moment. Yes used Gentoo in the past shaves a fraction of seconds off Arch, the long compile times and net usage on Gentoo, to much time spent in administration to be more than a play thing when I'm bored
26 • Linux (by Phillip on 2016-09-26 13:20:44 GMT from United Kingdom)
I have one laptop running Win 7 and Manjaro 16.08 KDE, and another Laptop running Win 10.
Ive used Windows since win 3.x and Dos 6.2 and dont have a problem with Windows. Im also NOT into windows bashing, and dont see the need for it. As for Windows being insecure, I blame the end user for not bothering to use basic skills and learn.
I use the OS I need to get stuff done, and at the moment thats Win 7 and Manjaro. I also dont even try to convert family or friends because they wouldnt even try to learn, they would be bothering me every day. Trust me, I have friends who dont respect me or my time, or my knowledge, why learn when they can bug me to go fix for free. They believe any future problems is your fault, as you installed Linux, or the problem didnt start till you did something to fix another problem. I leave other PC users alone to mess up, and let them pay a shop to fix their problems. If I was to start charging Id be better to start a business.
So I dont understand why smart Linux users have to bash windows ? If you dont like Windows, then just get over it, and get on with life, chill out baby.
27 • Linux (by P.T. on 2016-09-26 13:46:05 GMT from Germany)
Laptop: Void Linux + Win7 for CAD application
Void is similar to Arch, but works like a charm without systemd. Easy build system.
I consulted a non-geeky friend who was still using win7. I explained the drawbacks of the win10-"upgrade" and he turned to debian-testing with my assistance; he loves it!
28 • I run linux everywhere... (by tom joad on 2016-09-26 14:31:34 GMT from Hungary)
I run linux everywhere, all the time. I am a mad, serially addicted distro hopper too! Yes, I have linux shirts!. And I get questions from folks asking what is the funny looking little penquin guy all about? I tell them they don't have the need to know; it is secret! Or they ask what is an Ubuntu? I tell them the Ubuntus are giant monsters who live quietly in the Washington State woods and eat huge amounts of Windows!
29 • Where do you run Linux (by cykodrone on 2016-09-26 15:04:26 GMT from United States)
Android is Linux too (albeit corporate spyware), which on a personal mobile device, leaves the domestic domicile. Just sayin'.
I haven't used any MS or Apple products in 6 years, dumped Android earlier this year, and not looking back.
30 • Linux (by bushpilot on 2016-09-26 15:22:59 GMT from Canada)
Right now I am booting 3 linux distro's. Debian 8, Antergos & openSUSE, all xfce versions.
Run Windows XP in VB on Antergos. I have always liked XP and have configured all three linux distro's in a similar fashion..one panel on the bottom only. I don't have any need for a windows OS but set it up in a VB for a learning exercise.
As I am 81 years of age, I need to keep my brain exercised. To me Linux is a version of a crossword puzzle.
31 • Linux poll (by far2fish on 2016-09-26 16:23:04 GMT from Denmark)
Antergos Linux on personal laptop
Xubuntu on daughter's laptop
Fedora workstation in virtual box on work desktop and laptop as corporate policy dictates windows on the client. Also using Linux servers at work.
32 • Where do I use Linux? (by PM on 2016-09-26 17:25:16 GMT from United States)
For the longest time, I've been running Debian on home PC's and one of the servers at work. However, I'm in the process of building two more servers and switching everything over to FreeBSD. For starters, I prefer the BSD license over GNU. It isn't as restricting as GNU. I also like the consistency within the BSD community with regard to the file/folder structure. ZFS is also included as an optional partition method within the FreeBSD default installation. And even though ZFSonLinux is available for installation on several Linux distributions and is to be included with the next release of Debian ("Stretch"), it's still not quite there, yet (when it comes to ease of installation). Another pro to be considered with FreeBSD... Jails. The closest alternative that's available within the Linux community is LXC.
I will at least say this, I've been using Linux since Slackware 3.3. I've tried every MAJOR Linux distribution out there. And, if I had to choose a Linux distribution over everything else, I would choose Debian.
33 • Linux (by Wolf-NV on 2016-09-26 17:30:29 GMT from United States)
When WinXP died, I went to Linux - Debian 8! I had fooled around with it Since Corel!! You could not make me change! I have VirtualBox and try all kinds of OSs, but Debian is still my OS of choice!!
34 • Linux (by Polymath257 on 2016-09-26 20:03:39 GMT from United States)
I have 3 desktops and 1 laptop at home, all running Mint. I run several virtual machines with CentOS. My home router uses dd-wrt. At work, I manage 25 user machines and a LAMP server, all running versions of Linux.
35 • Where do I use Linux? (by Leka on 2016-09-26 20:23:34 GMT from Germany)
Where do I use Linux? On a laptop. I mean, I used to. I still have Linux distros on few laptops, but now for few months I use only Windows 10, lately with the anniversary update. But, there are quite a lot of people, who use one or few of my Linux distros, based on Debian, Devuan and Ubuntu, I had uploaded to the Internet. So, in a way, even if I had stopped using a Linux distro, someone out there uses one of mine. Strange, isn't it?
I became angry with Windows 7, and moved completely to Linux, then got a new laptop with Windows 8.1, but without the MS ransom. There are still ways to buy new laptops very much cheaper than the original price tag. After a while, moved it to Win 10, and liked what I saw. I liked the double quick boot, the easy desktop and lack of need for Wine. Every app works in it. Finding a file is faster than writing the whole word. And, umpteen amount of web browsers. And, I didn't have a single crash.
When the creator of Crunchbang dropped his niche distro and moved to Win 10, I was disappointed and angry at him, but today, I find he was right. In the Linux world, people are fighting, while in Windows or iOS, they are making only one OS. Right now, few Linux distros are "installed" in my laptops, and I look at them from time to time, but I haven't been using one for few months now.
36 • Distribution creators - add basics please! (by Greg Zeng on 2016-09-26 21:17:15 GMT from Australia)
So many Linux distributions make it impossible to be installed. They refuse to add Gparted or Synaptic Package Manager (or equivalents), in the 'Live" distribution. So they force myself to use the Peppermint distribution to clean the storage area, which allows adding the new Linux operating system.
Often we installers need to create UEFI, boot or root (re-sized, fresh) partition before a new Linux distribution can be installed. These two additional programs need not be installed in the new operating system, although Peppermint does this.
Good installations allow installation of updated files, live from the internet, during the installation. Synaptic Package Manager allows the skilled installer to select the fastest site to download these latest packages. Amongst the installation unfriendly oprating systems that I have met, are some official Ubuntu releases, Zorin, etc. Could this hostility please stop?
37 • @36 (by OstroL on 2016-09-26 21:51:38 GMT from Canada)
Why do you need an installer to install a Linux distro? You can install any Linux distro, even in that "blocked" for Linux Lenovo, right?
38 • @36 (by Cent on 2016-09-26 22:10:06 GMT from United States)
Except, you know, the original developer of Crunchbang, Corenominal, actually came back to Linux. Pretty fast in fact. I think he still has a Mac on the side, but it's mostly Linux yet again. And Windows users don't fight as much because they don't talk to each other nearly as much as Linux users do. It's not a community over there, as a community doesn't produce the actual operating system. Also, Corenominal didn't leave because of fighting, he left because he was allured by Windows... for a few weeks. But why shouldn't we incorrectly overgeneralize everything? Par for the course! Please, keep being as annoying as you are. We love pointless comments that provide nothing.
39 • Where I run Linux (by Carson on 2016-09-26 22:25:40 GMT from United States)
I try to run Linux wherever I can. Almost every computer I own runs Linux. (The only exception to this is my Windows 98 experiment.) I have convinced almost all of immediate family to use Linux. :)
40 • Where I run Linux (by LinuxJunkie on 2016-09-26 23:14:55 GMT from United States)
1 Laptop w/ Xubuntu 16.04
1 Desktop w/ LXLE "Eclectica" 16.04 (LXLE is my fav)
1 Desktop w/ Linux MInt 18 "Sarah" Cinnamon
My Mom's Laptop w/ Bodhi 3.2
1 Church Desktop w/ Zorin OS 9
1 Android Phone
1 phone w/ iOS
I started using Linux when WinXP hit end of life and haven't looked back. Oddly enough I found out about Linux through an advertisement that someone posted in the computers section on Craigslist back then. Only one PC still runs Windows and I upgraded it from 8.1 to 10 recently. I use it only when I need to as Linux is what I mainly use now.
I picked up a used Dell Desktop at a thrift store for $5 and bought a 250GB HDD for cheap online. Going to set up a dual boot on that machine and install a different Linux OS on the Dell machine I'm currently using and give it to a family member who desperately needs a new computer.
41 • Linux (by Gabe on 2016-09-26 23:28:53 GMT from Brazil)
@29 What are you using for mobile then? I am starting to consider a way out of Android. Won't touch anything MS or Apple based, so Android is the easiest way out. However, even though Android is open sourced, it is just full of official Google [bloat|spy]ware, and that not to mention that the Android that actually comes with your device is an overhaul to the tastes of the product's manufacturer (Samsung, Alcatel, LG, Huawei and even Lenovo itself). On top of that, there is also all the shady stuff that comes pre-installed and non-removable, with the graces of said manufacturer. I know I could root, but doing that to change Android for Android will still leave me with Android.
42 • response to Big Sky (by Bobbie Sellers on 2016-09-27 04:41:31 GMT from United States)
Memory Express seems to charge quite a premium for its machines.
43 • Linux all the way and Uruk (by Knut on 2016-09-27 05:39:36 GMT from Germany)
I run all Linux on my computers since 2009. At this moment that means Arch at the one of my workplaces, where I am allowed to change the operating system, Ubuntu Mate on my current Laptop and Manjaro on my old Macbook, that I sometimes use for portability reasons. Currently looking for a "new" laptop (maybe refurbished) and glad to have found some additional websites to keep an eye on in this thread.
While trying to find if Uruk could offer something that others don't already I saw that they provide an audio file to pronounce its name right. That is something that many technical products lack. Just think about gif, gnu and the like.
44 • @38 (by Alex on 2016-09-27 05:56:04 GMT from Canada)
Just 2 tweets from corenominal, the former creator of crunchbang.
"After months of procrastinating over buying an Ubuntu phone, I finally purchased a new iPhone" and "Upgraded my MacBook Pro to macOS Sierra. Lovely wallpaper." might say something.
It looks like, he has money now to buy a Mac. He used to live on donations before.
Anyway, the Linux distro devs are fighting each other, "creating" many different Linux OSs, which are not compatible with each other. That doesn't help, does it? Instead of concentrating one direction, we go different ways, never to meet and settle a problem, we simply have deb, rpm, pisi and so on.
Only one Linux distro (for people) had gone the correct way, Android. Only one that actually dethroned iOS and Windows.
45 • Where do i run linux ?! (by grraf on 2016-09-27 06:03:06 GMT from Romania)
On my PC.... it all started out as a dual boot experiment ubuntu alongside WinXP around the time Vista was released giving most users the natural WTF?! reaction to driver issues&wheel reinvention approach to user interaction... stayed with ubuntu for a few months hoped on to debian stable&testing but found the dev cycle too slow... aand for the last 3yrs i'm an arch user; odd enough despite an endless sampling of new distros i'm unable to snap out of it: to me pacman&AUR are the perfect blend of sanity&diversity and the kernel&drivers available to me are always the latest&greatist while bugs&instability is smth i rarely encounter nowadays(the enormous arch documentation is an awesome tool for learning and self problem solving)
46 • @44 (by Cent on 2016-09-27 09:24:13 GMT from United States)
And just a little ways below that tweet: "Built this the other night and it actually works quite well, I think. Faviconator:". He built it on Ubuntu. For Ubuntu. On an Ubuntu repository. I said he had a Mac. I never claimed otherwise. And yes, getting a job instead of relying donations from a niche Linux distro would do that.
You're one of those people that believe if everyone just worked on one operating system, then it would be perfect, aren't you? That would only work in a perfect world, and this is not a perfect world. It is unlikely that all of those people doing spin offs would do a huge ton in these larger distros if their own system didn't exist.
Android doesn't exhibit working together. It exhibits a distro by one of the most powerful, widely known companies in the world that entered a relatively unexplored world for Linux that hadn't yet been truly dominated by any Linux based operating system yet.
Windows came late to the party in the phone industry. It wasn't dethroned, it was knocked over with a light tap.
Again, Android doesn't exhibit unity, so I don't understand what you're trying to say with it.
47 • @44 (by Cent on 2016-09-27 09:32:55 GMT from United States)
Just a follow up. Corenominal uses a Hackintosh, not a real Mac. I just read it on his blog on a recent post.
"I’ve been pretty happy with my Hackintosh, it’s proved itself to be a powerful system and it’s been running reliably for about 18 months.
That said, I’m now faced with updating it to macOS Sierra, and that could be problematic."
48 • Mac is also UNIX (by Andy Mender on 2016-09-27 11:24:05 GMT from Austria)
Though many will undoubtedly flail me, it's worth mentioning that MacOS X is a very successful UNIX implementation. In addition to its cultural user-friendliness that brings in the fanboys and rakes cash, a typical UNIX toolset is there. Heck, it can even be expanded further :). No wonder Corenomical likes MacOS X.
Not a MacOS X fan myself, though I would often admire that side of UNIX from a FreeBSD user perspective.
49 • Run Linux (by Scrumtime on 2016-09-27 13:19:34 GMT from Nicaragua)
I started with linux in early 2000s mainly as a tool to help with virus removal and file saving on windows machines... Then just used it for internet stuff whilst keeping xp for all other tasks....for many years now I have only used Linux for my personal use still today i am 99% on linux in personal and business..we have 1 win 7 machine for software that will not run on linux that we use..
I run mainly Gentoo or Gentoo based ....Arch, slackware, I have too many machines in 4 locations of varying ages with all sorts of distros loaded on them mainly for historic interest i think
My GF who isnt at all comp savvy also now uses Linux and Android
don't see me changing any time soon
50 • @ 47 (by Alex on 2016-09-27 13:30:34 GMT from United States)
I used to have a Hackintosh once, actually iOS 5.7 on a laptop in decade ago. It is a BSD clone. What I don't like is that Apple wants to sell a machine for a higher price than its worth. Anyway, the guy left #! for Win10. Maybe, now he finds it good to use a stolen OS. Apple doesn't sell the OS, only the hardware. Maybe, its okay in UK.
Symbian, Windows Mobile, Blackberry and iPhone were already in the market, before Android arrived. The first Android smartphone was T-mobile G1 made by HTC end of 2008. And, 8 years later, Android has taken the market with about 5 billion users. It is still Linux, mostly based on Gentoo. The Linux Foundation says it is a Linux distro. Here at Distrowatch, we have 2 Android based distros, one exactly look like the Marshmallow version, and the other a PC version. I have the PC version installed in a ntfs partition, but as a Linux distro. Its an excellent distro!
51 • @50 (by Cent on 2016-09-27 14:53:09 GMT from United States)
My bad, you're right about the other phones. I never said it wasn't a distro though! Remix OS is based off the other project, and it is pretty nice! I personally don't use it, but it would be great for people who want all of their phone apps on their pc.
On another note, as I said earlier, he eventually came back from Windows to a combination of MacOS and Ubuntu for development. It's all in his blog very far in the past. He couldn't get past his Unix addiction, it seems ;P
My apoligies for being rather snarky earilier. There was no reason for it, and it was my comments that were made worthless because of it.
52 • @51 (by Alex on 2016-09-27 15:39:07 GMT from United States)
Remix OS doesn't act like a phone OS, but a PC distro. You can do things, an Android OS cannot do, like resizing windows etc. If you install it in an ntfs partition, you can access other ntfs or fat 32 partitions, but not ext partitions. If you install it in an ext partition, it won't see any other partitions. In other words, it doesn't see any Linux partitions, even though it is Linux. But as a PC distro, it is really fast, maybe the fastest Linux kernel based distro for PC at the moment.
Its devs had either not found a installer for Linux boxes, or doesn't want to do so. But, it can be installed with any amount of /data partition. Mine is in the dev mode, so it gets OTA updates as soon as the developers release them. No crashes yet.
53 • @52 (by Cent on 2016-09-27 16:05:14 GMT from United States)
I know it doesn't act like a phone OS. I've used it quite recently. But it still has the apps that an Android phone would, which was my point. And there is a tutorial in their help site, but it only works with UEFI currently, and it will wipe the entire drive to install with no real options. Again, I have no use for it. I prefer the progams in most Linux-based distro repos for a multitude of reasons.
54 • @53 (by Alex on 2016-09-27 16:42:38 GMT from United States)
You can install it in MBR and UEFI
http://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20160822&mode=67
55 • @16 Computer without OS installed (by Thomas Mueller on 2016-09-28 06:55:34 GMT from United States)
One way to get a new computer without an OS installed is to build from parts that you can order from an online vendor such as Newegg. Difficulty regarding installing FreeDOS or any other DOS on a hard drive is that (Free or other)DOS does not recognize GPT, though FreeDOS could be installed on a USB stick using FAT32 file system. @15: DR in DR-DOS is for Digital Research, it's not Doctor DOS.
56 • Where do you run Linux? (by Leka on 2016-09-28 19:16:47 GMT from Germany)
Where do you run Linux?
Looks like its not a good question. At the beginning, some of us posted some comments. mostly saying, we are sort of only-Linux users. But the truth is the majority of us are actually running Linux in a dual boot environment, in other words, in a Windows box as the secondary distro. Even if the boot session shows the Linux distro in the first place, Windows was or had to be installed first.
Its only Wednesday, and there was only one other post today, and that too shows it was not a good question.
In my case, I bought a laptop at a very profitable for me price, about 40% of its original price. It came with Win8.1, which was moved to Win10. In a way, I got a free OS, so why not use it? And, when you use it for a while, you find that its doing everything, what you just cannot get from your beloved Linux distro.
57 • Where do you run Linux? (by nolinuxguru on 2016-09-28 22:37:07 GMT from United Kingdom)
@56 A bit of ambiguity allows for a broader set of answers. I don't think that is why the comments have fizzled out by mid-week.
As an example, I no longer dual-boot Linux with the Windows OS, but quickly install Devuan [my current default]. The only delay is due to the obstacles put in my way [disabling secure boot and the horrors of UEFI!]. I no longer worry about leaving Windows in case I need to return computers, but rather because I might hate them and want to donate them to friends/family.
Dual-booting is, in my opinion, non-productive; better to keep an old computer for rare M$ needs. However, the monetary and human cost of maintaining MS computers is just crazy.
What was the question?
58 • rare_MS_Windows_needs_became_more_prevalent_with... (by k on 2016-09-29 06:34:01 GMT from Sweden)
@57 nolinuxguru and 56 Leka
... iOS upgrade to 10.0.2
So far, the latest 10.0.2, while not bricking this iPhone 5, is not mounted by any
of the Linux -- mostly Debian-based -- operating systems in use almost exclusively
before the "upgrade". :))
So, now, to backup photos only -- books still not visible -- MS Windows 7 back in
use, thankfully. So much information technology-based "contact" contains images,
they collect at a really rapid rate.
59 • OSless PCs (by zykoda on 2016-09-29 09:16:54 GMT from United Kingdom)
In the UK try Ebuyer Zoostorm range; some with and without WX.
60 • I use Linux in (by Zing on 2016-09-29 15:56:03 GMT from Singapore)
Looks like #60 is bit unlucky here.
I use Linux distro in a Windows laptop triple booting with Ubuntu, Remix and Windows
61 • Application Firewall (by bodhi zazen on 2016-09-29 16:40:11 GMT from United States)
You neglected to mention the linux native tools that are available.
Note the concept of an application sandbox comes form windows users and there is no real direct linux equivilent, however, there are linux tools that serve a similar purpose.
The 2 that come to mind are apparmor and selinux.
Selinux has very nice graphical tools although there is a bit of a learning curve to using such tools.
Apparmor is considered easier to learn and some distros ship with graphical tools- http://wiki.apparmor.net/index.php/Main_Page
Selinux also offers a selinux sandbox so no real need for a virtaul machine to isolate applications.
There is a nice discussion regarding alternates to selinux and apparmor here:
http://security.stackexchange.com/questions/42593/alternatives-to-selinux-and-apparmor
https://www.linux.com/learn/run-applications-secure-sandboxes-selinux
62 • Firejail_Firetools_a_must_regular (by k on 2016-09-29 17:55:31 GMT from France)
@62
Re: "You neglected to mention the linux native tools that are available."
The two sandboxing security tools SELinux, AppArmor, and sane file permissions, and Docker
containers were mentioned in Jesse's thorough tips and tricks review of Firejail sandboxing at:
https://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20160222
Thanks to that tips and tricks and comment 9 • "Firejail is ideal" by M.Z., I now almost
ALWAYS USE FIREJAIL for internet access.
Also fully agree with M.Z.'s assessment: "hope distro makes try to integrate tools as good & simple as this one".
Would be really fine to have in Tails, for example.
Firejail is so simple and fast to setup, efficient -- tight security --, easily controlled, and transparent -- user sees all data traffic from an application --.
By the way, thank you Jesse for the additional tip for enabling use of a firejailed application
offline.
63 • Where do I use Linux? (by Kubelik on 2016-09-30 00:26:40 GMT from Denmark)
Well here in our household we use Linux exclusively on our one and only machine.
That is 8 distros running side by side. We have no need for Microsoft, Apple
or the likes. No Skype, Facebook etc. either.
My personal favorite is Debian Testing. Next is Fedora. My wife prefers Debian Stable.
64 • DistroWatch Weekly (by Andy Mender on 2016-09-30 11:16:31 GMT from Austria)
@55,
I stand corrected. I got the "Doctor DOS" from my father. I was not aware that it's in fact DR-DOS.
@56,
I wouldn't immediately generalize that most of us use Linux in a dual-boot environment per extension of the fact that Windows was (or still is) installed on our computers. Unless building a rig from absolute zero, Windows is almost always the default OS. I think it's not fair to Unices of any kind, though it's fair as a vendor choice. No one forces anyone to use Windows, it's just there and many stop searching for their perfect OS before they even begin.
Also, GNU/Linux is a culture. When you're not born in it, you might never understand nor appreciate it fully. That's what happens when companies want to support GNU/Linux, but have no idea how. They delegate a random IT folk to "learn that Ubuntu thing" and they're done with it. Most consider GNU/Linux == Ubuntu and don't go further. We're a measly ~1% of the consumer market after all.
I think we live in very good times to breed people into UNIX. GNU/Linux has matured enough that our offspring may be able to comprehend its workings. They will learn GNU/Linux as the first ever OS and always measure others per their standards.
65 • Linux (by argent on 2016-09-30 11:23:44 GMT from United States)
Have Debian and Devuan on several machines in my house, also installed Devuan on 4 computers of friends and family.
Very happy they chose Linux over Windows for security and maintenance.
Windows 10 was the reason they wanted to erase the drive and install Linux.
No printer, sound WiFi or graphics issues and two of those were laptops!
66 • @64 (by Leka on 2016-09-30 12:47:33 GMT from Germany)
Actually Windows is being forced on users. Its what you see in every computer you see in the shops. Now, its offered in '2 in 1' tablets. People know (or heard) about Linux, and that ends there. When I tell guys that their smartphone/tablet is run by Linux, they say no, its Android.
The usual android tablet is on an ARM processor, so you can't use a Linux distro in them, but if you buy a '2 in 1' with Windows and at least 32GB, you can still install a Linux distro, in a dual boot environment, as they have Atom processors. Some even have better than Atoms. The thing is none of the Linux OSs ever try to make a distro for ARM processors. Well, Ubuntu had done one, but I'm not going to pay >300$ for it.
There are lot of '2 in 1' tablets lying in warehouses, and can be bought for less than 100$. That's less than the cost of Win10 package, and that's there.
67 • Linux (by Walt on 2016-09-30 12:57:52 GMT from United States)
I started out dual-booting Linux and Windows 98 around the start of the century (doesn't that sound ancient?) and moved exclusively to Linux at home a few years later. (I also had a 386 notebook running BeOS for a while.) Currently using Peppermint 7. I have no use or need for Windows, and while I am not really a computer geek (still not all that comfortable around the command line), I find Linux does everything I want and need it to do.
68 • @66 "2 in 1" (by Lennie on 2016-09-30 13:49:47 GMT from Canada)
You maybe able to install a Linux distro in a "2 in 1" tablet, but what the use? Linux distros don't have touch screen abilities, so it'd be a waste.
69 • @68 - touch interfaces in Linux (by Uncle Slacky on 2016-09-30 21:40:45 GMT from France)
I can assure you that Mint (Cinnamon) certainly has touch capabilities (since at least v17), and I'd be very surprised if any Gnome or Unity based distros don't also have touch enabled, given the size of their icons.
70 • ARM HID FUD (by Arch Watcher 402563 on 2016-09-30 23:05:55 GMT from United States)
@Leka Void offers ARM, even aarch64.
http://www.voidlinux.eu/news/2016/09/aarch64-support.html
@Lennie: It's just a driver question. The Linux kernel is a glorified driver library.
http://lii-enac.fr/en/architecture/linux-input/multitouch-devices.html
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/touchscreen
71 • Poster (by bigsky on 2016-10-01 00:55:30 GMT from Sweden)
100 ranked projects on DistroWatch. Thanks that was awesome and looking forward. It's been a long haul but never give up. Thanks
72 • @68 touchscreen (by linuxista on 2016-10-01 04:58:57 GMT from United States)
GNOME has quite nice touchscreen capabilities. In fact you could argue that the whole UI is optimized for it.
73 • Linux here, there (by Vakkotaur on 2016-10-01 06:19:46 GMT from United States)
Linux on two desktop machine, one laptop (Windows wiped off of it when the one reason to keep it vanished) and possibly on phone, but Android is primary there. I wanted to try ReMixOS on the laptop, but it utterly refuses to boot up on that machine so... no go.
The "Superbook" (think: laptop of just keyboard, display, pointer, and battery) project to use a phone as the computer looks interesting and I hope to get one of the early-ish models for shorter trips where packing the full laptop doesn't make as much sense.
And the way things are looking with SecureBoot and other nonsense that can (and therefore will) be used for some lock-in, I can see spending the money to get a laptop that already has Linux (even if a distro I would replace) on it. For desktop? Well, "I got it one piece at a time" (though it costs more than a dime!)
74 • Linux (by AliasMarlowe on 2016-10-01 10:21:35 GMT from Finland)
Have two desktops and three laptops, all running either Xubuntu or Crunchbang (and *only* Xubuntu or Crunchbang). Our three servers are all from Synology, and run Linux. Only one server is accessible from the web; it's our web server...
We have four Android phones which run a "sort of" Linux. There's also one old Symbian smartphone and a couple of non-smartphones (tough and cheap, for horseriding).
75 • Linux (by argent on 2016-10-01 20:01:17 GMT from United States)
@ AliasMarlowe: Great to hear someone else still uses CrunchBang, upgraded to Devuan from Debian wheezy and performs very well.
Hard to let go of an old friend and my very first Linux distribution!
76 • Linux (by anticapitalista on 2016-10-01 20:13:47 GMT from Greece)
Old PIII desktop running antiX.
Newish (AMD A6-5400K APU with Radeon HD Graphics) desktop running antiX.
Newish lenovo s21e netbook running antiX and W8.1
Old 412 thinkpad laptop running antiX.
Very old Dell latitude PIII running antiX.
77 • @ 76.Old hardware. (by Kubelik on 2016-10-02 03:15:16 GMT from Denmark)
"Old, newish, very old". - Anticapitalista, you make a serious and laudabale effort
to get the less fortunate (money-wise) going:)
78 • linux, linux,...... (by peer on 2016-10-02 13:30:55 GMT from Netherlands)
linux neon on my desktop. I like this os very much.
debian xfce on eeepc and on old toshiba satelite laptop. Works ok
avlinux 2016 on old pc. I use it as guitar amplifier
I rarely use windows, only for garmin mapsource
79 • never_mind_portability_or age_of_IT, hardware,_get_TAILS_now... (by k on 2016-10-02 20:01:10 GMT from Sweden)
@66, 76, and 77
... in order to continue browsing privately. Possibly others have also noticed
that Tor connectivity has slowed down dramatically lately.
So, you launch Iceweasel with FoxyProxy or Icedove with Torbirdy, but you
might have to wait MUCH longer to get connected, IF you get connected.
Leka from Germany wrote "Actually (Microsoft) Windows is being forced on
users." Ommitting to add "again", but also that it is much more than Windows
that is being forced upon us. Users are again being forced by Microsoft, Google and
Facebook to surrender privacy and freedom, in telecommunications, browsing and social
communications. Yeah sure, it is allowed, under current trade practices, for
Microsoft to gobble up Nokia, after Elop intentionally undermined Nokia by
ordering MeeGo out, for Facebook to acquire Whatsapp, and change its privacy policy agreement, Google to share Android users' data with "3rd parties", but there was a time when
such betrayals of trust were liable for class action antitrust suit.
Everything changes, or else time stops, so where does the "buck" stop? Literally and
figuratively, with you, the user. Act on conscience, not convenience.
TAILS is a distro that reliably enables users to browse and communicate privately, so
keep it "alive", pun intended also, and keep it by your side.
80 • @79 If only (by Leka on 2016-10-02 20:18:32 GMT from Germany)
Only fools use facebook, I believe.
81 • @76 (by billc on 2016-10-02 23:16:12 GMT from Australia)
Cheers Anticapitalista, anitX is awesome! And systemd free. Thanks for a great distro.
Number of Comments: 81
Display mode: DWW Only • Comments Only • Both DWW and Comments
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| • Issue 1167 (2026-04-06): Origami Linux 2026.03, answering questions for Linux newcomers, Ubuntu MATE seeking new contributors, Ubuntu software centre is expanding Deb support, FreeBSD fixes forum exploit, openSUSE 15 Leap nears its end of life |
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Vinari OS
Vinari OS is a desktop Linux distribution based on Debian's "Stable" branch and featuring a customised GNOME desktop. Some of its more interesting features include the Calamares system installer, the GSConnect phone-pairing application, out-of-the-box support for Flatpak packages, support for both UEFI and BIOS boot, and a beginner-friendly default configuration that does not require the use of the terminal.
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