this post was submitted on 24 Apr 2025
201 points (98.1% liked)

Linux

53521 readers
1801 users here now

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

Rules

Related Communities

Community icon by Alpár-Etele Méder, licensed under CC BY 3.0

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
AgreeableLandscape@lemmy.ml
nooter692@lemmy.ml
MarcellusDrum@lemmy.ml
cypherpunks@lemmy.ml
cyclohexane@lemmy.ml
d3Xt3r@lemmy.nz
201
I have used Windows all my life, and I have some questions. (lemmy.world)
submitted 1 day ago by ArchmageAzor@lemmy.world to c/linux@lemmy.ml
113 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Basically the forced shift to the enshittified Windows 11 in october has me eyeing the fence a lot. But all I know about Linux is 1: it's a cantankerous beast that can smell your fear and lack of computer skills and 2: that's apparently not true any more? Making the change has slowly become a more real possibility for me, though I'm pretty much a fairly casual PC-user, I don't do much more than play games. So I wrote down some questions I had about Linux.

Will my ability to play games be significantly affected compared to Windows?

Can I mod games as freely and as easily as I do on Windows?

If a program has no Linux version, is it unusable, or are there workarounds?

Can Linux run programs that rely on frameworks like .NET or other Windows-specific libraries?

How do OS updates work in Linux? Is there a "Linux Update" program like what Windows has?

How does digital security work on Linux? Is it more vulnerable due to being open source? Is there integrated antivirus software, or will I have to source that myself?

Are GPU drivers reliable on Linux?

Can Linux (in the case of a misconfiguration or serious failure) potentially damage hardware?

And also, what distro might be best for me?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] communist@lemmy.frozeninferno.xyz 1 points 11 hours ago* (last edited 11 hours ago)

I agree I honestly don’t like immutable distro’s at all because you can’t install packages the way everyone else does: via package managers.

this is false, rpm-ostree exists and works for this exactly. There's nothing you can't do on bazzite that you can do on a non-immutable distro.

Even if that wasn't true... package management is just done through flatpak, there's no real fundamental difference, it's just an abstraction layer, I don't see why that would be important to you at all, and comes with numerous benefits:

  1. You cannot break your system with these, ever.
  2. Significantly less burden on package maintainers
  3. You can have many versions of software installed
  4. These applications are sandboxed and thus more secure.
  5. This enables complete graphical management of software, no longer requiring the terminal.

It not having packages you may need applies to any package management solution, other distros do not package everything either. In fact, the distro with the most packages is an immutable one, nixos.