Linux

Mint. Just because it works with zero issues on the desktop. Everything else is either Rocky, RH or Debian.

I’ve been distro hopping for 15+ years but have settled with Mint for the last few, because I just want something that works. I’m too busy nowadays to bother with maintaining a distro, so I just want something that works out of the box and is easy to maintain. The laptop I use it on is connected to the TV as I use it to watch movies.

I primarily run Linux server distros for what I like to do. I usually do Debian since it's a nice base to just add whatever on to (sudo isn't even installed out of the box) so I have been working on a customized install script but if I don't feel like messing around too much I just go with Ubuntu and avoid using snaps for anything I care about (especially Docker, like wtf is with the snap version of Docker). I like the default toolset of Debian based distros and not having to screw with SELinux.

Fedora strikes a good balance for me. I come from arch and opensuse. I like the stability of fedora, but I like that it also gets updates faster than Debian. Most software I have found has Fedora considerations.

However, I have been using Ubuntu LTS for my self hosted media server.

My main reason to use arch is the exceptionnally complete and useful arch wiki. Though many pages are useful for other distros as well. With the archlinux and package install guides, it's just a matter of time (and study!) until you know how to get around.

Arch on the Desktop, Debian on the servers for peace oft mind.

Debian/KDE because I like the way I can customize (1 panel on the left with everything) No features removed just as one gets used to them. (looking at you gnome) No breaking changes to the desktop gadget api every update (you gnome again) Nice big repo.

Pop OS. Don't use much of its custom features since I have installed sway on top of it and did some custom edits, was thinking of switching to another distro but they announced COSMIC, which looks very cool. Why not stick with the distro that could have the best experience with it?

Mint CE for my desktop (might distro hop soon for multiple curiosity based reasons, all my data is on non-os drives anyway) - easiest to just get working when fast-swapping, IMO

Debian for my server - it's the flavor of Linux I'm most familiar with over the years & for my server I dont need any of the shit Ubuntu does

STEAM OS for my Steam Deck (I use it as a TV PC so desktop mode is common with it), because it's really good for that purpose

Manjaro, because Arch-based, rolling release, but with a dev test cycle to try to eliminate breaking patches.

NixOS, because:

• I can have my entire system be declaratively configured, and not as a yaml soup bolted onto a random distro.
• I can trivially separate the OS, and the data (thanks, impermanence)
• it has a buttload of packages and integration modules
• it is mostly reproducible

All of these combined means my backups are simple (just snapshot /persist, with a few dirs excluded, and restic them to N places) and reliable. The systems all have that newly installed feel, because there is zero cruft accumulating.

And with the declarative config being tangled out from a literate Org Roam garden, I have tremendous, and up to date documentation too. Declarative config + literate programmung work really well together, amg give me immense power.

I use OpenSUSE Tumbleweed because it focuses more on KDE than GNOME, is quite stable, and has snapshots to roll back to in case something does go wrong. I don't want to mess with my OS, I just want it to work reliably. I do use Debian on some devices (like my server) but the software (especially in terms of GUI apps) is very outdated and it doesn't come with the other features of OpenSUSE out of the box.

EndeavourOS - I jumped around distros a lot but always found myself coming back to arch. Then I found Endeavour which is just arch with the same basic setup I would always end up doing, so out of convenience I stuck with it

I use PopOS on my desktop. I was looking to upgrade an old Chromebook and while researching my options came dangerously close to buying a MacBook Air. Decided to buy an android tablet instead for my portable computer and bought another SSD so I could dual-boot on my desktop.

It's clean, somewhat macOS like in appearance but I actually have freedom to do what I want. Just in time for Windows 10 sunsetting too.

Using void linux because it has no systemd init system (it uses its own "runit" init system) ; and it is a natutal development after using Debian for a long time and wanting to understand more about gnu/linux system.

Also, it is very reliable with a lot of packages. It is standard enough so using info from arch, debian or other distro works.

But the origin was I could not understand how systemd was managing the system and it felt really contrived to go around it, so I began using void and that's the story.

I currently use Bazzite on my old laptop, just wanted to try out immutable distros and I like to stream games from my rig to it sometimes so completely functional steam was a nice addition. Plus learning about flatpaks and app images over installed packages has been interesting.

Then on my servers Debian/Proxmox and usually Ubuntu server in LXCs for more updated APTs then Debian, though I mostly run docker for my web apps rather then native APTs.

I work for a company that has a java program that functions on Linux but is nowhere near the level of support provided for mac/Windows, so I'm the Linux guy for our dept and when a customer is running into issues on a distro I'll spin up a vm on my homelab and see if I can rum through an install and get it functional.

So far the only one I literally couldn't get installed was Slackware lol I even figured out how to get it functional in ChromeOSes Linux subsystem.

debain, with xfce if i need a desktop. mostly because i started on xubuntu. started learning sysadmin stuff when all i could afford was a potato with salvaged computer components shoved in it. xfce considered that excessively over powered. ended up loving the way i set up my xfce env, and probably wont change it much over the next 20yrs because theres no need. so when cononical got extra gross it was easy to just move to debian and carry on with my life.

I've been using Garuda for... Two or three years? I've done a lot of distro-hopping looking for something that won't just break on me. I used Ubuntu for a long time but kept running into situations where it would break, such as boot loops. Eventually I settled on Garuda because it ships with newer software and Nvidia drivers, which is helpful because I use my PC for gaming. I have stuck around because it's garuda-update command automatically makes a backup of your system out of the box, and you can select to boot into a backup in grub then restore it really easily. There have been a couple times where something has broken on an update, but when that happens I can immediately restore the backup, and I don't even need to remember to run a backup manually. I do feel that the default theme is a bit gaudy so I swapped it to a default KDE, but other than that I've had pretty much only good experiences with Garuda.

I'm mainly on Linux for over 20 years (still have one Windows Box for VR and some games, hopefully I can migrate this to Linux with the next hardware iteration). I was on Suse, Debian, Mandrake, Gentoo, Ubuntu, QubesOS (which does not self-identify as Linux-distribution) with Fedora+Debian Qubes. I never had those installed on my main machine, but also worked a lot with kali, grml, knoppix, dsl, centos, Redhat and certainly a bunch of others.

The absolute best for me, as working in it security and with different customers, is QubesOS. Sadly my current laptop is so badly supported by QubesOS that it burns 6h battery in 25 minutes and sleep/suspent does not work at all, so I'm currently on Ubuntu (which I hate for their move to snap and being Ubuntu in general)

I use bazzite. I prefer fedora (that's what I have on my laptop) but the Nvidia drivers consistently give me trouble with fedora on my desktop. I'd get it stable for a little bit then something broke. eventually I got tired of it and tried bazzite since I had heard it was better in that regard. I love the out of the box Nvidia support as well as the HDR support with no extra steps. I'm really not a fan of immutable distros in general, I think rebuilding the ostree everytime I need to install a system package not available in any other way is super annoying, but it just works and that enough for me right now. I also enjoy some of the software it comes packaged with, like btrfs snapper and a very comprehensive ffmpeg build. I'll probably switch away from it to try something new this summer, but at least until my finals are over I just need it's stability.

The amount of software available in the package manager, without adding external repositories, exceeds that I've seen in any other distro I've used. Even with epel, I feel like others fall short.

The ability to modify the build time flags of software while still using the package manager is also huge. I hate when ffmpeg doesn't have speex support because some upstream dev figured it was a corner use case.

It's me, I'm the target demographic. I'm the one asshole who wants to build ffmpeg with speex support, clamav without milter support and rxvt WITHOUT blink support.

There are some pretty great userspace helpers too. Things to ensure your kernel is always built with the same options. Things to upgrade all your python or perl modules to the new interpreter version for you. Tools for rebuilding all the things based on a reverse dependency search.

Slotted installs are handled in a sane, approachable, and manageable way.

The filesystem layout is standards compliant.

I recall someone on /r/Gentoo saying something like "Gentoo is linux crack, when you get a handle on it, nothing compares."

When I boot my laptop into fedora/arch/mint/etc (or really any non-bsd based distro), I feel like I'm using someone else's laptop. There are a bunch of git repos under /usr/src for the software I wanted that wasn't in the package manager. I need to manage their updates separately. Someone else has decided which options are in this very short list of GUIs. I'm using whatever cron daemon they chose, not the one I want. Why is there a flat text log file under /var/db/? Why won't you just let me exist without any swap mounted? $PATH is just a fucking mess.

I use opensuse (tumbleweed and slowroll) because I just wanted to try it out a few years back and it mostly just works.

If I were to reinstall today, I'd probably use fedora again, since it's much easier to use things like Waydroid.

Artix (current)

• Vanilla as much as possible (same as Arch)
• Rolling release (same as Arch)
• No systemd (my personal preference)
• AUR availability (still an Arch derivative)

Guix (as soon as I have the time)

• Similar reason as for Artix
• Reproducible builds
• Guile
• Static configs

I dual boot Fedora and Arch. Fedora was just a fluke because it seemed like one of the most mainstream distros, and I was a Linux noob.

I liked Arch though because the Arch wiki is so useful for a beginner to learn from, even if you're not on Arch. At first, Arch seemed too complex and difficult for me, as a beginner, but when I kept finding myself at the Arch wiki when troubleshooting, I realised how powerful good documentation is. I installed Arch with a "fixer-upper" type mindset, with the goal of using the greater power and customisability that Arch offers to build a config/setup that worked for me (learning all the while). It was a good challenge for someone who is mad, but not quite so mad as to dive into Gentoo or Linux From Scratch

Bazzite because never breaks.