My Favorite Linux Distro and Window Manager

since starting this channel about nine or ten months ago the two most popular questions I get asked regarding my channel is hey what is your favorite Linux distro and what is your favorite desktop environment or window manager I get asked those questions on almost every video I make and to cite myself a little time and not have to keep answering the same question over and over again let's discuss it so what is my favorite Linux distro well what is your favorite Linux distro I mean what makes a Linux distro someone's favorite well first of all your favorite Linux distro will vary depending on your use case exactly how are you using this computer is it a business workstation is it a web server or an email server is it a media center is it a gaming PC what exactly is your particular use case use case dictates the distros that are appropriate for you this is also also going to dictate what becomes your favorite district also static release versus rolling release depending on your use case if your meet something that's rock-solid stable for example you want a distro that follows a static release model rather than a rolling release model now if you are a tinkerer if you are a developer Linux enthusiast somebody that likes to play with their system a rolling release model makes a lot of sense desktop environment also plays into your choice as far as favorite Linux distribution of some lists some Linux distributions focus on one particular desktop environment over all others so for example if you're really into the cinnamon desktop and follow the development of the cinnamon desktop environment you probably want to be on Linux Mint if you are a budgie fan and want to follow the develop of the budgie desktop environment you probably need to be on solace yeah if you were a big fan of unity you know back in the day Ubuntu was where you had to be to run unity if you follow the genome chill you follow genome development fedoras probably the distro for you so desktop environment does play into a decision as far as what distro you use what becomes your favorite just true other things to consider what is the support network like is the community friendly and helpful so think about things like support forums their web forms think about their IRC chat channels or their stack exchanges or mailing lists whatever all the various support networks that they have it's the community around those friendly are they helpful they give you timely responses are their responses accurate alright do the repos contain the software I need that is a huge question as far as for somebody like me I want all the software I need in the repos I want big full repos that have everything that I could possibly be looking for I don't want to have to compile anything from source I don't like going out and building things from source though big repos are a big plus in my opinion also does the distro have plenty of mirrors I have reviewed a handful of distros on the channel where they had very very few mirrors like one two or three mirrors sometimes and nowhere close to me in particular and you know installing software through their package manager took forever the download times were slow very slow and it takes forever to install packages and even worse to update the entire system so the last two points on this list are probably the big points for me do the repos contain the software I I need and are there plenty of mirrors most of the other stuff doesn't affect me as much like desktop environment that doesn't play into my decision at all because I don't use full desktop environments I use minimal window managers that I config myself so I really don't care what Desktop environment or window manager a district ships with but for most Linux users desktop environments a big one also the support networks a big one for most people not as big for me because I'm my own support network I rarely go to any of these web forms or IRC chat channels looking for help I usually find my own answers but for most people those are big points for me do the repos contain the software I need and are there plenty of mirrors and you know what that leads me to my answer what is my favorite Linux distro well I'm gonna give you two because I can't narrow it down to just one Debian and Arch there you go why Debian and Arch well the repos Debian has huge reposts everything I want is either in the Debian repos if it's not because Debian and Debian based distros are so insanely popular chances are if you know if it's like closed source proprietary software if they make a Linux package at all they probably make a dip package they make a Debian package for it so Debian I can get everything I need installed on Debian Arch the same the arch repos are big if it's not in the arch repos there's a very good chance it is in the arch user repository the aur and because of the a you'll our Arch probably has more packages available for me than Debian even but both of them pretty much have you covered as for our software now do you want to run mainline Debian or mainline Arch I do but for newer users I wouldn't recommend either Debian or arch to the new Linux users but you know what we do have a lot of Debian based and arch based distros out there some of them are a little friendlier for the new user than others for example Debian you want some something easy to use Debian based of course Ubuntu Linux Mint elementary peppermint MX Linux love that distribution arch want an easier way to get into Arch you know I don't recommend any arch based districts for the brand-new user but if you've been using Linux a little bit manager or ghosts not my favorite I've had problems with it in the past but a lot of people swear by it you might also want to check it out swag arch if you like xfce you like open box check out arch slabs arco Linux it's becoming very popular right now and you have a number of different desktop environments and window managers to choose from with Arco so definitely check those out but if you got to nail me down the two distros that stand out above the crowd in my opinion Debian and Arch Linux that leads us to the next question what is my favorite manager when people ask me that my immediate response is have you been watching my channel because if you have a lot of my early videos really centered around the open box window managers love the open box window manager it's light it's fast has no dependencies highly highly configurable and you can do everything in open box you can make it do some pseudo tiling it has dynamic menus what open box calls type menus where you can write bash scripts or Python scripts that output to that right click open box menu open box just I can't say enough good things about it so if you have to pin me down on a favorite desktop environment or window manager my answer is always going to be open box but I can live in anything I've lived in a lot of different desktop environments and window managers in the past I've used awesome window manager lived in it for a few months I've lived in X monad for a few months here on the channel recently I've lived in Q towel I'm living in cute ah right now early on in my Linux desktop career I lived in genome two I've lived in unity really loved unity on small screens like laptops I lived in KDE briefly here at the beginning of this channel you guys know I did a KDE challenge where I lived in plasma for a little bit I would be fine though running any desktop environment or window manager XFC fine LXDE they'll execute enlightenment fluxbox i3 you name it I can get work done in any desktop environment or window so I'm not a desktop environment or window manager snob you got to pin me down open box is my favorite but really any of them will do and again if you got a pin me down on a favorite Linux distribution Debian or arch I mean there you go now before I go I do need to do a special thanks to all my patrons all my patreon supporters and some David Carlos Chuck Daniel Bryan Lee or aka Ron mr. Neely pops Bart Robert Marcus tan mr. smartypants Swami Ben he made Keith Dan Michael Tony Bruno David Silvio Omar Jon Karl Greg Christian Rob Matt Mark Tiedemann first Steven second Steven third Steven Eduardo Alex Jake Benjamin Marcus interceptor first of all second Paul John to Billa you guys Rob you guys helped make this show possible these guys [Music]

Channel: DistroTube

Views: 42,228

Rating: 4.8999104 out of 5

Keywords: Linux, distro, favorite, new user, user friendly, Arch, Debian, Ubuntu, Manjaro, desktop environment, window manager, openbox, qtile, Gnome, KDE, xfce

Id: X6EmxiCrMJg

Length: 9min 49sec (589 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 15 2018