Anyone use Debian or OpenSuse LEAP?

[lxskllr]

[ rpm package manager isn't that intuitively easy compared to apt(-get, -cache, -file) and the storage of .rpm packages is more distributed, compared to /var/cache, but with snap introduction to Ubuntu (otherwise .deb packages) that changed for the maintaining/storage efficiency part(?), what's an advantage towards Debian (e.g. Bookworm, Trixie), from my POV. (thx) ]

A lot of gnu/linux comes down to need and personal taste. You mentioned the package manager. That's kind of a big deal. That's your main interaction with updating the system. Debian prioritizes libre software, but doesn't make it needlessly hard to to install proprietary software. If you accept the default install, you'll have an all libre system. It's also for people that just want a system that works, and aren't constantly chasing the latest packages. For better AND worse, when you install debian, that's all you're gonna get til the next release. You only get security updates. That also means trivial programs sometimes break, and they will not be fixed. If you really want them, you'll have to do some tricks to get them working.

Biggest downside is your system will pretty much always be out of date. Debian is glacial. Your security is handled with priority, but everything else happens when it happens. Some people run testing or unstable as a pseudo rolling release, but that isn't what those branches are for, and they really aren't rolling releases. You have to watch updates like a hawk or your system can/will get eaten. Blindly running apt update && apt upgrade will inevitably lead to pain.

Debian suits me philosophically, and it suits my nature(conservative). Only you can answer if it's the distro for you.

 

[Indus]

So I was just trying out Debian 13 in a vm. the install process is long, asks 50 questions, it failed one step for unknown reasons and had to reattempt it and finished.

I chose GNOME

boot times are long, almost a full minute.

interface is very sluggish even for a vm, both with wayland and xorg. (as if radeon drivers aren't loaded)

tried to install something with CURL, no curl, so I start to install curl and get "please insert debian13_ amd_firmware_blah-blah-media into DVD drive and hit enter.....only option is to close terminal.

View attachment 130615

I forgot how obtuse Debian can be.

Yeah there's a reason why I like the LMDE flavor of Debian.

That stuff comes pre-installed and my wife who's not a techie nerd can use it without me helping her. She hasn't broken it/ gotten a virus in 4+ years which was not the case with her windows install before this.

Infact funny thing is she watches a ton of youtube videos and clicks on facebook links.. 1 of them put a windows virus that lagged her videos to a crawl. No such problems with LMDE 5, now 6, hopefully in 7.

But I still haven't quite mastered debian by itself yet, nor have I installed KDE on LMDE versions. Theoretically they should work just fine.. but Cinnamon although not my favorite is workable for me. A lot more than gnome!

 

[Zepp]

Yeah there's a reason why I like the LMDE flavor of Debian.
...

But I still haven't quite mastered debian by itself yet, nor have I installed KDE on LMDE versions. Theoretically they should work just fine.. but Cinnamon although not my favorite is workable for me. A lot more than gnome!

You might want to check out Tuxedo linux. it's made by a German hardware vendor (like PopOS and system76) and based on ubuntu LTS with KDE desktop. https://www.tuxedocomputers.com/en/TUXEDO-OS_1.tuxedo

There is also Q4OS, based on debian that offers both KDE plasma and their own fork of old KDE3 called TDE

Q4OS - desktop operating system

q4os.org

and of course the classic Kubuntu which has ubuntu's regular point release and an LTS version.

 

[Zepp]

Well I actually decided to move to a debian base myself and chose Spiral linux which is kind of like what ultramarine is to Fedora. Very close to core but with some streamlining.

It is currently only based on Debian 12 but has a simple tutorial to migrate to Debian 13.
Has a good selection of desktop environments too.

SpiralLinux - Linux, faster than a snail

SpiralLinux is a user-friendly preconfigured Debian system with live installation

spirallinux.github.io

 

[Indus]

Well I actually decided to move to a debian base myself and chose Spiral linux which is kind of like what ultramarine is to Fedora. Very close to core but with some streamlining.

It is currently only based on Debian 12 but has a simple tutorial to migrate to Debian 13.
Has a good selection of desktop environments too.

SpiralLinux - Linux, faster than a snail

SpiralLinux is a user-friendly preconfigured Debian system with live installation

spirallinux.github.io

Let me know how you like it.

I've never had problems with debian like I said.

I'm just waiting on the new debian 13 with a kernel that supports my video card to roll out to the smaller distros but it'll be happening in a few months.

LMDE7 beta is out as well.. but it still uses X11 instead of wayland.

Not really a problem for me but it might be for some

 

[lxskllr]

My work machine running debian+plasma was weird with the wayland session. I had to switch it to x11 to get it to behave. X11 does everything I need it to do.

 

[Zepp]

Let me know how you like it.

I've never had problems with debian like I said.

I'm just waiting on the new debian 13 with a kernel that supports my video card to roll out to the smaller distros but it'll be happening in a few months.

LMDE7 beta is out as well.. but it still uses X11 instead of wayland.

Not really a problem for me but it might be for some

so far I'm really liking it. It's using kernel 6.14 as opposed to Deb12's 6.5. It has the latest version of budgie. Everything works just like the ultramarine install I had, but now with nice sloooow update cycles like I'd prefer.

Spiral linux really smoothed out the install and out-of-box usability and it was really easy to upgrade to deb13.

Only odd issues is it's very obtuse to change the lock screen wallpaper for some reason. not sure if it's more a budgie thing, but I dont recall having the issue with ultramarine.
Also after upgrading, the login screen wouldn't populate my user name and required me to enter it and password every time. found out I needed to install a lightdm settings editor to revert it to auto-loading my user on login.

 

[Indus]

so far I'm really liking it. It's using kernel 6.14 as opposed to Deb12's 6.5. It has the latest version of budgie. Everything works just like the ultramarine install I had, but now with nice sloooow update cycles like I'd prefer.

Spiral linux really smoothed out the install and out-of-box usability and it was really easy to upgrade to deb13.

Only odd issues is it's very obtuse to change the lock screen wallpaper for some reason. not sure if it's more a budgie thing, but I dont recall having the issue with ultramarine.
Also after upgrading, the login screen wouldn't populate my user name and required me to enter it and password every time. found out I needed to install a lightdm settings editor to revert it to auto-loading my user on login.

Nice. Always a small quirk somewhere but small quirks I can work with.. but not wrecked installs.

Lets see how you like it over a week daily driving it.

 

[Indus]

My work machine running debian+plasma was weird with the wayland session. I had to switch it to x11 to get it to behave. X11 does everything I need it to do.

Ohhh.

Is this standard debian stable 13 + the plasma it comes with??

I tried it in a VM and could not get some widgets to work which is why I didn't fully switch then.

 

[lxskllr]

Is this standard debian stable 13 + the plasma it comes with??

Yes. It was continuously upgraded from debian 10 or 11. Forget when I installed it. So I started on x11, and I don't think wayland was on offer for 12; at least not as default. I haven't tried a virgin install with wayland.

 

[Indus]

BTW I forgot to ask you one thing..

How is setting up samba for a home network on debian?

Is it a pain with SELinux just like fedora or it's much easier?

 

[Zepp]

BTW I forgot to ask you one thing..

How is setting up samba for a home network on debian?

Is it a pain with SELinux just like fedora or it's much easier?

Debian uses Apparmor instead of Selinux and from what I've read it's easier to setup things like samba with it.

 

[Indus]

Debian uses Apparmor instead of Selinux and from what I've read it's easier to setup things like samba with it.

If you set it up, please post a setup guide like I posted with fedora.

That's a real PITA to get it working sometimes.. like everything works but other computer doesn't see shared folder.

 

[Zepp]

I'm afriad I wont be any help with that, just pointing out that apparmor seems to be easier to work with than selinux for network file sharing.

but it looks like there are quite a few debian setup guides online

 

[lxskllr]

I set samba up for work, but I don't know how I did it :^D I just clicked stuff til it started working :^D

It wasn't overly complicated, but it wasn't a couple button pushes either. The process could've been friendlier.

 

[Zepp]

continuing the original topic, I noticed Opensuse Leap 16 will be officially releasing next Wednesday and they have an RC build available to test out now.

I started up a VM of it, and so far it seems much more usable than 15.6. More of the common packages I use are available in their repos.

Looking into opensuse more also got me interested in their slowroll implementation. It gets major updates only every month or 2(aside from regular security patches) but uses the newer kernel and packages of the latest tumbleweed. Reminds me a bit of Fedora in that way.
OpenSuse users really praise the reliability of it, even the rolling release tumbleweed, and it comes with snapper rollback snapshots enabled by default in case an update breaks the system.

Im now more keen on getting a long term feel for opensuse, since I've been familiar with the debian side for quite some time and know it will always work. Think I will try putting Leap on my laptop and Slowroll on the desktop and try them out for a while.

 

[Indus]

continuing the original topic, I noticed Opensuse Leap 16 will be officially releasing next Wednesday and they have an RC build available to test out now.

I started up a VM of it, and so far it seems much more usable than 15.6. More of the common packages I use are available in their repos.

Looking into opensuse more also got me interested in their slowroll implementation. It gets major updates only every month or 2(aside from regular security patches) but uses the newer kernel and packages of the latest tumbleweed. Reminds me a bit of Fedora in that way.
OpenSuse users really praise the reliability of it, even the rolling release tumbleweed, and it comes with snapper rollback snapshots enabled by default in case an update breaks the system.

Im now more keen on getting a long term feel for opensuse, since I've been familiar with the debian side for quite some time and know it will always work. Think I will try putting Leap on my laptop and Slowroll on the desktop and try them out for a while.

Let me know how it goes and especially if you try setting up samba.

I'm still sticking on fedora for a while till LMDE 7 comes out.

By then I hope to know if Fedora is stable and usable unlike ultramarine or if I need to switch to debian base or opensuse then.

 

[Zepp]

I'm still sticking on fedora for a while till LMDE 7 comes out.

Were you planning to install KDE on it or use Cinnamon desktop?

In my testing I kind of gave up on budgie, I had not really used it much on a laptop that I would put in suspend, and I found it's handling of wake-ups obnoxiously clunky. I also realized I am gimping myself using their subpar start menu when cinnamenu and arc menu exist. so I bid farewell to budgie and it makes my life easier as almost all distro's support gnome.

By then I hope to know if Fedora is stable and usable unlike ultramarine or if I need to switch to debian base or opensuse then.

I don't think there is a strong reason for you not to just go with a debian base honestly. Especially since you dont want a faster update cycle, and debian 13 just came out.

Opensuse Leap, while solid, just doesnt have the community coverage and app support debian does, and also comes with Selinux by default, which is harder to setup samba with. you can remove it and switch to apparmor but I found it obtuse and was unsuccessful.

If you like the idea of a BTRFS install with snapper rollbacks enabled out of the box like Fedora and Opensuse does, spiral linux does this and is just debian with preconfigured defaults. They offer KDE plasma iso and can easily be updated to deb13.

I have been torn between Spiral and ye ol' Zorin OS which is about to release version 18.

 

[Indus]

Were you planning to install KDE on it or use Cinnamon desktop?

In my testing I kind of gave up on budgie, I had not really used it much on a laptop that I would put in suspend, and I found it's handling of wake-ups obnoxiously clunky. I also realized I am gimping myself using their subpar start menu when cinnamenu and arc menu exist. so I bid farewell to budgie and it makes my life easier as almost all distro's support gnome.


I don't think there is a strong reason for you not to just go with a debian base honestly. Especially since you dont want a faster update cycle, and debian 13 just came out.

Opensuse Leap, while solid, just doesnt have the community coverage and app support debian does, and also comes with Selinux by default, which is harder to setup samba with. you can remove it and switch to apparmor but I found it obtuse and was unsuccessful.

If you like the idea of a BTRFS install with snapper rollbacks enabled out of the box like Fedora and Opensuse does, spiral linux does this and is just debian with preconfigured defaults. They offer KDE plasma iso and can easily be updated to deb13.

I have been torn between Spiral and ye ol' Zorin OS which is about to release version 18.

I can use Cinnamon but I find KDE more to my liking.

I have been using it for 3 months straight now without interuption as my daily driver and although I've had issues with Nobara, Ultramarine, Bazzite none of the issues were KDE related.

KDE just works for me and is the least problematic.

I'm just waiting for LMDE 7 to come out this month and I'll try it out in VM and see if I can use a KDE skin on that. If so, I'll go that route!

I too tried budgie and it was meh to okay. Nowhere semi acceptable like Cinnamon!

 

[Indus]

BTW @Zepp imo Gnome > Budgie.

I'm not a GNOME hater.. I just prefer KDE but I can get by with gnome a lot better than I can with budgie.

 

[Zepp]

BTW @Zepp imo Gnome > Budgie.

I'm not a GNOME hater.. I just prefer KDE but I can get by with gnome a lot better than I can with budgie.

Definitely. GNOME only needs dash to panel extension and arc menu and you have a plethora of customization options to make it the desktop design you want. I think it's extremely polished and well made.

I gave up on cinnamon as well because it seems to have a problem with simply locking the screen and the monitors going to standby. Instead they sometimes remain on indefinitely. This problem was present on both my Fedora install at work and the Spiral install at home. I could never find a solution online and there were a lot of threads talking about the issue.
Gnome just works exactly how I'd expect.

And with that realization I went back to Zorin, which feels like a premium product in it's presentation. Love it.

I respect KDE and am glad people enjoy it, but I find it's defaults and plethora of settings unappealing.

 

[Indus]

Definitely. GNOME only needs dash to panel extension and arc menu and you have a plethora of customization options to make it the desktop design you want. I think it's extremely polished and well made.

I gave up on cinnamon as well because it seems to have a problem with simply locking the screen and the monitors going to standby. Instead they sometimes remain on indefinitely. This problem was present on both my Fedora install at work and the Spiral install at home. I could never find a solution online and there were a lot of threads talking about the issue.
Gnome just works exactly how I'd expect.

And with that realization I went back to Zorin, which feels like a premium product in it's presentation. Love it.

I respect KDE and am glad people enjoy it, but I find it's defaults and plethora of settings unappealing.

I haven't had that Cinnamon issue.. but like I said before.. the wife uses LMDE6 and I haven't updated it to the latest and greatest yet.

I don't like Ubuntu's constant update cycle but I do love KDE.. I'm wondering if I can make KDE Neon my main.. would love it if they had a debian base though.

 

[Zepp]

I haven't had that Cinnamon issue.. but like I said before.. the wife uses LMDE6 and I haven't updated it to the latest and greatest yet.

I don't like Ubuntu's constant update cycle but I do love KDE.. I'm wondering if I can make KDE Neon my main.. would love it if they had a debian base though.

Well most of the popular ubuntu based distros actually use the LTS model so they have a longer update cycle.
Everything I've heard about Neon though it was more of a beta platform for new KDE features. It may end up being deprecated now since KDE started a new independent distro called KDE linux.

Here are your best options for Debian stable/Ubuntu LTS based distros with KDE other than just Debian itself:

MX Linux (Debian Stable) https://mxlinux.org/
Q4OS (Debian Stable) https://www.q4os.org/
Spiral Linux (Debian Stable) https://spirallinux.github.io/
Sparky Linux (Debian Stable) https://sparkylinux.org/

Tuxedo (Ubuntu LTS) https://www.tuxedocomputers.com/en/TUXEDO-OS_1.tuxedo
Kubuntu LTS https://kubuntu.org/
Ubuntu Studio https://ubuntustudio.org/ (<- some people say its the better Kubuntu)

 

[Indus]

I had to use windows today to use Photoshop.. I haven't quite mastered Gimp yet.

But after 3 months of using KDE Windows 10 feels strange and clunky.

BTW I did some research about how many people use Fedora vs Debian.. it's not even close.. 1.2 mil vs 40+ million on Debian.

 

[Indus]

That same exact problem of cpu and gpu reduced speeds.. it happened again on Ultramarine.

So I went back to Fedora. I noticed by it's default settings Fedora has a lot less repositories that give updates vs the constant updates Ultramarine was getting so at least one of them is creating a problem.

That brings me back to why I swore by Debian or LMDE.. they don't push constant rolling updates.. they push 1 big one every 2 years after testing it a long time.

A bit like my linksys router that had all kinds of problems after an update so I had to go back to the older software version. Sometimes it's just best to go with: "If it's not broken, don't fix it!"

So I'm currently debating between Debian or OpenSuse Leap which are long update distros rather than rolling ones.

Same thing happened again..

Last time for my reinstall was Sep 11, today is Oct 10th.

Something happens after 30 days in all Fedora reiterations or something.

I've got to find a new distro that doesn't do this..

So what are my options?? Debian/ Open Suse yep?