If you have been using Linux for +10 years, what are you using now?
Been using Linux for over a decade, and last few years Ubuntu (on desktops/laptops), plus Debian on servers, but been looking to switch to something less “Canonical”-y for a long time (since the Amazon search fiasco, pretty much).
Appreciate recommendations or just an interesting discussion about people’s experiences, there are no wrong answers.
Edit: Thanks for the lots of interesting answers and discussions. I will try a few of the suggestions in a VM.
Been using linux for 7+ years, first distro was mint, then I moved to manjaro, for the last couple years I’ve been using Guix, a Nix inspired distro.
Arch on my personal machines, Debian on my servers.
This is also my setup. I’ve tried nix a few times on desktop and servers, but didn’t stick. Keep going back to arch and debian
I started using Linux in '98 with Red Hat 5.2. I have swapped between many, many different distros. But for the last 10 years or so, I’ve mostly stuck with Fedora. It generally just works, is up to date, and I’ve never had issues upgrading on their 6 month release cycle. My desktop probably started on Fedora 20-something and has been upgraded to the latest (43) without ever doing a reinstall!
My primary computer is my Frame.work laptop running Fedora 43.
Nixos, meaning to try Gnuix but I got projects to finish!
Been on Linux for 20 years and I’m on Debian and Arch. Both are very different but equally great systems.
I tried Slackware a couple of times cause it combines the simple design of Arch with the stability of Debian, but it’s a bit too much in both regards.
As for desktop environments, I used to use Gnome on laptops and Plasma on desktops, but I recently stumbled upon Niri with Dank Material Shell and feel like it combines the advantages of both (fast keyboard/touchpad control, fully featured, lots of GUI customization options).KDE is ideal to me given performance and polish, things like fractional scaling and Wayland are all top tier. I use Kubuntu but am waiting on “KDE Linux”.
Recently switched to Arch, the archinstall script is amazing and gets you all set up. much better onboarding nowadays and is great to use.
After years of distro-hopping, I settled with NixOS 7 years ago and kept on expanding my setup to accommodate for my new demands from it. I might be hopping to GNU Guix at some point in the future because of their choice to use scheme as the configuration language for the Guix setups.
Up until recently, Debian on everything. Main PC/ laptop are running Artix (Arch minus systemd) and my servers are still on Debian
Manjaro on main, Debian on server, AntiX for low-spec and Devuan for experimenting with making stuff work without systemd. The only reason it isn’t all Debian sid is just because I have to game sometimes
You’ve had me realise how long I’ve actually been using Linux for, though not quite at the ten year mark unless you count some very early endeavours with ubuntu.
fully agree with you on Debian as a rock solid server. my “don’t fuck with it, just work” client system for several years now has been fedora workstation, though I’ve only relatively recently switched all of my personal computing over to it (still have several windows installations for work-related testing).
I realized after posting it was actually longer than I thought, too. Debian is great, some installs I even run Sid without issues, but I am pretty diligent about update notices.
Debian on my personal computers and servers.
Ubuntu on my work desktop, RHEL on work’s servers
I wouldn’t consider Debian “Canonical”-y, it’s just what they happened to pick as their upstream.
I tried some of the atomic distros, but ran into too many problems. When I buy a new computer, I sometimes have to run Opensuse Tumbleweed or Arch to get new enough hardware support… Too lazy to rebuild my kernel and mesa at home
Debian. I like my computer to work.
I’m using Linux.
