• 0 Posts
  • 14 Comments
Joined 8 months ago
Cake day: April 2nd, 2025
  • who@feddit.orgtoLinux@programming.dev•New to Linux which OS to use?English
    1·
    12 days ago

    Sorry you had bad luck there.

    My recommendation is that if there are no spin with your favorite DE, you simply do not use that distribution

    I guess that’s one way to be sure, but to me it seems excessively limiting. I have switched desktops on Debian-based distros, and the only tidying up I remember being needed was removal of the old desktop’s packages (to de-clutter my application menus) and a reboot (to launch the new display manager).

    My recommendation to a new user would be to try whatever distro/desktop combo is appealing, and if it doesn’t work out, either do some troubleshooting or just move on to another one. It might not be a path as well tread as the distro’s default, but it might work fine. You’ll never know if you don’t try.

    as it’s not being tested against.

    That’s untrue in at least some cases. Of course, different distros have different policies and people maintaining their desktop packages, so YMMV.

  • who@feddit.orgtoLinux@programming.dev•New to Linux which OS to use?English
    2·
    12 days ago

    I’ve never had logging in with a different desktop environment cause problems. (And I wouldn’t expect to. The desktop session selector on the login screen is there for a reason, after all.) Your comment makes me wonder what desktops you tried that stepped on each other, and what bugs you’re referring to.

    In any case, if I had an experience like what you describe, I would simply re-create my user account and its home directory. Going through a whole OS install as you suggest would burn a lot more time with no advantage, which doesn’t seem “better” to me. To each their own, I guess.

    Remember as well that your “distro spin” approach is only possible if such a spin exists. Example: If someone wants Linux Mint for its beginner-friendly community support, but also wants to try KDE Plasma, they can. But they’re going to have to install Plasma after the base OS, and switch.

  • who@feddit.orgtoLinux@programming.dev•New to Linux which OS to use?English
    7·
    13 days ago

    If you want to stick with a Windows-like desktop, pick a KDE distro over GNOME.

    I like KDE Plasma, too. Thankfully, most desktop distros have it in their repositories, so even if they use GNOME or some other desktop by default, you can install and switch to KDE after the initial OS install. I’m pretty sure this includes Linux Mint.

  • who@feddit.orgtoLinux@programming.dev•What are the best reasons people have given you for not wanting to try Linux?English
    1·
    18 days ago

    no, Big Picture mode and Game Mode are two different things. Bazzite does have Game Mode for PCs tho as well.

    GameMode is Feral Interactive’s project, and not what we are talking about.

    However, a bit of searching turns up relevant info from Bazzite:

    • Steam Gaming Mode is another name for gamepadUI.
    • It is built from Big Picture Mode and Gamescope, just as I suggested.
    • The interface is apparently available without loading Steam’s full desktop interface by launching Steam with the -gamepadui command line option.

    Looks to me like what you’re talking about and what I suggested are practically the same thing, perhaps excluding Deck-specific features that wouldn’t be available in kolanaki’s scenario anyway. If there’s something more to it, then sharing what that is would be helpful.

  • who@feddit.orgtoLinux@programming.dev•Linux PC Occasionally *completely* freezesEnglish
    1·
    27 days ago

    Assuming you literally just mean different versions of the kernel,

    I do.

    it’s highly unlikely this would help, this issue has persisted over multiple kernels and even after upgrading from fedora 42 to fedora 43.

    It could help if you’re experiencing a kernel bug that has not been present forever, or was fixed upstream more recently than the kernels you have tried. If you establish that the problem does not occur when using a much older or newer kernel, it greatly narrows down where a developer would have to look for the bug.

    For what it’s worth, I’m not just throwing random ideas out there. I have some experience in this area. ;)

    In any case, good luck.

  • who@feddit.orgtoLinux@programming.dev•Linux PC Occasionally *completely* freezesEnglish
    9·
    27 days ago

    it froze, but I could still hear her over our call, and then it slowly advanced the display over the next couple minutes-

    This means the system is not entirely frozen. The kernel is probably still running, but something is interfering with the display or some other subsystem(s). If SysRq key commands (reisub) worked on this system before the freeze, there’s a good chance they will still work after it happens.

    as in the mouse was moving very slowly according to how she was moving her mouse when it froze-

    I have seen behavior like this caused by a buggy video driver. You might want to experiment with different Nvidia driver versions.

    If that doesn’t bear fruit, you might experiment with different kernel versions.

    Edit 1: Also consider watching for kernel log messages when the problem happens (sudo dmesg --follow) or noting the time when it happens and then reviewing syslog/journalctl from that time after rebooting.

    Edit 2: Also take note of anything that consistently happens shortly before the problem turns up, like the screen going to sleep and waking up. Some devices have trouble with power saving features.