hell yeah mint

Not shown: The top 0.05% - "Use whichever distro you're satisfied with. The different distributions exist to offer choice, not to compete."
- Seriously... At SCaLE this year I saw people from various distro booths taking breaks and visiting other distro booths. Each time they looked genuinely interested and excited about what the other distro was doing.
  
  Seriously: this non-competitive behavior in the FOSS community is soo fucking refreshing!
- Capitalism thrives on exclusivity, teaching people that others doing the same thing is competition and not friendship.

Read this and your brain might get a new wrinkle: it's possible to appreciate multiple distributions for their own merits.
- https://i.imgur.com/suaSSMr.jpeg
  
  Why didn't you just paste a picture in the comment?
  That's more faster

Well, I'm still in the noob stage and i intend to stay there. My OS is just a means to an end and Mint is perfect for that.
- That’s fine. Most people aren’t “Windows pros” either.
  
  My windows have arches, BTW.
- Saaaame. Been using Mint almost exclusively for 5-10 yrs and i still feel like im playing in the wading pool of what u can do with it. I learn more as I need to, and generally enjoy that process. I always feel super satisfied with myself when i use the terminal, even if its sudo apt-get install Firefox.
  
  Whenever I need to do something, I'll figure it out. Sometimes it's a pain, like getting VNC to work. But then I'll write down the most important bits and duly forget the rest. I just want this stuff to work.

I see more posts complaining about annoying arch users than I actually see annoying arch users
That being said, hell yeah mint
- Arch user here. Mint is cool. Go mint!
  
  Of course Mint is cool. If it wasn't it'd be Spice.
  
  I wish mint + AUR was a thing
  
  Manjaro user here, they're both cool

Linux Mint has been good so far, but Debian is still the one I'm going to use mainly.
- Hell yeah Linux Mint Debian Edition
  
  At that point, what are you using Mint for? The Cinammon DE?
  IMHO, KDE feels much more modern, while Cinammon kind of feels like it's stuck in 2003. It reminds me of the stock gray boxy Windows 9x/NT/2000 interface.

Guy on the right will use Debian stable, rest is correct.
- hell yeah debian
- Hell yeah LMDE
  
  Thats the best mint flavor
  
  I just wish they had it w MATE
- Yeah I agree with the sentiment, use whatever is good for you, but I feel like most advanced linux users are not using Mint. They typically come to the realization that everything is either Debian, Arch, or build it yourself so they use one of those.
  
  Does Gentoo already count as "build yourself" on your list?
  
  Man, might swap to Debian 12, trying it on my netbook, it's nice.
- Hell Cinnamon DE is literally an install option on Debian. LOL.

hell yeah mint

Use Linux professionally. Worked with RHEL for years. Current gig uses Debian servers. Daily driver is a system 76 machine with the pop OS that came on it. Debian derivatives make great daily drivers for those of us that just need a browser, terminal, working wifi, and the ability to build and run containers.

Don't forget, that the Mint developers and developers of other "user-friendly distros" do very hard work, so you can enjoy less-hassle distro.
But it is very boring for "Never Settle" philosophy to use such distros.
Don't forget, that some people enjoy tinkering thing around them. Mint, Pop!_OS, Fedora etc are simply not interesting for them. They choose the hardest possible way and enjoy it.
- My first "daily driver" distro was Arch, and i love every minute of it.
  It's a tinkerer's dream

The true Linux users are the ones that realize that all Linux is the same. The only differences is package management, Desktop Environment, and customization by the Distro creator.
You can literally just install Debian stable with Cinnamon DE and get basically Linux Mint on Debian. Bonus points for adding backports so you get a slightly more updated kernel.
I know this is a joke, but you should use whatever distro you want to use....because at the end of the day it's all Linux.

- Nixos when you want to work on it and then it works forever ever

The only way to win the argument is to come up with an association that has nothing to do with computers at all.
I use Linux Mint because I like Mint Ice Cream
- Well it quite literally says it in its name that it is fucking mint, why wouldn't you run it
- mmmm thin mints

I don't have any need for arch, fedora is fine as it is. Might try arch if I have more reliable internet someday, my main concern is my system going brrrr one evening when I need to do some important legal work.
- If you need the stablest of stable stuff there's nixos.

Different distros are better at different things. Need a stable distro for your grandma? Use Debian or Mint. Need latest software? Use Arch or Gentoo. (And people do need latest software sometimes. For playing games, or in my case, for doing research. The F is FOSS stands for Free after all.) Similarly, there are server distros like AlmaLinux tuned for high reliability. I think it's counterproductive to argue about the "best" distro.
I guess the meme technically doesn't say that Mint is the best, but it kinda gives off that feeling by ridiculing Arch users.

I use Fedora more (at work) but I love the concept and execution of Mint. I’ll definitely use it on future personal machines.
I’m not an expert on distros, but it seems to me like the best drop-in replacement for Windows. It’s familiar for windows users, but it feels much better to use. That combination is great for getting normal people to consider using it.

I would hapilly use linux mint if only it didn't use apt, honestly don't like it as a package manager.
Ghere is also the fact that mint will have older versions of packages, for example neovim which I need to be latest version always.
That's why I loved arch and gentoo before, for their package managers and roling distro nature.
Now I'm on nixos unstable and it's currently my favourite unbreakable distro, and the nix package manager is really good and making my own pqckages is really easy.
- What do you not like about apt? Genuinely curious, never used anything besides apt/apt-get and aptitude. Am I missing out?
  
  If you never do more than update, upgrade, install and remove, then just skip every post recommending different distros for their package manager. For you (as for most users), it will not make the slightest difference if you are using apt, packman, whatever else. If there's something you want your package manager to do but it can't, you'll know. And if it comes to that, you can start diving into the different managers and which one is best suited for the specific thing you want to do.
  But it has to be mentioned that aptitude does not have super cow powers of course.
  
  You don't miss out on anything if it does what you need.
  For me apt is just slow and clunky, don't like the way some of the commands are and they are long, I prefer the way that pacman and portage do it where I can make commands be sinple and only be couple characters instead of whole words.
  I liked pacman because it was fast, and it was really easy to block a package from upgrading and downgrading packages is really easy.
  I liked portage because it worked with program's sources so I was able to just remove part's of program's and their dependencies I didn't need.
  I like nix now because of the way it manages dependencies, and for the fact that packaing programs in it is really easy to do.
  
  Am I missing out?
  Borking your system I guess. /j
  
  Nah, apt is great. I use Arch, but the package manager does not make a difference for me. I think I'd prefer apt for the user friendly terms to use it: apt search, apt install, apt remove, apt purge. Much nicer than the pacman equivalents I haven't even bother to learn.
- I don't like apt too as much. But, interface-wise, you can make it way better with Nala, which is a frontend for it.
  NixOS is too complicated and demanding for most users, who aren't programmers or hobbyists, imo.
  I prefer Fedora Atomic. It has the same pros (unbreakable, highly configurable with universal-blue.org, etc.) but feels way more user friendly.
  I use it with Distrobox on top, so I can use my package manager/ distro of choice (turned out to be Arch btw) on a extremely reliable system.
  For your case, you can replicate Mint by just installing the Cinnamon image from uBlue and applying some minimal tweaks.
  Then you get the user friendliness from Mint with the flexibility and unbreakability from NixOS. Do you like the idea? Just in case you get annoyed by NixOS in the future 🙃
  
  Seems like a fine idea, but nixos is just exactly what I want from a distro it turns out and nix is just the package manager I wanted but never knew I did.
  
  I like the idea of the fedora immutable distros, but the reliance on flatpak makes me a bit nervous (guess I’m just old-fashioned)… I think some kind of solution that puts a stable system like Debian or immutable fedora with a package manager like Nix might be very good (I know the U-Blue guys have been playing with homebrew?)
  
  I don't think OSTree systems can quite reach the flexibility of NixOS. For instance with NixOS (with direnv and nix-shells) you can essentially swap out your running system based on the different directories you enter and I think that's still just scraping the top of the iceberg. From my experience with OSTree (which is admittedly somewhat limited) I don't think you can reach that level of flexibility.
  It's still really cool, I don't mean to shit on that, I'm just saying NixOS and OSTree have different pros and cons and use cases.
- If for some unspecified reason you truly and absolutely need the latest version of something, nothing's stopping you from pulling the repo and building it yourself.
  
  That's fine when you need only one or two things, but when you wan't your whole system to be up to date as much as possible it becomes tedious.
- I really like the idea of Nix, but having to have GitHub account to publish a package is a big no for me, even if I have one.
- I'm in the same boat as you, but haven't tried making my own packages. Is there a guide somewhere I can follow?
  
  I mostly just searched nixos how to package pyrhon/go/rust/ program or nixos how to package sddm theme/gtk/...
  The best resource honestly are the randon blogposts since the wiki itself is really bad.
  I also recommend the channel vimjoyer.
  I also recommend to get into the habit of searching for options on https://search.nixos.org/options and for packages on https://search.nixos.org/packages which are great resources to know what you can set or install and already packages.
  You can also check my nixos config on examples for how to package sddm theme and shell scripts.
  I also have a couple programs on my selfhosted gitea that use flakes for packaging which you can checkout also.
  https://code.cronyakatsuki.xyz/crony/nixos
- There's a Fedora Cinnamon spin.

hell yeah mint

I used archinstall to setup my laptop with Gnome and only use pamac-nosnap for package management (flatpak is fine, but fuck snaps).
I made the most noob Arch install ever and I love it.
- Noobs don't know to avoid snaps... But that setup wpuld be good to recommend if a noob really needs to use arch, btw.

Debian FTW
- Two choices in the end game.
  Ready to go out of the box? Mint.
  Bare install where you pick your programs? Debian.
  And then there's the secondary question for some of us... the machine you game on?
  Ready to go? Fedora, Pop, or several other choices.
  Bare install where you pick your programs? Arch.

I've used Mint and, honestly, I don't like it. The default applications are kind of annoying to deal with, I find KDE and GNOME far superior. Themes are very limited. I just don't see why you'd want to use Cinnamon.
- Right out of the box it functions enough like Windows that even my wife swapped with barely a hiccup
  Yes, other distros can be great and all that jazz, but Mint makes a strong first toe dip for those who are less confident in tech
  Shit, I'm confident and I actually preferred my mint install over the other couple of distros I tried partly because it came mostly pre done and only my server gets my IT time these days
  
  Right out of the box it functions enough like Windows that even my wife swapped with barely a hiccup
  To be fair, you can say the same thing about KDE.

I run Tumbleweed btw.

Been using arch + sway + neovim for 5 years now. Everyone says it’s the “I spend more time fucking with configs than getting work done” setup but then why does my dotfiles repo look like this?
- Wow, I've been using Linux Mint for 5 years. I don't have nor do I need a dotfile repo.
  
  Big "I don't even think of you" energy. I'm here for it.
  
  Lmao
  ... But... What is a dot file repo? I just want to play games and do homework.
  
  Neither do I, but it’s nice to have the same settings on my desktop and laptop
  
  If you use vim and/or tmux you'll commit a lot to your dotfiles initially, but after you reach a stable configuration that you like you won't be changing much

Use Arch if you want maintaining your system to be a hobby in its own right. Use Mint if you just want something that works.
- The funny thing is, I feel like I have to maintain my arch system less than Windows
  
  It's definitely not as bad as people make out. That said, I only run Arch on my main machine, and Debian on the rest. Just in case, you understand.
- Unless you want two monitors with different scaling.
- Arch is great if you want to customize your system, but I wouldn't say it really needs "maintaining" beyond just updating more frequently. (which you don't even really need to do very often, you just have the option to get newer versions of software.)
- I don't even update my Arch setup that often. Most of my stuff lives in flatpaks. I just want updated software and rolling release, which Arch is the best for that.
- Same with Manjaro 🤟
  
  i've had manjaro break way more than normal arch
  
  Jeez, no. Use endeavouros

Tbf after searching for a just works distro and going down a distrohopping bunny hole I ended up on arch lol.
pacman -S gnome and everything is gucci + AUR is something else.
- Yea I'll stick with Arch for the AUR, so many times I've come across something I wanted to try and I see .tar.gz and I'm like ehhhh
  9/10 it's on the AUR
  
  I stay away from AUR because it is completely unsandboxed and unmonitored.
  To be fair, I don't believe flathub is constantly monitored, but at least it is (somewhat) sandboxed, if I set everything up in flatseal.
  I have recently replaced my final .tar.gz app (git-credential-manager) with the builtin github extension of codium, and removed my final two ostree overlay with flatpak sdk extensions.
  I am now happy (except I can no longer gpg sign my commit... https://github.com/flathub/com.vscodium.codium/issues/105 )

You are missing the "Cinnamon on Arch" guy a little further up the scale, but you gotta crop somewhere I guess 🤷

- Wayland is a ton of issues for me. But that was my fault for buying a laptop with an nVidia card. Never again.

I'm old enough to remember this being Ubuntu.

Meanwhile I'm over here dual booting Mint and Artix. I like fun, bleeding edge hobby distros and reliable boring ones that do everything I really need completely reliably.

MINT, MINT , MINT

Definition of standing on the shoulders of giants. Even from the start when it offered the codecs Ubuntu didn't mint has been there. Same for arch want something specified but don't want to start at a lfs or Gentoo it has your back all you have to do is read up on the bits you want. I think it's amazing that for me the best distros are still community ones.
- LFS is the linux pilgrimage that turns noobs into greybeards. Whrn it work uou erase it and install debian.

idk man, i just like me a good non derivative distro. Debian, arch, nix, gentoo, whatever as long as it has less hands it's being passed through im happy.
- Having a custom distro that installs some extra frequently used software by default is no problem for me.
  
  for me that's just a script that auto installs the software i need at minimum to be productive. Gimme an X server, i3wm, and some applications to compliment it and i'll be one very happy user.

Dayum, 9 years ago i started with mint and distro hopped a bit then daily drived arch for many years, and now I'm back to lmde6, so you ain't gotta call me out like that

I prefer Fedora. It works great and has no bullshit.
- I tried installing Fedora a few weeks back.
  It did not like my 3080 and broke horribly.
  Back to Endeavour...

debian for my server, fedora for my desktop, endeavouros for my laptop
just use what you like if it make sense for the given context

I thought they closed down Mint to get people to sign up for Credit Karma?
- Wait what?
  
  They seem to be talking about the budgeting app "Mint" as opposed to the Linux OS. Linux Mint isn't going away any time soon.
  
  After googling, I think that was a joke about an unrelated app.
- They did! I switched to Monarch, it's REALLY nice. They even have a feature tracker for ones they are working on AFAIK.

My only issue with mint is that it is downstream of Ubuntu so I feel like the maintainers have to spend too much effort fixing kinks and bypassing Canonical's dumb ideas.
LMDE is cool too, but then its too stable and doesn't have all the nice UI features of regular mint lol.
- I find it amusing and interesting that a heap of people work hard to create Debian, then a bunch of other people build on it to create Ubuntu, then a third group of people do a heap of additional work to wind back some of the changes to create Mint.

It is a sinus wave from me, went between Ubuntu and Arch several times depending on how playful y feel :D

Hard to tell if the 𝑦-axis is population or loudness

s/mint/Ubuntu/g

nixos ftw
- Ah, End of The Linux pipeline

Yeah, this is me completely, although I did use Fedora kde spin as I was getting tired of the mint ui. I used it exclusively for many many years and the steamdeck completely changed my opinion.
- steamdeck completely changed my opinion.
  What do you mean? Did it convince you to keep using KDE or did you go back to another desktop afterwards?
  
  Sorry, what I mean is that steamdeck desktop mode made me love kde plasma and decide to switch from mint to kde plasma.

I would like a mint.

What flavor?
- Is Cinnamon still the default?

More like Fedora with a bunch of VMs

Minty MacBook resurrection I did a while back
- Wow, all this time and you've prevented the screen bezel bumps from making chips in the top case (the palm rests). Clearly, you take better care of your computer than any of the university students I helped at an Apple Store back in the day.

IMO Mint is to Ubuntu what Manjaro is to Arch: a pile of duct tape in the name of user experience ready to blow at the worst time, down to the TLS certificate mishaps.
People pick really weird distros to worship...
- It's strange to worship any distro.
  
  The only distro we should worship is Hannah Montana Linux
- More like Ubuntu is to Debian what Manjaro is to Arch. And then Linux Mint takes the nice stuff from Ubuntu but does away with the bullshit.
  
  I think you give Manjaro a little too much credit here. Not that I want to hate on it, but Ubuntu is much less closely related to Debian than Manjaro is to Arch.
- when i decided to dump windows, i tried lots of distros. most would refuse to install or even boot to live, and the ones that do install successfully have issues with nvidia. like parts of the screen going unresponsive, constantly reverting to 60 hz, and just completely crashing. ubuntu does all three, fedora won't even install, arch distros can't find any of my sound devices. but mint works. no nvidia issues, no crashing, all devices work, refresh rate stays at 120. that's some damn good duct tape.