Ubuntu’s popularity often makes it the default choice for new Linux users. But there are tons of other Linux operating systems that deserve your attention. As such, I’ve highlighted some Ubuntu alternatives so you can choose based on your needs and requirements—because conformity is boring.
During my six month usage of Manjaro (my introduction to Arch-based distros), my desktop broke four times and booted me to the terminal. Almost once a month. I told myself this was the price you paid for living on the edge, using a rolling release. I switched to EndeavourOS and have not had a broken desktop in two whole years.
Manjaro’s handling of AUR packages is fundamentally wrong and with their design decisions it cannot be fixed. You either give up the AUR entirely, or resign yourself to constantly breaking AUR packages and having to try and fix them.
Manjaro’s handling of kernels via a GUI sounds good until you realise it’s entirely manual and if you don’t keep checking you will end up running an unsupported, out of date kernel with Arch packages that expect a newer one. Again, Manjaro violates Arch’s golden rule of avoiding partial upgrades by holding your kernels back until you manually update them in their GUI. If you’re running an Arch-based distro 99% of the time you want the latest kernel and an LTS kernel as a backup, but these are already in Arch as packages (and are thus updated in lockstep with your packages, as designed) so you don’t need Manjaro’s special GUI. Now if you wanted a particular kernel for some reason then sure, but Manjaro’s GUI doesn’t even let you pick the exact version you want anyway! All you can pick is the latest version of each major release.
If you’re anything like I was at the time, you think you like Manjaro but what you actually like is Arch. Manjaro just gets in the way.
How did it break? It never broke for me once in the last 4 years.
I constantly have dozens of AUR packages installed. I have 70 right now. They don’t break. Everything you’re writing here is false.
Sometimes dynamic linking fails for an AUR package over 6 months or more but that’s because I don’t update them automatically (because none of them are critical). A simple rebuild fixes that.
It’s not holding kernels back. The version you select receives updates. It’s not bumping major versions of that’s what you mean, but that’s exactly how I want it. I don’t want the distro doing that for me. I do not need the latest kernel.
Wrong again. I do not like several decisions in Arch and it requires more attention than Manjaro. Manjaro attempts to offer stability and low maintenance and actually does a good job of it.
I’m an experienced Linux user but I’m lazy and I want my cake and to eat it too. I want recent packages but I don’t want the risks associated with bleeding edge everything. Manjaro gives me that. You can call it “Arch for lazy people”, I don’t mind, it’s true.
My DE broke because Manjaro added untested/beta patches from upstream, sometimes even against the developer’s word. This is something that Manjaro is known for. Guess who inspired dont-ship.it?
Also I would appreciate you not calling my statements on the AUR false. I have personal experience on the matter so we can play my experiences against yours if you like, or we can listen to the official Manjaro maintainers reccommending that it not be used, as it is incompatible with the Manjaro repos. By design Manjaro holds back Arch packages, which means AUR package dependencies often do not match what is expected. This is not false. Can you use the AUR? Sure, but you must keep in mind that Manjaro was not designed for it and it will break AUR packages sometimes. Sometimes it’s as simple as waiting a couple weeks for Manjaro to let new packages through, but sometimes you can’t just wait several weeks and you need to fix it yourself.
And yes, Manjaro does hold kernels back because you have to specify when you want to move off a major release. You can accidentally be using an unsupported kernel and not even notice. Ask me how I know. Manjaro literally requires more maintenance than Arch on this front.
I can’t comment on what maintenance Arch requires that Manjaro doesn’t, as I run EndeavourOS. I’ve found it to be everything Manjaro wishes it was - a thin, user-friendly wrapper around Arch.
Just remember that Manjaro’s official response to them forgetting to update their SSL certs was to roll back your clock, putting everyone at risk of accepting invalid certs in the process.
What DE? What patches? And isn’t Arch the upstream for Manjaro?
The possibility that AUR dependencies may not be met is not false. What is false is the claim that it’s a common problem. The chances of it happening are tiny. If it did happen to you please mention what AUR package(s).
It’s very hard to argue with people who claim “it broke” but never give concrete examples of what broke. They make these outrageous claims and put the burden on you to prove them wrong. It’s either disingenuous or done by spiteful, clueless people who genuinely don’t know what they did wrong but then shouldn’t go around throwing mud.
That’s a feature, not a bug. I’ve already explained that I dislike any distro that forces major kernel changes on me. Forcing people to switch major kernel versions is dumb and dangerous. That’s high maintenance for me, waking up one day to find out I’m on a different kernel and that shit doesn’t work.
That is not what Manjaro is nor wishes to be. It’s a derivate distro with its own goals and I find it unbelievable how much some people can hate that. It’s not the first distro in history that’s downstream of another, Debian has dozens of distros using it as a base and you don’t see this kind of extreme reactions. I’m baffled by it.
Ah there’s the old chestnut. Thank God this irrelevant fact exists; what would people bring up otherwise when all else fails.