Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi.
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Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
@peter_mcmahan Debian is the only distro we actively feel like we can recommend right now. it continues to be community-driven and has a history of standing up for what's right.
we're personally big fans of NixOS at the technical level... or at least what NixOS was; its reliability has suffered heavily (at least for us) in the past few years, which we attribute to the political developments that soured us on it. we just don't have another declarative distro we can recommend, as yet.
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Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
@peter_mcmahan I just switched from Xubuntu to Debian Xfce for this precise reason.
Debian doesn't have a strong anti-AI stance, but it hasn't been overcome with slop *yet*.
Mostly my issues have been fiddly details, things that Xubuntu includes that Debian Xfce doesn't. I need to make a list.
But so far it's been great.
Hardware is a Lenovo X13 gen3, the most generic Intel hardware ever, which helps.
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J jwcph@helvede.net shared this topic
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Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
@peter_mcmahan come to elementary OS, it's a queer friendly, queer founded Linux distro that really don't support the use of AI.
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@peter_mcmahan have you looked at opensuse -- it has Tumbleweed for a rolling release? Sorry for suggesting it, but also arch fits your requirements... btw.
@petko @peter_mcmahan w.r.t. arch: Given the recent massive backdooring campaign, I’d stay away from the AUR, unless you can spare the spoons to verify every single package you install from there.
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Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
@peter_mcmahan Honestly, I can't answer any of your questions
but FWIW I do remember that doing my own most recent, failed attempt at switching over to Linux I decided to go with Zorin specifically because my other prime candidate, Fedora, was too AI friendly... -
Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
@peter_mcmahan > just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)
that part hasn't been an issue with any distro I've used for about 8 years. You're probably good with anything there
As for suggestions, I can't find anything official for a stance either way regarding AI, but Linux Mint Debian Edition could be a good choice for you. Similar Debian base as Ubuntu so it should all be familiar, and Mint's own tools are generally pretty good -
Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
@peter_mcmahan I'll add to the chorus that Debian is pretty good. I've been running it with KDE/Plasma on a work thinkpad and it's pretty good.
However, I am still running Ubuntu on my personal laptop because Debian 13 doesn't support my drawing tablet. (To be fair Ubuntu 26.04 didn't either and I had to roll back to 25.10 to get it to work with Krita)
Gentoo has declared a complete No AI, stance, but you really need to be willing to a lot of work to get it up and running.
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Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
@peter_mcmahan I’d just switch to Debian, since Ubuntu is a derivative that’s taken a wrong turn.
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Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
What about the ones in this list? https://noai.starlightnet.work/ @peter_mcmahan
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Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
@peter_mcmahan not quite Linux, but give FreeBSD a try maybe? It pretty much checks all your boxes.
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@peter_mcmahan I've switched from Ubuntu to fedora a few releases ago and am happy with that so far. Their ai policy is rather weak, but existent and at least rather critical than enabling (which for major distros is probably the best one can realistically hope for, given that even things like vim are vibe-coded nowadays 🫠) https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/council/policy/ai-contribution-policy/
@pileczka_gaia
fedora is a blast for laptops (I have fedora KDE on my ThinkPad
you can also get a GNOME desktop environment, closer to Ubuntu)
@peter_mcmahan -
@peter_mcmahan come to elementary OS, it's a queer friendly, queer founded Linux distro that really don't support the use of AI.
@serigala_tropis @peter_mcmahan and it is also quite a pleasure to use.
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@peter_mcmahan Honestly, I can't answer any of your questions
but FWIW I do remember that doing my own most recent, failed attempt at switching over to Linux I decided to go with Zorin specifically because my other prime candidate, Fedora, was too AI friendly...@jwcph @peter_mcmahan
#ZorinOS has no AI (for now at least).. but I didn't notice any in Ubuntu either so now I'm worried there's just stuff happening in the background? -
Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
Depends what else you're against!
Don't like systemd? MX Linux -- Debian based, light, lots of good tools.
Don't mind systemd, and doing a lot of your own manual work? Debian.
Want rolling-release? openSUSE Tumbleweed. Or, for greater stability, openSUSE Slowroll. SUSE is anti-ZFS though. Defaults to Btrfs. I *do not like* Btrfs. (Disclaimer: I worked for SUSE for 4 years.)
Want slim and lightweight & feels like Linux used to do: tiny and fast? Alpine.
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Depends what else you're against!
Don't like systemd? MX Linux -- Debian based, light, lots of good tools.
Don't mind systemd, and doing a lot of your own manual work? Debian.
Want rolling-release? openSUSE Tumbleweed. Or, for greater stability, openSUSE Slowroll. SUSE is anti-ZFS though. Defaults to Btrfs. I *do not like* Btrfs. (Disclaimer: I worked for SUSE for 4 years.)
Want slim and lightweight & feels like Linux used to do: tiny and fast? Alpine.
@lproven @peter_mcmahan +1 for openSuse. Ive used it for over 10 years on tumbleweed, but if you want a slower update cycle, go with slow roll.
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Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
@peter_mcmahan I moved away from Ubuntu several years ago. I was on Elementary for a while, which is based on Ubuntu but seems to be a bit friendlier and has come out against AI. Unfortunately, they followed Ubuntu's lead in making it almost impossible to install deb packages (which is a policy that makes no sense to me) and my accounting app is only available as a Debian package. I'm now on LMDE (the 'pure' Debian version of Mint) and very happy with it.
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@peter_mcmahan I moved from Ubuntu to Debian Stable several years ago, and haven’t regretted it.
Essentially, Debian seems to have taken inspiration from Ubuntu to become a bit friendlier, but thankfully they haven’t imitated the annoying bits.
@slothrop @peter_mcmahan Yeah I left Ubuntu for Debian circa 2010 and haven't looked back. I run it on my work laptop, the family laptop, and all of my workstations and servers.
I haven't used ZFS but it runs Ceph just fine.
If you are using it on a *recent* laptop you may need to update to the backport kernel since the shipping one might not have all of the drivers needed for things like sleep to work well, but that's not a big deal.
The mainline packages are not the most recent but realistically 95% of software doesn't need to be bleeding edge anyway and you can install backports or build from source for the 1-2 packages you might want something really new for.
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Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
@peter_mcmahan@mas.to if you sti want $error $distro searches to work well Linux Mint will likely be a good bet, since at that point it's just popularity. It's still Ubuntu based, so will likely be somewhat familiar, though not the same.
I've also helped someone install MX Linux, and CachyOS, and they seem to work well. Cachy is rolling, seems to have a decent community, and I haven't noticed any issues with lid shutting. No clue on zfs though, didn't try that or look for it -
Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
@peter_mcmahan
Nobody seems to be mentioning Mint, which is another Debian derivative.
Does this mean Mint is regarded as too AI-friendly? I hope not.I agree with the observation expressed by many that Debian/Gnome has the least "culture shock" for someone coming from Ubuntu. I have been running Debian for several years, and so have the family members. Mint as well, albeit before the AI-hype took off.
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Heavens help me, I'm asking for linux distribution advice on fedi. 🫣
It's becoming increasingly clear that I'll need to jump ship from Ubuntu very soon. I've been using linux as my only os for several years now, and I originally chose Ubuntu because I wanted web searches for "<error message> <distro name>" to generally just give me an answer. But every release has made things harder (like avoiding snap) and canonical seems dead set on driving their os into the GenAI void. So I need recommendations!
Is there a distro out there that has a strong anti-AI (or at least AI critical) stance that will mostly just work for laptops (reliable sleep on lid shut is a must)? With a strong community and good governance structure? Maybe with good zfs support? And rolling releases and up to date packages available? I've looked into basic Debian and Chimera, but I'd love to hear folks' thoughts on those and other options.
(Boosts welcome)
@peter_mcmahan
If you use Ubuntu just move upstream to Debian
