Are there any distributions that offer benefits post-installation?

I am aware of Arch (and some other relevant distributions) having access to the AUR, and would like to know if other distributions can offer anything other than a quicker set-up.

  • hello_hello [they/them, comrade/them]
    ·
    7 days ago

    Awkwardly looks at NixOS

    • Complete configuration based on declarative options.
    • Home Manager for declarative home directory management.
    • Nix Flakes for reproducibility and templating
    • devShells for programming.
    • Easy deployment on multiple machines, declarative disk partitioning with disko.
    • Is incredibly trivial to switch desktop environments (KDE -> GNOME takes only a few lines, or you can have both).
    • Releases every 6 months for a stable release, offers an unstable channel to live like an Arch user without all the fear of breaking anything you couldn't undo via the boot menu.
    • Largest set of packages (over 80,000) that is contributed to every day.

    NixOS is the most rewarding distribution to stick with, even though starting with it can be rough.

      • hello_hello [they/them, comrade/them]
        ·
        7 days ago

        You should watch vimjoyers series on NixOS as an introduction since he goes over a lot of the essential basics that may trip newcomers up.

        • Tomorrow_Farewell [any, they/them]
          ·
          7 days ago

          Already started, actually.

          Also, considering that I don't want to manually re-partition a partition that I have already prepared for Linux on one of my drives, I think I will actually be starting with NixOS.

  • EcoMaowist [she/her]
    ·
    8 days ago

    Fedora has RPM-Fusion as well as access to many fedora-tailored hardening scripts if that's what you're into. Setting up Flathub (and also adjusting things like internet permissions through KDE settings or flatseal f you're into that) is a good way to access large amounts of official and unofficial software on any distro. You can also add parameters in your /etc/dnf/dnf.conf/ file to optimize and speed up DNF

    • max_parallel_downloads=10 (lower this number if you have slower internet)
    • countme=false (possibly not needed, but manually disables user counting)
    • defaultyes=true (again not needed but even though I have been using Fedora much longer than Debian or Ubuntu I still like the Y/n setup over the y/N)

    You can also disable specific repos in either KDE or Gnome Stores (I don't know how to on CLI). I usually disable Fedora Flatpaks and all other 3rd party repos except for the RPM fusion repos I set up and Flathub. Saves a bit of time when using "dnf update".

    i use fedora btw, in case you couldn't tell.