I have had multiple systems with no updates for a year.

The biggest pain is always that the keyring is out of date and it does not want to install packages signed with newer keys. Once you have dealt with that once or twice, it is quick and easy to resolve and the rest of the update generally just works.

I agree with you completely. I am sure you deal with these minor issues quickly and barely notice them half the time.

But users of other distros would find it intolerable to have to deal with these small tweaks on any given day. “My computer is a tool” they will say and “it just needs to work”.

Fair enough. But then they turn around and fight bugs and limitations that were solved for Arch users months or even years ago.

And they fight to install software not in the repos, often making their overall system less reliable in the process.

I prefer the stability of Arch over the stability of Debian thank you.

The problem is that “stable” means two different things in Linux.

It can mean “reliable” as in it does not crash. I think that is what most of us think of.

However, It more often mean “static” or “unchanging”.

Take Debian Stable. It is “stable” because the software versions rarely change outside of security updates. This does not mean it does not crash. It does not mean it does not have bugs. It means you can depend on it to behave tomorrow like it does today. Design problem not the software installed? They are not getting fixed. As an example, you will see that the people saying Wayland does not work are almost always Debian users because they are using software from 2 - 3 years ago. Debian 13 has improved things but the NVIDIA drivers are from 2 years ago even now. And if KDE has fixed a lot of bugs, that does not mean Debian gets those updates.

Arch on the other hand updates its packages constantly to the latest to very recent versions. The behaviour of your Arch system changes all the time as new versions of software are installed. You may like this or you may not but this is “unstable” using Debian’s definition.

From the point of view of robustness, Arch users often have a better experience than Debian users. Things more often “just work” due either to new features or because issues have been resolved in recent versions. Rapidly developing software, let’s take Wayland or NVIDIA again, will often work dramatically better on Arch. However, every update has the potential to break something. And so, on Arch, you are certainly more likely to encounter breakage. Often these problems are very short-lived with fixes appearing quickly. This means that, even if something did break, many Arch users will not even know.

Anyway, this is my take Arch vs Debian:

• Arch is more “robust” (fewer problems on a typical day)
• Arch is very reliable but less reliable than Debian (updates rarely break but they can)
• Arch behaviour changes much more often (more features sooner but also more learning required and occasionally features lost or “get worse”)

So, it all depends on what we mean by stable

Mint has two kernels: a “stable” one and a “hardware enhanced” one (HWE). The HWE kernel is newer to improve support for newer hardware.

Many distros allow you to pick from multiple kernels.

Yes, all Linux kernels come from kernel.org

That said, kernel.org maintains not only a latest but also multiple “stable” kernels that maintained versions of previous kernels. There are usually about a half-dozen kernel versions to choose from.

One you have code from kernel.org, you can change the configuration to get kernels with slightly different capabilities and strengths.

Finally, you can patch the code you get from kernel.org to add or remove whatever you want. For example, you may add in filesystem support or drivers missing in the mainline kernel.

So, in the end, any given Linux distro may have a Linux kernel slightly different from what other distros use. You can probably run any Linux distro on the kernel from any other Linux distro though. In fact, this is what you are doing when you run something like Docker or Kubernetes.

Governments do not have to be involved in projects to pass laws that impact them.

I would argue greater EU participation in FOSS would improve the situation. One, the number of people in the government that understand how FOSS works may increase and frankly ignorance is often the problem. Second, if lawmakers themselves or the things they care about rely on FOSS, they will be much less likely to kick the legs out from under it.

From a code perspective, the risk is low. If it is just that they add back doors (not because it is the law), we simply create versions without those back doors and use that instead.

I do not think that developers have any greater insight into social or legal issues than you do.

I still use VirtualBox but a version built to work with KVM.

https://github.com/cyberus-technology/virtualbox-kvm

It does not need a kernel module or DKMS because it uses KVM.

Oracle is accused though.

You can use VirtualBox with KVM as well.

https://github.com/cyberus-technology/virtualbox-kvm

You are probably not recompiling the kernel but rather just a kernel module (DKMS). Still annoying.

You do not need a kernel module for the version above as it KVM is already in the kernel. That is why QEMU does not need a kernel module either.

Have not seen suggested alternatives?

Dinit? OpenRC? Runit? S6? SysVinit? InitWare?

Not many seem to know the last one.

https://github.com/InitWare/InitWare

There are more.

I guess a bigger entity could try to start charging for… something… Support, maybe, but that seems unlikely to take off.

Are you aware that Red Hat alone makes billions of dollars per year off Linux?

The FSF approach the microcode is just brain dead.

Most Wayland compositors don not have the concept of multiple windows being one application. And you cannot always control how and where they appear.

This is not a Wayland complaint. Just pointing out that old GIMP was just not very compatible with the core Design of Wayland.

Depending on what compositor you use, a lot of this has really improved.

The biggest “Linux” skill would be package management. It is one of the biggest differences.

Most of the rest of the advice here stems from desktop environment choice.

It depends on the distro and how it feels about shipping non-free software. Fedora, as an example, still ships without them.

Good thing GIMP went single window before Wayland popularity spiked.

Pretty harsh response given that a proper shape tool, and specifically the ability to draw a circle, is on the GIMP roadmap.

I do not think it is the most essential functionality but even the project sees it as missing.

Text has gotten a lot better in recent versions. It could still be better.

It is just a computer. Don’t let us nerds intimidate you. Use what you are comfortable with.

That said, you could dual boot or even just boot of a USB stick into a live Linux session. That will let you play with it and decide if it is as scary as you feared.

Linux Mint can be written to USB and booted into a live Linux session I believe.

Microsoft will for sure benefit here.

Many users, especially businesses, will simply upgrade.

Some will pay for the ESU.

Some will sign up for cloud backups.

All these benefit Microsoft.

Some fairly small number will work around Microsoft’s plan by upgrading Windows 11 where they are not supposed to or finding a way to get the updates for free.

Sure, probably the biggest fraction of users will probably do nothing. But they were already doing nothing for Microsoft so nothing changes in this case. Of anything, the load in Microsoft servers goes down a bit.

So ya, Microsoft has little incentive not to charge ahead.

I understand your frustration. And I agree that choice is an impediment to adoption.

That said, I am not that comment deserved your reply.

As far as I can tell, the OP was only offering one option—Debian. So your concern does not apply there.

And the next comment did not suggest having more options or adding confusing choices either. I think they were ok with offering just one distro. They just wanted to know why the single recommendation was not Mint.

He was not asking a new user why they chose Debian. He was asking the Linux expert why he chose Debian over Mint. Your comment does not seem to apply.

There is nothing wrong with Debian so I certainly think it is an acceptable choice. That said, Mint probably would offer a less jarring transition than Debian for Windows users. Mint defaults to Cinnamon (very Windows like). Debian defaults to GNOME (a less familiar desktop metaphor). Mint also comes with just a few extra tools and touches that can keep new users off the command line (unless they want to go there).

And if you like Debian, LMDE gives you Debian with the Mint GUI and tools.

Honestly, it seems like a fair question.

If you are only going to give them one option, why not one more likely to work for them? Them being everyday Windows users.

And all that said…I do agree that keeping it simple is the most important thing and offering a single recommendation is the right strategy regardless of which distro you choose to recommend.

The crazy thing is that Windows 11 may feel more foreign than Linux Mint would have. It depends what he uses his computer for. My guess is the web and maybe printing.