Is Ubuntu deserving the hate?

mp3, 1 year ago (edited 1 year ago)

There is some stuff that I hate, but I tend to come back to it for my home server just because of livepatch, which is nice to minimize the amount of reboots necessary and having a patched kernel for all my LXCs makes then also automatically protected.

pruneaue, 1 year ago

People dont hate on ubuntu cause its inherently bad. They hate on it because its a corporate distro and they do some questionable stuff sometimes. The OS runs fine.

Why not debian unstable? Its better than ubuntu in pretty much every way imo. Somewhat less user friendly i guess.

krash, 1 year ago

Doesn’t Debian still ship with X11 by default? For my desktop use, I can’t go back from wayland.

pruneaue, 1 year ago

Havent installed debian with a desktop environment in a long time. If its still default then its just that, default… meaning you could change it

krash, 1 year ago

I prefer software with defaults that are in line with my preferences. I rather have sensible defaults and a nice OOTB experience, instead of fighting my distro and it’s packages.

pruneaue, 1 year ago (edited 1 year ago)

Thats fair. I’ve jumped that ship a while back.
I checked and they seem to use wayland by default on gnome at least

Auli, 1 year ago

Don’t think so. I mean it has X11 but I’m running Wayland can’t remember if it was installed by default though.

Loucypher, 1 year ago

Is Debian unstable really unstable or is just like… Ubuntu?

Frederic, 1 year ago

Use MX Linux instead, I will never go back to something else

logir, 1 year ago

What are the advantages in your opinion?

Draconic_NEO, 1 year ago

It’s not actually unstable, more accurately it’s tested and verified as much as Debian stable, meaning it’s fine for desktop use but I wouldn’t use it for a server or critical system I plan on running 24/7 without interruption, both since it may have bugs that develop after long term use and gets more frequent updates which will be missed and render it out of date quickly if it’s running constantly.

lemmyvore, 1 year ago

It’s a dumping ground for new packages. Nobody makes any guarantees about it. It’s supposed to be used only as a staging area by developers.

It may happen to work when you install it or it may crash constantly. You don’t know.

XTL, 1 year ago

It’s unstable in the sense that it doesn’t stay the same for a long time. Stable is the release that will essentially stay the same until you install a different release.

Sid is the kid next door (Iirc) from Toy Story who would melt and mutilate toys for fun. He may have been a different kind of unstable.

Neither is unstable like an old windows pc.

rufus, 1 year ago (edited 1 year ago)

It’s relatively alright for something that’s called unstable. There is also testing which is tested for at least 10 days. And you can mix and match, but that’s not recommended either.

I wouldn’t put it on my server. And I wouldn’t recommend it to someone who isn’t okay with fixing the occasional hiccup. But I’ve been using it for years and I like it.

However, mind that it’s not supported and they do not pay attention to security fixes.

dan, 1 year ago

I used to run Debian testing on my servers. These days I don’t have much free time to mess with them, so they’re all running the stable release with unattended-upgrades.

However, mind that it’s not supported and they do not pay attention to security fixes.

To be clear, it can still get security updates, but it’s the package maintainer’s responsibility to upload them. Some maintainers are very responsive while others take a while. On the other hand, Debian stable has a security team that quickly uploads patches to all officially supported packages (just the “main” repo, not contrib, non-free, or non-free-firmware).

rufus, 1 year ago (edited 1 year ago)

Thanks for clarifying. Yeah I implied that but didn’t explain all the nuances. I’ve been scolded before for advertising the use of Debian testing. I’m quite happy with it. But since I’m not running any cutting edge things on my server and Docker etc have become quite stable… I don’t see any need to put testing on the server. I also use stable there and embrace the security fixes and stability / low maintenance. I however run testing/unstable on my laptop.

pruneaue, 1 year ago

Unstable is pretty damn stable, feels arch-y to me, and arch rarely has issues. If there are issues they’re fixed fast.
Testing is the middle ground. Tested for a bit by unstable peeps but thats it.

dan, 1 year ago

Testing is the middle ground. Tested for a bit by unstable peeps but thats it.

IIRC packages have to be in unstable with no major bugs for 10 days before migrating to testing. It’s a good middle ground IMO.

Of course, you could always run unstable and be the one to report the bugs :)

hallettj, 1 year ago

Debian unstable is not really unstable, but it’s also not as stable as Ubuntu. I’m told that when bugs appear they are fixed fast.

I ran Debian testing for years. That is a rolling release where package updates are a few weeks behind unstable. The delay gives unstable users time to hit bugs before they get into testing.

When I wanted certain packages to be really up-to-date I would pin those select packages to unstable or to experimental. But I never tried running full unstable myself so I didn’t get the experience to know whether that would be less trouble overall.

Loucypher, 1 year ago

Side question on this, why are people suggesting Debian, a stable but “old” distro, but never mention RHEL / Rocky? They are on par with stability (and quite possibly RHEL wins on it). Did you know that you can get a free licence if you register as a developer?

pruneaue, 1 year ago

As the other reply said, Fedora and RHEL harbor the same problem as Ubuntu in terms of corporate backing.
They’re all as stable at it gets when it comes to linux distros; all those “server distributions”.

I guess people recommend debian because that’s what they know. It’s got the biggest community, so the most support.
Nothing against Rocky, but i wont recommend it if i’ve never used it.

NuXCOM_90Percent, 1 year ago

If we pretend the issue is just the corporate aspects of Ubuntu/Canonical, Red Hat and RHEL have all of those and then some. People just try not to think about that because Fedora is so nice.

As for Rocky: The status of that is pretty much in massive flux since Redhat bounce between tolerating it and wanting it to be even deader than CentOS depending on the day.

jimbolauski, 1 year ago

The thing is R Hell can’t legally block rocky from using their source, unless they break GPL or stop publishing their images to iron bank.

NuXCOM_90Percent, 1 year ago

Are we really back to the 00s? Are we going to start calling it Micro$hill next?

And “Legally it can’t be stopped” doesn’t really bode well for long term support in the context of contributors and so forth. It won’t prevent me from using Rocky (I actually really like it for servers I will likely re-image sooner than later) but it also means I am not going to recommend it to people looking for a distro.

jimbolauski, 1 year ago

When looking at the 8.x and 9.x releases Rocky is the most popular distro for enterprise Linux. Even more popular than R hell, and yes I’m still bitter about what they did to centos.

Auli, 1 year ago

Technically they have to give the code to people who use their product. And the general public is not it. Except I guess the free license one would be problematic. Unless their is something in the license for your use.

jimbolauski, 1 year ago

You do not have to sign a licensing aggreement when you pull the image from Iron Bank, or spin up cloud VMs. In both of those cases you will get access to their source.

sabreW4K3, 1 year ago

I loved Unity. Also, I would argue that both Snap and Flatpak are bad. That said, be happy with whatever works for you. Ubuntu always gives me problems, whereas Fedora runs smooth. That said Ubuntu can read my old Passports, Fedora can’t. They each have the benefits.

iopq, 1 year ago

Flatpak is good because I don’t need to check whether the program is available for my distro.

Before: click Linux icon. They offer a .deb and maybe .rpm

Now: click Linux icon, they tell you how to get it on flathub

And it’s probably available on my distro too, but why bother? Didn’t even search it

sabreW4K3, 1 year ago

The beauty of Linux, at least for me, is that there’s inter-dependability and so you can run apps using less space than you would on Windows. Linux is like a metaphor for society, if your neighbour has something you need, they should share and vice versa. But alas, some twats with a Windows fetish decided to introduce the likes of Flatpak and Snap 🤮

iopq, 1 year ago

Then you don’t use it, THAT is the beauty of Linux

Loucypher, 1 year ago

Yeah I guess it really comes down to that.

vikingtons, 1 year ago

They’ve embraced Wayland, pipewire, gnome and what not, but snap is really questionable, particularly in the Linux ecosystem.

I gather it can be somewhat annoying to contend with (I.e. some apps on Ubuntu may only be available as snaps?)

Numpty, 1 year ago (edited 1 year ago)

Snap is a steaming pile of excrement. So much of the crap on the Snap Store is obsolete and out of date. Anyone and their monkey can post a snap on snapcraft, and… they do. Canonical is just as bad. They took it upon themselves to package up a lot of commercial-level open-source software 3 or 4 years ago… and then have done fuck all with it ever since. Zero updates to the original snaps they put there in the initial population of the Snap store (yes they do maintain a select few things, but only a small percentage of the flood of obsolete software in the Snap store). The result is people looking to install apps who poke the Snap store, go “oh hey, the application I want is there”, install it, and then get all pissy with the vendor… who looks about in surprise wondering how a potential customer managed to find such an old version (happened with at least 2 of my employers, and I’ve come across many more). Go search Reddit (or Google) for obsolete snap discussions. There’s no shortage people pointing at the same issue.

vikingtons, 1 year ago

I wasn’t aware of this situation, that’s really good to know.

I’m not keen on the snaps being centralised behind a proprietary server. I don’t really get why anyone would put up with that in light of Flatpak.

nakal, 1 year ago

This doesn't seem to be a problem with snap. Canonical probably tried to show vendors a way how to distribute software commercially. But vendors are on the level of cavemen and don't know shit about Linux even after serving a solution. Or they simply don't care about building up a market opportunity.

I don't want to defend Ubuntu. I don't like Ubuntu especially, but it might be a simple explanation.

Numpty, 1 year ago

It’s a problem with Canonical. They stepped up and created the snaps and then abandoned them instead of maintaining them. They still maintain the core that they include with the distro… it’s all the extras they created to pad out the store… and then abandoned. “Look the snap store has so many packages”… yeah… no… it doesn’t.

Why would a company who makes a commercial level open source package want to add snaps to their already broad Linux offering? They typically already build RPM (covering RHEL, Fedora, openSUSE, Mandriva, etc.) and DEB (covering Debian, Ubuntu, all Ubuntu derivatives, etc.)… and have a tar.gz to cover anything they missed. Why should they add the special snowflake snap just to cover Ubuntu which is already well covered by the DEB hey already make?

Sure, show vendors what’s possible, but if Canonical stepped up to make the snaps, then they should still be maintaining them. It’s not a business opportunity… its more bullshit from Canonical that no one wants.

clb92, 1 year ago

Most of the problems I’ve experienced with Ubuntu recently were caused by Snap. I really hate that they insist shipping that buggy mess.

ipsirc, 1 year ago

*buntu doesn’t even deserve threads like this.

Montagge, 1 year ago

Snap isn't that bad
Ubuntu is fine
People are not

BarrierWithAshes, 1 year ago

It's because Ubuntu is a company-backed distro consistently wants to go their own way. Not just snap but they've done it before with Unity and Mir (and probably others idk).

Course Fedora does literally the same thing and doesn't get any hate for it so idk. It's just a meme.

Personally I don't like Ubuntu because they didnt go far enough into their own ways but thats just me.

GustavoM, 1 year ago

In a nutshell, Ubluntu is trying to take user control off its users. And the users are mad because of it.

And yes, I’m talking about snap.

polographer, 1 year ago

I recently got a workstation class desktop for my home server and I had so many issues with Debian that I have to search an alternative, Ubuntu supported the hardware natively and I even got a firmware update. I think the hate is really unfounded. Of course there is corporate decisions, but so far it has never get in my way. I have it with a lot of docker containers and a lot hardware integrations. Even the secure boot with nvdia card is easy. I only installed virt-manager via snap, the other things were directly with apt. I did enable the live patch and that’s a nice addition to don’t need to restart a lot.

I think you should give it a try, so far it has worked for me.

ethd, 1 year ago

I’ve run Ubuntu Server frequently on VMs for work, but I could kinda go either way on it. The majority of people who have issues with Ubuntu have philosophical differences. I’m inclined to agree for my personal stuff (in principle I’d rather not get my packages from a single source that works on their own whims, in practice I never use anything but Flathub unless I need a package with deeper permissions) primarily because I believe that Linux should be as open as possible. That said, I already mentioned that my principles there only apply to machines I own, so I guess I’m a bit of a hypocrite 😅

the_q, 1 year ago

As an operating system Ubuntu is great. It’s user friendly, has great hardware support and is up to date enough for most users. Canonical though… That’s where the real sore spot lies for a lot of die-hards.

electric_nan, 1 year ago

I’m quite happy with Linux Mint Debian Edition. I think it is the future of Mint. It’s on a very recent kernel, and more and more software I use nowadays is in Flatpaks anyways. I don’t feel like I’m missing out on much new stuff, but maybe I’m just not aware.

dan, 1 year ago

How different is it from regular Debian? Like if I’m very experienced with Debian, does that equate to being able to easily use Mint Debian Edition too?

electric_nan, 1 year ago

I found normal Debian to be a little unpolished for my liking. Even using the Cinnamon DE, it was lacking some niceties that Mint brings. I don’t think you’ll have any trouble using Mint.

MiddledAgedGuy, 1 year ago

Ubuntu is a tough one. I don’t like it. I don’t like snaps, but more than that I don’t like their direction in general.

But I have some respect for them too. I think they played a pretty significant role in Linux being as popular (relatively speaking) as it is, and I don’t feel like they have any ill intent.

So I don’t personally care for it but I’m glad it’s around I guess is my point?

Vinegar, 1 year ago

I avoid Ubuntu because Canonical has a history of going their own way alone rather than collaborating on universal standards. For instance, when the X devs decided the successor to X11 needed to be a complete redesign from scratch companies like RedHat, Collabora, Intel, Google, Samsung, and more collaborated to build Wayland. However, Canonical announced Mir, and they went their own way alone.

When Gnome3 came out it was very controversial and this spawned alternatives such as Cinnamin, MATE, and Ubuntu's Unity desktop. Unity was the only Linux desktop, before or since, to include sponsored bloatware apps installed by default, and it also sold user search history to advertisers.

Then, there's snap. While Flatpak matured and becoame the defacto standard distro-agnostic package system, Canonical once again went their own way alone by creating snap.

I'm not an expert on Ubuntu or the Linux community, I've just been around long enough to see Canonical stir up controversy over and over by going left when everyone else goes right, failing after a few years, and wasting thousands of worker hours in the process.

jherazob, 1 year ago

Pretty much this, they don’t deserve hate but i won’t recommend them either

actionjbone, 1 year ago

You’re not wrong, but there’s also value in exploring different ways to do similar things. That’s what’s great about Linux.

Some of Canonical’s efforts may lead to failure, but that doesn’t mean they are a waste.

nossaquesapao, 1 year ago (edited 1 year ago)

One thing is to explore different ways to do things, like many projects do, but ubuntu goes further and FORCES people to use their experiments, as if they’re some sort of testing ground, not as if they’re the most used family of linux distros and the one a lot of people rely on.

Edit: Sorry if my tone was excessive, I think I’m getting grumpy with age.

actionjbone, 1 year ago

Haha, I get it. No offense taken.

I don’t disagree. But for better or worse, most people don’t think that much about their software.

Folks like us who do? We can make informed decisions.

Folks who don’t? Canonical’s experiments are probably still better than dealing with Windows 11 or macOS.

Auli, 1 year ago

Like snaps. They are different then flatpaks. You can use them for cli apps don’t think flatpaks can be.

kenopsik, 1 year ago

Flatpaks can also be used to run CLI programs, but it requires using flatpak run <package.name> instead of using the apps standard CLI command. But you can create an alias and should work mostly the same way.

For example, I have neovim on my Debian laptop via flatpak. So in order to run it, you have to do

<span style="color:#323232;">flatpak run io.neovim.nvim
</span>

You can create an alias for that command

<span style="color:#323232;">alias nvim='flatpak run io.neovim.nvim'
</span>

And then you can use the nvim command as normal

skullgiver, 1 year ago

To give credit where it’s due: Mir was pretty neat, actually. It had features that modern Wayland still lacks or has only recently gained. Ubuntu got an X replacement up and running in record time, but the rest of the ecosystem stuck with Wayland, so they cancelled their solution.

And you know what? Snap does solve some issues in interesting ways that Flatpak doesn’t. Unfortunately, the experience using Snap is rather inferior (and that goddamn lowercase snap folder in my home directory isn’t helping), but on a technical level I’m inclined to give this one to Snap.

Developing and maintaining Ubuntu costs money and unlike Red Hat, Canonical isn’t selling many support contracts. Their stupid Amazon scope and the focus on Snap are part of that, they just want to give businesses a reason to pay Canonical.

They’re trying very hard, but it just doesn’t seem to take off. Their latest move, pushing Ubuntu Pro to everyone, seems like a rather desperate move. I think Ubuntu is collapsing and I think Canonical doesn’t know how to stop it. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never paid for an Ubuntu license and I don’t know anyone who does, either.