What are some things you wish you had known when switching to Linux?
What are some things you wish you had known when switching to Linux?
I start: the most important thing is not the desktop, it's the package manager.
I guess the main things would be:
- As a beginner, don't bother trying to dual boot -- If you still need a Windows box, get some cheap hardware to do your Linux work on. It's too easy to screw up both systems otherwise.
- Don't get too hung up on a specific distro, the better you are at dealing with different configurations, the better prepared you will be for whatever comes. Once you've gotten one set up, don't be afraid to just try a different one.
I learned to never settle. If you don't like the default workflow of Gnome, try some extensions, or even a different DE. Same with Package Managers. If you don't like the syntax, make an alias. Don't just "deal with it". Windows has brainwashed people into thinking that there is only one way to do a thing.
Trying not to make it windows.
There's a lot of conveniences that Windows comes default with.
When I switched to Linux, my immediate goal was to find alternatives for EVERYTHING. That lead to being disappointed by a lot.
Understanding Linux and also recognizing there's a lot of shit I don't need (that windows was giving me for the sake of VALUE) was a game changer.
Linux is pretty easy to use nowadays. The only thing I would check before switching is driver compatibility.
Distrobox exists, so one is not bound to use a specific distro just because it packages some of the apps/binaries they require.
To start sooner.
That I shouldn't care as much about installed packages I no longer use. Sure, going through installed programs and cleaning up from time to time is ok, but no need to panic if something sticks around.
Especially when I installed something manually needing dependencies for programming, I tend to write down names of installed packages and then managing it manually, because I wasn't yet aware what their names mean. Now using same OS for over a year, heavly testing stuff, having multiple desktop enviroments and not cleaning it up my system partition is taking less than 30GB, compared to 1TB disk it's nothing.
When you're just trying to get work done: pick a solid, well-tested high-profile distribution like Fedora, Pop!_OS, or Debian (or Ubuntu). Don't look for the most beautiful, or most up-to-date, or most light-weight (e.g. low CPU usage, RAM, etc.). Don't distro hop just to see what you're missing.
Of course, do those things if you want to mess around, have fun, or learn! But not when you're trying to get work done.
Always put your filesystems in an LVM volume (and in general, partition disks with LVM rather than partition tables)! You never know when you might need to combine multiple disks, make a snapshot, add redundancy, or transfer to another disk without unmounting. But it's very difficult to format a block device as LVM once you can't erase its contents.
Make your /boot partition at least 500MiB.
Leave at least 1GiB of free space at the beginning of every disk. You never know when you might need to add EFI and boot partitions to that disk. And again, it's very difficult to do after the fact.
After switching to Linux I wish I knew how to report bugs. I'm a qa tester and I notice so many little things that can be replicated and fixing them would polish the user experience. But there are so many layers I don't know who to report the issue to. My first thought wasto report it to the distro forum and have the more technical people there take a look at the issue then escalate it to the distro maintainers or the actual software devs.
Another thing I wish I knew, was how to get my 2nd hdd to mount automatically. I fucked to my system 4 times(and recovered it) trying and then had to get my sys admin friend to do it for me.
That even though you are running an LTS version of Ubuntu (e.g. Ubuntu 22.04), some packages that have arrived over a year ago on e.g. 23.10 will never arrive on 22.04.
Example: i3-wm 4.22 or up (https://packages.ubuntu.com/search?keywords=i3&searchon=names&suite=jammy§ion=all).
That you can use any DE on any distro
Nothing, to be honest. It just worked and I loved it.
tab completion
Ctrl + R in the terminal. I never used it until I got a job using Linux, now it's probably my most used command at work and at home.
Found the debian user.
I've learnt how to use Linux in preparation for the day when Windows finally goes to far.
That just like windows and Mac if it doesn't support that platform prepare for headaches. Unlike windows and Mac you can get things that aren't supposed to run on Linux to run thanks to great tools like wine, proton, and even waydroid. But if you wanna avoid headaches just stick with what's supported for the most part.
If you switch to Linux you'll probably have to learn at some point to use the terminal but with some recent developments (new fonts, ligatures etc..) console applications evolved to be more and more ... Graphical! And this is awesome: check out btop, neovim/nvchad, lsd etc...
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The most important thing is DE, then package manager.
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Contrary to all basement cultists' claims, GNOME is the benchmark for DEs and has the best UX and workflow across all OSes. GNOME with its extensions is the reason I no longer find Windows to be as efficient, even though Windows can be pretty solid, and even though I have been a Windows user all my life, until 6 years ago when I hopped to Linux.
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Flatpak and Snap are revolutionary compared to Windows' method of installing software.
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Linux is NOT Windows. You can use cross platform programs, but STOP trying to make Linux a shoe in replacement. Learn and adapt a little bit.
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Though I enjoy and am currently using #LinuxMint, I wish I learned about #Wayland sooner. I didn't understand why game performance felt so off with my dual monitor setup for several months. I have since dabbled with an #Ubuntu #Gnome DE for some gaming, and Wayland support has alleviated those problems. However, I plan to look into other options when I've organized my data a bit more and establish proper backups. Learning #Bash, #scripting, #aliases, #workspaces and tweaking #hotkeys were also useful for making my workflow into what it is. Also, I wish I knew how bad #ProtonVPN and #ProtonDrive #Linux support would be. Despite getting used to their #CLI applications, the absence of feature parity is immensely disappointing.
Nothing of note, really. The openness of the whole system meant that I could learn whatever I needed to know as the need arose.
I started when I was a kid, though. I had plenty of time to explore and discover. It'd be harder as an adult in a hurry.
Don't use linux with the expectation that it works like windows. If you want to use linux, be open to new ways of doing things, and you will likely have a great time, try the old methods and you will run into impassable walls.
I wish I'd known how to use node-based compositors like Natron to produce VFX so I don't have to keep going back to macOS to use After Effects.
how cool and sexy and irrestible i became
to the right people ^^
That everything you need will work out of the box and you wouldn't boot into windows for 2 months. Would have done a full installing instead of dual-booting. Windows did have a matrix backup I needed though.
@elfahor How I was fucked up by trade-based society. Linux is cheap( not free), but is fun and enjoyable. It us fun to interact, support and be brave to act.
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