So I’ve recently taken an interest in these three distros:

All of these offer something very interesting:
Access to (basically) all Linux-capable software, no matter from what repo.

Both NixOS and blendOS are based on config files, from which your system is basically derived from, and Vanilla OS uses a package manager apx to install from any given repo, regardless of distribution.

While I’ve looked into Fedora Silverblue, that distro is limited to only install Flatpaks (edit: no, not really), which is fine for “apps”, but seems to be more of a problem with managing system- and CLI tools.

I haven’t distro hopped yet, as I’m still on Manjaro GNOME on my devices.

What are your thoughts on the three distros mentioned above?
Which ones are the most interesting, and for what reasons?

Personally, I’m mostly interested in NixOS & blendOS, as I believe they may have more advantages compared to Arch;

What do you think?

    • tanja@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOP
      3·
      1 year ago

      Silverblue is sure not limited to only flatpaks.

      Oh 👀
      I didn’t know that; I knew you could modify the underlying system, but doesn’t that result in new A/B snapshots, or something like that?

      toolbox/distrobox

      Sure, but I’d like to have a more seamless experience, i.e. not having to open/start any “containers” or something like that.

      Also, can I “normally”/traditionally install software on NixOS, e.g. through Steam?

      • Pantherina@feddit.de
        5·
        1 year ago

        Listen to the “Linux User Space” podcast, episode 404. They explain every immutability model af of now. Ubuntu Core is missing.

        Ubuntu is creating something new, looks really great but based on snaps, which are not bad packages but rely on a nonfree store that cant be replaced. So meh.

        • nottheengineer@feddit.de
          51·
          1 year ago

          Not bad packages

          I’ve made the opposite experience. There were loads of snap-specific issues when I used ubuntu. So many that I now recommend not using ubuntu just because of snaps.

        • tanja@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOP
          4·
          1 year ago

          Thanks for your suggestion, but I’ll never use snaps/snapcraft/snapd by choice;

          I do see the reasons for why developers/app maintainers may want to (universally) package themselves, but we’ve got Flatpak for that.

          Less loopback devices = better imho

          • Pantherina@feddit.de
            2·
            1 year ago

            Agree partly. Maybe snaps are bad, dont know the details, but if system packages and even the kernel can be packaged, thats pretty nice

      • LinuxSBC@lemm.ee
        3·
        1 year ago

        VanillaOS and BlendOS also use containers to install apps, just like Fedora Silverblue. In fact, it’s easier to install native packages on Silverblue than it is on VanillaOS. Just set your terminal to start a container by default.

      • 2xsaiko@discuss.tchncs.de
        2·
        1 year ago

        Also, can I “normally”/traditionally install software on NixOS, e.g. through Steam?

        Depends on what you mean by traditionally. Steam works without needing any special setup by enabling it in your configuration, just programs.steam.enable = true. There’s also imperative package management with nix profile (don’t use nix-env -i which you will probably come across, it’s broken by design). Personally though I recommend sticking with the declarative configuration and nix-shell which temporarily brings packages in scope for the current shell only.

    • Chobbes@lemmy.world
      1·
      1 year ago

      I think it depends on the user :P. NixOS is pretty hard to get into because the documentation isn’t great… but I’d argue it’s one of the most user friendly ways to configure a system, and it can be really nice to copy configurations from other people.