Can someone point me to a helpful beginners resource explaining some Linux basics? Like what is the difference between “distro”, which is what, like Ubuntu, fedora, Debian (? Or is that a category of distro?) And desktop environment which is what, KDE, Lubuntu, gnome? Like I don’t even know I have these categories right let alone understand why I’d pick one over another and what practical effects it will have- which apps will I/won’t I be able to install, etc…

I’m not expecting anyone to answer these questions for me, but if you could point me to something already written, I’d appreciate it.

  • Jumuta@sh.itjust.works
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    25 days ago

    basically there’s the big 3 (debian, arch, fedora) and everything else is just them with presets (ui, drivers, etc)

    debian uses apt, arch uses pacman, fedora uses dnf for packaging, so packages (app executables) aren’t intercompatible and so you usually have some apps that aren’t available on on or the other

    usually debian had everything, arch has everything with workarounds, idk about fedora

    anyway the tree is like:

    debian

    • ubuntu
      • kubuntu
      • lubuntu

    fedora

    • nobara

    arch

    • manjaro

    with DEs you should see which ones you like by testing them out, if you get the debian netinstaller you can select however many you want in the install process and you can switch between them at boot with the dropdown menu in the login prompt

    • akilou@sh.itjust.worksOP
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      25 days ago

      Awesome. Thank you. So I understand why a debian package wouldn’t work on Fedora, but are there Kubuntu packages that wouldn’t work on Lubuntu? Otherwise is there “Kedora” and “Ludora”?

      • Jumuta@sh.itjust.works
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        25 days ago

        debian packages will work on debian based distros usually, etcetc

        fedora calls their kedoras and ludoras “spins”, but I haven’t used fedora so can’t say how good they are