Pros:

• Better UX for system. On Windows and Mac you’re stuck with the old-style window movement desktops which suck and are chaos with lots of effort to maintain when trying to do anything productive. Even with third-party tools it’s nothing like being able to have something like Niri. It’s just better on the Linux world.
• It actually meets your needs instead of making your change your needs. The customization is insane, but usually you don’t even have to go very far to be happy.
• No bloat, no forced features like AI (tho you can get your own AI stuff if you want), less privacy concerns, better tools generally

Microsoft Windows is actually a complete piece of crap

Unfortunately, cons of switching:

• Have to use non-standard apps for certain things like office files or DAWs for audio production
  • Tho, these are less bad these days. In fact, some are better like I’ll take Blender over Maya any day, and I use OnlyOffice even on Windows, bc why pay for the “Copilot App” (formerly MS Office) when OnlyOffice is just as good and is fully compatible?
• Some games don’t work (esp multiplayer), and sometimes for no good reason other than the devs don’t like Linux users, e.g. Bungie.
  • Also far better than it used to be. Very few things I miss out on
• MacOS clearly has the better app distribution system. A single folder with all necessary deps save a couple core libraries. Simple, effective, can still be put in a store. Instead we have an obsession with sandboxing or overcomplicated packages. AppImages were so close to being right. But nope. We can’t have nice things sometimes

I’ve been using Linux-only since around 2019 (having used it alongside Windows for gaming before then) when Proton finally started getting good. I’m also an engineer, artist, writer, gamer, musician, maker, and more, so I feel like I have touched a lot of the different ways in which computers are used. I’ve used several distros for extended periods, and my fav is Arch (tho Nix is a close second; it’s just not quite ready for primetime)

Linux is absolutely a viable alternative, but you have to know what you want from your PC. How do you want it to function? Pick that choice. It’s not ice-cream flavors where all are equal and you have to decide; form follows function here. Decide what you need and then build your own system from that - bc Linux is yours. Refuse to be spoonfed slop no matter if the slop is from Microsoft or from a Linux distro. Slop is slop. Cook your own meal. It tastes better. If you don’t like mushrooms, don’t get mushrooms.

I always use Breeze Dark (even tho I don’t use Plasma)

The future of AI in Ubuntu [Except it’s Internet and Slackware in 1996 instead of AI and Ubuntu in 2026]

As 1996 progresses, internet-based tools are becoming more and more ubiquitous. Adoption across the tech industry has been mixed, both in terms of which projects are embracing “Web” technologies, and in how companies are structuring their adoption. As a result, I’m frequently asked about what Slackware will do (or not) to incorporate networks.

In this post I’ll detail how the internet will play a part in Slackware’s future, my framework for classifying internet features in the OS, and how Slackware is currently approaching adoption internally, because I think that will help paint a picture of our intent.

The bottom line is that Slackware is ramping up its use of Internet tools in a focused and principled manner that favours open network tools with license terms that feel most compatible with our values, combined with open source contracts. Internet features will be landing in Slackware throughout the next year as we feel that they’re of sufficient maturity and quality, with a bias towards private networks by default.

Internet features in Slackware will come in two forms: first as a means of enhancing existing OS functionality with networking in the background, and latterly in the form of “Internet native” features and workflows for those who want them.

You can’t.

Mobile application require strange wrappings and packagings to run native code like that.

On android you could potentially use termux and build from source for aarch64, but iOS doesn’t have anything like that.

Furthermore, iOS is very locked down, so running some random source from GitHub is essentially impossible without proper developer tools and a mac to run them.

Bc I’ve never heard of that

I just dont enjoy it. It feels extremely sluggish, the ui is far more confusing with 100s of menus and weird names, and it doesnt have any basic file hosting for releases which is annoying. There are more but it’s basically just lots of annoying little things that are super inconvenient.

I am begrudgingly moving to gitlab, slowly but surely

typedef struct {
    bool a: 1;
    bool b: 1;
    bool c: 1;
    bool d: 1;
    bool e: 1;
    bool f: 1;
    bool g: 1;
    bool h: 1;
} __attribute__((__packed__)) not_if_you_have_enough_booleans_t;