title, and to be clear I mean for my usecase specifically. Redhat is being absorbed into IBM and i’m a little worried about how that might affect the fedora project. I’m aware that they’ve been owned by IBM for a while but we are seeing all the typical signs of a company about to go to shit thanks to bad management. I am looking into and preparing to switch in case the fedora project is messed up as well.
I use my pc mainly for gaming (so steam is required) and stuff in my browser and I have a gtx 1650 (can’t get new stuff bc i’m broke) so although I don’t need the proprietary drivers necessarily, I prefer them. I use KDE with a handful of kwin scripts (like temp virtual desktops and karousel) and some cosmetic stuff like klassy, better blur, and a custom color scheme. I need all of that to remain possible. I currently use fedora kde edition, but I have been looking into immutable distros because I don’t know what I’m doing and I want to have a much lower chance of breaking stuff (or at least a way to easily unbreak it). I also want something at least reasonably up-to-date, because I like to get new features quickly. I don’t need to get them as fast as something like arch, but ubuntu and debian are way to slow for me.
what do y’all think would work best for me? I’ve looked at a few things but I haven’t been able to find anything but fedora that serves my usecase the way I want it to yet.
Opensuse tumbleweed if you want stability, rpm packages, and bleeding edge. They also have a fantastic KDE edition.
Although fedora is unlikely to break bad anytime soon, it’s better to support a distro with a good downstream company.
If you don’t like bog standard Debian, you might really like Debian Testing.
It allows you to get decently new packages; I’d say typical lag is one week to a couple months depending on the popularity and/or complexity of the project.
I’ve been using it on my desktop for over three years just fine. It’s been quite stable while still getting new software versions in a mostly timely fashion.
Do note though that Testing means Testing; it’s not really concerned with being a rolling release distro, but with preparing for the next release, so there’s a few quirks:
- Sometimes, a package you’re using gets removed while its dependencies undergo a transition, forcing you to use the Flatpak.
- When a new stable release starts to get close (usually 6 months), they’ll start what’s called freezes, where they let in progressively less changes until release, after which things start speeding up again.
- As a general annoyance of anything rolling release-esque, software behavior may change over time, meaning a previously good config can suddenly break, and you have to fix it.
Personally, I’ve grown tired of Debian Testing and rolling release in general; while I still using Testing on my desktop, I’ve thrown Debian Stable on most things I’ve owned since then, and if I really need a newer version of software, I’ll just install the Flatpak or use a container.
I ditched Fedora because I didn’t like the way the wind was blowing. I mention because despite having a bias against Redhat, I agree with most of the sentiment in the comments. I don’t think the future of Fedora is in any kind of jeopardy and if you’re happy with the distro, you should keep using it.
I don’t think Fedora is going anywhere for quite a while. I’d stick with it. If IBM eventually kills it, it’ll be far enough in the future that whatever you choose now will no longer the best option.
Fedora is its own thing, and unless IBM was RHEL to die, they have to keep kicking resources in, because the majority of non-security contributions come downstream from the Fedora community.
Probably no need to rush into anything. It sounds like the reorg is moving a data security team into Red Hat, and isn’t necessarily enshittifying anything.
A backup plan is always good, but this could wind up being a nothingburger.
Legal, hr, finance, and accounting is now IBM, and IBM has noted job cuts as part of the cost savings in its profit forecasting.
Engineering, product, sales, and marketing are not making any changes - yet.
I would note that IBM is also now pushing its “enhanced AI” support over speaking with actual people, unless you have an upgraded support tier. Basic support tier can also no longer escalate cases.
I would agree in not needing to rush anywhere, but I would have to say this looks like the start of enshittification for sure.
Yeah, I agree. The big picture is concerning, though this latest instance just happens to not be a red flag. We’re not enshittified yet, but it’s a short jump depending on IBM’s next decisions.
Considering Red Hat’s core is development, it’s not necessarily a bad thing to merge things like legal, HR, finance, and accounting with IBM’s own departments.
The trouble is, once the parent company starts merging some departments, shareholders often push to merge more departments.
If the right people hold sway at IBM, Red Hat won’t continue that route to the point of fucking up the OS. But that’s a big “if.”
The trouble is, once the parent company starts merging some departments, shareholders often push to merge more departments.
Especially since they are talking about all the money they will save cutting jobs.
Based on the time frames for this, I’m going to guess by the end of 2026 the engineering team will shrink, followed by a 2027 announcement of merging departments for better management, and RedHat basically be just IBM entirely by 2028.
If I still had any servers on RH for work, I’d be planning my moves right about now (personally I started the shift after the 2023 announcement on source code availability, finalized the last three servers in June actually).
Really quite a shame to see how things have changed.
Anyway, I’d suspect there are at least a couple years left before its a mess.
Yeah, I’m not panicking, but I agree with everything you said.
I want to believe that someone at IBM realizes what they lost if they fuck up Red Hat, but I’m sure we all know better than to count on it.
It’s just a bummer we have to have this conversation at all. Even when a corporation tries to start out on the right foot, odds are stacked in favor of enshittifying.
If you are worried about corporate ownership and like KDE. Debian is a good stable Distro for your needs.
Since timely updates are an issue, specifically Debian Testing is a good stable distro.
Is nobody using Ubuntu (just wondering)? 🤔
Ubuntu’s not “cool.” Personally I don’t care for GNOME or the theming in general. Also snaps are not popular. I do like the Debian base though, so I just use Debian KDE.
snaps! hiss
I’ve not been on linux for long, but I like my kubuntu system. Took a bit of fiddling (non standard video drivers, non standard Proton for steam, wayland was buggy on my hardware), but now it’s been working a treat for both gaming and productivity.
Judging by the sentiments for Ubuntu on here, I feel like it’s unfairly maligned. It seems like everyone wants Linux to be easier to adopt by the masses, but they don’t like the distros that fill that niche.
xubuntu is where it’s at.
Did you try Kalpa? (opensuse) unfortunately, I don’t know in which state it is. Aeon works very well for me. I’ve used silverblue before and I was surprised how good it is.
I don’t think you have to change. But if you want a new hobby, try Arch. I got it just the way I like it years ago and haven’t had to change anything. I picked Arch because I always ended up on their wiki anyway.
Or try arch light aka cachyos.
Nixos
