Little love for Fedora?

[DeaconFrost]

I'm relatively new to the Linux world, in terms of doing more than just trying it out. I have a new build (bottom tower in sig) that is going to be a Linux gamer and learning machine. I have a laptop running Ubuntu 18.04 that works well.

In a corporate setting, we use CentOS 7 as our Linux standard. I've set it up primarily as a server on 6-8 virtual machines for various purposes. I've been thinking of using Fedora 29 at home to better familiarize myself with the commands.

I don't see much in the way of discussions or mentions of Fedora on here. I'm just curious if there's a reason for it, or just that Ubuntu really is far more common/popular with better community support. Any reasons NOT to use Fedora?

 

[cjcox]

I use Fedora. While Gnome is practically insane, I still use it. It's all a matter of what you get used to.

 

[IdiotInCharge]

Using it for familiarization- or just grabbing CentOS 7, RHEL, or even Oracle's spin would be fine.

However, do note that they typically run older kernels, like really older kernels, and that performance in demanding workloads could be seen to be 'lacking'. Phoronix goes over this pretty well with their benchmark suite.

 

[Frobozz]

I daily drive Fedora on my work workstation. We're primarily a RedHat shop, so it's good for keeping my brain in the right command space. (No muscle memory 'apt' commands spilling out) It's also been solid on the typical office Dell Optiplex. I've brought this install from Fedora 27 and the upgrades have gone seamless each time. A plus is that you'll get exposure to upcoming tools before you fire up that next release of RHEL/CentOS. For example, you'll be comfortable with 'dnf' from using it, so breaking yourself from using 'yum' won't be as bad once it lands on the server.

Overall, I'd recommend it as a work desktop for you. You get modern UIs (Gnome 3.30), kernels (currently 4.19), and services. Yet they all work similar to how your servers do.

 

[Frobozz]

I have a new build (bottom tower in sig) that is going to be a Linux gamer and learning machine.

I just re-read that part. The only caveat that I have with the glowing recommendation for Fedora is 'gaming' use. I don't have an nvidia card here, so I'm not sure what the Fedora OOTB experience is like for installing the proprietary nvidia drivers. I can't imagine it's difficult, but I don't know that those trails are as readily blazed (and findable in search) as say with Ubuntu.

I still think Fedora is a solid choice, even for gaming, but you might have to work a little bit more as Ubuntu gets more of the search ranking when looking how to do specific things like install nvidia proprietary drivers or chase a particular library.

 

[ChadD]

If your planning on running a Linux home gaming type system. I wouldn't run Fedora or Ubuntu myself. Run a rolling distro with easy in repo access to the latest kernels, and nvidia drivers.

My suggestion to pretty much anyone not running a mission critical machine... is Manjaro.

Its not pure zero day rolling. Its a 2-6 week delay rolling based on the arch base. Arch is a zero day distro.. meaning if any software in their repo gets pushed its in the main arch distros in general same day. Manjaro has a stable repo which is in general means they hold version updates until a fix patch hits. As an example when MESA 18.3.0 was released manjaro didn't add it to their repos, when 18.3.1 was released they moved from the 18.2 line. They also have an unstable repo if you really do want to run zero day stuffs.

Ubuntu and Fedora in general means running older software.... stable distros no doubt. But most people using those distros for things like gaming will be using out of repo stuff which adds instability anyway. (yes anecdotal evidence from plenty of ubuntu users will roll in with the "I run 10+ PPAs" and things are stable.... but as a rule Ubuntu or Fedora + a ton of out of repo packages isn't really any more stable then a solid rolling release) Manjaro is the most stable distro I have used for Linux gaming.

As far as commands in general Linux is Linux. For home use your not going to see a lot of difference between Fedora or Arch or Ubuntu or Debian ect. Package managers will differ and their commands of course. But really that is a minor difference. Typing yum install package, pacman -S package, apt-get install package or zypper install package. The commands are not so different that one makes no sense if you use the other at home or work.

Other differences like hardened kernel methods and such are probably not something that you need at home... you can get your head around those things for work by reading in general.

 

[bigdogchris]

I'm not a big Linux guy, but the little I have used it at work I like the Red Hat stuff better than the Debian stuff.

 

[DogsofJune]

I looked at Fedora, but went with Ubuntu, and for the most part it's pretty stable and has been decent to game on. It does have it's quirks though. Been a learning experience with updating repositories. Some do, some don't. One day a game works well, the next, it's a 45 min test of wills to get it to run again after some update has happened. Either on Steam's end or Ubuntu's, or Wine's or Lutris, PlayonLinux, etc...
I have Manjaro up on a test box and am liking it more and more the longer I tinker with it. Just wish that box had more balls to it. That AMD 750k is meh.... Not my "1700x sucks" meh, but meh.

May keep my Plex/Gamer in Ubuntu, but I may swap to Manjaro. Dunno yet.

Thinking of converting my Threadripper box to Linux. Ain't made up my mind yet.

 

[Mazzspeed]

Ubuntu and Fedora in general means running older software.... stable distros no doubt. But most people using those distros for things like gaming will be using out of repo stuff which adds instability anyway. (yes anecdotal evidence from plenty of ubuntu users will roll in with the "I run 10+ PPAs" and things are stable.... but as a rule Ubuntu or Fedora + a ton of out of repo packages isn't really any more stable then a solid rolling release) Manjaro is the most stable distro I have used for Linux gaming.

C'mon ChadD, what year are you in?

97 PPA's and not a single issue. I'm also running kernel 4.18 no issues whatsoever on an LTS release, you're not going to be running the latest kernels using Nvidia drivers. The concept of dependency hell died a long time ago.

 

[ChadD]

C'mon ChadD, what year are you in?

View attachment 135749

97 PPA's and not a single issue. I'm also running kernel 4.18 no issues whatsoever on an LTS release, you're not going to be running the latest kernels using Nvidia drivers. The concept of dependency hell died a long time ago.

2019 now I think ?

I did say some one running Ubuntu was going to chime in with anecdotal look at my 100 PPA package setup 100% stable.

My point is still quite relevant if you are going to add 100 PPAs.. copr... Open SUSE built system or whatever method of third party repository or directly installed .debs and .rpms. You are just making things less and less the "stable" LTS distro your distros maintainers intended to ship.

Are things going to crash and burn if you install 100 or 200 or 1000 third party parckages / repos. No not likely. I agree with you for the most part Linux core components are pretty stable these days even if your versioning is all over the place.

I just don't get the point of installing a "stable" non rolling point release type distro if your just going to install 100 rolling third party repositories. Why ? Just install a rolling release. Yes I do believe having the majority of your packages being recent.. instead of a mismash of last years and yesterdays releases is more stable. But more important its easier. You installed 100 PPAs on top of your Ubuntu. I can take a new tower today install manjaro in 10 min, update install all the same software your using... and copy the steam share folder over and boom. 100% up and running newest everything no Fing around with PPAs. (My guess the machine wold be up and gaming and doing everything else in 30 min assuming you don't wanna copy 2TB of steam games or something. lol)

I get using Ubuntu or Fedora or Suse for a work machine. I do.... I install all 3 for clients all the time. I wouldn't install manjaro on an office computer. On my home computer though... it doesn't make sense to me to install tons of third party repositories and cross my fingers... that ya everything plays nice. I have been involved with Manjaro for too long I know better... the manjaro team holds things back on purpose fairly often even in 2019. Yes for the most part the maintainers just skip the x.x.0 and x.x-0 version releases.... but there are almost always 5-10 packages manjaro is holding back beyond that due to identified issues. (thankfully manjaro has a nice critical mass of testers and contributers... that submit a ton of fixes to lots of projects. )

Anyway beauty of Linux isn't it. We can disagree and still respect each other. And I don't disagree Ubuntu is solid... and the PPA system I do find much cleaner then the .RPM based worlds options. For new "power" / "gamer" types its just my opinion that a distro like Manjaro just makes life easier for them... no need of worrying about where to get the latest kernel, or Nvidia driver, or anything else. And the way Manjaro deploys arch zero day packages its rock solid stable.

 

[Mazzspeed]

My point is still quite relevant if you are going to add 100 PPAs.. copr... Open SUSE built system or whatever method of third party repository or directly installed .debs and .rpms. You are just making things less and less the "stable" LTS distro your distros maintainers intended to ship.

ChadD, I've got no issues and I don't see any on the horizon. I've run everything from Arch based distro's to Ubuntu based distro's and everything in between, fact is this is the most stable operating system I've ever run. I've only ever installed it once about three years ago, it's been cloned across drives, it's been 'tweaked' and it's been run on two machines now. As you can see I've added nearly 100 PPA's and I've had no issues whatsoever - I'm actually considering running this build for the full five years assuming 16.04 is part of the new LTS schedule.

I've even updated the kernel many times with no issue.

People have their biases. Some like Arch based distro's, some like Fedora based distro's, some like Ubuntu based distro's. I've been using Ubuntu for so long now it's second nature, I'm done distro hopping as long as Ubuntu keeps doing what I want it to do.

There's certain 'issues' with 18.04 that actually turn me off the release, so I'm happy to stick with 16.04 for as long as I can. But as far as Arch vs Ubuntu is concerned, it's like me making the claim "Arch is bleeding edge and therefore unreliable" - The second I make that claim Arch users are going to claim no issue, Ubuntu is no different. PPA's are the software installation method of choice under an Ubuntu based distro, they're nothing to fear and they work. Remember, a PPA is only rolling if I choose to update it, this idea that adding PPA's is going to cause a cataclysmic meltdown in fairly unfounded regarding modern distro's. I don't need to worry about where I'm getting the latest Nvidia driver from as once the PPA's added the driver automatically updates along with system updates if I want it to.

There's pro's and con's to everything, even the AUR isn't perfect. However one things for absolute certain - Both methods of software installation crap all over anything under Windows in terms of security and no operating system, not even Windows, is totally immune from dependency issues.

 

[ChadD]

We are on the same page Maz. For the record though I'm a Manjaro user not an arch user. Manjaro is not arch. At least no more then Ubuntu is Debian. Arch is less stable, and I think that is an accepted part of using arch... I would never use that for production anything. (although I have heard of people using it as a server os... wouldn't be my choice but it can be customized more then most so I could see the appeal depending on the situation) Manjaro is an order of magnitude more stable then its arch base. Just skipping the x.x.0 versions of packages makes Manjaro far more stable... nothing is pushed that hasn't had at min one bug patch. (stuff like Nvidia closed source tends to get a few weeks testing in unstable first)

But anyway, we are both right. In general Linux is Linux regardless of distro and their political decisions on versioning releases. As I have said I have installed Ubuntu for clients that are partial to it... I haven't ever had any show stopping issues with Ubuntu. That is true of every major distro though. Nothing I have had to deal with in years has been a result of a distros choices or F ups, just mine or my clients. lol Of course I don't install oddball stupid distros for clients and I have never run into a situation of showing up somewhere and finding some distro I have never heard off. Us Linux basement warriors may argue 1001 distros... but the real world with real servers seem to be partial to the same 3 distros, unless your dealing with really large outfits that are heavilly modifiying Debian or slackware or something directly anyway.

 

[FNtastic]

If your planning on running a Linux home gaming type system. I wouldn't run Fedora or Ubuntu myself. Run a rolling distro with easy in repo access to the latest kernels, and nvidia drivers.

My suggestion to pretty much anyone not running a mission critical machine... is Manjaro.

Its not pure zero day rolling. Its a 2-6 week delay rolling based on the arch base. Arch is a zero day distro.. meaning if any software in their repo gets pushed its in the main arch distros in general same day. Manjaro has a stable repo which is in general means they hold version updates until a fix patch hits. As an example when MESA 18.3.0 was released manjaro didn't add it to their repos, when 18.3.1 was released they moved from the 18.2 line. They also have an unstable repo if you really do want to run zero day stuffs.

Ubuntu and Fedora in general means running older software.... stable distros no doubt. But most people using those distros for things like gaming will be using out of repo stuff which adds instability anyway. (yes anecdotal evidence from plenty of ubuntu users will roll in with the "I run 10+ PPAs" and things are stable.... but as a rule Ubuntu or Fedora + a ton of out of repo packages isn't really any more stable then a solid rolling release) Manjaro is the most stable distro I have used for Linux gaming.

As far as commands in general Linux is Linux. For home use your not going to see a lot of difference between Fedora or Arch or Ubuntu or Debian ect. Package managers will differ and their commands of course. But really that is a minor difference. Typing yum install package, pacman -S package, apt-get install package or zypper install package. The commands are not so different that one makes no sense if you use the other at home or work.

Other differences like hardened kernel methods and such are probably not something that you need at home... you can get your head around those things for work by reading in general.

Just a heads up. I'm getting the impression from your statement, "Ubuntu and Fedora in general means running older software.... stable distros no doubt" that you aren't aware that Fedora is a bleeding edge (or, very close to it) distro. It's said to be the test bed for the Red Hat variants. Putting Fedora and Ubuntu into the same category is far off from the truth. Fedora's current version would be more comparable to Manjaro, in terms of kernel version, etc.

Something I wanted to pass along because it wasn't something that I knew up front, and only learned after I had to search down a specific requirement for a RH variant. Which was many years after I was deep into the Linux world.

 

[Mazzspeed]

We are on the same page Maz. For the record though I'm a Manjaro user not an arch user. Manjaro is not arch. At least no more then Ubuntu is Debian. Arch is less stable, and I think that is an accepted part of using arch... I would never use that for production anything. (although I have heard of people using it as a server os... wouldn't be my choice but it can be customized more then most so I could see the appeal depending on the situation) Manjaro is an order of magnitude more stable then its arch base. Just skipping the x.x.0 versions of packages makes Manjaro far more stable... nothing is pushed that hasn't had at min one bug patch. (stuff like Nvidia closed source tends to get a few weeks testing in unstable first)

But anyway, we are both right. In general Linux is Linux regardless of distro and their political decisions on versioning releases. As I have said I have installed Ubuntu for clients that are partial to it... I haven't ever had any show stopping issues with Ubuntu. That is true of every major distro though. Nothing I have had to deal with in years has been a result of a distros choices or F ups, just mine or my clients. lol Of course I don't install oddball stupid distros for clients and I have never run into a situation of showing up somewhere and finding some distro I have never heard off. Us Linux basement warriors may argue 1001 distros... but the real world with real servers seem to be partial to the same 3 distros, unless your dealing with really large outfits that are heavilly modifiying Debian or slackware or something directly anyway.

It's OK ChadD, I think your cool! Please don't take offense, just some enthusiastic banter

 

[Vermillion]

If your planning on running a Linux home gaming type system. I wouldn't run Fedora or Ubuntu myself. Run a rolling distro with easy in repo access to the latest kernels, and nvidia drivers.

My suggestion to pretty much anyone not running a mission critical machine... is Manjaro.

Its not pure zero day rolling. Its a 2-6 week delay rolling based on the arch base. Arch is a zero day distro.. meaning if any software in their repo gets pushed its in the main arch distros in general same day. Manjaro has a stable repo which is in general means they hold version updates until a fix patch hits. As an example when MESA 18.3.0 was released manjaro didn't add it to their repos, when 18.3.1 was released they moved from the 18.2 line. They also have an unstable repo if you really do want to run zero day stuffs.

Ubuntu and Fedora in general means running older software.... stable distros no doubt. But most people using those distros for things like gaming will be using out of repo stuff which adds instability anyway. (yes anecdotal evidence from plenty of ubuntu users will roll in with the "I run 10+ PPAs" and things are stable.... but as a rule Ubuntu or Fedora + a ton of out of repo packages isn't really any more stable then a solid rolling release) Manjaro is the most stable distro I have used for Linux gaming.

As far as commands in general Linux is Linux. For home use your not going to see a lot of difference between Fedora or Arch or Ubuntu or Debian ect. Package managers will differ and their commands of course. But really that is a minor difference. Typing yum install package, pacman -S package, apt-get install package or zypper install package. The commands are not so different that one makes no sense if you use the other at home or work.

Other differences like hardened kernel methods and such are probably not something that you need at home... you can get your head around those things for work by reading in general.

I second the Manjaro vote. I am a longtime Arch user and while I've never had an update blow me up the fast rolling release was causing grief with my gaming. New kernels and drivers every other day was causing stuttering at times and yes I know I could just block packages and what not but that defeats the purpose of wanting a rolling distro. So I bounced around distros for a few days as I'm to the point in my Linux life where I just want stable and fast.

Ubuntu and Ubuntu based distors while great for my Plex server are slow compared to Arch or an Arch based distro. So I gave Manjaro a chance as I feel like only an Arch based distro will give me the speed I want. I'm really enjoying it. Stable, as fast as my old Arch build, but it's actually more "stable". When I'm at my desk I have two 24-inch 1080p monitors and my E5510 is the 3rd screen. On Arch I couldn't play a game, have a movie playing on one screen and be streaming say a Webex video meeting (audio through phone) at the same time without everything being a stutterfest. Manjaro just rolls right along.

It's really been a pleasure using Manjaro and I even like the base XFCE build. XFCE was my DE of choice for a long time so to be back on it was an easy transition after using Budgie and KDE for so long.

 

[ChadD]

Just a heads up. I'm getting the impression from your statement, "Ubuntu and Fedora in general means running older software.... stable distros no doubt" that you aren't aware that Fedora is a bleeding edge (or, very close to it) distro. It's said to be the test bed for the Red Hat variants. Putting Fedora and Ubuntu into the same category is far off from the truth. Fedora's current version would be more comparable to Manjaro, in terms of kernel version, etc.

Something I wanted to pass along because it wasn't something that I knew up front, and only learned after I had to search down a specific requirement for a RH variant. Which was many years after I was deep into the Linux world.

No doubt. In my mind I think I often conflate Centos and Fedora. lol

With Fedora I think the main annoyance is still the 100% free ship state. I'm a big open source booster and I love RedHats OSS backing. It just makes it a lot harder to recommend to a complete Linux newbie. Knowing they are going to have to basically enable third party repos for things like Steam and steam integration... spotify ect. Not to mention Nviida drivers. With manjaro you can install them right from the installer... and Ubuntu makes their installation pretty painless as well. I think Fedora just recently got out of the box mp3 support. (I think you may still need to enable RPMfusion to install Mp3 I'm not 100% sure).

Anyway ya I have used fedora and a decent distro.... its just not really the noob friendly distro I would suggest anyone start with unless they are patient and are willing to do a lot of reading, as they won't get much hand holding on things most people take for granted with most distros.

 

[DeaconFrost]

I appreciate all the information. I think I'll stick with Ubuntu, and can always virtualize a CentOS install for practice/playing around. I'm going to do the same with Manjaro, as I've never used it. My head is spinning a little with the sheer number of distros, but I guess more choices are better than few.

 

[longblock454]

I have been running Fedora since Fedora Core 1 first came out, ~2002 IIRC. However I'm not a supporter of the Red Hat/IBM deal, so I'm thinking of switching over to Arch.

 

[Algrim]

I think Fedora just recently got out of the box mp3 support. (I think you may still need to enable RPMfusion to install Mp3 I'm not 100% sure).

Now that the codecs behind MP3 are patent-free...

 

[KarsusTG]

TBH, if you are going to use linux in a work/production environment there is a 85-95% chance you are going to be using a red hat derivative (fedora/centos/red hat, etc.) I personally have found that modern fedora will, at least on common hardware, work right out of the box with little or no configuration.

It's also better at power management than ubuntu flavors on laptops.

 

[NoOther]

I'm relatively new to the Linux world, in terms of doing more than just trying it out. I have a new build (bottom tower in sig) that is going to be a Linux gamer and learning machine. I have a laptop running Ubuntu 18.04 that works well.

In a corporate setting, we use CentOS 7 as our Linux standard. I've set it up primarily as a server on 6-8 virtual machines for various purposes. I've been thinking of using Fedora 29 at home to better familiarize myself with the commands.

I don't see much in the way of discussions or mentions of Fedora on here. I'm just curious if there's a reason for it, or just that Ubuntu really is far more common/popular with better community support. Any reasons NOT to use Fedora?

The only reason I can see against using Fedora would be gaming compatibility, especially related to drivers and getting it to work consistently with Steam or other services. That said, I don't know of any show stopper compatibility issues myself. Most of my experience with fedora is using it as a general purpose desktop though.

I have not used Manjaro extensively. I have played around with Arch and have made a Manjaro VM. I think there is a lot of growing support for it in the community though.

The reality is no matter what Linux Distro you choose, there is going to be some caveats to getting things working well for your gaming setup. But of the main distros we have mentioned here, there shouldn't be any show stoppers. I would tend to go with the combo of system (RH, Debian, Arch) and desktop environment (Gnome, KDE, MATE, XFCE, Unity, etc) you are most comfortable with and configure it from there.

C'mon ChadD, what year are you in?

View attachment 135749

97 PPA's and not a single issue. I'm also running kernel 4.18 no issues whatsoever on an LTS release, you're not going to be running the latest kernels using Nvidia drivers. The concept of dependency hell died a long time ago.

Nothing wrong with it until one or more of those PPAs is no longer maintained or is ported over to a different one. Had that happen a few times. Although really my preference has been to use a straight Debian build for some time now. So I manually install and update most of my packages.

 

[Mega6]

I've worked with most all the distros starting with Redhat back in the day. Yo can pretty much get any distro to do what
Ever you need. As you can see, each distro has its tweaks, strengths and weaknesses. My advice is to start with what u use at work - redhat / fedora- on the command line. This is important.


Then go from there.

There are much better places to ask Linux questions.

 

[hrsetrdr]

Sorry for the necro post...

I generally like Fedora, was one of the first Linux distros(Fedora Core 4) that I used for additional Folding@Home boxen. Fedora 29(most recent release) has been a little too cutting edge(buggy) for my likes, so my desktops run OpenBSD 6.4, Debian and Ubuntu.

 

[DeaconFrost]

I still flip flop between the two. I have issues each and every time I try to install Nvidia drivers under Fedora, yet with Ubuntu, it works flawlessly. A coworker recommended Mint, but I haven't toyed around with it yet. Good thing they are all free and run very well as a VM!

 

[IdiotInCharge]

Tried Fedora on my ultrabook- managed to lose all sound. It's probably something specific to the hardware and WINE, and it is quite annoying, but I'm back to Ubuntu MATE 18.04.2 (which is mostly 18.10). Somehow it's working like a charm.

Also decided to start dual-booting on my desktop; tried Manjaro first, but couldn't get it to extend the desktop to my three side monitors (which are on an AMD GPU, with the primary monitor on an Nvidia GPU). On a whim, booted off Ubuntu, and hey even the Live instance worked.

Can't get WINE to install though.

Maybe 2020 will be the year of the Linux desktop...