Manjaro Linux

[NickStone]

I had been meaning to install and try out Arch Linux for a while and the other week I decided I would do it, however, looking through the collection of DVD's that I had aquired from Linux magazines other the past 12 months or so I could not find the disk that had Arch on it.

I did, however, find a distribution called Manjaro Linux which is based on Arch but claims to be a lot more user friendly when it comes to installation of the Arch Linux system.

For those people who are not familiar with the Pacman package manager or with command line package managers, Manjaro comes with its own gui for Pacman called "Pacman-gui". It also comes with another gui app called Pkgbrowser which I have found realy useful to identify the exact name of a package I had wanted to install using either Pacman or Pacman-gui.

I have only been using this distribution for a week but there are things about it that I really like, such as the speed it takes to boot up and shutdown. I have not timed the shutdown process but it appears to shutdown within 5 seconds. I also like that fact that it installs all the major multimedia codecs by default (non of this adding third party repositories for DVD playback etc.).

I have had two problems over the week and the forums have been brilliant in helping me to resolve those problems.

It installed the latest version of Libre Office but only Writer and Calc, I then later installed Base but had a problem running a database as it required JRE. Searching the forums for help on this matter gave me the answer to resolve the problem.

So, far I am very impressed with this distribution and am thinking of replacing the distribution I have on my laptop with either this distribution or another light weight distribution such as Bodhi.

Yes I do recommend this distribution.

[james147]

FYI, if you want to try out ArchLinux, save your self some trouble and download the latest image rather the looking for an old cd (the iso is not very big). Otherwise you are just asking for a painful first upgrade

Though it looks interesting, might give it a try in a vm sometime.

[Jonas]

thanks for sharing, looks really good.

What DE did you run? I'm kind of looking for a rolling distro, with KDE. I really would like a light weight DE (to put all resources to render 3D) but my KDE-love kind of keeps me to KDE. I've tried Debian but I really didn't like how it played (used the stable but it felt like going back 2 years of KDE development). Manjaro seem like it could be the one, many reviews gives it thumbs up.

I saw this video review

again thanks for sharing - when I get the time, I'll defo give this a try.

b.r

Jonas

[vw72]

There are pros and cons to rolling releases. The obvious pros are that you can get the latest software much quicker than waiting for a new distro release. The obvious con is that things can, and often do, break.

Ubuntu announced that it is thinking of going to a rolling release as early as 14.04. I don't know if Kubuntu would follow suit. However, with the current model, you get the best of both worlds. For most of the major packages, including the various DEs, office suites, browsers, etc. There are community maintained PPAs that have the latest versions almost as soon as they are available (not quite as quickly, though as Arch has them). In addition, one can always point their repositories to the current development branch (ie. 13.04 right now) and you get the latest of everything as soon as the developers have it packaged. However, as mentioned above, it can also break your system.

Personally, instead of a rolling release, I prefer the use of third party and community PPAs. That way I can choose to upgrade only those packages I want to, when I want to, and if something breaks, I can roll them back to the official Kubuntu version.

[sealbhach]

I just tried out Manjaro Opnbox edition in a Virtual machine, I'm liking it very much. They have done a lot of work on user friendliness. I was surprised that it came with Flash player already installed. I think this is one I will recommend in future to people asking about an OS for older machines.

.

[james147]

There are pros and cons to rolling releases. The obvious pros are that you can get the latest software much quicker than waiting for a new distro release. The obvious con is that things can, and often do, break.

Rolling release does not result in frequent breakage, at least not the way Arch does it. The reason why the development version of kubuntu breaks so often is because it is effectively the testing branch where new things are tested, on Arch these are done in a separate repo so that packages can be tested before being shipped to everyone. My arch boxes have had less problems then I had with kubuntu which quite often breaks during a do-release-upgrade if you don't have a standard setup (ie you have added third party packages).

I don't know if Kubuntu would follow suit.

Kubuntu does tend to follow ubuntus model as they basically just package kde for ubuntu and maintain a separate ISO.

However, with the current model, you get the best of both worlds. For most of the major packages, including the various DEs, office suites, browsers, etc. There are community maintained PPAs that have the latest versions almost as soon as they are available (not quite as quickly, though as Arch has them).

I always found these tended to complicate things when you wanted to do a do-release-upgrade. Which means you don't really get the best of both worlds, you get some upgraded software at the expensive of a more likely breakage during a do-release-upgrade. Pure rolling release does not suffer from this as along as you update regularly and don't let package updates pile up.

In addition, one can always point their repositories to the current development branch (ie. 13.04 right now) and you get the latest of everything as soon as the developers have it packaged. However, as mentioned above, it can also break your system.

This is the same as upgrading to the development version, which might be rolling release, but it is not a stable model for a rolling-release system.

[vw72]

I wasn't trying to imply that Arch and it's derivatives were unstable because they were rolling releases, but even Arch itself cautions about problems that can occur because they are a rolling release and how to work around problems that an update might trigger. It has been my own experience that Arch is pretty darn stable, not bullet proof, but then I haven't found an operating system that is.

As for *buntu instability with release upgrades, I rarely do them anymore. I keep a separate home partition and I have found that it is quicker and less problematic to down load the image of a new release and install over the previous release. Even that isn't foolproof as sometimes configuration files in one's home directory can mess things up.

With regards to using the development version, unless they are messing around with changing infrastructure (like gcc or gtk, etc.), it usually is pretty smooth. However, by definition, a development version is not for production. It is a quick and dirty way to have a rolling release with *buntu, if you are careful (like turning off automatic updates so you can give it a few days to make sure nothing breaks). However, it is only a rolling release until the freezes kick in at which time all the package versions are frozen.

I didn't mean to sound like I was disparaging Manjaro. It looks very interesting. My comments were only meant that if one's goal is to have something more like Kubuntu but with more current packages, it can be accomplished without too much difficulty.

[bsniadajewski]

If I were the Ubuntu devs and I went to the rolling model, I'd have at least two repos available:
-- one for the 14.04, 16.06, etc. as LTS (like it is now)
-- the other for the rolling release

That way, those that want a very stable system, like an LTS or Debian Stable, can still have it, and those who want the latest and (sometimes) greatest can get theirs too (like a Debianized? Arch Linux).

Me? I'd go to the rolling release easily, hopefully they will release isos for the rollers very periodically to avoid having to dl multi-megs of updates after reinstall (or install on a new machine).

[james147]

That sounds like what they are planning to do. A rolling release with fixed LTS versions every couple of years.

[Jonas]

What james said. Read this on Muktware
http://www.muktware.com/5139/ubuntu-...-release-model

Discussion here (I've not seen it yet)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=AQvOIExkCaw

Considering that the phone will be out by then, a (somehow) rolling release will be mandatory...to most users, i.e - customers.
What ever path chosen, it's more then a year to a 14.x release, alot will happen before then.

B.r
Jonas

[bsniadajewski]

That sounds like what they are planning to do. A rolling release with fixed LTS versions every couple of years.

Hmm. I wonder, then, if they would do it OpenSUSE-style with Tumbleweed. That is, have a special "repository" that is only a pointer to whatever the current release is, and then have the rolling repo used for only the updated packages.

Or, like Arch (correct me if I'm wrong, never used Arch), just have the single repo and update as you go along?

[james147]

I find it very unlikely that they will drop stable releases (ie fixed package versions in a report with only security and bug fix patches)

[bsniadajewski]

Could it be possible for, say, the Main and (maybe) Restricted packages be in stable release and the Universe and Multiverse be rolling?

[sealbhach]

[Jose Manuel]

Manjaro Linux is an excellent distribution. Although, unfortunately does not have the same level of performance in all its editions and all their desktops.......

Manjaro with KDE or XFCE really is excellent, works really fast, LXDE is very good too. But versions with Cinnamon and OpenBox were regular, not bad, but certainly if you are installing Manjaro, do it with KDE or XFCE. Best regards.-

PD: If you are looking for a great distribution based on Arch Linux with KDE, I can also recommend Chakra Linux is really excellent and works very well.-