Freedom is the key to success with any distro

[Mauser]

That's my suspicion as well, though he has made more than 50 posts on the Forum.

I think you are correct. I bet it's a distro that doesn't have the configurability that MX Linux has. We all have our own tastes that at least with MX Linux you can configure it, theme it, and even chose other desktop environments to your liking. We can see this in the Screen Shot forum thread. Even someone like me that is command line illiterate can configure and theme MX Linux to what ever I like.

[Richard]

I'm still more interested in what it does than how it looks.
I like that it looks nice, and I appreciate that it is a part of the attraction.

I think the MX art team has done a great job in polishing the jewel that is MX.
Remember, art is in the eye of the beholder --you only need to satisfy yourself.

[fehlix]

... command line illiterate ...

Thanks for this phrase - I like it ...

[Mauser]

... command line illiterate ...

Thanks for this phrase - I like it ...

Your welcome.

[Artim]

I always change a few of the defaults, and I imagine most people do. I like my launchers in a panel on the bottom of the screen (I don't have a wide screen where it makes better sense to have it on the left or right), change the Conky or turn it off, depending on what wallpaper I'm using at the time, add an analog clock and weather widget to the top notification panel, use a different and larger font in the windows and stuff, and I love the customizability of Xfce4! I want my desktop to look nothing like Windows in any way. MX has become the end of all my distro-hopping.

[Eggnog]

One of the many, many things I like about MX is that it uses Xfce. When I'm surfing various forums I keep seeing posters here and there say they want something more "modern" than Xfce and something that is constantly "being worked on" (which often introduces the dreaded term "broken").

Xfce is stable. It is highly customizable. It doesn't need to be constantly tinkered with. Not only that, it is just about THE preferred desktop environment for ricers. A poll was done some time ago on r/unixporn and many were surprised to learn that Xfce was the overwhelming DE of choice for many of the ricers, including the top ricers, and that those DEs they're gawking over are Xfce. Why? Because Xfce is highly customizable. Gnome? Hardly. Plasma? Maybe a little.

So, yeah. Xfce is freedom. MX is freedom. Linux is freedom. It all adds up to freedom.

[manyroads]

I am always saddened when people think that freedom is doing things their way.... my freedom and your freedom is when we can do things as we find most useful, pleasant, fun, whatever.

[BitJam]

We also support users modifying MX however they like and making their own distro from it. Snapshot!

Exactly! With live-remaster and snapshot we have tried to make it as easy as possible for people to roll their own distro starting with MX or any of the antiX flavours. On top of that, we make our build-iso system available which people can use and have used to make their own distro. The music aficionado Eino (who I believe is no longer with us) used it to make his own music oriented version of antiX. In addition to the tremendous work of anticapitalista and many others, the build-iso system allowed the antiX devs to jump in and help get the first version of MX out the door in just a few months.

@freefreeno, If you dislike the MX specific tools, you do have a choice. For your own customized version of Linux just start with antiX-core, antiX-base, or antiX-full instead. In the antiX forums we have always recommended that you start with a smaller system and add things you want rather that start with a larger system and try to remove things you don't want. When you consider MX together with our sister distro antiX, you have a staggering amount of choice for making a custom Debian-based system tweaked exactly how you want it in a form that is easy to distribute to others. We've put in a tremendous amount of effort over almost a decade to make it as easy and convenient as possible for people to create their own version of Linux. It took a lot of hard work behind the scenes to make it so easy.

[aledie]

[

@freefreeno, If you dislike the MX specific tools, you do have a choice.

This is "freedom", right.
But actually i guess, freedom is an illusion in the real world, we are human and bound by many rules of the society, and our own values (even animals do)... The closest to freedom would be anarchy. We are as free as we stay within the allowed framework.
He gets it too such as his handle "freefreeNO"

[dreamer]

Exactly! With live-remaster and snapshot we have tried to make it as easy as possible for people to roll their own distro starting with MX or any of the antiX flavours. On top of that, we make our build-iso system available which people can use and have used to make their own distro. The music aficionado Eino (who I believe is no longer with us) used it to make his own music oriented version of antiX. In addition to the tremendous work of anticapitalista and many others, the build-iso system allowed the antiX devs to jump in and help get the first version of MX out the door in just a few months.

@freefreeno, If you dislike the MX specific tools, you do have a choice. For your own customized version of Linux just start with antiX-core, antiX-base, or antiX-full instead. In the antiX forums we have always recommended that you start with a smaller system and add things you want rather that start with a larger system and try to remove things you don't want. When you consider MX together with our sister distro antiX, you have a staggering amount of choice for making a custom Debian-based system tweaked exactly how you want it in a form that is easy to distribute to others. We've put in a tremendous amount of effort over almost a decade to make it as easy and convenient as possible for people to create their own version of Linux. It took a lot of hard work behind the scenes to make it so easy.

Excellent post.

MX Linux has some excellent tools. And rock solid boot/shut down experience. Good memory management. After the systemd shock MX Linux was exactly what I needed. It gave me back faith in Linux on the desktop. The Linux DEs are pretty good, especially Xfce.

I spent 500 hours this year tweaking MX-17 and apps. I have 80+ pages of notes, mostly info gathered from this forum. This forum is the best distro forum. MX Linux works and when there is a problem the developers usually know what is wrong. There has been so much guesswork in the Linux community since pulseaudio/plymouth/systemd were introduced. In my book those technologies are far behind Windows and Mac. GTK3 and Wayland put desktop Linux even further behind. Lennart Poettering might be the world's most talented software developer, but I think pulseaudio and systemd managed to hurt desktop Linux a lot. There's probably a reason why Google stays away from those technologies.

Look at Win32. Microsoft doesn't care that much about it anymore. It has 10-15 years of backwards compatibility and HiDPI support (if application dev updates the app). GTK3 has maybe 2 years of backwards compatibility and only support 2x scaling.

Linux is a challenge (like everything else in life). People including myself search for freedom. Then realize that freedom is a lot of work. You gain some, lose some. When MX-18 packages found their way into the MX-17 repo (that Windows 10 feeling ) I didn't feel like troubleshooting the Iris app so I started using Windows (LTSC) and felt good about it. It reminds me of the years I used Windows 7 just to avoid pulseaudio.

It's all about personal preferences. What I want to say is that no matter how much work goes into MX Linux there will always be people who prefer something else, people who think things should be done differently. I think the default look of MX Linux is good, better than the latest release of Linux Mint for example. I also think the MX tools are excellent. Without MX Linux I wouldn't use Linux in a "serious" way. Maybe I would use PCLOS just for fun. I would use Windows or if Microsoft becomes too annoying last resort would be a Mac. I think freefreeno's opinions are just as valid as anyone else's. What's even more important is that he was shown how to remove the MX tools. And replacing the icons shouldn't be that hard if their location is disclosed. /usr/share/icons or /usr/share/pixmaps maybe. ANGRYsearch (yes that's the name) should be able to locate those icons.

Merry Christmas everybody, it was a good year for MX Linux and well earned success.