Should I switch to MX?

[Silent Observer]

I started using Linux full time in 2011, after the second time my Windows XP became infected with FBI Moneypak (budget computing -- live antivirus was too much of a performance hit).

I started with MEPIS 11, chosen mainly because it had a similar interface to Windows 95/98/XP Classic. Over the intervening years, I've used AntiX (don't recall the version, but it was 2011-2014 time frame) because my second desktop machine was too slow to handle a heavier distro, then in 2014 I switch the main machine to Kubuntu 14.04, and in 2017 I installed Ubuntu Mate 16.04 -- which I'm still riding, but the poor thing is just about dead (EOL in four months).

Over that time, I've been somewhat remiss in not spending hundreds of hours reading man pages, trying to learn hundreds of commands with many thousands of options and switches -- with the result that my level of confidence at the command line is limited. I'm not a CLI newbie; I used DOS 3.31 for three years before Windows 3 dropped -- but that DOS had fewer than 20% of the number of commands a modern Linux does, and those commands were generally simpler in terms of fewer options.

So now, every time I look for a solution to a problem, the answer is "install Ubuntu 20.04 and see if that fixes it." Problem is, I'm really, REALLY tired of installing fresh, and to a large extent learning a new system, ever two to five years (and yes, I'd have had the same problem with Windows -- since I jumped on Linux, there have been four versions of Windows with three significant changes in interface).

What I'm looking for is a system in which uprades are a more gradual process. "Rolling" seems like what I want -- but the only rolling systems in Debian are bleeding-edge, based on Testing or Unstable repos, and this isn't a hobby system; it's my production machine (and my laptop, which will get the same OS as the desktop, doesn't get used a huge number of hours in a year).

I was just referred here from the Antix forums, where I'd gone because I read that Antix was rolling-Stable (it's not, and never has been; instead, it had, more than a decade ago, an upgrade script that probably never worked any better than Ubuntu's -- which starts, as its very first operation, by disabling all third-part repos and ppas). The suggestion was that I ask here about reducing the pain of version upgrades.

All I really want is to not have to spend a weekend fighting with my computer unless I'm making a major hardware rebuild (and my hardware is mostly fine -- video card is a little out of date, but I'm not a heavy gamer). Should I switch to MX?

[JayM]

As I tell everyone who ask these kinds of questions (and there have been many of them lately), try MX from the live USB then make up your own mind. Do you like MX better? Does it seem to run OK on your system? Does all of your hardware including sound, wifi, touchpad etc. work in MX? Nobody else can make decisions for others regarding what distro, desktop environment, etc. they should use.

[Silent Observer]

I don't have any oddball hardware, but I'd surely do that anyway. What I'm asking about is whether MX specifically will make the seemingly unavoidable version upgrades easier than, say, Ubuntu, where a so-called "upgrade" strongly resembles a slightly automated clean install.

[JayM]

It depends. Upgrades from MX-17 to MX-18 were handled automatically as they were based on the same version of Debian Stable which was Stretch. There was no migration path from MX-18 to MX-19 as the Debian Stable version 19 is based on changed to Buster, so a reinstall was required. If there was an MX-20 (which there won't be) users of MX-19 would be upgraded to 20 via the automatic updates. MX-21 (around the end of next year) will be based on Debian Bullseye (and probably come with Xfce 4.16) so again, a reinstall will be needed if you want the newest MX version, though nothing says you'd need to upgrade: we still have users running MX-18.3 and it's still supported as is MX-17, only MX-16 and earlier versions are at end-of-life. It's the same for all Debian Stable-based distros AFAIK: when the base version of Debian Stable changes reinstallation is needed.

[Stevo]

Our packaging team also tries to keep userspace applications as up to date as possible on Debian Stable--witness the current versions of many programs available for MX 19 which are otherwise available only as those huge snaps/flatpaks or in Debian backports--or not at all.

However, newer versions of GNOME or KDE, or programs that require those to build, would break many other packages, and we won't do those. We will wait until we get a Debian 11 version with a newer base set of packages.

[Silent Observer]

Okay, let's check that: what's the current repo version of GIMP? I've been running it from a Snap for a good while, because the version in the repos compatible with Ubuntu 16.04 was ancient. I was just playing with the KDE version of MX Live, and it's gotten back most of what I recall liking about the Plasma desktop (seems like KDE depends a lot on third party devs for the stuff I like about it, and they have to work behind the core dev team.

The other side of this is that Ubuntu 20.04 is probably at least as fresh as MX 19.3 -- Kernel 5, for instance -- and most likely has repo versions of stuff that's been available to me only in Snap form.

Bottom line, though, there's no way around installing fresh within the next few months, if I want to keep on a supported OS (and I do -- security updates are good). What's the support horizon for MX 19.3? Five years? Longer? Canonical's been saying Ubuntu 20.04 would be supported with security updates for something like eight or nine years -- but security updates aren't any help if you can't do work you want/need to do because the software you use isn't available for your "supported" platform in a version with the new feature you need. Any clue when KDE will next update Plasma enough to break stuff?

[JayM]

The support cycle of MX mimics the one at Debian regarding how often newer Debian Stable base versions are released (every 2-3 years) and how long older versions ("oldstable, oldoldstable") are still supported. More information can be found in the FAQs on the MX website, and section 1.6 of the user manual. Regarding KDE, MX uses whatever version is provided by Debian. Currently it's 5.14. I may be incorrect but it looks like Bullseye will ship with KDE 5.19. https://packages.debian.org/bullseye/kde/

[asqwerth]

MX is not rolling.

It does not have an upgrade path or script for you to upgrade to a release that is based on the next Debian base.

A Debian release/base has about 5 years of support, even though a newer release comes out roughly every 2 years.

So after you install mx, you could skip upgrading to the mx version based on the next Debian release. For instance, mx19 (Debian buster) EOL is around 2024 even though the next Debian base (bullseye) is out next year.

But even without an upgrade path, it's not too hard to upgrade mx when it's time, because the installer allows you to preserve /home (where your app config settings are, and maybe also your data unless you save that in another partition or storage media) while doing a fresh install.

That means you only need to reinstall various applications that did not come as default with mx, after your fresh install of new mx. The settings of those apps/packages, once you reinstall them, will already be there in home.

So just make a list of those apps before your install of new mx. And you may need to install your printer driver, if the printer isn't one that is auto detected by mx.

Newness of software? Check out the mx package installer (mxpi). The tabs in mxpi generally set out the packages in increasing levels of newness from left to right. There are no snaps but instead flatpaks, listed in the mxpi.

If you want to use snaps, you need to boot with systemd and follow Dolphin's video tutorial here

https://youtu.be/e-DrDXNnzlg

[uncle mark]

Bottom line, though, there's no way around installing fresh within the next few months, if I want to keep on a supported OS (and I do -- security updates are good). What's the support horizon for MX 19.3? Five years? Longer? Canonical's been saying Ubuntu 20.04 would be supported with security updates for something like eight or nine years -- but security updates aren't any help if you can't do work you want/need to do because the software you use isn't available for your "supported" platform in a version with the new feature you need. Any clue when KDE will next update Plasma enough to break stuff?

I came [back] to MX when they released the KDE version. I had been a longtime Mepis user, then went with Mint KDE until coming home. I think I remember you from the Mepis days. At least your avatar looks familiar.

I'll tell you to install MX, update it, and then sit back and enjoy. Quit fretting about the update cycle. Everyone has to do it at some point. You don't have to have the latest and greatest applications. That's something you seem to have convinced yourself is super important. It isn't. And don't worry that the applications won't be updated -- the devs and packagers here do a super job of keeping things updated and backported.

[asqwerth]

If you stick with mx19 kde until its EOL around 2024, you will be using plasma 5.14 with no upgrade of plasma version throughout.