An Observation

[BardicDruid]

I finally got around to installing virtualization and have been trying out some of the suggested "beginner" distros, so far MX Linux is the easiest to install and configure. But in all this I've noticed something, EVERYONE here has spoiled me, with MX Tools, I gotten so used to going there to get something done, that when it's not there I have to stop and try to remember how to do it without MX Tools. And since my memory isn't all that reliable anymore, that can lead to some interesting times. Just wanted to say thank you to all the devs and testers that keeps this distro going.

[DukeComposed]

EVERYONE here has spoiled me, with MX Tools, I gotten so used to going there to get something done, that when it's not there I have to stop and try to remember how to do it without MX Tools.

MX tools are surprisingly easy to use and to lean on. The Mint devs have done a great deal of work (re)writing Linux utilities to make their distro easy to use, but they've focused on things like a text editor, where MX tools focus on making system changes. Not every Linux user is an expert in vi or Emacs, or even nano. So being able to make important system changes without having to know you must edit /etc/sudoers or /etc/something.conf and precisely how that file must be changed is a huge boost.

[FullScale4Me]

Windows, for the most part, has everything in one place: the Registry. (1)

Linux, on the other hand, has settings grouped in places that made sense to the original developers but are, at times, vastly different than a similar project for the same type of 'widget' so to speak.

Having the MX Tools, like the OP said, pulls it all together for an easy setting change experience vs 10+ minutes of Googleing only to find out that the page you are reading only applies to Ubuntu 14 (or some other ancient version of an OS).

1) Windows Vista still needed a network.ini file in C:\Windows\System32 for some things to work right.

[BardicDruid]

Windows, for the most part, has everything in one place: the Registry. (1)

1) Windows Vista still needed a network.ini file in C:\Windows\System32 for some things to work right.

The last version of Windows I had installed on my home PC was Win95, a coworker loaned me his floppies of Red Hat 4 and I haven't looked back since. I've had some jobs that used Winblows, but the home PC has always been Linux.

[DukeComposed]

The last version of Windows I had installed on my home PC was Win95, a coworker loaned me his floppies of Red Hat 4 and I haven't looked back since.

Credit where credit is due. Beyond some experimentation in college, I think I started considering Linux sometime around the Red Hat 8.0 Psyche era. This was when people had Very Strong Opinions about exact kernels, and I recall sitting patiently and nodding while friends of mine extolled how, say, 2.0.38 was a superior kernel to 2.2.12 or something.

Kids these days don't understand how easy they have it not having to build their own XFree86 config. Meanwhile, I was a BSD nerd and I had to spend my time figuring out how to download and run dhcpd on my machine because it wasn't always included on the FreeBSD 3.2 install floppies. So while you're among elder kin here, you may have trouble conveying to the youths just how much work it was getting X11 working way back when, or why having functional audio is just a miracle no matter what.

[kc1di]

Of all the disrtos I've used over the years MX has the best tools set I've seen. It's very good at helping the user out :)

[Artim]

I have been playing around with a "desktop ready" version of FreeBSD lately just for grins and giggles and it's fun and very fast on my old hand-me-down machine. But when it comes to the little jobs I always took for granted in MX-Linux - like formatting a USB for data storage or to take to school and print stuff, I find myself always booting into MX-Linux again. When I want to share the wonders of FOSS to friends, I really can't share my OS on a bootable USB without frustrating my friends who can't make the sound work, or connect to wifi, install a printer, that kind of stuff.

So I make a copy of my installed MX-Linux with all the cool tools and settings because the dd commands don't always work and cloning the HDD isn't effective either if it's going in different hardware. As much as I enjoy tinkering with this other OS, it's so very complicated and "techy" that it's impractical. For the most practical stuff, I run "home" to MX-Linux!

Bestest, most wonderfulest and awesomeful Linux distro in the history of ever.

[Nokkaelaein]

MX Snapshot is one of the most awesome system tools ever written. No hyperbole.



There isn't anything quite like it anywhere else. This is coming from someone with pretty extensive experience in different systems through the years :P ... Like we have waxed nostalgic in some other threads on things like OS/2 and BeOS even, lol. And when focusing on Debian and Debian based systems, the first time I specifically installed and configured stock Debian was exactly twenty years ago. I've used other so-called ISO builders during this time. This is simply the peak achievement among all such utils, and it really, really just works.

MX Linux works so well as a basis for a wide variety of use cases, and after you have set up and crafted your system (perhaps extensively, meticulously and time consumingly ), you can create a reliable installation AND live booting media out of it, in one go, just like that, to run and install even on dissimilar hardware... That's just so awesome. Sorry, that's the best word I can come up with for that.