I recently set up Bazzite on my friend’s system after switching from Linux Mint due to some Nvidia driver issues. Although the hardware problems are not there anymore, the distro is now facing problems installing certain programs for software development that they had no problem installing in the previous distro. I think there are issues related to the immutability of the distro, though I am not sure since I am new to Linux too. Additionally, my friend is worried about higher storage consumption and slower performance in certain applications.
I realise the distro is primarily meant for gamers and my friend is not much of a gamer themselves, however they told me they appreciate its friendlier KDE interface so I wish to avoid switching from this distro again if possible. However I fear that they may encounter more errors in the future and that I may not be available to help them out whenever needed, so I am in a bit of a conundrum.
Thus I intend to ask here if it is possible to arrange something for easing development related tasks e.g. VM, distrobox etc. or whether it is easier to simply switch to some other compatible distro.
I…I don’t understand. Why would you use Bazzite for software development and not gaming when user is not a gamer but just likes KDE?
you can literally put KDE on anything. Bazzite isn’t friendly to installing anything that isn’t a flatpak or whatever.
Just use a different distro. you don’t need Bazzite. Switch them to like Fedora KDE or something.
And to people in this thread trying to push a camel through a pin hole…why? you’re talking about setting up VMs and Distroboxs or just using flatpaks on Bazzite when the most painless solution is to just switch distros.
You picked the wrong distro, just switch them to something more appropriate for what they want to do.
To give some context to this.
Bazzite is an immutable distro. Fedora calls them atomic. It means many many things are only really updatable online, and you arent allowed to make manual changes to them. Hence immutable.
Bazzite is a very bad choice if you want the same kind of use you’d get out of a windows or mint machine, or any other non atomic distro.
The shitty news here is if you want a machine you’re doing software dev on you’re going to need to figure out the nvidia driver shit, which is a pain in the ass but if you’re a software developer you should be able to do it.
Or just go with a arch derivative that packages Nvidia driver like endeavorOS
Yeah, I found out the hard way as a new user. Maybe it would be better to move to Fedora and set up everything myself. Bazzite might be perfect for consoles, but for desktop use it limits you a lot, even for normal usage, not just for software development.
but for desktop use it limits you a lot
For example? Because I’ve read this repeated a lot by people who don’t understand immutable distros. Of course you can’t “dnf install clang”, but you can use distrobox for that, ends up fairly similar.
Well, maybe i used a wrong phrase. When i said it limits you, i mean you (as a new user) must learn how to use the system. Any solutions you find from others in the internet do not apply to you. For a power user who frequently tinkers things feels like a limitation (it feels more like i am using my android phone rather than a desktop computer).
The distro as I said, it is perfect for a Console (or simple users like my parents), but for users who want more freedom its a bad choice. The mistake was mine as i did not know what the Atomic system is. First time i learned about them was after 2 days of having Bazzite installed 😅
Well I disagree. I tried Bazzite on my desktop and then installed it on my laptop, even though I seldom play games on it. I’m a long-time Linux user and a tinkerer, and so far I haven’t found anything I wanted to do and I couldn’t.
I can compile software with compilers from distrobox, I can design and slice 3d parts and send them to my printers, manage my servers, customize my system… Sure you can’t easily change your DE, although I guess it would be somewhat possible with rpm-ostree, but other than that I don’t see many limitations.
The main difference is that you should refer to Bazzite’s docs FIRST, because if you just search the web for your issue/goal, you’re going to find instructions that may not be compatible with an immutable distro.
Well i am new user. Now I’m learning how to use this distrobox, so i can install something that would be a copy paste from a git-hub page. Maybe this tool is the solution to my problems.
If you explain, maybe I can point you in the right direction
Maybe rebase* to
https://docs.getaurora.dev/dx/aurora-dx-intro/
before nuking and going a classic Linux distro like others have suggested?
(Personally I’m not sure if I could go back to non-atomic, having the option to just boot the old image if after an update sleep mode is borked or something is just too good.)
This is what I would suggest, as well. Rebasing is one of the best features of atomic distros.
On bazzite, your search order for apps/packages should be something like:
- Flathub
ujust. This is more for general configs than specific apps, but take a look at what it offers.- Homebrew
- Distrobox
- Podman/Docker images
- rpm-ostree
rpm-ostree is a last resort because it compromises the “atomic” principle of the system, but in a pinch it will give you access to anything you could get with
dnfon a regular Fedora install.Don’t sleep on Distrobox. I have a Debian box so I can run Signal from its official repo and install Geany with both GUI and CLI support. Once you export applications from distrobox they behave like first-class citizens within your desktop.
I strongly recommend trying Distrobox. If you instead hop distros, you’re going to find yourself in a similar situation eventually, where something is unreasonably difficult. That’s why Distrobox exists; so you can get the best of all worlds.
ujust setup-virtualization, distrbox ,homebrew are ur friends
Yeah, I thought one of the main reasons to use distrobox and the likes is for dev work having cleanly seperated environments.
Actual Developer and 20+ year Linux expert.
Don’t use immutable distros for development work. Hands down.
If you’re expecting the normal workflow of being able to install any tool or library you want without jumping through hoops…that ain’t immutable distros.
If you’re new to Linux as well, you’re going to have a bad time.
Actual developer and 30+ years Linux expert.
Don’t use anything but immutable distros for development work. Hands down.
Just develop in containers and have one container per project. Doing anything else will lead to broken projects as you can not properly control dependencies per project otherwise.
It is not harder to work in a container than on the real system.
OP is a beginner with Linux, as they stated.
Also, don’t come into the comments to be a dick, okay? You’re disregarding what OP said, and just coming in here to interject your own nonsense because it makes sense to you. This thread isn’t about YOU. We need less of people like you in general in these threads, and more people who READ THE POST and respond accordingly.
The OP has no experience with either immutable nor mutable linux. So let him go with the rubust version already installed over recommending some package-based, old-school distro, just because you are more familiar with those.
OP will need to learn things either way, let him learn the future proof stuff, not the outdated ways.
Yeah, you have no idea what you’re talking about.
“Guy doesn’t know Linux, so don’t just confuse him with that info, also throw in containers, advanced container management, storage layer interaction and what that even means, sandbox permissions, intermediate networking, RBAC routing, and WTF immutable means and why NONE of the best documentation on the Internet that exists for everything Linux covers whatever immutable distro.”
So yeah…there’s a stark contrast between all of the above, and having them use the SIMPLEST and best supported and documented version of a distro. You keep going banging that square peg into the circle whole you suggested without reason.
I bet you’re just GREAT with teaching 🤣
First off, you do not need to know most of that stuff. Tooling around container-based development is really nice nowadays. It just works almost all the time – and way more often than in mutable setups.
As a beginner you can not really transfer docs from one distribution to another, so you look for docs on your distribution and ask in the official support channels. Those of bazzite are pretty responsive and will be able to help. The community is able to help way better than in a traditional system where every installation is almost but not exactly the same.
Nothing is as bad as accidentally removing some important OS files and not knowing how to restore them. That will just not happen in an immutable setup.
I have installed immutable distros on lots of computers and the users usually are happier than they were on traditional linux: Nothing breaks anymore, the setup is way more solid. Its great for me, too, as I need to support them less often.
Seriously, you should give this a try: Immutable OSes are a huge step forward. Takes a few days to get used to, but I am pretty sure you will not want to go back afterwards.
I’ve been building custom immutable distros for more than a decade. They have their place. Desktop and development ain’t that place.
The main application and use-case is obvious: IoT, EDD, consumer devices…etc. Maybe even bare metal if you don’t have proper PXE or other remote image booting. They mean nothing for cloud, because, well, why? They certainly aren’t needed for any container-based work either, because containers.
There’s a reason why devs aren’t adopting them.
Also, on your point about people “accidentally” deleting crucial files, that’s a straw man’s argument. If you have users in any kind of setting where you need a stable and repeatable install, you’re working with mapped network mounts and these users don’t have sudo/root access. If you’re dumb enough to be giving them said access, or deleting these files yourself, well that’s on you.
Immutable distros are the future for everything. We just need to wait a for the people most heavily invested into the status quo to retire.
Any user can delete important OS files by turning their computer off while an upgrade is running in almost all traditional distros:-) Sure, you can disable updates, but that is not an option either.
I’m sorry to say this, but switching distros would be the better option. Bazzite locks down a lot of parts to ensure it works for games. There’s ways around it, but the effort is so much more compared to any other popular distro. Plenty of distros either come with KDE or have a version that has KDE.
Bazzite locks down a lot of parts to ensure it works for games.
This is not entirely correct. It’s a feature of atomic distros in general. Bazzite doesn’t lock anything down any more than its upstream Silverblue and Kinoite parents do, it’s just that most of the system files have been set to be immutable to ensure repeatable and standardized deployments.
This is great for scalability and ensuring the most uptime. Not so great if you want to do a lot of system tinkering.
The other issue is that a lot of existing software needlessly installs itself globally, rather than making use of the user’s local access. It’s a paradigm that needs to change, since most software doesn’t need access to most of the system directories to function.
Does it show I’ve never used an atomic distro before?
We all have different knowledge bases. You were close, I was just providing a little more clarity. No snark meant or intended!
Have a nice day!
Don’t take this wrong, but you should refrain from commenting on what you don’t know. Immutable distros have to fight a lot of disinformation already.
