I’m still new to Arch-based distributions, but I think that at least some of the reason for their stability relative to, say, an Ubuntu-derived system is the idea of being a rolling release. On an Ubuntu-derived system, you pretty much have to make a choice early on: Do I go with an LTS version and possibly fall behind technologically over time or do I figure on making big leaps every 6 to 18 months and deal with the possible breakage? (To be fair, I believe that Canonical is making changes to how LTS releases work to bring in new technologies over their lifespan.)
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To me, the real barrier of going from windows to linux is that it is hard to make a clean break. There are tons of forum posts about the “evil” of dual booting, but that is exactly what would make the transition easier. There lies the problem. Setting up dual boot is a little bit of wizardry. Most beginners are clueless about partitions and boot straps. Some distros support “install alongside”. If the automatic part doesn’t work correctly, the system could easily be bricked (at least from a beginner’s point of view.) I don’t trust any of the GUI installers to create/manage partitions automatically.
BTW, the only annoying issue I have with mint is that it sometimes resets the boot order when a kernel is updated. That makes my Arch based distros cranky at the next boot.
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I may have missed a bit of convo here but wouldn’t it be better for this chap to discover that on his own? I’m pretty sure there would be other distros to fall back on if an Arch Based distro felt too overwhelming at first. Either way, I know I personally prefer to learn from experience rather than not try at all because some internet person said it would be hard.
Arch isn’t that complicated. Especially with all the GUI helpers and software. I think this perpetual theory that is put forward that “Arch is a difficult distro” needs to end. The install is challenging for those who don’t know what they are doing, luckily we have distros like Endeavour, ArchLabs, ArchBang, and many others.
When green users encounter an issue, it’s not like they are left hanging. There is a solid community here and elsewhere that will support them.
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You could use rEFInd the way i do and separate each to have only one grub bootloader for each individual installation so when it updates grub it doesn’t see the others and add anything. I currently have triple boot of Enos but I’ve also had Windows and others installed.
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I love the idea of EndeavourOS being minimal. But because it is so minimal, I have long advocated a GUI style software program be installed. Why? Because EndeavourOS is minimal - it doesn’t come with a bunch of pre-installed programs so it needs a good software discovery tool. Because Arch noobs don’t know what they don’t know, nor do they know Pacman and may not stick around long enough to figure it out. They need to be able to “kick the tires” by quickly and easily installing some software and seeing what is available, without spending hours on the forums or in the Archwiki. Other than adding a GUI software installer, I don’t think there should be anything else included beyond what we already have - it’s just one extra program that enables all the other programs to be found and installed more easily than a noob at the terminal trying to rosetta stone their way through their first pacman experience. Some people are against it from a philosophical perspective (we want people that want to be terminal centric and know their system) and others are against it for practical reasons (more packages for our wonderful devs to keep up with).
However, the big problem with the GUI software tool is the implementation - the GUI tools pretty much suck. I and many other here have watched Pamac break multiple times over the last few years. Octopi isn’t much better and doesn’t have a very intuitive UI. There are a few others and although they break less often, they are even less user friendly than Pamac and Octopi. The appstream data feed that Pamac depends on breaks from time to time also.
So like the others that have replied, I would recommend Garuda for the use case of a less minimal Arch based distro, to serve as a gateway drug to bring new people to Arch based distros. If you already know you want to go to the Arch ecosystem, come over here, spend some time learning and skip an intermediate step to Garuda. Hopefully many of the people that go to Garuda will end up here after getting hooked by something a little more Arch noob friendly.
I understand that it may be hard to maintain, look just at Discover, they have a KDE team of professional coders but the “software store” is still half backed compared to the gnome app center or whatever it is called. (All due respect, still kudos to the whole project!)
I personally don’t mind much that there isnt a software app but if there would be one, something like synaptic package manager used in debian is more than sufficient for me and would be really cool. Just a database pulling arch package lists and possibility to install/uninstall and search packages. Instead of going on the web browser, or sudo pacman -Ss
Honestly, gnome software is no better. It is a bug riddled mess on pretty much every platform.
Isn’t that what bauh is, more or less?
Cool project, didnt know about it…
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I think it starts with the attitude of the “beginner”; do they really want to learn the OS and be successful. When I started I printed instructions for FreeBSD and followed along and got it working using Windowmaker also. Then I moved on to Slackware (was at version 7 then) and then I discovered Ubuntu 5.04 and stuck with Ubuntu on and off until 20.04. I recall always feeling drawn back to basics, command line, no GUI for software and no SNAPs or Flatpaks (major reason I left the whole Canonical train, yes you can get rid of snapd and snaps but I did not even want to support it, don’t trust them or like them)
I did do a successful Arch install three times but, really, what a hassle, and then I found EOS and I am so happy with it.
In brief, any distro can be a beginner distro if they want to learn. If they want GUI and easy go with Ubuntu, MX or Mint.
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That right … good point 
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There used to be an article that mentioned Bauh on the EndeavourOS website, but it seems to have disappeared. It was discussing it’s ability to manage AppImages, Flatpaks and Snaps. I don’t think the missing article mentioned Arch/Aur Package management. I can’t find the article now.
Anyone running Bauh? Is it reliable? I’m a terminal guy these days but still chase these GUI software installers in search of having a good recommendation for noobs. I’m installing now to try it out.
Building pamac-all definitely turned out to be harder than I thought it would be and also something of a leaning experience. Basically, some generated code had strange pointer casts that broke compilation. I ended up having to hand edit those files and do a ‘makepkg -e’.
An interesting alternative to pamac, for me, is the combination of gnome-software and gnome-software-packagekit-plugin. With the plugin, it supports binary arch packages and also provides a GUI interface for flatpak.
I haven’t used it recently but I played with it quite a bit in the past. It is more of traditional package manager and not a “software store”. But it lets you install repo packages, aur packages, appimages and flatpaks in way that keeps them all separate.
At this moment pamac is broken because it isn’t compatible with the latest version of vala. This happens from time to time because pamac targets Manjaro which holds some packages back.
I would strongly recommend against using this or any packagekit-based package manager on Arch-based distros. The reason is that packagekit deliberately does not allow any type of manual intervention. However, Arch sometimes needs some manual intervention. It is really a recipe for a broken system in the long-term.
Thanks for the heads-up on packagekit!
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Pop!_OS.
Solus.
Zorin.
Those three impressed me when I was trying out distros. Until I ran into Antergos and Endeavour. Currently using Garuda and I’m quite happy with it.
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Definitely +1
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This makes absolutely no sense to me.
“I love that EndeavourOS is minimal, that’s why we need to make it not minimal by adding a GUI package manager.”
You know what the word “minimal” means, don’t you? One of the things that make EndeavourOS minimal is the fact it does not have a bloated GUI tool. Not to mention, “terminal centric”, as advertised.
In that light, the Welcome App is already too much in my opinion, but it’s easy to uninstall it so I don’t mind.
It is really not difficult at all to install, remove and update packages from the terminal. I would argue that it is much less noob-friendly to include a half-broken mess of a GUI package manager that requires intervention and fixing from time to time, than to tell noobs to learn how to use pacman.
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Let me rephrase, maybe you will get it. Because EndeavourOS doesn’t load up an install with a bunch of programs, like LibreOffice, a bunch of Graphics program, a video editor, darktable, Steam, etc, it is very bare bones. Therefore, for those that aren’t already Arch folks and trying it out, they don’t know what they don’t know, hence having a way to browse through software to find some things to install and try out is very helpful for those who want to try things out to see if they will stick around for a while. If EnOS was a bloated mess, people could kick the tires by checking out all the pre-installed bloat, but it isn’t, so that makes it a little harder for the distro-curious to evaluate.
So if you are trying to draw in people to join this wonderful community who might have been intimidated by Arch based distros, just one freakin program isn’t really getting too far away from minimal (a program to enable all other programs). It’s a lot easier for an experienced user to pacman -Rs halfbrokenGUImessofapackagemanger if he doesn’t want it than it is for the noob to know what he doesn’t know.
But I think the welcome app works as a halfway house. Endeavour noobs can get started there, the rest can delete it.
By the way, I agree that the GUI package managers are a mess, that’s why this is more of a theoretical concept than a real suggestion.
Several times a month, we get the suggestion to add a GUI software app, and many reviews hit on the same issue. There’s obviously some desire for it from folks looking to join the community. I get it that maybe you don’t agree with it, but it should at least be understandable, if you try to put yourself in the shoes of someone who has never used Arch before, a lot of people want to try it before investing too much time into it. Then if they like it, they spend the time to learn the system. When I first came to Arch distros via Antergros, I think it took about a day and half before I graduated from their version of Pamac to pacman. But if I had played and browsed around with it, I might not have stuck around.
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That’s how it starts. Next thing you know, you’re drowning in bloat.
Besides, the issue of a GUI package manager has been raised and addressed on multiple occasions. No point in beating this dead horse any more.
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The purpose of EndOS is simple GUI installation of a minimal Arch system with vanilla DE / WM.
That is it.
No bloat and no extraneous packages. A starting point for each user to configure their system to their specific needs and wants.
Its philosophy is terminal centric, but if you want a graphical package manager post installation then just install one.
As an aside does the default Gnome packages include Gnome Software and / ordoes KDE packages include Discover?
If only Arch had thought of that …
This.
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