Linux Mint Arch Edition?

[TurkeyMan]

Hi people,

I'm curious to know what it would take to make a Mint or Mint-like distribution on top of Arch?
I've used Mint for years, but I flirted with Arch recently, and rolling + pacman + AUR has me so addicted.
That said, Arch is not without its shortcomings; there's no great Arch-based distro to make it usable for non-experts, and it takes a lot of work to tune it to an acceptable level of presentation and polish on install.
Manjaro is just not quite there, I think they've missed a lot of the values of the Mint community. I wonder what it would take to plant the Mint/Cinnamon façade and the auxiliary tools distributed with Mint on top of Arch? LMDE gave me some hope that maybe there were people interested in this sort of project (transplanting Mint to a different base).

Has it been discussed?

[BigEasy]

LMAO! Linux Mint Arch Opportunity is very unlikely.

[Fred Barclay]

I would seriously doubt it. Clem and Co already have their hands full supporting Mint on two very similar bases (Ubuntu and Debian). Having to support a rolling distro as well--especially when that rolling distro has a very different base (Arch)? Probably won't happen.

You may remember that the original LMDE 1 was based on Debian Testing and was rolling. Even that got to be too much work for the team, so they had to move to "update packs" before finally basing LMDE 2 on Debian Stable.

Finally, you have to consider all the work that would be involved in moving Mint to a different base. Rolling vs. stable aside, Debian/Ubuntu and Arch are very different (package managers, init systems*, packaging systems...). It would take a long time and a lot of effort to create a Mint Arch edition from the current debian/ubuntu base. Clem has indicated that he wants to spend his time improving Mint and its features, so I doubt he'd be willing to spend time working on an Arch base. Not that I would blame him either.

It's an interesting idea, but probably not practical for now.
You said that you tried Manjaro but didn't like it? I loved it--it was very "minty" in my opinion. Easy to use, very well designed... What version did you try?

*Debian Stable does use systemd just like Arch, but LMDE Betsy does not.

[mint-fans]

Hi people,

I'm curious to know what it would take to make a Mint or Mint-like distribution on top of Arch?
I've used Mint for years, but I flirted with Arch recently, and rolling + pacman + AUR has me so addicted.
That said, Arch is not without its shortcomings; there's no great Arch-based distro to make it usable for non-experts, and it takes a lot of work to tune it to an acceptable level of presentation and polish on install.
Manjaro is just not quite there, I think they've missed a lot of the values of the Mint community. I wonder what it would take to plant the Mint/Cinnamon façade and the auxiliary tools distributed with Mint on top of Arch? LMDE gave me some hope that maybe there were people interested in this sort of project (transplanting Mint to a different base).

Has it been discussed?

LMAE XFCE Install script

on arch linux live

Code: Select all

$ wget https://github.com/Mint-Fans/linux-package/raw/arch/lmae-inst-script-v1.tar.gz
$ tar -zxvf lmae-inst-script-v1.tar.gz

#### Script Settings ####
TARGET=/dev/sdax
LABEL="LMAE"
USERNAME=mint
TIMEZONE=Asia/Taipei
SET_LANG=zh_TW

INST_GRUBLOADER='1' 1=inst 0=not inst
IS_UEFI='0' 1=UEFI 0=BIOS
IS_MBR='0' 1=BIOS/MBR 0=BIOS/GPT

INST_BLUEMAN 1=blueman 0=blueberry

#### Install LMAE ####
$ sudo su
# cd lmae-inst-script-v1
# ./format
# ./basex
# ./xfce


Preview
http://i.imgur.com/9Df5k4o.png

[Hoser Rob]

You cannot make a rolling release noob friendly.

[mint-fans]

You cannot make a rolling release noob friendly.

LMAE-XFCE-64-bit-2016.07.01.iso
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwC3G7 ... hidVk/view

[Jon Spoonamore]

I 2nd this suggestion!!!!

I have switch away from using Mint 17.3 Mate to using Manjaro 16.10 Mate a month ago. IMO... Mint 18 is/was not worth the upgrade. Manjaro's Mate distro is just snappier than Mint's. It boots faster and all software seems to be optimized better. I still love Mint though. I'm a Network Admin. I'm always looking to optimize my hardware performance. Manjaro did that for me.

I keep telling people I would love to see the Mint Team get completely away from Ubuntu base. Canonical/Ubuntu is/has turned into another Microsoft. They will eventually screw everyone over!

I guess what I would really like to see is the Mint Team dropping Ubuntu completely and focus 100% on their Debian base or migrate to a 100% Arch base. Manjaro is doing for Arch like the Mint Team did for Ubuntu. IMO... Manjaro will be direct competitor with Mint in the next 12 months. Manjaro has gotten that good!

[deleted]

You cannot make a rolling release noob friendly.

FWIW... siduction/sidux/kannotix did....
I started with Debian SID, Kannotix, when it was based on SID. (way back when)
-H

[millpond]

I 2nd this suggestion!!!!

I keep telling people I would love to see the Mint Team get completely away from Ubuntu base. Canonical/Ubuntu is/has turned into another Microsoft. They will eventually screw everyone over!

I guess what I would really like to see is the Mint Team dropping Ubuntu completely and focus 100% on their Debian base or migrate to a 100% Arch base. Manjaro is doing for Arch like the Mint Team did for Ubuntu. IMO... Manjaro will be direct competitor with Mint in the next 12 months. Manjaro has gotten that good!

The problem with Ubuntu Mint is that it has many popular features for *consumers* like a store, and woth flaky PPA apps that may be poorly vetted, folks will see deficiencies in platforms without them.

I dont know offhand how difficult it would be to take FLOSS PPA source code and move it to a Mint/debian/arch repository, and script it so that when compiled it dumps into the appropriate file systems.

Dont forget either LMDE Betsy with its access to the entire Debian Archives, and its current systemd-less state, that I hope against hope will be preserved in future releases, perhaps by joining up with the Devuan folks.

Any idea how compatible the arch system is with debian? Major differences in glibc?? This might be a good start for a community effort!

[samriggs]

hmm already quite a few out there that you can use all the same desktop environments
Manjaro, Chakra, Antergos, ArchBang to name a few.
Really wouldn't make that much difference as far as I can see except for the community and a bunch of noobs screaming for tutorials how to update through the terminal with pacman and yaourt, in those cases manjaro and antegros has their software centers, which would probably need another tutorial for newcomers.
would they be bleeding edge?
Another forum section for breakages.
A lot of work for the team that has a ton on their plates already, probably need another forum just to support it.

I love arch myself but it can be a nightmare for new folks and could be a lot to support.
With so many out there it would be pretty much pointless to thin the team out for it, if they did do it I would be on board though just cause I love using arch myself but not for a work station.
Better to have one thing work great then a ton of things that barely work.
Sam

[deleted]

I 2nd this suggestion!!!!

I keep telling people I would love to see the Mint Team get completely away from Ubuntu base. Canonical/Ubuntu is/has turned into another Microsoft. They will eventually screw everyone over!

I guess what I would really like to see is the Mint Team dropping Ubuntu completely and focus 100% on their Debian base or migrate to a 100% Arch base. Manjaro is doing for Arch like the Mint Team did for Ubuntu. IMO... Manjaro will be direct competitor with Mint in the next 12 months. Manjaro has gotten that good!

The problem with Ubuntu Mint is that it has many popular features for *consumers* like a store, and woth flaky PPA apps that may be poorly vetted, folks will see deficiencies in platforms without them.

I dont know offhand how difficult it would be to take FLOSS PPA source code and move it to a Mint/debian/arch repository, and script it so that when compiled it dumps into the appropriate file systems.

Dont forget either LMDE Betsy with its access to the entire Debian Archives, and its current systemd-less state, that I hope against hope will be preserved in future releases, perhaps by joining up with the Devuan folks.

Any idea how compatible the arch system is with debian? Major differences in glibc?? This might be a good start for a community effort!

For the most part Mint doesn't maintain the ppps, just like Debian doesn't maintain many of the debs. They are maintained by others. That's one of the reasons say an Eclipse debs may lag behind the eclipse.org the current release. It's up to the deb maintainer.

If you look at the Ubuntu release cycle... they take a snapshot of Debian unstable, fix bugs, then release. Any non=core debs are updated according to the deb maintainer, not Ubuntu.
-H

[Citizen229]

I think I get what you guys are trying to say. However as a 1 year mint user I can tell you, mint is accomplishing what they set out to do. Making the best user friendly linux distro. As it stands it works flawlessly. If mint stepped into a rolling release, stability would be gone. A rolling release is one of win10's pitfalls. People are receiving updates and things are not working(even worse than before), and people are not happy. The LTS batch style of updates is a superior way of doing things for the average user. If people want to do more than what mint provides they do turn to arch. But please, lets not ruin or handicap a stable and easy to use OS the masses can latch onto. I would even recommend the mint name NOT be attached to arch distro. Someone could be interested in mint and get an unstable arch version and be completely turned off. If someone has aspirations to make such an OS name it Nutmeg or some other spice so people do not get confused.

[kwisher]

Manjaro comes very close to being what the OP is after.

[samriggs]

Manjaro comes very close to being what the OP is after.

Yup Antergos also but from what I remember it uses arch repositories and aur where I think Manjaro has their own if I remember correctly, bother has a graphical installer.

[thom_A]

So what exactly a Linux Mint Arch Edition would look like? And why would the current Mint change course when it's got the largest userbase? How long would it take to develop Mint based on Arch? Another decade?

Why not just stick with Manjaro if you say it's developing well, instead of Mint starting from scratch? What am I missing?

[samriggs]

Why not just stick with Manjaro if you say it's developing well, instead of Mint starting from scratch? What am I missing?

Your missing nothing I agree with you.

[pdhunter1987]

So in a nutshell... your thinking of a rolling unstable unpredictable arch like version of Linux Mint?

I doubt that would happen, we already have Arch Linux.
It would be reinventing the wheel i would think as well..

Manjaro do a great job, to be honest i think its the "Mint of the Arch Linux world".

[DeMus]

It would be reinventing the wheel i would think as well..

Isn't that what every distro does? All 1000+ of them.

[thom_A]

I keep telling people I would love to see the Mint Team get completely away from Ubuntu base. Canonical/Ubuntu is/has turned into another Microsoft. They will eventually screw everyone over!

I guess what I would really like to see is the Mint Team dropping Ubuntu completely and focus 100% on their Debian base or migrate to a 100% Arch base. Manjaro is doing for Arch like the Mint Team did for Ubuntu. IMO... Manjaro will be direct competitor with Mint in the next 12 months. Manjaro has gotten that good!

I think what separates Linux Mint from other Ubuntu-based distros is that the devs manage to filter out unwanted canonical stuff and produce products that are important to many users. Personally, I prefer Ubuntu-based distros because most of the applications that are available work without issues. Not to mention the amount of support available. Krita's latest releases, for example, come out in portable appimages. All you do is download the app, make it executable, then click. You can't do this if your distro is Debian-based. It's probably the same thing with Arch Linux.

[Joss]

Manjaro comes very close to being what the OP is after.

Yes.