Ubuntu has too many problems for me to want to run it. However, it has occurred to me that there aren’t a lot of distros that are like the Ubuntu LTS.
Basic requirements for a LTS:
- at least 2 years of support
- semi recent versions of applications like Chrome and Firefox (might consider flatpak)
- a stable experience that isn’t buggy
- fast security updates
Distros considered:
- Debian (stable)
- Rocky Linux
- openSUSE
- Cent OS stream
- Fedora
As far as I can tell none of the options listed are quite suitable. They are either to unstable or way to out of date. I like Rocky Linux but it doesn’t seem to be desktop focused as far as I can tell. I would use Debian but Debian doesn’t have the greatest security defaults. (No selinux profiles out of the box)
Ubuntu LTS is based on Debian Unstable branch, funnily. So you can probably try Debian Testing or Unstable branches, if Stable is too hardcore for you. I daily drive Bookworm Stable on 2 machines and it is fantastic. I use it with a few Flatpaks and Appimages.
The XZ malicious package did not get pushed to Stable branch, which is one of the reasons why I prefer updating late rather than being an idiot obsessed with consooming updates released 5 minutes ago. I always wait for updates, vet them, read forums and changelogs before hitting the green button.