• @[email protected]M
    link
    fedilink
    22922 days ago

    Cybersecurity engineers and pentesters don’t need Kali or Parrot. You don’t need Proxmox to use LXC and KVM. You don’t need OpenMediaVault to have Samba and NFS shares. You don’t need Clonezilla to make use of the OCS toolkit. You don’t need LMDE to have a Debian OS with Cinnamon and nonfree drivers installed, or Endeavour to have Arch with KDE Plasma.

    But it’s sure as shit good to have everything packed together and preconfigured by professionals.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      2222 days ago

      Proxmox does add extended hardware support, as does Kali. Parrot enables necessary repos and kernel modifications for Red and Blue team workflows. I don’t know enough about DEs to speak about the others but those three don’t apply to the meme.

    • lurch (he/him)
      link
      fedilink
      3422 days ago

      Clonezilla is more like an app that comes with an OS on a liveCD for convenience, as it’s troublesome to use the very OS you’re cloning.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        English
        721 days ago

        Yeah its a program that has a minimal OS. Its more about the program than the operating system.

    • 𝔗𝔢𝔯 𝔐𝔞𝔵𝔦𝔪𝔞
      link
      fedilink
      English
      521 days ago

      Sounds like a perfect application for Nix, IMO. Either ship a flake or a NixOS config module, and you’re set.

      The only disadvantage I can see is the unusual directory structure of NixOS.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      322 days ago

      Maybe the existence of these distros (appliances) is a sign of the state of Linux.

      May the next distro win.

  • Jeena
    link
    fedilink
    English
    1222 days ago

    FU I won’t do what you tell me!

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    2622 days ago

    New distros get a lot of crap, but often they are solving a need for someone.

    Take Windowmaker Live: ostensibly it’s just Debian + Windowmaker. I have seen comments saying why not just install WM on Debian? By asking that question, it’s clear the asker hasnt tried recently. There is a lot to configure, and there are lots of usability papercuts.

    A custom distro allows someone to fix those problems for themself, and share those fixes with others. It’s not fragmentation, it’s just FOSS.

    • emergencycall
      link
      fedilink
      1622 days ago

      It would help more people to improve the installer for difficult-to-install software rather than creating an entire operating system around that software. Using the entire operating system as an installer is over the top

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        121 days ago

        If you improve the installer to the point it can install any combination of software together (including incompatible versions of deps) you end up with NixOS again

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          221 days ago

          Much like how crustaceans have repeatedly evolved into pseudo-crabs, Linux distros tend to evolve into pseudo-nix

      • Cassa
        link
        fedilink
        221 days ago

        Don’t know the case for this - but there are absolutely cases where the merger is blocked for some reason, and why not just fix it yourself with a distro? It hurts nobody.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        4
        edit-2
        21 days ago

        Yeah I’m reading what they said and that kind of solution wouldn’t be acceptable in any industry…

        Imagine if you wanted to add AC to your central heating system and they told you they need to add a second furnace in parallel to the one you already have because it’s possible to add AC to your current setup, but it’s very complicated to do so…

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          221 days ago

          You’re re-inventing the Nix tool which is exactly a script that sets up all the programs and services you want to install

          • Possibly linux
            link
            fedilink
            English
            121 days ago

            Except no one really uses Nix outside of Nix OS. It is slow and complicated for little reason.

            Just use Ansible and an answers file

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              2
              edit-2
              21 days ago

              Then how come we have more packages than the AUR?

              And don’t say it’s because we packaged Python and Haskell stuff since we have more non-unique packages too

        • Jess
          link
          fedilink
          321 days ago

          Maybe one you could just download and pipe to bash. /s

            • Jess
              link
              fedilink
              321 days ago

              I figured, I was playing on the number of github repos with instructions for curl pipe bash combos.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      421 days ago

      +1, kubuntu was a lot simpler than installing KDE on Ubuntu and still having grub applications

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    921 days ago

    Hardware support is not really the province of distro, to me. Which makes them even more ridiculous.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    3921 days ago

    Nah. Push them out like rabbits do with their babies. Let them fight and see which ones prevail!

  • slazer2au
    link
    fedilink
    English
    6922 days ago

    Or do, that guy isn’t your boss. If he is, what are you doing listening to him about non work stuff he seems like a gatekeeper kina guy.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    46
    edit-2
    21 days ago

    They can go ahead and create all they want. I just wont use any of them unless they give me a reason.

    • Trip
      link
      fedilink
      1421 days ago

      Exactly! Nobody has to listen to OP and change plans because OP doesn’t approve! Like you, OP is free to NOT use the product!

  • oshu
    link
    fedilink
    1822 days ago

    Every project eventually makes their own package manager. Its pretty insane if you stop and think about how routinely the package manager is re-invented.

    • Possibly linux
      link
      fedilink
      English
      321 days ago

      Not really

      There are only a few mainstream package formats and ultimately you are going to probably be using distro packages or portable formats like Flatpak.

    • Cyborganism
      link
      fedilink
      722 days ago

      For real. I don’t mind the million distributions, but can we agree on one single package manager?

      • wander1236
        link
        fedilink
        1322 days ago

        Every time someone complains, another package manager is created

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        17
        edit-2
        22 days ago

        Where is that comic about standards now that we need it? The one where they create a new standard that is going to solve all the problems, except for now there is just one more standard??

        Edit: https://xkcd.com/927

        • Cyborganism
          link
          fedilink
          121 days ago

          Back in 2000 I started using Linux with RedHat (That’s what they were teaching us in college then.) and got to know RPMs before the automatic package dependency resolution tools. Then I moved to Ubuntu in 2004 and have been using that since, and even had a job where I built custom Linux distros based on Debian where I had to build DEB packages, so I got to know that system pretty well.

          But, honestly, if there are better package managers out there I wouldn’t mind changing if it means we all use the same thing.

          • @[email protected]
            link
            fedilink
            121 days ago

            I’ve broken both Fedora and Ubuntu already, so I had to find better solutions. With NixOS I can roll back to a previous revision easily on boot

              • @[email protected]
                link
                fedilink
                120 days ago

                Upgrade 22 LTS upgrade to Ubuntu 24 LTS failed and I forgot the upgrade didn’t succeed when I rebooted. Unlike NixOS, it doesn’t roll all the changes back when the upgrade is unsuccessful

                • Cyborganism
                  link
                  fedilink
                  220 days ago

                  Aaah I see. Ok. I can see why Nix appeals so much to you.

                  As I said, I need to try it out. I’m gonna download it right now and try it in a VM.

        • Cyborganism
          link
          fedilink
          421 days ago

          I don’t know if Flatpak can cover all the scenarios. It seems to be mostly for Desktop apps. I know Ubuntu was able to have system tools installed with Snaps though. However, having apps installed with their dependencies in one package is neat, but it takes a ton more in storage.

          Flatpak is a great extra layer to have on top of a regular package manager, but I wouldn’t use it as a sole package management system.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    6622 days ago

    But what if… I took Debian, and disguised it as my own distro? Ho ho ho! Delightfuly devilish, Seymore!

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      2622 days ago

      I daily Debian because I realized all of the distros I tried and liked were Debian based. That was 20 years ago.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        421 days ago

        Ubuntu, Knoppix and MEPIS? I first used Ubuntu in 2006, but it was still very immature then. I didn’t really know much about any other Debian derivatives.

        The other big one that was popular was Mandrake but that was rpm based, and a bit later PClinuxOS which was Mandrake based. I didn’t think Debian derivatives were much of a thing then aside from Ubuntu.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          121 days ago

          There are at least a couple of distros that are based on Ubuntu. Mint is a popular example. I’d say that based on Ubuntu means it is also a Debian derivative.

          • @[email protected]
            link
            fedilink
            321 days ago

            Mint didn’t really see any sort of popularity until around 2010 as I remember.

            I’m aware it’s initial release was earlier (surprised it was exist in 06!), but the reality of those times is that Ubuntu was still building itself up let alone Mint getting traction yet.