Musings on Linux distros and desktops

I've been using Linux for about a year and a half now. I've been interested in Linux for a lot longer than that, but my previous laptop, an Everex model somethingorother, had some hardware bits that didn't play well with the distros I was interested in. The mobo on my Everex went south :-( , which gave me an excuse to get a new machine :-) . I went shopping for a netbook, looking for something that would let me dual-boot, and ended up with an Acer Aspire. Had it about a week before I got around to installing Ubuntu, and it's been penguins ever since.

One of the things I love about Linux is that it allows me to do whatever I want with my computer. I'm not a Windows hater (Apple, however, is another story), and it's true that one can customize Windows to a certain extent, but there are things one cannot do without incurring the Wrath of Redmond. Entirely their perogative. In Linux however I am the final authority on what happens on my laptop. I am Root!

One of the good things about Linux is that it lets me tinker with things. One of the bad things about Linux is that it lets me tinker with things...

I'd had Ubuntu installed for a year or so, happily playing and tinkering and customizing. And it started to get a bit, well, buggy. Odd things happened, or didn't happen. My fault, and I knew going in that I might break something. But again, if something breaks in Linux, and you can't find the problem, or don't want to take the time, an new installation is relatively easy. And did I mention that I like to tinker?

Out with the old, in with the new! Ubuntu 10.10 had served me well, so I tried Ubuntu 12.04. It took me all of an hour to decide that I hated the new Unity look, and that led me on a several week long experiment with different distros. I tried OpenSUSE, Fedora, Puppy, Kubuntu, and finally settled for a bit on Mint. It was nice, but Gnome3 at the time was not very customizable, and Cinnamon was a work in progress, so I settled on Xubuntu. Which is where I've been for a couple of months. It's nice, relatively quick, but a bit boring and sometimes kinda cheap looking. The new distro bug bit again, but there's nothing out there that fits my needs like Ubuntu (although Fedora came very close). I finally decided to stick with Xubuntu but give Gnome3 a second chance.

What a difference a few months can make.

Gnome3 is a very pretty desktop. There is a certain elegance to it, it seems quicker than xfce (I know, it's not supposed to be, but it sure feels like it), and it can now be customized in ways that it couldn't be before. I installed it last night, and with a few clicks, checking this option or that, installing a plug-in or 2, I have an elegant, fast, easy to navigate desktop that fits my needs and my desires. It looks nothing like old Gnome; one could make it so if one wanted, but what would be the point in that? I've already gotten accustomed to having everything at the top of the screen, I like the way it handles Workspaces, the Acitivites hot spot is cool (and finally the Windows button has something to do), and the global search (I think that's the right term) is very handy. It's a new way of handling things, without being so new that it's too confusing.

So it's Xubuntu with Gnome3, at least until the bug bites again...