this post was submitted on 20 Oct 2025
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libre
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Welcome to libre
A comm dedicated to the fight for free software with an anti-capitalist perspective.
The struggle for libre computing cannot be disentangled from other forms of socialist reform. One must be willing to reject proprietary software as fiercely as they would reject capitalism. Luckily, we are not alone.
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- Free Software, Free Society provides an excellent primer in the origins and theory around free software and the GNU Project, the pioneers of the Free Software Movement.
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Don't be afraid to try out Fedora either, the Atomics are cool (it's what Bazzite and SteamOS are based on).
There's a ton of really cool distros that all have their neat niches. Once you get out of the locked down ecosystem of windows/macos you get solutions to tons of problems you might not even have known existed.
Linux is the back itching operating system, there's a spot it can reach for anyone.
And if it can't reach, someone will make it reach next year while Microsoft and Apple continue to neglect you.
I hate that I have to use Windows for work (proprietary design software), but I still do most of my development in Linux, and constantly have a WSL terminal open in any working directory so I can have sane filesystem interactions with bash and coreutils.
Linux users can always have hope for the future that things will get better.
Windows and Mac users are on that damage control downwards spiral. Windows users have to use a terminal to disable the bloatware and not be forced to make a spyware account. Windows is a caricature of what people used to complain about Linux now ("it's so good once you do these bespoke modifications")
2026 may be the year of the Linux desktop, maybe not. But I know that 2026 is also a year where millions of users were told by a oligarchic monopoly to buy a new computer and to be happy with mediocrity.
Every year is the year of the Linux desktop for millions of people lol. Next year it'll be the year of the Linux desktop for millions more.
I'm not following, unless you're just trying to be coy or something.
Bazzite and the other ublue distros are wonderful.
It's so nice knowing you can't really fuck up your machine unless you really try. Being able able to rebase is huge too. Just temporarily try out a different base image without fully reinstalling or booting into a live environment.
I've been running it for several months now and everything about it has has been incredibly solid and trouble-free. You can't tweak out an install the way you can with other distros, at least not without making your own spin, but nothing ever breaks. Perfect for people who want a good experience right after the install finishes.
Yep, I'm considering just switching to fully atomic and just running my environments with toolbx. I do a ton of Python work and I'm basically doing everything with venv and containers anyways.
Already got a Fedora Desktop install that I've tweaked out pretty hard and am dreading a reconfigure lol. Should still do it just to have the stability, I tend to crash my distros when I start going crazy with trying out packages and accidentally break things.
SteamOS is arch iirc
SteamOS is an Arch Linux-based Linux distribution
My bad, I know SteamOS is immutable like the atomics and got my wires crossed. Wouldn't be surprised if they do eventually switch to a ublue though since it's being pretty heavily developed and matches their goals.