[sf-lug] SF-LUG meeting notes + abt some lightweight distros

Mon May 7 21:56:30 PDT 2018

Bobbie Sellers <bliss-sf4ever at dslextreme.com> wrote at [01]:

> Ken was working on a member's laptop but was unable to get
> results and it was passed on to Aaron. Then after that he
> sat down next to Jackie B. and attempted to help her with
> the Ubuntu on her Toshiba.

Thanks, maestro, for the ThinkPad T61  :-) -- see [02].
Gives me a chance to see if I could revive this laptop or else salvage it 
for needed parts.

That "he" who "sat at down next to Jackie B. and attempted to help her 
with the Ubuntu on her Toshiba" was Ken, not me. As per the below, I did 
arrive very late.

Bobbie Sellers <bliss-sf4ever at dslextreme.com> wrote at [01]:

> Aaron came in very late but was there to get back the modem
> he had loaned me and to pick up the Bunsen Labs 32 bit
> version of their late release of Helium based in Debian.

Arrived at Cafe Enchante around 12:15.
Thanks Bobbie, for that DVD copy of i386 BunsenLabs Helium[03], which is 
based on Debian Stable/"stretch" :-)

There was a bit of discussion at the tail end of the meeting about various 
lightweight distros and their Desktop Environments (DEs) and/or their 
Windows Managers (WMs). Don't wish to get in too elongated a discussion of 
differences between DEs and WMs (because that's been done already over the 
last several years ;-) ).

I *will* mention, though, that I've artificially grouped some of the 
discussed distros into the two init classes of
A. With systemd
B. Without systemd or systemd-disabled

DistroWatch writeups referenced next to each distro below.

A. systemd-containing distros mentioned were
- BL Helium [03] (just as above)
- Lubuntu [04]
- Bodhi Linux [05]

B. systemd-free or systemd-disabled distros mentioned were
- antiX [06]
- Void Linux [07]
- MX Linux [08]

What was *not* mentioned during Sunday's SF-LUG mtg while I was there was 
the systemd-free Devuan; the official release of Devuan "asci" testing 
came out this past Sunday -- see [09]

BunsenLabs Helium [03].
BL Helium is lightweight with its Openbox WM, and it follows the tradition 
of being super lightweight started by its predecessor CrunchBang Linux.

Lubuntu [04].

Lubuntu is essentially Ubuntu with the LightweightX DE.  Ubuntu/Lubuntu 
came out with version 18.04 "Bionic Beaver" within the last two weeks as 
Bobbie S specifically mentioned a week ago last Monday [10].
The Lubuntu 18.04 System Requirements were bumped up a bit compared to 
previous versions of Lubuntu, as noted within Simon Quigley's Release 
Announcement [11]:
~~~~ quoting ~~~~~
Lubuntu is a good operating system for many old computers, but not for all 
of them. Some computers have too little horsepower or memory. A rule of 
thumb is that the computer should not be more than 10 years old (although 
some older computers are known to work as well).

Memory (RAM): Your computer needs at minimum 1 GB of RAM to use Lubuntu, 
but we recommend 2 GB or more for better performance (with web-based 
applications).
...
------------------------------

That release announcement soon resulted in this revealing exchange of 
comments at [12] :
~~~~~~ quoting ~~~~~~~
~
Simon Quigley	- April 28, 2018 at 1:48 am
> Minimum memory requirements jumped up twice in compare of 16.04. Why?

Computers have evolved.

> Can we install snaps in Lubuntu via GUI now?

Probably using the Ubuntu Software Center.
~
~
BornRetarded	- April 29, 2018 at 2:33 pm
>> Imagine if your car used twice the gasoline because cars have evolved.
~
~
Simon Quigley	- April 29, 2018 at 6:05 pm
>>> It's not the same thing.
>>> Please stop complaining about a number that we just bumped in the 
release announcement.
>>>The goal is to make sure people know that things like Firefox will need 
a couple of GB of RAM.
~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I sense that Simon is/was a might snippy now that Lubuntu might not be the 
lightest mainstream version of Ubuntu on the block. Note that I previously 
made an inquiry about the slightly lighterweight LXLE Linux [13] about 
three months ago here [14].

Bodhi Linux [05].

That's the lightweight Ubuntu/Debian-based distribution featuring Moksha, 
an Enlightenment-17-based DE, which Rick M has advocated in the past in at 
least the bottom of [15]. While I still don't like Bodhi and its Moksha DE 
-- having actually tried it out -- maestro was praising Bodhi Linux at the 
end of Sunday's meeting for its lighweightedness. Certainly lightweight 
compared to Lubuntu 18.04 "Bionic Beaver", I think.

While the above three Debian/Ubuntu-based systemd distros *can* have their 
init's and other integrated components teased out as per Rick M's and 
maestro's postings from the past on such -- see refs [16] through [19] -- 
at the same time I found it much easier not having to take the more 
extensive after-the-fact steps to purge systems from systemd as described 
at ref [20]. Instead, it's much easier to start-off with one or more of 
the systemd-free distros listed in ref [21] from the get-go.

antiX [06].
That super lightweight systemd-free distro with all those WMs which I 
*very specifically*mentioned 1 2/3 years ago within ref [22].

Void Linux [07].
First mentioned in Bobbie S's Meeting notes from Monday December 19, 2016 
in ref [23], and more recently mentioned in my posting of last November 
'Installing Void, C.E. Sign-in at SF-LUG mtg of 2017-11-05' in ref [24].

Some recent intriguing news about Void Linux is from one of its most 
recent 'Serious News' news story as quoted in ref [25]:
~~~~~~~ Quoting ~~~~~~~~
The current project leader has disappeared. We have had no contact with 
him since the end of January, and no meaningful contact for well over a 
year.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

MX Linux [08].
It's integrally related to antiX as previously mentioned above, it uses 
the XFCE DE, it's intended as a "mid-weight operating system", and it 
seems to currently be very popular at number 7th in DistroWatch's Hits Per 
Day ranking. What might be unique about MX Linux, as quoted in its 
'Systemd' wikipage of ref [26], is that "MX Linux ships with systemd 
present but disabled by default. The MX Linux team strongly urges users to 
remain with this configuration which uses sysvinit instead." This 
'Systemd' wikipage makes a good read for understanding what the MX Linux 
developers face and what choices they ended up making with the distro.

If I gather this correctly, the MX Linux developers still left-in the 
"hooks" for systemd, but these "hooks" are disabled by default.  The 
'Systemd' wikipage (ref [26] again) shows that taking steps seemingly 
similar to those in ref [17] for Debian 8 "Jessie" OpenRC Conversion can 
remove MX Linux's reliance on systemd and some of (all of?) systemd's 
various "hooks".

As before, Rick M, maestro, Michael P, Bobbie S, Akkana P, Daniel G, Jim, 
and really anyone else reading this are definitely invited and completely 
welcome to provide more complete information and advice on what I've 
written above :-)

-Aaron

========================
References
========================

[01]http://linuxmafia.com/pipermail/sf-lug/2018q2/013227.html
[02]http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Category:T61
[03]https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=bunsenlabs
[04]https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=lubuntu
[05]https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=bodhi
[06]https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=antix
[07]https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=void
[08]https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=mx
[09]https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=devuan
[10]http://linuxmafia.com/pipermail/sf-lug/2018q2/013216.html
[11]https://lubuntu.me/bionic-released/
[12]https://lubuntu.me/bionic-released/#more-3008
[13]https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=lxle
[14]http://linuxmafia.com/pipermail/sf-lug/2018q1/013079.html
[15]http://linuxmafia.com/pipermail/sf-lug/2016q4/012326.html
[16]http://linuxmafia.com/pipermail/sf-lug/2016q4/012277.html
[17]http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Debian/openrc-conversion.html
[18]http://linuxmafia.com/pipermail/sf-lug/2017q4/012899.html
[19]http://without-systemd.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page
[20]http://without-systemd.org/wiki/index.php/Alternatives_to_systemd
[21]http://without-systemd.org/wiki/index.php/Linux_distributions_without_systemd
[22]http://linuxmafia.com/pipermail/sf-lug/2016q3/012256.html
[23]http://linuxmafia.com/pipermail/sf-lug/2016q4/012373.html
[24]http://linuxmafia.com/pipermail/sf-lug/2017q4/012941.html
[25]https://www.voidlinux.eu/news/2018/05/serious-issues.html
[26]https://mxlinux.org/wiki/system/systemd

========================

aaronco36 at sdf.org
SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.org