Hibby

If you can manage a Linux server, you likely have no use for Unraid. If you want to put together a Synology type appliance out of PC hardware to run Docker containers and uses ZFS for backups, Unraid is a fairly user friendly option.

I’m a guy who prefers community based distros. They don’t have business decisions get in the way of the needs of the community. It ain’t perfect, but it’s worth the tradeoffs for me. Debian for stuff I don’t want to constantly mess with. Arch for the express purpose of constantly messing with (and sometimes messing up).

I’ve only barely gone beyond the more “backup + Docker appliance” style front end of Unraid, so I’m not sure. They make it extremely difficult for the untrained to get where you can break stuff. I am mostly an Arch/Debian guy.

Slackware may not be huge, but it is the base distro for Unraid.

Bobbi Flekman confronted the sexism in the Spinal Tap album “Smell the Glove” back when she worked artist relations for Polymer Records in 1982. She has known for years that “Money talks, and bullshit walks”

For desktop Linux, I use Arch. It’s a community driven base distribution, so the needs of the community are what drives development and there are no financial decisions of a company that get priority, which is refreshing. It also has access to the latest and greatest that Linux has to offer.

They have a philosophy of expecting basic effort from users and to have a tinkering mindset. Historically, Arch devs and users have a reputation of being grumpy greybeards, but many of the rough edges have been rounded off in the last few years. If you are willing to do a bit of reading or watching some YouTube videos, it’s not really that hard.

You can really build a lean and powerful machine that has just the software you want on the system with Arch. All it takes is a little effort and willingness to ask for help from the community after you have tried and failed to solve problems yourself. It’s really not the badge of elitism to use Arch in 2023. It’s never been easier to use and doesn’t blow up on you nearly as often as the reputation implies. Just use good hygiene and make snapshots so if you blow it up, it’s only a 5 minute recovery.