On Sun, Aug 09, 2015 at 09:44:11PM -0400, Steve Litt wrote:
> On Sun, 9 Aug 2015 18:14:10 -0700
> Isaac Dunham <ibid.ag@???> wrote:
>
> > Hello,
> > I'm looking for a Linux distro that I could recommend to friends who
> > are rather frustrated with Windows 10.
> > The friends in question ask me about how to fix problems with their
> > computers from time to time.
> >
> > The essentials would be:
> > -has a *good* Windows migration assistant, which must be able to
> > handle Windows 10; I know that Ubuntu used to have this.
>
> Could you describe this further? I don't know what you mean.

My memory is getting a little hazy, since it was about 7 years ago
that I saw this.
Back somewhere around the Ubuntu 8.04 timeframe, my brother had a
Windows (XP? Vista?) install on his laptop, and installed Ubuntu.

The installer detected the Windows install, asked "Do you want to
migrate a user account from this?", gave a menu to choose which user
accounts to migrate, and set it up so that the documents, pictures,
videos, and so forth were in the standard places in the home directory.
(It also managed to set the password to match Windows, if I'm recalling
correctly. Yes, I know that requires Windows storing the password in
a pretty weak form.)

> > -glibc-based, so that Flash and Avast Workstation will work
> > (at least one of the friends in question uses avast on Windows)
> I think all the majors and semi-majors have glibc, although some might
> also have musl.

Alpine Linux, which I use, is musl-based (though it's semi-major at best).

> > -has Chromium (and preferably Chrome)
> I think all of them have that.
>
>
> > -has Open/LibreOffice (one of the friends in question has used
> > OpenOffice on Windows since...7 or 8 years ago, I think)
> I think all of them have that.

I'd seen something about Slackware being an exception.

> > -DE familiar to Windows users (if Trinity were more active, I'd go
> > with that without hesitation; but I suspect properly configured Xfce
> > or Mate may be better at this point.)
> I'd highly recommend LXDE. It looks and acts just like w95, w98, wXT,
> and somewhat similar to W7. Xfce can also look the same way, if it's
> set up to do so.

At least one of the friends in question has expressed a fondness for
eye candy; additionally, I'd been concerned about the menu (Windows
2k and older, and the old "classic" interface, have a plain menu with
no side menu; but Windows 7, which was the last version either of them
was happy with, has a double-column menu with a search box.)

LXDE is close to the classic interface, but so is IceWM (my own first
pick for window manager.)

> > -can install to hard drive, though support for Live CD is desired.
> I think most or all of them are like that.

Puppy Linux isn't very good in that regard, hence the specification.

[snip a recommendation of Devuan]

> If you'd like an easy time maintaining your Windows refugee friends,
> I'd highly recommend installing LXDE. Most reliable window manager I've
> seen that isn't just a black screen you click on. Relatively low
> resource usage.
>
> By the way, there could be some other distros that fulfill all your
> preferences: I just don't know about them. Distros are switching to
> systemd so fast it's hard to keep track of who's still not evil, so
> I've familiarized myself with a bunch that have actively stated their
> independence from systemd.

Thank you.

Also, as far as this goes, I'd be open to using Debian Jessie with init
switched; while *I* don't want to have libsystemd present, I understand
that most packages that link to it currently will run without systemd.

Thanks again,
Isaac Dunham