For a “set it and forget it” gaming console experience? It is awesome. It feels like I already have a GabeCube under my TV (that I bought for probably half the price…). And when I have to do more complicated things than “run the update once a month”, I just ssh in from either my desktop or laptop.
But… it is an immutable/atomic distro. So if the packages you want to add are flatpaks or appimages? You are probably fine. Otherwise? You get into a mess where you are adding packages to your layers (?) and kinda feel like you are playing with fire. I did that to get iperf3 installed to test some networking upgrades and it was mostly painless but it was also a really bad experience versus sudo dnf install iperf3.
So my suggestion would be to stick to Bazzite for gaming first platforms and continue to use whatever distro you like (Fedora for the win!) for “real” computers.
You can use distrobox/distroshelf to set up a container with a regular distro and install packages in that instead of layering; if a package installs a GUI application you can export the application and it will show up in your applications menu.
And you can similarly do most/all of your dev work in a container that you spin up with a podman alias (fuck hashicorp with a rusty metal pole but damn if Vagrant wasn’t awesome). Hell, there are a lot of arguments that you should.
It inherently becomes a question of what your primary use case for a machine is and how often you spend fighting it to accomplish that. And, personally, I run Linux so I DON’T have to fight my OS. Which… is really weird when you think about it but holy crap Windows and Mac are annoying.
Immutable OSes are amazing for corporate environments and HTPC/Gaming computers are another solid use case. But if your primary focus is whether you can be a developer (as indicated by the doomemacs ask)… you are gonna be cranky.
Even Flatpaks get annoying sometimes during dev work. Yes I do need to talk to that device. Yes I know the risks. It’s ok. It’s just a microcontroller. Yes I know what I’m doing. It’s not going to hurt you. I wrote it!
Thank goodness for flatseal. If I were to do it again, I would probably do it the “old fashioned” way.
Bazzite has a Desktop image explicitly to cover your last issue. The SKU picker has a “Do you want Steam Gaming Mode?” question and explains that it’s intended for less secure single user/HTPC setups. If you say no, you’ll get the standard Desktop image with a standard user login like any other distro.
I use Bazzite for my HTPC (AMD NUC).
For a “set it and forget it” gaming console experience? It is awesome. It feels like I already have a GabeCube under my TV (that I bought for probably half the price…). And when I have to do more complicated things than “run the update once a month”, I just ssh in from either my desktop or laptop.
But… it is an immutable/atomic distro. So if the packages you want to add are flatpaks or appimages? You are probably fine. Otherwise? You get into a mess where you are adding packages to your layers (?) and kinda feel like you are playing with fire. I did that to get iperf3 installed to test some networking upgrades and it was mostly painless but it was also a really bad experience versus
sudo dnf install iperf3.So my suggestion would be to stick to Bazzite for gaming first platforms and continue to use whatever distro you like (Fedora for the win!) for “real” computers.
You can use distrobox/distroshelf to set up a container with a regular distro and install packages in that instead of layering; if a package installs a GUI application you can export the application and it will show up in your applications menu.
And you can similarly do most/all of your dev work in a container that you spin up with a
podmanalias (fuck hashicorp with a rusty metal pole but damn if Vagrant wasn’t awesome). Hell, there are a lot of arguments that you should.It inherently becomes a question of what your primary use case for a machine is and how often you spend fighting it to accomplish that. And, personally, I run Linux so I DON’T have to fight my OS. Which… is really weird when you think about it but holy crap Windows and Mac are annoying.
Immutable OSes are amazing for corporate environments and HTPC/Gaming computers are another solid use case. But if your primary focus is whether you can be a developer (as indicated by the doomemacs ask)… you are gonna be cranky.
Even Flatpaks get annoying sometimes during dev work. Yes I do need to talk to that device. Yes I know the risks. It’s ok. It’s just a microcontroller. Yes I know what I’m doing. It’s not going to hurt you. I wrote it!
Thank goodness for flatseal. If I were to do it again, I would probably do it the “old fashioned” way.
The solution for packages is do it in a container, that way its easy and doesnt involve layering more stuff.
Bazzite has a Desktop image explicitly to cover your last issue. The SKU picker has a “Do you want Steam Gaming Mode?” question and explains that it’s intended for less secure single user/HTPC setups. If you say no, you’ll get the standard Desktop image with a standard user login like any other distro.