I need a distro that is stable with a particular need to set up zero input automatic updates. If an update asks for a password or needs user interaction in basically any way it simply won’t get done. All he needs is a reliable platform for browsing the web. I am replacing an Ubuntu system that has apparently just stopped working (I have not had a chance to examine it yet) after years and years of not getting proper updates after he forgot his password.
Something like Bazzite is intriguing because of it’s locked down environment although he is very much not a gamer. Is there something locked down like Bazzite but with long term LTS release cycle?
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I installed Fedora Silverblue on my parent’s laptop almost a year ago and I haven’t had any complaints or issues.
They’re really not tech literate or heavy users so Silverblue is the perfect fit. I installed and configured Librewolf and Bitwarden for them and everything has been running fine. Everything else is vanilla Silverblue.
They don’t know or don’t care about updating software. But Silverblue does flatpak updates automatically in the background. OS and firmware updates are integrated and handled via the Gnome Software Center, so I’ll click the install button every so often when I visit. No terminal required! There is a password prompt, but at least it’s a GNOME shell password prompt, not a terminal password prompt.
Additionally, I was able to get LUKS encryption working without my parents noticing: https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/t/encryption-advice-for-silverblue/162810/7
It’s not the most secure LUKS implementation, but I’m also not worried about state actors hacking my parent’s laptop. Originally, I skipped the disk encryption entirely because the extra password prompt made it harder to use the computer.
Take a look at the immutable distros like Fedora Silverblue. It would install updates automatically, and has the ability to always rollback to a working version. I haven’t used it long enough to have version upgrades tested. Perhaps it asks for user input. These upgrades happen twice a year.
If I was doing that these days with my current skills, I’d install some minimal version of Arch Linux and probably would remote into it once in a while to update, or invent some simple script to do the updates unattended. The lesser the packages the easier the whole task.
Also, don’t forget there’s Chrome OS which you can install on a regular PC. (It was called Chrome OS Flex last time I did that for a relative.) It’s the easiest I can remember right now. That’s for situations when all they need is actually just a browser. For those cases Chrome OS shines.
I’ve put my dad on Bluefin (same project as Bazzite). It’s perfect. Major upgrades are the same as weekly updates. Transparent and uneventful. It’s been almost 2 years and zero major complaints. He even finally accepted to ditch his ancient MacBook Air since I installed the Affinity suite on his Linux laptop. It was his last holdover.
You can check out Bluefin and Aurora, which are Bazzite without the gaming. Pick the former if they’re used to macOS, the latter if Windows.
I personally have installed Mint (Debian edition) with similar needs. Absolutely zero input might be a bit much to ask, since user should be aware of that something is going on before shutting everything down, but when that’s taken care of the unattended upgrades work just fine. Just recently I had to fix a laptop with mint to friend of a friend because upgrade was interrupted. Just running ‘dpkg --configure -a’ followed by apt upgrade and apt dist-upgrade did the job, so not big of a deal for me, but for the owner of the machine that would’ve been pretty much impossible task since they just refuse to learn even the slightest amount of their computer and have a very short temper on anything like that. And I can kind of understand that too, at least up to a point. There are things which I just can’t be arsed to learn which are equally easy to different people.
The distro doesn’t matter, the Desktop Environment does.
If they are used to MacOS and want something simple and “out of the way”, go with Gnome.
If they are used to Windows, go with KDE.
Fedora is probably the most straightforward to install and manage right now. You won’t need to “lock down” anything if you don’t give them sudo credentials.and just a regular user account.
If they are used to Windows, go with KDE.
I’d say Cinnamon or XFCE. Plenty customizable enough for this use case and very straightforward.
Define what you mean by “locked down”. If you don’t give your user superuser privileges, every distro is locked down because the user can only ever write to their own /home
I’d strongly recommend Mint:
- with Cinnamon DE: very Windows-esque UI
- Ubuntu / Debian-based, i.e. rock-solid, unlikely to break
- 100% automated updates (including automatic removal of old kernels so your /boot won’t get clogged
- Timeshift system snapshots in case something does break. (Note: I’ve only ever used Timeshift to un-fuck systems that I, personally, had fucked with superuser rights and manual meddling.)
Seconded. Absolutely what I’d install in this kind of situation. I have an old machine set up for my wife with Mint. She only uses it to check her bank account, basically. So far zero issues.
FydeOS might be more in line with what you need. Based on ChromeOS, but without the Google account requirements and spyware. I installed this on my dad’s PC along with setting up DNS-based Ad blocking and it’s been rock solid. If he just needs a browser, that’s basically what it is.
That’s interesting, didn’t know that existed. I know OP didn’t ask about cost but I was curious if you’ve been paying for major version upgrades or subscribing for the yearly support? According to their pricing page only minor updates would be automatic for the free installs
so you’d need to manually upgrade the system whenever you need a major OS update to be done. It doesn’t seem quite as automatic as OP was hoping for but maybe it’s not a bad tradeoff if you only need to touch it once a year or whatever the software release schedule is.
He’s been on version 22 since I set it up back it February of this year. I don’t think a new major version had come out since then. (I actually haven’t thought to check) my plan was just to do a fresh install as needed for major updates, or when his current version stops receiving security updates since new features aren’t really a concern for him.
