I use Debian flavors for my daily drivers. I have no complaints, no real desire to switch it up on that front.
However, I am starting to get into self-hosting and homelab projects. I’d like to start test driving some light-weight distros of a different flavor.
I’d prefer a GUI be available, but the environment and WM is pretty inconsequential-- except it shouldn’t be bloated. I’ll install any additional apps I want, I don’t need a curated mid-to-heavy-weight distro.
The plan is to make heavy use of Docker images, to try to maintain a clean and modular setup of services. If that makes any difference.
Suggestions? Any slim distros you’re just gaga for?
Honestly, the more I’ve thought about it, the more this feels like a sound solution. And then I can just run VMs for distros I want to sandbox in.
Maybe have a look at Proxmox, a Debian-based hypervisor for VMs and containers.
I’ve actually really wanted to try Proxmox. Both for personal use, but because the experience/knowledge would benefit my career.
If you’re going for a container/VM-first approach, you might be interested in Bluefin DX - it’s an immutable distro based on Fedora Atomic, and follows a workflow revolving around containers and VMs. Basically tuned exactly for homelab users and developers, who’re looking for a stable yet up-to-date base (unlike Debian, which tends to use outdated packages, unless you’re on Sid). The biggest advantages of using an immutable distro is that you never have to worry about a broken update again - so you can just focus on your work.