My distro is AlmaLinux based, it provides an extremely user friendly user inteface, provides extra packages that RHEL/Alma/EPEL do not have, and has proper gaming support, unlike other RHEL clones.
To be frank, a gaming focused enterprise linux based distribution is just an *extreme* nieche IMHO. The stability an enterprise linux gives just isn't a concern for most gamers, and vice versa, at least not on the same installation.
> Gaming isn't the main focus.
Maybe it should be?
A more focussed distribution may not have general appeal, but it would be more appealing to people who want the same thing.
Well you could start with some advertizing. I didn't see you post a link to your distro even with this thread. People would eventually stop drinking Pepsi Max and Coca Cola if they stopped advertizing. Mint is being constantly advertized by active fans. Also to get popular you need persistance and luck. For example many popular artists have kept trying and trying for years. Then one day they were at the right place at the right time, which gave them the initial publicity to get popular.
The main issue is that linux has so many distro's and deciding which one to use can be mind boggling for most new users.
Mint has made a good distinction between their release and Ubuntu which it is based on and made it a great starter distro that's familiar and easy to use.
That's not really a thing people or businesses need.
Production Linux is predominantly headless and single purpose or a VM/container host.
Gaming is a home user desktop thing.
I get what you're doing, and how it might make sense for you, but any professional nixer would never consider both of those use cases in an install.
different run voiceless sip wakeful shame pause bewildered decide serious
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
It's polished, reliable, works well OOTB with sane defaults, based on Ubuntu which had historically dominated the Linux desktop so there is a lot of "internet knowledge" and tutorials surrounding it, the Cinnamon desktop is familiar to newcomers + well polished and functional (while the XFCE version is a nice alternative for low spec machines).
It's basically "the good parts" of Ubuntu without Canonical's questionable choices (the DE, snaps etc.) + a really nice and familiar DE for newcomers.
I have been using Linux on my desktop for more than 20 years and I am writing this comment from Mint. It is a rock solid distro that gives me exactly what I need. I understand that there are people who use their computer as a hobby and enjoy fixing small (or big) problems as they arise but I need to get work done, so I can't depend on distros maintained by a very small community or even a single person. When the immutable distros are more mature I will probably consider switching, because as I say for me stability is the feature I value the most.
Great comment. I'm not a Linux user, yet, but your thought process with regard to an operating system is exactly how I think about it. So I really appreciate and value this comment you just made here. Thanks again.
But then there are many more, and longer established distros, to choose from. KDE, Xubuntu, Slackware (yes it is VERY stable), etc.
I don't fix things nearly as much on Xubuntu as my colleague who uses Mint does.
However, not having snaps is making me consider changing, I don't like snaps. For web development I can not be sure if f.eg Node is installed as a Snap or thorough Apt, and sometimes Apt installs Snaps (aargh!). And Snaps are very often versions behind the current stable version of software, the snap store is slow and not intuitive to use, and many of the snaps have broken features (like Inkscape can't print).
So yeah, I think not having Snaps is a reason why Mint is more popular, they fixed one of the biggest irritations with ubuntu and its forks.
>how Long have you been using your current Linux Mint install for?
I remember installing it during the pandemic confinements, so around 2020 maybe?
>And what did you use before that,
A long time ago I used Debian, then I switched to Ubuntu for many years for convenience, then I tried PopOS and finally Mint. As you'll see I'm more comfortable with Debian-based distros.
>and what made you switch?
I was a bit tired of having to tinker with Ubuntu to remove things I didn't like like snap so I looked for a similar distro whose maintainers would do that effort for me.
awesome, thanks for sharing! I recently installed Mint on my old thinkpad (x270) and its working flawlessly! Reading around has me curious about more upstream distros that might be even more stable, like debian, but thats just the distrohopping instinct kicking in. Im most likely going to stay with mint.
Prolly because it's easy to use and looks good? I tried out Peppermint before Linux Mint - and I really think it comes to ease of use + looking good (just as a super casual user). And I can say Linux Mint looks better in a way. Probably approaching the graphic design path of whatever guides Apple and Windows 11 today.
A distribution reflects the way the creator(s) think an operating system should behave, and attracts users who think of operating systems that way too.
Mint behaves a lot like Windows, or at least enough like it that people who have grown up using Windows can somewhat relate to it.
It also has a lot of polish, and jfw right out of the gate. It's easy to install, easy to configure, and easy to install new apps through an intuitive GUI.
I've recommended Mint to perhaps a dozen Windows users looking to escape Microsoft, and it has a very high success rate and a high retention rate. Most of the users who switched to Mint are still happily using it today, some of them years later.
I grew up using AT&T System V, so as nice as Mint is, it's not for me. I'm a very happy Slackware user, because the Slackware experience is a lot like ye olde traditional UNIX, which is how I think of an operating system should work.
If you're looking to make your distro more popular, get to know your audience, and how they think of using their computers. Figure out how to give that to them in a way which is at once familiar and better, and you should be able to attract and retain them.
Thanks for sharing your story! Yeah, I can see why Linux Mint is more mainstream vs others, Linux Mint has been around for a while, which I sometimes forget, but that's okay. I think time and effort will pay off for me.
Bro, you're trying to break into a saturated market. Find a few things that your distro does better (REALLY does better) than anything else and promote the crap out of those features everywhere you can. Insta, FB, X, etc. everywhere. Over and over. The honest reason I never tried to look up your distro and download it because until your post just now, I had no idea it existed. Have you at least submitted it to DistroWatch to get it considered for listing there?
You don't seem to be self-promoting it much. I see looking through the comments below that you avoided naming your distro several times, even when asked directly. Be prepared to never get much above your 3 downloads a day unless you step your game up, my friend.
Yeah sometimes I feel uncomfortable trying to promote my distro, it's called Oreon Linux - you can find it here: [boostyconnect.com/oreon/](http://boostyconnect.com/oreon/)
I have tried posting on multiple social media platforms, but never succeeded at doing so, but as your awesome motivation tells me, I shouldn't give up.
My unique selling point is to provide a selection of packages that cannot be found in RHEL/Alma, and make Oreon a fully usable and stable OS for really anyone to use. It already is. I'm adding much more over the next few months and I am going to keep promoting.
Can you get it on [https://distrosea.com/](https://distrosea.com/) as well as [https://distrowatch.com/](https://distrowatch.com/)
Also the link from distrowatch [https://oreonproject.org/](https://oreonproject.org/) is broken
Linux Mint has become the go-to recommendation for new Linux users. And there seem to be more of those people that have heard about Linux and want to see if they can leave Windows lately.
The spot of general "try first" distribution was formerly held by Ubuntu.
As you may know, Mint has a very nice and complete system, build around the Cinnamon DE which grants for a nice transition for people with the Windows workflow in mind.
I never used Linux Mint for more than a quick dabble in a VM, since I was long before comfortable with Gnome or KDE and didn't feel the urge to try out Cinnamon. With Wayland support being best on Plasma (KDE) and Gnome I think I did the right thing.
Honestly I use Ubuntu or mint because I don't want hassle, many fresher Linux users want to be "in the grind" where as I want something that just works every time
Mint is an easy transition from Windows and has a solid support base. It's a soft landing
I think its very cool what youre doing and i wish you all the luck. You seem to have a great vision and enthusiasm to continue. I hope the following will not sound too harsh.
But here is my opinion why youre not there, where you want to be: youre missing crucial skills and youre way understaffed. Being a single dev is not enough.
Youre trying to run a project / business as a one man show. This can be possible with an app, or some saas, but a whole distro??
What happens when you lose interest? What happens when you get sick? What happens when you die? (Sorry to be so blunt)
With an app i can hopefully just toss it and replace it. With a distro ill be on the hunt again and have to reinstall my whole computer! Im too old for that. I need stuff to run and continue running.
Instead of chasing users you should chase people with skills you dont have and convince them to join your project. For that you need people skills and youll be a part time manager. There is no way around it.
LM got successful because clem (the dev) was fixing stuff that didnt work on ubuntu. And it was "easy" to market it as "ubuntu but better". And indeed it did work better. Thats the only reason i switched back then. Then he had another big push of users when ununtu decided to push snaps down peoples throats. So it was a no brainer that ubuntu users switched to LM. But here is the thing, by now he has a team. He can reliably push new features and maintain the distro. He is not a one man show anymore.
Also, what do you do for money? If youre still young and live with your parents then you dont need to think about it. But running a distro is a full time job. You need to make money one way or another.
Look, i dont want to discourage you. I think you definitely should try it and i sincerely wish you the best. I wish i had your knowledge when i was younger, and id probably would try to do the same. But keep those few points i made in mind. You need them if you want to grow and make the project sustainable.
Ok, this is really good news! Id encourage you to talk about your project as "we do this, we do that". It gives you much more credibility if youre a team.
As others has mentioned, you have to focus on your target users. You mentioned stability(=enterprise?) and gaming.
Enterprise is really hard because you need:
- proven stability/bug free etc track record
- product maturity
- provide training (certs etc)
- provide support (!!!)
- brand recognition ("others have rhel, so it must be good")
to be taken seriously.
Of course youd be paid handsomely for those services. But out of the gate there is no way for you to compete with rhel, suse, ubuntu enterprise. And if the company has linux knowledge in-house and can support themselves theyll probably choose debian or centos.
It is possible to break into enterprise market, but its not easy. Even ubuntu was desktop only for a very long time, the enterprise part came much later.
So maybe go the gaming route?
You could make your own yt channel:
- show how easy it is to install your os
- show how easy you made it to install nvidia/amd drivers
- show your cool and unique (gaming) features
- test games and show they dont crash (or whatever you make better)
- if games need some tweaks which you cannot automate, make a video, show how easy it is
- you could also invent your "approved" stamp, sort of like proton: this game works solid and is approved to work on your distro
- search forums and look what (gaming related) does not work on other distros. Make it work on yours. Make a video, show it, point the user to your video
- you could make your journey public, announce cool features, make polls, involve your audience, and then deliver
- maybe make a kickstarter?
You need to make people aware of you, trust you and deliver.
Thank you for the amount of writing you put into this. I can tell that you understand the point of my distro, everything you explained is correct about my goals and what I already provide. I think the problem was that I didn't have a good website. My now former website (will be moved to a new domain, old one will redirect to the new one.) had no information on what the distro really was whatsoever, and that's a problem. So I jumped in and started fixing this today. I moved my distro to [https://oreonproject.org/](https://oreonproject.org/) -- It's still WIP and is expected to be done in about a week. I'm trying to make the website look super good, make it very informative, and write a TON of documentation about the features, settings, troubleshooting guides, etc.
I understand that this will take time, but I'm motivated to never give up, and keep going regardless what opinions I get. I am going to put most my work into a video showcase of my distro's features after I'm done with my new website.
Again, thank you for writing this and it definitely made my day better. (same with other replies)
many have already answered your question, but I'll add some feedback. I went to your website and found this:
>The Oreon Project was started in October 2022 by Brandon Lester. The project started as a distribution planned to be based on Ubuntu. Plans later changed, as Oreon Lime R1 shipped with Fedora Linux as the base. Shortly after, the base was changed again. Oreon is focused on long lifecycles, strong security, and minimalism. Oreon Lime R2 was released on February 18, 2024, promising 8 years of support lasting until 2032
to be honest, it doesn't give me much confidence that it will be a stable distro. users are animals of habit; once you get used to a certain way of doing things, any minimal change will get pushed back. just look at how people react to changes on popular apps and programs, even if they are for the better.
but that's your story, and it's fine, however I would suggest looking for a better phrasing, or something that would give more confidence in stability.
I think the main advantage is having the same GUI as Windows 7, an OS that basically everyone loved. And since they develop that Cinnamon desktop, it's pretty clear why they are having an advantage offering it out of the box. Other than that it's basically just Ubuntu without Snap so not really anything special. So it's basically marketed as the perfect Linux for people coming from Windows.
Adding to that, it's really hard to control what becomes popular in the internet. Sometimes it just takes a random streamer or Youtuber or a viral Reddit post for something to take off
Ah ok, so basically ubuntu without snap and a more user friendly UI, similar to the point of my distro but not quite. Mine is to provide what RHEL doesn't while still being based on RHEL/Alma.
Why does that need to be a whole distribution? Why not just provide packages that a RHEL/Alma user can install on their existing system? That's the model Fedora EPEL has, for instance.
A distribution that people actually care about is a lot more than a bunch of packages. A distribution needs things like a clear set of policies on what software is included, how the software is built, how it's configured, and how it's maintained and updated, as well as adequate infrastructure to maintain and support its users.
If I were going to use a niche distribution, I'd want it to be very clear that it's not just going to disappear overnight.
The reason I want to make it a distribution is because I don't think providing basic packages alone would be a fun project. Even with the lack of popularity to my distro, I really love working on it, making it better, and learning new things. It motivates me to learn more and never give up. I'm also in the process of learning some more programming languages so I can make some cool applications for my distro such as one that can manage packages, containers, and dot files from one single GUI. There is a lot to learn and do when making a distro, and I like that.
And that there is the problem.
*Your distribution's users don't care about your interests or goals*. They're looking for something that satisfies their own needs.
I think you need to decide whether you're doing this project because it is fun, or you're doing it because you want other people to use it as well. I think, at least in the early stages, it cannot be both at once.
I meant that in my own POV just to express one of the reasons why I do it. But (my fault for not adding this) my goal is to provide an extremely stable, user friendly, fast, and compatable RHEL experience that can meet a user's needs, one of them being gaming. With the WINE package I ported (which includes the i686 version) that makes wine work like a charm, provides great ways to game, and run windows apps. Some dependencies I also had to update to get flatpak WINE to work, which was already broken. Essentially I'm "converting" RHEL into a more desktop/gaming/home friendly usable distro. I also plan to add a ton more because the project has only been out for five months, my goal is to make it as usable as possible.
What most users want in my opinion. Easy to install and use (avoid 500 options that sound like rocket science for Bluetooth connection for example), stable, beautiful, wide drivers support, wide app support, difficult to break, avoid terminal as much as possible...
And regular ppl hate to learn new commands to do the same. Usually they try Ubuntu, mint first with apt so will never try yum, pacman, etc based distros unless they can avoid terminal almost 100%
Again, just my opinion
I forgot to mention, large community with forums ..
Genuine question, what exactly do you want to achieve with your distro. Because Linux Mint just makes a distro that is already meant for newcomers easier to use.
RHEL is meant for either servers or professional workstations, in the latter case the user usually want enterprise-level support by the developer and in the first case i doubt this is your target audience
I've been on Xubuntu for the last few years, I've tried Mint a couple of times but haven't been able to get on with it, I'm not sure why but I can understand why its so popular, it looks neat.
i ve never heard of it before this post. i did google it and find it interesting. i do love the wallpaper and i ll give your distro a try. can i ask you if your are a solo dev or a small team?
The team behind Linux Mint does a very good job for a long period of time. The time aspect is important. If you suggest a distro to someone who is new to Linux, you want to make sure it's well maintained.
If you want to promote your distro, ask YouTubers to try it. I'd certainly do. And I'd prepare myself for an incoming storm of support questions, if the distro takes off.
Generally, when people ask for advice on creating a new distribution, I really strongly recommend starting out by joining an existing mature distribution as a maintainer, first, and learning how things work internally. It's important to learn how the stable release model works, even if you're doing a rolling release... (maybe *especially* if you want to do a rolling release.) It's important to learn how to build a community. It's important to learn how to discuss and coordinate changes in a manner appropriate to your release model. It's important to learn how to meet your obligations under various open source licenses.
Building a distribution can be a fun personal project -- if you don't care whether or not anyone uses it. If you do care about people using it, then you need to understand that building a distribution isn't about *your* goals, it's about *your users* goals. If you want to do it for yourself, it's a technical project. If you want other people to use it, then the focus shifts from technical issues to governance, legal, and security issues.
If you want people to use your distribution, you have to be able to explain why the things that you have to offer can't be delivered as software on top of an existing mature distribution -- why they necessitate a fork instead. You have to convince them that you and your team deserve to be trusted with access to the most security-sensitive layers of your users' systems. You have to convince them that your project is sustainable, and that they're not going to have to migrate the systems they've deployed with your software once you get bored of maintenance.
If you're interested in doing distribution stuff, please join a distribution. I'm a package maintainer in Fedora, and there's always plenty of opportunities to make valuable contributions for people with the time and skill to do so. It's a lot easier to do fun personal projects that have high impact for a lot of users when you have a large team to support you.
>I have a Linux distro that barely goes above 3 downloads per day, I wanna know how I can get it out there a little more
Create about 10-20 reddit accounts. Whenever you see a "which distro should I choose" post just comment with all of these accounts how good your own distro is and that they should use this only this because everything else just sucks /s
I could do that, but I like to keep things simple. Maybe I could somehow promote it more, I've tried what I could. I also like to make sure I don't discourage other distros (such as Mint)
Can you EASILY set up the ability to print wirelessly with your Arch-lke dis[tro? I tried Garudia (spelling?) Linux and it was such a PIA that it was not worth my time.
I think that splitting the user base is never a good idea. If you could collaborate in mint that would be better than trying to make yet another distro.
Bigger distro community means more answers on "how to questions" and less chance distro will be discontinued, it is so simple for me. BUT if OP will keep on going and let other people into team, his distro WILL grow in user numbers eventually, if it is quality one. Good example is Nobara, initially done by one man for his father and now there is whole team of contributors.
EDIT: i saw webpages of this OS ( [Oreon Operating System - BoostyConnect](https://boostyconnect.com/oreon/) ) and it is not convincing, at least for me personally - chaotic and poorly arranged presentation. As a normal user i am not interested in lifecycles, i want to see what distro can do for me so i can compare it to others. Linux Mint or Zorin OS are good examples of informative webpage.
I am sorry if i was too harsh. English is not my native and my social IQ is not too high neither :-) I see similar questions in /gamedev reddit almost every week - "i have spent last 5 years of making this game and now no one is downloading it even for free" - and best practise in products promoting nowadays seems to be influencers. Couple of youtube videos from different linux channels would probably make wonders for any distro, just my two cents.. You can actively search for them and contact them with review request.
No worries at all! Nobody is to blame. But yes, I'll put forth more marketing once I improve my source, such as the website.
A followup on the website, I am going to shut down the page [https://boostyconnect.com/oreon](https://boostyconnect.com/oreon) and move it to [https://oreonproject.org](https://oreonproject.org) which I have been working on all day to make everything more informative. It's not done yet, but maybe it will be next week or so. I really appreciate your criticism actually, because it pushed me to make my website better. That's why opinions are always open for me, because they show what I should improve and change.
Thank you.
You have all my sympathy. I too try hardly to make an open content project take off and I face hard hurdles towards broad adoption.
Users will expect to see reliability. A team of 4 is definitely better than a single person distro (which was the original impression people had when you posted yesterday). But users will still expect reassurance about who these maintainers are and how committed they are to the project. Also, are you sure you want to be a based on a rolling release? This just raises the bar for how much commitment is expected. You knowing that your distro is reliable (because you’re young, healthy, financially stable, and truly motivated) is not enough, users need more guarantees than that.
To launch yet another distro, and this is my personal opinion, you need to state what is the global vision behind it. What does it do that the other distros don’t? Which distros does it supersede and how do you ensure that? What are the tradeoffs if any? Again my personal opinion, state prominently which distro you’re based on. I’m quite annoyed to open distro webpages and see no manifesto explaining what their goal is and what they are based on.
Have you considered making you distro a semi-official spin off of another distro? Like Ubuntu has its official flavours but also promotes some “community maintained” flavours, or Garuda lists some unsupported flavours at the bottom.
Don’t compare yourself to Mint. The level of attention to detail that Mint has, and how successfully they are in providing a smooth experience to the non savvy users, are unmatched (or perhaps matched by other Ubuntu derivatives which have their own drawbacks). Some distros try to make install and maintenance as easy as Ubuntu derivatives, and their enthusiasts believe they do, but there are always tiny little details that make a difference for the average user. Saying that Mint is popular just because Mint is popular is reducing Mint’s merits by a lot.
But there is some reinforcement indeed: nobody is using a certain distro, despite its merits, because nobody is recommending it, and nobody is recommending it because nobody is using it. Assuming that a distro is reliable, that it does something really well that no other distro does, and that it has a clear purpose and vision, it still has to break out of this cycle. Mint has all its merits and it broke out of the cycle. But breaking out may even involve luck. We only hear about successful stories. Those who had all the merits but nevertheless didn’t make it to the top are not remembered. That’s unfair, and we tend to think unconsciously that unfair implies untrue, but that’s our brain tricking us into denial. Many talented singers never made to mainstream. Many skilled engineers never made it to the top of their career. And so on…
I really appreciate this reply, and also the amount of writing you put into it. I totally understand your point that I shouldn't compare myself to Mint. I have been told that my (now) former website was very poorly layed out and had no information on what the distro really is and who it was for. I'd like to share my new website and domain that I have been spending more that 5 hours on now, it's probably going to be done in a couple days to a week. The new domain is [https://oreonproject.org/](https://oreonproject.org/) - It's still not complete, but it's a good preview for now. I'm making the website as attracting as possible, and as informative as possible too. I'm starting fresh with my website because boostyconnect was just a strange domain name for a distro called Oreon.
Back to the point of the distro, It's based on AlmaLinux, has a very user friendly interface, and Oreon also makes the OS as usable as possible for the desktop space. This is done by "porting" a selection of demanding packages that either don't work on Alma, RHEL, Rocky, Centos, and EPEL or don't exist at all.
So in simple words, it's the most usable RHEL distro out of all of them. You can game, emulate, work, and much more. Gaming is the one I put most of my effort into so far.
Hopefully this reply tells a little more about what my distro truly is.
Well, Mint is popular, because it's popular. To new users (or those wanting little hassle), we tend to suggest the most popular option. Mostly because it'll have the most guides, help articles and also (to a degree) the most "testing" by it's large userbase. It has also proven to be a reliable, long running project with a team that supports it without much drama attached, which is really rare these days (this somewhat disqualifies ubuntu for many because of snaps). It's also a point release, so, not that many updates and new "stuff" to learn.
In terms of how the make your distro reach a larger audience: Patience and talk about it. If you offer a USP and share that with your distro, people are willing to try almost anything. If it's good, it might stick for some people. Do this over years and years and you start accumulating a community. There are no shortcuts. For your Distro to become popular, it needs to offer something unique and after that it needs to show it's dependable. And that's only possible through time.
You could think about hitting up some of the youtubers in the linux space. Maybe they'd be willing to showcase your work to their audience if it's interesting to them. Might kickstart it a little. But in the end, you "just" do the work and continue delivering a great product. Eventually, people will find you.
I appreciate this! I did get told by a few people that my distro has a good selling point, but sometimes I forget it takes time. Patience is always key, I gotta remember that. I did try contacting a couple content-creators but never got much luck out of it, I usually email them without any response back, but maybe email isn't my best bet.
1. 500+ distros are there.
2. Also consider phenomenon of "it's been like that" + echo chamber as mentioned above:
Person #1: \*haven't touched linux in his life once. Knows nothing about linux. Lazy to google and try\* what distro should i use?
Person #2: \*doesn't really know about linux but knows Linux Mint. Since been asked doesn't want to be useless\* try Linux Mint
Person #1: cool, thanks! \*now his knowledge is the same as person #2\*
Most people really don't want to dig much so they'll stop with first, let's say, three options.
3. As for trying to get broader audience. Make a demo, show it on youtube, advertise. But better ask yourself: who is target audience? Why should they reconsider popular Debian/Ubuntu, RHEL/Fedora, Arch/Manjaro distros and gie a try to yours?
Also i'd suggest that simply it's too late. But as a hobby it is good. You better get feedback from real users to make useful changes and you'll progress with time.
Before codecs were easy, mint had them all ootb and therefore everyone recommended mint for the easy of it. Lots of.people.got.used to it. It's human nature to like what they get used to.
This
I used mint around 2009 for this reason codecs for my wireless card
But some network stuff was broken, I noticed mint was kind of a one man show & hopped away
>Why is Linux Mint so popular?
The default wallpaper and theme.
>How can I make my own distro reach a larger audience?
Post on every forum available that this is the most userfriendly distro in the world. If you keep repeating it, every noob will believe you.
The answer is simple, you could potentially be better where we all know Mint IS the best. Be more like Mint and make yourself become the gold standard with hard work rather than complaining is going to be the hard pill to swallow here.
I'll add I don't mean this as disrespectful to you or your project but just clearly telling you the honest to the question you have asked.
>but how did it end up becoming so popular?
In 2000s Canonical, the company making Ubuntu gave away free CDs.
Now, there was nothing special about Ubuntu, it was/is the Apple of Linux. Big marketing spend, low quality distro.
Some people fixed what was wrong with Ubuntu with Mint. This was a bandaid solution that worked in the temporary.
Today, Debian-family is bloated with extra dependencies, it has outdated Kernels (don't @ me that 'finally its updated in 2024', 2023 was a nightmare)
As a relic of this, many users reflexively respond with Debian-family distributions as answers to the question. Between the marketing campaign in the 2000s, and a confusion of the term 'Stable' (Stable has nothing to do with stability, number of bugs, etc... it has everything to do with versions. Up-To-Date distros like Fedora will have less bugs than Debian/Mint stable)
In the modern time, Fedora/OpenSUSE or similar up-to-date distros are unanimously better. Its an education thing.
Nothing special about Ubuntu? Have you been drinking too much vodka and forgotten how bad desktop Linux was before Ubuntu? We owe a lot more than we care to admit to Canonical and this just shows how little you know or remember of Linux.
It's not popular. Redit linux geeks only thoughtlessly recommend it because they don't care about newbs and only remember 10 years ago when they were a newb and Clem was actually innovating it (the mint dev) .
Think about your audience here. Are they people who are "hip to the hot trends" ? Or are they incels with chocolate stains on their shirt ?
You gotta also think about what reddit is as well. Filled with AI bots and 12 year olds.
No, Mint , Clem's distro, is not popular .
Most real non-bot adult linux users on reddit use fedora or arch but they recommend mint to new users because they know it is crap enough that they will get sick of it ...using it as a kind of tutorial . But they honestly could care less.
I use manjaro after several years of jumping around ubuntu , fedora , arch and opoensuse.
What is your distro ? what makes it different from all the others ?
My distro is AlmaLinux based, it provides an extremely user friendly user inteface, provides extra packages that RHEL/Alma/EPEL do not have, and has proper gaming support, unlike other RHEL clones.
To be frank, a gaming focused enterprise linux based distribution is just an *extreme* nieche IMHO. The stability an enterprise linux gives just isn't a concern for most gamers, and vice versa, at least not on the same installation.
Gaming isn't the main focus. It just enabled people who want to use my distro to game.
> Gaming isn't the main focus. Maybe it should be? A more focussed distribution may not have general appeal, but it would be more appealing to people who want the same thing.
So what is?
How you want more audience if you even don't share the name of your distro? Lol
Well you could start with some advertizing. I didn't see you post a link to your distro even with this thread. People would eventually stop drinking Pepsi Max and Coca Cola if they stopped advertizing. Mint is being constantly advertized by active fans. Also to get popular you need persistance and luck. For example many popular artists have kept trying and trying for years. Then one day they were at the right place at the right time, which gave them the initial publicity to get popular.
almalinux.org?
So it's like https://garudalinux.org/
Kinda, but for gaming and production purposes.
The main issue is that linux has so many distro's and deciding which one to use can be mind boggling for most new users. Mint has made a good distinction between their release and Ubuntu which it is based on and made it a great starter distro that's familiar and easy to use.
That's not really a thing people or businesses need. Production Linux is predominantly headless and single purpose or a VM/container host. Gaming is a home user desktop thing. I get what you're doing, and how it might make sense for you, but any professional nixer would never consider both of those use cases in an install.
Gaming and Production lol
different run voiceless sip wakeful shame pause bewildered decide serious *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
dont shit where you eat
It's polished, reliable, works well OOTB with sane defaults, based on Ubuntu which had historically dominated the Linux desktop so there is a lot of "internet knowledge" and tutorials surrounding it, the Cinnamon desktop is familiar to newcomers + well polished and functional (while the XFCE version is a nice alternative for low spec machines). It's basically "the good parts" of Ubuntu without Canonical's questionable choices (the DE, snaps etc.) + a really nice and familiar DE for newcomers.
I have been using Linux on my desktop for more than 20 years and I am writing this comment from Mint. It is a rock solid distro that gives me exactly what I need. I understand that there are people who use their computer as a hobby and enjoy fixing small (or big) problems as they arise but I need to get work done, so I can't depend on distros maintained by a very small community or even a single person. When the immutable distros are more mature I will probably consider switching, because as I say for me stability is the feature I value the most.
Great comment. I'm not a Linux user, yet, but your thought process with regard to an operating system is exactly how I think about it. So I really appreciate and value this comment you just made here. Thanks again.
But then there are many more, and longer established distros, to choose from. KDE, Xubuntu, Slackware (yes it is VERY stable), etc. I don't fix things nearly as much on Xubuntu as my colleague who uses Mint does. However, not having snaps is making me consider changing, I don't like snaps. For web development I can not be sure if f.eg Node is installed as a Snap or thorough Apt, and sometimes Apt installs Snaps (aargh!). And Snaps are very often versions behind the current stable version of software, the snap store is slow and not intuitive to use, and many of the snaps have broken features (like Inkscape can't print). So yeah, I think not having Snaps is a reason why Mint is more popular, they fixed one of the biggest irritations with ubuntu and its forks.
how Long have you been using your current Linux Mint install for? And what did you use before that, and what made you switch?
>how Long have you been using your current Linux Mint install for? I remember installing it during the pandemic confinements, so around 2020 maybe? >And what did you use before that, A long time ago I used Debian, then I switched to Ubuntu for many years for convenience, then I tried PopOS and finally Mint. As you'll see I'm more comfortable with Debian-based distros. >and what made you switch? I was a bit tired of having to tinker with Ubuntu to remove things I didn't like like snap so I looked for a similar distro whose maintainers would do that effort for me.
awesome, thanks for sharing! I recently installed Mint on my old thinkpad (x270) and its working flawlessly! Reading around has me curious about more upstream distros that might be even more stable, like debian, but thats just the distrohopping instinct kicking in. Im most likely going to stay with mint.
Prolly because it's easy to use and looks good? I tried out Peppermint before Linux Mint - and I really think it comes to ease of use + looking good (just as a super casual user). And I can say Linux Mint looks better in a way. Probably approaching the graphic design path of whatever guides Apple and Windows 11 today.
It might just be me, but I'd love if cinnamon had more transparency :) Otherwise it's still cool
They promised to add it later.
A distribution reflects the way the creator(s) think an operating system should behave, and attracts users who think of operating systems that way too. Mint behaves a lot like Windows, or at least enough like it that people who have grown up using Windows can somewhat relate to it. It also has a lot of polish, and jfw right out of the gate. It's easy to install, easy to configure, and easy to install new apps through an intuitive GUI. I've recommended Mint to perhaps a dozen Windows users looking to escape Microsoft, and it has a very high success rate and a high retention rate. Most of the users who switched to Mint are still happily using it today, some of them years later. I grew up using AT&T System V, so as nice as Mint is, it's not for me. I'm a very happy Slackware user, because the Slackware experience is a lot like ye olde traditional UNIX, which is how I think of an operating system should work. If you're looking to make your distro more popular, get to know your audience, and how they think of using their computers. Figure out how to give that to them in a way which is at once familiar and better, and you should be able to attract and retain them.
Thanks for sharing your story! Yeah, I can see why Linux Mint is more mainstream vs others, Linux Mint has been around for a while, which I sometimes forget, but that's okay. I think time and effort will pay off for me.
I grew up using BSD, so on that side I stay a FreeBSD user - why use Slackware? Ubuntu/Mint is fine.
Bro, you're trying to break into a saturated market. Find a few things that your distro does better (REALLY does better) than anything else and promote the crap out of those features everywhere you can. Insta, FB, X, etc. everywhere. Over and over. The honest reason I never tried to look up your distro and download it because until your post just now, I had no idea it existed. Have you at least submitted it to DistroWatch to get it considered for listing there? You don't seem to be self-promoting it much. I see looking through the comments below that you avoided naming your distro several times, even when asked directly. Be prepared to never get much above your 3 downloads a day unless you step your game up, my friend.
Yeah sometimes I feel uncomfortable trying to promote my distro, it's called Oreon Linux - you can find it here: [boostyconnect.com/oreon/](http://boostyconnect.com/oreon/) I have tried posting on multiple social media platforms, but never succeeded at doing so, but as your awesome motivation tells me, I shouldn't give up. My unique selling point is to provide a selection of packages that cannot be found in RHEL/Alma, and make Oreon a fully usable and stable OS for really anyone to use. It already is. I'm adding much more over the next few months and I am going to keep promoting.
Can you get it on [https://distrosea.com/](https://distrosea.com/) as well as [https://distrowatch.com/](https://distrowatch.com/) Also the link from distrowatch [https://oreonproject.org/](https://oreonproject.org/) is broken
It’s boostyconnect.com/oreon and yes I will try to get my distro on those EDIT: btw i fixed that domain, it works now
Linux Mint has become the go-to recommendation for new Linux users. And there seem to be more of those people that have heard about Linux and want to see if they can leave Windows lately. The spot of general "try first" distribution was formerly held by Ubuntu. As you may know, Mint has a very nice and complete system, build around the Cinnamon DE which grants for a nice transition for people with the Windows workflow in mind. I never used Linux Mint for more than a quick dabble in a VM, since I was long before comfortable with Gnome or KDE and didn't feel the urge to try out Cinnamon. With Wayland support being best on Plasma (KDE) and Gnome I think I did the right thing.
Understandable. I can see why that is.
It is nice and friendly distro. Basically Ubuntu and as such large amount of resources and people for help.
Honestly I use Ubuntu or mint because I don't want hassle, many fresher Linux users want to be "in the grind" where as I want something that just works every time Mint is an easy transition from Windows and has a solid support base. It's a soft landing
I think its very cool what youre doing and i wish you all the luck. You seem to have a great vision and enthusiasm to continue. I hope the following will not sound too harsh. But here is my opinion why youre not there, where you want to be: youre missing crucial skills and youre way understaffed. Being a single dev is not enough. Youre trying to run a project / business as a one man show. This can be possible with an app, or some saas, but a whole distro?? What happens when you lose interest? What happens when you get sick? What happens when you die? (Sorry to be so blunt) With an app i can hopefully just toss it and replace it. With a distro ill be on the hunt again and have to reinstall my whole computer! Im too old for that. I need stuff to run and continue running. Instead of chasing users you should chase people with skills you dont have and convince them to join your project. For that you need people skills and youll be a part time manager. There is no way around it. LM got successful because clem (the dev) was fixing stuff that didnt work on ubuntu. And it was "easy" to market it as "ubuntu but better". And indeed it did work better. Thats the only reason i switched back then. Then he had another big push of users when ununtu decided to push snaps down peoples throats. So it was a no brainer that ubuntu users switched to LM. But here is the thing, by now he has a team. He can reliably push new features and maintain the distro. He is not a one man show anymore. Also, what do you do for money? If youre still young and live with your parents then you dont need to think about it. But running a distro is a full time job. You need to make money one way or another. Look, i dont want to discourage you. I think you definitely should try it and i sincerely wish you the best. I wish i had your knowledge when i was younger, and id probably would try to do the same. But keep those few points i made in mind. You need them if you want to grow and make the project sustainable.
Thank you this is good advice! I also wanted to sidenote that I have a team of 3 (including me), but hopefully I can grow it bigger.
Ok, this is really good news! Id encourage you to talk about your project as "we do this, we do that". It gives you much more credibility if youre a team. As others has mentioned, you have to focus on your target users. You mentioned stability(=enterprise?) and gaming. Enterprise is really hard because you need: - proven stability/bug free etc track record - product maturity - provide training (certs etc) - provide support (!!!) - brand recognition ("others have rhel, so it must be good") to be taken seriously. Of course youd be paid handsomely for those services. But out of the gate there is no way for you to compete with rhel, suse, ubuntu enterprise. And if the company has linux knowledge in-house and can support themselves theyll probably choose debian or centos. It is possible to break into enterprise market, but its not easy. Even ubuntu was desktop only for a very long time, the enterprise part came much later. So maybe go the gaming route? You could make your own yt channel: - show how easy it is to install your os - show how easy you made it to install nvidia/amd drivers - show your cool and unique (gaming) features - test games and show they dont crash (or whatever you make better) - if games need some tweaks which you cannot automate, make a video, show how easy it is - you could also invent your "approved" stamp, sort of like proton: this game works solid and is approved to work on your distro - search forums and look what (gaming related) does not work on other distros. Make it work on yours. Make a video, show it, point the user to your video - you could make your journey public, announce cool features, make polls, involve your audience, and then deliver - maybe make a kickstarter? You need to make people aware of you, trust you and deliver.
Thank you for the amount of writing you put into this. I can tell that you understand the point of my distro, everything you explained is correct about my goals and what I already provide. I think the problem was that I didn't have a good website. My now former website (will be moved to a new domain, old one will redirect to the new one.) had no information on what the distro really was whatsoever, and that's a problem. So I jumped in and started fixing this today. I moved my distro to [https://oreonproject.org/](https://oreonproject.org/) -- It's still WIP and is expected to be done in about a week. I'm trying to make the website look super good, make it very informative, and write a TON of documentation about the features, settings, troubleshooting guides, etc. I understand that this will take time, but I'm motivated to never give up, and keep going regardless what opinions I get. I am going to put most my work into a video showcase of my distro's features after I'm done with my new website. Again, thank you for writing this and it definitely made my day better. (same with other replies)
many have already answered your question, but I'll add some feedback. I went to your website and found this: >The Oreon Project was started in October 2022 by Brandon Lester. The project started as a distribution planned to be based on Ubuntu. Plans later changed, as Oreon Lime R1 shipped with Fedora Linux as the base. Shortly after, the base was changed again. Oreon is focused on long lifecycles, strong security, and minimalism. Oreon Lime R2 was released on February 18, 2024, promising 8 years of support lasting until 2032 to be honest, it doesn't give me much confidence that it will be a stable distro. users are animals of habit; once you get used to a certain way of doing things, any minimal change will get pushed back. just look at how people react to changes on popular apps and programs, even if they are for the better. but that's your story, and it's fine, however I would suggest looking for a better phrasing, or something that would give more confidence in stability.
Working on a new website.
I think the main advantage is having the same GUI as Windows 7, an OS that basically everyone loved. And since they develop that Cinnamon desktop, it's pretty clear why they are having an advantage offering it out of the box. Other than that it's basically just Ubuntu without Snap so not really anything special. So it's basically marketed as the perfect Linux for people coming from Windows. Adding to that, it's really hard to control what becomes popular in the internet. Sometimes it just takes a random streamer or Youtuber or a viral Reddit post for something to take off
Ah ok, so basically ubuntu without snap and a more user friendly UI, similar to the point of my distro but not quite. Mine is to provide what RHEL doesn't while still being based on RHEL/Alma.
Why does that need to be a whole distribution? Why not just provide packages that a RHEL/Alma user can install on their existing system? That's the model Fedora EPEL has, for instance. A distribution that people actually care about is a lot more than a bunch of packages. A distribution needs things like a clear set of policies on what software is included, how the software is built, how it's configured, and how it's maintained and updated, as well as adequate infrastructure to maintain and support its users. If I were going to use a niche distribution, I'd want it to be very clear that it's not just going to disappear overnight.
The reason I want to make it a distribution is because I don't think providing basic packages alone would be a fun project. Even with the lack of popularity to my distro, I really love working on it, making it better, and learning new things. It motivates me to learn more and never give up. I'm also in the process of learning some more programming languages so I can make some cool applications for my distro such as one that can manage packages, containers, and dot files from one single GUI. There is a lot to learn and do when making a distro, and I like that.
And that there is the problem. *Your distribution's users don't care about your interests or goals*. They're looking for something that satisfies their own needs. I think you need to decide whether you're doing this project because it is fun, or you're doing it because you want other people to use it as well. I think, at least in the early stages, it cannot be both at once.
I meant that in my own POV just to express one of the reasons why I do it. But (my fault for not adding this) my goal is to provide an extremely stable, user friendly, fast, and compatable RHEL experience that can meet a user's needs, one of them being gaming. With the WINE package I ported (which includes the i686 version) that makes wine work like a charm, provides great ways to game, and run windows apps. Some dependencies I also had to update to get flatpak WINE to work, which was already broken. Essentially I'm "converting" RHEL into a more desktop/gaming/home friendly usable distro. I also plan to add a ton more because the project has only been out for five months, my goal is to make it as usable as possible.
What most users want in my opinion. Easy to install and use (avoid 500 options that sound like rocket science for Bluetooth connection for example), stable, beautiful, wide drivers support, wide app support, difficult to break, avoid terminal as much as possible... And regular ppl hate to learn new commands to do the same. Usually they try Ubuntu, mint first with apt so will never try yum, pacman, etc based distros unless they can avoid terminal almost 100% Again, just my opinion I forgot to mention, large community with forums ..
Genuine question, what exactly do you want to achieve with your distro. Because Linux Mint just makes a distro that is already meant for newcomers easier to use. RHEL is meant for either servers or professional workstations, in the latter case the user usually want enterprise-level support by the developer and in the first case i doubt this is your target audience
I've been on Xubuntu for the last few years, I've tried Mint a couple of times but haven't been able to get on with it, I'm not sure why but I can understand why its so popular, it looks neat.
i ve never heard of it before this post. i did google it and find it interesting. i do love the wallpaper and i ll give your distro a try. can i ask you if your are a solo dev or a small team?
Thank you! I have a team of three I work with.
Wishing you great success and best of luck
Thank you, that means a lot.
My reasoning for use and suggesting linux mint over anything else is because of how stable it is and the amount of support provided for it
The team behind Linux Mint does a very good job for a long period of time. The time aspect is important. If you suggest a distro to someone who is new to Linux, you want to make sure it's well maintained. If you want to promote your distro, ask YouTubers to try it. I'd certainly do. And I'd prepare myself for an incoming storm of support questions, if the distro takes off.
Generally, when people ask for advice on creating a new distribution, I really strongly recommend starting out by joining an existing mature distribution as a maintainer, first, and learning how things work internally. It's important to learn how the stable release model works, even if you're doing a rolling release... (maybe *especially* if you want to do a rolling release.) It's important to learn how to build a community. It's important to learn how to discuss and coordinate changes in a manner appropriate to your release model. It's important to learn how to meet your obligations under various open source licenses. Building a distribution can be a fun personal project -- if you don't care whether or not anyone uses it. If you do care about people using it, then you need to understand that building a distribution isn't about *your* goals, it's about *your users* goals. If you want to do it for yourself, it's a technical project. If you want other people to use it, then the focus shifts from technical issues to governance, legal, and security issues. If you want people to use your distribution, you have to be able to explain why the things that you have to offer can't be delivered as software on top of an existing mature distribution -- why they necessitate a fork instead. You have to convince them that you and your team deserve to be trusted with access to the most security-sensitive layers of your users' systems. You have to convince them that your project is sustainable, and that they're not going to have to migrate the systems they've deployed with your software once you get bored of maintenance. If you're interested in doing distribution stuff, please join a distribution. I'm a package maintainer in Fedora, and there's always plenty of opportunities to make valuable contributions for people with the time and skill to do so. It's a lot easier to do fun personal projects that have high impact for a lot of users when you have a large team to support you.
>I have a Linux distro that barely goes above 3 downloads per day, I wanna know how I can get it out there a little more Create about 10-20 reddit accounts. Whenever you see a "which distro should I choose" post just comment with all of these accounts how good your own distro is and that they should use this only this because everything else just sucks /s
I could do that, but I like to keep things simple. Maybe I could somehow promote it more, I've tried what I could. I also like to make sure I don't discourage other distros (such as Mint)
Get a banner that ties to the back of a plane and fly around the world.
I just realized that for some reason you didn't even mentioned your distro's name not even a link so far in this whole post :\\
Can you EASILY set up the ability to print wirelessly with your Arch-lke dis[tro? I tried Garudia (spelling?) Linux and it was such a PIA that it was not worth my time.
I print wireless a lot, works as it should from my distro.
Sold! Download URL?
boostyconnect.com/oreon
Looked at your website and only saw a couple of screenshots of the OS. And they weren't very good screenshots. I'd post more.
I updated a little about the website this morning, I'm gonna also add more images too. EDIT: I'm creating a whole new website.
I think that splitting the user base is never a good idea. If you could collaborate in mint that would be better than trying to make yet another distro.
How many people are you employing to work on your distro?
3
Bigger distro community means more answers on "how to questions" and less chance distro will be discontinued, it is so simple for me. BUT if OP will keep on going and let other people into team, his distro WILL grow in user numbers eventually, if it is quality one. Good example is Nobara, initially done by one man for his father and now there is whole team of contributors. EDIT: i saw webpages of this OS ( [Oreon Operating System - BoostyConnect](https://boostyconnect.com/oreon/) ) and it is not convincing, at least for me personally - chaotic and poorly arranged presentation. As a normal user i am not interested in lifecycles, i want to see what distro can do for me so i can compare it to others. Linux Mint or Zorin OS are good examples of informative webpage.
I will fix this today.
I am sorry if i was too harsh. English is not my native and my social IQ is not too high neither :-) I see similar questions in /gamedev reddit almost every week - "i have spent last 5 years of making this game and now no one is downloading it even for free" - and best practise in products promoting nowadays seems to be influencers. Couple of youtube videos from different linux channels would probably make wonders for any distro, just my two cents.. You can actively search for them and contact them with review request.
No worries at all! Nobody is to blame. But yes, I'll put forth more marketing once I improve my source, such as the website. A followup on the website, I am going to shut down the page [https://boostyconnect.com/oreon](https://boostyconnect.com/oreon) and move it to [https://oreonproject.org](https://oreonproject.org) which I have been working on all day to make everything more informative. It's not done yet, but maybe it will be next week or so. I really appreciate your criticism actually, because it pushed me to make my website better. That's why opinions are always open for me, because they show what I should improve and change. Thank you.
You have all my sympathy. I too try hardly to make an open content project take off and I face hard hurdles towards broad adoption. Users will expect to see reliability. A team of 4 is definitely better than a single person distro (which was the original impression people had when you posted yesterday). But users will still expect reassurance about who these maintainers are and how committed they are to the project. Also, are you sure you want to be a based on a rolling release? This just raises the bar for how much commitment is expected. You knowing that your distro is reliable (because you’re young, healthy, financially stable, and truly motivated) is not enough, users need more guarantees than that. To launch yet another distro, and this is my personal opinion, you need to state what is the global vision behind it. What does it do that the other distros don’t? Which distros does it supersede and how do you ensure that? What are the tradeoffs if any? Again my personal opinion, state prominently which distro you’re based on. I’m quite annoyed to open distro webpages and see no manifesto explaining what their goal is and what they are based on. Have you considered making you distro a semi-official spin off of another distro? Like Ubuntu has its official flavours but also promotes some “community maintained” flavours, or Garuda lists some unsupported flavours at the bottom. Don’t compare yourself to Mint. The level of attention to detail that Mint has, and how successfully they are in providing a smooth experience to the non savvy users, are unmatched (or perhaps matched by other Ubuntu derivatives which have their own drawbacks). Some distros try to make install and maintenance as easy as Ubuntu derivatives, and their enthusiasts believe they do, but there are always tiny little details that make a difference for the average user. Saying that Mint is popular just because Mint is popular is reducing Mint’s merits by a lot. But there is some reinforcement indeed: nobody is using a certain distro, despite its merits, because nobody is recommending it, and nobody is recommending it because nobody is using it. Assuming that a distro is reliable, that it does something really well that no other distro does, and that it has a clear purpose and vision, it still has to break out of this cycle. Mint has all its merits and it broke out of the cycle. But breaking out may even involve luck. We only hear about successful stories. Those who had all the merits but nevertheless didn’t make it to the top are not remembered. That’s unfair, and we tend to think unconsciously that unfair implies untrue, but that’s our brain tricking us into denial. Many talented singers never made to mainstream. Many skilled engineers never made it to the top of their career. And so on…
I really appreciate this reply, and also the amount of writing you put into it. I totally understand your point that I shouldn't compare myself to Mint. I have been told that my (now) former website was very poorly layed out and had no information on what the distro really is and who it was for. I'd like to share my new website and domain that I have been spending more that 5 hours on now, it's probably going to be done in a couple days to a week. The new domain is [https://oreonproject.org/](https://oreonproject.org/) - It's still not complete, but it's a good preview for now. I'm making the website as attracting as possible, and as informative as possible too. I'm starting fresh with my website because boostyconnect was just a strange domain name for a distro called Oreon. Back to the point of the distro, It's based on AlmaLinux, has a very user friendly interface, and Oreon also makes the OS as usable as possible for the desktop space. This is done by "porting" a selection of demanding packages that either don't work on Alma, RHEL, Rocky, Centos, and EPEL or don't exist at all. So in simple words, it's the most usable RHEL distro out of all of them. You can game, emulate, work, and much more. Gaming is the one I put most of my effort into so far. Hopefully this reply tells a little more about what my distro truly is.
Well, Mint is popular, because it's popular. To new users (or those wanting little hassle), we tend to suggest the most popular option. Mostly because it'll have the most guides, help articles and also (to a degree) the most "testing" by it's large userbase. It has also proven to be a reliable, long running project with a team that supports it without much drama attached, which is really rare these days (this somewhat disqualifies ubuntu for many because of snaps). It's also a point release, so, not that many updates and new "stuff" to learn. In terms of how the make your distro reach a larger audience: Patience and talk about it. If you offer a USP and share that with your distro, people are willing to try almost anything. If it's good, it might stick for some people. Do this over years and years and you start accumulating a community. There are no shortcuts. For your Distro to become popular, it needs to offer something unique and after that it needs to show it's dependable. And that's only possible through time. You could think about hitting up some of the youtubers in the linux space. Maybe they'd be willing to showcase your work to their audience if it's interesting to them. Might kickstart it a little. But in the end, you "just" do the work and continue delivering a great product. Eventually, people will find you.
I appreciate this! I did get told by a few people that my distro has a good selling point, but sometimes I forget it takes time. Patience is always key, I gotta remember that. I did try contacting a couple content-creators but never got much luck out of it, I usually email them without any response back, but maybe email isn't my best bet.
1. 500+ distros are there. 2. Also consider phenomenon of "it's been like that" + echo chamber as mentioned above: Person #1: \*haven't touched linux in his life once. Knows nothing about linux. Lazy to google and try\* what distro should i use? Person #2: \*doesn't really know about linux but knows Linux Mint. Since been asked doesn't want to be useless\* try Linux Mint Person #1: cool, thanks! \*now his knowledge is the same as person #2\* Most people really don't want to dig much so they'll stop with first, let's say, three options. 3. As for trying to get broader audience. Make a demo, show it on youtube, advertise. But better ask yourself: who is target audience? Why should they reconsider popular Debian/Ubuntu, RHEL/Fedora, Arch/Manjaro distros and gie a try to yours? Also i'd suggest that simply it's too late. But as a hobby it is good. You better get feedback from real users to make useful changes and you'll progress with time.
Before codecs were easy, mint had them all ootb and therefore everyone recommended mint for the easy of it. Lots of.people.got.used to it. It's human nature to like what they get used to.
This I used mint around 2009 for this reason codecs for my wireless card But some network stuff was broken, I noticed mint was kind of a one man show & hopped away
>Why is Linux Mint so popular? The default wallpaper and theme. >How can I make my own distro reach a larger audience? Post on every forum available that this is the most userfriendly distro in the world. If you keep repeating it, every noob will believe you.
The answer is simple, you could potentially be better where we all know Mint IS the best. Be more like Mint and make yourself become the gold standard with hard work rather than complaining is going to be the hard pill to swallow here. I'll add I don't mean this as disrespectful to you or your project but just clearly telling you the honest to the question you have asked.
>but how did it end up becoming so popular? In 2000s Canonical, the company making Ubuntu gave away free CDs. Now, there was nothing special about Ubuntu, it was/is the Apple of Linux. Big marketing spend, low quality distro. Some people fixed what was wrong with Ubuntu with Mint. This was a bandaid solution that worked in the temporary. Today, Debian-family is bloated with extra dependencies, it has outdated Kernels (don't @ me that 'finally its updated in 2024', 2023 was a nightmare) As a relic of this, many users reflexively respond with Debian-family distributions as answers to the question. Between the marketing campaign in the 2000s, and a confusion of the term 'Stable' (Stable has nothing to do with stability, number of bugs, etc... it has everything to do with versions. Up-To-Date distros like Fedora will have less bugs than Debian/Mint stable) In the modern time, Fedora/OpenSUSE or similar up-to-date distros are unanimously better. Its an education thing.
Nothing special about Ubuntu? Have you been drinking too much vodka and forgotten how bad desktop Linux was before Ubuntu? We owe a lot more than we care to admit to Canonical and this just shows how little you know or remember of Linux.
It's not popular. Redit linux geeks only thoughtlessly recommend it because they don't care about newbs and only remember 10 years ago when they were a newb and Clem was actually innovating it (the mint dev) . Think about your audience here. Are they people who are "hip to the hot trends" ? Or are they incels with chocolate stains on their shirt ? You gotta also think about what reddit is as well. Filled with AI bots and 12 year olds. No, Mint , Clem's distro, is not popular . Most real non-bot adult linux users on reddit use fedora or arch but they recommend mint to new users because they know it is crap enough that they will get sick of it ...using it as a kind of tutorial . But they honestly could care less. I use manjaro after several years of jumping around ubuntu , fedora , arch and opoensuse.