I’m a long time Windows user who has experience with WSL. Last year, I needed a laptop for university, and out of laziness, opted for a Macbook since, although they’re expensive as hell, are reasonably reliable.

Since using the mac, I’ve absolutely fallen in love with it over Windows. Note that I refer to the non-iOS specific aspects. After not touching my desktop for several months, I now see that I absolutely hate Windows even more. I would like to move my desktop to a Linux system some time in the future. However, my education is limited, and so I’m here to ask for help.

Currently, I’m a student in Mathematics and Computer Science. But outside that, I am, for the most part, a programmer. I rarely game, but I would like the option for the rare occasion that I have the time to do so.

I’ve grown comfortably with the command line, through my in-depth knowledge of lower level knowledge is limited. So, I feel I’m comfortable enough to extend the possible domain of my options.

I would love to hear recommendations and suggestions. I’m also open to other options such as NixOS, but that would require some research to learn more, which is fine. I’m not doing this soon.

If you could provide any links and resources that I can follow to continue learning, especially if relevant to your suggestions, I would be deeply appreciative!

My Mac is the most Linux-like thing I’ve used for so long, and it’s been so, so much easier to work with compared to Windows (I hate Windows PATH limitations so much).

Thanks, all ❤ 🐧

  • just_another_person@lemmy.world
    17·
    8 months ago

    MacOS is a BSD distro, which shares most of the same cli commands with Linux (though certain overall functionality may differ by command).

    I’d say stick to GNOME for desktop to start as it flows much more similarly to MacOS. I’d say Fedora 40 to avoid the current issues with Ubuntu 24 and derivatives. Should give you solid footing to figure out what you don’t like and adapt accordingly. Maybe even try out a handful of distros via LiveCD before committing, up to you.

    Re: Dual booting for gaming. Not even really necessary for 95% of all games now thanks to proton. The only hold outs are games with very aggressive anti-cheat installs that can’t operate outside of Windows.