Jorge Castro, a developer of the Ublue.it project, talks about why Image-based (immutable) systems are way better.
They are ready to use today, for most people.
Changes to the system can be done in a centralized location, like their NVIDIA images, and you can be sure every Client has exactly the same image.
If something breaks, you can reset it!
And its also way safer, as you have a clean system. Apps cant install what they want. You can easily revert all your changes with rpm-ostree reset.
Btw. you can still install as many packages as you want with rpm-ostree install and even add COPRs and other repos like RPMFusion (included in ublue).
Feel free to ask questions!
Ublues enhanced Kinoite image is what I use. Minimal layers, awesome experience!
This is the first I’ve heard of ublue, very interesting project. I started using Kinoite around the time SteamOS 3.0 details were coming out. My Arch install had just shit the bed and I thought it’d be good to get familiar with how the immutable OS might work. I was skeptical at first, but still going strong on the same install probably around 2 years later. I was skeptical at first, but once I got in it and started daily driving, I realized this is the future of Linux.
Really its great! No you cant use a mutable OS for years. Immutable? No problem! You can even switch desktops, upgrade and downgrade versions, try the beta and switch back,…
Its still very hackable. /etc is changeable for example. You can layer RPMs and hack around installing SDDM themes using Lunas awesome sddm2rpm.
And still its secure, has zero-downtime updates and its modern.
Ive been rocking an ublue image for a few weeks now and ive been pretty comfy with it. Before using inmutable distros the idea of having random clutter anywhere on my pc was quite frustrating for some reason lol. It led me to reinstall the os whenever i installed/uninstalled too much crap. The concept of an “always clean” os is what let me to silverblue: Now i can just delete a container if its getting too big for my liking.
Ublue is the cherry on top: Now i dont worry about updates at all. Its always a new, clean install every time i boot up the computer. One day ill look on the ublue’s core qualities so i can improve my experience even further. Also long live
rpm-ostree rebase; it made the switch as painless as it could be.I encounter misinformation and other FUD about immutable distributions quite frequently
Imagine a root filesystem that is only modified when you expect, instead of at any time by any software on your system, the horror! </sarcasm>
While I generally agree on the issue, the video had a lot of filler and the point could have been made in about 5 minutes.
The issues mentioned mostly hit the classic cycle-based distributions and while rolling release based distributions also have this issue, it’s not as apparent. They usually run for years (I recently switched away from an Arch installation that was about 8 years old that did not have issues with updates or anything). Incidentally, I did actually switch to an immutable system because I wanted to try something new and the machine had been delegated to my secondary in 2020. The mechanism however is very different.
It remains to be seen what immutable approach will gain the most ground in the coming years. We have some immutable systems like the ones in the video that is similar to how Valve does it on the Steam Deck. Take a classic distribution and keep updating a fix base image. Or container if you want to call it that. Then there’s systems that are immutable by their very nature, like NixOS which I installed or something based on Guix. I believe the latter approach is superior if you are in control of the machine while the base image has advantages when you deliver a system to clients who don’t want to or are not supposed to administer the system themselves.
Though I’m quite sure the classic mutable distributions aren’t going away anytime soon.
@Laser @Pantherina Please make a better video summary as I tend to get long winded!
