Linux for macOS lovers: Distrowatch's review of Elementary

[buster]

https://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20200113#elementary

[fox]

Of the current distros, Elementary is probably the most Mac-like in appearance. Once upon a time there was a Pear Linux that was even more Mac-like than Elementary. There are also several Mac-OS themes for Gnome, and I think also for Plasma. I understand that Zorin also has a MacOS theme, but you have to get the paid version to get this theme.

[Jason]

I haven't used a Mac since the 1990s but I still elementary even though I no longer use it. I have no problem with that kind of interface, for MacOS, it's the only thing those machines have going for them.

I think that the reason I stopped using elementary was that it doesn't play nice with my VPN client. You can install it, but you can't control it. So everybody time you boot it's on and there is no graphical way to turn it off, other than just killing under system processes. Then you can't start it up again. I use PIA almost all the time. The only time I don't use it is when I use Netflix which won't work if it's on.

I didn't really get this criticism in the review:

The extra warning when I tried to install Firefox and LibreOffice was not the only odd issue with AppCenter. LibreOffice is broken down into several entries. There is a LibreOffice entry and then separate entries for each component application. I started by selecting the LibreOffice entry in the hopes that it was a meta-package that installed the entirety of LibreOffice, but it only install the core of LibreOffice, which was unusable without also installing Calc, Writer, etc.

You mean that's not how it's installed in other distros? I'm using Kubuntu 19.10 and it does it this way with LibreOffice, too. I don't see any "LibreOffice entry" though, just one "KDE Integration". I figure this is the way for all Ubuntu-based distros other than maybe Linux Mint. Maybe a Mint user can check this and report back.

[fox]

I didn't really get this criticism in the review:

The extra warning when I tried to install Firefox and LibreOffice was not the only odd issue with AppCenter. LibreOffice is broken down into several entries. There is a LibreOffice entry and then separate entries for each component application. I started by selecting the LibreOffice entry in the hopes that it was a meta-package that installed the entirety of LibreOffice, but it only install the core of LibreOffice, which was unusable without also installing Calc, Writer, etc.

You mean that's not how it's installed in other distros?

What I think he meant was that there was no metapackage in Elementary that installs the whole suite. In Ubuntu and Mint there is such a thing in the repos, but it doesn't matter because all of LibreOffice is installed automatically with the distro.

[Jason]

What I think he meant was that there was no metapackage in Elementary that installs the whole suite. In Ubuntu and Mint there is such a thing in the repos, but it doesn't matter because all of LibreOffice is installed automatically with the distro.

I understood what he was saying. I just thought it didn't make sense in that he was using a Ubuntu-based distro and I'm using a Ubuntu-based distro, too, and it doesn't have a meta-package either, at least not in Discover. When I installed Kubuntu, I think I chose the light install which doesn't include anything much beyond the browser, codecs and plugins and base Plasma apps. Either that or I just removed LibreOffice at one point. But when I reinstalled it, I had the same thing, no meta-package. I thought this was the way with all Ubuntu-based distros.

It might be there in Synaptic, which I would presume that elementary lets you install but maybe not. They do have a curated list in their app store.

[fox]

In the Ubuntu 19.10 repositories there is a file called libreoffice. It's a metapackage that installs all components of the office suite.