From: lars@beagle-ears.com   
      
   On Fri, 26 Dec 2025 09:06:54 -0800, John Ames wrote:   
   >> AFAIK aren't all these DE-flavored "spin" sub-distros connecting to the   
   >> same repository? Is it not possible to just swap out the default DE for   
   >> your environment of choice? I never did see the point of doing it that   
   >> way, but even if you're stuck with this or that "flavor" for $REASONS it   
   >> should be easy enough to switch off of the part you hate, unless I'm   
   >> greatly mistaken.   
      
   My thoughts exactly.   
      
   On 2025-12-26, rbowman  wrote:   
   > Theoretically. At one point I installed a GNOME distro, didn't like it,   
   > and added KDE. It worked, mostly, but had some occasional problems when   
   > updating. More recently I installed Linux Mint MATE on one laptop and   
   > added Xfce. It seemed to work although I didn't use either DE heavily. I   
   > reinstalled LM Cinnamon when I switched to a SSD.   
   >   
   > I have added sway to two KDE boxes and i3 to the LM box. That seems to   
   > work although at one point the system got confused when I called MATE GUIs   
   > from i3. Like my earlier GNOME/KDE experience I think you have to limit   
   > mixing and matching for the best experience. I never tried it but from   
   > some forum posts adding a DE and trying to uninstall the original DE   
   > doesn't work well.   
   >   
   > With EndeavourOS if you choose the offline installation you get KDE but if   
   > you select online you select the DE during the installation. I think that   
   > makes more sense than having separate isos for each flavor like Mint,   
   > spins like Fedora, or K, X, L, etc Ubuntus that give the impression   
   > they're different projects.   
      
   I think your experiences described above kinda validate Fedora's   
   approach to "spins". I.e. the main project takes responsibility for   
   several flavors without the heavy rebranding. The difficulty that   
   appears only when upgrading are issues in the packaging scripts.   
      
   The BIG differences between distributions are   
   - initd vs systemd   
   - RPM vs apt   
      
   And the next important difference seems to be GNOME vs KDE.   
   The rest is things that should be runtime-settable options.   
   And "cinnamon-mint" and the like should be packaged as an   
   add-on package of theme scripts   
   --   
   Lars Poulsen - an old geek in Santa Barbara, California   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)