[deanhills]

I thought I should make a separate thread for this. If you have been using Linux as an alternative for Windows - successfully - please tell us what Linux distribution you have been using and how you have set this up?

What GUI are you using, and have you found a way to incorporate use of wordprocessing and spreadsheet tools with your Linux desktop - can you easily print documents - how would you go about this in a Linux desktop setup?

[LightDestory]

Well, all I can say is: it depends on which type of usage.

• As a fast to get and easy to setup Ubuntu & derivatives are the choose. Again speaking of Ubuntu if I need a low waste resource I go with Xubuntu and if I need some fancy style I like UbuntuMate or UbuntuBudge
  Every distro has its own preset of installed software, such as terminal, editor and explorer, but they are all the same so no need to "learn how to use them"
  
• I personally bring with me an extra USB drive with a portable and persistence Linux environment: on this specific case I used for a lot of time PuppyLinux, that is very good, but lately I am trying out Kanotix
  
• On my laptop, that I bring with me during university lessons, I am using Fedora because I am a little bored by Ubuntu/Debian repositories
  
• I would never use ArchLinux and derivatives (Manjaro, I am looking at you)  because it is the most up to date Linux ever but at the same time is it unstable
  

Regarding the "office work" such as wordprocessing, excel and printing... it is a very hard work. I have tried using OpenOffice and LibreOffice but I am used to Microsoft Office suite and these two suites doesn't provide me the same feeling. I am unable to stylize the text as I like. So, despite having OpenOffice installed in case of need, I am pretty good using the WebApp version of Microsoft Office and when I can't use them I try the Google Docs suite.

About printing... I have never get any problem about that, Printer manufactures rarely provide drivers for Linux but still it works thanks to "standard channel communication" that printer MUST be compatible. Of course Linux is missing any type of application to check the health (carriage status, maintenance actions) of the device, so if your printer isn't a display and button equipped you don't have almost any chance to perform some important actions, like cleaning up the ink heads.

Regarding GUI... I set always dark-like themes, remove any waste from the Desktop, set to small the bars and use a widget such as Conky to set up custom system monitors, YOU CAN DO ALMOST EVERYTHING WITH CONKY, I LOVE CONKY

[tryp4vps]

The Linux distribution I have been using is Ubuntu. I have just set this up with normal installation method via USB.

For the incorporate use of wordprocessing and spreadsheet tools, Ubuntu desktop, by default, comes with LibreOffice which basically supports Microsoft Word and Excel formats. And printing documents with LibreOffice is also easily on Ubuntu, as it requires no special driver for my printer.

[rudra]

i like to use Ubuntu. actually i do use it a lot. it is very easy to use and i have not faced any driver issues for a long time now.

other than that, i like Mint, Arch ( they have a very nice knowledge base, that they really strive to keep updated with all the nitty gritty details) and fedora.

i think Elementary linux might be the most beautiful looking though. but i cant say much about it.

for office work, as mentioned above, libraoffice and OpenOffice are great alternatives to ms ones.

[ikk157]

The short answer is: Yes, I have indeed managed to do that successfully in a linux environment!

The long answer is:

Well, first things first, the linux distro that I use is Raspbian, which I run on both my Raspberry pi 3B+ and raspberry pi 4B (4GB RAM).

It seems to work quite nicely to do the “basics”.

As for word processing and spreadsheets, Raspbian comes with LibreOffice pre-installed. Which gets the job done quite nicely.

I also have no issues printing through my wireless laser printer, so that’s also a plus!

I do have to say that the fact that the Raspberry pis run on the ARM architecture is the biggest limiting factor they’ve got. This is because it’s hard to find programs that support it! This is exactly why you can’t just run a full version of Windows on them. And the windows IoT core which they support is a plain joke to be honest.

[Littlemaster]

Currently I like Ubuntu as Windows partition has messed up in my laptop. I had used dual boot, since I had to format the windows partition I have to remove it from boot menu. Grub seems showing errors and the laptop seems to have some hard drive problem.
Ubuntu seems to have good alternatives to windows.

[chanalku91]

I use ubuntu with the KDE Desktop environment!

I customize it to be more elegant and integrated with the theme of my room!

And this is used for various projects and personal needs!

[Sn1F3rt]

I do use a desktop environment on my VPS as I need it for some purposes. I was using GNOME on my existing CentOS 7 installation. However, it'd been lagging very much.

After the last OS reinstallation, I'll using xfce on my CentOS 7 VPS. I find it to be extremely light on resources as well as storage, and still much faster than GNOME (I haven't tried out MATE).

If you'd like to use a desktop environment, I'd recommend CentOS 7 with xfce as you're quite well-versed with CentOS, and it has a beautiful user interface, room for lots of customisation and supports almost everything you'd need on regular Windows PC.

Regards,

[perry]

pop or manjaro

if you still want to be able to play windows games these 2 needs mimimal extra configs to run them
both are also graphic optimized.

i used pop os AND I ABSELUTELY love it.
i'm back on windows now because of my new pc having to many issues with linux

[rudra]

windows iot core is not a plane joke. it was never meant to be used as a desktop os. it has its use. and those might be best served by the core the way it is.

i am wondering though. How good is your raspberry setup for use with college tasks ? Is it really effective as s desktop pc now ? the version 4 i mean. please do share some experiences of doing some computing tasks with it.

i would like to mention about a little configuration trick i use. i set next boot choice option in grub and reboot so i get into windows when i need it and then when i reboot from within windows, i get back to Linux. you can use it on a good too where you don't want to spend time selecting grub menu options over vnc that is in control panel.