I will be returning from a month-long vacation next week. Let’s see if my arch machine will break completely!

I’ve had no problems, as long as I’ve updated the keyring first sudo pacman-key —refresh-keys. I’ve probably gone a few times not upgrading my system for a while and I had minimal problems.

I am using NixOS and have used Arch before. Its great. No dependency hell, superb config management (with home manager) and builtin rollbacks. But the nix language is somewhat arcane. Error messages are only somewhat helpful and docs are really lacking. NixOS also uses quite the amount of disk space in its store. Would only recommend NixOS if youre a resourceful programmer (or not)

PS. Ive never had arch break any drivers on me, or any upgrade failing (unless a package itself is borked, but they usually put out posts for this). But my systems all amd, ymmv

Oh yeah I use nvidia so it’s pretty unsurprising. How much coding is required? I know how to code so it’s not a very big deal but I’d like to have an idea.
- As someone elase said, it's not really coding but more like writing a configuration. If you need an example (I'm using AMD so there will be some changes required) you can check out my own config at https://gitlab.com/theshatterstone/nix-conf
  
  Edit: Also, the note on shebangs applies to all scripts within NixOS.
- I wouldn’t call it coding. It’s more about writing configurations. You have to provide a list of packages you need and some configuration for them like configuring default desktop environment. I recommend searching for dotfiles repos with configuration.nix on github to get an idea.
- nvidia-open-dkms usually doesn't break when updating.

I have several virtual machines here with Arch that I often don't use for months. And when I do use them, I proceed as I do with every update. So before an update, I check if something has been published at https://archlinux.org/news/ that affects the installation in question. This is done automatically with the help of the tool informant. If something has been published that affects my installations, I take that into account. Otherwise I run pacman -Syu as usual. And that's it.

Most likely, nothing will happen. Arch breaking if you don't updating 5x a day is more of a meme than a reality.

I've updated a client's Arch server that hadn't been touched for years, and it went just fine.

You're the user, you're in control, you're empowered to make sure it won't break after the update, you're empowered to fix it if it does.

I update my arch computer maybe once a month for years and it works fine.

I use Debian so that i can ignore it for a year and it still wont break.

After a long time I usually upgrade the keyring first with pacman -Sy archlinux-keyring For upgrading I like to use Topgrade which also upgrades other stuff (snaps, flatpacks, pip, ...)

For upgrading I like to use Topgrade which also upgrades other stuff (snaps, flatpacks, pip, ...)

Aaannnddd saved.

I've gone like 5 moths without updating a laptop on Arch before and the only thing I had to deal with was updating keyring first

Same, maybe even longer in my case.
That's usually how it goes...sudo pacman -Sy archlinux-keyring and you're good. Until you notice that all your python packages are broken because of 3.11 ;)

NixOS + Home Manager user here.

I run in an opt-in state config. / is tmpfs. /home is tmpfs. /boot and /nix are real filesystems. At boot, the EFI loader reads the configuration from /nix/persist/etc/nixos/flake.nix, symlinks all the programs and configs into / and /home, and startup proceeds as normal.

That means nothing persists across boots unless I add it to my config. Cruft doesn't accumulate in hidden areas, it's all in my config. That keeps things fast, makes management easier, and makes troubleshooting easier.

I've never used Arch or Nix, but I switched from Void -> Guix and have been very happy with it. It's such a huge peace of mind to be able to have your whole system declaratively configured, package changes being atomic and generational (rollbacks so no worries about breakage), Guix shell for messing about, and being able to make your system do anything you can write in Scheme.

That's my daily driver. On servers so far I've gone with Debian Stable + Guix.

Also Void is still a fantastic distro, and is what I would use if not for Guix/Nix.

What does Guix use for its init system?
- GNU Shepherd! Written and configurable entirely in Guile Scheme, just like Guix itself.
Is guix pull still slow? That was a problem I and a few others had a while back.
- guix pull && guix upgrade is still a bit slow, but I never thought excessively slow (definitely slower than xbps, pacman, and probably apt too).
  
  I guess I never thought much about it because of rollbacks, so it’s safe enough to just cron.

I've got an Arch server that I update monthly (and have been for 2+ years now), and a desktop that I update maybe 2-3 times a week. I've not had any issues, so long as I update the keyring first. Good luck!!

I do a weekly patching on my Arch server. So far so good!

I use NixOS. Was a kinda rough start since it was annoying to install apps through a config, but after getting my config fully fledged out I love it. A declarative system is a dream for a dev, I can just copy my config to a new system, run one command, and I have my entire system back! Very stable as well

I guarantee it

Hey look it's my alt account

(Disclaimer that I’m still new-ish to Linux)

I just went about a year between EndeavorOS updates on a laptop and uhh… it wasn’t happy. I just installed Kubuntu which hopefully will be more forgiving haha.

I don't get why so many folks try niche stuff when the tried and proven solution is out there.

Tumbleweed, excellent support for KDE, rolling, great defaults, snapshots out of the box, lots of support/documentation, OBS...
- Snapshots require btrfs though, don't they?

I know it’s not the same (some would argue worse), but I ran manjaro for a long time and just didn’t have these sorts of issues. Maybe I didn’t update enough, or I updated too frequently, or ?

You probably didn't have a lot of AUR packages installed. That seems to be a big issue for Manjaro. They hold packages back and the AUR just keeps going so things get out of sync and break.
- As far as AUR is concerned, one should be fair. The things that are offered in AUR can be problematic in general. No matter if you use vanilla Arch or a distribution based on Arch. Because not everyone who offers something in the AUR cares about updates in a timely manner or at all.
  
  There is definitely a reason why https://lists.archlinux.org/archives/list/aur-requests@lists.archlinux.org/ exists. Just as there is a reason why there is a general warning about the AUR (https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Arch_User_Repository).
  
  With Manjaro, I rather see the problem that the team responsible for it apparently does not learn from its mistakes, so that, for example, the SSL certificate of the website has not been renewed several times (https://web.archive.org/web/20230706060943/https://manjarno.snorlax.sh/). That may not be a big problem in itself, but if even such little things go wrong, then I personally cannot trust an entire distribution.
- Not sure what constitutes a lot, but definitely had AUR software. Generally only for things that were not otherwise available