The site recommends OpenSUSE and NixOS, both of which are much less used distributions without as much package support. This is not to say that they aren’t private or secure, they are, but there’s downsides that just aren’t touched on in the article recommending them mainly, that a lot of the most important tools Privacy Guide reccomends just aren’t natively available on them. For example, I use OpenSUSE, and I can’t use Mullvad, a recommended tool, because the package for the VPN is broken on my system, and I can’t even access the error message logs. I am sure there is a lot of software Privacy Guide recommends that is available on Arch- or Fedora- or Debian- based systems that aren’t available on other systems they recommend.
I think the fix to this would just be a warning or note, such as “Only use these if you are willing to give up certain programs due to their limited package availability.”
I love privacy guides and have been an active member for years, and want it to be effective at getting people into privacy, but this hinders it. I also still love OpenSUSE and I am honestly tired of distrohopping so I might just switch to IVPN or wait for the issue to be fixed.
Do other tools PG recommends work there? Genuinely asking if there’s equal package availability compared to Debian or Fedora or Arch. If there is, then NixOS should not have a warning, but if there isn’t, then I think it should.
This is the Site Development category, not Questions. You’re the one who’s supposed to name the packages that don’t work on NixOS, instead of just opening a thread with assumptions. Everything I use works fine for me.
So then I don’t think there should be a warning. I haven’t used NixOS in a long time, I think I tried it out like four or five years ago for a school project, and I had this issue back then. If it’s changed since then, then I think the warning should just exist for OpenSUSE, as stated previously.
By this logic, Arch should get a warning for having the lowest number of packages* and Fedora a warning for being less up to date than the other recommended distros. Silly, right?
*which is a bit meaningless anyway because some distros split the same thing into many small packages and others don’t
but suse supports rpm’s and the official repo can be used. On Fedora, arch linux, you’re also encouraged to use the developer signed build from the AUR/side repo.
What does this mean? There’s no official repo from Mullvad that supports OpenSUSE as @seize said, it’s the same packaging formats but not the same repos. Unless you mean the official repo from OpenSUSE, which you can’t use, because it doesn’t work.
But Fedora DOES have a warning for being less up to date than other recommended distros,
Fedora has a semi-rolling release cycle. While some packages like the desktop environment are frozen until the next Fedora release, most packages (including the kernel) are updated frequently throughout the lifespan of the release. Each Fedora release is supported for one year, with a new version released every 6 months.
And Arch has the AUR, which none of the other distros have.
Somewhat? Mullvad doesn’t have a profit incentive to put time into less-used distributions, like OpenSUSE, because a lower amount of their users use them. Is that OpenSUSE’s fault, or Mullvads?
This shouldn’t turn into a discussion about Mullvad’s applications distro availability, but did you know they don’t make their app available for Arch Linux either? Do you consider the Arch user base small?
I believe what @fiqiluvo.epileto was referring to is the official third party repo for Mullvad Browser on Fedora Linux.
# Fedora 41 and newer
# Add the Mullvad repository server to dnf
sudo dnf config-manager addrepo --from-repofile=https://repository.mullvad.net/rpm/stable/mullvad.repo
# Fedora 40 and earlier
# Add the Mullvad repository server to dnf
sudo dnf config-manager --add-repo https://repository.mullvad.net/rpm/stable/mullvad.repo
# Install the package
sudo dnf install mullvad-browser
# And to install the alpha version
sudo dnf install mullvad-browser-alpha
The focus on OpenSUSE and Mullvad puts blinders on this discussion in my opinion. @xra, correct me if I’m wrong, but maybe a simpler solution would be a warning that recommended software may not be packaged for your Linux distribution of choosing. This could be as simple as adding a statement to the first paragraph on the Desktop/PC page. I did look at the Linux Overview page and such a warning didn’t seem to fit the purpose of that page.