In the case of Firefox profiles maybe I can actually provide some useful info this time.

“firefox -ProfileManager” brings up the GUI profile manager and “firefox -P [profile name]” boots a particular profile.

Anyway, good luck.

Sorry, I’ve never tried to revert a package but I “think” synaptic can revert packages (system or otherwise) and shared it because I wanted to make sure it works on Linux mint. Maybe I should have clarified that’s more of a “best guess” on my part than something I’m sure of.

The risk of rolling it back is even if brave works fine with an older version, if a different piece of software was tested with the newer version and expects it you could end up with a situation where other pieces of software that depend on it either break or keep trying to force you to update.

If you have a system backup and all you’re risking is time then I’d say go for it, just wanted to bring up the potential risks and some other options as well.

You could check synaptic package manager to maybe see about rolling it back https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=179192

Though keep in mind that trying to roll back a particular dependency couldbee a good way to run into problem’s.

You could also try re-install Brave and/or try installing as a flatpak to see if those fix it without rolling back

It’s between XFCE for it’s simplicity and KDE for it’s Wayland support for me

I think Debian is close to new user friendly IF they pick Gnome or KDE with all the default stuff there, and has getting closer with non-free firmware enabled by default now, but still isn’t quite there as a plug and play new user friendly distro. Things like flatpak w/flathub or snap out of the box isn’t there, and it’d be hard to get a full Debian setup without using the command line (especially for a non free software zelot who wants Spotify and discord out of the box)

Something like mint is just a tad easier, and that might be the different between an easy install and an unexpected set of hiccups that a new user might struggle with. The mint installer is also a lot more intuitive, at the cost of being less universally compatible (a big goal of Debian).

• Compatible with more devices than many distros

• Extremely customizable

• Community run distro

• Very stable, and can run the bleeding edge through Snap/Flatpack/Appimages, Distrobox, or VMs/Containers

Debian

My understanding is that it’s not really the disrto, but the software running on it that’d effect battery life and performance. Both Debian and Arch can come pretty bare bones on a blank install (Ubuntu and derivatives tend to come with a fair bit of stuff bundled out of the box).

I’d personally reccomend trying a Debian installation (I’d likely say use stable, but testing or sid are also options if you need quicker updates and don’t care for flatpak/snap/appimage/distrobox). The installer plays nice with Windows, and you can skip installing a desktop during installation then CLI install a tiling window manager to really minimize ‘bloat’.

One word: Mint

It’s pretty streamlined, more reliable than some newer trendy Ubuntu spin offs, and still powered at it’s core by the same old kernal that even the “advanced” distros use.

I applaud you for trying Arch, and if you can figure it out while learning Linux in general that’s a great achievement, but it’s overly complicated and I personally wouldn’t reccemend it to anyone starting out (or even a most experienced users unless they had a particular need for it’s features).

If you continuously get issues across all distros in VMs a live environment might also be worth checking out (live being booted off external media without an install).

Ultimately, though if Linux does mess with your workflow, then use what works best for you. Sure I like Linux, but if it breaks what you need and Windows or Mac doesn’t then use what works best for you. But, there’s a saying “the more the island of my knowledge grows the greater the shore of my ignorance”. The more you learn the more that you realized how little you know. It’s always the case for anybody who’s either not an extreme expert or a narcissistic, but it’s also a great motivator to keep learning.

Assuming you’re fine with non-free drivers I don’t think there’s too much to worry about nowadays (at least that’s what I’ve gathered from personal experience & the lack of hearing other scomplain).

That said, I’ve never had any issues with HP devices, and even an HP Chromebook worked without too much hassle.

Thinkpads are also a classic Linux machine, and I doubt you could go wrong with those either.

Very nice. I like how you went about telling the user how to make a decision and provided and their various options rather than just spitting out a list of distros you like without telling the user why you did so. One thing I would bring up though, depending on whether you want it to be closer to a one stop shop or a springboard to further research, would be that for a new user touching a few pros/cons of the various aspects you mentioned (e.g. stable vs rolling releases) to maybe point them towards what would be a good fit for them. But that’s more so depending on what your philosophy is on the “what’s good” vs “how to find what’s good” slider of things.

Google’s a much bigger part of the ecosystem by default. Used to be the Google app store was a selling feature, now Google is integrated into pretty much every device (and has contracts with manufacturers to force that).

It’s also, like Shortwavefilter mentioned, much harder to root or flash a devices.

Though the AOSP has gotten better in ways too. It’s gotten a lot better hardening, and still is fairly open (e.g custom app stores added one click).

Last, there’s still plenty of bloat pre-installed on some brands, but I think that was the case a decade ago as well if my memory is correct.

Honestly I can’t think of too many essential settings or apps that’d be a necessity for everyone. Usually I’d say change privacy settings and disabled as much bloat if you’re not using a ROM; but that might not be applicable if you’re on a work phone. Apps wise, I’d say stick to open source if you can for the basic offline utilities -F-Droid is great for that if you’re allowed to install it.