Indeed. Though, it has diverged so much and became even more popular itself. It’s one of those exceptions confirming the rule.
For example, you cannot just use Debian packages on Ubuntu. The same way you cannot just use Ubuntu packages on Debian. Sometimes you may have luck and it may work accidentally, but often you will get issues with non-matching dependencies, different package names and other issues.
I think Devuan is also an exception. I really is just Debian without systemd.
Artix is just Arch Linux without systemd. However…
Right, but if you switch from Debian to Devuan, nothing stops working, and some rhings are actually better, particularly the installer.
Quite frankly, I do not trust your personal definition of “nothing stops working”, because there is plenty of evidence you are using Linux in a way which is very far away from the average usage, let alone using advanced GUI setups. If something does not work, you just use the terminal instead of noting how it does not work. It’s too natural for you, that something does not work properly. 
Do you trust me if I say Debian works properly?
Your definition of working properly is rather exceptional.
I use Debian every day on several servers. It works fine. However, Debian with a GUI works like shit, if it works at all. I think I already told the story of how I tried to install Debian GUI on a laptop some time ago. It simply wouldn’t budge. It did not work. Not even I could get it to run.
No. My definition of working properly is what the vast majority of PC users around the world understand as “working properly”. It means, that pressing on a GUI button works, without glitches & bugs and that the UX does not suck huge arse. Or that the GUI does not exist in the first place.
If you want a distribution made for the people, you cannot make them use the terminal, ever. To you, it’s natural. You even say sometimes, using the terminal is “better” than using the GUI. This is absolutely wrong for the average Joe. Could not be any wronger.
Well no point worrying about whether it is a derivative or not.
According to you none of them work.
According to me, none of them work, if you are breaching a certain threshold of what you need to do. If you just open a browser with a single tab open, watch only 320p videos and read the occasional text file, then it will “work”. However, this is like nothing. To me, this is not using a computer. It’s doing nothing.
It’s like getting a Porsche and driving with it slower than a granny in a wheelchair. This Porsche is “rolling”, but it does not “work” as in, it does not do what it is supposed to do.
Yes I drive my Landrover like that too.
There is no compulsion to use any device to its max.
Doing something does not mean it is using it “to its max”. It just means it is being used properly.
Doing something below the minimum and then saying “everything works” is wrong, is where I am getting at.
If I buy a car and never drive it, I cannot say “it works”, because I literally didn’t even use it.
Understand. There is no minimum
We can
and
Thank you for getting us out of that loop mount sinkhole
Just a FYI.
“Linux Mint is arguably the best Ubuntu-based Linux distribution suitable for beginners.”
Source;
There are a lot of crazy opinions online, especially about Linux.
Not more, then crazy opinions on this forum about windows, disrespectful hate about Linux. And they all coming from you!
Hi @easyt50 ,
That is a good article on Linux distros for beginners.
Most of the distros mentioned are Ubuntu derivatives, so not surprising Mint is among them. The Ubuntu family seems yomhave a mortgage on new users? Why?
The article is all about the technical side… I wonder which distro has the best community support?
I wonder which is easiest to install?
I am surprised that MX is not even in the list
I don’t know about the “best” community support, but I found 3 sites for Linux Mint that I had good luck getting support / answers to my question. Actually, this forum “It’s Foss Community” was one of my best sources for help, esp when there was 3 or 4 active moderators.
I have installed about 8 different distro’s and Mint (to me) is one of the easiest one to install.
Same here. MX is my second Linux choice. If Mint was not available, that would be my OS. Matter of fact, on my desktop I reserve a couple small partitions (root and home) for a guest distro. For over 6 months, MX is the guest.
So on my desktop instead of dual-boot, I have triple boot. Mint, Win 10, and MX.
Back to the printer problem 
I got an very old Hp Deskjet F375 printer/scanner working with this ct.de article again:
Am Drucker bleiben | c't | heise magazine
(sorry, its behind a paywall, but I have an abo, its only in german, I’m from german). They checked it with a Raspberry PI, but should work in all Ubuntu/Debian versions and other distries you can adapt the commands.
The main things that were helpfull:
(it also helpfull for local usb printer, the full article is also about scanner and multifunction printer)
Print server
Even before you set up the CUPS printing system, you should connect the printer via USB interface and turn it on (in the output of lsusb, the device should show up now):
sudo apt-get install cups printer-driver-all hplip
The command does not only add the actual service, but besides CUPS itself it also adds some packages for common printer models, which come from various free projects and partly from manufacturers. They cover a large part of common printer models.
With the packages “printer-driver-all” you can get all drivers included in Pi OS and with “hplip” you can add some HP specific programs and modules. Some packages also help with the scanner operation of multifunctional devices - thus making possible manual steps unnecessary, which the article recommends for the scanner setup.
To make the printer visible in the network, you have to allow CUPS to share it, share it in the friendly network and allow administrative access to the CUPS web interface:
sudo cupsctl --share-printers
sudo cupsctl --remote-any
sudo cupsctl --remote-admin
It is also necessary to assign the user who will manage the printers to the “lpadmin” group. For the default user “pi” this command does it:
sudo usermod -a -G lpadmin pi
Now you can reach the CUPS web interface in a browser, on a Mac by entering the name with .local appended, i.e. as http://printit.local:631 - 631 is the TCP port CUPS listens on. On a Windows PC, take the IP address of the Raspi instead of “printit.local”; resolving the .local name will not work easily there (see explanations at the end of the article and in the box on p. 20).
Box:
Rights twister: Fun with devices, udev, groups and users
When accessing scanners and printers under Linux, all sorts of things can subtly go wrong. Often it has to do with access rights. When USB devices are plugged in, the udev daemon creates pseudo files in the file tree that are necessary for access. The daemon uses an extensive set of rules for this, which also describes who is allowed to access a device.
For scanners and printers there are special groups like lp and scanner. Regular user accounts like “pi” on the Raspi can be sorted into these groups. The groups also contain special user accounts which have been created for services, for example “saned” for the SANE daemon. If this assignment is missing, SANE cannot control a scanner.
It is easy to find out who owns a device and which group is allowed to access it: lsusb lists all USB devices. With the bus and device number of the scanner or printer you build the device path and display the permissions, for example with getfacl /dev/bus/usb/001/003.
(translated with deepl)
A bit late in the game, but all the 'buntu flavors i’ve tried are much slower than any of their derivatives.
Point taken!
Saving this to my notes in case i decide to switch distros (highly likely) again!