Well, maybe. I suppose one could interpret it as many things, depending on context. I was rather thinking of phrases such as “pinnacle of achievement” or “peak of readiness” (and similar) which might be thrown into the mix in the form of creative copy writing.
Such is your prerogative, but I do believe that I have implicitly expounded the context of that statement within the essay itself.
Obviously, the statement does not apply to all newbies. It only applies — as explained within the essay — to those not willing to learn and put in the effort to properly maintain their systems.
Perhaps, but with great power comes great responsibility — this is not an empty statement — and the community of good-natured volunteers was already being far too heavily strained from needing to cater to people with a consumerist attitude and no sense of responsibility.
Longstanding volunteers and moderators were getting burned-out from having to repeat the same thing over and over again, and were leaving the forum, one after the other, all because of the fact that Manjaro was deliberately being advertised as extremely suitable — if not ideal — for that kind of audience, which it absolutely is not.
Either way, the tone of my essay — which I still believe to be well-balanced and self-explanatory — is beyond the scope of this thread.
This thread is about whether more effort could be put into emphasizing the technical nature of Manjaro, which would be more truthful, instead of making the description of Manjaro read like a commercial — and as such almost by definition deceitful — advertisement, which is how it used to be, even though I will concede that the current description on our main web page is already a little more serene.
Maybe the Immutable edition of Manjaro could indeed be advertised as suitable for absolute beginners and consumers alike once it becomes available to the wider audience, but even then this qualification would still not apply to the regular Manjaro editions with a functional pacman and with periodic updates that may or may not bring along .pacnew files.
It baffles me to no extent that the detractors of my essay fail to understand that this is exactly why I wrote it. It’s even there in the proverbial black & white.
No, I think that can be for new users. I can still remember when I was a new Linux user… All it took was a lot of reading and a willingness to make mistakes. At the time I wasn’t a member of any forum either. That came later, when I was more confident.
It’s not fair to break up a complex statement into smaller statements which by themselves no longer convey the message and/or give it an entirely different meaning, even.
It’s an essay, not a single and blunt statement that Manjaro would not be suitable to anyone who’s new to GNU/Linux. One has to read the whole essay and then take it for what it says, not read a single snippet and then cast judgment on its validity.
That probably applies to Linux, in general. There are ample people who can’t make the change from what they already barely know about that other OS, they simply don’t have the mental or emotional capacity to actually learn anything beyond the bare basics on that other OS, so Linux is not for them, and that other OS barely is.
However, that only strengthens the stance when one takes into consideration the so-called rolling release nature of Manjaro and other Arch derivatives; which requires even more dedication and active engagement from users than most other distributions.
Hopefully this Manjaro Mesa (another name I toyed with briefly) will go some way toward creating a level playing field; an easier climb; for many new(er) users, regardless of their aptitude.
And those users who fail understand what any of the fuss is about; well, they can continue living on the edge; with Manjaro Edge (or, Unstable, as we currently know it).
I agree the website needs a proper writeup to explain to users which version of Manjaro [including the coming Manjaro “Static”] is most suitable for them.
And it should be there whether or not people actually read it [though some will, I think], because Manjaro should be able point to the explanatory notes if there are complaints after a messy upgrade, and say, “well, we warned you”. It’s better than NOT having a writeup, or a misleading one, and then being accused of being misleading or irresponsible.
So it’s an advisable CYA move, in my opinion.
I like Manjaro Static. I don’t like Summit or Apex or Peak, because it carries the connotation that the immutable version is the best, which I disagree with.
