I have an old notebook with a large crack in the display, a thick, round dot, and I’ve installed the manjaro-kde-25.1-rc1-251223-linux618.iso (with external Monitor) and later I will try the manjaro-kde-25.1-rc2-251230-linux618.iso.
I did the same in VirtualBox.
I’ve set up my notebook so that I can access and remotely manage it using KRDC from my other working notebook and this PC (also Windows 10, dual boot).
After the installation, I switched to the Testing branch.
So now what?
What are you testing?
How do you approach it?
How or what can I contribute?
As a thank you for the great Manjaro and all the work you’ve put into it?
How and what can I report into the Testing thread, because I enjoy reading it and the Unstable thread?
Thanks and best regards,
Tony
Oh, and a happy and healthy New Year to you later.
Translated by Google because of my poor englisch
I switched to the Testing Branch roughly 2 weeks ago, and I have to say, it’s as stable as Stable, At least for me, and at least so far.
You can use your computer as usual and if issues pops up with software from the repositories, report it on the Testing updates thread. At least that’s how I have it.
What:
I was testing the functionality I used on stable branch so to not have any surprises on stable. Approach:
When I was on the stable branch I was testing the releases in a VM, eg the VM was on the testing branch. How:
Comparing the functionality of stable with the testing releases for the flavor I was using.
Reporting issues in the testing thread with the usual generic info needed for support requests and specific info for the issue. (example: when a gnome extension misbehaves use the gnome specific debug tooling)
To keep in mind:
Depending on your skillset testing can be thorough, just the stuff you use or just use it and see what you run into, it depends on what you’d like to invest. I perceive that the most useful tests are the specific manjaro packages: the integration of the whole system with the most visible examples, the DE/WM releases with theming.
Keep in mind that the packages coming to testing have been released by their upstream projects and have traveled through their respective testing regime already and have been through: arch testing, arch stable & manjaro unstable before landing in manjaro testing. Check with upstream for issues, they might be solved and released/patched.
Thanks, Most Morning I spend some Time in the Forum reading latest, Testing and Unstable, Memberhub and all what sounds interesting and fill up my Manjaro arch Linux Skills, oh and my English of course.
Danke und dir wünsche ich das auch
I was Born in Germany Berlin and in young years My English was prefect but now .. no need to talk or read and to practise it in offline live.
The Testing branch is actually only different from the Stable branch in that the version of (most of) the software packages is newer, and that there will more frequently be updates than in the Stable branch.
I don’t think it’s ever been mentioned on the forum, but Manjaro offers Enterprise Services–direct installation and support services for businesses. This is something I’ve seen at very few distros, and at no other Arch-based distros.
I suspect that to meet business needs and to minimize support loads for these customers, Manjaro has the extra Testing Branch to double-check integration and so forth between the Unstable and Stable branches.
I run Testing Branch on my main desktop, and Unstable on a laptop. I have not had any issues with either. Then again, my hardware choices and typical use cases are very mainstream. So one would expect no issues.
My typing is poor and therefore slow. I see Aragorn has slipped in a reply which you’ve marked as solved. I’ll skip the rest of what I was going to write but post this anyway.
Well, that’s the Manjaro GmbH, which is a commercial business registered in Germany, and which is a separate entity from the Manjaro distribution. The Manjaro distribution itself is a community-developed project and has no commercial interests. There is a cooperation between both entities, but they are separate.
That said, I doubt whether the GmbH would recommend the use of the Testing branch, given that Manjaro Summit — i.e. the immutable variety — was specifically developed for commercial applications.
No, the Testing branch already existed before the Manjaro GmbH was created.
It was I myself who marked my post as the solution, Your Honor, because it was the only one so far that actually and directly addressed the OP’s question.
No, not necessarily. It’s a matter of personal preference. Some people like living on the bleeding edge, as in…
So in the case of those people, it might indeed be a better idea for them to run the Unstable branch.
All jest aside, the Unstable branch is essentially Arch Stable, and it is quite usable. However, given the bleeding-edge nature of the software — and you do have to keep in mind that Manjaro does build several of its packages from source code, such as the kernels we use — the Unstable branch is subject to frequent updates and even individual package downgrades.
The Testing branch is less prone to such frequent changes and to package downgrades, but even there it may still happen, as well as that the frequency of the bundled updates with a dedicated Announcements thread is still quite a bit higher than in the Stable branch.
In theory, the Stable branch should be the trouble-free one — in theory, but as they say, “in theory, theory and practice are the same thing, but in practice, they are not.”
I’ve had Manjaro installed for ages and have been happy and satisfied with it ever since.
I read a lot in the forum, including the Testing and Unstable threads.
I thought I could contribute something by switching to either Testing or Unstable. That was my intention.
And I wanted to ask for advice on whether I should switch to Testing or Unstable, depending on which you think is more useful.
My main PC and notebook will remain on the Stable branch.
Only my old notebook with the cracked screen, and at the PC where VirtualBox is running in, would be switched, so if something goes wrong, I’ll just reinstall.
