this post was submitted on 17 Jun 2024
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Linux

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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

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[–] priapus@sh.itjust.works 12 points 4 months ago (3 children)

I have never heard of toolbx before, can anyone share how it compares to Distrobox? I've been using that for some time.

[–] scottmeme@sh.itjust.works 9 points 4 months ago

Its mostly used for servers so that a GPU can be easily used with containerized software.

Most of these use cases don't even have a display output.

[–] Telorand@reddthat.com 6 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

From what I gather, it's very similar. They're both containerization tools to install software in a container overlay (someone mentioned to me before that they both even draw from the same Docker images).

Toolbx environments have seamless access to the user’s home directory, the Wayland and X11 sockets, networking (including Avahi), removable devices (like USB sticks), systemd journal, SSH agent, D-Bus, ulimits, /dev and the udev database, etc..

I'm not familiar with the finer details, but here's some example use cases.

ETA: Based on the examples, it reminds me of how NixOS uses nested shells to do things.

[–] biribiri11@lemmy.ml 5 points 4 months ago

From what I gather, it’s very similar.

They are both just wrappers for podman(/docker). Distrobox is more feature rich, and is far better documented, but is closer to a collection of bash scripts rather than a fully cohesive program. Toolbx is… definitely something. Their only real claim to fame is being less “janky”? IDK, it reeks of NIH, and in my experience, it’s a lot more fragile than distrobox (as in, I’ve had containers just become randomly inoperable in that I can’t enter them after a bit).

If you want to be pedantic, technically, distrobox is a fork of toolbx before it was rewritten.

[–] boredsquirrel 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Its faster and more minimal.

For desktop use poorly it doesnt have the ability to use custom home dirs so dotfiles will conflict

[–] priapus@sh.itjust.works 1 points 4 months ago

I see, I only use distrobox for building software that doesn't easily run on NixOS, so that likely shouldn't matter too much for me.