What brought you to your current Linux distro and why did you leave the previous one?
What brought me to Kali Linux:
For me with Kali I’ve always preferred the rolling release cycle, ever since Arch Linux. But I also like the polish, the easy organized access to sysadmin, networking and devops tools.
More recently finally appreciating their official switch from Gnome to XFCE.
Why I left Ubuntu LTS:
I’ve used rolling distros for the largest chunk of my time on Linux, mostly because I don’t like having to upgrade my system every few years, or months. So moving to Ubuntu LTS was an experiment to see if I could just settle on one distro ~ eight years or so.
But as it turned out, I went from 20.04 to 22.04 to 24.04 anyway, which defeated my whole goal. Lol That’s what convinced me I needed to get back to a rolling release cycle.
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First it was gnome three on Debian Gnome which made me switch to Debian MATE.
After that stable Debian being a problem on too many sites that said my software was out of date all the time plus some proprietary software I wanted to run without work arounds or other hassles. So I switched to Ubuntu MATE.
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Does switching desktop also count? 
Oh, nevermind, I’ll include the rest too. 
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I was on Fedora and switched over to Debian. My main two reasons for doing so is that I found the kernel update frequency a bit too high on Fedora (especially as I had to rebuild the Nvidia kernel module every time), and the second being that I align much more with Debian’s philosophy. I also really like that it’s a community-driven distribution.
I actually just wrote a blog post about it! 
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@tkn sure. Why not? Useful info still. 
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Reading. That keyboard though!! 
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Hahaa, I must admit, it’s “just” a Keychron C2 Pro, but I love the look of it, and given that it’s my first experience with owning a mechanical keyboard myself (Banana keys), I’m really happy with it.
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Don’t forget that the Showcase category description is…
Share your projects, apps, service launches, and news with our community who can test, make-use-of, and provide feedback.
Optional obviously, but just in case you missed sharind there
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Hey cool, you used to have MATE installed on debian 
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Thank you for the reminder (and for sharing as well).
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Absolutely–it makes the old laptop feel very snappy, I like it. I use it mainly for some light media consumption and writing.
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I’ve been using antiX since 2007, and I’ve been using MX Linux ever since MEPIS dissolved in 2012, so I really haven’t changed all that much. Slackware was my first distribution and I still have it installed. I started using Debian around 2001 and I still use it, though I’ve centered more on using derivatives of Debian in antiX and MX Linux on my installed configurations. Nevertheless I have a Debian Trixie Flash Drive available, so not that much has changed.
Mandrake is gone, replaced by Mandriva, the founder of Libranet passed away, so did the distribution, so those are other landscape changes.
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I’ve been with Ubuntu from the start, with different DMs, orignal GNOME, then flashback, then finally MATE.
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Yes, I find the Desktop just as important as the OS.
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Debian came with the Mate desktop. After my first Debian install they offered Debian Mate Complete which had some proprietary software so I could immediately have WIFI when I booted my laptop instead of having to have it on the wire and install the WIFI software, which for me was Broadcomm at the time. It has been a long time, I am not sure if they offer Mate or Complete anymore. That was Debian 8 Jessie, 2015.
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@Jymm Mate is still mentioned in some publications, though neither Cinnamon nor Mate are typically mentioned as one of the top four alternatives: GNOME is the default, as it has been ever since desktop environments became commonplace. KDE Plasma is the other prominent offering, then Cinnamon is listed third (surprisingly) in an article at fosslinux, then Xfce. Debian.club, on the other hand, mentions only GNOME, KDE, Xfce and LXDE, though in most circles, LXQt has replaced LXDE. computingforgeeks.com mentions GNOME, KDE, Xfce, LXQt, Cinnamon, and MATE! Go figure! In that last reference it’s definitely about Debian 13, so those are the primary choices, though even more ARE available.
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I am surprised that Cinnamon scored higher than XFCE. I did not expect that 
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I looked at the official Debian site and they offer the MATE desktop for Trixie 13. It seems MATE is still alive on Debian.
See the Debian CD FAQ for lots more information about Debian CDs and installation.
The images here were put together by the Debian Images team, using live-build and other software.
I used to download Debian MATE (complete) from Softpedia. They have taken Linux off Softpedia completely, just Windoze and Apple now.
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So Jymm, did you install Debian MATE? If so,
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did you find the installation process “fluid”?
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were you able to configure your desktop the way you wanted (presumably to closely emulate what you had with UbuntuMATE)?
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any recommendations about pitfalls to avoid or pre-plan?
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