TL;DR I am using Windows and I want help setting up all the conveniences I enjoyed back into Linux… specifically an alternative to OneDrive.
I am going to admit something that is strange and maybe evil… at the least it betrays a loss of integrity and deficit of dignitity.
For the past few months I have been using Microsoft Windows as my OS. It started with finally deciding to play with AI and turning on the features on my phone… which meant turning on Google Play Services… not necessary, but it is what I did.
Then I randomly bought some tiny Livaa PC to mess around with that came with Windows, so I got comfy with that.
As a student, I must use Microsoft Word because as much as Libre Office tries it just mangles the formatting. So, I discovered Office 365 and how it is easily accessible in the Edge Browser… plus Bing AI.
One day I just thought fuck it, I want to use all the music software, play all the games. I want to use my graphics card without needing to think. I want all the harware I bought to work. So I installed Windows. I use OneDrive. I ask Bing, and Bard, and Opera AI…
Well, I pay for Kagi because it is better.
…
Anyways, I think I had my fun. I want to go back. I need to, it is potentially immoral not to.
Please help me transition back!
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I’ve been in your shoes many many times. My needs and expectations change every few years. I recently bought a Steam Deck and have been using an OCI image called Bazzite based on Fedora Silverblue the past few weeks and it’s been great exploring Linux and feeling the real ownership of the things I run and host.
I’m a tinkerer at heart, have two Raspberry Pis, one running as a router and the other running as a general server paired with my Synology DS720+ as a self hosted everything else, email, online docs, cloud server, Jellyfin, etc.
If you want it to be easy look at some distros like Bazzite which has a good gaming focus. Or Linux mint which is great as well.
Look at alternative software for what you’re using, music software has Ardour for a DAW or Audacity/Tenacity for general audio editing. Kdenlive works great too or davinci resolve if you really need more oomph.
AMD hardware always works better with Linux so if you have or can upgrade to AMD stuff make that a bigger priority especially since they focus more on FOSS software and release a lot of things as such.
You don’t have to feel guilty about not cutting off some programs and web apps. As a photographer I’ll probably never be able to leave Adobe sadly but I’ll just accept that.
Don’t be afraid to try things and experiment, it’s the fun of it. Looking and trying new things. It’ll be a great way to get back into it!
Thank you! I have been looking at Fedora Silverblue and ran it for a couple weeks. My only issue is that sometimes I need programs that only got .deb files, and they are meant to run on Ubuntu not debian.
I have found happiness on Pop!_OS.
Pop is growing in popularity for all the right reasons! I hope it works out great for you! A few tips I would give is to make sure to do backups and look into things like Timeshift to make unexplainable errors and potentially wonky package installs easier to undo!
Backups are definitely a task I have been sleeping on. I will set that up.
Best alternative to OneDrive is NextCloud or OwnCloud.
Though you will need to setup your own server (can be just some old desktop/laptop collecting dust or a raspberry pi) to run either one, plus get your own web domain (cloudflare I recommend for getting one.)
But it is so worth it if you need cloud storage and want full control of all your files.
Thank you! I will check those out.
I absolutely have old capbable computers I need to put to work.
Check out SyncThing for a peer2peer (device to device) solution which doesn’t necessarily need a server, but having an always-on device like a server is still great for using Syncthing as well. It’s easy to use, only slightly more involved than setting up Nextcloud or Dropbox or whatever. But all done via a web-based GUI. It works surprisingly well, stable and conflict-free for the complex syncing it has to do all the time. Basically you install SyncThing on all devices you want to keep in sync, and they will find each other via their IDs when they are online, and automatically sync all their directories which should be synced. Of course it’s open source and cross-platform too.
Seems like the best solution for my needs. Thank you!
I use Nextcloud with a CODE server to provide an office suite in a browser. I’ve had no problems with it and it does what I need.
There is also a OneDrive Client for linux.
Thank you for the reply! Nextcloud seems like the way to go, and it has a client for everything which is nice.
I need to learn how to host things. The pricing is reasonable though, but I am not a business, but I will see.
I like OneDrive, but I no doubt there is a FOSS solution. I just need to look into a hosting provider I guess.
Nextcloud is free unless you are a business choosing to pay for support or you pay a hosting provider. It costs nothing to run it on your own hardware. Also if you are interested in self hosting and would like to really put in the work to understand it the easiest place to start in my opinion is the docker examples, especially the docker-compose examples.
That said, make sure you have backups. Nextcloud is a massively complex application which does all the basic stuff pretty well, but you are the responsible person if it breaks. It’s far far from set-it-and-forget-it software.
Thank you for the advice. I know the data is my responsibility… so I need a better system.