Linux desktop OS "closest" to windows

[didds]

I suspect this is a sort of "how long is a piece of string" type question but anyway...

Which linux desktop OS has a feel closest to windows would you all say? whether that be windows XP through to Windows 10 which in themselves are very different

putting feelers out there...

didds

[didds]

Ignore me!

Ive now immediately found this!

LOL

https://www.lifewire.com/best-windows-l ... es-2201177

didds

[kiloran]

Ignore me!

Ive now immediately found this!

LOL

https://www.lifewire.com/best-windows-l ... es-2201177

didds

I've no experience of those in your link, but Linux Mint is a well-known and well-established Linux distribution and in my view very Windows-like (but without the bugs and a zillion times faster!)

--kiloran

[Infrasonic]

I use Mint also but I am tempted to try Zorin having read many favourable reviews from the past year or so, a plus is it has Wine already installed for trying out Windows apps.

[UncleEbenezer]

The distro matters less for "look and feel" than what windowing system and desktop you select. So for example KDE - which is an installation option on any distro I've encountered - works with a menu akin to a windows Start menu.

[GeoffF100]

Lubuntu is very much like an old (XP or before) version of Windows, and runs well on old computers (or modern entry level laptops). If you like simple and fast Lubuntu is worth a look. I am using it on a 10 year old PC right now. I have also got a modern i5 running Windows 10, but I do not use that as much.

[GeoffF100]

You can also make a Windows 10 look alike if you want:

https://www.gnome-look.org/p/1013482/

Someone has even made a Windows 8 theme:

https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2014/02/win ... -gtk-theme

Now, that is weird, but anything is possible with Linux.

[ten0rman]

I transferred to Linux 3 or 4 years ago with the demise of Windows XP. I tried Suse12, and couldn't get on with the desk top manager. I tried Ubuntu, didn't like the ginormous icons or the peculiar colour scheme (yes, I know it's probably customisable, but after it crashed my computer I gave up), and finally Linux Mint with the Mate desktop. Initially this was v.13 - I'm now on v.18.1. I'm fully satisfied with Mint, so much so that I haven't even looked at any alternatives. For me, Linux Mint just works, and works, and works.

This setup, as standard has a button on the bottom left in the same place as the Windows Start button and which does the same thing. It also has a bar along the bottom, called the Panel, which is usable in exactly the same fashion as the Taskbar (?? - it's so long I've forgotten) along the bottom of the XP screen on which are displayed various shortcut icons for opening programs. On the rhs it has a set of I suppose you could call them control icons including a clock & date, just like XP has. And finally, I can have as many, or as few, icons as I want on the desktop, lined up in my case vertically at the LHS in one or two columns. Again, identical to XP.

You can have wallpaper - if you wish - I don't, preferring a plain black background. Any windows that are opened are similar to XP, indeed I believe one of the available could schemes is called Redmond - I wonder why!

The downside is that the Linux Mint icons are not as colourful as XP. Or maybe it's me that can't be bothered in chasing up how to amend them as it's satisfactory for me as it is.

I do get the very occasional crash, but to be fair, I am using a Win32 program via Wine, and a DOS program via DOSemu, so odd things might be happening. I'm probably talking about once a month. Or maybe less.

Otherwise, I use Linux Mint more or less as I used to use XP. I have three laptops, all running Linux Mint, and all networked such that I can easily pass data between them any which way. Two of the three have external hard drives as well, all fully accessible from any machine, but in reality, one of the two is my main machine, whilst the other is my backup machine being effectively a duplicate of the main machine. The third is the one I cart into the workshop if necessary.

Can't think of anything else.

Hope this helps,

ten0rman

[JohnB]

Another vote for Mint MATE. Note that Linux GUI people keep wanting to "scratch that itch" by reinventing the UI every few years, always very different, normally worse, but the developers are so deep into it they can't see it.

MATE is the opposite, it aims to change as little as possible.

[GeoffF100]

The downside is that the Linux Mint icons are not as colourful as XP. Or maybe it's me that can't be bothered in chasing up how to amend them as it's satisfactory for me as it is.

Here is an article telling you how to do it:

https://itsfoss.com/install-icon-linux-mint/

There are plenty of colourful ones here:

https://www.fossmint.com/best-linux-icon-themes/

With Lubuntu, you can choose between several ready installed icon themes with the click of a mouse.

[didds]

All excellent - cheers!

didds

[ten0rman]

Geoff100,

Thanks for those references.

Mint itself has various themes built-in so to speak, and I've already chosen the one I like best. The fact that icons such as shortcuts, folders and single use items are 50 shades of grey (!!) as distinct from the Windows use of fancy colours is what I was refering to. In fact, they could all be replaced by text for me since I invariably read the associated text anyway. What I'm trying to say is that I really couldn't care less about colour for these icons so I won't be looking into it anytime soon. My intention was just to raise the point for a standard installation. But thanks anyway.

Cheers,

ten0rman