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Arch Linux Is a Meme, but It Shouldn't Be
You've probably come across the Arch Linux memes, but are they doing it a disservice? Arch Linux is an excellent distribution, and I have five reasons why you should look past those labels and see for yourself.
For those that are unaware, the meme about Arch Linux is that its users love to brag, unsolicited, that they use it—made more ironic by its reputation for being unstable. The oft-quoted line is "I run Arch, BTW." I'll admit, I was one of those guys. When I started using it (around 15 years ago), I was proud of the fact that I had gained some competent skills in Linux. These days I really don't care what distro I use, as long as it's Qubes, BTW. However, I do feel that the Arch Linux meme does it a huge disservice, because, despite its obnoxious fans, it's a great distro.
The Base Distro is Bloat-Free
I've always loved the idea of a lean operating system. When I used Windows XP, I disabled as many services and graphical features as I could to save resources for gaming. After being on Linux for a year, I discovered Arch Linux, and the lightweight approach appealed to me greatly. With Arch Linux, you get to choose exactly what you want on your system and ignore everything else.
I'm not the only one who loathes bloat. I've often heard a great deal of criticism directed at Electron apps, which are wrappers around the Chrome browser. Electron apps (like Chrome) can use a gigabyte of memory just to run, and many in the Linux community dislike such resource hogs.