Voyager Linux

Just found out about Voyager Linux. Link: CLICK HERE. (That link will take you to an article on The New Stack that explains about Voyager Linux.) I went, "oh, that is what Zorin needs." This OS has the Caffeine extension included by default. And others, too, that Zorin could benefit from. Not that I'm gonna switch, no, but this is a perfect example to support some of what I have said before in terms of feedback for Zorin - to include or develop extensions that would help the desktop experience even more (like better power management, for example). If this "unknown" distro can do it, so can Zorin. (I just stopped typing and checked DistroWatch; it's actually # 38 on their list - interesting; so maybe not so "unknown" after all.) Huh. OK.

Well! In any case, just wanted to share. Thanks.

Update:

Tried out Voyager in VirtualBox (out of curiosity). No way. I like the concept behind it (similar to Zorin), but not the presentation. Way too sloppy and non-cohesive. If the Zorin Group would just include a few more specific extensions by default in the installation ISO for Zorin 18 and onwards, that would better match the desktop experience expected by Windows migrants. I think that'd make happier campers out of those who already use Zorin. Voyager made me more appreciative of Zorin.

Based on that article alone, it doesn't look very impressive, to be honest. Just Gnome with a few extensions. What Zorin OS brings in addition to that is their own layout changes to make it look nicer, their own appearance tool and other changes under the hood.

It does highlight one important aspect that should be directed at Gnome's developers: customization. They should make it easier for developers to introduce new features via extensions, not harder.

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Yeah i've tried Voyager in the past, and I concur with what @zenzen is sort of saying about it. I don't mind the idea, but the execution is... rough, to put it mildly.

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Agree with both of you, @zenzen and @applecheeks37. A bit hard to believe it's No. 38 on DistroWatch's list (not that it's a reliable "metric" by any means, but it gives us a rough idea of how "popular" a distro is). Should be further down the list.

Distrowatch's popularity rating uses a very naive metric. The more people click on some link, the more it ranks up. It's a good way of knowing where people are looking at, but not necessarily how much they like what they're seeing.

To say something good about this project, I think it's nice they are looking to make the default experience easier to customize. It looks like they've made some efforts with making available for 2-in-1 laptops as well, although I'm not sure how much of that is their own effort or Canonical's:

https://voyagerlive.org/voyager-pc-tablette-2-en-1/

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Can I be clear that Caffeine is to prevent desktop from becoming idle in full-screen? This is present as its own package in PCLOS Debian (Plasma) in Synaptic Package Manager, no extension needed. Another reason to move to Debian instead of Ubuntu!

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I did not know this. Perhaps this can be a suggestion for XFCE users struggling with xset -dpms

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Just to be clear - I like Caffeine (and Espresso) because it keeps games from going dark when I play them, especially in fullscreen. This is one of the things Linux has more work to do (with power management). Linux does many things well, but power management is not necessarily one of them. In Windows, I can game in fullscreen for an hour or whatever and not have the screen go dark on me. It's the default behavior in Windows. But with Linux (at least on GNOME), you need an extension like Caffeine or Espresso to compensate and get similar functionality. Be nice if this was built-in by default in Linux. Zorin has a chance to add this specific feather to its hat, and make it a compelling reason to switch completely from Windows.

I'm a little gaming gremlin streamer at times, and I can't say I've ever had this issue crop up for me. And I've played for much too long at times. I'm not sure what specifically the differences are between your setup and mine, but usually it's XFCE and the like that give me problems, not Gnome.

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I understand not ? Xfce let screen go blank after awhile in fullscreen ?
I've never encountered that , and I watch movies a lot ,in fullscreen. Both screens stays on.
And my power manager isn't set up that way. If I do nothing ,screens goes off after 5 min. If I watch movie or YouTube or whatever,screens stays on.
Or maybe I'm misunderstanding

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This seems to be an issue of hardware variety rather than Desktop.
Hardware must clearly communicate with and be fully compatible with power management.
Whether you are using Gnome or XFCE.

I have never experienced screen darkening on XFCE during videos or games. But others have and we worked to find solutions here.
And others have reported just the same on Gnome - thus the suggestion to use the Caffeine Gnome Extension.

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I did in gaming, turned off the setting "dim screen" in the power plan. When i finished a level and the game started to play a movie. After a minute it made my screen a bit darker because the system thought i did not use my notebook.

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