LINUX MINT TALES VOL.1
Apr. 25th, 2025 04:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
neonoverdrivei recently made the (admittedly impulsive) choice to switch my main OS on my personal laptop from windows 11 to linux. ok, well, specifically the linux mint distro, because that seemed the most approachable to me as a linux n00b.
i already was quite familar with reformatting/installing different OSes, so if anything, writing the install media to a drive and booting to it was a breeze. it also installed waaay faster than i thought it would, ahah. though- i suppose it makes sense, i was starting completely from scratch and wiped my main drive, since i already had everything archived on my externals.
and man oh man, what a difference it has made. linux mint in particular runs like a dream, even after setting up a bunch of my necessary software/other configurations(very few, but still)
i really, really like it. it's so nice being able to have FULL CONTROL over my OS without having to jump through hoops, or having unwanted features jump me out of nowhere. (COUGH COUGH, copilot, COUGH COUGH.)
which sucks, because i generally like to keep up on my updates knowing how ridiculously volatile windows can get if you *dont*. alas, my curse was to be beset upon by useless bloat and garbage that i just kind of had to live with, or forcibly erase.
i didn't mind windows 11. in fact, i quite liked the QOL features it had, what with tabs in the file explorer, and.. um. ... um. well.
i actually dont remember what else, if ill be honest.
okay that is to say, linux mint has been an incredible breath of fresh air. i'm still trying to train myself on using the terminal, i have ssssome idea of how it works, as i have experience with it since my work laptop is a macbook. and its like. yknow. similar enough, i guess.
plus, linux mint is as beginner friendly as it gets, as its pretty much laid out like a windows OS, plus it comes with a software manager, plenty of useful drivers (even wacom drivers, surprisingly. i dont use a wacom, however, so i had to seek out the huion ones, lololo) and plenty of preinstalled FOSS (Free And Open Source Software) included. like the libreoffice suite, which i dont know if ill use much, but damn is it a nice plus.
it has a driver manager too, so you can choose between reccomended ones (like for nvidia, though my main GPU is amd which from my understanding is much friendlier than nvidia is with linux.)
(clip relevant.)
so! that went off without a hitch, really.
but then came the sticky parts.
see, a lot of programs i use do have linux versions. vscode, yknow. for my website. audacity.. even unofficial ports for shit like roblox. like i was good on that front
buuuut then theres clip studio. the one thing i quite literally refuse to work without.
it wasn't THAT much of a pain to install, at least. i just had to do some googling/research for the best option, which was through bottles, (courtesy of this user on reddit)
so, easy! that was set up. i cant.. use the asset store, but like. fine. my digital hoarding habits made it so ive backed up literally every brush i love.
but then i had to go through the hurdle of "how do i access/open my existing .clip files" because bottles is a flatpak software, aka, it runs mainly in a sandbox for security reasons- so it cannot really read/write to any files outside of it UNLESS you give it permissions to do so.
sssssso i had to figure that out. couldn't be that hard, i said to myself, downloading flatseal (a gui manager for permissions on flatpak software). which, yes, it isnt hard. i just had no goddamn clue how to allow myself to view files outside of the CSP instance in my other drives, especially my external, where. yknow. All My Art Files Are.
i mean, yes, i couldve copied it to that folder and worked there but i wanted a way to at least back it up conveniently and not have to copy and paste..
so then i played around with flatseal, you can set it so that a specific software has access to the file system- and i did that for bottles. great! i go to bottles. check if it can see my externals. it can. great. ok. i open csp. i go to >open
go to drive where my external is
no files
FUCK.
so i go back to flatseal, close bottles and i realize something very quickly.
i didnt have it so flatseal also could access my file system. and my theory was oh, shit. maybe thats why it doesnt wanna work for bottles. so i do that for flatseals setting too
open bottles. open csp.
>open
>F:drive
FILES!
IT WORKED. I CAN ACTUALLY USE CSP WITHOUT LOSING MY MIND. and then i set up all my brushes, my layout. and it saves perfectly fine, performs great too! no problems there, at least for now.
next steps for myself will be to begin really trying to theme my desktop. i have found some icon/theme packs but nothing really makes my inspiration soar. i'm mainly on the quest to aero/glass-ify the living shit out of this thing. so, in the next volume youll find out what comes of that.
also. i found out getting toonboom was a pain in the ass to start on linux. so ive abandoned her for now. sorry girl that i got very, very legally. (;))
i already was quite familar with reformatting/installing different OSes, so if anything, writing the install media to a drive and booting to it was a breeze. it also installed waaay faster than i thought it would, ahah. though- i suppose it makes sense, i was starting completely from scratch and wiped my main drive, since i already had everything archived on my externals.
and man oh man, what a difference it has made. linux mint in particular runs like a dream, even after setting up a bunch of my necessary software/other configurations(very few, but still)
i really, really like it. it's so nice being able to have FULL CONTROL over my OS without having to jump through hoops, or having unwanted features jump me out of nowhere. (COUGH COUGH, copilot, COUGH COUGH.)
which sucks, because i generally like to keep up on my updates knowing how ridiculously volatile windows can get if you *dont*. alas, my curse was to be beset upon by useless bloat and garbage that i just kind of had to live with, or forcibly erase.
i didn't mind windows 11. in fact, i quite liked the QOL features it had, what with tabs in the file explorer, and.. um. ... um. well.
i actually dont remember what else, if ill be honest.
okay that is to say, linux mint has been an incredible breath of fresh air. i'm still trying to train myself on using the terminal, i have ssssome idea of how it works, as i have experience with it since my work laptop is a macbook. and its like. yknow. similar enough, i guess.
plus, linux mint is as beginner friendly as it gets, as its pretty much laid out like a windows OS, plus it comes with a software manager, plenty of useful drivers (even wacom drivers, surprisingly. i dont use a wacom, however, so i had to seek out the huion ones, lololo) and plenty of preinstalled FOSS (Free And Open Source Software) included. like the libreoffice suite, which i dont know if ill use much, but damn is it a nice plus.
it has a driver manager too, so you can choose between reccomended ones (like for nvidia, though my main GPU is amd which from my understanding is much friendlier than nvidia is with linux.)
(clip relevant.)
so! that went off without a hitch, really.
but then came the sticky parts.
see, a lot of programs i use do have linux versions. vscode, yknow. for my website. audacity.. even unofficial ports for shit like roblox. like i was good on that front
buuuut then theres clip studio. the one thing i quite literally refuse to work without.
it wasn't THAT much of a pain to install, at least. i just had to do some googling/research for the best option, which was through bottles, (courtesy of this user on reddit)
so, easy! that was set up. i cant.. use the asset store, but like. fine. my digital hoarding habits made it so ive backed up literally every brush i love.
but then i had to go through the hurdle of "how do i access/open my existing .clip files" because bottles is a flatpak software, aka, it runs mainly in a sandbox for security reasons- so it cannot really read/write to any files outside of it UNLESS you give it permissions to do so.
sssssso i had to figure that out. couldn't be that hard, i said to myself, downloading flatseal (a gui manager for permissions on flatpak software). which, yes, it isnt hard. i just had no goddamn clue how to allow myself to view files outside of the CSP instance in my other drives, especially my external, where. yknow. All My Art Files Are.
i mean, yes, i couldve copied it to that folder and worked there but i wanted a way to at least back it up conveniently and not have to copy and paste..
so then i played around with flatseal, you can set it so that a specific software has access to the file system- and i did that for bottles. great! i go to bottles. check if it can see my externals. it can. great. ok. i open csp. i go to >open
go to drive where my external is
no files
FUCK.
so i go back to flatseal, close bottles and i realize something very quickly.
i didnt have it so flatseal also could access my file system. and my theory was oh, shit. maybe thats why it doesnt wanna work for bottles. so i do that for flatseals setting too
open bottles. open csp.
>open
>F:drive
FILES!
IT WORKED. I CAN ACTUALLY USE CSP WITHOUT LOSING MY MIND. and then i set up all my brushes, my layout. and it saves perfectly fine, performs great too! no problems there, at least for now.
next steps for myself will be to begin really trying to theme my desktop. i have found some icon/theme packs but nothing really makes my inspiration soar. i'm mainly on the quest to aero/glass-ify the living shit out of this thing. so, in the next volume youll find out what comes of that.
also. i found out getting toonboom was a pain in the ass to start on linux. so ive abandoned her for now. sorry girl that i got very, very legally. (;))
