Hands on: Debian with Raspberry Pi Desktop review
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This comment first appeared in issue 354 PC Pro.
Many distributions are available in full fat and light versions. Zorin and Linux Mint are a great example, each with the option of ISO based on GNOME or XFCE. Debian and Raspberry Pi OS are very similar to the Raspberry desktop. Available for Parts After being the default operating system for the single-board computer of the same name for ten years, it uses neither gnome nor XFCE, but Pixel, Pi improves the Xwindows environment, and the lightweight itself is based on the lightweight LDXE desktop manager.
Don’t let the “lightweight” nickname delay you. The Pixel has many features familiar to competitor environments, including menu bar, application menu, desktop icons, and context menus. It does lack decoration, though. Without widgets, like in Mint, you can’t capture windows to the edge of the screen for simple arrangements, and the visual style of Zorin is missing.
However, it does launch quickly, it has all the features you might need, and its options and settings are both easy to understand).
this operating systemThe original name of the Raspbian – hints at its Debian roots. Actually, you think you are installing stock Debian while working in the installer might be forgiven because there is no mention of the Raspberry Pi.
It is built in Bullseye (Debian 11) and Linux 5.10 kernel, both start showing their age. Debian is currently 12.2 (Bookworm), based on regular Raspberry Pi OS for single-board computers, and supports 6.1 kernel.
Where Raspberry pi Already produced your own imager to set up the Raspberry Pi OS, the image can also handle user creation, configuring SSH, building Wi-Fi credentials, etc., and so on, for most other distributions, the process of installing Debian using the Raspberry Pi desktop is similar to this. Download the ISO, write it to the bootable USB drive, and start the installer from there. About ten minutes later, we sat in front of the desktop and fully supplemented the necessary applications we were ready to use.
The pre-installed office suite is libreoffice 7.0.4 (the latest is 7.6), and claws are installed to manage emails, and the default web browser is Chromium. Other applications can be installed by adding/removing software tools or using APT through the terminal. We chose the latter to install Firefox and Thunderbird, and in each case we set up version 115. This is especially popular when it comes to Thunderbirds, as the 115 marks an important interface refresh, which makes the suite a more pleasant environment to spend throughout the workday.
Elsewhere, the preinstalled app list reminds you that the Raspberry Pi is popular in STEM environments, coding and automation. Both Geany programmer editors and excellent Thonny Ide proved this along with Scratch and Mu. The same goes for Smartsim circuit designers.
Both VLC and image viewers are pre-installed, but if you use them you will need to manually install GIMP (for bitmap graphics), Inkscape (Vectors), and Shotwell (Photos). Again, this can be done by adding/removing software utilities, but this is not as friendly as an equivalent installer UbuntuMint and Co, sometimes presents a large list of options in response to searches, each accompanied by the same default icon. You may sometimes find yourself scratching your head and wondering which one you need.
The Pixel includes recommended software tools, which do allow you to avoid software installers and easy-to-use suitable for a few common applications, but the three mentioned in the previous paragraph do not exist. We want to see them included in the next refresh.
Although we have captured several aspects of Debian with the Raspberry Pi desktop, there are a lot of suggestions. It boots up very fast, the pixel interface is very refreshing, and compact enough to be a reasonable choice for running full-time from a USB thumb drive.
Yes, it is starting to look outdated in some places (note that it was released in July 2022), but the Raspberry Pi tells us that an update is planned and that is expected to arrive before Easter. Meanwhile, if you want to recycle some old hardware as a workhorse without padding, or want to use the same environment on single-board computers and desktops, this distribution may be what you are after.
