After using Arch and Debian (two great distros) I have been using Mint for the last 7 years or so and I have yet to feel any desire to change distro: it's just what I was looking for.
'Better' only exists in regards to specific needs: what do you think is not as good as it should be with Mint? Then ytou will be able to decide if this or that other distros offering it are indeed better ;)
LD_PRELOAD - you can override library functions (if the program is dynamically linked), and change their behavior. Like add adblocking to libcurl, or fix the RNG, or such.
A somewhat similar trick works with virtual functions from C++ (or function pointers in C, but these are rare) - you read the original function pointer outta the vtable, then substitute yours, add some fun behavior, then call the original behavior in the end. Note that this might not be possible these days as code might live in a read-only region of memory.
https://lemmy.world/comment/26416591
My comment there applies here as well 🙂
Some additions to what your post and the other comments listed:
Mint is good if OS tinkering isn’t where you want to spend your time and you want something with sane defaults that just works. Immutable distros like Bazzite, Aurora, or SteamOS are arguably more newb-friendly and turn-key, whereas Mint is more readily customized (and broken).
Depends on what exactly we talk about. I don't need to wait years for the new updates of specific programs, where I need or want to have the new features and improvements. RetroArch is such a case. I even compile it from source nowadays, because they don't update it in over a year. And imagine this was part in the distributions stable repository, which would take even longer to get the new version. The Linux Kernel is also updated frequently and contains improvements for performance or compatibility. I used Ubuntu for 13 years straight, starting as my first main distribution. And I was sick of this "stable" thing, where in example GIMP wasn't updated in the repository. I used PPAs to mitigate this, and it was a horror. In example when GIMP released to support long standing requests for features, it was painful not able to use them, because it would have helped me a lot back then.
These are just a few things, not a list of all reasons. With AppImages and Flatpak (or Snap), there is less reason to use Rolling Releases than ever, but its not a full replacement for distributions repository.
"everything is a file" Might be interesting. And monolithic kernels.
What do you get out of a rolling release? I get that you get newer stuff faster, but what does that do for your day to day use?
I assume that's because Archlinux is designed to be minimal and you to add and change things. You are expected to understand and people maybe experiment or do things wrong. On top of it, the ever changing nature of always up to day can break sometimes (usually it doesn't, but its more prone to breakage than a cyclic upgrade).
My above suggestion wasn't actually using Archlinux directly, but more like EndeavourOS or CachyOS in example. Arch was just an example, there are also Rolling Release models for Fedora and openSUSE as well. I just mentioned this type of Rolling Release as to why you would want to switch off from Mint, as this could be a good reason for.
anecdotal experience tells me people who use arch break their system way more than people who use mint, not exactly sure why that happens
"Newbie distro" is usually meant to describe an operating system that is easy to get into for newcomers to Linux, who don't want to get into the details yet and just start using it. This is my interpretation of what the communities usually mean by that term.
If you like Mint, then there is no reason to switch off it, especially not for the reasons because people call it "newbie". It's likely that there is no "better" distribution for you and everything that is different will be bother you. One reason why you might want to switch off could be a Rolling Release model, like Archlinux (or something based on Arch that is rolling too). But that comes with its own problems and you might not like it to have an ever changing and evolving system, always updating to the newest. If that doesn't excite you, then maybe you should stick with a cyclic release model like Mint. And nothing wrong with it, if you like that stability*!
*stability=here that doesn't mean a stable system in sense of problems, but more in the sense of non changing stable environment, unstable would mean its always evolving as a rolling release, not that it is less stable in problems
As others have said, if you're happy with it, no need to change. I switched out to Arch (BTW) because I like to pull my OS apart and tinker with it, but if you're not into that then there's no issue with going with something stable that just works.
newbie generally means easy. I have been in tech for close to 30 years and have been a nerd much longer. Im not big into spending a whole bunch of time on my personal laptop though so use the newbie distros. if I want to goof around I use a virtual machine.
Really? I was lucky then because my experience was seamless. Just clicked two bottons, my password once and boom - upgraded.
Of you like Mint stay with it. A friend of mine has been using it for 10+ years probably.
There are so many distros and you might find each one has something positive or negative about it.
Just use what you like.
Just a warning, installing too many WMs or DEs can cause….. issues. Two will probably be fine, but before you go wild and install all of them, just be wary as it can cause conflicts between apps and shit. So yeah, just be wary.
Probably the only reason you might switch is for something like CachyOS that probably has the similar problems you get with Arch but with a more custom kernel with their own tweaks/configurations to speed things up and provide newer hardware support in general.
Either something like that, or a want to switch and try something either new and/or more/less advanced... if there's even any distro more user friendly than Mint.
Otherwise, the only other reason I could see for leaving would be if you for some reason don't like how Mint is developing/being developed.
Don't customize shit. Once your tweak one thing it might work for a month or 6 months or longer but at some point it WILL be the domino that fucks your system. I've tweaked everything endlessly for years. Now I run damn near stock. Tired of fixing shit.
Edit: doesn't matter if you document what you tweaked. Files and folders move, layouts change, code changes. You lose items, updates happen. There is no stable tweak ever. Eventually something will happen.
Source: I've ran most common distros and tweaked every one of them. All to wind back up on stock mint. Shit just works.
If it works for you, stick with it. It also doesn't cost anything try others.
Other than being able to do a minimal install? Nope.
Neither you nor I can say with 100% certainty it does or doesn't. They didn't go deep on their hardware that I saw. All I was pointing out was that that was a bit much of a simplification. There are reasons to look at the kernel. Just not a lot of them. Largely I agree with you though. Debian, fedora, or any of their offshoots on hardware from the last ten years potato potato right?
But on a potato. I have an old laptop with a core 2 duo in it. A late 2000's laptop that only ran windows 7 at best. It's still surprisingly capable despite its age. Put something like a modern fedora on it, though that's a different story. It becomes slow almost to the point of being frustrating to use. No matter which desktop environment I'm using. Drop MX or similar and it's a whole different experience. Part of it kernel patches, part of it run times. Even i3/i5/i7 haswell or older can see a solid boost on kernels not compiled with modern processor extensions primarily in mind.
I've always thought of Mint as a newbie-friendly distro because there is a convenient UI for everything that you want to do, but that doesn't mean it's somehow limited for more advanced users.
It's friendly to new users but does not block things that more advanced users would want. I don't think there's any reason to stop using it as you become an advanced user.
The only reason to switch would be if some other distro has a specific selling point that you want to try. I've tried a few of them and always just end up going back to what I'm familiar with.
I went from Mint to CachyOS for gaming reasons, on the whole I enjoy it more tham Mint for pretty much everything. It’s just a bit more streamlines and organized, and software storage isn’t as much of a mystery box.
That being said, Mint is a great OS that I didn’t have any issues with outside of some headaches when it came to running some games. If it’s not limiting you with what you need it for then there’s no reason to jump ship if you like it.
Do you really think that matters in OP's context?
Of course I was simplifying things