In today's open source roundup: Is the Asus Flip or the Acer 11.6 Chromebook a better buy for Linux? Plus: Five reasons why Ubuntu is so popular. And the status of Wayland and Mir in Manjaro Linux 2015.08 "KDE-Next" Chromebooks: Asus Flip or Acer 11.6 for Linux? Chromebooks have been burning up the sales charts at Amazon, and one redditor recently had a question about which model to buy. He wanted to know if the Asus Flip or Acer 11.6 was a better value and a better bet to run Linux. It’s a tough question since both laptops are rated 4.5 stars by Amazon customers, and there are pluses and minuses to each model. Mirazsyed asked his question in the Chrome OS subreddit: I am looking to buy a new laptop and I think Chromebooks are the way for me to go. I am on a tight budget, but I could ask my father for more money. So my dilemma is picking between the Acer 11.6 chromebook[1] or the Asus Flip chromebook[2] . I’ll be using it mostly to browse the web and watch videos on YouTube. I might play some light games and even install Linux onto it. The screen size difference isn’t a huge deal. The Acer is so cheap that I am wondering why I’m even looking at others, but the Asus looks so good that I’d feel like I’m using a MacBook 2015, which TBH looks quite good. I’ll mostly use the computers at my University’s computer labs for heavier work, but I need something ultra portable and easy to use wherever and whenever. Will the Acer do, or am I missing out on something awesome without the Asus? More at Reddit His fellow redditors responded with their suggestions and thoughts: Primtimtecanuck: ”If you’re going to install Linux, the Acer might be the way to go. The Linux support is better for the x86 processor on the Acer as opposed to the Rockchip (ARM-based) on the Asus Flip. That said, the Flip is really nice and portable. Way better screen than the Acer.” Mirazsyed: ”The screen is great and the build is amazing. Is there no way to install Linux on ARM processors?” Primetimecanuck: ”There are ways. But it’s more involved than x86 based computers. Also, like I mentioned, Linux support is better and you’ll find more programs supported for x86 based computers. I re-read your original post again, and I must agree with you that using the Flip makes me feel like I’m using a higher end laptop because of the aluminum build. The thin and sleek body just looks and feels good.” Justeducation: ”Get 4GB. Spotify alone takes up 1.2GB of RAM. YouTube another half gig. The various Google apps about 100+ gigs each. So unless you want to be constantly waiting for your Chromebook to swap stuff in and out of RAM, get 4GB. There is a comparison video on YouTube. ” Yusoffb01: ”Flip! Better screen.” More at Reddit Five reasons why Ubuntu is so popular Ubuntu has long been one of the most widely used Linux distros, but what is it about Ubuntu that makes it so popular? A writer at Softpedia lists five reasons for Ubuntu’s widespread proliferation on Linux computers. Silviu Stahie reports for Softpedia: Ubuntu is now the most used Linux operating system out there, both for desktops and in the cloud, and there are some good reasons why that is true. We’ll go through a few of those reasons. It’s impossible to know whether Mark Shuttleworth, the founder of Canonical, imagined this right from the very beginning, but he did put a lot of money and effort into this project. He was already a rich man after starting a few other projects, but Ubuntu is proving a difficult nut to crack. The desktop side of things hasn’t been made profitable just yet, although other branches are. 1. Ubuntu is everywhere 2. Ubuntu is supported 3. Ubuntu is stable 4. Ubuntu is easy to use 5. Ubuntu is punctual More at Softpedia The status of Wayland and Mir in Manjaro Linux 2015.08 “KDE-Next” In this week’s feature story, Jesse Smith at DistroWatch took a look at the status of Wayland and Mir in Manjaro Linux 2015.08 “KDE-Next.” He walked away with a mostly positive impression from his experience using KDE-Next in Manjaro. Jesse Smith reports for DistroWatch: A little while back the Manjaro Linux project put out a release announcement for a development branch called KDE-Next. The announcement mentioned the Manjaro developers were working on including the Wayland display server technology in the new development release. At the time, I saw the terms “KDE” and “Wayland” together and thought this would be a great opportunity to see how well KDE’s Plasma desktop works with the Wayland display server technology. I had already installed the distribution so I set about to see if I could get Wayland to run on Manjaro. There does not appear to be much documentation available to assist us in enabling Wayland on Manjaro, apparently such tasks are best left to the developers. However, looking through the distribution’s repositories I did find a number of Wayland/Weston packages and compatibility libraries. I installed these and, while I was not able to get an independent Wayland session operating, I was able to launch a Wayland session on my Plasma desktop. Basically, I could run Wayland in a window on my X-powered session. The Wayland window and the test programs I could run all worked well. The Wayland environment was responsive and all the test programs, most of which display simple graphics or animations, worked. The one quirk I ran into with Wayland was the way keys would sometimes stick. Every so often, while I was typing a command in the Wayland virtual terminal, I would get additional key strokes mixed into my input. In the end, while my exploration of Wayland was limited, I had a very positive experience with Manjaro’s KDE-Next spin and I am definitely looking forward to seeing what new developments come out of this experimental branch of the project. More at DistroWatch Did you miss a roundup? Check the Eye On Open home page to get caught up with the latest news about open source and Linux. Software DevelopmentOpen Source