I’ve only had Netrunner Rolling installed in a VM for 2 days (on a Manjaro/KDE host) and, although I can see some visual cosmetic and package differences between the two distros, I’m not quite sure what I would gain from using NR as my daily driver compared to Manjaro. I’m not keen on the kavuntu based theme so my next step would be to return a Netrunner install to the Breeze theme and then I thought if I want a more stock standard Plasma experience then why should I install NR only to spend time altering the theme when Manjaro already uses Breeze.
Are there some other beneficial points for going with Netrunner?
within the last two years, the projects have become much closer and many differences no longer exist due to upstream KDE Plasma work.
With Blue Systems now also engaged directly with Manjaro Team, the Rolling version will lilely be folded into pure upstream work in the not so distant future, which means your safe bet is going directly with Manjaro KDE.
Yes it’s good news about Blue Systems and Manjaro. I hope this means that the Manjaro folks will lean more towards Plasma based systems because “everyone else” has settled on Gnome as the predominant desktop of choice. There is definitely plenty of room for a major player(s) to emphasize KDE instead as Plasma deserves a major stake in the future linux desktop space.
Thanks for your advice about Netrunner. Have you any suggestions where I could best make inquiries about selling and supporting Manjaro/KDE based hardware (laptop+NAS) in Australia?
Manjaro’s main edition is XFCE, I don’t see this changing anytime soon for the community project.
However, Plasma is the choice for the commercial products, hardware and OEM edition.