this post was submitted on 03 Dec 2025
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Recommendations for after installing Linux (Mint) coming from Windows for best practices for a casual user ? (kbin.earth)
submitted 4 days ago by veggay@kbin.earth to c/linux@lemmy.ml
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I finally bit the bullet and I'm giving Linux a second try, installed with dual boot a few days ago and making Linux Mint my default from now on.

There are a lot of guides and tips about the before and during the transition but not for after, so I was hoping to find some here.

Some example questions but I would like to hear any other things that come to mind:

I read that with Mint if you have a decent computer you don't need to do a swap partition? So I skipped that, but I'm not sure if I'd want to modify that swap file to make it bigger, is that just for giving extra ram if my hardware one is full? Because I have 48GB of ram and if I look into my System Monitor it says Swap is not available.

Was looking at this other post, and the article shared (about Linux security) seems so daunting, it's a lot. How much of it do I have to learn as a casual user that's not interested in meddling with the system much? Is the default firewall good enough to protect me from my own self to at least some degree? I was fine with just Windows Defender and not being too stupid about what I download and what links I click.

I was also reading about how where you install your programs or save your data matters, like in particular partitions or folders, is that just like hardcore min-maxing that's unnecessary for the average user that doesn't care to wait half a second extra or is it actually relevant? I'm just putting stuff in my Home folder.

Connected to the last two points: in that Linux Hardening Guide lemmy post I shared the TL;DR includes "Move as much activity outside the core maximum privilege OS as possible"... how do I do that? is that why people have separate partitions?

Downloaded the App Center (Snap Store) and I was surprised there was even a file saying to not allow it... why is that? Is it not recommended? Is it better to download stuff directly from their websites instead?

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[–] TriangleSpecialist@lemmy.world 1 points 2 days ago

I mean to be fair, I am making a conscious effort to stay open minded when I give advice to people, but I also personally would avoid snaps (and Flatpak, but for different reasons) altogether.

But this is more me being opinionated and strongly disagreeing with canonical practices. I don't mind sacrificing some of the convenience because of that, but wouldn't push it on anyone.

All this to say, I don't know the reasons why people tell you to avoid snaps, but I can imagine at least a dozen that would be valid opinions from technically minded open source people, so I would not jump to conclusions.

The snap thing has spanned a whole drama since the beginning so there's a heavy context behind you might not be aware of. Or maybe you are and don't care that's totally fine too.