I've been using the Budgie Desktop Environment (DE) for quite some time—ever since Solus first became publicly available. I even tested an early beta version of Budgie before Solus was officially released. Over the past five or so years, I’ve noticed that Budgie has gone from being at the forefront of desktop innovation to playing catch-up.

I understand that a major factor in this shift is the availability of developers, time, and resources. Unlike when Ikey was working full-time on both Budgie and Solus, the current Budgie team, led by Josh, operates with minimal personnel and resources. Given these constraints, progress has understandably slowed.

That said, I still believe Solus is a solid operating system and could benefit greatly from offering a "minimal" ISO install. This would allow users to set up their preferred DE or window manager without being tied to Budgie, Plasma, GNOME, or XFCE (which was a great addition, by the way). Personally, I’m not a big fan of KDE or GNOME, and with Budgie still catching up—let’s be honest, do we really expect a Wayland version to be ready in Q1?—that essentially leaves XFCE as the main alternative.

A minimal ISO would provide several advantages:

A more personalised server setup(I know Solus OS is desktop user experience focused)
Allow for installation of alternative DEs like Cinnamon
Lightweight window manager installations
Greater flexibility for advanced users
Don’t get me wrong—Budgie is still a fantastic DE, and I have loved it for many years. Josh and his team have done an incredible job considering their limited resources. However, realistically, Budgie has become more of a niche, nostalgic desktop. It’s almost like comparing Windows 7 to Windows 10/11 —while W7 was one of Microsoft's best versions(After XP), would anyone seriously choose it over Windows 10/11 today?

    DrunkenAlcoholic 've been using the Budgie Desktop Environment (DE) for quite some time—ever since Solus first became publicly available.

    same.

    Budgie may seem stagnant sometimes (gets the least updates of the 4 in the last 6 mos. by my reckoning). By the same token I've never had it fail, and still appreciate its ease. I agree, it's seen no bells and whistles in a while but I'm oK.

    DrunkenAlcoholic I’m not a big fan of KDE or GNOME

    me either

    DrunkenAlcoholic do we really expect a Wayland version to be ready in Q1?

    I'm don't but in Josh I am trusting.

    PS--I love your minimalist iso approach but manpower. Cinnamon would have been right at home here, I agree.

    DrunkenAlcoholic Budgie has become more of a niche, nostalgic desktop. It’s almost like comparing Windows 7 to Windows 10/11

    I think many consider Cinnamon a "niche" and "nostalgic" desktop as well. I think it's second to Budgie that is for sure.
    Actually I would take 7 over 10/11 in a heartbeat if they still supported it. But even by then the user control was usurped and I would went to Linux anyway.

    Hang in there, I think Budgie will surprise you. I have been a budgie user as long as you have. I still love Budgie miles over the other three. The wayland thing will have to be a bridge to cross for sure.

              I agree that Budgie lacks some features. For example, there is still no real calendar integration. But I am pretty confident that Budgie 10.10 with wayland support will be released soonish.

                brent All good points Brent, and to be honest, I probably would have also chosen Windows 7 over Windows 10/11

                elfprince Budgie still has its fair share of bugs, which is the frustrating part, at this stage Budgie is over 10 years old

                Sebastian Yeap, a 10 year old DE and still no calendar integration is one example, and yet a screenshot application gets development time, while gnome screenshots exists and many other screenshot tools that work on Budgie

                        DrunkenAlcoholic Sebastian Yeap, a 10 year old DE and still no calendar integration is one example, and yet a screenshot application gets development time, while gnome screenshots exists and many other screenshot tools that work on Budgie

                        I've said this a few times in the past: Raven has the potential to do this (calendar duties) and many more things. Maybe it's not Budgie-proper that needs to expand as much as Raven which has so much potential as a complete desktop manager. My fantasy, though 🙂

                            We are not creating yet another ISO to test. We have rejected a minimal ISO multiple times now.

                            Budgie is not developed by Solus, if you have feedback for their developers this is not the place to give it.

                              It might be a good idea to add a FAQ section to the help center where recurring questions like minimal ISO, addition of another DE etc might be adressed.

                              brent Raven which has so much potential as a complete desktop manager.

                              100% agree

                              Harvey Budgie is not developed by Solus, if you have feedback for their developers this is not the place to give it.

                              But Budgie is one of your flagship DE's for Solus, why wouldn't we be able to discuss it here?

                                    DrunkenAlcoholic But Budgie is one of your flagship DE's for Solus,

                                    flagship (noun) · flagships (plural noun)

                                    the best or most important thing owned or produced by a particular organization:

                                    Budgie has not been a Solus project for a long time. So this phrasing no longer makes any sense, and this wording should be removed from our website. We do not have a flagship edition.

                                    DrunkenAlcoholic why wouldn't we be able to discuss it here?

                                    I did not say you couldn't discuss Budgie here. I said:

                                    if you have feedback for their developers this is not the place to give it.

                                    Obviously if Budgie is not a Solus project, feedback about its development does not belong here.

                                    If you just want to talk about it with Solus community members that is fine, but that would not be feedback, it is a discussion with random people. It would be like me giving feedback about my experience ordering from Pizzahut to my mechanic. There is nothing the mechanic can do with that information.

                                          I was unaware that Solus owned or produced (make or manufacture from components or raw materials) Plasma. I thought that was what KDE did and to "produce" a desktop environment in this context meant using a programming language / toolkit / framework to create one from those elements potential and developer know how.

                                          Given this new knowledge of Solus ownership I am removing Plasma's floating panel. Its ugly, pointless and at the very least should not be a default. I am also going to reallocate some of its funding. Thank you for letting me know. 😜

                                            Harvey Given this new knowledge of Solus ownership ...

                                            One might point out that Plasma is just as much a "flagship" as Budgie is, given your criteria.

                                              Well, I agree Plasma is the:

                                              best or most important

                                              Solus Edition/Flavour/Spin. I'm sure KDE will understand we are not trying to imply anything more than that. Plasma #1

                                              Somehow I can't follow this discussion.
                                              But somehow I have the feeling that it's a good thing... 😂

                                              Harvey feedback about its development does not belong here

                                              Sorry for the misunderstanding Harvey, I had no feed back for the development of Budgie, I was just pointing out facts, not feed back.

                                              Thank you for letting me know Solus does not have a flagship desktop, and in fact non of the desktops provided by Solus in the download section are Solus projects and therefore feed back for them should be re-directed at the desktop developers, so once again I do apologise for that misunderstanding, One could nearly be lead to believe that if Solus has no accountability for any of the non flagship desktop's ISO's that is provided in the main web site that there could actually be a "minimal" iso? or what exactly is Solus Project without the Desktop environments provided in download page?

                                              btw, might want to think about changing the wording on the front page of the solus project web site

                                              Some Suggestions:

                                              Designed for Nearly Everyone
                                              Solus provides a multitude of experiences that enable you to get the most out of your hardware.
                                              From our flagship non-flagship Budgie experience for modern Windows 7 devices to the more traditional XFCE experience for lower-end devices, Solus aims to provide the best non-flagship experience for your device without a minimal iso.

                                                The point was that there is no flagship edition any more since Budgie is no longer a Solus project.

                                                When we provide a ISO / edition, it is for something we are interested in supporting and it meets our own internal expectations, including our confidence in doing a good job maintaining that edition given our experience with that DE and our resources to do so.

                                                Just because we do not develop Budgie, Gnome, Plasma, XFCE does not mean no issues with those editions could possibly be our side. This is why XFCE is still listed as a BETA edition. We were not 100% confident with our offering and wanted more feedback and testing. For reference Solus only provided Plasma as a beta ISO for multiple years before becoming an official edition.

                                                So no, none of what I said has any impact on our current lack of interest in providing a minimal install ISO. No we do not need to re-word it to point out we do not provide a minimal install or an edition for Deepin, Pantheon, Pixel, Cosmic, Cinnamon, lxqt and every other DE under the sun. Our download page makes what editions we provide very clear. If that is not what people want, they should find a Linux distribution that fits their requirements better.

                                                  DrunkenAlcoholic while gnome screenshots exists

                                                  GNOME Screenshots basically ceased to exist as an independent project (nowadays the functionality is directly integrated into GNOME Shell), which was one of the reasons for Budgie to create its own implementation.

                                                  Harvey Budgie has not been a Solus project for a long time. So this phrasing no longer makes any sense, and this wording should be removed from our website. We do not have a flagship edition.

                                                  A certain variant of Solus could very well still be a "flagship" edition. There is no implication of ownership of the DE that it's based on, same as a company with a flagship product doesn't necessarily claim to produce all of its raw materials and constituent parts by themselves. It's the final product that counts.

                                                  That being said it probably still doesn't make sense to call it a flagship edition, seeing as the other DEs receive just as much care (if not more) these days.

                                                  Harvey I was unaware that Solus owned or produced (make or manufacture from components or raw materials) Plasma. I thought that was what KDE did and to "produce" a desktop environment in this context meant using a programming language / toolkit / framework to create one from those elements potential and developer know how.

                                                  Same here. Solus doesn't produce "Plasma", but it produces "Solus Plasma", which can be quite different from other implementations of Plasma.

                                                        By the same argument Solus produces the Linux kernel because it is heavily patched. The more you twist the intention of the words usage to kinda, sorta, but not really apply the less meaningful it becomes. Flagship edition no longer has any meaning to Solus and we should stop using the phrase. It was asked internally awhile back, what would a non-flagship edition mean? There was no good answer.

                                                        It used to have meaning. It was a Solus project. Budgie was a core focus and often received fixes before they landed in branch. Solus had the latest release of Budgie first because it was tagged around a Solus release. Solus did not provide as many editions. It was in a poor state on many other Linux distributions (I remember reading about how Buddies of Budgie worked on improving the built in theme etc so it wasn't only good on Solus).

                                                        Budgie should not be focused on 1 distribution (They are not) and Solus should not focus on 1 DE enough to the point flagship is a word that could be meaningfully applied (We are not).