Pretend your running a live OS off a read-only USB, yet any changes (app installs, config changes, etc) you make are saved to the HD. A new version of the OS comes out, so you write a new ISO to your USB, and upon booting it, all you changes are applied on top.
This is a simplistic view of immutable distros, but thwy wrk more like snapshots. It allows for rollback. So you install v1, then v2 is a newer snapshot of the base OS, v3 is another, always building.
The catch is they often require apps to run under things like flatpak so you don’t have to alter the OS packages. Personally, I’m not a fan for a daily driver, but it’s great for distros like Bazzite.
After reading this I’m confused about what immutable means
Bazzite contributor here, there’s no reason to care about this. This term just confuses people you can safely ignore it.
Pretend your running a live OS off a read-only USB, yet any changes (app installs, config changes, etc) you make are saved to the HD. A new version of the OS comes out, so you write a new ISO to your USB, and upon booting it, all you changes are applied on top.
This is a simplistic view of immutable distros, but thwy wrk more like snapshots. It allows for rollback. So you install v1, then v2 is a newer snapshot of the base OS, v3 is another, always building.
The catch is they often require apps to run under things like flatpak so you don’t have to alter the OS packages. Personally, I’m not a fan for a daily driver, but it’s great for distros like Bazzite.