[thrwawy283]

It feels like we're late to create the desktop experience where most things run in containers. My wish is to run something like Proxmox as a "stable base", and within it have a VM for my firewall (pfsense), my primary Linux OS (Fedora/Arch), a VM for services (Docker & k8s), and a VM for Windows gaming. I like the separation of concerns. I've wanted to do all of this on a laptop but I can't get a VM to exclusively take control of the GPU & display controller (overtake the laptop display panel).

For a long while now I've wanted a stable, slim base OS. I actually thought Rancher Desktop was a rebirth of RancherOS: https://rancher.com/docs/os/

I really liked the concept of a "system docker" and a "user docker". I thought Fedora CoreOS had potential to be the first Linux "Desktop" container distro.

Oh well, maybe a desktop distro that aims to containerize all apps is a 2023 thing. Still remember that Steam bug?

[thinkmassive]

Fedora Silverblue is a Linux desktop container distro https://silverblue.fedoraproject.org/

[thrwawy283]

I have never heard of this (until now). Thank you! I've been loving NixOS so I hope it's easy to build the world like that. :-)

[signalblur]

Isn’t that essentially what fedora Silverblue is?

It’s an immutable desktop OS where everything is ran in flatpaks/podman pods for the most part and it’s actually a really great experience.

Can play stellaris on steam with it for example with no issue.

[thrwawy283]

I have never heard of this (until now). Thank you! I've been loving NixOS so I hope it's easy to build the world like that. :-)

[signalblur]

No problem! I love it so much - it’s really simple. One thing I’d recommend is if you use vs code - to set it’s built in interpreter to use the toolbox:

https://www.carmenbianca.eu/en/post/2021-02-05-silverblue-de...

Specifically the “vscodium in a flatpak” (also of course works with the Microsoft version vscode )

[moondev]

You can do exactly this with proxmox or esxi. Create a main "gaming vm" to autostart with GPU + USB passthrough. Then you can manage your other vms from the web browser on your gaming vm.

[thrwawy283]

I understand what you're saying, but I'm seeking a very particular setup. Currently you cannot get a VM/guest to exclusively control the display panel of a laptop. You can get it to take exclusive control of a GPU, even an integrated GPU, but not the display controller and laptop panel itself. Usually the laptop user is left running an external monitor for their "main display". I did see myself administering pfsense and the separate "services" VM from the web browser.

The best you can do is have the host/hypervisor own the laptop display, and then remote desktop to or "stream out" the guest framebuffer.

[arejaytee]

But what are you using to access this startup VM that's isn't clunky/laggy?

[XorNot]

We're sort of desperately missing a high speed graphics option for VMs. Which is one of those things which feels like it should have become more prevalent by now with everyone throwing GPUs into server hardware and wanting to timeslice it amongst containers.

[lostmsu]

Have you tried Cubes OS?

[thrwawy283]

Yes, but I don't consider that easier to maintain. The appeal of a dockerfile or k8s manifest means I can expect some degree of isolation, and easily distribute that experience to others. Getting something to run in Cube OS is more of the VM experience, than container experience. I do like both.