When comparing GNU Guix vs Bodhi, the Slant community recommends GNU Guix for most people. In the question“What are the best Linux distributions for desktops?” GNU Guix is ranked 58th while Bodhi is ranked 76th. The most important reason people chose GNU Guix is:
A method which works across languages and provides a reproducible programming environment.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Can setup a shell which has exactly the defined libraries available
A method which works across languages and provides a reproducible programming environment.
Pro Can always roll back to a safe state
Guix creates new profile generations for each operation. If anything goes wrong, a simple --roll-back gets you immediately back to the previous, working, generation. Because it is a purely functional package management system, generations don't affect each other, so you're back to the exact same state as before : still working.
Pro Can create independent packages
Guix pack creates packages which do not need Guix to be run.
Pro No side effects when building packages
Guix is a purely functional package management system. This means that the act of building a package does not have side effects, such as destructively updating or deleting files that may be used by other packages.
Pro Can build containers right-away, from docker to tarballs
See guix pack --help and here.
Pro Easy to add your own packages
The clean and declarative syntax makes it easy to define new packages by using an existing one as an example.
Pro Doesn't require root privileges
Normal users can install packages on a Guix-enabled system, or even run their own Guix instance if the system isn't Guix-enabled.
Pro Low resource consumption
System requirements include 128 MB RAM, 2.5 GB hard disk space, and a 300 MHz processor.
Pro Minimal base system
The philosophy for the distribution is to provide a minimal base system so that users can populate it with the software they want. Thus, by default it only includes software that is essential to most Linux users, including file browsers (EFM), a web browser (Midori) and a terminal emulator (Terminology).
Pro Different profiles to choose on first startup
Bohdi Linux offers a few different profiles to choose from when first booting the OS.
Pro Built in compositing
Bohdi Linux has built in compositing. Users can choose a composited desktop upon first boot by choosing the fancy profile.
Cons
Con Updates take a long time
It's gotten better over time but both updating Guix itself and updating the installed packages can take a long time.
Con Cannot handle filetypes that have different semantics across different versions
While the functional approach that Guix takes is great for sandboxing binary artifacts of packages, it seriously lacks any power in handling configuration files or user data. It's difficult to upgrade and downgrade files where semantics and syntax can change between versions.
