I think 2026 is the year of Linux for me. I know I’ve said this before, but it feels like Apple has lost it’s way. Liquid Glass is the last straw plus their draconian desire to lock everything down gives me moral pause. It is only a matter of time before we can’t run software on the Mac that wasn’t purchased from the App Store.
I use Linux on my servers so I am comfortable using it, just not in a desktop environment.
Some things I worry about:
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A really good C++ IDE. I get a lot of advice for C++ IDEs from people who only use them now and then or just to compile, but don’t live in them all day and need to visually step into code and even ASM. I worry about CLion but am willing to give it a good try. Please don’t suggest an IDE unless you use them for hardcore C++ debugging.
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I will still make Mac versions of my games and code signing might be a problem. I’ll have to look, but I don’t think you can do it without a Mac. I can’t do that on a CI machine because for my pipeline the CI machine only compiles the code. The .app is built locally and that is where the code signing happens. I don’t want to spin up a CI machine to make changes when the engine didn’t change. My build pipeline is a running bash script, I don’t want to be hoping between machines just to do a build (which I can do 3 or 4 times a day)
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The only monitor I have is a Mac Studio monitor. I assume I can plug a Linux machine to it, but I worry about the webcam. It wouldn’t surprise me if Apple made it Mac only.
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The only keyboard I have is a Mac keyboard, I really like the keyboard especially how I can unlock the computer with the touch of my finger. I assume something like this exist for Linux.
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I have an iPhone but I only connect it to the computer to charge it. So not an issue.
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I worry about drivers for sound, video, webcams, controllers, etc. I know this is all solvable but I’m not looking forward to it. I know from releasing games on Linux our number-one complaint is related to drivers.
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Choosing a distro. Why is this so hard? A lot of people have said that it doesn’t really matter so just choose one. Why don’t more people use Linux on the Desktop? This is why. To a Linux desktop newbie, this is paralyzing.
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I’m going to miss Time Machine for local backups. Maybe there is something like it for Linux.
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I really like the Apple M processors. I might be able to install Linux on Mac hardware, but then I really worry about drivers. I just watched this video from Veronica Explains on installing Linux on Mac silicon.
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The big big worry is that there us something big I forgot. I need this to work for my game dev. It’s not a weekend hobby computer.
I’ve said I was switching to Linux before, we’ll see if it sticks this time.
I have a Linux laptop but when I moved I didn’t turn it on for over year and now I get BIOS errors when I boot. Some battery probably went dead. I’ve played with it a bit and nothing seems to work. It was an old laptop and I’ll need a new faster one for game dev anyway.
This will be along well-thought out journey. Stay tuned for the “2027 - This Time For Sure” post.
Comments:
For proprietary drivers Ubuntu has impressed me. I just one-click updated my Dell’s BIOS from their firmware panel. They even support secure boot out of the box in case you want to dual boot Windows.
Arch has a reputation for best documentation, but I’ve never tried it.
I eased my transition to Linux by running it in a VM for a while. VMWare has good 3D API pass-through and is now free.
Interesting idea.
AMD is pretty well supported by Ubuntu, but NVidia is a little behind and you might need to compile for support of a specific card or something. Arch and Fedora are typically newer kernels and have better support for newer things, but they lack the wide install base, support and wide range of legacy drivers that Ubuntu has.
I would recommend starting from the particular system you want to run on and then choosing something from there. The IDE you choose won't really change that stuff, but the hardware you want to run will.
Timeshift is what you're looking for.
Hardcore C++ devs probably only use an extremely customized emacs
I hope you have a great journey. As you discover what Linux can do and the endless possibilities for customization you will discover new ways of interfacing with your computer you never dreamed of.
I was like you, a bit worried about everything at first but man, this is far more easy than I would have ever thought.
I run Fedora and Nobara (a gaming and AV distro) on my AMD and Intel PC. Installed Mint for my dad and sister. Once you got things working, it's super stable and all fun. Not sure what you use for game dev but Godot is awesome on Linux, I even got VR dev to work, just for fun.
I have an M1 max for work and gave Asahi Linux (the only distro for Apple Silicon) a try. Overall it was an awesome experience, but it was really under-using the GPU power for my video work so I endedup going back to macOS. I completly agree that Liquid Glass sucks big time. That was about 2 years ago so I believe the project is now much better. Funny I actually just watched the videofrom Veronica too!
Running a VM (UTM on mac is great) will give you a good general idea of the distro's feel. If I have to recommend one, Nobara is just an awesome experience out of the box.
Cheers, and sorry if my english sounds a bit weird, I actually learned most of it playing Monkey Island and Maniac Mansion when I was a kid lol (true story).
Install the distro you want in root disk partition. And you can install / resintall / change distro without worrying to overrwrite your home partition.
But I feel like Linux works for specific workflows, and for anything else it becomes *a project* just to get things done.
I would certainly suggest running it in a Virtual Machine to familarize yourself before making the switch.
But as an alternative, have you considered downgrading from macOS Tahoe to Sequoia?
After months of being unhappy with my Mac after the update, I recently got around to doing this and it left me far happier using macOS again.
Assuming you're still distributing via Steam you'd need to either download the build artefacts and upload them to Steam via a separate pipeline _or_ download `steamcmd` and upload via a custom Xcode Cloud post-build script. Caveat that I've never actually tried either of those approaches myself.
The only thing I would say is stay away from any Arch or Arch based distro if you intend to use your computer for work. I do use Arch and love it but would not recommend it due to the fact that it's bleeding edge and might introduce some quirks from time to time.
For Time Machine, you have plenty of options available, this is the beauty of linux (time shift, back in time, rsnapshot, timevault,..)
Enjoy and good luck!
Before Fedora I was using Arch for quite a while. I still like it, and in fact it's my main distrobox for all software I don't run via Flatpaks, but after trying Bazzite OS in my gaming HTPC (which is amazing!) I got sold on the whole immutable distro idea and decided to give Fedora Silverblue a shot on my desktop. I'm still here, 2 years after, and I plan to stick with it for a while.
Completely unrelated, just finished TWP (did resort to the hints occasionally, should have taken the game's own recommendation to play in easy mode first) much fun was had... Am I going out on a limb, that you have a soft spot for going quite meta at the end of your adventure games? At least to me both TWP and RTMI were conceptually similar?
I don't think there are any other IDEs that are on the same level on Linux. VS Code is a toy for C/C++ development.
My humble contribution regarding distributions:
* The best: Debian
* The best for this scenario: elementary OS
;-)
I have done C++ development and debugging in VS Code, and while it's nowhere as complete as Visual Studio, I vastly prefer it over working in XCode. But I hear CLion is really good, and I'm using JetBrain's Rider for work (with Unreal) which I can definitely vouch for.
- after installation, systems starts with a pixel garbage screen -> 20 Minutes search and terminal Hocus Pocus solved it...
- firefox? sudo apt... or flatpak install... or sudo dnf ? -> ufff.....
- system locks up, fine... restart
- startup takes much much longer then old mac os 11.12... hmmm... this cant be...
- installed draw.io works fine
- installed gimp, all ok
- now screen locks up, I hear all notifications etc, but nothing moves
- restart... same frozen screen after login.. ufff... I am too tired for this.
I'm a sysadmin and have quite a few installs of debian / ubuntu and redhat running...
privately on our personal machines me and my friends mostly ran mac and windows, as a low hassle base with many available specialised tools.
all 4 of us are all on linux now.
Here are my observations for switching:
first install a second disk into your computer. If you only have a mac laptop, partitioning seems to be ok, but do not under any circumstances let windows and linux share a drive. It also makes accessing / emulating the other operating system easier.
emulating the os you want to switch to is a very good idea since it allows you to quickly cycle through distros.
where I landed: debian is stable, but seems to fight you if you do not know "the debian way" right off the bat. (that is to say, I really like the debian way)
ubuntu has a tendency to work flawlessly, then break spectacularly after a few updates.
nobara is a wonderful distro for gaming, but I couldn't get it to run stable on my older desktop with nvidia card.
fedora / GNOME is my favourite right now (I love all the little GUI tweaks you can customize your desktop with).
bazzite / KDE is what all my friends run.
emulation is a good way to go to minimize friction. I may be at an advantage since all my programming takes place in xemacs since last millenium, so no switching cost there (I switched from mac to linux 4 years ago). I use gdb for C debugging, not much experience with C++ so...
A possible middle ground is to freeze the plumbing: pick a boring, popular distro (Ubuntu or Fedora), lock down your toolchain/editor, and leave experimentation for later. Once the base stops being a constant concern, everything else becomes a technical decision again, not an existential one.
And if something critical breaks, at least you’ll know what broke—rather than blaming “Linux” in the abstract.
Timeshift was already mentioned, but I do not know it.
A DIY alternative is btrfs snapshots, or even just its copy-on-write feature to make manual copies that take zero space. Btrfs is a great filesystem and in 2026 there is really no reason to use ext4 anymore.
Regarding IDEs, I have two options:
1) KDevelop
2) Netbeans
KDevelop: I like the IDE for c/c++ development.
Netbeans - I have done some c/c++ development with it (but mostly used KDevelop) for that. I use Netbeans for Java development and the debugging works as well.
My hardcode debugging is probably not equivalent to yours but this is my suggestion.
Cheers,
Phillip.
I personally use Red Hat for my dev station but I am not in games so maybe something like Ubuntu is better or Fedora.
Either way good luck and look forward to reading your blog if we see any updates!
Reasons, why other distros will make you angry:
- Debian, outdated drivers, harder to get proprietary stuff
- Ubuntu, crappy Desktop Environment out of the box, lots of ubuntu pecularities
- Fedora, everything Redhat comes with things specific to Redhat, such as SELinux, which you can ignore, but you want to stay close to vanilla
- Archlinux, best choice, if you want to fiddle with a vanilla linux experience, but you do need to fiddle
- nixos, really cool proof of concept distro, but not standard in how it handles configs
Reasons why Pop!_OS will make you angry:
- Currently outdated drivers (based on most recent ubuntu LTS release)
- Some ubuntu-isms are still there
Explanation:
I have used many Desktop Environments and distros. I moved from Gnome2, which I loved to Gnome3, which I disliked to Cinnamon, which I loved back to Gnome 3 due to wayland woes. I was looking for something else, but really did not want to stay with Gnome3.
I have now installed the new Cosmic Desktop Manager on my machine and it is all I ever wanted. It is really the perfect tiling desktop manager. I run Arch, but maybe for you Pop OS, which provides the better polished experience, might be the better choice. It's like Ubuntu without the cruft and with the better default Desktop Manager.
In that case I would suggest you plan your move for April, when Pop OS based on ubuntu 26.04 LTS will be out so you have the newest drivers for everything.
As to CLion: It's the one I prefer too, but I do hope to be able to move to zed at some point in the future. I saw somebody else suggesting KDevelop or Netbeans and I would vote against those.
* CLion is awesome.
* On Linux the drivers are usually part of the kernel. Things are magic or don't work. You won't know until you try.
* AMD GPUs are easier to deal with since the kernel and user space drivers are open source and extremely mature.
* Distros are a matter of opinion. I would strongly recommend Fedora for development, as it's stable but up to date.
* I use an atomic version of Fedora (Bazzite) which treats the base system like a git repo. I can then use a container for each project (Distrobox) to isolate dependencies. This is an awesome workflow without any real RAM or performance hit, since containers are native on Linux.
* This also enables easy systemwide rollbacks or even rebasing the system to something else!
Have fun out there!
Hot Ziggity!
For non-Macs, as a gamedev you should prolly have a working environment that is as close as possible to SteamOS. That means KDE Plasma Desktop (what SteamOS Desktop Mode uses) and relatively up-to-date graphics drivers. Unfortunately, there's no direct equivalent to Time Machine for Linux yet. Next best thing would be Timeshift or BTRFS snapshots, but those can require some work to set up properly and even then they're not as easy or integrated as Time Machine is on macOS.
Based on all this and guessing that you don't really care for system-imposed limitations, here are some suggested Linux distributions:
* Fedora KDE
* Ultramarine KDE
* Solus KDE
* EndeavourOS
If you're fine with some system-imposed limitations similar to what SteamOS has (immutability), then Bazzite is a good option.
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