I have used Arch for >13 years (btw) and use the terminal every single session. I also work with Linux servers daily, so I tried the other families with DEs (Debian/Ubuntu, RHEL/CentOS/AlmaLinux/Fedora).
I’m comfortable (and prefer) doing everything with CLI tools. For me, it’s a bit difficult to convert my Windows friends, as they all see me as some kind of hackerman.
What’s the landscape like nowadays, in terms of terminal requirements?
Bonus question: Which distribution is the most user-friendly while still updated packages? Does anything provide a similar experience to Arch’s amazing AUR?
Yes. I agree these chatbots are another text interface like a CLI. So to me that’s again a barrier to usability when I wish to refer to graphical or linked logical items on my screen that don’t have any text description. I don’t work in a purely text world, where usually there are no CLI commands for what im doing.
Its likely these people find a chat bot easier as they don’t need to memorise a command plus modifiers exactly letter perfect. Where one mistype can fail, or worse. Two big issues people have with a CLI. And the chatbot output is made readable too. Where on a CLI it’s hard to know if something worked, not being familiar with the terminology it spits out.
I hate llms, but honestly some sort of local one that wasn’t trained on the orphan crushing machine thats integrated into the terminal could really help people. But I dont think it needs to be an llm. Just a cleverly coded lookup program like fish or tldr. Something where I can type “audio” and get settings for audio to show up with brief explanations so I can troubleshoot.
I myself forget commands a lot and have a notepad file (that I made an alias for so I can open it super fast from terminal) . But most peolle find this batshit insane that youd have to do that in 2026 and i get made fun of a lot. I myself like the simplicity.
> i get made fun of a lot.
Yes. They don’t understand you need a way that works for you. We are all different. There is no one-size-fits-all.