Another small but well-maintained distro with a dedicated following reaches the end of the trail.
ArcoLinux has said goodbye.
On Saturday, ArcoLinux’s founder and lead developer Erik Dubois announced in a post on the the distro’s website, as well as in a YouTube video, that after eight years he’s calling it quits and is shutting ArcoLinux down.
“We have made the decision to end all projects within the ArcoLinux ecosystem,” he wrote. “This includes the discontinuation of all Arco ISOs including Arcoinstall, Carli, Alci, Ariser, tools, apps, scripts and infrastructure that we have maintained over the years. We will keep the websites up and running for several years and all videos on Youtube will stay online. All the GitHubs will stay online as well.”
He started the Arch-based distro in 2017, with the purpose of helping users master Linux through hands-on experience. Its mandate was to turn Linux beginners into Linux experts.
“Since day one, ArcoLinux has stood for education, experimentation, and empowerment,” he said in his farewell post. “I didn’t just want to build a distro — I wanted to help people learn Linux, love Linux, and grow into confident users, tinkerers, and developers.”
A Familiar End
The reason for ArcoLinux’s demise? Well… basically, it was just that time.
“Aging is humbling,” Dubois said. “As I near 60, I’ve come to realize I simply don’t have the same mental sharpness or stamina I used to. I catch myself making little mistakes — the kind that matter when you’re maintaining an ecosystem with this many moving parts. Rather than let that diminish the quality of ArcoLinux, I choose to leave it while it’s still stable, respected, and valuable.”
While he uses the term “we” throughout his farewell post, when attempting to read between the lines, it appears that he has been working on the project by himself, or else practically by himself. In any case, there’s evidently no one around with the skills and the connection with the project who has the desire to carry on.
Users Aren’t Abandoned
Dubois deserves some kind of gold star on somebody’s refrigerator door for the way he’s shutting the project down, however. He’s going the extra mile to make sure that ArcoLinux’s users don’t have to hustle to find another distro, and then have to go to a lot of trouble to migrate to it. He said that a transition package will be posted that will allow users to convert their ArcoLinux installs into Arch Linux.
“The code, the videos, the documentation — they’ll remain online for others to learn from, fork, or remix,” he said. “I truly hope others will take inspiration from it. Just as I was inspired by the community years ago.”
Users will continue to be supported until July 1st, 2025.
Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux
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